Today, I wanted to share my point of view on female superiority / female supremacy. When one visits a website dedicated to information on female dominance in a relationship, one often seems to encounter views espousing female superiority / female supremacy more generally. For example, one well-known source of information on female dominance is the Elise Sutton website (http://www.elisesutton.com/), which argues for female supremacy.
There are at least two possible views on female superiority / supremacy: (1) that all women are superior to all men; or (2) that women on average are superior to men. (The key dimensions which people who discuss these ideas typically have in mind are intellectual superiority and superiority with respect to leadership qualities.) Let us first consider the first view, whereby all women are superior to all men in the dimensions of intellect and leadership. The Elise Sutton website seems to espouse this view. I find this claim to be highly implausible. There are clearly lots of examples of men who are incompetent and/or poor leaders, but this observation does not imply that all men are inferior to all women. In fact, it's pretty easy to falsify such a hypothesis: many men are clearly superior to many women in intellect and leadership qualities. E.g., our president or Mahatma Gandhi are clearly superior to most women (and men, for that matter) on these dimensions.
The more interesting claim is that women are superior to men on average, in intellectual and leadership qualities. Although this is an interesting hypothesis, there is no quantitative evidence in support of it that I am aware of. Neither is there any strong evidence in favor of the opposite view: that men are superior to women in intellectual and leadership qualities. The clear null hypothesis here is that men and women are equal in these dimensions. I will therefore assume the null hypothesis (as any scientist should) until I encounter evidence to the contrary.
How does this affect relationships? The null hypothesis is that both men and women differ a lot in their desires to lead and/or be led in a relationship. So while I very much like to dominate my husband Evan, this doesn't mean that all women should like to do the same thing with their mates. Indeed, many women may like to be dominated by their mates. If so, they should seek a man (or woman) who likes a more dominant role in the relationship. Yet others (perhaps the majority) might like a balanced relationship in terms of power.
Regarding the Elise Sutton website, there was some discussion on she-makes-the-rules.com a while ago about whether Elise Sutton was a real woman, or perhaps was a man masquerading as a woman. (Search for Elise Sutton in the discussion forum.) None of the women at she-makes-the-rules.com (some of whom are active in female dominant circles) had ever met Elise Sutton, so they suspected that "she" was really a man. I would guess that they are right: until someone I know can verify "her" in real life, I will assume that Elise Sutton is just an over-active male fantasy.
Finally, I would like to add that I am not superior to my husband Evan: I am just dominant over him. We both happen to like it that way.
I usually like to include a photo or two, for the more visually-inclined of my readers. Here's another shot of me in my pink sweater and skirt, with my paddle.
And here's a shot of Evan receiving an over the knee spanking, for general naughtiness.
My best wishes to all,Deirdre.
Interesting post.
ReplyDeleteThere's an article, "Is There Anything Good About Men?" by Roy Baumeister, which argues that men are superior at taking risks especially when the rewards serve the larger group, and that women are superior in their ability to take care of an intmate relationship. There's also been a number of studies showing a marked relationship between testosterone and both the willingness to take risks and competitiveness.
An argument could be made that this greater attention to intimate relationships on the part of women (assuming that it is actually the case), make them better suited for taking the lead in a relationship and that, in and of itself proves superiority. Blanche Black makes some arguments along these lines on her blog, and while she's a strong writer I'm not convinced. Leadership requires the willingness to lead, and from what I've seen, that correlates with competitiveness. At the same time I don't want to overstate the importance of competitiveness either. After all, the Type-A personality visiting a dominatrix is a walking cliche.
For what it's worth, which is precious little, I suspect that fewer women than men are suited for leading a relationship, but that if it was possible to compare the performance of the leaders from both genders, the women would be doing a better job at taking charge.
As for Elise Sutton, whatever it may be - male, female, something in between, it seems to be doing pretty good at turning a buck. I salute its entrepreneurial spirit.
The guy who does the blog 'femdom 101, mommydom 201 or a kool aid drinker?' has hilarious taste in photographs. Every so often he does an Elise Sutton sighting. These are a couple of my favorites:
http://femdomnonsense.blogspot.com/2010/03/elise-sutton-saturdays_20.html
http://femdomnonsense.blogspot.com/2010/03/elise-sutton-saturdays_13.html
http://femdomnonsense.blogspot.com/2010/02/elise-sutton-saturdays.html
I don't know much about Elise Sutton, but maybe the motives behind the views are really about the fetish. For male or female subs, the idea of a dominant and superior gender could make their partner(s) more attractive. I agree with you, Deirdre. What matters is individuals and their unique relationships. Of what use can we make of generalities? I don't believe in forcing people into roles, whether they're men or women, even if some statistical evidence was found that suggested something about the "average". A person isn't an average, and in this case, I'd also question anyone's claims with regard to defining "superiority".
ReplyDeleteThanks for the visuals. No question you take a superior photo. ;)
I think my comment was not taken the first time I tried. Please forgive me if it should appear twice:
ReplyDeleteMa’am,
I could never lay out my arguments in the stringent way you do, not only because English is not my language, but also because my approach would be less scientific by far. Anyway, I fully support your thesis that neither women nor men are superior – not in general and also not on average. There are many more examples of female or male outstanding (or inferior) leadership than those you cited, but as a truly neutral Swiss I will not name any that came to my mind, at least not in this blog .
I have visited Elise Sutton’s website a few times in the past and I find her (or ‘his’) views a bit over the top. Interesting reading, but hardly applicable to everyday life.
