Have you ever felt stigmatized for being a switch or sub?

[NR47]

So as a heterosexual guy, I've often felt over the years in different bondage/SM forums online that guys like me who enjoys getting tied up sometimes, or those who like being submissive all the time are criticized or laughed at for having such desires, and mostly by women on the forums rather than men. I've gotten some pretty blatant insults, both online and in real life, for expressing my desire to get tied up from time to time. I'm lucky to have a wife now who is very open minded and accepting, and though she is usually the submissive in our relationship, she's more than willing to tie me up when I feel the need for it. Ever since I was interested in bondage I've had the desire to experience both dominance and submission, and I don't think there's anything abnormal or wrong about that.

[BlissfulMisery]

Before saying anything else, I am so sorry that you have had to deal with this sort of stigmatization (and I have certainly seen examples of it myself on occasion). Unfortunately being rejected by others for expressing some aspect of ones core identity is still an all too common experience for people into kink, and it certainly stings worse when it comes from fellow kinksters (and this can take many forms - male submission is not the only kink that is often stigmatized).

At the end of the day I suspect the main cause of these sorts of responses stems from the simple fact that men being submissive is a contradiction of commonly held beliefs about gender roles. While yes, people into kink *tend* to be more open minded about such things on average for what I think are self-evident reasons, unfortunately this does not apply to everyone, and like it or not you will always remember the bad interactions over the hundred cases where nobody says anything.

The insults stem from a defensive reaction - your existence as a (sometimes) submissive man inherently contradicts their fundamental world view that 'all men are a certain way/expected to act a certain way and that is just how it is'. And whenever someones core beliefs are challenged, especially if the person in question is insecure in some way, the near-universal response is to lash out, to attack or try to tear down the thing (or in this case person) that makes them uncomfortable. Anger in response to a perceived threat, although the threat in this case is psychological, to the ego, and to the comfort one can take in the world being simple and 'well-ordered' where everything is straightforward and clear. Even if reality is never so simple nor convenient, and stubbornly refuses to always play into our various comfortable self-delusions.

On occasion, there may also be some element of playing into the common kink *stereotype* that 'all straight submissive men love to be insulted/demeaned'. To be very clear, I do not mean that they are 'trying to do you a favor' or anything like that (consent blah blah blah), but that the exact *nature* of how they react is likely colored by this. Much easier to justify/excuse being cruel when you can tell yourself 'well he probably likes that kind of thing anyways'.

Caveat: obviously the above does not describe everyone. With anything like this, the best one can really do is speak in generalizations/broad strokes.

[NR47]

Before saying anything else, I am so sorry that you have had to deal with this sort of stigmatization (and I have certainly seen examples of it myself on occasion). Unfortunately being rejected by others for expressing some aspect of ones core identity is still an all too common experience for people into kink, and it certainly stings worse when it comes from fellow kinksters (and this can take many forms - male submission is not the only kink that is often stigmatized).

At the end of the day I suspect the main cause of these sorts of responses stems from the simple fact that men being submissive is a contradiction of commonly held beliefs about gender roles. While yes, people into kink *tend* to be more open minded about such things on average for what I think are self-evident reasons, unfortunately this does not apply to everyone, and like it or not you will always remember the bad interactions over the hundred cases where nobody says anything.

The insults stem from a defensive reaction - your existence as a (sometimes) submissive man inherently contradicts their fundamental world view that 'all men are a certain way/expected to act a certain way and that is just how it is'. And whenever someones core beliefs are challenged, especially if the person in question is insecure in some way, the near-universal response is to lash out, to attack or try to tear down the thing (or in this case person) that makes them uncomfortable. Anger in response to a perceived threat, although the threat in this case is psychological, to the ego, and to the comfort one can take in the world being simple and 'well-ordered' where everything is straightforward and clear. Even if reality is never so simple nor convenient, and stubbornly refuses to always play into our various comfortable self-delusions.

On occasion, there may also be some element of playing into the common kink *stereotype* that 'all straight submissive men love to be insulted/demeaned'. To be very clear, I do not mean that they are 'trying to do you a favor' or anything like that (consent blah blah blah), but that the exact *nature* of how they react is likely colored by this. Much easier to justify/excuse being cruel when you can tell yourself 'well he probably likes that kind of thing anyways'.

Caveat: obviously the above does not describe everyone. With anything like this, the best one can really do is speak in generalizations/broad strokes.

I agree with your ideas. I think Freud was definitely on to something when he spoke about the element of feminine and masculine which is inherent in every human being, but I think this is still not well understood in western society and most men where I have lived seem to do their best to overemphasize their masculinity, probably out of a fear of being seen as too feminine or weak in some way. I'm not even talking about sexual orientation but rather the outward image we project and how people perceive us. I for my part have gotten beyond that and could care less about how other people view me. I think it's healthy to be ok with both of these elements within ourselves.

