PS023 - Earned Leather, Gifted Leather, Leather Identity
My new podcast is up! The sound quality is a bit challenging on this recording, but I had to take the opportunity to get these two recorded while I had the chance!
Episode: https://shows.acast.com/660e243b2f834f0017de9181/episodes/660e2440acbcaf00174d994a
Half of the leather community seems to be wanting to “earn” their leathers, and the other half does not feel qualified to “gift” leathers. Scotty Thomson and Katie Fulcrum join Lee Harrington in this passionate discussion about what leather means, leather identity, and getting turned on amidst a culture of tribal customs. Along the way the council of elders votes on a few issues, laughter is shared, and hearts are poured out for the world.
Passion And Soul Podcast:
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RSS Feed: https://feeds.acast.com/public/shows/660e243b2f834f0017de9181
Erotic Awakening Network: http://www.eroticawakening.com/podcast/
Episode Notes:
Scotty Thomson: https://fetlife.com/users/63099
Katie Fulcrum: https://fetlife.com/users/83858
Links Mentioned:
International Mr. Leather – http://www.imrl.com
Dark Odyssey.com – http://www.DarkOdyssey.com
MSC (Master/Slave Conference) - http://www.masterslaveconference.org/
Council of Elders - http://www.leatherati.com/leatherati_issues/2012/01/a-guest-editorial-review-by-guy-baldwinofthe-leathermans-protocol-handbooka-handbook-on-old-guard-rituals-traditio.html
Lee’s Upcoming Events/Appearances:
http://passionandsoul.com/appearances/
Lee Harrington Contact Information:
http://www.FetLife.com/passionandsoul
http://twitter.com/#!/PassionAndSoul
https://www.facebook.com/lee.harringon
https://www.facebook.com/passionandsoul
Support the Passion And Soul Podcast – Join our Patreon today!
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[music intro]
Announcer:
Welcome to Erotic Awakening, an exploration of all things erotic. Every Thursday, your hosts, Dan and dawn, share with you their experience and insights on kink, power exchange, and erotic life, as well as bring you interviews with exciting people from various lifestyles. Then every Monday, you'll hear from our various guest hosts. These nationally-known educators bring a variety of experience to the mics and share with you an ever-increasing, diverse world of alternative life.Erotic Awakening is intended for mature audiences. If you are offended by adult topics or prohibited by law, we recommend you stop listening right now.
Lee:
Hello, fellow adventurers of sexuality and spirit, and welcome to Erotic Awakening with Lee Harrington. Today, we're going on an adventure into the deep, dark truth of the past of this thing called [dramatically] Leather. Or some bullshit like that.[all laughing]
Poor Scotty was in the corner just being like, I'm not talking during the intro.
So, for folks who are listeners to the podcast, you will have remembered fondly I'm sure, from a year ago, the delightful Scotty Thomson.
Scotty:
How's it going, everybody?Lee:
And joining us today in our oh-so-highly technological studio known as “my living room” [all laugh], we have, of course, the fantastic Katie Fulcrum.Katie:
Hey, everybody.Lee:
So, and you may also hear the occasional bark, and that is my dog Stitch. So, I'll introduce him in advance. But instead, he's playing with a cat right now, so we're fine.So, a couple days ago, Scotty and I were on public transportation in beautiful New York City, and we ended up in a conversation about the culture and mythology that's coming up around the idea of gifting, and earning, and bestowing leathers.
And, Scotty, when you and I were talking about that, you were sharing with me a story of someone who didn't feel comfortable buying leather, and I was wondering if you could recount that story.
