Monday, September 26, 2011
M/M Hypno Singles Mayhem
Over the summer, I decided to try out some male-for-male hypnosis singles sites. Specifically, I set up an account on hypnotising.org and the IRC chatroom #gayhypnosis to see if I could find a good hypnotist to put me under online. I figured, I wasn't finding any good hypnotists on Fetlife, maybe they would be easier to find on a hypnosis-only site.
...um...
Hypnotists were easy to find, yes. Good hypnotists? Not so easy.
The following vignettes are not in chronological order, but rather in the order that it feels natural in which to tell them. I'd also like to preface this by saying that I realize that I still didn't get anywhere near the level of crap that so many people get just for presenting as female on Fetlife or other sites.
Older Dude in #gayhypnosis
This guy invited me to a private chat. Wanting the same treatment that I would give any of my subjects, I grilled him on what he would like to do with me in a first session. The answer was something along the lines of, "Oh, just put you under and feel things out."
Then I asked what he would like to do after that. Answer: "Fly out to [hometown deleted] and buy a collar for you," followed by a lengthy, way-too-detailed description of how special this collar would be.
...I responded that I was definitely not looking for what he was looking for.
I changed my hometown from [actual hometown] to "Variable" immediately afterward. He private messaged me again the next time I was in the room, wondering (not unkindly) why I was there, when I had already found "what [I] was looking for" and found it not to my liking.
Do I really need to explain where this guy went wrong?
Couldn't Be Sexy If He Tried
Another guy private-messaged me in hypnotising.org's own chatroom, asking to hypnotize me. He asked me what I liked, and I pointed him toward my hypnotising.org profile, which explicitly outlines everything that I like, as well as my hard limits.
His response? "Oh, I've done all of those things."
My inner response: "...suuuuuuuurrrrrrre you have."
My chatroom response: "Ooh, can you tell me about some scenes you've done, then?"
His response to that: "Oh, I don't kiss and tell."
So, OK, this guy's already making my Bullshit Detector go off. But I decide to give him the benefit of the doubt - I mean, I've done everything on my list as a hypnotist, right? And not everyone is comfortable disclosing their scene details.
Well, then he starts bragging about all the cool things he likes to do...one of which was "dumb jock" suggestions, which are right at the top of my hard limits. In fact, by this point my profile explicitly opened with "IF YOU WANT A JOCK, LOOK ELSEWHERE." So I pointed out that he seemed to be confusing my want-list with my limit-list.
As he continued to talk in circles and not give me any specifics whatsoever, I told him, "give me something to fantasize about!" He responded, "I don't work with fantasy, I only work with reality." (Yay for missing the point?)
At this point I've given up on salvaging anything from this guy, so I give up trying to be coy and tell him that he is not making himself remotely appealing, on any level.
Spiral: come on, give me SOMETHING to get me interested!
Not-Sexy-Guy: lol, i'm interested in you.
...yeah, you and a bunch of other horny hypnotists on this site, I'll need a little more than that.
Denouement: The next day, he invited me to watch him put another guy under on cam in a private chatroom. Or, rather, he was inviting me to put another guy under on cam - there was a massive miscommunication (which says something about his communication skills) that led to him thinking I was going to be the hypnotist, when in fact I figured I might as well check out his hypnotism skills and see if he was at least any good.
After the miscommunication was cleared up, he proceeded to put under the other room-goer with a hands-stuck induction. The hypnotee did not have a microphone; he was only able to communicate by typing - and this guy did a hands-stuck induction. Hands-stuck is my default, but I'm perceptive enough to know when it is a terrible idea - and by then, I'd learned to be disturbed by any hypnotist who would deprive his hypnotee of a means to communicate.
Not-Sexy Hypnotist proceeded to be utterly baffled and lost when this induction didn't work. So, not only did he use a poor method, he didn't have any backup plan when it failed.
Sigh.
Mr. Douche 'Tist
Here's the main event. There were some other mishaps, but these three were the most notable, and this one was by far the experience that left the biggest impression.
The first day I was on the site, I threw out messages to a bunch of hypnotists who seemed vaguely interesting. Not that I had a lot to go on; most of the profiles on this site only had a sentence or two. So I messaged people who at least had decent grammar and professed some kind of nerdiness.
I soon got a reply from a guy that I will refer to exclusively as Mr. Douche 'Tist. We chatted a bit on YIM, did some half-decent negotiation, and got on Skype for the trancing.
The first hypnosis session was, frankly, awesome. He had me freezing and posing in all sorts of positions, stripping in fun ways, feeling REALLY subby with a "good boy" trigger, and generally having a blast. His induction technique was also fantastic - I was legitimately impressed.
That said, there was one red flag that came up in this: up front, during negotiation, I stated that I didn't want any amnesia. He agreed to that. However, he proceeded to be surprised that I was fully aware and conscious every time I froze. Silly me, I just figured he defined "amnesia" differently, and I shouldn't be concerned.
(I think I'm right that he just defined it differently, but I still consider that a red flag.)
I proceeded to float in subspace for an hour after the session, which was reeeeeeaalllly nice.
My second session with him...hoo boy.
He messaged me, asking if I wanted to do another trance. I was up for it at the time, and asked what he wanted to do that night. He replied, vaguely, that he just wanted to do some freezing scenes. I was like, cool, sounds perfect to me right now.
Well, he used and reinforced the triggers from the last session. I should mention that I was starting to be impressed with my own ability to freeze in place - every time he used the freeze trigger, I was stock-still and it was awesome.
And then...
...well, first, while I was frozen, he suggested that I would unfreeze as a puppy. Won't lie, this is something I've wanted to do for ages, so I didn't mind - except that I had told him that I had to be quiet (someone else in the house was sleeping), so barking loudly was right out. So, I became a puppy for a minute or two, but I couldn't really get into it and I was very quiet. After he brought me back out, I explained that my headspace was messed up by the noise issue. He proceeded to look bored, freeze me in the middle, and leave me to awkwardly continue after being unfrozen.
