June Cleaver : Femme Friend or Femme Foe

[Sachita]

Originally Posted by Martina

Is any of that real content about gender?

• wanting to devote your time and energy to pleasing another
• enjoying domestic chores (if only for the beloved other)
• being available to nurture, support, or instruct

The part that is gender specific other than the clothes is grooving upon the power dynamics embedded in gender. That is kink. Fetish. Whatever you want to call it.

I can get hot because the person I am with is butch. I can get hot because the person I am with has power. I do not conflate the two. It does not get me extra wet BECAUSE a masculine person has power over my more feminine self. Or it has like twice. It's not my kink. But it's a kink. And as such I respect it.

But bringing the conflation of power inequity with gender roles into the world as a "natural" way of relating -- that is sexism. Talking about women's roles and butches or masculine ID'd people's roles as if they are real things. Um no.

I was briefly with someone who had those ideas. We had been friends first and equals. I was shocked when it all came up in D/s. Stupid me. The fact is he no longer respected me as much the minute I went down for him. In his mind, bringing together power exchange with traditional gender roles MEANT disrespecting women. And that is what it has traditionally meant. I have an Egyptian friend who swears no, no, it's separate spheres, and both are respected. To which I say bullshit.

great post Martina.

You know I felt conflicted most of my life because I didn't fall into any traditional roles- not ever. I had one aunt that was typical June Cleaver type and waited on her family hand and foot. She took great pride in this. Another aunt was a go-go dancer that wore sequined bikini's and fishnet stockings and danced in a hanging cage. She had lots of boyfriends who bought her gifts, cleaned her house and treated her like a Queen. I wanted to be her but when I heard my mom and other family members gossip about her it made me feel stupid. I wanted to be a go-go queen. I didn;t want to cook and clean for a bunch of people who never reciprocated.

In school there were too many times when I heard, "You'll marry a nice man and he'll take care of you." or "Its just as easy to fall in love with a rich man then a poor man." such stupid bullshit. I didn't want anything to do with any of it.

So at a very young age I made my own money and people did things for me. If you wanted to date me you knew this about me and if you didn't like it I showed you the road. Later I tapped into femdom and things became more serious. I was much happier but I still had to deal with too much judgement about how my way of living wasn't normal. That I couldn't treat people like that and that women didn't act like I was. Meanwhile they lined up to serve me.

I spent way too many years with people trying to shove that great white lie down my throat. I admit that when I see a woman so dialed into that I question if she's really happy or trapped. I know its stupid and one sided because I expect that from someone else. I personally would love a butch wearing an apron and baking me cookies. Life would be perfect.

oh wait if I think about it I'd really like a June Cleaver sub femme wearing a cute little dress, cooking, cleaning and waiting on my hand and foot. It would bring out my masculine energy and I'd have to throw her down and fuck her. Damn I'm so sexist! lol

[The_Lady_Snow]

Originally Posted by Sachita

great post Martina.

You know I felt conflicted most of my life because I didn't fall into any traditional roles- not ever. I had one aunt that was typical June Cleaver type and waited on her family hand and foot. She took great pride in this. Another aunt was a go-go dancer that wore sequined bikini's and fishnet stockings and danced in a hanging cage. She had lots of boyfriends who bought her gifts, cleaned her house and treated her like a Queen. I wanted to be her but when I heard my mom and other family members gossip about her it made me feel stupid. I wanted to be a go-go queen. I didn;t want to cook and clean for a bunch of people who never reciprocated.

In school there were too many times when I heard, "You'll marry a nice man and he'll take care of you." or "Its just as easy to fall in love with a rich man then a poor man." such stupid bullshit. I didn't want anything to do with any of it.

So at a very young age I made my own money and people did things for me. If you wanted to date me you knew this about me and if you didn't like it I showed you the road. Later I tapped into femdom and things became more serious. I was much happier but I still had to deal with too much judgement about how my way of living wasn't normal. That I couldn't treat people like that and that women didn't act like I was. Meanwhile they lined up to serve me.

I spent way too many years with people trying to shove that great white lie down my throat. I admit that when I see a woman so dialed into that I question if she's really happy or trapped. I know its stupid and one sided because I expect that from someone else. I personally would love a butch wearing an apron and baking me cookies. Life would be perfect.

I know I can say this to you and you will not be like oh that fucking Snow here she goes, I know you will hear me.


You gotta let that go, the one sided assumption that if a woman is dialing into domestication or tasks that come to some form of care taking, or care giving they are trapped.

Here's why.


We're Doms if we want, need, expect this from a butch and we expect them to do it we have to release the one sided.

They are woman too (unless they are not) and the masculine appearance may be able to let you forget that but the assumption they are trapped could be made of them as well.

In BDSM/Kink we can't CAN NOT go into it with any kind of ism or gender role expectation, and we must check our isms ALL of them for us to be able to succesfully lead.


