To exclude or not to exclude, that is the question.
I’ve been watching Fetlife’s groups splinter.
I’ve spent WAY too much time at Fetlife in Master’s absence. It occupies my time, though the jury is out on whether it occupies it in a good way or a bad way. Doesn’t matter, really. I know it’s temporary. Once Master is home my time there will dwindle significantly.
I’m aware that the site will continue to flourish even without my input. ;-)
There are, at last check, 2,323 different groups on Fetlife. 2,323. Granted probably half of those groups are bogus; the group creation function is open to anyone for anything. But still, even if it’s half, that’s some one thousand ways that people try to isolate their kink. Not all of them in the spirit of “one true wayism”, though some of them are that, for sure. More in the manner of trying to relate to a specific group of people.
It’s interesting to me to watch it being narrowed down.
The Submissive Women’s group was too convoluted and from there spawned the Master/slave group in an attempt to narrow down the participants. It soon became apparent that the M/s group didn’t specify well enough either so along came the Real-Time group. But Real-Time didn’t exclude people who don’t live together and so the 24/7 Live-In group was born.
What I see happening is groups sitting dead in the water. The groups that are thriving are the ones that include everyone because everyone is clamoring. The opinions differ, the viewpoints vary, an approach is different. A new thread is started because someone wasn’t there last week to know that we already covered that topic and it’s buried 20 pages in so we discuss it all over again. It’s a continuous cycle of conversation based almost entirely on the groups inclusion of different kinks.
Sure there are arguments and disagreements. People become passionate about defending this apparent attack to their kink. On the rare occasion someone even learns something or has their mind opened a tiny bit.
But what can be accomplished in the elite groups? What, once it’s finally narrowed down to Only Purple Cunt-lipped Jabberwockies (thank you Sinn, for the wording), will be learned? What growth can there be? Advice, sure, from the more experienced purple cunt-lipped jabberwockies on how to deal with problems specific to purple cunt-lipped jabberwockies.
But it all seems so stagnant.
It’s not that I don’t understand the desire to communicate with “my own kind”. As a slave, but not *just* a slave, a very specific sort of slave, I do sometimes want the ear and advice of other slaves who get me. Slaves who, when I ask a question, spare me the rigamarol of first debating what “slave” means and then debating what “TPE” means and then debating what “power” means and then.. well you see what I mean.
So, I’m on board with it, honest. But I get bored with it very quickly.
Maybe I just thrive on turmoil.
Probably I thrive on turmoil.
I sure seem to find it without trying.
I need a feckin’ hobby.
Subject Change-
Would it be considered topping from the bottom to buy Master a certain book for Christmas because it just might contain information that will spur Him into domming me the way that *I* want to be dommed rather than the way HE wants to do it? Maybe? Perhaps? A little bit?
*sigh* Probably He wouldn’t read it anyway. He’s stubbornly set in His ways, the stodgy old fart.
~~*~~
I woke up this morning thinking about Romper Room. More specifically, about Romper Room’s magic mirror. She never saw me in her magic mirror. I don’t have a popular name, or else I missed that episode, but either way, she never ever saw me no matter how good of a Do-Bee I was (I was never a Don’t-Bee!). And here I am, 37 – almost 38 - years old and I had a sad this morning remembering that I never appeared in Romper Room’s magic mirror when I was 4.
It must be true that you spend your whole adult life recovering from your childhood.
Tags: fetlife
Uncategorized | kaya | 
Monday November 17th, 2008 11:41am
Your paragraph about the group that has the same circular discussion every week made me laugh, because it touches on one of my pet peeves. I’m the kind of person who sits back and listens for a couple minutes before entering an ongoing discussion. This is true regardless of whether it’s a a face-to-face discussion or online one. It drives me crazy when people jump in without understanding the context! Before I join a group and start asking questions, I do a search to see what’s been discussed before.
I’m sure, somewhere, some sociologist has studied the group dynamics of online message boards. They can be amazing–yet frustrating–to watch.
