Early Monday morning before dawn, back at home from Black Rose and in Eileen‘s arms, I was crying because I felt lonely and invisible. Moments before, out of bitterness and jealousy, I had just said that the people I like were not my friends in scene (kink) spaces. A little while later, I told Eileen parts of the following story. When I was done, she sighed at me and said, “You say these people aren’t your friends, yet you defend them viciously.” This is that story.
I think I met Rona, a relatively young, beautiful, and obviously intelligent woman, the first night in the Black Rose dungeon. It could have been the second night, and it could have been in one of the relaxation areas known as the Oasis Room. I can’t remember exactly because just about the first thing I did on that Friday evening was stand against an X-frame and present my back as the target for singletails and fists.
In any event, sooner or later one evening during the weekend Rona, another new friend, and I were sitting in the Oasis Room talking about some inconsequential thing. Eileen’s new fire-engine red double-locking handcuffs were locked around one of my wrists. With my hand, I fiddled with the open cuff making loud ratcheting noises in the room.
Out of nowhere, a man who shall remain nameless approached our little circle, smiling, and said, “If you’re going to make some noise, do it with some real cuffs!” He handed me a set of heavy metal handcuffs that dwarfed the standard police-issue pair of handcuffs I was playing with.
Immediately, instinctually, I knew I would not like this man. His announcement was clearly not intended for me but for Rona, whom he turned to with a lascivious smile after depositing the enormous set of cuffs in my palms. Pissing contest, I thought to myself. It is thought typical of older men who aren’t kinky to buy sports cars to show off the size of their penis. Perhaps older men who are kinky buy large handcuffs for the same reason.
In an attempt not to be overtly rude I said, “Wow, these are huge.” They also don’t sound any different than mine, I also observed, though I did not say that part out loud.
“Yeah, and they come in different sizes, too,” he said, taking the first pair out of my hands and replacing them with a slightly smaller version.
“Where did you get them, and how much were they?” Why waste my time asking questions one by one when asking related questions in groups might make him more likely to say only those things I cared about hearing? I had to admit, the cuffs were pretty. If I disliked this man’s presence, perhaps I could find some solace in his cool toys at least for a few moments.
Germany, not too expensive, they’ll make ’em custom for you, they’re special because they don’t pull, and he’s got so many because he’s been collecting them for some forty-odd years, I learned. A brief conversation about his toybag developed, during which he called over his slave to bring this or that or the other thing.
By this time, the man was lounging on his side next to us and grabbed every opportunity he could to talk about himself, belaboring points like his experience (some forty-odd years), name-dropping every connection he had, and doing this all while looking at Rona and decidedly not at me or our other (male) friend. The two of us might as well have been invisible, since he seemed to turn towards us with a little start whenever we would say anything in response to him.
“I make her sleep in those cuffs,” he gestured towards his slave while he rambled on and on. “Yeah, they’re comfortable enough, but why should I care? I’m not wearing them.” Oh yeah, I thought to myself, you’re so bad-ass, you definitely have a bigger penis than me. I’m kind of amazed you haven’t creamed your pants fantasizing about yourself already.
This is exactly the kind of thing that would happen to me every Friday and Saturday night in Paddles, New York City’s only public BDSM club, almost all night, for two years straight. (Why I poured money into Paddles’s coffers twice a week for two years straight is another story entirely.) By now I’ve become quite accustomed to that sort of interaction from these kinds of “mandoms” (to steal a term from Bitchy).
These days I take a little more glee in steering the conversations towards topics that I know these men would find uncomfortable, or that might prove amusing at least in some small way. One such highlight I can remember is the following:
Me: I used to live in Manhattan in a 250-square-foot apartment that I shared.
Him: Shared? With someone of the opposite sex, I hope, so it’d be nice to get close!
Me: Well, I’m bisexual, so I’m not particularly concerned with a roommate’s sex.
Him: Oh! Well…I always said bisexual people are the luckiest. My friend, she’s a bisexual switch. She’s got the whole world to play with because bisexuals are all basically sluts!
(I’ll admit to paraphrasing that, but I guarantee you that it sounded even better in person.)
