I only do online Domming, and I only do it with female subs, so this reflection is limited to that world. Perhaps it applies to Dommes and male subs, or same sex D/s..but I have no feelings about those relationships.
So, between a male Dominant, and an online female sub, where does trust really begin? I'm going to posit there is a single action, a tipping point, where a Dom can actually see that trust has really happened with his sub.
No, I don't think it is when the conversation finally gets around to the Dom requiring a specific act of submission. That back and forth can go on for weeks, months even, I think, without being 'real' submission. Why not? Because everyone in The Cage is masquerading. We have Cage names, cage profiles which may or may not reflect the real person behind the words, or even the images. With being identifiable real people, it is still forms of safe play online.
There ARE elements of necessary safety in this for any submissive cautiously approaching a new D/s relationship, especially online. In some ways this can be a world of smoke and mirrors, of shape-shifters on both sides of the divide.
So how does a Dom know, for a certainty, that he has earned real trust? And how does a sub realize she does, in reality, trust her new Dom?
I will suggest in the majority of cases, it is this one single act. It matters not of the Dom requires it, or if the sub offers it.
Real trust between an online sub and her Dom happens when she transmits to him her identifiable face atop her bared breasts, or her fully naked body.
By the single act of sending a topless or naked selfie with her own face included, she has told him that she KNOWS the internet is awash in images of women who disrobed, and then found themselves embarrassingly posted somewhere online. She is taking a huge leap in trusting him.
To accept that risk, to trust a new Dom-- isn't this the defining moment of real, actual trust?
Only a real shit would trample on that trust, seems to me. He must know the gift he has been given, of the trust behind that first unwrapped image. But there are real shits out there in Domland. Still, she has made the decision. She trusts.
I'd be curious if I am close to what goes through the mind of female online subs on proclaiming trust through an act... What was your defining act of real trust?