Scotty:
Right. I was contacted by a friend of mine who has a bondage performance coming up, and thought that it would be most appropriate, and super hot, [Lee laughs] if he were to wear a leather outfit for this and have the opportunity to get some leather, but was really conflicted, was feeling very guilty and very shy about going to buy leather, and then to wear it in this performance because he hadn't earned the leather.Lee:
Mm.Scotty:
And so he sent me a note just asking, you know, “so… I don't know what to do, help.”Lee:
Yeah, I actually had something really similar happen as far as people writing, that I had somebody who is - not necessarily the head of the Leather family, but one of the more elders of the Leather family write me and say, “hey, one of our members really wants a cap bestowed upon them or a cover, and I don't know how to do that. And according to the internet, and it's like literally…”Katie:
The authority of all things.Scotty:
Right!Lee:
Oh yes. According to the internet, to be able to have earned your cover, you have to have been part of the gay men's Leather community for 15 years… or you have to have grown up from being a slave and spent years in servitude before earning the right to be a top, and then earning the right to be a dominant, and then earning the right to be a Master, and then be covered as a Master. And he said, “well, this person has never done either of these, so can I still gift a cover or is that weird?”Katie:
I think that's what you and I were talking about that day on the car. And we talked a little bit about when my Owner of years past got his cover, and what I was told, which was basically, “do you feel that they've earned it? You're gifting it to them.”Lee:
Yeah.Katie:
I'm always nervous when somebody wants the cover, though. I think that that's a gift that is given, not asked for. Because otherwise we'd have 9,999 hats out there that people just wanted and said, “buy this for me.”Lee:
Do you think it would really be that big of a rush to go do that? Is that something that you're actually seeing? Or is that a concern?Katie:
I think it already is happening.Lee:
Okay.Katie:
I think there's a lot of people that don't understand the concept of what a cover is supposed to mean, and the responsibility that it entails in accepting.Lee:
Well, I'm curious, for each of the three of us, what does a cover entail? What does that mean to each of us? So I’ll start with you.Scotty:
[pauses] That's a really good question. Certainly for me, it really has a lot to do with the history for me, and I'm talking about my own personal history, not the lionized mythology of “one true way” Leather.For me, it was riding on public transportation in San Francisco, going through the Castro district, and the first time that I saw a real live Leatherman, when I was a boy soprano in the San Francisco Boys Chorus, probably 10, 11 years old. And just looking at that, just being so struck with that outfit, and “oh my god,” that, you know, and not having such a developed sense of my own sexuality that I could put my finger on why exactly that was cool. All I knew was that, “wow, that's really cool.”
And I also really - the riots at San Francisco City Hall after the Dan White trial. You know, there were just these really powerful images of gay men who were fed up and weren't going to take it, and were rioting at City Hall. And I remember there being leather jackets, big mustaches prominently featured in those news images.
And so it was really a trip, having just all these different sides, because of course there was also the Village People, which was kind of a caricature.
Lee:
Yes.Scotty:
But that was such a huge part of pop culture. But for me, it's that history of awakening, of what really gets me hard, and also that awakening of political activism and social justice. And so it is that mixture of responsibility to community, standing up for your beliefs, and getting hard, and having sex the way that you want to have sex, without, you know - completely bucking what's normal or what's most prevalent.Lee:
So I'm hearing there an underlying statement of authenticity as well, as compared to simply saying, simply being anarchistic.Scotty:
Right, right. And so there's definitely a part of me that says, if someone walks into a leather store and sees a Muir cap on the wall, and starts drooling, and gets wet or gets hard, you know, like, there you go. Your wetness or your hard-on just earned you that cap.Lee:
All right.Scotty:
There's a part of me that says that. You know, I mean, I'm really fascinated with the move towards gear nights at a lot of the clubs that are out there, rather than just, you know, dress code, high protocol, but any fetish gear. And it's kind of a new twist on, you know, hey, come out in whatever gets your dick hard.Lee:
And that's been the new… because not everybody who's listening at home has a gear night. We've got people listening in South Africa. We've got people listening in Guatemala. So, like, when you describe a gear night, it's people showing up in whatever gear turns them on.Scotty:
Exactly. It could be a wrestling singlet, it could be a tracksuit, it could be latex, it could be leather. It's whatever qualifies as “gear.” You know, some intentional outfit.Katie:
Which were born out of the uniform nights that they used to have at all the Leather bars, where it was the night where you had to come in your leathers. You know, coming in in sneakers was not acceptable. Coming in in “street clothes,” were not acceptable. Because it was the one night they dedicated the space to what they were into, and at that point, it was just the hardcore leather, especially in the men's bars.Scotty:
Right.Katie:
I remember when I started bootblacking at one of the bars, big problem because I was a girl, even at uniform night. And that was a real - like, they had to have a meeting about whether or not that was a violation of space.Scotty:
Yup. And I've heard that that is still an issue in many of the spaces.Katie:
But that's kind of getting away a little bit from where we're talking about.Lee:
Well, to me, it's a conversation about - how I tend to work, like these kinds of conversations, [excitedly] I'm taking Katie's podcasting cherry! Oooooh, yeah!It's that the questions become conversations, so each of us will answer the question eventually, but as long as we're still on the topic of leather earning, Leather history, Leatherness, Leather identity, Leather culture, we're still vaguely in the same realm.
