Slave vs. Submissive

A slave alone.

The difference that matters to me…

I’ve heard many say that in BDSM there is no real difference between a slave and a submissive, that the defining line is when consent starts and ends. While some voices and writings qualify that in BDSM both partners can always give or take their consent as autonomous beings with agency, they do agree that for the most part a slave has given blanket consent and a submissive does not.

There is also the argument that no label is more important, or more valid, than any other label. It is just a descriptor.

I read posts that go something like, “I’m so tired of all the specialness, or otherness, people want to ascribe to their labels.” As if it isn’t a very human thing to want to fit in with the group while at the same time pointing at ourselves and saying, “I’m with them, but I’m still different.”

Within the ambiguous halls of BDSM histories and the context of the rule book (spoiler alert, there is no actual ONE rule book), dominant and submissive are verbs—labels that describe an intentional action rather than an adjective that describes a character or archetype.

Anyone can choose their actions, change their actions, make their actions at any time. The descriptions are fluid. Yes, people use them as adjectives, even as nouns, but for the most part, when you get into discussions, everyone has to agree that the labels themselves are fluid and can be defined however the person wearing them defines them.

This drives my literal way of thinking a little batty. I think it’s my special brand of ADHD that wants everything to be what it is. I want meanings to have permanence, for words to mean what the dictionary says they mean.

And for me, a slave is very different than a submissive. Being a slave became a mindset some time ago—one that I practiced, that I worked hard at, that I sacrificed for, that cost me something. I was a slave by choice, yes. But that negates the effects of ‘training,’ which made me this way, which opened doors in my mind and in my identity. Training that fundamentally rewired me, affirming character traits that had never been affirmed as well as rewiring those traits to make them more compatible for Dominant companionship and Mastery.

When I weepily tell a Master that “I don’t do well alone,” he knows what his kind do to women like me. He answers, “Of course not. You are a slave. You need to be owned.”

I read these beautiful posts about the delicate balance and wonders of female trust for her Dominant partner, but there are no posts about when a woman is pushed beyond trust and has simply learned to obey because it is more natural than resistance.

There are levels of trust. The keys to my trust are buried so deep, it would take a very rare kind of man to even realize he doesn’t hold them. The areas where I don’t trust are not obvious. And none of them have anything at all to do with kink, sex, or orgasms.

I believe this is what defines me as a slave. I do give my Master blanket consent after I am collared. Once I am owned, so are my choices, so is my yes. But also, it doesn’t take trust for me to try new things, go new places, be placed in new situations, or have decisions taken out of my hands. It only takes obedience. Be it joyful, willing obedience or a stiff-armed submitting of my will to a greater will—if I have given my yes, I am not going to go back and change my mind. Hopefully I have chosen a worthy partner. Hopefully he is a man and a Master with my best interests at heart.

For me, long before I stepped into a world of submission, giving my word meant something. I swore I wouldn’t be Beauty from Disney’s Beauty and the Beast.

Do you remember the scene where she takes her father’s place and says she will do anything? She agrees to follow all of Beast’s rules. And then she breaks every single one of them. When he becomes angry, she freaks out and runs away, taking herself and her beloved horse into danger. Beast risks his life to save them and gets hurt. And she never even apologizes.

What a sorry, pathetic, selfish image of womanhood. I promised myself that I would be stronger. That my choices would mean something, that my decisions would mean something. Which means I will try to stick with something even when it gets scary, even when I have no idea where I’m going, and even after trust is broken.

So when I give my word as a slave, as an owned one, and accept a collar, it will stand until the Master has broken his word over and over. Until I am sure I have done everything I could. Until I knelt with my very soul while the storm of circumstances that I don’t get to control swirls around me. Being a slave is so much more than consent to serve all my Master’s kinks.

It is the refusal to run when the castle doors feel too heavy, when the rules chafe, when the Beast—no, the Master—shows teeth. It is staying obedient because the word I gave was not a suggestion. It’s a vow carved into my soft parts.

I am not fluid. I am not a someone who will redefine the shape of my surrender on a whim or because of fear or feelings. I chose this shape long ago, paid the price in tears and rewiring and lonely nights, and I wear it like skin now. When the collar locks, it is not a game of pretend. I walk forward and don’t look back to see if the door closes behind me.

That is the difference. That is what a slave is. That’s how I define it.

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