Again: I don't think there's necessarily anything wrong with that. Freezing someone mid-conversation is par for the course. But it sent up another red flag that he would do this while I was explaining a problem, and I was irritated that he didn't seem interested at all in my issue.
So, he froze me again, and this time he suggested that when I unfroze, I'd be a cave man.
...that took me completely off guard. It was a hard limit I didn't even know I had, because I hadn't even given this fetish any thought. So, when I unfroze, the suggestion flat-out didn't work, and I told him that that kind of play just wasn't my thing.
OK. Here's where it takes a turn for the fucked-up.
Mr. Douche 'Tist (this is where he earns the title) then put me back under, and gave me a series of new triggers and suggestions. One of those suggestions was that he would be able to change my opinions on things. I outright rejected that one when he asked if I understood and accepted it. He woke me up, said it was fine that some things weren't working, then put me back under and, after a very lengthy deepening, he suggested that I would wake up with no free will.
Ordinarily, that would be really hot to me. But this guy had already surprised me with an unnegotiated kind of fetish play, then tried to give me a suggestion to change my opinions, and now he wanted me to be mindless - one right after the other, without so much as a pause to talk to me. This was not a good sequence of events for ensuring my trust.
Keep in mind - I was still in a really floaty, subby headspace this whole time. I was having trouble stringing together any kind of coherent protest - and he didn't give me the time or prompting to allow me to.
So I woke up, supposed to be lacking in free will (by the way, he didn't give me a chance to "accept" this suggestion), and I told him (still floaty, still rambly) that there were still some things I wouldn't do, even though I felt really submissive and obedient.
His response: "Sorry, [pseudonym I was using], you're not working out as a volunteer." *signs off*
WHAT.
THE.
FUCK.
No aftercare. Didn't even wake me up out of the subby headspace he had just built. Didn't ask me to elaborate on anything that had gone wrong, or why it had gone wrong.
Since I like to believe the best in people, I tried to see it from his perspective: he probably thought I was a faker, and that there was no point in doing anything if I were lying about being hypnotized.
Still: throwing in suggestions without negotiating them is pretty awful to me. I know there are hypno-subs out there who love it (including, from my chatting, most of the subs on hypnotising.org), but I stated up front that I wanted to negotiate things thoroughly before doing them. Furthermore, I find it outrageous that he didn't give me time or prompting to communicate any problems with him after I had resisted three suggestions in a short period of time. I know that in that situation, I would have asked my subject if there was a persistent problem, and if they would even want to continue. But no, this guy steamrolled ahead past my resistance, and decided that I wasn't worth aftercare if I wasn't going to fulfill his whims.
Yeah, this wasn't exactly a worst-case scenario. Maybe I'm disproportionately pissed off. But the more I think about it, the more this guy is a model for how not to scene with people, and the more justified I feel in saying that he was a selfish douchebag.
What I Learned from Mr. Douche 'Tist: I learned a lot about communication. I like to think I already knew how important it was to check in regularly and ask how everything was going, but this really hammered it into me by putting me on the receiving end of half-assed care. This guy showed only token concern for my desires or needs, only caring about his own desires when push came to shove.
Conclusion:
Not all of my experiences on hypnotising.org and in #gayhypnosis have been bad ones. I've chatted to some really cool hypnofetishists - mostly hypnotees - and had good conversations. I even met some ethical hypnotists and assorted good people. I even chatted to some hypnotists who seemed really awesome, and who took the time to get to know me; even if it turned out that we weren't compatible, I was much more warmed by those experiences than the hot session with Mr. Douche 'Tist. But the sheer, overwhelming selfishness and douchebaggery that I witnessed pissed me off because it was more common.
Maybe these two sites are so filled with this behavior because moderation is non-existent. Or maybe I'm finding out the hard way what it's like to be hit on by people made confident and self-assured by male privilege. Maybe all the predators on the site made these awkward and way-too-forward flirting methods look viable, because at least they bothered to come after token attempts to get to know a person. It baffled me, because I just couldn't imagine some of these approaches (like the first two vignettes) being appealing to anybody. The real kicker, Mr. Douche 'Tist actually has a really good reputation around thereabouts - it seems not being a predator makes him look good in comparison, and he probably doesn't often run into subjects as high-maintenance as myself. (That's not an excuse for him, by the way - if your sub needs care, they should get it. Period.)
Argh.
This has been Frustrated, Snarky, Pissed-Off Spiral. In the next post, I hope to bring back Sexy, Fun-Loving, Happy Spiral.
Sunday, September 25, 2011
Puppets, Dolls, and Robots
(I also figure, if I post every time I feel like posting, it'll keep me in gear to make sure I don't have any other half-a-year-between-session-and-post situations.)
Of note, ASFR is the hypnosis stuff that I most enjoy as a subject/submissive. Being frozen, being called a puppet, being a robot: I like. If I'm hypnotizing somebody else, I still love it, but I also enjoy blank mind, limp body, and sensation/pleasure suggestions just as much.
So, here are my thoughts on the Big Three sub-fetishes of ASFR:
On "Puppet":
I LOVE the word "puppet." However, I don't find puppets particularly sexy. When I use the word in my fetish play, I'm not thinking about what a puppet is. I'm thinking about what the word "puppet" implies: a being completely under the control of somebody else. This can relate to hypnotized-to-be-a-marionette scenarios (like this one and around 4:09 in this video); however, while I enjoy those (ESPECIALLY being on the receiving end), they're not a very big Thing for me. And speaking of the receiving end, if I'm going to be a marionette, it has to be a human marionette, I don't really want to be hypnotized to feel like I'm made of wood or whatever.
