RE: Dominance, Submission, and Gender

RE: Dominance, Submission, and Gender (Full Version)

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[Poll]

Dominance, Submission, and Gender

Men are the natural dominants

7% (12)

Women are the natural dominants

1% (2)

Dominance has nothing to do with gender

38% (58)

Men are more dominant, but there are exceptions

19% (29)

Women are more dominant, but there are exceptions

1% (2)

You're doing this poll to start a big argument

19% (30)

I'm glad these things are anonymous

11% (18)

Total Votes : 151

(last vote on : 11/8/2013 11:41:51 AM)
(Poll will run till: -- )

Message

JeffBC -> RE: Dominance, Submission, and Gender (4/17/2013 8:34:03 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: SomethingCatchy There is no such thing as an alpha wolf within a pack. There is a mother wolf, a father wolf... Thank you :) Man, I swear that BDSM folks just LOVE that "wolf pack" theory which has not been used by actual biologists for what now... 60 years? quote: The idea of men and women calling themselves 'alpha' makes me angry. It's a flawed term and there's absolutely no scientific basis behind it that's reputable and reliable. I occasionally use the term. Got a better suggestion for "that sort of person who tends to be in charge of whatever situation they find themselves in"? I feel like we, as humans, don't really like to look at humans very closely. I tend to use "alpha" when I'm trying to talk about "socially dominant" rather than the other types only for want of a better word. Heh, I also tend to put quotes around it. Of course, given the size of packs that humans form and given the actual definition of Alpha I'd more or less have to say that if you don't own a house in the Hamptons then you're not an "alpha human". I'm not convinced that is what BDSM people mean when they use the term though. quote: This question is offensive because it's the same as asking if black men are rapist and white men are Christians. Nothing about skin color (or gender) dictate what they will turn out to be. Really? That'd only be true because you yourself are putting a value judgement on the picture. You are assuming that for some reason best known to yourself "dominant is better". I don't see it that way. So to me this is a value-neutral question impossible to offend. The correct answer may be yes or not but I don't see anything offensive.

littlewonder -> RE: Dominance, Submission, and Gender (4/17/2013 5:30:49 PM)
I rarely use the word "alpha" mostly because it's become clique. I tend to use the word "leader". I find that it fits better when you are talking about a person who is a dominant personality and people are just drawn to to lead and do whatever needs to be done. This person doesn't ask for it, doesn't go chasing after it. People just naturally sway to that person to lead.

littlewonder -> RE: Dominance, Submission, and Gender (4/17/2013 5:34:44 PM)
BlkTallFullfig, the studies for me personally, would make sense in that those first born sons with that compatible gene have a a lower fertility rate. Imo, it would make sense as to why I feel dominant men have become less and less populous. It seems over the last 50 years or so, imo, dominant men have become fewer and fewer. I'm not talking about "Doms" but about dominant personality men.

BlkTallFullfig -> RE: Dominance, Submission, and Gender (4/17/2013 6:47:01 PM)
Oh Littlewonder, I don't believe that less male leaders are born. I think that with the outlawing or gauche appearance of knocking girls over the head, and dragging them home coming into being as the rule, that many leaders or more dominant male types began to feel displaced, and confused. The rest have learned to adapt, and lead when necessary, or consented to. If you do get out of this country once in a while, and go to places without a lot of TVs emulating how the west lives, you will find some fairly manly men still running the house, the woman/women, and the business. If science/genes prefer heterogeneous combinations for survival, do you believe that stronger gene combinations would result in weaker men in general? Would they need to be less dominant to survive among us broads nowadays? M

JeffBC -> RE: Dominance, Submission, and Gender (4/17/2013 7:05:10 PM)
quote: ORIGINAL: littlewonder People just naturally sway to that person to lead. Man, I'm not sure it works that way for me. Some people do. Some people I need to exert myself to get them sway. Mostly what I think is that I'm usually the guy stupid enough to step up when everyone else steps back (and I mean that seriously). For whatever reasons, a power vacuum or incompetent leadership or a leadership challenge simply draw me like a moth to the flame. Sensible folks are backing away slowly.

NuevaVida -> RE: Dominance, Submission, and Gender (4/17/2013 10:09:39 PM)
LOL Jeff that describes me at work. Now I'm on a new team, which is ridiculously cool with the brilliance of its members (as in I'm practically giddy all day from the conversations we engage in), yet we've joked about how most of us are natural leaders in the work place, and what's going to happen when we ALL step up to be in charge. [:D] My main coworker and I have already acknowledged that we're going to clash sometimes and this is why, so when we do, let's pull our egos out of it, work through it, and do what's best overall.