I belong to an online group for rosacea sufferers. At least once a week, someone new joins and immediate asks one of about a dozen topics that is covered regularly, and is thoroughly documented in the archives. It frustrates me to no end that these people can’t search before they ask, though it never seems to bother some people. (I figure they are either infinitely more patient than I am, or it gives them another chance to talk about their favorite topic–themselves.)
I belong to another online group for alumni of a particular school. Most of the members have been participating in this group for years and years. We don’t have a lot of member turnover (except for when people get pissed off, take their toys and go home). After the election, the discussion turned to politics and got very heated. People threatened to quit the group, and others just got huffy. But it made me laugh because someone commented that it was the most animated discussion we’d had in months, and if people didn’t want to talk about politics, we could go back to rehashing the same dozen conversations that (fortunately) only seem to arise once a year or so. It was true…some people would rather have the boring, redundant conversations than actually discuss something interesting and different!
Just wait, soon you’ll see a Fetlife subgroup for purple cunt-lipped jabberwockies who only want to talk politics!
I laughed out loud at a Fetlife subgroup for purple cunt-lipped jabberwockies who only want to talk politics. Because it is SO going to happen. And I will laugggggggghhhhh!
I guess I just really prefer the interesting and different discussions, but at the same time, I like being able to withdraw back into the comforting, familiar and boring topics.
Per usual, I want it all, tyvm. :-)
Hey, speaking of rosacea – any thoughts on the bare minerals make up? Have you tried it? I hear it’s good for it.
I have a ton of Bare Minerals makeup. It’s good, but…
I think it can be drying, particularly this time of year. So I’ll load up on moisturizer before putting it on. Then you run the risk of having it look a little thick and gummy, because it sticks to the moisturizer. But if you don’t moisturize first, you run the risk that it’ll highlight the flakiness. So it’s a mixed bag.
If you don’t have dry skin/flakiness, then it’s worth trying. I’d suggest ordering it from Sephora.com, which will let you return it, no questions asked, if you don’t like it.
(Also, I hate Bare Minerals’ brushes. I have one that’s about 3 years old, and since the first day I’ve owned it, it’s left bristles on my face. I’m not sure why I still even bother with it, since I have other brushes that work so much better!)
On the subject of Bare Minerals…
1. Wash your brush several times with mild shampoo and wash in a motion that pulls the soap down your bristles. After a few washes, it should get all the loose bristles out.
2. If you use the Bare Mineral moisturizer (only a really small button size drop for your whole face) before using the makeup, it’ll keep your skin moisturized and it won’t make your face look gummy. It’s about $20 a bottle, but it lasts me almost a full year.
I use bare minerals and LOVE IT. It’s kinda expensive to get started, but in almost two years I have had to replace the foundation once and the powder twice, which makes it WAY cheaper in the long run than liquid makeup which dries out.
Also, I’ve noticed that it really helps cut down on break outs and keeps my face looking fresh and natural without the artificial look I feel a lot of liquid makeup gives off.
Plus (I’m super girly) I LOVE all the colors and the eye shadows do not tend to crease on me.
I don’t work for BE, I just really love their stuff.
As for Fetlife – I find it incredibly amusing, especially the posts from LoveIsAllYouNeed, including his thread where he deleted posts that were not “beneficial to novices.”
Yeah, Bare Minerals does have some great shades for eyeshadow. (Now, if only I wore eyeshadow more than once a month!) The stuff lasts forever…I have so many containers of it, and think I’ve only finished one of them.
I haven’t tried the BM Moisturizer, but I’ll get a sample next time I’m at Sephora. Good tip.
As for the brushes: Maybe I just got a defective one, because I’m diligent about regularly washing brushes and this one just won’t stop the shedding. Damn brush. Sephora brushes, on the other hand, rock.
(No, I don’t work for Sephora, just a big fan.)
To make this post kinky: Is there a Fetlife subgroup for purple cunt-lipped jabberwockies who only want to share about makeup tips?
