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Re: A question of property... :-)
Mon, 18 Apr, 1994
>>> I know some couples (top/bottom) live very happily with one member
being beloved (:-)) property, and I wonder if this model works ok over
long spans of time and the major drawbacks / advantages to such a
relationship?? <<<
Hi Shawn,
Yes, a property relationship can work over long periods of time if the
two people involved are right for it. Having been in one for over five
years, I'm living proof of that. By being right for this sort of
relationship I mean that it requires a certain dedication, intensity,
and stick-with-itness in both parties that you're not likely to feel
unless you really crave or need this sort of long-term experience.
Major Drawbacks:
Let's see...on the top/dom side, you're taking upon yourself an enormous
responsibility for a long period of time, perhaps the rest of your life.
If you take your responsibility seriously, you're not going to just walk
away from this person or this relationship if either stop being good or
fun for you anymore. Your responsibility as the dominant in absolute
control of his or her property is to _make_ the relationship work, even
if your partner is unwilling to help or is actively sabotaging it.
You have to be the "grownup" all the time: the one who doesn't lose his
temper (or at least not often), the one who doesn't play emotional
manipulation games, the one who doesn't strike back in anger. If you
consider this person to truly be your property then their failures
become your failures, their inability to overcome their self-destructive
habits become your problems because you have assumed ultimate
responsibility for them. Sure, you may, as part of your responsibility,
be teaching them to succeed or to solve their problems themselves, but
doing this often takes years or decades, and in the meantime, you're
the one who accepts the blame when they stumble. The blame comes from
you usually, not from the other person. Someone who is able (note that I
didn't say "willing"--g) to be the top in a relationship so extreme that
the other person is considered property is not generally the type who
assigns blame on others when things go wrong. Such a person usually
enjoys control to an extreme extent, he or she likes it ALL the time. So
when something goes wrong in the relationship, they blame themselves
because they see themselves, correctly, as the one who holds the power,
the one who is ultimately responsible and in control. It can feel awful
when someone else under your control fails.
On the bottom/sub side, which I am much more familiar with, drawbacks
include:
1. Initially, a period of resistance to being controlled which can last
months to years (in my case, it lasted years). Resistance to the
constant control present in a relationship where you are considered to
be property is natural because no one is taught or trained when growing
up how to be a slave. In most ways we're taught the opposite, and so
learning to give in, to submit always to someone else's will and
desires, is a slow learning process. You learn through trial and error.
If the dominant is right for you, you eventually learn to trust his
judgement as much as you do your own (if not more). You learn that
there is no diminution of your spirit, of your initiative, of your
natural firepower , just because you obey someone absolutely. You
learn to control _your_ temper, and the random urgings of your will.
People usually do not become aware of how undisciplined their wills are and
how little self-control they actually have until they practice being a
slave for a long period of time. It's like air, you're usually not
aware of it at all until it's cut off or restricted. Unlike air, losing
an unbridled will is not a life-threatening condition, in fact it may
enhance your life considerably.
2. After a long period of time of being under a very strict rule you
can actually become unconscious of it. Upon occasion I complain to my
master that I don't feel controlled enough, I who must ask permission to
go to the bathroom, to drink an alcoholic drink, to eat, to buy a dress
or a magazine, to go out with friends, to take a job. I don't get to
choose when I get up in the morning or when I go to bed at night or,
when I am at home, what activities I will do and in what order I will do
them. I have to ask permission, or beg, for anything out of the
ordinary that I desire to do or consume. I call to "check in" with my
master if I am away from the house and I need to do something unexpected
or out of the ordinary. And if he says, "don't do it," I don't. And
yet I don't feel controlled enough and complain about that to him on a
regular basis. Perhaps this is because we aren't always doing extreme
things all the time. He exerts his power over all the mundane routine
activities of life, if he had me crawling on the floor every minute of
the day or in bondage or doing other traditional SM activities, we'd
never get anything done.
If he was independently wealthy and I didn't have to be a work slave,
perhaps I'd spend more hours of each day as a pleasure slave, but
there'd always be times when he wasn't doing anything explicitly sexual
to me, and I'd probably be complaining then too . I think that my
libido (particularly the frequency with which I desire S&M sex) is
slightly higher than his. He knows this but prefers I match myself to
his sexual pattern, and while such a demand might tear apart an
equal-partners relationship, in our situation this denial just makes me
more excited. Constant sexual frustration is a mixed bag, but I'd take
that over an equal power relationship any day. This leads in nicely to
my next drawback.