Katie:
Gotcha, okay.Lee:
And anyway, if people from at home don't already know this - Dan, and Barak, and Sheba, and dawn and I, we write the notes of the description for our podcast after we've recorded it. Sorry if I took away the veil from your mystery balls at home. But yeah, we write it afterwards, because then I can say, and “we went on this grand adventure through blah, blah, blah, blah.”Katie:
Gotcha. [laughs]Lee:
So I think it's important to consider that gender affects the notions of Leather culture.Katie:
Oh, definitely.Lee:
That, you know, I remember being at Southwest Leather Conference a couple of years ago, and Master Archer from Atlanta, and his girl who makes the amazing black…Katie:
Elegant.Lee:
Elegant. Thank you. I just had to describe the polish!Katie:
Black Gold.Lee:
Black Gold, yeah. And it's amazing boot polish, by the way, at least in my opinion. It's a [unclear] for everything.Katie:
Agreed, from the bootblack.Lee:
But they were doing a class on earned leather, and there was a dyke in the front row who was crying. And they asked her what's going on, and she said that somebody in her Leather family who had a cover had passed away, but nobody had given the cover to her. So the cover from, you know, it was an all-women's Leather family.She said, “The cover's just been sitting there in a closet. I don't know what to do.” Like, you don't give that thing away. You don't… And to her and to her Leather family, it was a sacred artifact. And she said, “I don't have the right to earn it because nobody put it on my head.” And Archer turned around and said, actually, what does the rest of your Leather family say? And all the other women around her said, “You should… She would have wanted you to wear that. You deserve that.” And just the… That emotional expectation goes back to what you were talking about with the vest, to me, which is, “Nobody put it on my head, I don't have the right.”
And I completely agree with you, I completely agree with you where you said, you know, otherwise we're going to have just everybody petitioning for their caps and everybody's going to get a cap because they said, “I want a cap, give me a cap, yay!” [claps hands] But I wonder where the middle ground is.
Katie:
I think there's a middle ground of voicing a feeling of being ready for it…Lee:
Mm.Katie:
And then waiting until your family decides you're ready for it. That being your slave, your Leather family, your community, whatever, I think there's definitely that place. But when there's an expectation of it… I often have many problems with people who have expectations on most anything. But when there's an expectation of, “I've said I want it so now it will happen,” that, for me, is a sign of a poor Master who cannot wait for something, and wait until things are the right time and the right place.People who force a situation, that's actually a sign of someone I would not want to personally cap, because that's not what our community is about, in my opinion.
Lee:
So what does a cover mean then for you?Katie:
Well, I didn't get introduced to covers until I had been part of the fetish scene for a while. I came in through the fetish scene, and then about four years in, I went to IML for the first time, and that was my real introduction to the leather community, and where I fell in love with things like bootblacking, and service, and some of the protocols that we take as fairly stereotypical.And I remember seeing the difference in how some people carry themselves versus others, and some conversations that happened after that. I think that as you were saying, Scott, authenticity definitely is a part of it. I think there's also a part of… there are family leaders, there are community leaders, and it's accepting that role and that responsibility.
Lee:
Mm.Katie:
And that's where I struggle, because I see people who want to walk in the Leather world, not the fetish world where it's just about getting your dick hard, but want to walk in the Leather world, but don't want to carry the responsibility of the roles they want to dress for.Lee:
Right.Katie:
So that's where I get conflicted.Scotty:
Lots of people want to come to the party - they don't want to do any of the planning, and they certainly don't want to clean up.Lee:
Yeah, yeah, very well stated.For myself, covers are something I'm really conflicted over. Having been raised an army brat, like… uniform has such a strong meaning to me. Where yes, there's times I can get dressed up and it's fun and whatever, but I was making a statement when I was a young street punk, and I took one of my mother's - I don't remember the name of it anymore, but it's the, I want to say it's the Guardians of Athena, it's the women's auxiliary for the, for DAV, for the Disabled American Veterans.
And she had this one pin that represented the women's side of it, and by putting it on, I was saying that even after discharge, even after I am out of whatever, I am still a woman who will stand up for the rights of the people who have come before me. And who I represent, like, I knew that putting that on as a street punk, I was like, “No, this is a real statement.” People are like, “Oh, it's a really pretty pin!” And I'm like, “Don't fucking touch this.” Unless you know what this means, whatever.
And so like there's a part of me that still holds onto that, that if you're going to put that on, fine - wear the full World War II, Nazi, perfect-to-a-pin uniform. But if you're putting that uniform on, know the cultural history of it. Know the meaning of it, know the people whose lives died for that, you know, under the auspices of that uniform. Know the lives of the people who died in those uniforms. Right? Because there are people who died on both sides, I'm just going to throw that out there too.
So I think uniforms are incredibly hot, but I think there's a cultural importance that needs to happen there. But I get torn because, like you were saying, Scotty, I see somebody dressed in the iconography of my erotic heritage, and my body has a physiological response. Because they're pulling upon the archetypes of my personal desire. And I just kind of go… [groans] does the political half of me want them to know, “Well, do you know what that means?! Do you know that in the 70s, people were rioting, and that hat meant that they were getting their dick hard.” And we come full circle, so I feel really torn about the entire thing.
