Photograph – Femdom Resource

Authenticity

Ivy Harte has published a short substack article on authenticity in pro-domme sessions – Have We Mistaken Unpaid for Authentic? I think it makes a nice company piece to the article on BDSM myths from Lady Vesper I featured last week. Money was actually featured in the last myth there, but I think Ivy Harte offers a slightly different take on the topic.

People sometimes imagine that authenticity and intention exist at opposite ends of a spectrum, as though something carefully crafted must somehow be less real. I don’t think that’s true. We don’t assume a conversation with a therapist is somehow less meaningful because money changed hands.

I’ve riffed before on this topic. There’s a conflation of money with power, where really it should be linked with consent and capacity. Contributing money creates the space and time to play, it doesn’t create power over the play.

When I’m getting pierced by a domme those are authentic needles. It’s not fake blood that comes out. Impact play give authentic bruises. I’m not pretending to be tied down and faking those screams. Nor are there real and fake version of subspace.

People have no trouble untangling money and power in other areas. Buying a theater ticket doesn’t give me the power to direct the play. I could hire a band for a party, and make song suggestions, but I don’t get to control how they play or suggest new lyrics. Only when I comes to BDSM do people get hung up on the idea that money equals power equals control.

This is Goddess Ivy in a shot sourced from her Bluesky feed.

Poised Pose by Pillar

This is one of those images where, as soon as I saw it, I knew I wanted to feature it in a post.

Madam M look as fabulous as she always does. Calm and collected. I also love her chair. That’s a very sexy piece of furniture. Finally, there’s those bound disembodied hands, with the warm organic rope and the hard industrial pillar. There’s a man hidden there somewhere, but he’s simultaneously in the foreground of the shot and also totally absent from it. Beautifully done.

Originally posted here to Madam M’s Bluesky feed. You can find her Loyal Fans here.

Myths

Lady Vesper posted a twitter article on the 6 BDSM myths that make her furious. I think they’re a pretty good set. You read the article for her reasoning but the myths themselves are as follows…

The submissive has all the power because they can stop the scene at any time.
The submissive allows the Dominant to dominate them.
The submissive is the vulnerable one (partly true).
The Dominant is responsible for the submissive’s mental state.
Dominants don’t need safe-words or aftercare.
Money makes real BDSM impure.

The first one here is one of my personal bugbears. I frequently see it quoted online, often by people talking about BDSM to a non-BDSM crowd. I think they believe it makes them sound clever, with special insider knowledge of the dynamic. Ooh, what a clever subversion of expectations!

In reality it’s a nonsense statement. As Lady Vesper points out, it mixes up the concepts of power and consent. Anyone can say no and walk away from the scene at any time. That’s not the same as having the power to direct and control the scene.

I find it particularly annoying because it plays into the idea that dominants are simply fetish dispensers, going through the motions of a scene at the behest of the submissive. It diminishes the agency and desires of the domme, which is really the opposite of what femdom should be about.

This shot of Lady Vesper is from her Twitter feed. You can find links to her Fan sites and Substack here.

The Tingle

The artist (and researcher) CurioBubbles posts fun little comics on Reddit about the human body and why things work the way they do. Worth checking out if you like mixing science education with cute artwork.

I mention it here because a recent comic covered why you can get pins and needles after compression on a part of the body. I always thought it was simply due to blood rushing back, but it turns out it’s a bit more complicated than that. The blood coming back does wake the nerve up, but then the sensation you feel is the nerve basically firing off a bunch of noisy signals as it tries to reconnect with the brain. I’m sure anyone who has played with nipple clamps or similar compression toys can attest to how painful that can be. They hurt a bit going on. They hurt like hell coming off.

I’ve noticed that a lot of dommes can be positively gleeful when it comes to removing clamps that have been on for a time. Rubbing the affected area afterwards is another favorite trick. That really messes with the nerve while it’s still recalibrating!

Image source via tumblr. Not sure who originally created it.

Her Parlour

I like this shot of Miss Courtney for how it plays with the traditional prison / cage set-ups. Often the shots are taken from inside, looking through the bars at a glaring domme. Or an external shot of a domme gloating over her captive. This has a very different dynamic. She’s waiting for you, almost with an invitation to step inside.

It puts me in mind of that old poem – The Spider and the Fly.

