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Peter Masters |
Peter Masters |
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| About me | About this site | My books |  |
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Archetypes, Forms and Images
| Penetration |
| Engagement |
| Consent |
| Communication |
| Power |
| Authority |
| Control |
| Trust |
| Fetish |
| Defence mechanisms |
| Mapping motivations to activities |
Images are pictures we have in our minds about how other people should appear and behave. These pictures aren't merely like two-dimensional photographs, or three-dimensional static sculptures. Instead, the pictures we have in our mind contain details of physical appearance, size, behaviour, clothing, and all the attributes which we would normally associate with a real person.
If we talk about, say, a Farmer, then we each might come up with a picture of a man sitting on a tractor, wearing overalls and a straw hat, driving through a field of wheat. Or we might see a man sitting on a stool in a barn, milking a cow. We know generally how he's going to talk, what he's going to be interested in, how he behaves, and so on. Now, this image we have in our minds about how a farmer appears and how he behaves helps us recognise a real farmer when we see one. Undoubtedly a real farmer isn't going to exactly match the image in our mind---he might be wearing a different shirt, for example, or he might actually be a she---but we know the basic characteristics and when a real farmer comes along we recognise a match.
In the BDSM world, and once we have a bit of experience with others who are also into BDSM, we develop our own images of how a Dominant should be, how a Submissive should be, and so on. I remind you that this isn't just how they look. It's also how they behave. With these images in our minds, when we see someone at a BDSM social event or party, even without speaking to them at all, just by seeing them and how they behave, we recognise them and start responding to them.
This latter point is important. Someone doesn't need to be a dominant for a submissive to start responding as if they were. It is enough that they seem to be a dominant. Someone could learn the right words to say, the right things to do, and the right clothes to wear, and this would get a positive reaction out of many submissives.
If the person isn't really a dominant, then what is the submissive responding to? And how much of a dominant does a submissive need to see for them to start reacting as if the person were a dominant? Is it just the clothes? Is it enough to talk like a dominant?
The answer has to do with how well the submissive can fill in the gaps that the faux-dominant has, with the necessary elements from her own image of a dominant. It also depends on how much of a need the submissive feels to engage a dominant. The more of a need or hunger she feels, the more likely she is to trigger with less than a real dominant.
The ability to fill in the gaps is important, too. It's common for a needy submissive to start responding to a new dominant, such as someone at a play party, just by seeing them, much less actually meeting and talking with them. This is because the submissive projects their idea of an ideal dominant onto the shape of this possible-dominant and then they respond to that.
Of course, this same thing can happen with dominants who begin to respond dominantly to someone who is merely dressed as they think a submissive would dress, even if this possible-submissive actually isn't one.
There are, as I said above, two factors in this:
- How closely the possible-dominant or possible-submissive resembles the ideal image of a dominant or submissive in the person's mind, and
- How much of need the person feels to meet up with and engage a dominant or submissive. The more their need, the more they'll consciously or unconsciously fill in the blanks from their own conception or ideal image.
It's clear that a person--say, a dominant---who is fully satisfied in the submissive department is not going to respond even to a real submissive, much less a faux-submissive, because they have no need to do so. However, someone who is hungry for attention or in need of some form of BDSM engagement is likely to indulge---consciously or unconsciously---in some wishful thinking and imagine that the person they see before them is actually the real deal... and respond as if they were.
