MistressDiane
Posts: 334
Joined: 2/5/2004 Status: offline
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This probably would have fit in better with one of the past "can they be Dominant if they're polite, nice and/or curteous" threads but I received it today and it fits the OP's question as well. This has been posted with the author's permission. for Issue number 12 Wednesday, March 07, 2007 Permission By Jack Rinella I recently received an email that read in part “Heart of a slave asks Permission to Approach.” I usually react kindly but directly to such a request by reminding the writer that he has no need to ask permission to approach me since he or she is a free person and equal to me in every way that counts. I guess I’m just old-fashioned. We weren’t so pre-occupied with such strangulated methods of meeting one another in the “good old days.” Of course “Back then when I was your age,” as one might say, we usually met in a bar so most of our permission to speak protocols were communicated by smiles, glances, stares, and nods. We knew the tops from the bottoms by the side on which they wore their hankies and whether they were interested in our fetish by the color (few that they were) of their hankies. I always cruised the ones “flagging yellow” since a guy who would take piss would do almost anything else. For my part, I flagged light gray, since I was still wary of dudes into heavy scenes. Little did I think that 25 years later I would be known as one of those dudes. Therefore a smile returned was all that one needed to walk up to the stranger and initiate a conversation. Our kinky world had not yet been overly polluted by arrogant pseudo-masters who wanted to protect themselves with aloofness and false pride. We knew that we were equal in our desire to get laid and to get laid that night. What better reason need one have, after all, to be in the bar in the first place? My not-so-hidden agitation with ridiculously formalized protocols has to do with that fact that I believe that equality and mutual respect are among the fundamental necessities of our lifestyle. Add to those qualities the understanding that trust must be earned before it is acted upon and you have a good formula for a safe and friendly adventure. Deprive a player of any of those human rights and you are on a course toward trouble. The problem with my reasoning is that manners still matter, even among equals. It is here that politeness, civility, and propriety lubricate equality, so to speak, so that we are gentle and understanding with one another, eschewing rudeness, interruption, and unwanted advances. I may not need permission to speak, yet I may still be inclined to say “Excuse me.” I may not be forbidden from approaching you, but I realize that permission to approach is not the same as the right to touch. I may be your equal but I am aware of the signs and signals that we use among civilized folk so as not to make an ass of myself or to thrust myself upon you against your wishes. Simply put, I am not so full of myself that I push my way in and stay there long past my welcome. You say (Well not you, but I hope you get the gist of my writing.) that you want to learn. I don’t deny that’s the case. I might suggest that each of us start learning by listening to ourselves. What do the use of the third person when first person is correct or of lower case “i” when it ought to be capitalized indicate? I know that I may be a minority here, since so many seem to have totally demolished the protocols of correct grammar that the good sisters taught us in Catholic school. To be honest, Protestant, Jewish, and Atheist teachers did so as well. I believe it has everything to do with self-respect and mutual respect. The first concept asks, therefore, what do you think of your own worth? Is anyone really “better” than you? I trust the answer is a resounding “No.” I am not negating that others look better, or are smarter, or richer, or more experienced. I am speaking of one’s acknowledgement of his or her innate worth, that which is inherent in the fact that each of us is a fully human, and therefore fully worthy, individual. None of us is any more human or less human than any other. That intrinsic fact easily leads to mutual respect. I respect you as I respect myself, given that I indeed respect myself. Respect protects us from all the nasty actions that disrespect engenders. I won’t violate the person I respect. I won’t trash them, despise them, ridicule them, belittle them, or in any way harm or denigrate them. Respect demands politeness, not rudeness, care not slovenliness, attention not mindlessness. Too often we think of disrespect in more severe terms. What about the minor instances? How do promptness, care of another’s toys, noise in the dungeon, cleanliness, exhibitionism in public places, failure to return calls, and all the other minor inconveniences we impose on one another fit into the scheme of being respectful? Our actions are meant, I hope, to empower each and every one of us to attain our highest potential, our greatest pleasure, our right place. Real empowerment is based on self-worth and mutual respect. Where do D/s and fetishes such as verbal abuse, humiliation, and raunch play enter in? They become acceptable because equal partners have agreed to freely (consensually) enter into them. In this way one equal gives his or her equality to the other as a gift, in fact indicating “I will take a lower station in order to elevate you to a higher station.” Doing so is what creates the heightened polarity that engenders what we call the power exchange. Equality, after all, is not sameness. There is no contradiction in the idea of equal but different. One cannot say, for instance, that the positive pole of a light bulb is better than the negative one. Without both, the light bulb just won’t work. It gives the saying “Do unto others” a new meaning. The unto others recognizes our equality, that each of us has something to contribute, one to the other. Somewhere I learned that all systems tend towards equilibrium, “a static or dynamic state of balance between opposing forces or actions.” This is the basis of the power exchange, as power naturally moves from one pole to the other in order to attain equilibrium. When the “poles” are unequal, the power exchange becomes lop-sided and erratic. It’s for that reason that I have said that neither partner can effectively have more of one characteristic than his or her partner has of its complement. A person cannot, therefore, be consensually more dominant than the submissive is willing to be dominated, a sadist cannot be more sadistic than the masochist is willing to be receptive. That is just to say that recognizing and respecting the equality we all share is central to what it is that we do. Have a great week. Copyright 2007 by Jack Rinella, all rights reserved.
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Ms. Diane "..and they who danced were thought insane by those who refused to hear the music." ~Monet *Suffer BayBeee!!!!!* "My treasures do not sparkle or glitter, they shine in the sun and neigh in the night."
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