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1101 East Pike St. Suite 300, Seattle, WA 98122
1101 East Pike St. Suite 300, Seattle, WA 98122
Also very unlikely that a dominant is going to be on board with a MFM, unless the M is one of his other submissives. Maybe she should consider joining a D/s family? Either that or find a bisexual switch to date rather than insisting on a dominant.
Did anybody else LOL at "lady sauce"?
And her search is probably limited by her community. There are femenist-aware, Sex At Dawn reading, dominant men in big cities. But I gotta say, I wouldn't be nearly so femenist-aware (which isn't to say that I'm in expert) if I hadn't had the privilidge of dating patient feminist ladies in the past.
So while it's possible as some above say that you're cutting your dating pool down by looking for 'self-IDed doms who are UTS on BFPIC', I'd say it's cutting it down in a totally awesome way that will be great for you in the long run.
P.S. Hey Letter Writer: Dan's right you may have to make the guy. But consider that if you can find the guy with the feminist principles, you can teach him the kinkiness, instead of the other way around. More fun, and not the same goddamn "please recognize my humanity and acknowledge the self-reported experiences of women" conversation over and over.
Oh, and if KFFG is at all bisexual my inclined, I invite her to message me! She sounds awesome. :)
Oh, and if KFFG is at all bisexually inclined, I invite her to message me! She sounds awesome. :)
Good luck.
Btw, KFFG, I'm totally on your side about the feminism. I refuse outright to date dudes who aren't down with it. Probably not coincidentally, I've been single for a while, but that's fine by me.
LW. I haven't read Dan's response, yet. I'll get to it.
Wanted to answer you first. Not that I easily have an answer, mind. Just don't settle for any Ol situation, when you settle down. And, if you young women still have to train the males, well you just gotta train them. If , however, they don't pick up quick, move on.
I've talked with my sons, re being with women. Understanding the issues of feminism. Still, they come out with stupid, sexist lines
( maybe it's just in the male DNA? )...( Just a joke MrE.)
As for the LW, I'm not entirely convinced of her capacity to be sufficiently up to speed on something about which a potential BF is equally passionate. Perhaps it's generally unlikely for people with driving passions of their own, and they may be better off with educable types.
Given how all the references to education are running strictly one way (except for a parenthetical hint from Mr Savage) in the letter, the response and the comments, I'm almost tempted to tell LW just to dump potential partners who don't clear the bar at the beginning. My grounds are that the ones presented as her target audience deserve better than to be viewed as projects for a salvage operation, or untaught savages who will magically be transformed into acceptable mates after sufficient exposure to her superiour wisdom. It's not quite that simple, though, and there is a certain sort of male guilt likely to produce the service top perfect for her.
There are agreements made between doms and subs that should be explicit and recognize reasonable boundaries for everyone involved. That means each owning the fact that they may have arbitrary boundaries that they can't realistically expect the other to completely mesh with just.. on instinct. This is how we got safe-words for chrissakes. So maybe apply a similar approach to your feminism and your potential partner's feminism. If he's generally progressive, smart, and part-way to your way of thinking, then find the equivalent of a safe-word when discussing your opinions about college sex, college rape, dom-sub relationships and where they extend to, feminism in general, etc. "Whoa, you went too far there..." is fine conversation starter. It says "you and I have different lines and we need to learn where those are. You may need to change your mind to fit my boundaries and vice-versa. This is me saying you hit a boundary."
You're going to disagree with your potential mate. The good couples find a way to navigate disagreement - not preemptively avoid it or give up when they encounter it.
But also, small towns are hard for people like you. I'm sure it's hard. Ask yourself if you're making it harder than it needs to be. If not, consider moving to a more target-rich environment?
Even most progressive men are raised almost from birth with a very sexist world view. You know this yourself. And we can be oblivious to all but the most blatant examples of feminism. The subtle, not obvious stuff can still go right over our heads.
Especially younger guys. I would probably meet your standard of feminism today, but I'm over 50 now. When I was your age, I hadn't learned half that stuff yet. I was pretty liberal in general, but still pretty naive of a lot of feminist ideals. It isn't something you learn overnight. It takes a lot to un-train all the garbage we've been fed from birth. A little patience and willingness to train on your part would help a lot.
If a guy is a total misogynist asshole, then don't bother. But if he's pretty liberal and trying to be on your side, but is still just a bit young and ignorant, then he is trainable.