I don’t use BM (Hehehe. Bowel movement), but I use Medusa’s Circle, which is similar. (Based in Chicago, where I got mine, but they have a website) I don’t use very much makeup, but I LOVE theirs. And they have that whole entire rainbow thing, which seems like something you’d enjoy. Especially as they’re all shiny. I use it with some cheap-o makeup brushes, though. I haven’t had a problem with it yet. Hell, it even mixes well with WATER for a liner, which is something you don’t get with most eyeshadows. A bunch of the other stuff I’ve tried gets all wonky when you mix it with water instead of saline.
And on the topping from the bottom question? I don’t think it is, but then again, I have a weird relationship DESPITE the M/s. I drop hints like that all the time. I find it easier to ‘accidentally’ let something slip, and then act all horrified about it.
Is it weird that I have no idea what Romper Room is? …Wonder if I would have appeared in the mirror…
I can tell you a traumatic childhood experience I had though…it had to do with Sesame Street and to this day I still have issues with Big Bird. I was probably 2 or 3 and I still used a pacifier. My parents decided that I was too “old” to have one. SO instead of just like taking it away from me or whatever they hung a nail behind the bed. I would go to sleep sucking it and during the night when it fell out of my mouth, they’d hide it on the nail behind the bed. I’d wake up and look for it and they would say “Big bird took it…maybe he’ll bring it back tonight” So every single effin day I would watch Sesame Street and study each one of of those damn yellow feathers looking for where he was hiding my pacifier. No one realized *why* I was watching so everyone assumed I loved Sesame Street…they would buy me big bird stuff and it would make me furious. Before bedtime they would give me my pacifier back (actually, they’d just leave it laying on the pillow…because, you know, he snuck in and brought it back, right?) and the next morning the whole charade would start again.
As far as Fetlife, I totally get what you mean – it does seem elitist and OTW and blah blah blah.
Which book do you wanna buy Him?
Sorry, the big bird story was mine…I forgot to include my name
LMAO@Big Bird. That’s hilarious. :D
The book is The Forked Tongue. Listen to the description:
“This book is not comforting; it does not reassure. It does not teach anything a decent person needs to know. It is a book about BDSM, but it will teach you nothing about tying knots, swinging floggers or spanking. It does not attempt to reach the vanilla public. This book addresses control, it addresses change. The recreational uses of humiliation, conditioning, psychological torture, hypnotism and interrogation techniques are explored and laid bare, broken into usable steps and understandable, applicable concepts. It is a workshop of ruin, the tools necessary to cement lasting alteration and unforgettable experiences for those few who truly crave them.”
Huh? HUH? Isnt that hot as fuck?? I want.
Ohh Flagg’s book! Of course it’ll be hot! Flagg & Soulhuntre were the first people Daddy met in the lifestyle.
I’ll tell you this…I bought Daddy a D/s type book last Christmas and He still hasn’t read it. So…you know…good luck with that :/
Pfft. Well THAT’S not encouraging.
What book was it? Maybe I want that one too! ;)
Well, it’s nowhere near as cool as Flagg’s book…BUT…it’s about the psychology of control. I’m huge into the “why’s” of things…like how come I want to give up control…how come someone else doesn’t want to give up control, but take control. What makes it all flow? WHY WHY WHY, ya know?
I just thought it would be…not so much a teaching type book, but a deeper learning type book.
The Control Book.
It got good reviews?
I’ll tell you this…I bought Daddy a D/s type book last Christmas and He still hasn’t read it. So…you know…good luck with that :/
This is what I’m anticipating as well le sigh
that book is so sitting in my “things I want” folder. I had the same reaction when I read the description…HAWT!
Holy crap.
I know it’s a few years to late.. and i’m NOT miss marty.. but.. *grins*
Romper Bomper Stomper boo.. tell me tell me tell me do.. did all my friends have fun at play??? hmmm… i see my good friend Tess and I see…(the rest are totally unimportant ;) )
awww! For real I have tears in my eyes. :) :) :) :)
Now I has a happy.
the boredom issue and the “one true way” issue are what killed the slave register for me. i’ll never forget it. there was a thread that ended up with some comment to the effect of the following:
“it’s like this: if you’ve been married for 40 years and you wanna talk to people who have been married for around that same time, why would you want people who have been only married for 2 years in the club?”
and that’s when i realized. they don’t *want* input, or conversation. or dialogue. or differing opinions. or new ideas. they want a *club*. and that’s totally cool – i have no issue with that, even when they don’t want me in it. it’s just that online forums are kind of pointless (IMNSHO) if everyone just says “me too” over and over again. if i have something to say and i don’t want any dialogue, i’ll write a blogpost and cut off comments. me? i’m there for the frenzy of arguing and nasty ranting and bloody images.
okay, not really. but i am there for the conversation. and i don’t do the “me too’s” – i tend to drop out of those groups pretty quickly.
oh – and by the way – i was on romper room as a kid. so nah nah.
