I think in a lot of BDSM, the enjoyment that a D-type gets out of particular activities often doesn’t really get discussed. The reason behind this varies — with some activities the source of enjoyment is seen as implicit (and sometimes judged in a way that’s completely off the mark), while with others there can sometimes be an assumption that D-types only engage in particular activities for the enjoyment of their s-type.
I think chastity devices can sometimes fall into either category, depending on who is having the discussion and in what circumstances. Because of this, I thought it’d potentially be interesting to talk about the varied reasons I enjoy chastity as a dominant person (although please keep in mind my feelings are my own, and not representative of dominants as a monolith).
Power and Physicality
A big part of the erotic appeal of BDSM for me is getting to feel powerful. Even back before I properly got involved in kink, I used to get a thrill from being the one to take the lead during sex. The personas or role-play headspace I find myself drawn to also generally have a heavy emphasis on power imbalances, although the nature and expression of that power changes depending on the headspace, persona, or scenario in particular.
Power dynamics obviously don’t need to involve any physicality — you can play with D/s dynamics with absolutely no gear and even no physical interaction between parties. However, I personally find it easier to get into feeling powerful if there’s some kind of physical representation of my desire, will, or control in a scene. A chastity cage can — to an extent — function like a physrep in a LARP, allowing it to stay in mind more easily.
While there are other objects or toys that can work for this kind of physical representation of power, a reason I find chastity cages scratch the itch for me so well is because they hit a sweet spot in terms of ‘enough limitation that they’re hard to ignore, while not so conspicuous that they’re super visible’. While day collars exist, I find that jewellery can sometimes become easy for subs to ignore if worn on a daily basis, and while things like restraints introduce a very clear limitation on a bottom’s body, they’re not something that can be worn outside of private kink parties or the bedroom.
Chastity also fits that niche well for me well because it’s a kind of play that has an everyday-safe physical representation of power for both dom and sub. A caged sub wears their cage, while their keyholder can wear the key. There’s a whole bunch of ways you can play with the teasing potential of this (and I wrote an erotica piece about that kind of teasing, if you’re looking for inspiration).
Interestingly, I’ve found that not only does having a key on a necklace make me feel powerful with my sub, but it also makes me feel more confident around other kinksters. As a trans man, I can often feel pushed or pressured into submissive roles. Having something tangible that makes it very obvious I’m dominant makes me more sure I’m being read in the way I want to be, and gives me a boost of confidence.
Sadism and Suffering
While, a big part of the appeal of BDSM is power for me, I’d say my primary driver in kink is sadism. I really enjoy causing pain and suffering, regardless of if power dynamics are involved in play or not. When they are, I prefer the D/s to serve and support the SM dynamic, not the other way around.
Sadism has many flavours — some people find the level of play intensity doesn’t matter, so long as it’s difficult to bear for their bottom, others only enjoy it if they have a masochist to bounce off of, while others still only enjoy dishing out pain that isn’t physically enjoyed by their bottom. My flavour of sadism is a mix of a few things — while my main thing is that I genuinely just love heavy topping (whether that’s impact toys, playing with electricity, or drawing blood), I also do like the psychological side of inflicting suffering.
Like many things in BDSM ‘suffering’ is a word that you could debate about the meaning of for hours (and people absolutely have!). For me, to cause somebody to suffer in the context of BDSM is to put them through an experience they don’t enjoy. This doesn’t mean they don’t want to do it — consent is always an absolute necessity for any kind of erotic interactions — but their reasonings aren’t related to enjoyment of the experience. They may want to do something they hate so they feel tough at the end of it, may want to suffer as a form of service, or may get off on the discomfort of suffering itself.
It’s pretty easy to see where ‘somebody doing something they don’t enjoy’ and ‘chastity’ can cross over! As well as the obvious, I also like to use the threat of chastity as a motivation for suffering in role-play — if my bottom is playing a submissive persona who desperately doesn’t want to be locked away, that gives them a motivation to endure other kinds of suffering from my dominant persona.
Material Fetishism
This one is pretty simple — I like the material of some chastity cages. It’s not all of them — silicone ones don’t really do much for me — but metal cages like these in particular scratch a little fetishism itch for me.
I love metal as a material in other forms too — I love chainmail and scalemail fetish clothing, am a big fan of chain bondage (check out the book The Art of Chain: A Guide to Steel Restraint if that’s of interest to you too), adore basically everything Chains Of Metal have ever made, and have collected a surprisingly large collection of smut involving knights in plate armour who don’t take their helmets off.
