Frequently I am perplexed by the suggestion that a submissive person is, somehow, a lesser person, or a weaker person, or a person who is less than fully developed in their personality.  Exactly how this idea came about I have no idea but I wonder if perhaps there was some moment in the tortured history of the vernacular that a simple minded person couldn't distinguish between submissive, subservient, subordinate, and substandard and muddled up their adjectives.  Another possibility is that many people have got into the habit of applying one-word labels to themselves and to other people and since we are all complex creatures it is inevitable that those labels are going diminish in usefulness as more people employ them.  All of this might be of no importance except that it also seems to me that as the result of this linguistic confusion no small number of people who find so-called submissive inclinations within themselves and express them, are then accosted because they don't conform to some standard of aspiration or behaviour that has unknown origins and very little authority beyond being fashionable.  Others seem to be lambasted with accusations of inferiority and are then tormented by assorted self doubts about their own motives, worth and mental stability.  On a slightly different track I've encountered several discussions that, to me, seemed to be proceeding completely awry because the participating persons were using the same word to mean quite different things.  This article is principally about words.

Before I get any further I'd like to apologise in advance for any of the following that sounds like a lecture from somebody who thinks they've got the definitive opinion on a subject; one day I might learn to write in a more relaxed style but, in the meantime, my attempts at unambiguous and meaningful correspondence do tend to come across rather like the classroom notes from a patronising and bumbling professor of the old school.  I'd especially like to apologise to any linguists, grammarians, etymologists or other skilled wordsmiths for whom my clumsy and imprecise attempts to clarify the use of language will possibly be experienced as a form of verbal torture.  When I finally get to heaven I will no doubt be made aware of all of my errors and have the rest of eternity in which to find them funny but, for now and for whatever it is worth, here is my take on submit, submissive and submission.  Are you sitting comfortably?  Then I'll begin.

Although there is nothing grammatically wrong with the statement “I submit”, it isn't a complete description of the process and rather invites the questions “What do you submit, and to what (or to whom) are you submitting it?”  In linguistic terms, we could contrast running, eating and submitting to see that they are slightly different:

Linguistically running is an action that can be wholly self-contained and thus the statement “I run” is essentially complete.  Eating is an action that you apply to something else and hence the statement “I eat” is not essentially complete because the object of the action is missing.  The statement “I eat chocolate” is essentially complete because it includes the object (chocolate) of the action (eating) as well as the subject (I) that is performing the action.  Submitting is an action that requires two objects which are known, if I understood properly, as the direct object and the indirect object.  So, for example, the statement “I submit the report to my client” is a complete because it has the action (submitting) that is being performed, the subject (I) which is performing the action, the direct object (the report) which is being submitted and the indirect object (the client) to which the report is being submitted.  If you leave out any of the components then the statement diminishes in meaning.

Now since Taken In Hand is not, as far as I have seen, very concerned about reports or clients, let me try and make this relevant to those who are likely to be reading, namely men and women who are contemplating relationships in which the man takes a leadership role.

The first point that I think needs to be recognised is that within this context, submission is an action initiated by the submissive person and not something imposed upon them.  Within this context one cannot ordinarily and meaningfully say, “I am being submitted” in the same way that one can say “I am being squashed” because submission is a state of activity not passivity, it is something you do, not something that is done to you.  In the context of romantic relationships, submission originates from within while squashing originates from without.

In general terms we might say that the woman in a male-led relationship is submitting herself to her man but while this statement is meaningful to, and usefully understood by, some of the contributors to Taken In Hand, it isn't perhaps understood by those aforementioned simple souls who muddled up their adjectives and think that the submissive woman is somehow degraded by her submission so let us analyse it in more depth.

Remember that the act of submission requires three components, namely that which is performing the submission, that which is being submitted and that to which it is being submitted.  Within the context of the “Taken in Hand” relationship the subject is easy to define; it is the woman. The indirect object is also easy to define and it is the man in the relationship.  The direct object is where things get more interesting ... what is it that the woman is submitting to the man?

