I’m not afraid of submissives. That may seem comically obvious, if you think submissive men or women are intrinsically harmless, simply because they’re submissive. But a submissive woman can hurt me a lot if I care for her and she doesn’t want what I can give her. A submissive woman I love can break my heart. Literally. (I mean literally.) 

But I can hurt a submissive who puts herself under my domination. I can give her physical pain. I can give her psychological pain, too. I can make her sorry, or frightened, or – for a time – alone and helpless. 

That’s why submissives come to me (when they do), or to some other dom. That’s what they want.

Submissives should be afraid of me, or of any dom. We can hurt them, and that’s something to be feared. But they don’t feel that fear, or they move past it. That ability to trust, to place oneself in someone else’s hands, is awe-inspiring. It is extraordinary. I admire it. There is immense courage there.

A dom will never be called to front up such courage,