I really do think it’s underrated as a potentially erotic material — the shininess and firmness, the constant weight of it, and the paradox of it being a shielding material with items that leave the wearer exposed. Chastity cages are especially a really great place for these aspects to play out — the shininess of metal can read like jewellery, with a cock playing the role of an adorned plaything, the heaviness of the cage material is very apparent, and the oxymoronic nature of a protective material being used to expose somebody and make them vulnerable is in full force.
While I don’t love it as much as metal, I do also like hard plastic cages. Again, there’s the hard material aspect, and I love how varied the colours of plastic cages can be. I’m particular fond of transparent plastic for the exposure factor, although I have developed a softness for pink cages because many of the women in my life who are chastity submissive really like the gender affirmation aspect of it.
Removed Emphasis on PiV Sex
I want to start this section with a disclaimer — penis-in-vagina sex is an act that many people genuinely enjoy, including a lot of dominant people who prefer to be on the receiving end of it.
However, I’m personally not into bottoming for penis-in-vagina sex at all, to the point where I’m somewhat repulsed by the idea. Culturally, our society places a lot of stock in penetrative vaginal sex as either ‘the most important’ or ‘the most natural’ kind of sex, and as a trans man I have often felt pressured into penetrative vaginal sex by potential partners, who often see that as the sexual appeal transmasculine people have.
Chastity — by completely removing the possibility of PiV sex — helps me to focus on things I find enjoyable about partnered sex, like BDSM activities, topping with a strap-on, or even more sensual play like massages. While obviously I absolutely could just engage with these types of play without chastity, the sexual messaging and models of desire were taught linger on subconsciously, and can sometimes cause difficulties when we push against them. In much the same way that being “forced” to do something by a dominant can give a submissive “permission” to do something they may have feelings of guilt or shame about, removing PiV sex as a possibility gives me ‘permission’ to focus on the sex I like, even in the face of that cultural baggage.
Body Modification
By this I don’t just mean the fact that chastity cages can be used to change the shape and size of genitals (although that is hot, especially in the realm of heavier fantasies for me), but also body modification in a more temporary way. A chastity cage changes how somebody’s clothes fit, their gait, and means they have to sit to pee.
While they have become more mainstream, body modification communities and BDSM communities have gone hand in hand for a long time, with the two also crossing over with alternative and queer communities (and people like me who are all three!).
The link between body modification and BDSM is partly that some body mods (like piercings) increase sexual pleasure or cause changes in sexual function or sensation. For others, getting body modifications can be a scene in itself, while for others body mods (like tattoos) can function as permanent signs of ownership.
While I’m potentially interested in more traditional body modifications (like tattoos and piercings) in a BDSM context, I’m also a bit wary. It’s not the kind of thing I would do outside of a very long term relationship, and would need a lot of planning and talking first.
Additionally, I’m somebody who is heavily modified for primarily non sexual reasons (with my sexual reasons entirely limited to ‘this makes me feel sexy’, rather than changes in function/sensation) and my motivation for that has often been body autonomy. I worry that placing body mods I have for that reason into a context where we’re playing at having a lack of body autonomy (although obviously submissives are submissive as an act of body autonomy) will feel emotionally difficult for me.
Because chastity cages are a kind of body modification that I don’t have and have no interest in wearing, they function as a ‘safer’ way for me to play with body modification without potentially causing me to have some complicated relationships about my own body. At the same time, chastity cages are also a much less permanent and low stakes way to play with body modification play.
Gender Affirmation
Arguably, this is more a site at which the past two factors cross over than a reason I like chastity in itself, but it’s important enough that I wanted to give it its own section!
Most of my partners are trans women or transfeminine people, some of whom enjoy chastity because it feels gender affirming for them. I’ve alluded to a complicated relationship with my vulva in this post, and many of the women I play and sleep with have equally complicated relationships to their penises, as well as histories of being coerced into being the penetrative partner. Chastity cages removing that possibility entirely can be comforting for them in the same way that it is for me.
Body modification — like requiring the user to sit down to pee, or making the penis smaller over time — can also be a source of affirmation. Some chastity devices are specifically designed to make the wearer look like they have a vulva, and while these are often intended to be used as a source of humiliation for cis male subs, they don’t have to be!
This blog post was sponsored by TotalChastity.com. None of the links are affiliate links.