If you lived in Vancouver BC or Montreal or something, you'd have a larger pool to choose from. But in a small community with a limited dating pool, being willing to compromise and willing to train may be necessary.
https://soundcloud.com/loveandradio/the-…
A black musician befriends several KKK members, and over the course of many years, influences them to quit. I happened to listen to it today, right before I saw Dan's tweet about the deBoer essay.
https://feminismnowadays.wordpress.com/
Whether a guy is "educated" in feminism is somewhat irrelevant to me. There are lots of creepy-ass Hugo Schwyzer type guys who know all the lingo and theories and never say the wrong thing, and "examine" their motivations constantly. I find these guys exhausting and slightly sinister. This concept is also quite classist, as I believe it presumes liberal arts higher education.
Then there are men who are simply respectful and value you as an equal. They may not know any of the "feminist" lore you do, but they are fair people who readily agree to your point of view when you point out injustices.
Any man you meet, no matter how "feminist" is going to be socialized to exercise male privilege. That is impossible to avoid. Long term partnership, raising children, etc, will require you to occasionally fight back and out of the gender traps into which YOU BOTH will fall.
My advice is to find someone fundamentally good and decent, who you really like and with whom you make a great team. Find someone who has the same core values that you do. Don't "educate" or "train" them. That is condescending and weird. Negotiate your relationship, as everyone does. Try to understand if your dealbreakers are really about finding a good partner, or finding someone who's up on the latest hashtag politics.
There are plenty of gentle giants in rural BC! I'm picturing a plaid dungeon in your future.
When I read this, I thought "Aha! I found the problem." Up until then, I didn't understand how the LW was having difficulties, if she's accurately describing her standards.
@21: "I have to agree with Dan, re: you will probably have to train your man. He won't train himself."
Look at how many people on this thread are talking about "training" "your man." Do you understand that you're describing a nonconsensual D/s relationship? If that's what the LW is looking for, I can understand the problem better--not many people want to be in a relationship where they're the property of their partner, and their partner gets to chastise and/or punish them for having the wrong thoughts. Lots of people actually want a relationship of equals.
I'm not my partner's property. She doesn't get to train me unless I also get to train her or I consent to an unequal relationship. I suspect I'm far from unique.
And we're out there -- I'd even come with at least one gold star;) And should you ever find yourself near Minneapolis....
You have to be aware that feminist ideas can come across as threatening and misandrist. It scares the hell out of some men, and not without reason. Like any other political movement, feminism contains it's share of crazy assholes. Hopefully you are a reasonable person so this won't be an issue.
She didn't really clarify her long-term relationship goals and timeline but I suspect that right now she'd be willing to postpone LTR/baby/whatever goals in favour of some play right now.
For now, why doesn't she just concentrate on turning some local lout into a serviceable dom. He doesn't need to be likable or even agreeable. He just needs to be someone trustworthy whom she can hate-sub the Hell out of.
Mr. Perfect she can find online and have shipped up from Vancouver, or Montreal or wherever. If he's a great feminist he'll accept the arrangement as is.
To be clear, I'm not saying that male dominants are any more misogynistic than the general male populations (Gorean doms excepted), but that she might expect the domination to commence after she consents, where the doms may be trying to act dominant as soon as they meet her and find out she's submissive.
Lord knows I get plenty of it going the opposite way--submissive men grovelling at their very first contact with me. She can probably weed out the bad ones by watching how they interact with women they aren't trying to snare.
You train a dog, or an employee, or a student, or yourself. You don't train a partner.
Nope nope nope nope. So wrong. Every single dom I have ever fucked more than once was a committed feminist. And we're talking a decent number by now.
I certainly would not ever call myself a "feminist". At the same time, I agree with pretty much everytjing I know about it. Social equality, income equality, anti rape culture etc.
And most ppl my age (30) would agree (that I know anyways). Shouldnt be that hard to find a guy with those values.
If it's a deal breaker that her mate be a "card carrying" member of the Feminist Party that wants to go out and make signs for protests etc., well, that might a tall order.
Not saying this is common or women need to be suspicious of men simply because they're men. My point is that, knowledge of such topics and the ability to "say the right thing" is not nearly as relevent as how someone behaves over a period of time.
I agree totally.
Having to not only use brainspace to maintain the adequate level of quality of toping someone(are the ropes too tight or too loose, did I grab the right candle, is said candle too high or low, is this position causing too much/not enough discomfort, etc.,etc.) and also maintain the adequate level of socal awareness analysis(am I reinforcing gender sterotypes with this, am I objectifying her, am I abusing male privilege, etc.) gives me a headache just thinking about it.
