If you don’t respect what we do as subs, you will never be able to handle our power.

I recently met a domme with a three-page list of demands for her successful subly candidate. She was expected to quit her job, attend therapy sessions, absorb the household’s spiritual beliefs, and adopt their eating habits. She described all of those things in detail, so I can inform you that I learned them in nursery school in-between Barbie Battles.

Yes, my Barbies had battles. Just be quiet.

She didn’t ask whether the sub in question actually needed all that guidance. She assumed it based on the role alone. In doing so, she inferred that all subs are broken. Our eating is broken. Our careers are broken. Our minds are broken.

You know how dogs can smell fear? Well, subs can smell derision. If you think we’re less than you because we live on the right of the slash, we know it. We might not be able to define it, but by god, we see it.

There’s one breed of dominant that’s rarer than all the rest: The one who begins their kink journey as a sub. Some of them are legitimately compelled by the role, but many realise that it's the only way to understand the submissive experience.

Let me tell you three things about dominants who start their journeys on the right of the slash:

• They don’t see submission as inferior, so they treat us with respect. That’s why they can exercise power at a higher level.
• They’ve actually experienced the cogs, pulleys, and shafts that make a sub glitch like a broken windup toy. That’s why they’re so good at it.
• They don’t giggle to themselves when they see a word like “shaft” in a very serious essay. How very dare you look for dad jokes in my Ted Talk?

If you find inferiority in the submissive role, you declare it every time you say you’re helping your sub to live a healthier life. We don’t choose the role because we lack basic adulting skills. Hell, many subs are high-powered business people who just want a goddamned break from being in charge. Others, like me, are mainly here because our vaginas said so. I’ll admit that there are subs among us who want their dominants to fix their lives, but that’s different from assuming that all subs require reparation.

There’s a difference between “dominant” and “condescending.” If you don’t respect what we do as subs, you will never be able to handle our power. Your very concept of dominance is broken, and you’ve deferred to domineering instead.

We don’t call dominants “domineers”, George. Submission is not a passive act either. It’s a choice you can only make if you have power in the first place. If you don’t have that power, it’s not submission, but some other broken thing.