The image of a butch in an apron is hot, but I'd be pretty pissed if someone assumed she was doing it because it was forced or entrapment.


In real time we can have these convos with our girls/women/Femmes. Here too so we gotta make sure we aren't bringing that one sided machete especially when trying to attain a subject.

Make sense?

[Sachita]

Originally Posted by The_Lady_Snow

I know I can say this to you and you will not be like oh that fucking Snow here she goes, I know you will hear me.


You gotta let that go, the one sided assumption that if a woman is dialing into domestication or tasks that come to some form of care taking, or care giving they are trapped.

Here's why.


We're Doms if we want, need, expect this from a butch and we expect them to do it we have to release the one sided.

They are woman too (unless they are not) and the masculine appearance may be able to let you forget that but the assumption they are trapped could be made of them as well.

In BDSM/Kink we can't CAN NOT go into it with any kind of ism or gender role expectation, and we must check our isms ALL of them for us to be able to succesfully lead.


The image of a butch in an apron is hot, but I'd be pretty pissed if someone assumed she was doing it because it was forced or entrapment.


In real time we can have these convos with our girls/women/Femmes. Here too so we gotta make sure we aren't bringing that one sided machete especially when trying to attain a subject.


Make sense?

Yes I get it and honestly I'm not really holding on it all any more. Of course I might always have that little voice in my head as I check myself. I don't feel I am caught up in gender per se but I could be.

And for me much of this is more about fetishism then anything else. I love role-fucking and anything that fucks the mind.

I think I'm ok here but I know what you mean and respect it.

[The_Lady_Snow]

Originally Posted by Sachita

Yes I get it and honestly I'm not really holding on it all any more. Of course I might always have that little voice in my head as I check myself. I don't feel I am caught up in gender per se but I could be.

And for me much of this is more about fetishism then anything else. I love role-fucking and anything that fucks the mind.

I think I'm ok here but I know what you mean and respect it.

I am in favor of all things Fetish!

I can easily fetishsize all things vintage.

RAWR

[girl_dee]

Originally Posted by The_Lady_Snow

I am in favor of all things Fetish!

I can easily fetishsize all things vintage.

RAWR

i SO love the cupcake dress!

[ArkansasPiscesGrrl]

I am still reading the posts in this most wonderful thought-provoking thread.

I also, Snowy, related to the Momma aspect from the earlier posting. That is where, I think, my own idea of part of how I learned growing up to identify. Since I got married at the baby young age of 16, and started raising my kids at the age of 17, and the fact that my own mother had died when I was 13, I just really didn't have a lot of examples to draw upon. I basically had to just DO. Do my best. Stumble through the best I could. Try to remember what my own mom was like (hey, at that age I really wasn't paying a lot of attention to her and what she did, how she did it, and certainly never spoke to her about WHY she did what she did and what she may have thought about it!)

So I became the nurturer. That was a role I had been thrust into when my mom had her cerebral hemmorhage and slipped into a 7 month coma before dying. I was the middle child, and already did the whole peace-keeping role. So I had to grow into the momma figure for my younger siblings, even though the next one down was only a year younger than me. My older siblings were just older enough to have their own busy lives and could not be bothered. Just the way it was.

I *like* taking care of others. Doing nice things for them. Pleasing them. As I have gotten older, it has become more of a choice to me whether I will do something or not, though. I remember talking to someone about getting coffee for my partner in the mornings. She asked me if I did this as a "duty", or was it because I really WANTED to get her coffee. I told her that since I was already getting my OWN coffee, it made sense and was not an inconvenience to get someone else's. Do I let others do things for me? Yes, of course.

As to the Femme/gender topic, I like Jo came out very late in life, and I don't know if that colors my viewpoint. I am female. I am a woman. That is my gender. I am also queer, that is who I love and how I want my sex. Finding myself to "Femme" was a whole other process and journey. My Femme is not just the fact that I still like to take care of others at times. My Femme, to ME, is my softer side, my open heart, my hopes for my future, my vulnerability, my fierceness, my courage, my toughness, my grit, my wisdom. It also speaks out and YELLS and SCREAMS and HOWLS and DEMANDS to be HEARD when I am around a Butch. It demands to be recognized, demands to be seen and appreciated and loved.

I will close with a cute little true story. Back in the day, when I was very active in the leather community in FL, one of my nicknames was Juney. As in June Cleaver. I have always been so damned white-bread in my looks. I am a mother and grandmother, for Gods sake! Frumpy at times. Well, when I was running the largest BDSM social network in the State of FL, and Topping others, and losing myself in bottoming to others, the fact that I looked so ordinary, while at the same time was just so fucking KINKY, well, it just warmed my twisted little heart! I do love me a good mind fuck!

So hell to the yeah, I still to this day answer to "Juney". Proudly!