Of course, you could respond that really good doms and feminists don't have to think about it. However, then you are changing the ask. You aren't just asking for a feminst who is also a dom. You are asking for the feminist and dom equivalent of Bruce Lee, that being someone who is not only a dom and a feminist but can be both without thinking the same way that Bruce Lee could do martial arts without thinking about forms, strikes, whatever.
If that is what you want you will definitely have to move as I can think of about 10 or 20 places in the world where someone like that would exist.
Willingness to reflect on your poor words and actions and then change attitude is perhaps something that is more important than already being a "feminist"
And the letter-writer might want to consider moving. Try Boston or Seattle or San Francisco.
@41 - the latter. By my definition you ARE a feminist. As most feminists I know agree with me. Why would you never call yourself one? Fear of the word feminism is a huge detriment to change for the better - misogynists love to keep feminist a dirty word. It could mean a great deal of good if you were to call yourself one, especially if you really are an army guy and around a higher proportion of people who are more likely to listen to a man than a woman. (Sadly that last is not a guess, but based on personal experience...)
Out in the remote north, she might be better off advertising in a Vancouver alternative paper for a man who already is the kind of man she wants and just happens to be moving up to her neck of the woods. If you can't move (back) to the city, see if you can't get the city to move to you.
Of course one shouldn't continue to date a jackass or misogynist but expecting a man to agree with her beliefs/politics lockstep is condescending and, ironically, anti-feminist.
There's nothing more tedious than someone with a cause and a chip on their shoulder about it. Even if he does know/agree with basic feminist principles he may not think it's the most interesting conversation to have again and again.
There has to be some alignment in any relationship (opposites may attract but don't tend to last) but this letter writer sounds insufferable and very young.
Then again that could just me me mansplaining....
I'd like to think men might sometimes, somewhere, somehow assist women in their own personal development, but a quick search on google turned up nothing.
I also hope I don't shock any of the Slog men by saying this, but in my dating days I used to use a few small tricks to "test" whether a man subscribed to shitty ideas in such an obvious way that he wasn't a good prospect for me. I would always buy him at least one drink (to see how he reacted to sharing costs) and I'd never go home with him on the first night we met (I had to know if my "no, but I want to see you again" would be respected...) You could call this sneaky or manipulative, but it did a lot for my peace of mind in choosing someone to pursue. These small details tell you a lot more than whether he is an avowed Male Feminist who can spout a few buzzwords.
Well don't just stand there in the door complainin', Missy, grab a bunk and make yourself at home. Cold beer in the fridge. You like baloney sandwiches? Sorry about the mess in here, I ain't used to entertainin' polite company. T'ain't much, but it's home.
As for "training" boyfriends...I hope that everyone reading this, of whatever gender, has enough basic self-esteem not to keep dating someone who wants to train them in any way. Anyone who thinks they have a right to transform a real person into a custom-fitted partner is surely a deep narcissist and best avoided.
Incorrect. Two ways you're incorrect: Feminism doesn't require constant self-policing (if it does, you're doing it wrong). And examining your actions doesn't make it tough to enjoy being a Dom. Also, anyone examining their actions constantly in a relationship is going to be annoying.
Since when is anything that claims to know "the way things are" right? since when is it safe to accept a group of ideas as "principals" of humanity. Why don't you wake up to the values of ambiguity and looking at things as individual circumstances instead of all through the lens of feminist philosophy. Feminism proports to offer a description of history, human relationships, and to offer a grand project of social engineering. that feminism is a SCIENCE Forest Girl, and since when does science exist without accepting criticism? Without a little contradiction? I will tell you the holy cow of feminism is a zietgiest and a dangerous science and history will show it has as many bennifits and faults as any religion or cult. Take a look at education for boys, take a look at rising suicide, ake a look at how few realationship are successful, take a look at which gender is doing the most divorcing, take a look at the inequality of rights for men and women, Think about power is something far greater than money and politics and educate yourself before you start preaching. And consider humility as deal breaker, because good sex or not, this intelligent educated feminist wouldn't date your stupid ass
Incorrect. Two ways you're incorrect: Feminism doesn't require constant self-policing (if it does, you're doing it wrong). And examining your actions doesn't make it tough to enjoy being a Dom.
Also, anyone examining their actions constantly in a relationship is going to be annoying.
Move.
Even if we theoretically did find each other attractive, her location would be a dealbreaker for me. I wouldn't be very happy living in a "a small community in the far north" (ie rural and cold) surrounded by other guys (kinky or not, artsy or not, educated or not) who were clueless about sex and feminism, and I suspect I'm fairly representative of my type. Sorry, otherwise kinky, artsy, liberal, intelligent lumberjack, you may be okay, but I don't want to be one of you.