NuevaVida -> RE: Dominance, Submission, and Gender (4/17/2013 10:17:03 PM)
As to the birth order idea, I'm not so sure, but I only speak that from my own family's perch. Oldest brother - neither dominant nor submissive, just a genuinely cool and balanced guy. Oldest sister - never displayed submissiveness and yet in her most current marriage, I swear to all that is holy they are M/s, with her being the s. Other older sister (middle child) - a fiercely dominant personality, yet stifled by her religious views and tried like hell to submit to her husband. Oddly enough, he had the same views but didn't have a dominant bone in his body, which caused them both to be miserable, unfortunately. But she's a dominant/leader type, through and through. Other older brother (4th in line) - On the submissive side but resists it like crazy. Me - the youngest - in younger days was submissive in pretty much all aspects but evolved into a rather dominant personality, a leader at work and with family & friends, and submissive to the man I'm in love with (although I give him some push back from time to time). Nobody who knows me socially can imagine me submitting to my man.

BlkTallFullfig -> RE: Dominance, Submission, and Gender (4/18/2013 5:40:10 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: NuevaVida As to the birth order idea, I'm not so sure, but I only speak that from my own family's perch. Oldest brother - neither dominant nor submissive, just a genuinely cool and balanced guy. Oldest sister - never displayed submissiveness and yet in her most current marriage, I swear to all that is holy they are M/s, with her being the s. Other older sister (middle child) - a fiercely dominant personality, yet stifled by her religious views and tried like hell to submit to her husband. Oddly enough, he had the same views but didn't have a dominant bone in his body, which caused them both to be miserable, unfortunately. But she's a dominant/leader type, through and through. Other older brother (4th in line) - On the submissive side but resists it like crazy. Me - the youngest - in younger days was submissive in pretty much all aspects but evolved into a rather dominant personality, a leader at work and with family & friends, and submissive to the man I'm in love with (although I give him some push back from time to time). Nobody who knows me socially can imagine me submitting to my man. My Family is similar, with no technical reason for such. Oldest sister is dominant through, and through, but pretends poorly, to be submissive around men (at the same time she's ordering the rest of the room to be quiet, or kills selves for not obeying, when said man leaves. Next sister is very much dominant, married, desperately trying to be submissive, but failing miserably, every day. Older brother, very much a leader/dominant. Next brother is submissive to the bone, and is lost in a world asking him to be different. Next sister, very much dominant, and lucky enough to accidentally (family hook up) married hersef a fine submissive man. Than there was me.... But enough about us, M

littlewonder -> RE: Dominance, Submission, and Gender (4/18/2013 5:31:29 PM)
In my family I am next to the youngest and my brother is the oldest out of us 5 siblings and my brother was always like a father to me while growing up since he's twice my age. He was always the one to lead in our family. He was the one to make sure everything was done and we were all provided for. I have a sister who is younger than me but she's nowhere near submissive...or dominant as far as I'm concerned. She's just a rude and inconsiderate woman. BlkTallFullfig, I'm not sure about in foreign countries since I've only ever been overseas once and I wasn't there long enough to notice what the men were there. But here in the States I find that most men are nowhere even close to a dominant personality. But I also believe we've done the men in the States a big disservice by coddling them and not having a lot of interaction by father figures in the past 50 years or so with many being raised by single women. There are not a lot of role models for them of the male persuasion imo. As for this: quote: If science/genes prefer heterogeneous combinations for survival, do you believe that stronger gene combinations would result in weaker men in general? Would they need to be less dominant to survive among us broads nowadays? You know I never really thought about that but with my views above, it would make sense. quote: JeffBC: Mostly what I think is that I'm usually the guy stupid enough to step up when everyone else steps back (and I mean that seriously). For whatever reasons, a power vacuum or incompetent leadership or a leadership challenge simply draw me like a moth to the flame. And see...I would call that the natural leadership sway. Leaders are usually the ones who step up when no one else will even though they may hate it. People wait for that person to come forward. They know that person will if no one else will so they sit back in their quiet corner and just wait. Eventually you and Master would both step forward no matter how much you will hate it but you will thrive in doing so since everyone trusts your decisions and the path you will steer them in. Yeah, I'm that person who will be sitting in that corner because I know you and Master will do it. I can count it. [:D]

