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Talk:Dominance and submission

While I appreciate that there my be D/s relationships that exist outside of the BDSM world, the topic of this article is "Domination & submission (BDSM)" and it should stay true to that theme.

If someone wants to do an article on non-BDSM D/s, I encourage them to do so and link it from this article, but please don't attempt to re-write the article into something it is not.

I agree, though the sentence "There also exist D/s relationships outside of the BDSM community, or where the dominance and submission is not sexual or erotic in nature, which are not referenced here." leaves me wondering what sort of relationships these are? If there isn't an article to link to, at least giving an example might help? One possible example may be Domestic discipline - although it's unclear to me how such relationships actually differ from "BDSM" D/s relationships, other than the fact they call it by a different name? (Note that I also raised this point on the talk page of Domestic discipline.) Mdwh 20:03, 1 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

BDSM is NOT a paraphilia or a group of paraphilias. The author should consult the DSM or a degreed professional psychology educator to get accurate information. Paraphilia describes a certain range of very specific conditions. While it may be included within the spectrum of BDSM it is neither a specific or general characteristic of all BDSM and its participants in general. Master Martin, Kansas City

BDSM as a term is not referenced in the DSM, it is colloquial. However - bondage, sadism, masochism, humiliation and many other aspects of BDSM are defined in the DSM-IV-TR under sections 302.83 and 302.84 as paraphilias. As such, it is acurate to refer to BDSM as a "group of paraphilias".

It is also commonly defined that BDSM refers to Bondage, dicipline, domination, submission, sadism and masochism, and as such it accurate to describe D/s as "considered part of the BDSM group of paraphilias".

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=BDSM

While it may be possible to conduct a D/s relationship without entering into the clinical definition of a paraphilia, (as discussed in the article) it is still correct to say that D/s is widely "considered part of the BDSM group of paraphilias", in both the clinical and popular environments.

It should be noted that a reference to behaviors as being paraphilias does not imply their being pathological or requiring of treatment, just that they conform to a certain identifiable pattern. --Outlander 15:27, 25 July 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Reading this article it would seem that D/s (and perhaps even BDSM) is a perfectly healthy, normal lifestyle. Is it too politically incorrect to ask that there be a section regarding criticisms of D/s or how to recover from a D/s relationship gone bad?

There is discussion of this in the "Safety" section. If you feel more is needed, let me know what issues you feel need to be addressed, without turning this into a "how to" article. Personally, I don't think there are ANY lifestyles that are perfectly healthy, they all have their tribulations - --Outlander 18:50, 27 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I guess I am suggesting the article is not neutral regarding D/s. It seems framed in terms favorable to the lifestyle, and the risks mentioned in the safety section are presented on par with tennis elbow and shin splints for athletes. There is little content in the article that would suggest or give voice to the idea that anyone considers D/s itself an inherently unhealthy modality for relationships. (The introductory passage does state it's a "paraphilia" but this is not elaborated upon.) In many other topics found on Wikipedia there is a "controversies" or "arguments against" section which represents those viewpoints. But the totality of external references here are pro-D/s are advocacy resources. At the very least it would be nice to see some indication of how many people practice D/s (5%? 75%?), to put it in context.

I'm not aware of any anti-D/s factions, perhaps you could elucidate. Most of the anti-SM groups ignore D/s. Even most churches don't have a problem with strict D/s, as long as it's done within a heterosexual marriage. As for statistics for how many people practice this, it's nearly impossible to count as people don't generally make this sort of thing public. It's also hard to determine what is a "strict household" and what is a "D/s household" . Perhaps Kinsey got some numbers, I don't know if he interviewed people on the topic. I'll have to look. --Outlander 15:36, 29 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

................................. New Poster:

To respond to "BDSM refers to Bondage, dicipline, domination, submission, sadism and masochism, and as such it accurate to describe D/s as "considered part of the BDSM group of paraphilias"."

You are mistaken. Despite the opinion of a few, while mainstrean BDSM does happen to contain the letters DS, it does not contain D/s. Do a history on The term D/s. It was not in use at all at the time that the term BDSM was coined and popularized, which occured in the circulation of papers advertising those which sought for play partners in the 1970's and sought to describe a list of frequently interelated playstyles. Prior to the term "BDSM" It began on both the East Coast (NY) and West Coast (CA) with the individual terms B&D and S&M which were later consolidated into BDSM , meaning Bondage and Discipline and/or Sadism and Machosism.

Moreover, the term D/s is not D & S. The letters cannot stand individually. The D is capitalized but the /s is in the primary position as a denominator, thus the elements of the term are unified into one in an interdependent and symbiotic relationship. D/s is a descriptive term defining the willingness of the partners to engage in a acknowleged and strategic and definitive redistribution of power during the course of the interaction, at varying levels, times and intensity depending on each couples preferences.

The term was coined in the 1980's but in reality the dynamic was used both within and outside of the BDSM communities throughout history. The most common recorded application being within the realm of religion, where one or the other partner is encouraged to yeild or "submit themselves" to the preferences of ones partner. Perhaps it goes back even futher, animals including human ones have a core instinct to dominate or submit, run, or attack.

