While it can be difficult to find good, positive representation of Female dominant relationships in fiction it’s not that rare to see at least some BDSM in many webcomics. Sometimes it’s merely a secondary or tertiary character. such as Clarisse in Girls with Slingshots, or Marten’s mother in Questionable Content. Which is nice and all, but does leave one wanting more.
There are other bits and pieces of Femdom themed comics out there Fluffy Bunny Domination is a lighthearted look at BDSM from a female dominants perspective.
Oglaf’s original focus was a comical high fantasy tale about an apprentice for a Dominatrixy sorceress. (Though the comic does lots of one-offs and has a few other stories going on as well.)
I really enjoy the smattering of F/m themed comics that Humon on Deviant art makes, but to find them you’ll have to trawl through her archives.
I’m a sucker for fantasy and female dominated cultures. (also, pointy ears)
When it comes to webcomics that are entirely about BDSM and female dominants I’ve found two.
Garden Hose is a terrifically wry look at the BDSM scene from the perspective of a single sadistic female dominant named Quinn. There are about forty strips, and then the artist had to go on indefinite hiatus because of a wrist problem, but I would say that it is a must read. Not because it’s all warm tingly happy goodness, but because it lays out precisely what is wrong with the scene from a female dominant’s perspective. So it’s good for dommes to read something they can identify with and good for subs to get an idea of what their perspective partner pool is dealing with.
This storyline should be required reading before you can get your official malesub id card.
Then there is Sunstone by Shiniez. Also on Deviant art it has two completed chapters, (a third in the works) gorgeous artwork, interesting story and it avoids many of the most egregiously bad BDSM erotica/romance tropes.
I like it well enough, although well, it’s totally a wish fulfillment fantasy piece, presented as a slice of life story about BDSMers. It’s enjoyable and it is nice to see a domme and sub shown getting butterflies and exchanging sweetness rather than just icy scowls and bowing and scraping. It is F/f though, (not that there is anything wrong with that) but I’ve notice that F/f seems to be a common pairing for works that (I think) are trying for a broad appeal.
It’s worth a gander. Still, I really wish it was F/m. I started writing these As close as it gets posts to find and highlight positive examples of female dominance, Femdom that was’t all fetish and fantasy but showed a real loving relationship. I’ve found some, but now what I’d like to see is a positive portrayal or two of a submissive man that I can identify with, at least a little. Someone that a dominant identified woman might conceivably harbor fantasies about. The Dommes in GWS, Garden hose and Sunstone are solid, admirable, and interesting characters, but there aren’t any desirable male subs in those stories, and that’s a bit of a bummer.
Guess I’ll have to keep looking.
There really is a terrible shortage of portrayal of submissive men as anything other than a punchline. It scarcely matters what the medium is. If a submissive male is portrayed, it is either as a joke or as an extra or bit player in a story about a dominant woman.
One of my Tumblr followers just helpfully pointed out that you can find attractive submissive male characters, they just tend to be gay.
Which since I’m sharing F/f, I guess I ought to share M/m too, but it’s not exactly my cup of tea.
That one can only find attractive, gay submissive characters and not straight guys is a very good point and something that needs to be remedied for everyone’s sake. It does seem a little odd though that there are a lot of men who identify as submissive out there – or at least fantasize about submission – I would have thought that there would have been more positive male characters because of this. Why do you think it could be, Peroxide?
Also, I hadn’t seen Garden Hose before, so thanks for the heads up. It was brilliant.
” a lot of men who identify as submissive out there – or at least fantasize about submission – I would have thought that there would have been more positive male characters because of this. Why do you think it could be, Peroxide?”
My assumption is that Since most media is made about majority characters. (Straight, white, [dominant] hetero-sexual, vanilla, men.) Media about minority characters still is shoe-horned into the same handful of cultural tropes (and males submission doesn’t fit those even if you’re making media about kinky people.) While many men may harbor submissive fantasies, It’s still a minority and even fewer men are likely to consider it a large part of their identity, or make a fuss that they don’t identify with the way male/female romantic relationships are portrayed in media.