(One of the reasons they're not a big Thing for me, it should be noted, is that it's difficult as hell to make them work in a satisfactory way. Either the hypnotist has to painstakingly describe every single movement of the "strings," or the subject has to be able to see every movement of the hypnotist's hands, or only two body parts can be moved at once, ARGH, it's more trouble than it's worth.)
So, to sum: it's the word, and its accompanying metaphorical concept, that I find sexy as hell.
On Dolls:
OK, doll fetish is a little different. I do occasionally go nuts for "doll" clothes (one of my Fet friends has a Raggedy Anne outfit; I'm a big fan, even though she uses it for age play instead of doll play) and doll makeup.
However, like "puppet," I primarily enjoy "doll" as a metaphorical concept. In this case, it implies not only a being under control, but a being that exists to be played with. "Puppet" implies this, too, I suppose, but I tend to use "doll" in a more playful sense.
This word also has some personal significance to me, because in my early days of hypno-playing, I found that the word resonated with many of my hypnosis play partners in an unexpected way. I started using it at first because I personally thought that "doll" described freezing-and-posing better than "mannequin" (which is more commonly used on hypno-porn sites) - I mean, most mannequins I see aren't very poseable, so "life-sized doll" always seemed like a better description when explaining the concept to a play partner.
I found, to my surprise, that this description seemed to awaken a new turn-on in several of my partners. Obviously, this is not the case with everybody, but it happened often enough that the word gained a strong positive association for me.
"Doll play," as a fetish, often has a distinct objectification element. I'm REALLY not sure if that's part of my own doll kink. When I use the word (and when it gets a positive reaction), my mind turns to the idea of a doll who actively enjoys being played with and posed. I like to see a subject's reactions to being posed. And I always give my hypnotee the choice of being able to speak or mute when they're frozen - I often enjoy having a conversation while posing somebody. But the idea of reducing a thinking, conscious person to a thoughtless object IS appealing to me, if only on a fantasy level (or on a "happening to me" level - my submissive fantasies tend to be less inhibited than my dominant fantasies). And I also enjoy frozen expressions and blank stares indicating mindlessness, which seems inherently dehumanizing. My doll scenes tend to emphasize being frozen more as a kind of bondage than as a dehumanizing experience...but that word, "doll," and its objectification implications, remains.
Long and short on objectification: I could probably come up with an awesome objectification scene if I were playing with somebody into that kink, but I can discard it in a heartbeat and have never pursued it actively.
On Robots:
I know exactly where I stand on robot kink, which is awesome!
I enjoy robot play purely on a superficial level. Stiff, monotone, holding still unless obeying a command, not reacting to outside stimulus, speaking only when spoken to - these superficial aspects are all incredibly sexy to me. I often get the same thrill out of non-robot scenes - like blank mind scenes.
I'm also interested in trying a "mad scientist turns the captive and bound victim into a robo" role play. It seems like it would be a more fun "mad scientist" scenario than a straight brainwashing or a mind control ray.
But I'm not really turned on by robots. I'm turned on by people (or myself) acting like robots as a result of hypnotic suggestion. I also have strict preferences: I like monotone voices, I HATE stilted voices. Perky robots just aren't my thing.
Metaphorically, "robot" also makes a good metaphor for someone under control, but I prefer to keep it separate since I enjoy the specific role play.
As for other robot trappings: I like clockwork/wind-up toy suggestions, although they're sometimes awkward to make work (much easier than marionette scenes, though). I would love to do a remote control scene, but it either involves doing some very complicated things with a Bluetooth headset or describing what button the hypnotist is pressing and what it does each and every time - so it's a bit too much work considering I like vocal commands just fine. I'm not into full robot costumes, but a silver one-piece bathing suit would be hot for robot scenes. If I'm the subject, being nude would be preferable to any kind of outfit.
Perhaps notably, the robot trapping I most enjoy is some kind of object - a collar, a headband, a helmet, a ring - that stops the subject's thoughts and turns them into a biological robot (see: the infamous "Ring Around Gilligan" MC scenes).
...so, I think that's all I have to say about my ASFR kinks, unless I feel like editing this post sometime. I don't know what kind of feedback I can get on this - maybe from my previous play partners who have their own perspectives on how these kinks play out - but anyone who wants to start a conversation with me about this will likely make me happy, because I'm really interested in teasing out the intellectual aspects that this kink holds for me (since it's all tied up in words and concepts as much as types of play).
Later, all!
Saturday, September 24, 2011
Of Robots and Jedi - Also, Bro Music
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So, I have been putting off this post for ages. Around half a year, to be exact. Some of the details may be a touch fuzzy by now. Also...this post may be a touch on the boastful side, which is another reason I have put it off a little. :) Simply put, this is about a truly amazing session with Georgie (our last one-on-one session).
(I will attempt to keep rolling out new posts until I'm caught up with all my recent awesome times. Maybe the promise will stick this time. XD)
Georgie was not really into the whole robot fetish that I like. I rarely get to do any robot play anyway, so I wasn't very fussed about that. Then, she sent me a Fetlife message offering to do robot play...on the condition that her robot persona be named either Rei or Eva.
I don't like Neon Genesis Evangelion, but a reference that geeky was WAY too tempting to pass up.
She was also interested in trying out some forms of amnesia, and, once I suggested it, Jedi Mind Tricks.
So, I mentioned in passing in this post that Georgie's feelings about a mindless trance gave me some ideas for future play. Well, I'm rather proud of how I took this input and used it to modify my robot fetish play to suit her tastes.
