Are you out, or are you closeted?

Pretty well all my friends know what I'm into and none of them seems too bothered by it, even those who are vanilla. Indeed some of the vanillas seem rather intrigued and even a touch envious. When I first started having spanking stories published, in the old print magazines like Janus and Stand Corrected, I wondered about using a pseudonym, but then thought, what the hell?

So anyone who googles me will soon find out that I love to spank. But I'd totally agree with Rosie's partner's wise remark: 'Those that matter don't mind, and those that mind don't matter.' So true.

As for what proportion of women are willing to be spanked, my own guess (based of course on my own limited experience) would be that maybe some 20% actively enjoy it, another 40% will go along with it if you approach them right, and 40% are 'No Way, You Perverted Sexist Pig!'

I agree with the sentiment, but... my bosses would mind, and they kinda matter
You're lucky, though. It would be nice if we could all just be out, but I don't think society is there yet.

99.9% in the closet, and the closet keeps expanding.

In my early twenties I hit it off with a girl in her earlier twenties. An offhand comment by one led to an intense conversation where we learned that not only were we both spankos (Not that we knew the term back then), but we had perfectly compatible/complimentary desires and limits. Looking back I know that we were blessed, as our common kink is varied enough that just because two people are spankos, it doesn't necessarily follow that they work as spankos together. Within 90 days we were married, and that was over a quarter century ago.

We both followed professions in which any hint of kink would destroy a reputation and career instantly, so we stayed within our shared closet. (Shared meaning that though I was the top, the closet was 90% hers by volume) Over the years one or the other would sneak into sex shops in far away cities during business trips to look at toys, or use someone else's internet to download stories. (And we absorbed them much like Burgundy did in her twenties) Being from a boy scout/mountain climber/engineer backround who could work metal/wood/leather/rope, it was my job to create and maintain toys, which were added to our closet. We wrote stories for each other, knew nothing about SSC or safe words, but came up with similar concepts in the vacuum of our closet.

I have finally reached a point where it is not as risky for me to be out, but because she is still in a job where it matters, I stay in our closet. I have not shared, though my wife has shared with select people. She has told me that she has had very similar experiences to Burgundy, in that while they complain, she is "glancing away awkwardly like a harlot in church". I believe one of her sisters and one of mine know. Our children do know, simply because we were foolish enough to wish for intelligent children, not realizing that such children come with a very high price. It's a very humbling experience to take every precaution of soundproofing yet still have to explain that daddy isn't really hurting mommy, and that mommy is screaming because she is really super happy... (They are in their twenties now. One is prudish but keeps our secret out of respect, the other is strangely silent, but I suspect has inherited.)

Interestingly, I write in many different genres, but am probably the least prolific in my specific kink. I attribute it partly to the knee-jerk reaction to never let anything out of the closet. The other reason would be that while I'm writing a story she's often reading over my shoulder, and at a certain point I'm told "Oooh, we should do that right now!", and the story gets abandoned. While I'm not ashamed of my kink, I will stay in the closet to protect her...and our closet really hasn't been that bad of a place to be.

That was a fine contribution to this discussion shadowmos, I like the idea of 'We should do that right now!' Ta.

For myself I think my wife has known for ages of my interest, but it only got bad when she found out about the subject of the story writing. it was not good.
I also showed one of my stories to a couple of literary friends and after a bit of smirking things carried on between us as before.

In hindsight, I so wish I had saved some of those old stories that are gone from the internet now. Not to distribute, but for myself, because they were so good. But that wouldn't be fair to the authors of these deleted stories; they had the right to delete them if they no longer want their stories in circulation, sigh.


That's so wonderful
I wouldn't say my husband's and my kinks are perfectly compatible, but they are similar enough that we have fun working out games that both of us enjoy a lot. And we find that as we get older and pure sex drive goes down (no more boinking like crazed weasels five times a day), kink remains and acts as an auxiliary sex drive. So I feel like we'll never be 'done'.

I feel your pain, so many wonderful stories from the days of bulletin boards and newsgroups lost to internet entropy. Perhaps we should call it the 2nd Law of Spankodynamics.


Almost like a battery back-up, keeps things going until the power kicks back on...