The first way to answer to this question is to respond that she submits whatever she chooses to submit.  This is important to grasp.  Submission, remember, is a state of activity, not of passivity and hence is the result of a choice that the submissive person made.  Submission is therefore totally unlike oppression: A submissive person gives something of their own volition while the oppressed person has something extracted from them contrary to their own desire.  My submission is something I choose to give or withhold but oppression is something that somebody else does to me regardless of my preference or choice and that I would avoid if I could.

The second way to answer the question is to respond with another question, namely, what is it that the submissive woman has to offer?  This also is extremely important to grasp because a woman cannot submit that which she does not herself possess because nobody can give what they haven't got.  A woman in a male-led relationship can, if she chooses, submit to her man her talents, her energy, her material resources, and her body.  I'll come back to what this means in a moment but, for now, we only need to see that if she has no energy and no talents and no resources then she cannot offer those things to her man which means she can only offer her body.  Also, “talents”, in this context, does not just mean things like the ability to prepare a meal dinner, repair a broken window, organise an event, wash clothes, manage a household or children, or run a transnational corporation; it also includes talents such as patience, selflessness, kindness, tact, charm, a smile, empathy, the ability to hold an intelligent conversation and all the other dozens of personal qualities that can be used to make life better.

So, what does it mean to submit your resources, talents or energy to another person?  In very simple terms it means that you allow the use of those resources, talents and energies to be directed or guided by the person to whom they are submitted. This might involve explicit direction in the sense of an instruction being given and then obeyed or it might involve implicit direction, in the sense that the offeror uses their own understanding and prior knowledge to attempt to anticipate the needs or requirements of the receiver and to meet those needs and requirements without any explicit instruction being given.  Neither approach is right or wrong, better or worse because they are just two different methods each being more or less suitable for different situations.  A parent, for example, will submit themselves to the needs of their young child and an employee will submit themselves to the requirements of their vocation and workplace, and, in each case, there could be both implicit and explicit direction from the child and from colleagues.  In the case of a male-led romantic relationship, the submissive woman will sometimes receive explicit directions from her man but far more often, she will work with the directions implied by the circumstances of their relationship and surroundings.  In some relationships and situations the man and woman might feel more contented with a higher degree of explicit direction and in other relationships and situations the man and the woman might get along very nicely with only the directions implied by their shared circumstances.  Since both circumstances and needs can and do change it follows that the methods will also have to adapt.

Because submission is something that I do (rather than something that is done to me) it can be easier or harder according to my talents and character and mood.  It is relatively easy to submit to somebody who is appreciative and encouraging and when I give something that I enjoy giving but it is more difficult to submit to somebody who is negatively critical, harsh, unappreciative or selfish or when when I do not enjoy giving whatever it is that I give.  However, “difficult” is not the same as “impossible”.  It is entirely possible for a woman to submit to a man who is a selfish and ignorant brute but few women could do so and even fewer would enjoy it.  This leads us to another very important point, namely that in the most difficult situations only the strongest can submit and only the most noble of the strongest can take humble satisfaction in doing so.

By now it should, if I haven't waffled too much, be becoming clear to the simple-minded and adjectively challenged detractor, that submission, far from being a sign of weak character and mental deficiency, is actually a sign of strength and possibly even of virtue.  The person who is most able to be submissive is, by definition, a highly competent, talented, person with a lot to give and the strength of character to do the giving even when circumstances are less than ideal.  Most people simply are not capable of being very submissive either because they haven't bothered to develop any worthwhile talents or attributes of character, or because they are too full of their own pride and selfishness and egotism to be able to consistently give anything of value to anybody else.

With the foregoing in mind it will also, I hope, be increasingly obvious that not only is there no contradiction or paradox in the fact that intelligent, dynamic and competent women should want to be submissive but, on the contrary, that is exactly what one should expect because such women have much to give and the ability to see the desirability of giving it.

