Lolita Wolf's Predictions & Predilections

At the recent Master/slave Conference, Jack McG gave the keynote address. One of the things he came out in favor of was that the Master/slave community should standardize the definitions of slave, submissive and boy. Jack feels that the lack of standard definitions hinders us as a community and that we do not know what someone is talking about when they use these terms.

Well, there are a lot of different kind of slaves, and different kinds of submissives, and boys, too. I don’t think it would be wise to ask them to categorize and define themselves into neat little pigeonholes. I like the diversity. I especially enjoy the nuances.

But before totally dismissing what Jack said, I did a little research. I went to some experts. How would the New York boys of Leather define “boy?”

“We are a group of kinky people who generally like the submissive or bottom side of things. We aren’t, however, defined by what we do in bed; those tastes vary widely among our members. Rather, we feel we share some “leatherboy” personality traits. What are those? That’s difficult to say! We’re fun-loving, enthusiastic, inquisitive, playful, loving, and adventurous, and we’re always looking for new adjectives. We have a youthful outlook, though we might be any age. We have masculine energy, and we’re attracted to masculine energy, though we might be any gender or orientation. We value connection and brotherhood, but we are inclusive and openminded about where we can find it.”

That’s a rather broad definition. It sounds like I couldn’t possibly figure out what any of these boys are about without getting to know them and asking them each individually about what it means to them to be a boy. There are so many ways to be a boy that I would balk at standardizing the meaning of “boy.”

I also worry that standardizing the meanings would lead to people stifling their needs and desires in order to fit into a definition. My ex-slave would bottom and also top. I remember people telling me that his topping was not very slave-like. Balderdash! It was something I liked and encouraged. I was proud of him.

Yesterday I made a point about the difficulty of defining what it means to “have sex.” I said that people need to ask their partner(s) what the term means to them. You, know, like, communicate with each other. So here we are again: same point, different day.