In our relationship neither partner is really dominant. I always had an underlying wish to be dominated by a strong woman and I was very happy when my wife agreed to try the part. However, partnership comes first and is the way most decisions in our household are achieved. Female “domination” or Domestic Discipline or FLR are rather means to soup up or sexual lives, although I sometime wish it would be more (and then, at critical moments, I don’t). I have often discussed this with my wife and she has taken a more dominant stance more recently, punishing me for real mistakes or for annoying her, and I have a clear impression she is enjoying herself on these occasions. We both are about three years from retirement from our professional lives which means we are going to spend a lot more time together. I guess the Domestic Discipline aspect of our relationship could gain more importance then. It’s all a bit confusing, I know, but it is the best way I can put it to words.
Let me again compliment you on your blog – it is certainly one of the best – if not THE best on the topic and the one I check first every day!
George
Hi Deirdre,
ReplyDeleteAs always, thanks for the post and pictures. It's easy to take your blogging for granted, because you do it so well, and you make it look easy. But I keep reminding myself that writing these posts, and editing them, and adding pictures, and final checking etc, takes a lot of time. It also takes a big emotional investment to think about what you want to write, AND to put yourself out there for comments and potential criticism. Fortunately, all your readers appear to be fans, so I hope that stokes your fires a bit.
I can't say it as eloquently as you or the others who commented earlier, but I tend to agree with your stance that neither the "females always superior", nor the "females generally superior" position have much evidence to support them. I can understand that perhaps some women's motivation in being proponents of such a view could be in response to past and current examples of oppression of women by men, which are all too common. Still, I don't think there's much to be gained by an argument that either gender is inherently superior. In my opinion, individuals should pursue relationships and societal roles with a balanced view to their personal preferences, along with healthy insight into the likely positive and negative effects those roles and relationships will have in their community. It doesn't mean I think people should be ruled by others' opinions of their actions and choices. But I think it's healthy in community to consider the impact of our actions and choices on our fellows, since we need one another.
Thanks again for the interesting thoughts, as well as the revealing pictures!
-Carl
I only found your blog a few weeks ago. Now that I have had time to read it from the start. I agree with you comments on FLR.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the great blog.
I couldn't agree with you more. There no basis in fact for the "all women are superior" rubbish. I also think it's kind of a cop-out... it lets men who recognize their need to submit to relieve themselves of the reality of their situation. It's not a personal thing if "all women are superior", but if the real truth is that they, and they alone, have surrendered all that traditional male prerogative, then it makes it much more personal and poignant.
ReplyDeleteDeirde,
ReplyDeletewhat excellent common sense. I could not agree more.
i don't get spanked because K is superior and I'm inferior (neither of us thinks that). I get spanked because its in my nature to be misbehave and spanking is a resolution that works for us, and she doesn't lead our relationship, she just does something bout it when I go astray.
DD is about much more than being superior or in charge - I know lots of bossy arrogant women who aren't superior , they are just bossy and arrogant and all they do is make the lives of those they consider inferior (men) miserable. No way can they provide the constructive guidance that DD requires, far from being suited to giving spankings, they would probably benefit from getting one or two, bring them back to earth.
And yes I know strong assertive men who are nothing more than boorish bullies, no way are they the right people to be dealing with bratty wives. On the subject of which, k has a few friends who are not superior at all, they are dangerous in charge of a credit card and car keys, and yes the odd spanking (from the right perosn0 might do them some good too.
So the point of this rant is?
Superiority has nothing to do with gender.
Leadership and superiority aren't the same thing, and has nothing to do with gender either
DD relationships are more about leadership and shared responsibility than superiority
Getting a good spanking when you need it doesn't make you inferior, just naughty. Responsible people accept the consequences of their actions, inferior ones try to hide from them.
R
Consider the matter in sexual contexts. When men experience an orgasm, their semen is a product necessary for procreation. Simply put, men's sexuality is utilitarian and the act is pleasurable to ensure the continuation of humanity.
ReplyDeleteHowever, women's orgasms have nothing to do with procreation. Women don't need to have an orgasm to get pregnant and giving birth is anything but pleasurable. These sobering point give women something to consider and choices to make. In other words, they have the potential for greater control of the male/female exchange.
Since a woman's orgasm is something totally separate from procreation, she experiences orgasm for the sheer pleasure of sex. Not only that, but women can experience orgasms from the clitoris AND g-spot, they can experience orgasms emotionally, with great length, and they can experience multiple orgasms.
It's no wonder WLM and FLR relationships feel so natural: women need more from their men sexually thus they are superior.
Deidre- great post, will you ever post any pictures of you naked
ReplyDeleteBob
I think an F/M, wife/husband relationship benefits from the wife's maternal instincts. Spanking is not only punishment, it is also nurture.
ReplyDeleteWhether the impulse to nurture is natural or is culturally derived by women is, of course, not clear. This is a perennial question, pursued by scholars in a number of social science disciplines, but never satifactorily answered.
While we uphold the wife as the family disciplinarian, we must recall that in adult relationships these roles are negotiated. The events of initial negotiation, as often as not, seem to begin when the husband initiates the conversation.
Details are then worked out from the perspective of an equal partnership. The wife provides the discipline; the husband promises certain preferred responses as the result of that discipline. Thus, it is equality of need and mutual respect that lie at the heart of an F/M relationship.
jm
i suppose any site that deals in sexuality may be suspect when commercial (or otherwise).
ReplyDeletethe virtue to Elise Sutton and to the use of 'superiority' or 'supremacy' as tags is the awakening in males of their desire to submit, to feel submissive, to let a Female take the lead.
some men, as You point out, reject or laugh at the notion. but some of us recognize the drive and wish to develop or fulfill it.
if 'supremacy' serves as an aphrodisiac phrase to lead us where we want to be in a relationship with a Woman who wishes to dominate, why not?
mysster