However, clarity might be further improved if I can manage to separate the “form” of submission from the “intent” of the submission.  It is possible (I really don't know) that much confusion arises because various behaviours or desires are labelled as “submissive” regardless of what attitude or desire underpins that behaviour or desire.  So, for example, the act of receiving a spanking or other corporal punishment is often labelled submissive even when the woman being punished has deliberately provoked the punishment to satisfy her own self-centred desire for attention or erotic pain.  By contrast another woman might be spanked because she has failed to obey some instruction or has displeased her man in some way.  By further contrast another woman, having done nothing deserving punishment, might offer herself for physical chastisement because she sees that her man needs to release certain stress or tensions and will be able to do so by using her body in this way.  Of these three, the third woman is being submissive as is the second.  However in the first example, it is more likely that it is the man who is being submissive by responding favourably to the needs of his presently self-centred woman; he is submitting his talents and energy to meeting her desire or emotional need for attention and physical chastisement and it is her immediate need that is giving the direction to his actions.

Of course real life is never so simple and any attempt to comprehensively describe real life with mere words is almost certainly doomed to failure.  Even in one event, the attitudes and desires of all three of the above scenarios could be intermingled or could follow one another as cause and effect.  The woman who provoked a thrashing to satisfy her own desire for painful attention might, having had her need met and having had different emotions and hormones activated by the corporeal sensations, be filled with an overwhelming desire to do whatever it takes to please her man and thus her attitude could switch from being not at all submissive (when she was provoking the thrashing) to being very submissive (after the thrashing).  In the same act, the man might submissively give his woman the thrashing she needs & desires and, through the act of doing so, be stimulated to use her body aggressively or demandingly or even selfishly to satisfy an erotic need that he didn't have before her stripped and striped stern came into view.  Thus the submissive role passes from the man to the woman and both are ultimately fulfilled.  Note also that the fact that the man is being submissive by punishing the woman, does not mean that he does so reluctantly or feebly because submission is not the opposite of aggression or vigour, and submission is active not passive.  If the true meaning of submission can be understood then there is no contradiction in him submitting to her by beating her bared backside briskly.  Moreover, in the complexities of real lives, a person will oscillate in and out of submissiveness as they are affected by tiredness or stress or other emotional states and according to whether humility or selfishness has presently got the upper hand in the constant battles of the ego.

Personally, therefore, I don't find it very helpful to describe a person's role as submissive or not.  Within any cohabiting relationship that is going to survive constructively for more than a day or two, both partners will submit to one another, but their submission will take different forms according to their individual needs and their combined circumstances.  Consequently I do find it helpful to think of roles in terms of who provides the basic leadership in the relationship, who takes responsibility for what happens in the relationship and who, in the event of an unresolved disagreement, makes the final decision so that the two people can move on.  In this view submission is not a role, but rather it is a set of attitude guided behaviours that can be used to enhance a role.  In my idea of the ideal relationship, the man will for the most part lead and direct and the women will, for the most part, follow – those being what I think are usually (but not always) the most appropriate assignments for those particular two roles – but, according to my understanding of submission, they will both be more or less consistently submitting their talents and energies to one another for the benefit of themselves and their relationship.

In addition to all of the foregoing I think we do ourselves no favours by applying labels either to ourselves or to others.  If I cannot be described by a handful of adjectives carelessly applied then how much less can I be meaningfully described by a single adjective?  Additionally, it seems to me that the popular use of certain words treats them as if they were opposites when in fact they describe entirely different things: The two that immediately come to mind in the context of this forum are “dominant” and “submissive”; even in simple usage these words do not occupy opposite ends of any spectrum because, as adjectives, they are generally used to add information about completely different aspects of a person's existence.  In ordinary English, “submissive” describes a person's attitude while “dominant” describes their “presence” (think of how you would use the word to describe a flavour, feature, aroma or colour) and hence, if the words are used in their normal English sense rather than as forms of socio-sexual jargon, it is possible for a person to be simultaneously dominant and submissive.

Indeed it is possible for a person, lets say woman W, to be dominant, demure, submissive, compliant, and assertive all at the same time because dominant describes W's presence, submissive describes W's attitude, assertive is a description of the manner in which she conducts herself, compliant describes how she responds to particular specific requests and demure is not a comment about W at all, but a description of an observer's subjective perception of W.

The English language has a great many useful adjectives, including some that are subtle or obscure, but if we try and make one or two adjectives do the work of fifty of them then it is hardly surprising that we should find the chosen few hopelessly inadequate and our discussions crippled – especially when trying to describe something as complex as ourselves, our relationships and interactions.  In the little table below I have tried to think of a few words that I consider to be often overused, underused or otherwise abused within discussions.

