Femdom Resource – Page 199 – The beauty of dominant women

A sad week

This hasn’t been the best of weeks. Robin Williams’ death was a shocking piece of news. I liked some of his films, but wouldn’t have described myself as a fan until I saw him live a few years back. It was at a small club in Seattle and I went just because friends had somehow scored tickets. I thought it’d make for a pleasant and amusing evening out. I ended up in tears of laughter. He had such an incredibly energy on the stage. I’ve seen many famous comedians over the years, but none had the kind of intensity he created. Heartbreaking that such a talent could die the way he did.

Following that came news of Lauren Bacall’s death. She at least passed on naturally after a long and eventful life, but it was still a sad moment. She was one of the great talents and characters of Hollywood. I loved her movies, particularly the ones she played opposite Humphrey Bogart. I think this quote about her granddaughter dragging her to see the recent Twilight flicks sums up her personality beautifully.

“She said it was the greatest vampire film ever made,” Bacall recalled. “After the film was over, I wanted to smack her across the head with my shoe.”

The first image below, with a bit of Bogart bondage, is from The Big Sleep. That has the unique characteristic of being one of my favorite movies and also one of my favorite books. The second image looks like a publicity shot. To paraphrase the great Raymond Chandler, she gives me a look I can feel in my hip pocket. In fact it’s almost impossible to find a photograph she doesn’t look amazing in (for example these two shots here and here).

Thanks for all the memories Robin and Lauren.

In the tank

Here’s my final water themed post for the foreseeable future. Seattle has now returned to its traditional rain and, more significantly, I’ve run out of interesting water images to feature.

I like this combination of heavy chains and water. There’s a nice duality to the idea of chains as both bondage and a weight pulling him under. The big glass tank is also pretty cool. I really think kinky porn studios should invest more in unusual equipment and visual impressive scenes. Regular movies range from intimate character driven dramas through to crazy over-the-top special effect extravaganzas. In contrast most porn is somewhere between an Adam Sandler comedy and a Will Ferrell comedy. i.e. Middle of the road crap to middle of the road occasionally good. I’m not going to hold my breath for the porn version of a Jim Jarmusch movie, but surely creating a visually striking Luc Besson equivalent is not beyond the wit of a big kink studio.

This is obviously a Divine Bitches shoot. I believe it feature Wolf Hudson and Mistress Isis. It’s not often you see a swimmer’s nose clip in a porn shoot.

Bobbing for apples

It continues to be about eleventeen bajillion degrees in Seattle (apologies if my highly scientific terms are too confusing). It has also been a couple of weeks since I did anything kinky. Or at least anything kinky involving another person. Having my portable fan topple onto the bed when I was jerking off almost qualified as CBT, but coming close to inadvertent circumcision by domestic appliance isn’t really a fetish of mine.

This excess of heat and dearth of kink is making me antsy and grouchy. I realize there are now many kink deprived readers from hot parts of the world cursing at their monitors after having read that. As problems go it’s not the worst one to have, but it’s my blog, and I’ll whine if I want to.

As for posts, I’m therefore maintaining the hunt for cool refreshing femdom. This one from Divine Bitches is an intriguing but odd image. I like the fountain, but why the head first dunk? He looks like he’s playing the old Halloween game of bobbing for apples. Perhaps she has thrown his chastity key in there?

I found this on the Femdom Times site.

A refreshing dip

It’s insanely warm in Seattle right now. At least by the local standards. My apartment temperature control claims it’s 83F, and that’s at 2:30 in the morning. So while this image might typically be seen to be an intense type of breathplay, right now to me it looks like a very refreshing dip. I could really use someone shoving my head into an icy tub of water.

As the not particularly subtle watermark suggests, this is from Mistress Kawa. She’s a Spanish based Mistress. I found it via the Felm Cyber tumblr.

DomCon LA

Another day, another post, another movie. This one is a little different to the last two, as it’s just a short clip taken at DomCon in LA this year. It’s a time lapse movie showing around 70 dommes assembling for a group photograph, put together by Alice in BondageLand. I thought it was kind of fun, particularly if you know enough faces to play spot the domme.

I couldn’t locate a good photograph of the 2014 shot, so this this image is actually from the same event in 2012. It again comes courtesy of Mistress Alice in BondageLand

My Mistress

On the continuing topic of movies, although in a less family friendly vein, is a new Australian feature entitled My Mistress. It stars Harrison Gilbertson as a troubled teenage boy and Emmanuelle Béart as the beautiful dominatrix who lives down the street. I haven’t seen any reviews for it yet, but you can watch the trailer here.

