Expectations and Myth - 8/3/09

[2009/08/03 7:12] Zealot Benmergui: Welcome A/all to the House of V’s College of Kink. My name is Zealot Benmergui, Baron BardHaven and I will be your host today. Some of you may know me from lecturing here at House of V and other locations around the grid. Others of you may know me as Little Walter the Sheik in the made for cable movie “Lavern and Shirley Return: Brewery Slags” or as the voice of Juan the Bolivian Stableboy in “My Little Pony V: Back Paddock Peccadillos”, released direct to DVD last fall.
[2009/08/03 7:12] ***SA***: hahahahhahahaha
[2009/08/03 7:12] ***MS***: lol
[2009/08/03 7:13] Zealot Benmergui: The topic for today is " Expectations and Myth”…Or perhaps the subtitle is more relevant…”Real Life Mistakes that Compound in Second Life”. This week we will tackle “Expectation” while next week we will deal more with “Myth” but the two are two dies of one cannonball. Please note that for the purpose of clarity, I will tend to use “she” to refer to a submissive and “he” to refer to a Dominant, but either can be of any gender. Your humble lecturer WILL accept tips, but they must be paid to me directly, if you are so inclined, thank you.
[2009/08/03 7:15] Zealot Benmergui: It has been a long time since I have lectured here at House of V, as in several months which is like a decade and a half in SL time, so perhaps I should briefly introduce to myself and explain my recent sabbatical, without pictures or anything.
[2009/08/03 7:15] ***SS***: no pictures?
[2009/08/03 7:15] ***SS*** awe shucks
[2009/08/03 7:15] Zealot Benmergui: OK, maybe a few Jpegs for extra tips
[2009/08/03 7:16] ***SS***: he he
[2009/08/03 7:16] ***SS***: ok!
[2009/08/03 7:16] ***WY*** smiles
[2009/08/03 7:16] Zealot Benmergui: So who am I exactly and what the hell do I think I am doing here? Well, beyond being a Dominant for nearly all of my sexual life, which according to some family legends began prenatally, I have more than 5 years experience online (and something like two decades in real life) as a lecturer, consultant and moderator on topics pertaining to D/s, BDSM, Online Relationships and Deviance of all flavours. I have lectured in numerous venues around SL on a regular basis until a few months ago I decided to stop completely, cold turkey. Why, you may ask.
[2009/08/03 7:16] Zealot Benmergui notes the tip and arranges the webcam
[2009/08/03 7:16] ***SS***: he he
[2009/08/03 7:16] Zealot Benmergui: Go ahead, someone ask “Why?”
[2009/08/03 7:17] Zealot Benmergui: I'll wait
[2009/08/03 7:17] ***SS***: Why?
[2009/08/03 7:17] Zealot Benmergui: thank you
[2009/08/03 7:17] ***SS***: welcome
[2009/08/03 7:17] Zealot Benmergui: Well, due to several situations I came to the stunning and quite shattering realization that I really didn’t know shit all of what I had been talking about, and decided it would be best for everyone if I just shut the fuck up. So I did.
[2009/08/03 7:17] ***IJ***: Why?
[2009/08/03 7:17] ***SS***: so why are you back?
[2009/08/03 7:17] ***SS***: You learned more about teaching and said, fuck it I am back?
[2009/08/03 7:18] ***SS*** winks
[2009/08/03 7:18] Zealot Benmergui: Close..and you are just rushing ahead, next you'll tell me my sled was named rosebud
[2009/08/03 7:18] Zealot Benmergui: About three weeks ago, I decided it was time to start working my way back to lecturing.
[2009/08/03 7:18] ***SS***: Thor, but that is my story, not yours
[2009/08/03 7:19] Zealot Benmergui waits for another why
[2009/08/03 7:19] ***SS***: why?!
[2009/08/03 7:19] ***MS***: y
[2009/08/03 7:19] ***KR***: why?
[2009/08/03 7:19] ***SA***: why not?
[2009/08/03 7:19] ***SS***: that happens
[2009/08/03 7:19] Zealot Benmergui: Well, first of all I got bored.