After trancing and deepening Georgie, I gave her the suggestion to become a robot - suggesting that she would feel trapped inside her own body, feeling her body obeying and staying in a stiff posture without any ability to control it. I suggested that all of the trappings of a robot - the mechanical movements, the monotone voice, holding still when not following orders, the total obedience - would be a kind of discipline or protocol that she would feel compelled to follow. (I don't know if I've mentioned it much, but Georgie LOVES protocol - Eve is the one usually providing it.) All of this was meant to move away from the usual "mindless and mechanical" part of robot roleplay, and replace it with something more similar to what Georgie prefers - compelled obedience, protocol, etc.
And the Evangelion reference I chose was "Eva-00" (AKA Rei's Eva), to double up on her request. :P
So I played around with Eva-00. I had her kneeling, stripping, posing - spanked her to no reaction (which I found sexy, at least) - that kind of thing. :) I also gave her a phrase to say when I pressed her belly button - "I am a stupid cunt," to go along with her verbal humiliation kink.
She liked it! I'm kind of proud of the fact that I crafted the scene in such a way that she got something out of it despite not being into the main fetish we built the scene around.
Next, we tried working with amnesia a little. I took her feedback from way back to our first scene together - the exact language she used to describe forgetting her name. I deepened her trance, and had her chant "No thoughts, only obedience" over and over for the duration of the trance. It quickly became the barest whisper under her breath, but as she kept it up, I suggested that she would focus on the chant, and all of the other memories of the trance would be like smoke that she couldn't grasp until she was allowed to do so. While she was chanting, I ordered her to all fours, and suggested that my control was so total that her body would feel whatever I told it to feel - to demonstrate, I suggested that she would feel a hard spank when I grabbed the back of her neck. I did just that, and she shuddered beneath my hand and gasped at the sharp imaginary impact on her bottom.
Before waking her up, I also set up the Jedi Mind Trick - thinking that I would test her amnesia ability by including the "forget that it was suggested" part of the Trick.
So, I brought her out of trance, and she was happily frustrated to be unable to remember the trance. I eventually triggered her to remember again, and she was quite pleased with both the mantra and the mental spank. Then, it was time for a lot of random Mind Tricks: making her forget her name (or replacing it with the word "Whore"), turning her back into a robot, getting her out of her shirt and bra, and - the highlight - making her arms, then her legs, go limp.
Spiral: *Mind Trick gesture* Your arms are limp.
Georgie: ...my arms are limp...
Spiral: *lifts her arm and lets it drop*
Georgie: This is...kinda hot...! I like the helplessness of it...
Spiral: Mm, good! *Mind Trick gesture* Your legs are limp, too.
Georgie: My legs are limp, too.
Spiral: *shoves Georgie down to the bed and positions her arms and legs*
So, in short, awesome session. :) We were going to a slosh later in the evening, and I set up the Mind Trick to be active during it so that I could give her spontaneous suggestions.
(Added aside: the amnesia on the Mind Trick didn't work out, to our mutual disappointment, but it was still awesome.)
That slosh was...notable. The slosh organizer had not been informed that it was the same night as a music event - about a half-dozen people getting up and singing two songs apiece on acoustic guitar or ukelele. For some reason, this attracted a MASSIVE AUDIENCE (the restaurant was filled wall-to-wall); judging by the fashion choices of the audience, and the inexplicably huge audience for a bunch of random people singing, my guess is that it was a frat/sorority event of some sort. Anyway, the restaurant didn't expect any kind of major turn-out, so there was only one server for this entire packed place - and we, at the slosh, couldn't have a decent conversation for the first hour plus of the event (I actually got shushed by someone when I tried to talk over the music).
So, uh, suckage. When Georgie showed up and was exposed to the awful bro music of the performers, she turned to me and lamented that she wasn't better at amnesia.
I used the Mind Trick to demonstrate some simple hypnotic phenomena to interested slosh-goers - bound Georgie's hands in various places, mostly.
The highlight of the night was toward the end. Georgie was wearing a corset, and a local Domme who is most excellent with corsets offered to retie it for her. Said Domme was disappointed about not being able to give Georgie any "orders" this time around, so instead, I gave Georgie the suggestion that she would have an orgasm as soon as her corset was fully retied.
...that could have been better thought out. There was no clear signal that the corset tying was "finished," so there were a few false starts. Still, Georgie was breathing hard in arousal at each false start, and once the corset was finished, she exclaimed,
"I don't know if that was an orgasm, but it felt FUCKING GOOD!"
I think that's a pretty good result. :)
Wednesday, June 22, 2011
Back from Inactivty with Insights
Without giving away too much personal detail - my life is in an odd place right now. Not bad-odd, just odd. I'm currently away from the majority of my closest friends; distance has forced me to come to a friendly parting of the ways with all of the play partners I've blogged about; and I'm slightly lacking in direction right now.
In order to ensure that future blog posts happen soon, I'm going to make an enticing preview of things that I promise to write about soon: an account of my last one-on-one scene with Georgie; more threesome shenanigans with Georgie and Eve; my experience looking for a hypnotist on http://www.hypnotising.org; and an excellent online hypnosis session.
I'm going to take a moment to write about hypnosis porn, to sort out and publish some thoughts I've had lately. Please excuse the MASSIVE generalizations I make, as well as the fact that these thoughts subscribe to sexual binaries. If anything, I think it is fascinating (and saddening) that my observations show that the gender binary pervades hypnosis porn and all discussion of it - I think that these observations can contribute to an understanding of how a specific group understands and reacts to gender.
I also want to emphasize that I do not think any of the various groups I generalize are wrong. Rather, I'm simply struck by how people with certain sets of tastes outnumber those with other sets of tastes by such wide margins.
I've noticed - from browsing around the Mind Control Forum, Fetlife, and hypnotising.org - that the hypnosis porn market consists of the following vocal groups:
* Dominant or switchy males who want to see women hypnotized, and want to see as little of the male hypnotists as possible while never, ever wanting to see hypnotized men. (There's a reason that the proprietor of Girls Gone Hypnotized advertises the lack of male nudity in the sex scenes! That's not a dig at him, it's simply the way the market has evolved.)
