Whither the D/S in BDSM?
I've written a few times how the BDSM scene in SL is in many ways quite different than the experiences I've had in First Life, one of the most profound ones being that in SL, Dom/mes and submissives are seemingly always in an interplay of ownership. Subbies hang around BDSM places like Velvet Thorn, the Guild, or the Cellar, waiting for a Dom/me to come in who may very well be the one to toss a collar their way. Or some Dom/mes treat every submissive as a potential object of ownership, handing out collars like candy to a bevy of submissives that hang around for a week or two.
Yesterday at Velvet Thorn, I was at Miss Kitty's Sunday Morning discussion, and the topic was going on about this very issue. Miss Kitty and Miss Magick both said that in their First Life experiences people were far more into the "Bondage/Discipline" and "Sadism/Masochism" aspects of BDSM, but not a whole lot of the Dominance/Submission. This mirrors my own experience in the scene here in Los Angeles, in which the majority of people are far more into casual play than being a 24/7 lifestyler. Sure there are some of those folks, but from what I see, people show up at parties, get in a scene or two (often with the same persons at each party, no doubt), and then go back to vanilla life not having any BDSM contact with their play partners til the next party.
As I've seen this discussed before, I saw a similar reaction again from most of the attendees -- most people in SL find the concept of "casual play" to be at best strange, and at worst downright distasteful. Apparently, people that come into SL looking for some casual play are viewed much like people that inhabit sex clubs in Zindra, or places like "Nadine's Fuckbunker" -- d00ds looking for quick sexxorz and nothing else. Most of the Dommes at the discussion said they would not engage in casual play with submissives, even though they agreed that some number of the "submissives" in SL are really bottoms looking for a topping scene. The submissives at the discussion said they really wanted a Dominant woman to have a relationship with, and largely rejected the idea they were simply bottoms looking for a good top.
This to me is very odd. If a number of the subs in SL are really potential bottoms looking for a scene, why is casual scening viewed with the same regard as going to the dentist by a large number of the denziens of the BDSM world in SL? In my First Life group, casual scening is the norm -- at any play party I attend, I see at most five or six D/s couples, usually the same ones over and over. Most of the gang at any event are simply looking to get their kinky fun in for an evening. What is it about this that is so disregarded in SL?
The point of this entry is to look at the D/s in BDSM, which many people don't remember is in the middle of the B/D and S/M. In Second Life, D/s seems to be the gold standard, and a Top/Bottom scene outside of an established D/s relationship is viewed as in some way "inferior" and even somewhat dirty. I remember back a number of years ago when I hung out at the Cellar, there was a Domme that would come in, IM a submissive, and then take her to the dungeon or a private room for some kinky fun. This Domme was disliked by the other Dommes that inhabited the Cellar, but as she wasn't breaking any rules or going against issues of consent, there was nothing they could do. The dislike toward her though was quite palpable, and even a good number of the submissives there expressed dislike toward her. In First Life, this would be a pretty common occurance -- I see Tops come in, have conversations with bottoms, and then 30-60 minutes later they're getting their kink on in a room for an hour or so.
My only guess here is the fact that a large number of people in the BDSM scene in SL have no First Life experience. The way BDSM is handled in SL is a mutation of a mutation of a mutation: the 70s First Life, largely underground scene moved into Bulletin Board Services (BBSes) in the 1980s that were the early text based online experience. In the 90s, as BBSes gave way to the Internet, online BDSM moved into Internet Relay Chat (IRC), and the mutation that was the BBS BDSM changed all the more. Then SL comes along and the mutation happens again, mixed in of course with a healthy amount of Gorean thinking, which is another whole story.
What people in SL experience is a third generation mutation of BDSM that existed back nearly 40 years ago. While the mutation may not be that extensive, as there was a good amount of crossover between the First Life kinksters and the online folks, there is enough to make a worldview change. While the scene in First Life seems to be geared toward casual, kinky fun, the online world seems to prize D/s and some kind of relationship as the way to do things "right." And while there is certainly casual play going on in SL, it seems a bit more "ghettoized," and the more "proper" places police their own by promoting D/s relationships. I think if a Domme were to come into Velvet Thorn and start propositioning the subs there for some "kinky fun" that was not attached to ownership, they would be warned to stop being a "pest" to the subs. I've seen a couple avatars banned for continually doing just that (as well as being a pain in the ass in other ways, but still, the open dislike of a Domme propositioning the subs is rather obvious, especially if the Domme suggests they "go elsewhere" for the fun.)
I'm certainly not saying there is any right or wrong way to do anything, after all YKIOKIJNMK (Your Kink is OK, It's Just Not My Kink.) I just find this disjunction between what seems to go on in First Life (less D/s, more casual play) and SL (more D/s, disdain of casual play by "cultured" folks) interesting. I'd be interested to know if anyone has the same or different experiences in both SL and any First Life experiences they may have. Feel free to comment!