[2009/08/03 7:19] ***SS***: the other?
[2009/08/03 7:19] Zealot Benmergui: But second of all I came to a realization almost as shattering as the first…that NOBODY knows shit all. None of us…anyone who TELLS you they have all the answers is trying to fuck you or sell you something. In the end, all any of us really do is make the best choices that we can, or as, pardon a moment of geeking, Denathor says to Pippin in Return of the King, “Go now and die in what way seems best to you”.
[2009/08/03 7:19] Zealot Benmergui: None of us really knows much more then the next guy, or gal for that matter. The stupid leading the blind.
[2009/08/03 7:20] Zealot Benmergui: So then, by my logic there is really no difference between "right" and "wrong" since we all tend to make the same mistakes in the same way and crash and burn eventually nearly identically, landing as twisted husks side by side, like some enormous half naked Sargasso Sea of Perviness. All we need are seagulls pecking at our genitals. All we have in the end then is experience...it isn't right or wrong...just cause and effect, that's what we can share.
[2009/08/03 7:20] ***SS***: no one has all the answers, only the experiances they have had
[2009/08/03 7:20] Zealot Benmergui: Exactly
[2009/08/03 7:20] ***DM***: thanks for the taxi ***SS***
[2009/08/03 7:20] Zealot Benmergui: And good lord but I have plenty of experience. 15 years online, and nearly four of those in SL, will age a guy...how that aging turned out really doesn't matter...in fact the more agony riddled they are the better. More causes, more effects, more blood, more fun. More experience.
[2009/08/03 7:21] ***SS***: and what they can work towards, or desires they have, to come to learn more of what they want
[2009/08/03 7:21] ***SS***: sure thing sexy ***DM***
[2009/08/03 7:21] Zealot Benmergui nods..Or at least to qualfy for Triple Jeopardy
[2009/08/03 7:21] ***SS***: on line there are a lot of fools
[2009/08/03 7:21] Zealot Benmergui: Just online?
[2009/08/03 7:21] Zealot Benmergui: You are MUCh too kind
[2009/08/03 7:21] ***SS***: so called subs, masters, domme, slaves..
[2009/08/03 7:21] ***SS***: no
[2009/08/03 7:21] ***SS***: all over
[2009/08/03 7:22] ***SS***: just here it seems to be harder for some to pick out
[2009/08/03 7:22] ***SS***: me, I don't talk to many
[2009/08/03 7:22] Zealot Benmergui: nods...and what makes the difference between fools and bigger fools? Experience
[2009/08/03 7:22] ***SS***: so I am a "Miss"
[2009/08/03 7:22] Zealot Benmergui: But are my experiences of any use here? Does blood ALWAYS tell? After all, I have never been a a submissive, so how can I advise submissives? Am I in the wrong place? Has my begine failed to begin? And before you say "How do you KNOW you aren't a sub if you have never tried it?"...I have also never used a pneumatic nail gun to fasten my cock to a coffee table before, but I know it wouldn't float my boat. Just one of those things.
[2009/08/03 7:23] ***MS***: y
[2009/08/03 7:23] ***SB***: hehe
[2009/08/03 7:23] Zealot Benmergui: Somethign about the intense pain followed by the slow descent into shock and death
[2009/08/03 7:24] Zealot Benmergui: Even I have some areas of kink I will not enter
[2009/08/03 7:24] Zealot Benmergui: I have found that in most cases, our experience is weighed against our expectations…the way we have known things to go as opposed to the way we think or hope they will go. Expectations some could argue are the bane of almost all relationships. That horrible land of misunderstandings and broken dreams and dead puppies and beets and broccoli milk shakes. How are they formed, well first of all they tend to be formed based on such relatively static principals as gender. After all, a man is a man and a woman is a woman, aren’t they. Can’t we expect them to act relatively consistent with their gender stereotypes?
[2009/08/03 7:25] Zealot Benmergui: I am not so sure. Cornell West, my favorite social philosopher at Harvard, has theorized that in a few more generations society will reach a "Post Racial" age. We will all be so intermingled that race will no longer be a useful way of dividing the population, replaced completely by economic status and educational level. I would take that idea further, and say we are also moving into a Post Gender age, and nowhere is gender more posted then in Second Life.