* Submissive or switchy women who want to see women hypnotized.
* Submissive men who are not interested at all in seeing men hypnotized (this group appears to primarily consume MP3 inductions and video inductions).
* Dominant females who produce their own content: [listed in order of proliferation] MP3 inductions; video inductions starring conventionally attractive women; videos of women being hypnotized (real and fantasy); videos of men being hypnotized (I have found exactly one example of that last category in all my time looking at hypno-porn - will discuss this in a moment).
* Dominant males who produce their own content: [listed in order of proliferation] videos of women being hypnotized (real and fantasy); MP3 inductions; and video inductions.
* Dominant males who do not seem to care for hypnosis porn and would rather hypnotize men themselves.
These groups dominate any discussion of hypnosis pornography on the Mind Control Forum. Fetlife and hypnotising.org have not produced too many discussions of the topic, and the different demographics present there (BDSMers with a casual interest in hypnosis on Fet; gay men on hypnotising.org) could skew this demographic overview. It's not like I'm taking numbers, but I think it is worth noting that these are the groups that drive the creation of hypnosis pornography.
The trends that these groups create are as follows (according to my subjective but long-term observation):
* Correct me if I am wrong, but the number of men producing MP3s for sale is minuscule compared to the number of women producing MP3s.
* There is exactly one website that I have found featuring men being hypnotized by a woman: Queen Cleopatra's site.
* There is exactly one website that I have found featuring men being hypnotized by a man: HypnoSubmission.
* HypnoSubmission, the sole producer of male/male hypnosis video that I have found, does not pay its models. The models are volunteers - the website's model application is actually an application for a pro-dom session, in which submissives willing to be video-taped are allowed to get their session for free. This indicates that the producer is primarily interested in scheduling hypnosis sessions - the videos are a bonus source of income that he cannot and does not depend upon.
* Producers such as Lex (real hypnosis) and Daphne (fantasy mind control) have been outright told in polls and discussions that there is no market for videos featuring men being hypnotized. Lex has, on at least two occasions, posted a poll on the MC Forum surveying the interest level in a shoot where he puts under a man and a woman together; the response, each time, has been overwhelmingly negative. Daphne's production has sadly stalled due to various issues; while she was producing, she never made a male-sub video despite (if I'm recalling correctly) showing interest in doing one on the forum.
* The Erotic Mind Control Story Archive has around twice as many male-dom stories as fem-dom stories. It has around triple as many f/f stories as m/m stories.
I've commented before about the utter dearth of male-sub hypnosis porn available - and how I wish I had the confidence/security/what have you to help address that dearth.
What I'm trying to get at, in this sprawling series of observations, is that the hypnosis community may be shutting out people who would otherwise be interested. There may be a touch of insular thinking going on - all the hypnosis porn is of women being hypnotized by men; therefore, all of the people who frequent the most popular forum about hypnosis porn and erotica are fans of that who wish to see more. I will support this statement by noting that there are very few openly trans posters on the MC Forum, despite transwomen making up a significant proportion of the hypnofetishists I see on Fetlife - no doubt in response to the Erotic Mind Control Stories Archive's rule against featuring transgender content in its stories.
OR, alternately, there is flat-out less demand to see men hypnotized. If so, why is that?
This website suggests that there are simply a lot of forces at work that prevent the professional creation of erotic male imagery that does not conform to a very specific mold. This sounds about right to me.
Perhaps all of the men who would like to watch men get hypnotized are turned off because the men they'd see would inevitably fall into one of two categories - so unattractive to the man watching as to render the model unappealing, or so much more conventionally attractive than the man watching as to render the model threatening.
One thing specific to the hypnosis community - there appear to be very, very, very few dominant women active in the online community who are not simply producing their own content, and these women go with what the market demands. Those women who do not fit the molds I listed above probably do not even bother with the hypnosis porn available - or are bi/pan/homosexual and satisfied with what is out there. I have no doubt that there are plenty more dominant female hypnofetishists than those who are producing content - they just don't seem to have much online presence for one reason or another.
Furthermore, in my opinion, is that the cultural conception of being hypnotized - with all of the subtext of domination and control that it entails - has made being hypnotized an intensely feminized position. Hypnotize the Princess is a trope that is very rarely gender-flipped in Western stories - just count up all the prominent examples of women being mind controlled on that page. In contrast, there are a tiny handful of examples of men being mind controlled. (Hence the title of the trope.) Perhaps there is simply very little room in Euro-American culture to see a man put into a a hypnotized state while acknowledging the eroticism of the scene. Most times when a male character is hypnotized in a cartoon - Barney on The Flintstones, Beast Boy on Teen Titans - he is made out to be weak-willed and foolish. The only example of a male hypnotized by a female villain, with all of the erotic subtext intact, that I remember from my own childhood is Tuxedo Mask from Sailor Moon - IE, originating from a Japanese text.
So, I suppose the point I'm trying to make is this: American culture (and the English-speaking countries that also consume same culture) marks being hypnotized as a feminized position. This has shaped the formation of the online hypnosis porn community, to the exclusion of those who would like to see men hypnotized. To me, this says a lot about a growing expectation that women be more sexually flexible in contrast to a rigid male heterosexuality, as well as how the regulation of gender norms produces disgust and disinterest in any content that breaks those norms. Perhaps those two points do not come across very clearly in the scattered observations above, but I am simply ruminating here rather than crafting a strong argument.
This post is meant as a polemic - a starter for discussion. I want to read other people's thoughts about this! Are there sources for porn of men being hypnotized that I simply haven't found yet? Are there people with similar frustrations about the content available? Is the market simply that hostile to seeing men being hypnotized? (My observations say: yes.)