NuevaVida -> RE: Dominance, Submission, and Gender (4/18/2013 9:05:08 PM)
quote: ORIGINAL: BlkTallFullfig But enough about us, M [:)]

njlauren -> RE: Dominance, Submission, and Gender (4/19/2013 6:07:30 PM)
I think it is interesting, it is another area, like gender roles, where culture and training can make it difficult to figure out what is inate and what isn't. Women in many cultures are supposed to be the 'weaker' sex (which I dispute, if men had to have babies, we would probably have died out millions of years ago lol), and that plays into so much of what happens. I think that a lot more women are naturally dominant personalities if they had been given the chance and/or allowed themselves to be that, and the same with sub men. Using myself as an example, my natural bent is to be submissive, I don't fit the stereotype of the alfa person (sorry for using that label, I mean as in the common stereotype), while I have always been healthily competitive I don't need to win, I am not balls to the wall, always in charge, etc, it is just isn't who I am. Yet I tend to be one of those people whom someone else mentioned, where I tend to step up and be a leader when situations require it. I manage people, have for years, yet I don't play the dominance game, I tend to work more collegially and while I make decisions all the time, I also don't have to use dominance with the people I work with. Likewise, kind of like the story of Rob Roy's wife, I am no wilting violet, whatever my gender is, I would fight to the death to protect what I have, my family, loved ones, and I also am not a doormat otherwise, if it is important I'll make my opinion known and so forth, so it gets complex. Growing up in a family of Italian origin, and having been around a lot of friends who were Jewish, there is an interesting take on this in those cultures. The male is ostensibly the head of the household in the traditional culture, women are supposed to defer and such. Yet, you often used to see what my mother called the iron fist in the crying towel, where the so called submission of the women in actual play had them being the de facto rule; they worked within the culture and managed to bring a lot of power unto themselves, in my experience no one wanted to cross the woman of the house, so to speak lol. My take? I suspect that there are a lot more women whose natural inclination is to be dominant than you would expect viewing women in society, and a lot more men whose natural inclination is submissive, but that the roles imposed on them by society kind of have reigned that in. It will be interesting to see as time goes on, as women have achieved so much, and the old societal norms kind of break, what will happen, it could be we find a situation where male versus female dominance or submission basically shows no correlation, or at the very least, where a lot more men/women defy the expectations people generally have.

LizDeluxe -> RE: Dominance, Submission, and Gender (4/19/2013 7:48:47 PM)
quote: ORIGINAL: njlauren Women in many cultures are supposed to be the 'weaker' sex (which I dispute, if men had to have babies, we would probably have died out millions of years ago lol) One of my close male companions says that while women must bear the children men have to put up with women. He swears that it is a fair trade-off if not slightly in favor of the women. :) I think these gender based discussions are somewhat futile. There are so many environmental and societal influences that work on us from an early age... how do we strip away all of that to determine who is naturally this or naturally that? I say it's virtually impossible to do so.

Dreamless -> RE: Dominance, Submission, and Gender (4/20/2013 1:22:01 AM)
Oh, glorious can of worms. I have a feeling that the people in the men are naturally dominant camp are going to of course be male doms and heterosexual female subs. My opinion is of course that a wide variety of social pressures, circumstance, upbringing, and cooking from all around makes people into what they are. I roll my eyes at any 'true submissiveness/dominantness', and especially at the people who post things like "I HAVE BEEN A DOM SINCE I WAS 8". Not that I'm actually, you know, quoting a precise statement I read once on this forum, not at alllll, but then... This birth order thing. I am the oldest child, female, raised in an extremely conservative Christian home where I was indoctrinated from day one into women are submissive men are leaders you are to be a good homemaker and caretaker and serve your lordly man mentality. Let me stress and underline that. By personality, I am indeed a caretaker! I like people happy, well fed, and I enjoy keeping them that way. ...And, you know, like beating people up a little, tying them up, doing terrible things and they can damn well listen to what I told'm to do. Somehow I came out a top when nothing about my upbringing ever told me I could dare be a leader. For all I was percolated to be a heterosexual female sub, I am not. I don't have a highly dominant personality and command the world about me, granted, no. I take things as they come, easy come, easy go, and I'm of the impression that many people switch; the powerful business leader submits, the humble cleaner dominates. But when it comes to this kink thing, I know what I want and it's the whip and reins. From a historical standpoint, based on survival, yes, it makes sense for men to be dominant. We are no longer at odds with survival, where women as the only childbearers, who can feed children far more effectively than a man, have to stay home to have their children and raise those children, and men by default must be the hunter, to keep their family alive. Half of our children will not die, and there's no fight for mere survival. There's been a paradigm shift, one that mandates submission and domination are not required to simply survive. There are a great many people in this world and if I do not have children, it hurts no one, because twenty other women will have children instead of me and the world will keep on turning, and people will keep on living. Today, we live in a world where power is earned and submission is given. Where you are powerful because you do x, not because you are x. I would also argue that men being completely naturally dominant over women creates an imbalance of codependency that I've personally seen be very harmful to women after their husband dies or they're otherwise left alone. Which is why I think the natural balance should be precisely that: a balance, weight to weight, and shifted only with careful consideration to the consequences. And one could argue that I feel that way because I'm a woman, a Libra, a firstborn, a dom, naturally submissive obviously or a hundred other things. But I know one older woman who was well balanced after her husband died. They were equals in a time that women weren't really equals. She's got no interest in dating because "all men from my time period think women are fainting flowers", and calmly, confidently does her thing. It didn't change the pain or grief, but she gets by without needing to run into the arms of a new man to take care of her. Unlike some others I know, who bounce from man to man, from bad relationship to bad relationship, because they "need" a man. Respect is a thing to be earned. It's nothing to do with gender. If it was, anyway, why would there be so danged many male subs? They're a thing, guys! A thing.