[BlissfulMisery]

To be honest I would argue that even looking at it as 'feminine vs masculine' elements is missing the point. The loose collection of personality traits that are grouped under either are hardly restricted to a particular gender in practice - while you can sometimes make generalizations, each individual ends up being fairly unique, which points to (but does not prove of course) it coming down to life experience and upbringing more then some innate immovable qualities determined by gender.

But pseudo-philosophical ramblings aside...

most men where I have lived seem to do their best to overemphasize their masculinity, probably out of a fear of being seen as too feminine or weak in some way.

Unfortunately a far too common thing... I feel sad for those trapped in that mindset as it is a terrible place to be in mentally, to feel as if you are constantly being judged and have to behave in specific ways to pass some arbitrary standard among your peers. Of course it is not so easy to break out of/avoid that, given how society/culture does its best to condition towards such thinking, and I think 'we' have long underestimated (and continue to) the kind of damage this causes in the long term, both in terms of individual psychological harm, and in terms of the wider ramifications on society.

But of course there are plenty of reasons as to why these attitudes stick around (a major one being the circular self-reinforcing nature of it all).

[NR47]

Of course upbringing plays a significant role in the formation of one's sexual characteristics, however I would argue that evolution plays an equally if not more important role. We have recently discovered remains of modern humans as old as 366000 years, so we know as far back as that humans had brains that functioned on the same level as ours do today. What really interests me is how much of our fetishes and sexual practices have ties to some ancient past, and how they continue to evolve today.

[BlissfulMisery]

Well I was speaking more broadly in terms of personality/behavior, not so much about kinks specifically.

But on that subject...

It seems self-evident that many specific kinks are rooted in culture and upbringing. It stretches credulity to think that kinks/fetishes revolving around things like costumes (uniforms like police, soldiers, nurses, doctors, maids), or things like pet play, or even bondage are somehow hard-wired into the brain from thousands of years ago when such concepts did not even exist - there was no rope back then after all. And those are just a few basic examples, obviously there are too many more where the same logic would apply to list them all.

For obvious reasons it is a somewhat understudied area of psychology, but it is suspected that kinks develop in tandem with sexuality, based on exposure to stimuli, timing, and context. Which makes sense - infants are essentially a blank slate, ready to adapt to nearly any environment they end up finding themselves in, and it makes sense that sexuality would be similar, rather then entirely 'hard-coded' (which also explains the resulting variety in such). After all, it is not an uncommon experience for people on this board to have developed an (usually platonic due to the age it happened) interest in bondage through seeing a bondage scene in some form of media, or experiencing it as part of a childhood game. Although I do not think this theory is a full explanation, as there are certainly people for whom there was no obvious 'trigger' and they had had such thoughts as far as back as they could recall (although it is possible it happened so early as to not be remembered).

I do think the line gets a lot blurrier when you talk about broader categories like dominance/submission or sadomasochism, since with things like that it is at least more plausible there is some core evolutionary root (after all, establishing hierarchies is pretty fundamental to human nature), even if said root is only tenuously connected to the end results. Certainly an interesting thought, but hard to prove either way.

But I suppose I should refrain from straying even further from the original topic

[GagFan96]

I have definitely seen instances of that stigmatization online luckily I have not personally had to deal with any of that myself but I do understand and sympathize with you're concern. I truly hope your experience on this site is better than some of your previous experiences. That being said I'm not necessarily the target audience for this post as I myself am a bisexual male.

[BlissfulMisery]

That being said I'm not necessarily the target audience for this post as I myself am a bisexual male.

Well if we are going by that logic I should also not be posting here. But it would be a far more boring world if nobody ever wandered outside their usual circles

To be honest, surprised at the lukewarm reaction to the thread - I have heard of enough second hand examples to think that there would be multiple forum members who have had experiences like this at some point or another.

[GagFan96]

That being said I'm not necessarily the target audience for this post as I myself am a bisexual male.

Well if we are going by that logic I should also not be posting here. But it would be a far more boring world if nobody ever wandered outside their usual circles

To be honest, surprised at the lukewarm reaction to the thread - I have heard of enough second hand examples to think that there would be multiple forum members who have had experiences like this at some point or another.

I agree the lack of response is not what I would've expected.