All I can do, I suppose, is show my support for video of men being hypnotized whenever I see the topic raised - and encourage others to do the same if they want to see it!
Wednesday, April 6, 2011
A Brief Update, and Some Erotica Recommendations!
I did go to my first play party recently! I got to indulge my exhibitionist streak a little by hanging around in the nude for a little bit of time here and there. I also did some brief hypnosis scenes, although I have not obtained permission to blog about them. (If I do get that permission, I will!)
SO, right now, I will post something that's been on the backburner for a while - a list of some of my favorite hypnosis erotica! There are a lot of recurring themes - freezing and extended induction scenes especially - but I tried to go for a range of stories that show different things. There are two brainwashing stories on this list, one story that rings true to the BDSM community, a high school fantasy, two scene stories that take place in hotel rooms (which are strikingly opposite one another in many ways), and a fun little gem about a couple's introduction to hypnosis.
These stories are also exclusively female-sub stories, oddly. Despite my call for more male-sub hypnosis porn, I'm not much of a consumer of it myself. Jukebox and RC have both produced some that I like, but I tend to like f/f best both because of the usual male pig reason (IE, I find all parties equally sexy in all roles - and I like to switch my identification from hypnotist to subject frequently), but also because I find it weirdly difficult to relate to male viewpoints while reading erotica.
Prequel by 8-Bit (f/f, questionable consent)
8-Bit is generally an excellent author, with stories that sometimes have...problematic elements for me. This one has the "nonconsent that continues due to consent" type of set-up, which is less than ideal for a guilt-free bit of hotness. It also has a high school setting, which is a little uncomfortable even with the clear acknowledgment that the characters getting kinky are 18. There's one or two scenes in here that are a bit uncomfortable, including the rather unsatisfying ending.
...it's also BLAZINGLY HOT. The inductions have just enough detail to make it feel like a real hypno story without dwelling on them to the point of tedium. The amount of detail is also perfect for adding to the sense that the hypnotized submissive is so wrapped up in the control that she isn't quite sure what's happening to her. There are so many amazing little bits, and a first person viewpoint that has a combination of helplessness and consensual lust that just works for me. The hypnotist and hypnotee also both come across as people I'd like to hang out with, which is a major plus.
Freeze-Frame by Jukebox (m/f, f/f)
I decided to go for one story per author for this post...and, well, with Jukebox it's incredibly hard to pick just one. My favorite Jukebox story changes often. This one's a keeper, though, because I love the character dynamic of the BDSM meet-and-greet. It's an excellent use of what I call an "unaware" freeze trigger - usually this leads to a brief pause in the action, but here there is so much going on around the sub that the gaps in perception add to the story instead of simply creating a speed bump. I love how Jukebox fleshes out the characters without taking too much time away from the sexiness (Jukebox's writing is very streamlined, one of his greatest strengths), and it honestly feels like the kind of environment I find in the community.
This story also has a sequel. (Totally doesn't count toward one-story-per-author!)
Outcall by Trilby Else (f/f, m/f, noncon)
BEST. BRAINWASHING. EVER.
...OK, maybe that's a bit much, but seriously, the enslavement scenes in this story are to die for. The story starts squicking me progressively more as it goes along (once it gets to the scene where the sub/victim is overwhelmingly turned on by bad macho pickup lines, the story completely loses me). That's how Trilby Else writes, though...his stories always bring the non-con hard after a certain point, and I always lose interest once I get there. But that doesn't mean that I can't enjoy those early scenes.
It's also a story that portrays sex work pretty well, I think. The main character is a prostitute, and the non-con really comes into play when she is dragged outside of the bounds she sets for herself in that profession. There are lines that she doesn't cross as a prostitute - which humanizes her as a character. After all, Trilby can't bring that non-con element in unless his characters are well-rounded enough to have limits...
Face to Face by Robotdoll (m/f)
If you need to have your characters established as people before the sex starts...um...skip this one. "Face to Face" is a pure scene story, and it works in that regard. The D/s dynamic suffers a touch from that lack of depth, but it's a great sex scene for freeze and robot fetishists. I'm not even into a lot of the sex acts in this story - I just plain love the way that freezing and robot roleplay are worked into them.
I'm also very biased because this was the first story I found that really, truly satisfied my robot kink. This is about a human acting like a robot in a completely consensual hypnosis scene. That "rb" label on the EMCSA often means a few too many other things.
The Trance Key by HypnoFan (m/f)
This story has gone unfinished for over a decade. It has no sex in it. Or orgasms. It's all foreplay, all trance play, and I love it that way. The banter is great, the D/s dynamic flows smoothly, overall it's just a joy to read. The hypnosis is also scrupulously accurate, with a lot of really fun tricks and speed-inductions worked into the dialogue. (Regular readers of this blog may have noticed my penchant for dropping narration in order to convey dialogue - I love pure back-and-forth dialogue and I enjoy mentally isolating little bits of it that happen in my scenes.) If only HypnoFan had finished his stories!
Subscription Model by Scifiscribbler (m/f, but it takes a while to get there; noncon)
This one's new and still going on, but it's pretty clear where it's going. It's also incredibly accurate to how I watch porn, making it really easy for me to put myself in the main character's head...which is a very hot place to be. The later chapters have gone in directions that I'm not so crazy about, but I am a fan of it overall.
And after that list of my faves off the EMCSA, here's one I love from an author who has left that site:
A Different Place by RC (f/f)
RC's writing was my introduction to hypnosis erotica. I mentioned in a previous post that my default induction is based on one from an RC story - and RC's inductions are always grounded in reality. Even the sci-fi robot stories on the site still use induction techniques instead of going the "sufficiently advanced technology" route. Anyway, this story is a nice, quick, freeze-focused story with a strong character dynamic. I suppose there's not much else to say except that freeze scenes rarely work quite as well as they do in this story - but that's what fantasy is all about, ne? And the fantasy is delicious.