My partner knows, and has done for years/decades; but as she simply hates the idea I'm not sure what good that does to either of us. I have been going to a men's group for more than twenty years now (yeah, I don't give up easily) and I've been out to them for about 15! Indeed they've read one of my stories ( Testament to Virtue) and we know quite a bit about each others' sex lives in general. In fact, Paul in Polly's New Panties is partly based on one of them. Other than that, I'm completely in the closet, I hope.

That of course is same for so much in life, personal and professional life can be separate, and some say should be.
The US military in 90s till 2011 had their "Don't ask, don't tell" policy with regard to same sex relationships by serving personnel, in other words they sadly did not condone the relationships, but as long as you did not tell then they did not take action against you, only positive was you could not be 'outed' or harassed, unless you openly were involved in same sex activity.

Thankfully the UK allowed gay and lesbians to serve in 2000.

So the quote 'Those that matter don't mind, and those that mind don't matter.' is not a cover all, but any sensible adult would not raise a matter that would offend others if it unavoidable.

Any adult who does the above are seeking confrontation, unless it is as a LSF member informed me when i used the quote previously, 'outing' themselves to a close family member who did not receive the news well, that must be awful situation to find self in.

I'm totally closeted I'm afraid and will be so forever and ever until the sky falls down. It would definitely mean social pariah should my preferences be known and my job would most likely go down the drain should I go public. Things would eventually calm down and be pretty much okay, but many doors would be closed. I'd live through it though, so sorry NSA, no blackmail material to find here. What happens at home is your own private business fortunately. My dear wife pretty much guessed my preferences. Well, after the first few thousand swats regularly on her bottom when making passionate love that is (and it's not because I'm in any way like rap music, which I don't). On my grand day a few years back she actually showed up in our bedroom in a kinky school uniform, hiked her knickers down and crawled across my lap, saying 'happy birthday', so I must have been pretty obvious. I'm an opportunist so I did seize the moment. She did however state afterwards that she was a bit reluctant to repeat the experience. Maybe I do need more practice to make it right. Well, I count myself lucky anyway to have a rather understanding partner that meets me half way at least from time to time. It's funny though; you can say in public that you hate people of certain religions, abuse women and handicapped verbally as well as physically, or generally just be an asshole, and it's socially accepted (and sometimes praised), but should you breathe that you like to spank people, life as you know it would most likely be over. In contrast to popular belief, Sweden is far from liberal in its view on this kink. In addition to me being strung up in the nearest tree by aggravated members of the feminist party, the lady partner would most likely have ended up in a psychiatric ward for mental evaluation as society would think it impossible for a woman to actually enjoy or agree willingly to being spanked. Gays, queers, lesbians and others in the HBTQ group are slowly gaining their rightful place in society, but I think for spankers it's still a long way to go. Heck, even a die hard S/M person has it easier to gain acceptance as it is now, in particular in the light of the successful shades of gray movies and similar. It's kinda funny though, because if there's a spanking scene in a popular movie, it immediately gets ripped, upped on YouTube and gets a billion views. Everybody seems to like it; no one can admit it. I so envy you Americans and Brits for your get-togethers where people of similar interest can meet and live out their desires. You're just so bloody fortunate.

You're right about that; Sweden is a very strange combination of relaxed about sex but still somehow straight-laced. Must. Maintain. Rigid. Dignity. At all times!! And spanking is definitely undignified, not to mention sexist (if it's a woman getting spanked), so it's a no go. Whenever I've tried making mild jokes about it when I'm over there, people get embarrassed and look away (of course that happens for hundreds of other reasons too - what is wrong with you Swedes nowadays...)

But here in Canada, spanking jokes are pretty common and often enough met with winks and joking along. I think the difference is, unfortunately, that spanking is still a really common part of everyday culture here, and probably over 80% of people who are adults now were spanked as children. So of course it's open season for dirty jokes (but so is everything else; for Canadians nothing is sacred.)
So some sneaky hints and jokes are okay, but outright coming out is not okay, and would result in shunning at work as well as socially.

Your post made me sad again

P.S. Good lord, man - paragraphs!! My eyes, they bled reading that...