Rona seemed decidedly uninterested in this fellow and had become much less talkative since this man encroached upon our space. His slave, for her part, chimed in frequently with verifications of her master’s claims (“I often cook dinner in those cuffs!”) at what seemed like expertly rehearsed opportune moments.
Back to the cuffs, however, he reiterated their comfort and then asked Rona if he could borrow her wrist. I tensed at this, but a moment later she agreed and allowed her wrist to be cuffed. Up until now this man was a nuisance, obviously hitting on Rona but in no position to be a threat. Of course, we were surrounded by other friends having their own conversations and we were in an environment where safety was on everyone’s mind, even going so far as to have designated volunteers serving as Dungeon Monitors perusing the nearby areas. Nevertheless, there was a line that I felt he had crossed.
Now, I started watching this man’s shoulders and face closely. I watched his shoulders because their movement would be the first sign that he would move his arm, and I watched his face because his eyes would tell me where his attention would focus next and his mouth would tell me a lot about how he was feeling about the thing he was focusing his attention on. If he was going to have my new friend’s wrists cuffed, then I wanted to make sure, as the person physically closest to my new friend, that I could serve as a first line of defense. If this was combat, then this man was an enemy.
Of course, Rona clearly needed no defense in this particular situation, and yet, I was already bracing myself to go all commando on this guy’s ass—that is, assert Rona’s requests, whatever it be, vocally or physically if necessary—the moment a signal from Rona indicated I should do so. Eventually Rona cited exhaustion as an excuse to get him to remove the cuffs. When he started tickling her instead, she quickly became rightfully insistent and he did finally leave us, taking his German cuffs with him. Rona was—and is—fine.
The experience, however, put me in a sour mood. I had been reminded of dozens upon dozens of similar, negative experiences. None that ended any worse than what I just described but negative nonetheless. I was reminded of a few stories my ex-girlfriend had told me, some stories long-distance online friends had told me, and dozens of stories I’d heard elsewhere as well, some of which had ended in worse ways than this one. Most of all, I felt angry.
I was angry about everything that had just happened. The invisibility; the assumption that we—or she—was too stupid to see what this simpleton’s desires were; the roundabout way he felt he had to go about chatting Rona up; the pissing contest he wanted to start—consciously or otherwise—with me. It was all so unnecessary, I think, and so damaging. Maybe not if it were just once, or twice, but after two times a week for two years straight it starts to add up. I’m living, livid proof.
Epilogue: Interested persons might find this post by Rona an interesting followup.
by Rona
05 Dec 2007 at 22:19
So, now I’m going to share my perspective on the story, which is really hardly different at all. We were having this lovely conversation, when Mr. I Have Expensive Toys Don’t You Find Me Shiny decided to come up and take over the conversation. At first I was willing to give him the benefit of the doubt, because they were pretty nifty cuffs, but I became increasingly annoyed at the fact that he was utterly cutting you and the other member of our conversation out of the discussion. Since I was feeling rather exhausted from participating in a scene that I should have thought better of earlier that evening, I put up with it content in my enjoyment of the fact that he was utterly wasting his time (and trying to refrain my desire roll my eyes at you.)
Now, for my own pride, I must say that I would _never_ have put up with being cuffed by an idiot I don’t know in a place where I wasn’t utterly secure in the fact that if I wanted the cuffs off and he ignored me that I would have backup (from the DMs in the next room). However, I was sitting there at the time thinking “am I really so tired that I’m letting him pull this crap on me? I guess I am. I was just planning on going to bed anyway, and although I’m annoyed that he’s killed off the good conversation its way too much work to object to cuffs and other dick-sizing in the form of ‘let me show you my expensive custom made toy.'” I’m more than a little mortified by the fact that, in putting up with it, I let the two of you down. I could see you were getting irritated, but I was too knackered to do anything about it, for which I apologize.
Anyway, so he’s gabbing on and on and we discover that not only is he an ass, he’s an ass who went to high school with my mother. I continue to humor him, because I am, in my sadistic size 2 soul, becoming increasingly amused at the fruitless effort he is putting out to impress me, and then *poof* he goes too far. Yes, the cuffs are nice. Yes, the glove thing is nice. No, you are not going to start tickling me you are going to get your hands off me right now and your cuffs too. I don’t actually remember what I said to him, but I was clearly pissed off at that point and had he not removed the cuffs I rather suspect I would have hit him with them, and then gone and gotten a dungeon monitor. Or possibly gotten the dungeon monitor first. I’m not really sure. I’d like to believe it would have been the former, but that may be 20/20 hindsight.
