Losing Dog

"Did I seriously catch you trying to sneak a peek at me in the shower? I barely got my shoes off before you gave yourself away, perv. Or maybe you wanted to get caught. That tiny little bulge in your pants seems to agree with me. You're so fucking weird. If you want it so bad, jerk to my sock loser 🖕"

Basically, I'm not really into old guard stuff. The leathery aesthetic, chains and collars, the idea that my autonomy and agency are turned over to a D-type don't really appeal to me. There's aspects of it I enjoy, I like being submissive, I like symbols of devotion, I like an exchange of power, I like having another person in my dynamic that stands of different footing and that can make demands of me. I like the loving undercurrent of it, that the dynamic serves the end of 1empowering both parties, providing structure and care, well founded rules that serve to make the foundation of a functioning life and a better person for whom they apply to. I like the mutual appreciation and acts of service that show as love.

My conception of BDSM is as such, a pair of consenting individuals agree to introduce a power imbalance into the relationship. That power comes with rights/priviliges and responsibilities. It comes with unique expressions of that power and ways that power is served and revered. That power is specific and therefore limited, it is only as absolute as is negotiated.

I'm a switch. I like being on both sides of the slash, I'm both a dom and a sub depending on the context and the person. I very much like being treated like a person in my dynamics, I like being Shepherd the human person with agency and autonomy, Shepherd the person not Shepherd the monster, not Shepherd your actual mom.

But the whole package, when I look at it, gives me a rumbling in the tummy I can't quell. Something feels off. I don't see myself in other submissives. I don't see myself in other dommes. I don't think I exist outside the concept or outside of BDSM but I don't feel myself fitting neatly into the lifestyle and it rubs me the wrong way. I want to feel that belonging I want to see my fantasies mesh with someone else's in a way that feels right. I want to be able to craft my lifestyle dynamic to fit my idea of what is right and wrong. In this writing I'm gonna try to lay it out smoothly, mostly for myself, but also to give it to you to see how it bounces off the public.

Where I feel this differs from old guard is that the power is given so wholly, or rather that the typical flavors of old guard dynamics inherently demand a more all consuming type of domination than I want.

I like the idea that the power I give flows from consequence in a way that is coercive. It reifies that power, grounds it in something controllable and revokable without it being tied to a literal chain. To this end I really like blackmail, chastity, other forms of physical domination like being overpowered. In essence I give my dom the power to levy consequences and to set a standard of behavior that if I fall below brings about a consequence. It lends itself to the kind of reward structures I find really motivate me, negative reinforcement being the biggest one. Chastity isn't the punishment it's the standard and if I want it gone, I have to affirmatively DO something to get rid of it.

To that end I'm not doing something just because my dom told me to, I'm doing it because there's a sword of damocles hanging over my head making me do it. But the only person to ever have the power to hang that sword is my dom.

It's a game. An asymmetrical game with predefined prizes and consequences as well as rules both parties adhere to. This game-like structure is the same as the relationship's structure.

Now the whole, "beatings will continue until morale improves" approach of negative reinforcement can't sustain an entire dynamic, and old guard dynamics also use coercive power as well as kinks like chastity. However it's this idea of playing games, everything being mediated by a game, is what I like. It's motivating, it's fun, it brings out the best in me. Even if I'm not competing against my dom and they set me up to compete against myself that brings out a competitiveness to me that I can use to better myself. My flaws can be ironed out, my habits manicured by gamifying life this way.

Someone had once said to me "Reading a book is not a game, but seeing how many books you can read in a year is a game." And it demonstrates how you can make a game out of literally anything.

So much of old guard or other dynamics have this "because my dom said so" or "because that's how it is" or even a "because I am devoted to them" way of justifying the dynamic I don't align with. In my reading and experience the origins of old guard BDSM are in the military. A place where power needs no justification and cannot be questioned, a place where it is absolute and arbitrary at the same time. Where justifications end at, "because I said so" or "because it's good for you". I can't work with that. My brain won't, I'm too defiant for it. It feels baseless and ridiculous. From the outside, the military is ridiculous and silly. When the fantasy breaks and the mask drops the demands a dom makes feel ridiculous if that's the only basis for power. Sure, cooking for your dom is an act of service and love you do because of the dynamic, but that's not a game - It's reading a book. Making your dom the best meal of their life, curating a nutrition plan for them with health goals, making a menu for them when eating is hard, those are games. The activity is clear, but you can append consequences and rewards, reified by the dynamic with coercive tools, to make even the simplest acts of devotion into games whose justifications don't bottom out at "because".