None of the preceding notes are intended to be definitive but I hope that they will help and encourage people to clarify their thoughts and find words that are more precise when describing their ideas.  That isn't always easy because language changes with use and even thesauri don't always agree.

Several woman have indicated that they feel uncomfortable describing themselves as submissive but I hope that my attempt at an explanation will help people see that, if we stick with the non-specialised use of the English language, there is no contradiction in describing oneself as, for example, an assertive, competent, dominant and submissive person.  However because each adjective will not necessarily apply to every situation the person encounters nor to every role that a person performs even this list of adjectives is likely to be misleading unless it is qualified with descriptions of the situations in which each applies.

Near the beginning of this article I did apologise for possibly having the writing style of a patronising professor but now, for those who'd like a challenge, here is some suggested homework:  Choose one of the following titles and without using any of the words: submit, submitted, submitting, submissive and submission (or any derivatives thereof) create and submit an article suitable for publication on Taken In Hand.

1. Giving examples where appropriate, discuss the significance and relative importance to a woman of the qualities of decisiveness and circumspection in partner or prospective partner.
2. Giving examples where appropriate, discuss the significance and relative importance to a man of the qualities of compliance and respectfulness in his partner or prospective partner.
3. It is impossible for a woman to be simultaneously sexually aggressive and sexually subordinate; discuss.
4. Identify five qualities of character that make a man suitable for a “Taken In Hand” relationship and contrast them with five qualities that would make a man unsuitable for a “Taken In Hand” relationship.
5. Using examples from real life to illustrate your discussion, and with particular reference to sexual violence within the context of a “Taken In Hand” style of relationship, discuss whether and why a person's emotions follow their actions or a person's actions follow their emotions. 
   (Please do not answer this question if you do not understand what is meant by a “Taken In Hand style of relationship”.)
6. With reference to a “Taken In Hand” relationship (or some particular aspect of one), describe three modes of leadership and their relevance, and identify the roles of those involved.
7. Using examples from real life to support your argument, discuss the proposal that the qualities of Assertiveness, Bravery, Control and Dominance form the initial components in the formation of a successful “Taken In Hand” relationship.

If you like the idea of this challenge, please keep the following in mind:

• There are no correct or incorrect answers.
• Points will be awarded for precise use of terminology, constructive content, humour, originality and any evidence that a dictionary or thesaurus has been consulted.  [hint, http://www.reference.com/]
• Points will be deducted for lack of clarity, for using any use of the words: submit, submitted, submitting, submissive and submission (or any derivative thereof), or for offending against any of the general posting guidelines as laid down by site owner here and here.
• Articles will be judged by whoever reads them and the decision of the judges will most certainly not be final or binding on any person in any way and may be reviewed on appeal at any time by submitting another article.
• Needless to say there are no prizes to be had beyond the loving appreciation of your readers and the glory of participating.

[Editor's note: To submit an article, start a new topic in the readers' forum.]

To summarise: I consider submissiveness to be an attitude that leads to a course of action chosen and performed by the submissive person and it is something that is done best by those with much to give.  Exactly what a submissive person submits will depend on what personal skills and qualities that person has developed and which of these they choose to offer.  Within any constructive relationship both partners will submit to one another but the process of submission does not define the substance or form of the submission and hence, for example, it is entirely possible for a woman to be submissive by receiving a punishment from her man and for a man to be submissive by giving his woman a punishment that she needs or desires.  Alternatively a man could submit his energy and talents to to his wife by taking the leadership role and she could submit her talents and energy to him by accepting and following his leadership.  Since submission is the practical outworking of a choice, it follows that strong, competent, capable people submit, not because they are forced to do so (which would in any case be a contradiction in terms) but because they can.  By contrast self-centred or talentless people are not submissive because they are simply incapable of it.  There is nothing weak or degrading about a person choosing to allow their talents and energies to be directed by somebody else but, on the contrary, such submission is a generous and powerful gift but also a gift which only the strong and virtuous can give consistently.

LifeOfCuriosity

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