Answer to Maymay: On being bondage furniture

This started out as a comment, answering Maymay's blog entry "On Being Bondage Furniture". However, it turned out so long and then started talking more about me than about him, and so I'm making it into one of my own blog entries in stead.

I read all your blog entries, but I don't comment much. This seemed like the right time to change that.

My first reaction was "oh, you poor man!". You trigger every instinct in my body to protect and nurture the people I care about. You've had so many bad experiences, felt so lonely and sad, and I just wish there was something I could do. And yes, that might sound odd, seeing as all I've ever done is read your blog, but I have come to care about you. At least the "you" that you show in your blog and twitter comments. I've grown to respect you.

You've tought me to see the BDSM scene (and the world in general) with a new pair of eyes. I notice things now that I didn't before. And because of you, and the things you've tought me, I've realised that your story is just one of many, many others out there. There are so many submissive men who experience similar things. And so, if I can't help you, then at least I can try to help some of them.

The problem, for me, is that I too have been burned. I've met the real creeps, the guys to presented themselves as submissive but just wanted to top. The desperate, submissive guys who turned into stalkers. The guys who didn't want to use safewords in play, or who kept pushing me to do stuff I wasn't comfortable with, or who just wouldn't take no for an answer. I have recieved countless mass-produced messages on various BDSM sites and forums, from submissive men who haven't even bothered to read my profile.

And I know, logically, that most submissive men out there are like you: Kind, intelligent, respectful, who see others as humans first and their roles second. But because I have been burned, I keep being afraid of meeting just another creep. And this makes me afraid of even trying. This scares me, and other female doms/switches I know away from the scene.

But really, there isn't much to do about this, is there? It makes me sad.