BDSM Roles

On every profile page, there is a place for each member of these forums to list their BDSM role. Lately, I've been reading through the new members' thread and soe of the other threads here and I've noticed a lot of members saying they are not sure what their role is. What I have also notied is that a lot of these confused people assign themselves a role for the purposes of completing their profile.

Well, I'm here to help out, if I can.

The first thing I'd like to say is that no one has to fill out the BDSM role part of their profile if they are not sure into what role they fit. If you are not sure of your BDSM role, then leave the field in your profile blank, or type in "uncertain" or "confused" or something to that effect. Don't arbitrarily assign yourself a role, just because you feel you need one to complete the information in your profile.

Secondly, because you are confused or uncertain of your BDSM role, that does not automatically make you a switch. Switches, classically, are scene players that like to top for a particular event/person/group, but also bottom for another event/person/group. Most likely, switches will be found attending local BDSM group functions and events. I've had the opportunity to get to know some switches from a couple of Houston BDSM groups over the last couple of months and, believe me, they are not confused about their role. They have some very specific ideas about the people they will top for and the people for which they will bottom.

Similarly to the second point, just because a person is unsure of their BDSM role does not necessarily make them a submissive either. A whole bunch of dominants didn't know they were dominant when they started looking for their role. The same goes for submissives. Many submissives need to experiment for awhile before they know they are submissive.

So, if you are not sure of your BDSM role, leave the field blank or type in one of my suggestions for your role mentioned previously. More importantly, do what you need to do to figure out into what group you fall. Experiment if you want to. Find a mentor, if you must, but do be careful of people claiming to be mentors that ask you to send them nude pictures of yourself first thing off. They probably aren't mentors. Make some dominant and submissive and switch friends and talk to them. Ask them how they came to know what the right role for them was.

The BDSM Library Forums have an excellent PM system, as well as an integrated system to allow people to email one another through the server, and even a system to allow members to contact other members over their IMs. There are plenty of resources here, and a whole lot of people, available to assist you and to talk to you about just about anything you are comfortable talking about. So, use the system and the people here to your fullest advantage. It's a lot more effective and probably a lot safer in the long run that just trying to figure your role out all on your own.