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nanshakh -> RE: Principles of a Female Led Relationship (9/20/2009 7:46:32 PM)
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I don' think there are a few differences between female and male dominance. I think there only are differences.
Although I found many of the posts that tend to demonstrate the contrary very interesting and well argued, and I enjoyed reading them even if I don't agree.
Yet I only want to point at one difference: Fetishism.
Fetishism exists more in relation to everything that is feminine rather than masculine. Hence, feminine fashion is infinitely more varied and sophisticated than masculine fashion. I think as a rule, the masculine fashion industry is about one tenth of the feminine one.
Is it because women are objects? hardly. Women pay more attention to their beauty. Whatever effort has been made in our society to make men, and even young boys, pay more attention to their clothes and their looks and mainly, pay more money for it, at best it succeeded in making them more self conscious, and more attentive to their appearance for social reasons. Women are more attentive to their beauty, not just their appearance. It is a partition much more varied and played on more subtly. And it has mostly always been so throughout history. And women fashion is fetishist, it has always been so, it will always be so, any type of feminine fashion uses and plays with fetishes, whether it is conservative or provocative. Whether the majority of women are conscious of it or not, the clothes designers are. Look at that fascinating universe. Look at the catalogues, look at the little shops or the departments stores, look at the fashion designers, the fashion weeks, the catwalks, even the few fashion museums. The new collections coming out are prime time news. The men? oh yes, there is a fashion for men too, a sort of back alley. And then, how can you keep selling expensive clothes to men? you can sell them what they need according to their social status, and there it stops. You can propose 3 main genres to them: formal/business, trendy weekend/leisure stuff, and sport. The few messages the most coquettish men can send with their clothes are minimal, basic: I'm self conscious, I have money and good taste to spend it, and I conform with the trend. Women? it's a galaxy, one cannot see the end of it. Women do not wear fashion, they wear a universe that reflects who they want to be, who they want to attract, how they want to be noticed -or not. There are such infinite and delicate variations in the assembly of their attire, for whatever occasion, that women can send a combination of signals and hints and plays on these variations in an always renewed way.
Just try to play that partition with masculine fashion!
Two women can be furious because they accidentally wear the same evening dress; imagine if men were horrified because they spotted another guy wearing a similar suit!
One of the key differences: fetishes. Men wear clothes, women wear fetishes.
And, it so happens that fetishism plays quite a role in D/s relationships. In fact there is no real boundary between the world of female domination attires and vanilla fashion. Amusingly, one influences the other, both ways! It always remains feminine fashion. It's just fashion, it's just fetishism.
Female domination has always existed. Always in mostly male dominated societies, but it has always existed. Hardly tolerated, only hinted at sometimes. So for it to appear to blossom in the open is very new, hence the comparison with male domination is biased, if only because male domination was so far ipso facto dubbed 'normal'. But it's amusing to see what female domination has accomplished in so short a time, for instance, in creating a fashion and fetishism of its own. It's amazing how the trend for female domination has created a look for the dominant woman, a look that is not at all stereotyped and coarse and vulgar, contrary to what many people pretend. In fact dominant women can dress exactly as they like, and yet use the fetishism of feminine fashion to turn their attire, be it a business suit or a blue jean and blouse, into something suggestive of their dominance. Or they can wear amazing attire, 'classic' femdom attire, but always do it in an original and elegant way. Look at dominant men trying to wear fetish attire that are supposed to reflect their dominance? usually it only seems like they are trying to imitate dominant women. I find this fact significant. If anything the world of maledom in bdsm is rather limited compared to that of femdom, but it is already borrowing its dress codes and symbolism from it.
I think that's because women are beautiful. Now who's chuckling? :) - Oh yes, sure, men can be good looking, very good looking even. Women can be much more than that. That's why feminine beauty fascinates as much men as other women, women who are not sexually attracted to the same sex, but are sensitive to feminine beauty.
Women can wear anything, and transform it into something else, into something that is more than just a piece of garment. They can transform it into an object inhabited by their femininity, an object that becomes itself feminine.
Try to see a maledom do that with his clothes. :)
And the personalisation of feminine accessories into fetishes plays an enormous role in female domination. When it does with male domination, it's because it is imitating the power of fetishes in female domination.
Look at whips. They have existed since antiquity. They were rather ugly coarse portable torture instruments handy to hurt without harming excessively slaves and animals. To suit different applications, whips have been specialised through time, yet remaining basically that: functional tools. And then the women start using whips, and look what they do with them! First in craftsmanship. Since the time women have needed whips to climb on horses, they transformed them into a variety of elegant, expensive and lovely accessories. When dominant women have started using whips, they lent a whole new meaning to them. A woman carries her whip like a scepter, or like a weapon; like a fashion accessory and even like a jewel. But she always carries it like a feminine attribute, and a symbol of her power. So far, men had always carried a whip as they would have done a spear or a gun or an axe.
And I know I'm being long, so I won't even talk about shoes or boots!
It's not so much men who are fetishists, it's rather women who have that power to domesticate objects, fashion them, stylise them and turn them into jewelled symbols reflecting their femininity, into weapons of seduction, and power. By doing so, they create artefacts that can keep haunting and seducing even when they are not present! That's an art. Not a masculine art. And this art dominant women use it indifferently on men as well as on other women. Just in the same way that women's use of fashion and power of seduction has always been directed indiscriminately at women and men together.
I used that example to highlight what seems to me the fundamental difference between feminine and masculine domination. I think male domination is always limited; it is basically brutal and coarse, even for the most subtle and manipulative ones. Feminine domination is more all encompassing. Women dominate more affectively, even those who like to degrade completely their slaves. Male domination is inevitably linked to a form of physical subjugation. Instead women seduce into submission, with a paraphernalia of weapons that men could never dream of.
Nanshakh
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