3. Are you reading the Nurse Jones re-runs courtesy of the "Ol' Sarge"
network? These posts describe some very intense experiences crammed
into a very short amount of time (one month). No one can keep up that
sort of intensity over a long period of time (years). When things start
to slow down, to lose that fervid edge, when you are not multiple
orgasming every day, or even every other day, you begin to think that
the relationship is on the rocks, that it isn't working anymore. This
can be a dom or a sub thing, and it's where most inexperienced people
have trouble with long-term bdsm relationships. This often seems to hit
relationships around the time of their third year, for some reason.
People think that there must be something wrong with their partner or
themselves or both or that they've suddenly discovered that this person
is the wrong one for them after all.
One way to avoid that feeling of "we've done everything there is to do
and we're so bored with each other" burnout is to take it very slow
right from the start. Pace it--you've got the rest of your life to
experience and experiment, so why rush it it all into the first couple
of years? My master's been threatening to give me an enema since our
first week of knowing each other, and it still hasn't happened. It will,
but whether it will be 5 days from now or 5 years from now I have no way
of knowing, but I shiver in fear and anticipation of its inevitibility.
Another way to time things out so that they work over the long run is
to let your activities come and go in cycles. Do caning for a few
months and then don't do it again for nine or ten months. Do certain
forms of bondage for awhile and then put them away. Set toys or
activities aside and then bring them back. If you're really into pain,
lighten up for four or five months until your sub is soft and sensitive
again, and then get hard. Cycling activities and taking it slow are not
things that appeal in an age of instant gratification and five-second
attention spans. They require a certain preserverence and intelligence
to implement in a way which works but the payback is that you're seldom
bored.
Finally, if I complain too much about being bored with my master's
current crop of activities, I am given the opportunity to discover
(call it a learning experience--g) how a little sexual deprivation does
wonders to shrink one's enuni.
A drawback that both partners face is the possibility that their
personalities might not be compatible with each other over the long run. I'm
talking about something deeper than the burnout syndrome described
above. I'm talking about a basic incompatibility between two people
which doesn't show up until the blinkers of lust and romance begin to
slip off. As you don't want to make such an absolute commitment to a
person unless you're pretty well certain they are going to be "right"
for you for a very long time, it is a good idea to not take ownership
(or conversely, not give oneself away) until the first heady (and
possibly misleading) rush of romanticism has passed away from the
relationship. When the passion quiets down a little, people either
start to get ticked off at each other, annoyed at certain personality
traits, or they start to grow more deeply in love. At any rate, there
is a change that comes after the honeymoon phase and you need to wait
for that change and see which way it will blow before you make a
permanent commitment.
When my master and I first met, we had a romantic phase at the beginning
of our relationship, but it was not the sort of blind obsessive "let's
do it all as quick as we can" thing I had been used to experiencing with
previous partners. There was a kind of calm measured pace to it from
the very beginning that was entirely Donald's contribution. He'd had
lots of slaves before, and so he understood the timing of these things
really well. He knew exactly how fast he wanted to proceed with me, and
he imposed that pattern on the development of the relationship. I never
felt deprived or ignored, but there was a pattern, a rhythm to the
relationship that he, as the dominant, set: he'd tell me each day when I
was to call him, when I was to write him, what I was to write about,
what I would do when not in contact with him, etc. Without being the
least bit rigid or systematic, he imposed this sort of slow stately
order to our relationship that managed to give me everything I needed
but kept me ever wanting more. And that has continued to this day.
Advantages:
1. If this sort of relationship (being human property/owning human
property) is what you've been looking for all of your life, it can be
profoundly fulfilling. While having the full complement of human
problems, hassles, difficulties and personal demons, I feel complete
and at peace in a way that I would venture that very few people ever
do. At rock bottom, at the core, I'm extremely secure, and the very bad
stuff that goes on outside me or even inside me seems to only ripple the
surface--it does not touch the core. In addition to the peace aspect,
part of the fulfillment is also how intensely exciting and perverted it
is to be living out your life at one extreme end of the power spectrum.
There is a non-stop low level undercurrent of sexuality that is always
there between you during the most mundane experiences (the only thing in
my experience that drives it away is severe external stress, and even
then, it's only temporarily driven away). My master orders his property
to do something and we both feel that pleasurable thrill: me because I
must obey, him because he must and will be obeyed.
