I ran across an internet poster the other day: you know, one of those images with a clever caption photoshopped across it. (Aside: Adobe must just be driven mad by the non-trademark uses of "photoshop.") It was attempting to make a striking statement about the kind of relationship often characterized as “dominant/submissive.”
It said, as best I can recall: It’s simple. I tell you what to do, and you answer “Yes, Sir.”
That is just so wrong.
Exercise for the reader: why is it that the rarest words for a good submissive girl to utter are “Yes, Sir”?
Anyone care to comment?
— Frenulum
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The military connotations?
ReplyDeleteThat’s a fair guess, and it’s true that there’s nothing military in the owner/belovèd relationship (as I understand it). In that context, “Sir” would tend to imply a relationship born of unequal rank, rather than of love, equality, and non-equivalence.
ReplyDeleteBut the word can denote many other things, without the overtones of rank or rating.
Think of it this way: it happens that my belovèd refers to me as her Sir, and uses Sir as my name — this is what works happily for us. But other couples make other choices, such as Master or Daddy. With none of the military implications, it would be equally rare to hear the good submissive girl in those couples utter “Yes, Master” or “Yes, Daddy.”
I’ll leave the question on the table for a bit, in the hopes of getting a few more voices in the conversation.
Van, thanks for your thoughts!
ReplyDelete
Hm. I say "Yes sir," pretty often, although that tends to be more in response to actual questions:
ReplyDelete"Do you like this?"
"Yes, sir."
Rather than a direction. Generally a direction is followed by merely doing what I am asked.
Exactly.
ReplyDeleteIn response to an order, to say "Yes, Sir" implies that there was an option, a decision on the submissive's part to comply or not — that she was considering and deciding. That option does not exist in the nature of the relationship that I understand.
Order, obedience. Nothing in between.
There is no need or reason for my belovèd to tell me that she will obey me: it is a foundation of how we are together. Even more arousing than her unhesitating compliance is the fact that I have absolute confidence in it.
Full marks :o) and thanks for writing.
Interesting. . . My lovely bride has been addressing me as "Sir" from time to time since the beginning of our courtship. Not because I required it, mind you, but because she knows I like it:) Since we've been married, she has stopped doing so, which was actually vexing me a little! But now I get it- before I had "play" authority; she played along. Now, she's signaling me that my authority is real by simply doing each and every thing I ask of her, immediately. This is deep;)
ReplyDeleteI'm quickly learning that, as a truly natural submissive, she's ahead of the curve on this stuff. Thanks, Prof. Frenulum, for helping me catch up!