Also, why should there be "two" D/s's... one BDSM D/s and one "non BDSM" D/s, when the dynamic is one simple dynamic at the core, a disclosure that one partner will be submitting to the preferences of the other to some degree?

The fact that some BDSM play partners use a D/s dynamic does not alter the crux of the dynamic. The discussion of D/s should reveal it as simply "applicable to" BDSM "And many other popular lifestyles and situations" and "an integral element to some BDSM relationships". Thus it would make more sense to either Include is as a sub discussion of BDSM without it's own page, or better yet, give it it's own heading without BDSM and then link to BDSM from it's description/ content.

To consider an acknowledged D/s framework in a relationship equal to a "paraphilia" is to be unaware of the definition of either D/s or "paraphilia". Even applying the term to BDSM should be done with greater discrimination -- one should not fail to mention that many professionals, M.D.s and Ph.Ds disagree with such as sweeping catagorization of mainstream BDSM. and for good reason. With the advent of the internet it is now becomming more apparent that many activities are far more the norm than once supposed.

Also some endeavors once thought to be "paraphilia" are actually seen as healthy active fantasy outlets by professional contemporaries, when undertaken by healthy consenting adults. For example. the dictionary term "humiliation" is NOT the same as the term as applied by mainstream BDSMers. It differs greatly in it's intent, effect, application execution and result. It is actually thus "play" humiliation" or "Staged Humiliation Scenes". Making my girlfriend eat gummyworms from a plate on the floor whilst I "taunt" her, or calling her my "nasty little nymph" while lovemaking for example. (I don't do those terrible things, chill out).

Shine the Light 4ever

~ Lord Sage, Builder of the Inner Cathedral

My, what an impressive honorific.

As for the acronym BDSM, I refer you to the Wikipedia article BDSM and the relevant references.

As for the term D&S, it is short for Domination and submission, a popular term. I just ran a Google search and came up with 2,270,000 hits, so it is clearly not unheard of. Please note that, as stated in the article, not everyone adheres to the internet capitalization convention.

As for the "two" D/s's, there are clearly situations where a D/s relationship occurs outside of BDSM, such as in the military or in religious orders. The dynamic there can be clearly different than in a BDSM-based D/s.

As for the "BDSM group of paraphilias", the DSM and most professionals define them as such. One should remember that even the DSM-IV acknowledges that a paraphilia is not necessarily pathological, and can be a "healthy active fantasy outlet" if it does not cause undo distress. Please refer to the DSM-IV-TR under sections 302.83 and 302.84 --Outlander 21:57, 11 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

While the DSM is definitely a useful reference point let us also recall that it's an arguable and oft-argued standard. Most importantly, they are definitions of distinctions noted within contexts that land folks in therapy. I mention this because of the sheer volume of people I have known who have taken various aspects of BDSM, D/s and M/s as means to compensate issues that would otherwise have them bottoming to a therp. :P

I often think of BDSM (in the largest, most inclusive sense) as an identifiable culture with it's own particular set of ethics revolving around trust, consent and limits, with a partular emphasis on mentioning unmentionables so that one does not accidentally do the unspeakable.

The problem with defining BDSM practice and culture in relation to paraphelias is that there is an implication (to those who are neither psycholgists nor players nor lifestylers) that the behaviours themselves are inherntly "sick," when far more often, the opposite is true, that having such desires and remaining outside of a context that allows their ethical exploration and exprssion is that leads to unfortunate life experiences. --Firewheel 17:58, 24 January 2006 (UTC) (aka Bob King)[reply]

I've done a bit of reworking, trying to clean up the article, based on comments etc.

The introduction was long, and included a long section which can basically be summarized as "BDSM relationship styles", Ive moved that to its own section, cleaned up the intro a little, and added an overview to D/s.

I've also moved the "consent" stuff to its own article Consent (BDSM) (needs its own article, being so significant and having siverse issues, legal etc). Can someone precis the current text in this article to remove unnecessary duplication while leaving what's needed "bare bones"? Thanks

Last, doesn't a lot of this artuicle belong in BDSM generally, rather than specifically under D/s only? Wrong article? "More background can be found in the article on BDSM"? Or worth duplicating? FT2 04:21, 17 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Hey--no mention of Sade in the history section? Seems like a pretty big hole! He's an important guy for all this.

No, he is not. Sade was a sad(e)ist, not a fan of D/s :P Perhaps historie d'o is a bit more accurate, but I doubt it :P Redk 00:44, 16 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

My experiences tells me that this is not true at all. There are almost exactly as many submissives as there are doms, and it is evenly distributed at the two genders. I could point to an old thread at a forum (the BDSM-forum at helgon.net, you need an account to get access) where they asked the users about their preferenses in D/s. The result was very close to 50% on each gender. However, this does not feel like a really waterproof evidence :/ Anyways, just walk into a club and see for yourself :P - - - *eats panncakes with icecream* Redk 00:44, 16 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Ok, so no one has said anything else about this for 20 days now, so I change it then :P ;D Redk 20:31, 6 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]