[NR47]

Perhaps people just prefer not to think about those negative experiences. I just was interested in other people's input because I remember in particular when I asked a question on the online forum "Girls ask Guys" a question to the effect of, "Girls, do you like to be tied up in bed by a guy?"...The response was overwhelmingly positive. But a week later I asked the question, "Girls, would you ever tie up a man during sex?" I couldn't believe the amount of negative responses, some downright aggressive in nature and very rude. As if a male was not a male unless he always displayed a dominant personality. It quite surprised me because I somehow assumed people in the UK, where most of the responses were from, were more open about these gender role issues. I grew up in the Midwestern United States around men who seem to do everything they can to seem more masculine, and where something as simple as bleached hair or tight fitting clothing is enough to get you ostracized from society if you are male. So I always was interested in the psychology behind such behaviors, how they came to be in the first place, and why it's still such a big fear to be one's true self, rather than putting up a facade all the time. I guess in that respect people are often very much products of the societies they grow up in, although I'm somewhat of an exception.

[captured_prize]

Sorry you had to go through that. Fortunately, I haven't experienced this on here, as everyone here as been very supportive. Not only do I like being tied up, but I also like crossdressing, so the stigmazation goes double for me. I don't think there is anything wrong with a man wanting to be a switch or a sub. You like what you like. After all, there is no stigma against women wanting to be dominant, so why should there be a stimga against men wanting to be submissive? It's because as a society men are supposed to be strong and dominant all the time no matter what. The way I see it, men don't have to be strong and dominant all the time, just when they have to be.

[tiedinbluetights]

As a heterosexual submissive male myself, most of my life the real stigmatization I have felt was mostly societal and turned inward on myself.

By that I mean that aside from this forum, and one other forum that shall remain nameless, no one online knows about my "tiedinbluetights" persona. On this forum, it only ever happened to me once, a single post by a new user, which I did report and said post was indeed deleted by the mod team. So aside from that single incident, this forum has been very open minded and receptive.

In real life however, the only persons to whom I've ever admitted are my mom, when I had a frank discussion with her about how these interests fo mine may have come about, and my wife, shortly after we have started dating. In both cases the reactions were sympathethic, empathic, non-judgemental. I guess I've been lucky.

However, that did not prevent the feelings of shame I've had all my life, even to this day, as if something is fundementally wrong with me for wanting to be tied-up by women, submissive to women, all why I'm wearing tights, leotards, and a corset. Those feelings of shame come from societal depictions of what men in general, and men that have my build and stature in particular, ought to behave like. So I have felt stigmatized not because of any single interaction with individuals, but from sheer societal-pressure. A forum like this one has almost always been a safe haven. So while I sometimes toy with the idea of just leaving this forum, I always end up returning to it.

In the end, I'm grateful for my lovely understanding wife in RL, and to the open-minded and welcoming community of this forum in the onine-scape.

[NR47]

As a heterosexual submissive male myself, most of my life the real stigmatization I have felt was mostly societal and turned inward on myself.

By that I mean that aside from this forum, and one other forum that shall remain nameless, no one online knows about my "tiedinbluetights" persona. On this forum, it only ever happened to me once, a single post by a new user, which I did report and said post was indeed deleted by the mod team. So aside from that single incident, this forum has been very open minded and receptive.

In real life however, the only persons to whom I've ever admitted are my mom, when I had a frank discussion with her about how these interests fo mine may have come about, and my wife, shortly after we have started dating. In both cases the reactions were sympathethic, empathic, non-judgemental. I guess I've been lucky.

However, that did not prevent the feelings of shame I've had all my life, even to this day, as if something is fundementally wrong with me for wanting to be tied-up by women, submissive to women, all why I'm wearing tights, leotards, and a corset. Those feelings of shame come from societal depictions of what men in general, and men that have my build and stature in particular, ought to behave like. So I have felt stigmatized not because of any single interaction with individuals, but from sheer societal-pressure. A forum like this one has almost always been a safe haven. So while I sometimes toy with the idea of just leaving this forum, I always end up returning to it.

In the end, I'm grateful for my lovely understanding wife in RL, and to the open-minded and welcoming community of this forum in the onine-scape.

It's great that your wife is open and supportive regarding your sexual desires. I personally feel that in many societies men are expected to be sort of "hyper masculine" and we sometimes can feel ashamed if we don't fit with this image. I personally see aspects of both feminine and masculine in my character, and sexuality. One day I might wear some cotton boxer briefs and the next day I throw on a satin jockstrap. I feel just as comfortable in one as I do in the other, it just depends entirely on my mood. The same goes for bondage, whether I'm the one being dominant or submissive. I think the main thing is having a partner who is not going to judge when we don't exactly fit the male stereotype, and who we can have that close intimate connection with while exploring our sexuality.

[StrugglingSue]

I don't feel that I'm submissive, though I do love being bound, lol.

It's an interesting question; I've been cut out of relationships because of this, but it's been rare.

But now I'm wondering how many people who know about my interests privately look down on me, and talk about me behind my back. I suppose I'll never know.

I guess I'm okay with that. Maybe, lol.