By Jeb
Out of the Closet, and
Back
By Jeb
My good friend Phil Ross posed the question to me; "Whatever happened to Metro slave?" Those of you who used to read Metro slave may be wondering the same thing. If not, I'll try to make this interesting anyway.
Phil has asked me to write 1500 words for the LeatherWeb. My first reaction is that I have never been able to contain my thoughts to a mere 1500 words. My second thought is just to write "Fuck David Stein" 500 times.
Metro slave was the first, and as far as I'm concerned, still the only slave magazine ever published. It's claim to fame was arguably the best personal ad section of any magazine and, of course, my editorial critiques of the leather community. To this day, I'm haunted in terms of being ostracized from membership in virtually any leather club over some of my writing. However, if you run a leather club, I'd love to join.
Metro slave was less than successful in terms of getting slaves to write articles of value to other slaves. Virtually all the articles were written by myself or by one of the many Masters who read Metro slave. The material from slaves tended to be porn or articles that were really nothing more than wild fantasy. To those slaves whose articles were published, you are the exception, and I thank you for your thoughtfulness.
I started Metro slave in 1993 and ended it in 1997. Many things led to my decision. But two main things drove my decision to abandon the magazine.
1) The criticism and personal attack on me became too great. Towards the end rumors were so rampant and mean that I literally dropped out of leather.
2) I concluded that not only had everything about slavery been written, but that true Master/slave relationships simply do not exist except as fantasy.
Addressing the first point. I had no idea how mean the leather community could be when I chose to take a high profile in leather. Rumors about my beating a guy up so bad he will never play at SM again and my having a shrine to John Wayne Gacy in my dungeon, among other destructive gossip, persist to this day. I am my own worst enemy in terms of being so outspoken. But I naively assumed I would be attacked on the facts and not in a manner calculated to destroy me. I also assumed if anyone heard anything bad about me, they would just pick up the phone or send me an email and ask me about the allegation. No way. I found I was the last to hear of a rumor, and then only after it had spread like a virus over the Internet (in particular AOL). So while hundreds of people would get the rumor all at once, I would have to deny the rumor with fact, one person at a time. A task both impossible and futile.
The second point deals with my attempting to find an absolute in terms Master/slave relationships. My feeling was that Master/slave relationships existed long before leather and therefore leather, while a much larger community, was still only a subset of Master and slaves. I did not count on the leather community insisting that leather relationships be defined by politically correct leather organizations and that anything outside of their pre-determined norm would be considered dangerous. For instance, my philosophy of not using safe words is enjoyed by the slaves I play with, but scorned as dangerous by the larger community. This, despite the fact that my dungeon has a 100% safety record. I simply refuse to dumb my play down to the level of SM 101 and I take the leather community credo (whatever that is exactly) as advisory at best, irrelevant at worst.
Slavery simply cannot exist in our current leather and legal environment. Reality is that no matter what contract is signed by a slave, it is unenforceable legally and subject to being interpreted as a license for abuse by the community. If a Master/slave couple play with any modicum of reality, they may find their play not welcome in public dungeons.
In terms of learning about slavery, the outlook is equally dismal. Anyone out there writing about Master/slave relationships today is either deluded or unwittingly writing about intense Daddy/boy relationships - not slavery. I would strongly urge all slaves to consider, rationally, when their dick is freshly soft from cumming, if they truly believe they can ever be a slave except by the willing (and not undesirable) suspension of reality by both the Master and the slave? True slavery does not exist except in modern day sub-Saharan Africa.
I also highly recommend you deeply discount anything written about slavery if the author is paid. Anyone being paid cannot be objective as they can hardly write that Master/slave relationships do not exist as they have established that they are whores to the written word that slavery does exist. They also serve their publisher and not the slave seeking enlightenment. Master/slave experts are a dime a dozen and most aren't worth the dime much less the price of a magazine. The only material worth reading, besides this web site, is The Leather Journal, Checkmate (the how-to articles only) and, my personal favorite, The SandMUtopian Guardian.
I wish I could tell you things had gotten better since I stopped publishing Metro slave. In fact they are getting worse. The Leather Community is publishing definitions of abuse in SM relationships that are clearly written by bottoms to control Masters. It seems the Masters who go along with this are only too happy to be told what to do. Perhaps they are innately unbalanced and need such guidance? Or maybe they are truly bottoms and only top because they can't get a date any other way? Those not strictly following the written guidelines of what constitutes abuse will find themselves, like me, ostracized by the "A" list of leather. For myself, I am not sure if I follow the guidelines or not. I read the signs of abuse put out by the National Leather Association, but it is nearly all psychobabble, putting the onus for abuse entirely on the Top. I know too many abusive bottoms to give such a manifesto much truck. Further, I assure you, many of the slaves I have met do not consider what the NLA has put out to be abusive. For example, one of the signs of abuse supposedly is "Do you feel obliged to have sex?" How many slaves find that abusive? About none? If these signs of abuse ever become part of the Leather Credo, every Top may as well start flagging right and put his legs in the air for a nice, long, dry, fornication.
Let me tell you to handle abuse: If you are being abused, leave the relationship. Simple. If you are dependent on the relationship, well I guess you will eat the abuse as long as the benefits outweigh the abuse. No written guideline or promise of a support group or a shelter is going to change that. Of course, those who covet you as slave will "counsel" you to get you to leave your Master for the safety of their own dungeon. Be wary of anyone offering counsel as they often only have their own interests at heart. If you've been used once, it is likely you that will be used again. Bottom line is that the only one who can affect change is you.
Another dangerous trend is the outreach by leather organizations to educate the police and other law enforcement about leather. This is one of those ideas that sound so good, but if you study it, you realize how dangerous involving the police is. Those who educate the police will be defining leather for everyone. If they don't like how you behave in leather, well the police are only a phone call away. What the "A" list of the leather community has failed to accomplish in terms of all of us conforming to their edicts, they will accomplish via the invocation of a police state within the leather community. I don't tell you they are intentionally creating an oppressive leather regime, however I strongly feel this is the certainty of their actions. Amusingly, I am sure the people involved in the recruiting of police to enforce the expanded leather credo will be feted with awards and the adulation of the community while those of us warning of the danger to come will be marginalized or vilified until it's too late. At which time, by a twist of logic, those who sounded the warnings will be blamed for all that is wrong in leather. I'm such a prophet.
So what have I been doing in leather since I ceased publishing Metro slave? For me, it has been back to the closet. I only play privately and then only with a witness who is known to be friendly to me. I check the photo ID of anyone I play with. I do not attend public play parties, much less actually publicly play. Further, my dungeon, which was the venue of many a party, is no longer available to groups. I am in the closet. Not to hide from society, they never scared me, but rather from the leather community. They have truly taken on terrifying proportions in terms of restricting and codifying our hard won sexual freedoms.
Jeb is the former publisher of Metro slave magazine and currently owns The Leatherneck Bar in downtown Chicago. Jeb insists the bar be run without attitude, mostly without a dress code and always friendly to the first timer or novice. If you liked this article, even if you disagreed with it, Jeb will contribute more. Jeb invites your email, especially if you have heard any rumors. Contact Jeb at jeb@concealcarry.org or at 630 986-8550. The Metro slave web site still kind of exists. Those interested in a back issue of Metro slave just to see what the fuss was about are invited to check out www.metroslave.com. Jeb waives copyright as long as this article is published in its entirety to include this final paragraph.