2. A minor but most important advantage of a relationship where the power
roles are extreme and clear cut is that you have none of those nasty
power struggles, fighting, manipulation, and nastiness so endemic to
vanilla relationships (or to SM relationships which are vanilla in
terms of power). All that ugly stuff is just not there, it makes no
sense, there is no room for it. It's not that my master and I are
excessively polite with each other or that I never shout or scream at
him , it's that the context is completely different. I eventually
learned and he knew from the start that when I argue with him I cannot
expect to "win" anything. I argue because it allows me to vent my
feelings and thoughts. After I vent, he decides what is to be done about
the issue in question, just as he always does. My attempts at
manipulation don't work with him. There is no subtle deadly threat I can
hang over his head (he'd just laugh at me if I tried), no way I can make
his behavior conform to my desires and expectations, none of my
manipulations sinks in or takes. He has no fear of me or of anything I
could do. And I, once I realized that manipulation wasn't going to work
with him, eventually gave it up, as it made me feel bad (unsubmissive)
and rather foolish.
Likewise, he has no need to play manipulative little head games with me.
He owns me and can do anything he likes with me, so why should he need
to stamp his foot and say "I'm going to walk out on you/get mad at
you/reject you if you don't do as I say"? The person who has to say that
is not a dominant no matter how they might style themselves: he or she
is a scared and spoiled little bully. If I don't do what my master
says, he punishes me in a way that motivates me not to disobey again.
End of story. No complex manipulative messiness is needed when the
power is so polarized. I did vanilla relationships for 16 years before
I met my master. I know what hell those power struggles can be (it's a
petty, mean sort of hell) and it's an enormous relief not to have to
deal with that shit anymore. A large part of your emotional reserves
become freed when you don't have to expend them "defending your turf"
from your partner.
3. The sub in these sorts of relationships gets a tremendous sense of
security when or if they discover they can really trust their owner's
judgement and maturity. You realize that you don't have to be watching
your back constantly like you do in many a vanilla relationship, waiting
for the stab of betrayal or, if your partner is self-destructive and
ignorant, the major fuckup. You can relax and stretch out and bask in
your dominant's care and protection, and that's a wonderful feeling. I
think too that the dominant feels his own sense of security, assuming
his sub is the strong and trustworthy sort. You own this person
absolutely, they aren't going anywhere or doing anything without your
permission, they'll always be there loving and serving you and trying to
be more and more of what you want because they've committed themselves
to being your property. I don't think that dominants who view subs as
weak-willed dishrags can ever relax and feel the enormous sense of
security that the dominant who has a strong sub and knows it feels. The
dishrag theorists have always got to fear that the sub is going to turn
to jello one day and either leave them or lose all initiative and spark
of humanity due to their "weakness". If all subs are dishrags, then
being a dominant becomes an onerous and dreaded task.
4. There are many more advantages, but I'll mention only one more. It's
kind of a side effect of the relationship, but it's a nice one
nonetheless. Under my master's directing and guiding hand, I've been
able to do things (succeed in my career, overcome vices, bad habits,
and personality flaws, change major life attitudes) that I formerly
considered impossible. My personal term for this sort of "doing the
impossible," is miracle working. While not technically miracles, these
are the sorts of things that I did not have the knowledge, the
will/preserverence, or the confidence to accomplish on my own. They were
as out of my reach as flying to another star. Really, I have become
another person. There isn't always a transformative aspect to power
relationships, but I think it tends to be more common in ones where the
power exchange is extreme and where there has been lots of time for the
changes to take place.
This next one isn't an advantage or drawback; it's just something that
"is" for master/slave owner/owned relationships and if you're
considering such a relationship for yourself, you need to take it into
account. Due in part I think to the intense intimacy that these
relationships engender, honesty in communication plays a much larger role in them than
it does in the average vanilla relationship. In fact, a lack of
communication will have much more serious and swifter repercussions on
this type of relationship than on the more egalitarian type--you might
even say this is the relationship's Achilles' heel. I've known many a
vanilla relationship (hell, I was in one for 12 years!) that can roll on
smoothly for many a month or year on the grease of white lies,
deceptions, half-truths, and partners hiding their true feelings from
each other. You can ignore or overlook your own or your partner's lack of
absolute honesty without bringing the whole house of cards down on you.
Not so in a property arrangement. If the trust is broken--on either
side--it can be devastating for the relationship and very difficult to
pick up the pieces later on. I feel immune to most of the problems that
break up other relationships, but I am very conscious of the fact that
if I were to lie to my master (or he to me, about something important)
it could tear us apart. I trust him absolutely not to lie to be about
anything important (he tells me that he keeps information from me that
is not important to me but is important to the privacy or safety of
others, and of course I trust him about that) and I watch myself
vigilantly for any tendencies to lie, mislead, or hide things from him.
I tell him everything; and while I don't always tell him instantly
(that's something I'm working on--g), I keep nothing from him (you
folks who send me unsolicited email of a certain sort ought to consider
the consequences of that last statement--g) and I never cover anything
up, no matter how much I might think that it would "help" him if I did.
It would be so easy to break that trust...and so difficult to regain it.
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