That’s why I comment on Fetlife only once in a blue moon. It is the same old conversations being rehashed from other forums and the repetitive game of ‘let’s debate the undebeatable’ (i.e. what is a slave?) I can’t be bothered.
I’ve got one of those names that every woman and her dog has. It’s so boring and makes me cringe. I remember have three other people with the same name in my own class! It’s better to have a touch of uniqueness.
xk
kaya – if it’s any comfort to you she never saw me in the magic mirror either……… (my god you are only 37 and *i* watched romper room – damn that show must have been on…… for like.. ever !!!)
As for fet life… i gave up on it eons ago.. couldn’t keep up with all the damn messages….but then i don’t “do” social butterfly well (cheeky grin) …. BUT i do have to say one thing… i am proud it is a Canadian site… wow… when John first opened it .. i figured ok ok a handful of Canucks will show up to play….. but my god !!! it has grown beyond my wildest thoughts…….
morningstar (owned by Warren)
Kaya…I’ve read a lot on fetlife and not once have I had an urge to discuss anything on there – not because I’m not seeking for answers or have a need to answer questons or defend my lifestyle or lack of lifestle – I am frankly bored with the discussions – I love reading real books from real people about everything to do with life not just kink. Why don’t you buy the book for yourself and once you read it discuss it with your M?
is it snowing up in your parts yet?
and i can see kaya and carina and and and…she missed me too kaya, i was royally pissed off because my eldest sister got to go on the show and yeah i am still recovering..
Shit shit shit. Why did you go & ask that?! I bought that book for M for Christmas just Friday! Now I’m having to confront that little “am I topping from the bottom” niggle in the back of my mind dammit.
I decided that it was not tyvm. I’ve decided it’s like a vanilla person buying The Joy of Sex or something to give their sex life a little jolt. I think our D/s life could use a little jolt. That’s not topping… right? I mean… he might want to read it… right?
Aww dammit Kaya.
Groups are definitely more interest when there are differences among the people participating.
That being said, there are people who go to those places to seek out people just like them and they don’t want to fight about whether their way is right or wrong.
oops…See my journal
Captain Kangaroo showed a picture I colored. It was a green hand, and I was 4 or 5. I can still remember him saying my name on the show and my heart stopped. Miss Louise never saw Vonnie in her magic mirror, though.
Sometimes I have trouble relating but I totally get the thing about Romper Room. That blasted woman never saw me either. I used to jump up and down on the couch while she was looking to try and make sure she’d see me, but she didn’t. And you know what? I was totally on to her “reverse psychology” trickery. She saw me, the old bag, but she was pretending NOT to see me the same way that teachers ignore you waving your hand in the air and say, “I love how Susie Nerdface is sitting nicely with her hands in her lap.” And so then I’d sit nicely on the couch with my hands folded nicely on my lap, being a total Susie Nerdface to see if she’d send me some love then. And she didn’t. She DIDN’T! Was she punishing me for jumping on the couch? Or was I really invisible to her? Either way I was highly resentful and switched to Polka Dot Door.
Pokarooooo!!!
Kaya,
I’m not sure why, but I don’t recognize any of those kids shows except Captain Kangaroo. And I’m older than you.