[2009/08/03 7:25] ***SS***: some think treating a woman like shit is the way to be a dom
[2009/08/03 7:25] Zealot Benmergui: Nods...among other foolishness
[2009/08/03 7:25] ***SS***: some think calling them anything but thier name is wrong...
[2009/08/03 7:25] ***SS***: what they don't get is, we have a gift, and ladies it is a gift, that should not be given lightly
[2009/08/03 7:25] ***SS***: and to anyone
[2009/08/03 7:26] ***SS***: mhmm
[2009/08/03 7:26] Zealot Benmergui: And much of that is based on expectations...what people think should or will be.
[2009/08/03 7:26] Zealot Benmergui: and as for the importance of care when submitting, that is several lectures all it's own
[2009/08/03 7:26] ***KR***: tell that to a gorean
[2009/08/03 7:26] ***SS***: I am gorean
[2009/08/03 7:26] ***SS***: and I do say that
[2009/08/03 7:26] ***DM***: but expectations can be a good thing too right?
[2009/08/03 7:26] ***SS***: the ones here are young guns
[2009/08/03 7:27] ***SS***: and please leave gor out of this conversation.... please..
[2009/08/03 7:27] ***DM***: lol ***SS***
[2009/08/03 7:27] Zealot Benmergui: Gor can be extreme, and there are more crappy role players in Gor then anywhere else except maybe DragonCon...but at core it is is still consensual D/s
[2009/08/03 7:27] Zealot Benmergui: just with more props
[2009/08/03 7:27] Zealot Benmergui: and when it is done right, it can actually be very beautiful
[2009/08/03 7:27] ***SS*** feels her blood boil...
[2009/08/03 7:27] ***SS***: yes
[2009/08/03 7:27] Zealot Benmergui: sadly, most people online do it incorrectly
[2009/08/03 7:28] ***SS***: the beauty of a woman in service to a Master is beautiful
[2009/08/03 7:28] Zealot Benmergui: Gor attracts far more then it's share of the fools we mentioned earlier
[2009/08/03 7:28] ***SS***: sensual, loving
[2009/08/03 7:28] EscorTools HUD shouts: pingCore
[2009/08/03 7:28] ***SS***: yes it does...
[2009/08/03 7:28] Zealot Benmergui: usually because it has a certain reputation, and it is easy to find
[2009/08/03 7:28] Zealot Benmergui: just follow the dude in the fur skirt
[2009/08/03 7:28] ***MS***: lol
[2009/08/03 7:28] ***SS***: its painful for learners to get involved in a gorean role here
[2009/08/03 7:28] ***DM*** sighs..i ws in a relationship...and being new, thought things were supposed to be acertain way in that relationship....but the more i spoke and learned i realized every relationship is different
[2009/08/03 7:29] ***SS***: it is not one way, it's waht you both want, experiance, desire
[2009/08/03 7:29] ***SS***: learning from both
[2009/08/03 7:29] ***DM***: so i patiently waited for something...and realized my expectation was just different ..not wrong
[2009/08/03 7:29] Zealot Benmergui: exactly Miss***DM***...the difficulty of trying to hold onto expectations, even once we see they are totally off base
[2009/08/03 7:29] ***SS***: want me to join you up there Sealot?
[2009/08/03 7:29] ***KR***: mutal respect and trust...
[2009/08/03 7:29] ***SS***: Zealot*
[2009/08/03 7:29] ***SS***: he he
[2009/08/03 7:30] Zealot Benmergui: smiles...tempting....but discussion works just fine
[2009/08/03 7:30] ***DM***: lol
[2009/08/03 7:30] ***SS***: May I call you Z?
[2009/08/03 7:30] ***SS***: please?
[2009/08/03 7:30] Zealot Benmergui: Certainly
[2009/08/03 7:30] ***DM***: i do expect things though....sooo
[2009/08/03 7:30] ***SS***: thank you! :)
[2009/08/03 7:30] ***DM***: lol
[2009/08/03 7:30] ***SS***: and you should ***DM***
[2009/08/03 7:30] Zealot Benmergui: Lets consider the most basiuc form of expectations in a relations...gender role...