Thursday, March 24, 2011
Public Play at a Slosh!
"Um...I can't remember. Use it so I can see."
"Order."
"[wince] ...Right side."
--------------------------------------------------
So, the other night I went to a slosh in town with Georgie, Eve, and Miomi. Georgie and I had gotten in touch the day before, and she told me that Eve was giving her a set of protocols and commands for the evening. Not one to be upstaged, I asked if she would like any hypnotic triggers for the evening - and she enthusiastically wrote up a list of requests.
First, I popped over to Georgie's place to refresh and reinforce her existing triggers as well as add some of her requests. [Lots of "re" words in that sentence.] I triggered her into subspace, commanding her to repeat the mantra "I am a docile, obedient pet" to deepen her submission.
Once that was done, I used her trance trigger and worked on creating a more mindless trance that we could use for amnesia and sensation triggers - she wanted to try a "time stop" freeze trigger that left her unaware of what happened while she was frozen, as well as some more complex behaviors that she would forget afterward. Well, the unawareness and amnesia parts didn't quite work out - but we got a new state out of the attempt, a state where she was a mindless puppet with no thoughts, no feelings, just obedience. I ordered her to bring me a glass of water, and watched as she sleepwalked through the task and brought it to me. She didn't like this state as much as her subspace trigger - she felt less like she was compelled to obey and more like she had nothing better to do than follow my orders. The subspace trigger also gave her more room for happy-go-subby kind of feelings. Still, the state seems like it will be useful for other suggestions we've thought of doing down the line - and her preference gives me a few ideas, too. >:)
The puppet trance (as we ended up calling it) was handy for setting up some sensation triggers. After trying out a few different ones, I settled on giving her a mild pleasure trigger (usable by Eve and me) and an open trigger for feeling a hard spank (as detailed in the introduction of this post). She wanted it open, so I figured I'd use a word that would come up naturally at a slosh, what with the waiter taking everyone's orders and all the doms talking about the orders they give their subs. Didn't seem to work out quite like that (the conversation in the intro was started when Georgie and I explained to Eve and Miomi why we were disappointed with the waiter's word choices), but she and I nevertheless had fun all night with the trigger.
First, though, we continued the prep session with a few brief scenes: I froze her and put her in a nice glamor pose [...I messed up the photograph of it, though], then dropped her into subspace. I had her give me a shoulder rub, then put her on all fours for a quick spanking. Brief, but very, very hot for both of us. :D
Anyway, at the actual slosh, I spent a little bit of time giving Georgie her orders and quick bits of pleasure, showing both triggers off to Eve. Eve herself was responsible for putting restrictions on Georgie's clothing and speech, although I did not get to see how much that played out. I did get to watch when Eve had Georgie go to the bathroom and discreetly hand Eve her panties upon returning, which Eve pocketed for the night. After that, the two of them headed out to join the smoke-break crowd while I stuck around inside to chill with Miomi and meet some new people.
One of those new people was a lady relatively new to the group, who shall be called Joan, who was slightly skeptical and very curious about hypnosis. I explained some of the various applications, perhaps not terribly well, before the conversation moved on a little. Once Georgie and Eve came back inside, though, I brought Georgie over to give Joan a practical demonstration. I froze Georgie, and posed her while explaining that I could move her around like a doll or action figure - and Joan exclaimed that it was totally hot. I then bound Georgie's hand to the table we were sitting at to show the bondage applications. The two of us expounded to Joan about hypnotically induced orgasms and other cool bits...and Joan asked if hypnosis could be used to inflict pain, too. So I gave Georgie an order, and Joan's skepticism faded a lot once she say Georgine jumping in her seat at the word.
Georgie then egged me on to try a handshake induction on Joan, but I found the double-talk surrounding the negotiation very uncomfortable - I've obviously had a few fails with the Ericksonian handshake, and wasn't feeling very confident about it. So, once Joan got fed up with the two of us talking in circles and demanded to know if she was getting hypnotized or not, I went with the handy-dandy hands-stuck induction on her. Her face was very animated as I froze her hands together, with a few visible grimaces of effort and/or surprise when she couldn't pull her hands apart. I hit my stride with my patter and speed-relaxed her [how's that for a bizarre contradiction in terms?], then, since she seemed so enthused by watching it, froze her in place using that same patter, having her relaxation turn to stiffness, and posed her a little so that she could get a feel for it.
I then brought Joan out of trance, and she was quite happy with the experience - she was fascinated with how she felt like she was going along with what I said, but nonetheless she could not move when I froze her. Georgie and I introduced her to Eve before the night was over, and the three of us headed out (Miomi found some other people to hang out with to end the night). The possibility of a play party down the line was brought up...that would be awesome if it ever occurs. :)
So...that night rocked. Unfortunately, I had an early morning the next day, so I couldn't stick around Georgie's place afterward while she and Eve checked out some outfits to incorporate into our play. But then, that play will be happening, so I'm quite looking forward to it!
Thursday, March 17, 2011
Switching with Miomi
Life has been crazy lately. Crazy awesome, but still crazy. So there hasn't been much time for sexytimes, and even less time for blogging about them.
(Technically, there has been time, but other things have kept me busy and feeling like I shouldn't be blogging.)
So, in the time that I haven't been blogging, I had an utterly excellent session with Miomi. We met at a munch - she was new to the group and very shy, so my friends and I invited her to join us for a lengthy hang-out afterward. 'Twas good fun, and she and I got in touch later to schedule a hypnosis session.