As for the book, I see you having two problems. One, it probably is topping from the bottom. Two, aren’t you supposed to have a book purchases okayed by Him? Of course, if you buy it, whats the worst that’ll happen? You’ll be…p u n i s h e d. Is that really a bad thing? ;)
Dave
My name was never called either – “sheenagh” just wasn’t that common a name way back when – go figure!
and (grins) we’ve had this Fetlife discussion before LOL – I had to leave becuase I got into so many fights LOL “stupid heads” as my kid used to say!
i go on fetlife to read other people’s views and get differing viewpoints. i dont comment much as what i would comment-has already been said. as soon as i start reading personal attacks-which is alot-i click out of the discussion.
i save most of my thoughts for my blog-although my blog pales in comparison to yours :)
she never said my name either :(
although i have a popular catholic name & a famous nun with my name was always in the news at the time. i thought the whole thing was rigged myself-lol.
I totally get what you’re saying about fetlife and it’s five bazillion groups. I’ll never understand why, in a “lifestyle” that craves to be tolerated, we can’t just be tolerant of each other.
It reminds me of when I was in high school and I had a lesbian friend who said I couldn’t hang out with her “crowd” on the regular because they had “lesbian night” and it was *only* for lesbians and I was bi. I remember looking at her like she’d just sprouted a second head and wondering how a girl dealing with so much intolerance already could pass that intolerance down to me simply because I liked boys too. Thankfully, at that point in my life, I was already starting to grasp the concept of “That’s her shit, not mine.” and just went back to hanging out with my eccentric crowd of straight, gay and bi friends.
And I do mean eccentric. We were a strange array of cheerleaders (who threw me a baby shower in 4th period when they found out I was pregnant – thus the start of our less superficial friendship), jocks, preps, stoners, goths, thugs, grits and nerds. I got along with everybuddy. And then I got less tolerant of bull shit drama.
I think I’m too young for Romper Room :/ My parents are always making references to it and I’m like “I get the fact that it’s for kids… but the rest, without seeing the damn show, makes no sense.” Wonder if she ever said my name. Probably… it’s pretty common.
fir reference-
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=td1KAgrYUGA
For not fir.
Ok babe, i did not read the comments– they were about stuff not fetlife based a lot.
i don’t go to fetlife much anymore… it deteriorated fast, but not just the splinter groups—
it’s the SAME OLD SHIT over and over and over– which is GREAT for newbs and the people who want to hold their hands.
GREAT for people shut in with nothing to do and lots of anger management issues.
GREAT for people who like to disturb shit and spread cancer:)
Not so good for people with thoughts and ideas based on years of living the life, writing about it, doing it, and no time left in their days to bake or sew or cook let alone sit around arguing with some assinine a-hole over and over on thread after thread as they say things like “Fucking moving cars from the tailpile while in heavy traffic is really keen and i did it last week truly!”.
Nope. i have not seen a single thing on fetlife that educated me on kink (but i sure as shit have been bored to tears by assholes that need to ASK shit rather than fucking use GOOGLE… i mean, how many damned times do we have to offer advice on how to make a safe call, mix an enema, find a dungeon, or what a fucking munch IS?????? i am sorry– that is time wasting stupid!) or that enriched my knowledge base.
i use fetlife for keeping up with friends and their personal ideas (like you and me!), or finding out about scenes i didn’t get to see (cause i was naked and screaming at the time?).
i hate the damned threads that a certain woman starts over and over that are NOTHING… (i am bored, are u? / everyone loves me/ are you cooking beer?/ etc.) that take up time and energy… how bored do you gotta be to engage in that?
i have whittled my world down to about 100 sincere thoughtful people who know their shit and have real honest well thought out reasons for feeling the way they do. i don’t agree with all of them, but i at least don’t have to pretend i do.
PART TWO (cause i am so succinct ya know)…
i won’t spend time trying to talk to idiots that have opinions that i KNOW are based on their fantasy jerk off time (you know who i mean, the alden dude) nor will i waste it arguing with the ‘pull up yer big girl panty’ jerks (who can’t do so when *i* tell them to fuck off), nor with the oh so sincere people that are fine with a spanking or two and think that’s KINK but get all twizzled with what you and i do….
fuck it.
let’s go clean the house for the man that gets us hot and write our memoirs and get paid for them… we have WAY better lives that those fuck ups.
Hugs to you– guess i am happy and on a rant wagon today as well!
smootch!