KFFG, your standards don't sound at all unreasonable (so ignore the bile upthread), but the solution is probably the same solution as for lonely gay people, trans people, whatever, in small rural communities (even relatively enlightened ones): find a bigger pool with more fish. Because even people who are exactly in each other's target demographic sometimes don't feel chemistry, and you need to increase your odds.
But if you're really attached to living where you live, yeah, you may have to do some continuing education, either of the "here's how to be kinky" or the "here's how to respect women" variety, or both.
There are lots of dudes out there that should work out just great, once you get in a pool with a lot of dudes. The trick will be finding one that wants to head back to that piece of Canadian countryside with you.
Having said all that, she might have a choice between a) Waiting a long time; b) Moving to a city; or c) suck it up and compromise. Have some good GFs for company and a not-as-compatible fella for rutting, reproducing, and cohabiting.
But as to the question of whether you're worth that guy you want? Whether he exists or not in your town is a separate question, but yes: It does go without saying that you ARE worth it.
Nor is the concept of "feminist submission" really contradictory - when in scene, the answer to the questions "am I reinforcing gender stereotypes with this, am I objectifying her, am I abusing male privilege" should be "YES". That's the point - scenes like that are hot for the participants precisely because they're wrong in a normal context. Like a lot of kink and fetishes, power exchange can be a way to eroticize something that is normally frightening or uncomfortable. For the (feminist) female sub, it's being dominated by aggressive male sexuality; for the (feminist) male dom, it's expressing aggressive male sexuality.
I know there are certainly people in the BDSM scene who do believe in traditional gender roles both in and out of scene, but I don't want anything to do with those people. Personally, I'd much rather dom someone who is strong and self-confident and choosing to submit (hot!), than someone who is deferential and submissive outside of BDSM too (meh). And I know who I'd rather spend time with after the scene. Maybe I'm a rarity, but I sure hope not.
If a particular candidate starts trying to dom her before they're in-scene (or have even negotiated), he's (a) not a good feminist and (b) not a good dom, either.
Also, it's fun to think of you shooting down some douchey pseudo-sensitive windbag with earnest expression and charmingly tousled hair--after he proves beyond a shadow of a doubt that he is full of shit. Jihan Ghomeshi, anyone?
You be respectful, kind, thoughtful, actively seek consent, etc. And then when your girlfriend wants you to smack her ass and call her a slut, you do it. It's really not that complicated.
Can you name a third feminist, by the way? Or, you know, maybe just one who's name you can actually spell correctly? Might help your case.
Dan - if you want to take Jeffy's advice and are in need of some straight (or mostly straight) male companionship, my feminist husband and boyfriend would both consider it an honor.
Secondly, her test is unfair, not that she has one but that she is unaware of this being a political issue with a lot of nastiness attached to it. Did you not hear the title "War on Women," bandied about? She puts men on the defensive immediately about principles that were not taught in the unemotional context of a school, but by people who are loved and respected by her date. The same way she was likely taught hers.
She has not EARNED the same respect, not learned anything about why these beliefs are there, but insults them and the people who hold those beliefs on the first couple of dates. Then KFFG wonders why she is failing.
The rest of your comment is equally nonsensical. KFFG is sexually frustrated because she's not willing to be respectful and "deferential" towards the people teaching her dates to be sexist? Towards the people waging the "War on Women"? SHE'S the one being nasty and insulting?
Earn your own damn respect. Or hell, just fuck off and die in a fire.
trying to get a man UTS (on anything) is (was) exhausting. if i wanted a student, i'd be a teacher or professor. i'll stay single thanks because the likelihood that you'll be part of a couple and still acting, living, being single is (eventually) the majority more than not anyways.
unless boys are just dumb throw rocks at them like david and goliath said.
i say just have fun and explore the world and if the right one comes along you will know it. and with a little hard work (not teaching) and luck, you might just get what you want. and deserve.
A thoughtful feminist man will have an easier time shifting to: "if women make an informed choice to be hit/dominated/degraded because it turns them on, then it's okay."
Your post @17 brought a smile to my face, too. Glad I could return the favor.
I care a lot about feminist issues. I asked this guy I sleep with a lot if he was a feminist. I got "Uh yeah I guess so"
"What do you mean you guess?"
"I think women can do whatever the fuck they want."
Yeah it's not perfect, but what matters to me is that when I tell him I need comforting because I'm getting mad at men that I have to put up with X, he does it. And it matters that I think he's hot. The rest is negotiated.