[2009/08/03 7:30] ***SS***: a sub is not a mat
[2009/08/03 7:31] ***DM***: ok
[2009/08/03 7:31] Zealot Benmergui: The world has become a gender free for all that the law is struggling to catch up with, all over the world. Same sex marriage? How last decade. These days worry about Same Parent Marriage. Mixed species marriages. Do they have to still be alive? Can you marry someone who isn't TECHNICALLY an animate object?
[2009/08/03 7:31] ***SS***: no
[2009/08/03 7:31] Zealot Benmergui: IN California, it depends on the judge
[2009/08/03 7:31] ***SS***: lol
[2009/08/03 7:31] Zealot Benmergui: Gender may mean less to us as sexual creatures then we ever realized. Meredith Chivers at Queen’s University in Ontario has been researching what REALLY arouses us, and she has concluded the main thing that turns us on is arousal, pure and simple. Seeing someone else in the grips of pleasure stimulates our own desires. With men, that usually still runs on gender lines, our strongest reactions are to watching women orgasm (or men if we are gay)…that is not at all true with women.
[2009/08/03 7:31] ***SB***: lol
[2009/08/03 7:31] ***DM***: not with me lmao
[2009/08/03 7:32] Zealot Benmergui: Chivers has found that women are turned on by watching ANYONE enjoy sex, the gender is immaterial. If they are enjoying it, then it immediately causes a physical response in most women. In fact, in some cases even the SPECIES is immaterial. She found a certain level of arousal in women just in watching apes fucking. Now THAT is dangerous stuff. Must be all the screeching.
[2009/08/03 7:32] ***SS***: I am I admit it
[2009/08/03 7:32] ***DM***: o.O
[2009/08/03 7:32] Zealot Benmergui: Good lord, we thought the plain old, “Fuck who you want, we’ll make more” Sexual Revolution in the Sixties was a big deal, they obviously never watched a baboon cumming, or had group sex in a petting zoo under 500watt grolamps. If the real world is becoming less and less hung up on pre determined sex roles, more understanding that this stuff is very very individual, why then is SL lagging behind in some ways?
[2009/08/03 7:32] Zealot Benmergui: Why is SL still such a seething pool of relationship expectations?
[2009/08/03 7:33] ***SS***: I dunno
[2009/08/03 7:33] ***SS***: why?
[2009/08/03 7:33] Zealot Benmergui: Maybe it isn't....for example...Well, why am I a man in SL? Beyond a certain lack of creativity of course?
[2009/08/03 7:33] Zealot Benmergui: I am a man in SL because I CHOOSE to be...but I know lots of men playing female avatars, some openly and some not. Hell I have fucked a few. I know several women playing men, both gay and straight. I know a few transgendered people playing whichever sex they damn well please, thank you very much. I even know some furries who are actually human beings in real life.
[2009/08/03 7:33] ***SS***: cause that is what you are?
[2009/08/03 7:33] Zealot Benmergui: just because I am male in rl doesn;t mean I have to be in SL...in SL we can CHOOSE such things...
[2009/08/03 7:34] Zealot Benmergui: for serious reasons or just shits and giggles
[2009/08/03 7:34] ***DM*** sighs
[2009/08/03 7:34] Zealot Benmergui: Why do we rush to bring real life limitations and rules to a virtual world, where ANYTHING is possible as long as you don't let the Lindens know? Why do we rush to make gender mean something when so many of us change sex as often as they change soulmates...some do it weekly for fuck sake. We tend to try to force our real world expectations of love and commitment to function in Second Life, and with very few exceptions, they just won’t. Not no way, not no how.
[2009/08/03 7:34] Zealot Benmergui: And we end up getting our hearts handed to us in the process
[2009/08/03 7:35] ***SS***: I play a woman and a sub, cause that is what I am... doesn't mean I am going to call anyone Master, or Sir.... just cause...