Zonie63 -> RE: Dominance, Submission, and Gender (4/20/2013 5:43:14 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: JeffBC quote: ORIGINAL: SomethingCatchy There is no such thing as an alpha wolf within a pack. There is a mother wolf, a father wolf... Thank you :) Man, I swear that BDSM folks just LOVE that "wolf pack" theory which has not been used by actual biologists for what now... 60 years? quote: The idea of men and women calling themselves 'alpha' makes me angry. It's a flawed term and there's absolutely no scientific basis behind it that's reputable and reliable. I occasionally use the term. Got a better suggestion for "that sort of person who tends to be in charge of whatever situation they find themselves in"? I feel like we, as humans, don't really like to look at humans very closely. I tend to use "alpha" when I'm trying to talk about "socially dominant" rather than the other types only for want of a better word. Heh, I also tend to put quotes around it. Of course, given the size of packs that humans form and given the actual definition of Alpha I'd more or less have to say that if you don't own a house in the Hamptons then you're not an "alpha human". I'm not convinced that is what BDSM people mean when they use the term though. I tend to shy away from terms like "alpha" and "beta" as well, although I think of them more in context of what would "naturally" happen among a group of people cut off from society due to some catastrophe or disaster. I think of movies like The Poseidon Adventure or The Towering Inferno where groups of people are put in situations where they have to fend for themselves, without any help from the authorities. There are those who naturally take charge because they have to in order to survive. Of course, the movies tend to be a bit more stereotypical, with the leading men taking charge and being strong, while the women are screaming, crying, or panicky. There are also seems to be a difference between societal dominance - the people who are at the top in society and have houses in the Hamptons - versus nature dominance - people who would be more dominant in the wilderness but would be totally lost in the city. I'm not sure who would be more dominant, the high-powered Wall Street guy or the mountain man who can fight a bear. On the other hand, the mountain man would be lost on Wall Street, so if he's with a woman from the city, then she would probably be more dominant when it comes to dealing with society, only because he wouldn't know what to do.

BlkTallFullfig -> RE: Dominance, Submission, and Gender (4/20/2013 7:26:17 AM)
Hyas Littlewonder, quote: ORIGINAL: littlewonder I have a sister who is younger than me but she's nowhere near submissive...or dominant as far as I'm concerned. She's just a rude and inconsiderate woman. I believe, or have lived to observe, that even in this country, whether or not you believe is male dominated/paternalistic, what passes for normal behavior in men, often is considered inapropriate, bad form, or bitchy and inconsiderate on a woman. quote: here in the States I find that most men are nowhere even close to a dominant personality. But I also believe we've done the men in the States a big disservice by coddling them and not having a lot of interaction by father figures in the past 50 years or so with many being raised by single women. There are not a lot of role models for them of the male persuasion imo. I cannot disagree that the best way to raise a family is with 2 happy parents, and a great support system, but I doubt anyone has the perfect formula for what works, ouside of what they are born with. I think all parents do their best, and given the choice, they would have a dual parent household. However, when the choice for women became more than submit, or leave, we began leaving. Until we learn to balance power in a relationship, or consciously enter into relationships that are symbiotic, we will have better marriage/parental statistics. quote: Dreamless I would also argue that men being completely naturally dominant over women creates an imbalance of codependency that I've personally seen be very harmful to women after their husband dies or they're otherwise left alone. Which is why I think the natural balance should be precisely that: a balance, weight to weight, and shifted only with careful consideration to the consequences I like, and agree with this statement, but to be fair, it's true in any relationship, where one takes the reigns, and does not share financial responsibilities, and survival plans. Welcome to the message boards Dreamless, M

Level -> RE: Dominance, Submission, and Gender (4/20/2013 7:33:55 AM)
FR 28 to 3. It must be true.