Much as I enjoy seeing Emmanuelle Béart in tight latex and high heeled boots, it’s a shame the dominatrix tropes are so inextricably woven into the idea of domination and kink. It’d be nice to see a movie where kink and femdom wasn’t tied to professional dominance, and where the leading lady didn’t look like she’d be equally at home playing catwoman. Despite all that, the movie does look like an interesting one to watch out for.

Frozen

Lacking any children to entertain I’ve not seen the latest Disney hit Frozen. While I’ve no plans to remedy that anytime soon, I was intrigued to read about a set of handcuffs somebody had built based on those used in the movie. They’re apparently designed to prevent wizardly powers being invoked, and are therefore fearsome metal mittens that cover the entire hand. They even come with a fancy carry case. The effort put into them is impressive, but I wonder if turning up with a BDSM device modeled after a scene in a children’s movie might be more creepy than cool.

This young lady seems to have some wizardly powers all of her own. I’m not sure if she’s responsible for the snow itself, but she’s certainly responsible for making all the gentleman’s clothes disappear. I just hope she’s got an equally good spell for making those high heeled boots grip on icy ground.

Fatal Attraction

After the verbiage of the last two posts, here’s a little eye candy. These striking images are by the photographer Lyn Averson, who also posts on Deviant Art under the account yourloveleaves. They’re from a series called Fatal Attraction, a name which makes more sense when you see one of the later images in the series.

Following up on the flip side

Yesterday’s post featured a rather depressing article on the experiences of four dommes working in commercial BDSM houses. I thought I’d follow it up with some personal comments on the topic.

For those that are unaware of the professional BDSM business, I should explain that there are basically two types of pro-domme – independent and house. The difference rests in who actually owns the business. An independent domme is her own boss. She handles advertising, client screening, scheduling, sourcing equipment, providing a suitable playspace and (obviously) the session itself. In contrast a house domme works as an independent contractor for a commercial dungeon. The management of the dungeon handles the business side of maintaining the space and attracting clients. A domme will typically work a shift and negotiate sessions as clients appear. Anyone can show up at a commercial dungeon at almost any time and get to play, where independent dommes schedule in advance and may require days or even weeks of notice.

I always play with independent dommes. I’ve never seen any reason to do otherwise. My rational is simultaneously altruistic and selfish.

I know where the money is going, and it’s 100% to the person I play with. A commercial house takes a large cut of a session fee and I’ve no way of knowing exactly who is getting that money.
I get to play with someone who has demonstrated a degree of commitment to her profession. Managing a successful small business is hard work and, as mentioned in prior posts, I’ve endless respect for the skills necessary to operate as a successful pro-domme. In contrast the screening and training for dommes in a commerical house can be vague to almost non-existent. I might get someone with years of experience, or it might be someone who looks good in heels and just got handed their first whip.
I can build a relationship with a domme. Dommes in commercial houses can have regular clients, but if I’m going to play with one person frequently, it’s much easier if I can schedule and negotiate with that person on a 1 to 1 basis.

None of this is to say that there aren’t talented dommes working in commercial dungeons. For example, readers of Miss Margo’s blog will be much aware of her undoubted BDSM skills, as well as her complex feelings about the space she worked. It’s also true that many independents started in a commercial dungeon, and that well run dungeons do exist. My problem as a client is that I’ve got no way of identifying those cases. Even if I was guaranteed a fantastic experience with a talented domme, I wouldn’t want to do it anywhere that mistreats its employees. Whether it’s my mechanic, lawyer or barista, I always bias to small and independent concerns, and I think that’s a particularly important policy when it comes to sex work.

This is another image taken by Susan Meiselas at New York’s Pandoras Box in 1995. You can see the full set of photographs here (note that there are 2 pages worth).

The flip side

Over the last couple of years I’ve written a lot of posts about positive experiences of professional domination. That’s not a matter of selective editing. From my perspective, as a client playing with independent dommes, my experiences have been overwhelmingly positive. However, I think it would be remiss of me to not feature articles that show a less positive side of the profession. One such article is ‘The Commercial Dungeon Experience: Abusive Management And Exploitation‘ hosted by the Tits and Sass site. It features four dommes who experienced some fairly horrendous treatment in commercial houses.

I may post some follow-up thoughts tomorrow, but for now I’ll just offer the link as reading material. If you’re at all involved in sex work (on either side of the transaction) then the Tits and Sass site is generally well worth reading. Although if you’re on the client side of the equation I strongly suggest limiting yourself purely to reading, and not butting into the discussion.

The image below is by the photographer Susan Meiselas and was taken at NYC’s Pandora’s Box in associated with the Nick Broomfield documentary Fetishes. Note that I’ve no idea where the four dommes in the article worked and I’m not implying a connection between the article and that particular house. It just seemed a suitable image to use, given that it’s one of the most well known houses in NYC, and the documentary is one of the most well known representations of a commerical BDSM house. This was from back in 1995.