Can you identify a submissive man?

Is there such a thing as "subdar"?

Photo by freestocks on Unsplash

This came up on Reddit: Is there a way to identify a sexual submissive?

My answer was: Yes. No. Sort of….

It would be bizarre if sexual preferences were entirely random, if there were no link between personality and kink.

However - based on the handful of subs I know in RL, plus some long conversations via private messenger - it's complicated because of definitions, framings, culture, fetish, trauma, and Shadow Self.

It's a bit like going, "What video games might this person like to play?"

Does the dynamic manager go home and manage some more with a game of Civilisation?

Or does he settle into the dumbest first-person shooter he can find? Or zone out with Tetris?

Or, maybe he'd enjoy some of those games, but thinks video gaming is stupid, immature, or immoral.

So, a lot of different sorts of people want to submit in a variety of ways. There's no one unifying trait, but maybe you'll find them most easily amongst those who are physical and playful - but that probably goes for switches and dominants as well.

If you are looking for somebody who tends to be submissive within a relationship, then I think this tends to be people who get their certainty from outside themselves - which describes me and some of my friends, all lifestyle submissives.

People like us tend to be great champions of organisations, causes, and people. Think Maximus from the Gladiator movie, though this could be twink edition and with a side order of brat.

The biggest test, though, is are we submissive to you?

That doesn't mean drooling over your boots. It's more to do with how we centre you. At the same time, maybe our flirting style tends to playful teasing because we enjoy being on the wrong end of a sort of delighted outrage. We can also tend to display old-style gallantry, but use playfulness and self mockery to mask that it's in earnest.

BIG HOWEVER... the important caveat…

This doesn't guarantee we are actually kinkily submissive.

We may tend to being service tops, or flip to reveal a little used Shadow Self that's dominant.

We may also be carrying cultural injunctions to be super macho. We may frame our bedroom solicitude as "being a good lover and therefore very manly, just like James Bond but with more oral...".

We may have traumas that make us run a mile from kinky submission.

We may have picked up very specific fetishes...

So, what I'm saying is that you can maybe identify people who would be a good lifestylish sub if they were a sub, and maybe have a higher than average chance of being a sub.

That rules out a lot of people who would be great bedroom only subs, and probably misses some excellent matches who just don't present that way.

However, “looking under the light” is a good start, and maybe the only ones who deserve you are the ones you find there…

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