50 Shades Of Lioness

The furor is building over the Fifty Shades of Grey movie. The romance novel trilogy of the same name has sold more than 450 Million copies. Imagine that! I actually read the books. The writing isn’t very good, the story is nothing to write home about, so what’s the big deal? The answer, of course, is BDSM (to use the Internet acronym).  This women enters into a non-consensual D/S relationship and loves it, mostly. My understanding is that women, who buy most romance novels, like to lose themselves in plots where unbelievably handsome men with semen that tastes like a vanilla milkshake, remove women from their tedious lives and transport them on exotic adventures. It’s a simple formula.

Of course in our house, the whip is in the beautiful woman’s hand and the handsome (ah hem) lion is at her mercy. Of course, our story’s heroine is a reluctant dominant who makes sure that everything is fine before weaving her evil web. The hapless lion (moi), is her very willing prey.  Not quite 50 shades. And, my semen does not taste like a vanilla milkshake. I consume enough to be very sure of that.

It appears that in book buying, movie going, as well as purchasing chastity devices and S/M toys, the “victim” is the real consumer. How many people would have bought a book where the heroine dominates her handsome, vanilla-semen, hero? Not 450 million! You can bet your bra on that.

The fact is that in the leather (BDSM, for your “Net” folks) community, dominant women are incredibly scarce. Just go to a meeting of a large leather society. You’ll find the audience full of submissive (self-identified) males with a healthy minority of submissive women. If there are any dominant women present, they probably came with their submissive partner or are looking to make some money from the submissive men there. This may sound cynical, but over three decades of participation in these organizations has taught me that.

Mrs. Lion would never attend one of those meetings. She also wouldn’t identify herself as a dominant. If anything, she tends to be more submissive or, at least, super giving and nurturing. I could see her enjoying the “Grey” romances. I think she did. My dearest lioness is quite dominant with me. She constantly tells me that she isn’t. She is just doing what I want, even when I desperately don’t want what she is doing at a particular point in time.

Of course she is right. Every top to a very large degree does his or her topping to make the bottom happy. Topping is work and the sexual rewards, if any, aren’t really compensation for that. Very few tops do it out of some organic need. They do it because it works for them and more importantly for their partners. Another point in the 50 Shades story that is wrong.

Bottoms dearly want the illusion that their tops truly love to dominate them. Some tops actually do, but not as many as you might think. I really want to believe that Mrs. Lion has accepted the control I offered and now is using it without any particular interest in how I feel about it. I want to believe that my surrender is accepted and that no other consultation is needed. I want to be free to hate what is happening without fearing Mrs. Lion will stop because she thinks she is making me unhappy. I don’t want her to feel sorry for me and give me an orgasm because I am super horny. Well, I do want the orgasm, but not as much as I want to feel that control. I love and hate the edging and ruined orgasms. I hate the spankings but love that I get them. I hate diapers (truly), but love she forces me to wear one sometimes.

There is a problem with her taking on this role. She signed up to be my lover and partner in life, not a full time lion tamer. This is an issue for anyone who is a lifestyle top. The only way I know to prevent it becoming a problem is to put a fence around the activities where she is queen of the jungle. In that context she is the strong, ruling lioness. In other areas she is my loving partner. In a way we have been moving in that direction; at least I think so. Watch, she’ll write that no such thing is happening.

Another blogger, Thumper (denying thumper) has been in an enforced chastity relationship for over six years. In his post yesterday, he recounted a short conversation with his wife. One short interchange made my heart jump. He and his wife crossed paths at the gym:

“Are you going to see Fifty Shades of Grey this weekend?” the trainer asked with a smirky tone in his voice.

“See it?” Belle replied, “We live it.” Then she looked at me. “Don’t we, babe?”

Oh yeah! That’s amazing.

4 Comments

  1. Author

    I wonder how much geography affects terminology. I find the term “leather” amusing in terms of community identification, particularly because so many of the people I associate with would never wear the stuff. BDSM, as an acronym, is ridiculous, especially because it pretends to be all-encompassing of kink, when that couldn’t be further from the truth. But that’s the pesky thing about name tags; they only fit in a very small area, and often they just don’t stick properly. 😉

    Labels. Gotta love ’em.

    I don’t see what all the hype is about where 50 Shades is concerned. I tried to read an excerpt and was rapidly put to sleep. I’ve never been a fan of bodice-rippers though, so I assume I’m just not the target audience.

    Anywhoo…

    I enjoyed your post. 🙂 I’ve seen your comments on Thumper’s and Drew’s blogs in recent days, and you’ve been very articulate in your points. Just wanted to stop in and say hello.

    1. Author

      Hello to you too! There really isn’t an all-encompassing term for our community. “Leather” doesn’t really refer to what people wear. I never was in leathers very often. I think it comes from the early days of the S/M (another acronym) community. Organized power exchange originated in Greenwich Village gay bars in the 50’s (so many believe) and those guys did dress in leather. I prefer “leather” as a reference to the community because it doesn’t suggest any roles.

      Thanks for reading and commenting. It’s good to know you found us.

      1. Author

        My work takes me to some interesting places. I once worked a GLBTIQ leather event where 90% of the participants were vegetarians. The joke was that they were, therefore, a “pleather” community. 😉

        And FYI, I was able to get to your blog via the pingback link on Thumper’s 50 Shades post. Your comments have been showing up linkless on his blog. If that’s intentional on your part, that’s cool. But if not, it is easily fixed. Website addresses have to be entered in http:// format for the links to propagate on WordPress.

        50 shades of fun for your Valentine’s Day:

        http://youtu.be/7WahBH9sANg

        Have a great weekend! 😀

        1. Author

          I am automatically logged in on Thumper’s website by WordPress. I will have to see why the link doesn’t go in. I am very happy you found your way here.

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