[2009/08/03 7:35] Zealot Benmergui: Yes, but would you call them Grand Poobah?
[2009/08/03 7:35] Zealot Benmergui: What if they had the big hat?
[2009/08/03 7:35] ***SS***: newp
[2009/08/03 7:35] ***SS***: asshole maybe
[2009/08/03 7:35] ***DM***: lol
[2009/08/03 7:35] ***SS***: but hey that is me
[2009/08/03 7:35] Zealot Benmergui: for some, that will do
[2009/08/03 7:35] ***SS***: yes
[2009/08/03 7:35] Zealot Benmergui: It seems more and more what REALLY matters is the ROLE we choose for ourselves, not the gender we hold in meatspace…submissive, Dominant, top, bottom, male, female, human, something squishy….they are all really just roles. The same goes for such relationship as partner, husband, wife. They have no intrinsic meaning here, no societal understanding forcing us to view them a certain way…but we still expect them to. Some involve more fantasy then others, while some are more or less digitized versions of our real life selves…but they are all chosen in SL, as are what they mean to each of us. A woman trapped in a man’s body in real life can just choose a woman’s body in Sl, no muss no fuss. A partnership in Sl may have no real equivalency to real life marriage, or it may be all about buying life insurance and choosing ugly curtains.
[2009/08/03 7:36] Zealot Benmergui: All that gender and other real life vestiges really bring to SL are expectations. Baggage we don’t need and shouldn’t carry. We use things like gender the way we do clothing in SL, as a sort of shorthand for stereotypes. A male avatar wearing leather chaps and a bad mullet, we KNOW what he is into. We still at times EXPECT a man to behave a certain way, a woman to behave another. D/s is the mainstream in SL and the mainstream is comfortable with Master TesteHammer Slutplucker and his sub kittymeowmeow Thistlehoney. Complete with all accessories, silly clothing and kung fu grip.
[2009/08/03 7:37] Zealot Benmergui: Of course, you occasionally run into MISTRESS TesteHammer Slutplucker, but then the name carries a COMPLETELY different connotation.
[2009/08/03 7:37] ***DM***: what about those that dont "play" a different role and are just being..just me
[2009/08/03 7:37] ***SS***: good question!
[2009/08/03 7:37] Zealot Benmergui: That is the beauty of working without expectation....all approaches are valid
[2009/08/03 7:37] ***DM***: a woman and a sub....can i not expect things?
[2009/08/03 7:38] ***DM***: as me?
[2009/08/03 7:38] ***SS*** waits for the answer
[2009/08/03 7:38] Zealot Benmergui: we judge each on their own merits, on what they show us, not what we assume them to be or what we want them to be
[2009/08/03 7:38] ***SS***: I had talked to someone, they said they were forced
[2009/08/03 7:38] ***SS***: to take a collar
[2009/08/03 7:38] ***DM***: some have tried to force that on me
[2009/08/03 7:38] ***SS***: please explain there is no forcing
[2009/08/03 7:39] ***SS***: some girls don't know that
[2009/08/03 7:39] Zealot Benmergui: Are there things you desire in a relationship? Of course, and you can seek those one on one..nod assume they are there and then get crushed when they aren't
[2009/08/03 7:39] ***DM***: as me i say no i expect mroe lmao
[2009/08/03 7:39] ***DM***: more*
[2009/08/03 7:39] ***SS***: exactly...
[2009/08/03 7:39] Zealot Benmergui: first, last always
[2009/08/03 7:39] Zealot Benmergui: Understand...ALL D/s...and yes, ALL D/s...is consensual
[2009/08/03 7:39] ***DM***: that i think is achance we take on here or rl...*sighs
[2009/08/03 7:40] ***SS***: mhmm... so many think it can be forced, there is nothing given with you wanting to do so
[2009/08/03 7:40] Zealot Benmergui: D/s does not exist unless a submissive CONSENTS to submit in that specific situation
[2009/08/03 7:40] Zealot Benmergui: people who expect a submissive to kneel and fellate anyone with a bad haircut and a spelling problem are just wrong..but often convince newcomers they are right