lkh_lashouts | Doms are from Mars, submissives are from Venus (Reply)

Alright, it's been awhile since I read the books, and I admittedly only got up to Narcissus in Chains so I could be completely off the mark with the assertions here, in which case, please let me know and my apologies.

But it seems that the gender dichotomy is very strong in the AB books. Girl things, guy things, Anita is the only non-stereotypical woman, everyone is either a BIG STRONG MACHO MAN (unless he's with Anita, in which case she is his Prince Charming because there MUST be a 'guy' and a 'girl' and Anita *has* to be 'the guy' because MEN ARE BETTER) or a GIRLY GIRLY GIRL who is going to like white picket fence, be a victim, a slut, insane, a lesbian, evil evil evil, jealous of Anita, or some combination of any/all these traits. We're all pretty aware of this in this comm, and all the terrible implications it makes, if not downright proves, about the ideas on gender and relationships that LKH has (since there's no divide between the reality Anita sees and the reality of what's actually going on in the books that I can tell)

Just another set of sprinklings to add to that sundae of anti-feminist fail is something that hit me last night...if memory serves me, the only cases of men who are submissive, either to women or in general, are Nathaniel and males who are from a supernatural species that is matriarchal, such as the weretigers. Nathaniel is the way he is because of great trauma and abuse. The weretigers are (or at least, according to someone who got further in the books than I did) the way they are not simply because of a matriarchal culture, but because something inherent in their species means that even an Alpha weretiger male cannot resist submission to a female.

So, assuming that memory serves me right, there don't seem to be any men who are subs just because they like it. It has to be a result of either trauma or supernatural status. To me, that says that while LKH really likes subby men (which I think she does), she doesn't think that a man could naturally be like that unless there was some kind of explanation for it besides that he simply enjoys it. And given that she seems to take the phrase 'opposite sex' to a very literal extreme (if guys are like X, then women must be the exact reverse--unless they're Anita, naturally) then it probably follows that women cannot be dominant unless there are similar reasons--though probably less sympathetic ones, like that they're just evil, which women generally are in this 'verse anyway. And come to think of it, wasn't the intersexual Narcissus stated to be into both sides of BDSM?

So, am I missing or misremembering things? Reaching for fail when there really isn't any (at least not in this case)? Possibly on to something? I welcome all thoughts and opinions!