I write all of the above for two reasons.
The first is to thank you for your impulse to look out for me. There was a time I would have been offended by the implication that I couldn’t look out for myself, but a) you just met me so you had no idea whether or not I could, b) I unfortunately know a hell of a lot of people who can’t, and c) I tend to have the same impulse myself. I watch like a cat to make certain people aren’t getting pounced. I’ve been in the scene for more than 10 years now and while I have met many absolutely delightful people, there is certainly a subset of men who give your average arrogant jerk a bad name. I used to let it get to me. Now, with the wisdom of the slightly aged (*grin*) I tend to be more amused by their sad flailing. Besides, I’d rather they act like jerks to me, since I know I can stand up to it, than focus their attention on someone less experienced who can’t. Mind you, this is also one of the reasons that I spend most of my time in queer kink spaces, because some version of this crap constantly happens at Paddles, it makes me annoyed, and it gets old. My comment to my weekend companion about the man in question was something along the lines of “Why is it that so many dominant men think that submissive women should be honored by any scrap of their attention? Don’t they realize they are as common as warts on a toad?”
The second is to say that several times in the dungeon over the weekend I could see that you were looking unhappy, but I didn’t know what to do about it. My impulse was to go over and hug you and talk to you try to make you feel better, but I’d just met you and it seemed inappropriate or presumptous. Especially since when I’m unhappy in similar ways I desperately don’t want anyone to notice.
Anyway, on the car ride home a non-trivial amount of time was spent discussing the fact that I was so thrilled to have had the chance to meet you and Eileen, and how I had already put you into the friend space in my head – although doing so on such short acquaintance felt terribly presumptuous. It didn’t help that I was a wee bit paranoid about being an annoying blog-reading fan girl. Reading peoples’ blogs often gives you the completely misleading feeling of having known them for ages, and you have to remind yourself that you haven’t. :)
by Elizabeth
05 Dec 2007 at 22:30
Well, first of all, I’m unhappy to see you sad. Grrrrr. The world has too many stupid assholes in it.
FWIW, I find that I sort of like running into to stupid assholes like your handcuff guy nowadays because they are so much fun to take down. I can’t pick on *nice* people, but it’s quite a lot of fun to see people like him get what they deserve.
Hope he makes a sales call on me shortly. I’d know him anywhere.
hugs, E
by Boymeat
05 Dec 2007 at 22:43
The SM scene is nothing more than a micro slice of general society. Unfortunately, due to that, we get our large percentage of assholes. Sad, but true.
Of course, the funny comment I wanted to leave was that there are perfectly nice fellows who you even know here in NYC that have those German cuffs, and would be happy to hand them over and watch others enjoy them for a time. :-)
by maymay
06 Dec 2007 at 01:16
Rona,
That’s not something you I think that you need to apologize for. I could just as easily have slipped away from the conversation as you could have stopped his attentions toward you, but I didn’t. It’s not your job to make sure I enjoy my conversations, it’s mine. :)
Something I wrote in the first paragraph this post deserves a bit of a brief explanation: I think my friends can sense a distance I place between myself and them, and it’s that distance of my own making that causes me to describe them as not-quite-friends in scene spaces, even though I value them beyond measure and acknowledge their friendship. (As an aside, the English language really has such a horrible dearth of words to describe friendship.)
However, that informs two things. First, that even people, like my friends, who can take care of themselves deserve to be defended viciously. In fact, people who I don’t even know, or like, deserve to be defended in that manner—and I’ve done that before, too. Second, that friendship is fluid and that the value I see in people differs from person to person.
For what it’s worth, I noticed that you noticed. Also, with all my years of practice, if I’d had wanted no one to notice, no one would have. ;)
I was thrilled to have met you, too! I only wish we had met sooner. So hey, thanks for commenting.
by maymay
06 Dec 2007 at 01:22
Boymeat,
Very true. This is exactly why I feel just as uncomfortable in everyday society as I do in most of kink society. Frankly, neither environment is much to my liking. Little wonder I feel like so much of this world is not where I should be.