Since she's a cuddly one, I went with a progressive relaxation induction with cuddles and petting. Great way to do an induction, since it's effective, simple, and has some neat dominance overtones to it. She was a great example of Lady Ru'etha's declaration that "depth is bullshit" - Miomi didn't go incredibly deep, but she was in a highly suggestible state that allowed for all kinds of fun.
Miomi's a furry - wolf fursona - which gave me some imagery to play with. I prefer to tailor my suggestions, terminology, and dominating style to the person I'm domming - and having something like the furry "fursona" gives me something to guide my choices. I played into pet/master gestures the whole session. I enjoyed the way she whispered "Mmm...scritches" every single time I tickled/scratched her under the chin, like it was automatic (I think my love of hypnotic triggers speaks to why I would find that hot). Building off these gestures, I channeled it into some petplay, turning her into an obedient wolf cub through hypnotic suggestion. It was more of the same, with the addition of her words being replaced with growls as she padded around on all fours...she liked it a lot. :)
[Just an aside: what is the DEAL with the hate-on for furries?! I don't see it as much around Fet, but, for crying out loud, it's just people who like anthropomorphized animals. And the furry fetishists are seriously no weirder than other fetishists...I'm turned on by blank stares, monotone voices, people holding poses for a long time, and all kinds of odd things, you can't tell me that's any less odd than being a furry.]
Miomi let me try something that I had never gotten to do before: making a non-ticklish person ticklish! I've wanted to do this ever since I first made a ticklish person feel nothing while getting tickled. She's not completely un-ticklish...but tickling her normally requires some deep digging into her sides. Anyway, this gave me a fun way to dominate her, pinning her down with a burst of tickles after triggering her ticklishness. I also did an awesome ropeless bondage scene with this, where her arms were bound to the bedposts and her legs were covered by pillows - each pillow hypnotically suggested to be too heavy to move. Then I swooped in for the tickle torture and whatever other pleasurable avenues I chose to take. >:D
At one point, I also gave her a hypnotic ball gag. She was impressed by how well she felt it holding her mouth open as I took the opportunity to play with her...
Aside from these novelties, the session had a lot of the fun tricks that I've done with Georgie and Pet Ferret: vulva-hands, freezing, robot. Miomi didn't seem particularly attached to the hypnosis effects outside of the unique sensations and petplay...she said that being hypnotized felt like just another way to be submissive, and just as good as feeling subby through other means. So, due to her blanket go-ahead in the negotiation, I demonstrated a lot of things to see if any of my favorites struck her fancy (she's quite curious, and was up for anything I threw at her), then focused on sensation-oriented suggestions like the ticklishness trigger and the vulva-hands when that seemed to come out on top.
The vulva-hands scene was quite excellent, as it happens. Miomi registered it differently than Georgie does - she felt the sensations on her palms duplicated on her clit, rather than experiencing her hands as erogenous zones. It still led to her panting and moaning facedown into the bed as I worked both hands to create a nice, powerful doubled sensation. I might have to work on really mapping out this whole hands = vulva deal so that I can mix up the pleasure I provide with it.
Toward the end of the session, the control of the session shifted toward Miomi. As she put it, she had such a fantastic time subbing for me that she repaid the favor by letting me get all subby.
(How's that for a reversal of the stereotyped dynamic...I've read chances to dominate described as rewards in stories and in people's perceptions of BDSM. Here, subbing was seen as the position with the greater capacity for pleasure, and therefore the more rewarding position between a pair of switches.)
Now, when I'm domming, I tend to focus extensively on giving my partner pleasure. Subbing for Miomi helped me articulate one of the reasons why I do this: when I am receiving a lot of pleasure, "in control" is one of the last phrases I'd pick to describe myself. In this case, with Miomi scratching my neck just right (she found a sweet spot that I didn't even know existed...), I was a curled up little ball of submissiveness who couldn't manage much more thought or speech than a meek "Thank you, ma'am." My eyes closed naturally as I curled up to her (I mentioned in my last post how much I enjoy blindfolds - lack of vision reinforces that feeling of losing control, and also helps me focus more on the stimulation that I am feeling), and then her hot breath against my ear, and the gentle nibbles and the licks, drove me into incoherence. I simply felt all need to have control slip away from me, and I melted against Miomi.
I guess I have to emphasize here how much my sensitivity affects the way that I process pleasure. To me, feeling pleasure can be absolutely overwhelming. Intimidating, even. For example, I love a good low-key backrub, but a more advanced one (like the truly amazing ones Georgie does!) will have me thrashing in ecstasy, and I'll need to ask for a break after just a few seconds. This is probably why I am the first person to list "pleasure torture" as a fetish on Fetlife - the intensity of some pleasure is so great for me that I have to ask for mercy, and prolonged pleasurable acts (such as hot breath on my ears) feel wonderful and scary at the same time. Miomi really drove this home with the skilled way that she worked my neck and ears - any hint of dominance collapsed under the onslaught of sensation.
(So...I guess this is my subspace? Triggered by intense pleasure, leaving me meek and reactive while I close my eyes and don't speak much.)
She slipped into the role fluidity really well, too! It sort of went back and forth as each of us would do these little dominating gestures to shift control one way or another. For the climax of the session, I put her back under and gave her the suggestion that her desire to get topped again would grow the more she topped me, until she was absolutely ready to go back to subbing. Then I indulged my subbiness for just a touch longer than she wanted, before taking back firm control with her trance trigger and bringing her to her knees. >:)
(Can't say that this suggestion affected much...it basically played into how the two of us were feeling anyway...)
So, to sum up: fun, fun session. Also probably the single longest one-on-one erotic hypnosis session that i have done. Miomi enjoyed it muchly - and I got an even more delicious taste of the subby side of things, which helped me better articulate some aspects of my sexuality. That's pretty much cool outcomes all around!