“Will you walk into my parlour?” said the Spider to the Fly,
“‘Tis the prettiest little parlour that ever you did spy;
….

Who wouldn’t want to be the fly to this particular spider and her steel web?

You can find Miss Courtney’s professional site here, her twitter feed here and her Loyal Fans here.

Cascading Whip

Here’s some visual loveliness to kick the weekend off with, courtesy of Berlin’s Lady Lexi. I try and avoid posting too many shots of beautiful dommes in fetish wear – there’s plenty of other sites for that. However, I loved the composition of this image so much, I felt I had to share it.

You can Lady Lexi’s professional site here and her link collection here. Image was sourced via this post on her Twitter feed.

DDI

I couldn’t do a series of posts on meeting pro-dommes in the old days without mentioned Domina Directory International – or simply DDI. If cards in phone boxes were the low end of the advertising market, this was definitely the high end. It was professionally printed and distributed, with high quality photographs alongside articles and contact details. I remember play spaces having copies in their entrance rooms, particularly if a domme using the space was featured in it. There were European and US editions, and it was even available to purchase in mainstream outlets.

Unsurprisingly, like a lot of print media, it didn’t survive the coming of the internet. There is still a Twitter feed for them, but the last post was over a decade ago.

Unlike a lot of similar magazines from that era, I’ve yet to find any detailed articles on its history or background. It was pitched as by pro-dommes and for pro-dommes, but exactly who the creators were is unclear to me. Mistress Sidonia has a good tribute post on her Femdom Blog, so check that out if you’re interested in her take on it.

This was #27 of the North American edition, although I can’t see a date on it. The banner along the bottom is indicative of its time.

Pick a Card

My previous post featuring an old pro-domme advertisement, and a comment left on it from Simon, reminded me of this post by the brilliant femdom artist Sardax. It describes the process of seeking a pro-domme in pre-internet days and features the below image, showing the typical sex worker cards you might find in a phonebox or dodgy newsagents.

I remember visiting London in the 90’s and seeing examples of these, but it was a practice already beginning to die out. Unsurprising, given the limited information a card could offer. After all, who’d fancy calling a number on the basis of just “Gas Mask, Leather, Rubber, Boots, etc.” It’s not a lot to go on. The “School Girl Uniform for Sale” is another intriguing one. Did you turn up expecting to put it on? Or for a middle aged sex worker to be wearing it? My favorite is the “1/2 hour of hell” which both catches the eye and gives the advertiser a lot of leeway in delivering the service. It’s the mystery box of cards.

Some Things Never Change

I’m continuing the historical theme with this image. It’s another one from mrunderheel on Twitter. However, in this case it wasn’t the image that caught my eye – although it does feature a very fun phone – but the text. It’s an interesting glimpse into the pro-domme world of the past.

Firstly, there’s the mention of ‘transvestites’. You almost never see that today. Cross-dressing or feminization seem to be current words of choice. I guess transvestite carries too much negative baggage, Rocky Horror usage not withstanding.

Then there’s the use of ‘Greek’ to mean anal sex. That used to be a standard sex worker code word but has gone out of fashion. ‘Slave Greeking’ here presumably means pegging or similar activities.

The acronym S.A.S.E might require some explanation for my readers under 40. That stands for ‘Self Addressed Stamped Envelope’ and was a common request if you were writing to someone and wanted a response. By enclosing an envelope with a stamp you were paying the postage for the reply. I remember it being a standard thing in the 70s and 80s when requesting information.

The part that made laugh and gave me the post title was the phrase – “No pen pals.” I’m assuming this meant don’t waste my time and send me letters expecting a response without paying for a session. Yes, even when it took many days to communicate, and actual pen and ink were required, reply guys and timewasters were still a thing. Self-centered horny men are, sadly, in endless and timeless supply.

You can see the original full size version via this Twitter post.

Thumbscrews

I’m always entertained when I stumble across strange vintage femdom pornography. Often it’s terrible bondage or odd outfits that catch the eye. In this case it’s an unusual means of torture.

I think the original form of a thumbscrew was a small vice, that crushed the fingers. The domme here seems to have taken the screw part of the name a little too literally. I’m guessing these are woodwork and metalwork tools that have been repurposed by an inventive pornographer. She at least seems to be enjoying herself, even if the slave isn’t.

I’d guess from the color and style this was originally shot in the 1970’s. It was recently posted to Twitter by mrunderheel.