I’m going to remember that. ;)
Elizabeth,
I’ve done that in the past, too, though unlike you and Rona, I don’t find it quite as amusing anymore. Of course, I also get fewer opportunities to do so seeing as how most of these people don’t seem to notice my presence to begin with. Most of my subversion takes the form of perceived innocence.
by Bitchy Jones
06 Dec 2007 at 03:05
Ugh.
Sometimes I really don’t want to share spaces with M/f. It’s not right, to think that way, I guess. But because I am fat and shy and inquisitive and not dressed like a cock, mandoms always hit on me (not that I’m pretty). It makes me really uncomfortable.
by Wendy
06 Dec 2007 at 05:34
Ah Bitchy, you know some men, mandoms or not, will hit on anything with tits. I’m not all that pretty, and rather fat myself, and I’ve gotten it too.
The few times I went to paddles with my boyfriend at the time, we would wind up at a table with me and Franklin, and like, three other guys with half rods staring at my tits and ignoring Franklin, or engaging in token conversation with him. It was creepy, and it was weird, because we were young and new and didn’t really know anyone or anything yet. And I felt bad, coz he thought he was making friends with those guys. Franklin is very sweet and innocent.
May, you know, I totally get your vicious desire to defend your friends. I get the same way about my friends. Its very primal. When I consider someone ‘mine’, and someone else hurt them, it tends to get unpleasant.
Why is it this weekend, everyone seems to be writing about or dealing with fucktardery? Are the stars all wonky again?
by Victor
06 Dec 2007 at 17:46
You met Rona in the Oasis room, I was there. *grin*
While I did see the cuffs, I missed this entire interaction of course, as I was wrapped up in my own conversation. I heard all about it later, mind you. I’ll agree with Wendy and boymeat that it really is just the whole “there are asshats in all parts of human experience” factor. Doesn’t make it any less irritating, of course.
by Mirehn
06 Dec 2007 at 18:12
These people really irritate me. Although I am no a scene-goer, I recognize the type. However I find myself unable to just tell them to go away, which is really what they deserve.
Although I think the moment it went from normal idiot to overstepping the line was definitely the handcuffs. I am, in general, a visitor from a different kink, but if someone had done something like that to me or a friend of mine, it would have certainly made my blood boil. I think you reacted the right way though. But yes, these assholes are everywhere.
Mirehn
by Boston Boy
09 Dec 2007 at 00:41
I’m sorry that someone like that blemished what should have been a purely fun time. But, if possible, my respect for moved up even higher, in that you were ready and willing to fight for your friend, while maintaining self control and respect for your friend’s autonomy. It’s funny how in circumstances like that many people can act in exactly the same way but have entirely different intentions and attitudes; I highly approve of yours, probably because I identify with them. I’ve been put in similar social dynamics with my girl a few times, even given my incomparably smaller scene experience than yours, and am made most uncomfortable by my inexperience, in that I’m not sure how I’m supposed to react. I don’t always know if behavior that seems incredibly presumptuous and rude to me is in fact ok in a sex positive, bdsm crowd. And so I seethe inside, and do nothing, though ready and willing to step in. The fact that I KNOW my girl can take care of herself (heh, I’d count on her to take care of me if I was in trouble) somehow does nothing to relieve my conflicted feelings. I find it comforting and affirming to know that someone like you has somewhat similar feelings.
Assholes be warned, step too far over the line and Maymay will bring it. And unlike me, he knows where the line is. So watch out.
by Boston Boy
09 Dec 2007 at 00:42
Blah, my late night typing and lack of editing strikes again, but I’m sure you’ll figure it all out.
by Dov
15 Dec 2007 at 14:05
Sigh I knew you weren’t doing good and was pretty worried about you.
Yeah guys with big handcuffs the new measure of dick size. In the rope world we have them in the form of the I can do the most people in the air types or the let me show you the knot you should really be using types. Nothing piss’s me off more or kills a space for me when someone comes over and does the im hitting on the person your with routine by waving my (Insert whatever fallacy of greatness here)