JeffBC -> RE: Dominance, Submission, and Gender (4/20/2013 7:39:08 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: Dreamless I would also argue that men being completely naturally dominant over women creates an imbalance of codependency that I've personally seen be very harmful to women after their husband dies or they're otherwise left alone. Which is why I think the natural balance should be precisely that: a balance, weight to weight, and shifted only with careful consideration to the consequences. Heh... sadly, there is a big difference between someone who is "dominant" or "claims to be dominant" or "wants to be dominant" and someone who is a credible leader.

Level -> RE: Dominance, Submission, and Gender (4/20/2013 7:41:18 AM)
Indeed.

njlauren -> RE: Dominance, Submission, and Gender (4/20/2013 7:45:12 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: LizDeluxe quote: ORIGINAL: njlauren Women in many cultures are supposed to be the 'weaker' sex (which I dispute, if men had to have babies, we would probably have died out millions of years ago lol) One of my close male companions says that while women must bear the children men have to put up with women. He swears that it is a fair trade-off if not slightly in favor of the women. :) I think these gender based discussions are somewhat futile. There are so many environmental and societal influences that work on us from an early age... how do we strip away all of that to determine who is naturally this or naturally that? I say it's virtually impossible to do so. I agree, Liz, I think they are somewhat futile, much as with gender roles it tries to take arguments about nature versus nurture and make simple explanations for complex things. For example, with gender roles, the nature types will tell you that men were genetically meant to be more dominant because of survival and their strength, while women were naturally submissive because of their nurturing kids, less strength, but that leaves out that there have been societies where women culturally are dominant (As Oscar said to Felix in an episode of the Odd Couple "Felix, Men chase women, except in certain societies in the South Pacific, and certain bars in Greenwhich Village" lol). A woman could be dominant who is 5' tall and 100 pounds and use the strength of a sub male. For all the talk of male strength, when it comes to leading, directing, figuring out what to do, physical strength has little to do with that, and I could argue that testosterone doesn't lead to great decision making all the time... There are the nurture types, who claim that gender roles are all man made, societally driven, yet with type I trans M to F's (or F to M's), they are brought up as boys or girls, socially imprinted with all the standard stuff, yet a type 1 trans girl is likely to want to play with dolls rather then trucks, to want to play with girls rather than with boys, where a type 1 f to m might want to be out roughousing with the boys. One famous case, one that should have gotten a certain gender expert brought up on charges of professional ethics, a baby boy had his genitals mutilated, the parents were told it would be better to bring the child up as a girl, and with the help of all these experts, they raised the child as a girl, they did all kinds of psychological programming on her, made sure the parents reinforced her being a girl, went through female puberty (without menses, obviously), and was absolutely fucking miserable, later on transitioned....intersex people are often 'changed' at a young age, before they can express their gender, and in a lot f cases the parents and doctors guessed wrong.... I think part of the problem with dominance and submission is the idea that it comes only from physical characteristics and strength. While I appreciate a tall, strong woman, I submit because of who the person is (for the record, my wife is fairly tall, not particularly strong, and most people consider her a softie personality wise....what they don't know lol).....the therapist I worked with was all of 5' tall, but take it from me, even the most macho male dom types respected her, and the couple that tried to tell her she was really sub found out who much lol.....Domination can come from force of personality and intelligence, and as Dreamless points out, as society changes it becomes less and less about evolutionary genetics, if it ever was (I personally think a lot of the 'natural dominance' was men using their strength to force their rules on women, rather than women naturally submitting). One of the reasons for the incredible backlash you see in society IMO, that is played out in politics and on right wing talk radio, about how society is being 'emasculated', how boys are being degraded to 'build women up' and all that jazz, is in large part I think we live in a society where a guys muscles mean less and less and where dominance is achieved through education and skills and the old assumptions of men being dominant and women submissive as an automatic thing, where dominance is earned, is causing that anger, because the old inbred assumptions and 'unearned privilege' of dominance has been lost.

BlkTallFullfig -> RE: Dominance, Submission, and Gender (4/20/2013 10:31:14 PM)
quote: ORIGINAL: Level FR 28 to 3. It must be true. I've waited for someone to say something, and clarify this obscure (to me) reply. Alas, no one has. So, Huh Level?! [8\|] M

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