Katie:
I don't think there is a problem if somebody wants to wear something or have their partner wear something just because of the fetish value of it. I think, though, that wearing… So if I want to wear...I don't even know what at this point, but if I want to…[all laugh]
Lee:
Lederhosen!Katie:
If I want to wear lederhosen and do a little jig and all this kind of stuff, you know, I… for my partner, then that's great and wonderful and hot. But if I'm going to wear it out in the Leather community, if I'm going to wear it to MsC, if I'm going to wear it to the Leather History Conference, if I'm going to wear it to places where it means that I am taking a certain role by wearing this - whether it is a title vest, my Boot Black Brigade patch, these are things that mean “I stand for something.” And that's where you cross the line from fashion and fetish into...help me with the word here.Scotty:
It's the difference between uniform and costume.Lee:
Well said.Scotty:
And I think that, particularly as the institutions have become more and more virtual, and less and less brick and mortar, the mechanism of having the family, or organization, or group recognize the leader and have that leader stand as the figurehead, they're largely becoming fewer and certainly farther between. And I think that in our new Leather community, there are a lot more goddamn independents.Katie:
God bless the GDI.Scotty:
Yes, and I think there really is no mechanism for the GDI to be recognized.Katie:
But even the GDI has a partner, even the GDI has friends.Scotty:
Right.Katie:
They may not belong to a brigade or a club, but they still have people that they consider part of their lives.Scotty:
Yet, it's outside of the mythology, and so you wind up having someone who feels like they haven't earned it because it hasn't been bestowed upon them. And you have a bunch of people who are thinking that they don't have the right to bestow it because they're not part of the traditional club or whatever you call it.Lee:
Well, it's really funny that you bring that up, because that's pretty much what happened to me. I was gifted my cover a little over two years ago by my Girl and my Boy. And it was because I had mentioned offhandedly a year and a half earlier that I'm like, because they were just like, “Oh, I'm really surprised that you don't have your cover. You've been on the scene for 10 years, blah, blah, blah.” And I'm like, “Who the fuck is going to give me one?”And they said, “What do you mean, everybody knows you.” But I'm like, everybody knows me, but I'm not part of, you know, I had been a member of Bad Girls of Portland, but because I was no longer a girl, I was no longer a member of Bad Girls of Portland. [laughs] That I was an associate member of literally 20 different clubs, but not a patch-carrying member of any of them.
And everybody just kept making the assumption, “Oh, well, it's Lee Harrington, he's going to - he already has his cover,” or “It's Lee Harrington, somebody's going to give it to him eventually.”
And I bitched about that one night when they had asked me the question, and a year and a half later, they surprised me with - and they actually couldn't do it in person, because one lived in Australia and one lived in Hawaii - so they surprised me with a gift certificate to a vendor at IML and said, “go get your cover, it's waiting for you.” Which was a weird… whatever, but it was what it was.
But it was really interesting that, you know, everybody just assumed, and literally when I asked friends, after I got it, I was like, “oh my god, I just got a gift, my cover was so amazing, and blah, blah, blah.” And they were like, “ooh, was there a ceremony?” And I'm like, if by ceremony you mean gift certificate to IML, yeah, it's like a ceremony.
But everybody's also, people either ask me, “Well, how was your ceremony?” Which didn't exist, it doesn't exist in a lot of situations, but there's that mythology, right? Or everybody was like, “You mean you didn't have it already?” It was one or the other.
Katie:
Well, the whole ceremony thing, I mean, it's like collaring ceremonies, we've turned them into, you know, seven-level productions. Yeah.Scotty:
Well, and why wouldn't we? Let's think about what rites of passage still exist in our modern society. You know, I mean, the big ones used to be getting the driver's license or, you know, graduating from high school was a fairly common rite of passage that was still left.Well now, by the time someone graduates from high school, they've already graduated 12 times, because they're graduating from daycare, they're graduating from preschool, they're, you know, they're graduating, they're graduating, they're graduating.
And I think that it really feels like the internet has done a lot to take the rites of passage away, because there's just so much information, and so I - I don't know.
Katie:
I don't disagree with you, but because of the internet, in my opinion, it's made it into a “collaring has to look like this,” or a “capping has to look like this.” You know what, the best collaring I ever had was in an Owner's basement, and it was two minutes between me, him, and his wife.Scotty:
Yes.Katie:
And that was so much - so deep and meaning to me the way that they did that, more than if we had made a big, huge deal out of it and everything else.Scotty:
And that's what I was trying to get out of that Internet. What's that?[all laughing]
Lee:
You realize you're on the same page?! Fuck! Oh my god, okay, let me just get this straight. Three elders...[Scotty laughing]
Katie:
Are you calling me old?Lee:
…of the Internet age leather community have just agreed… that stuff happens… and it's hot… and it works. That's weird! Does that make us an elder council?Katie:
So… done!Scotty:
Yeah.Lee:
Alright, it's been proclaimed. Somebody tweet it, somebody tweet it.Scotty:
So what's the difference between a council and a tribunal?Lee:
Oh. Uh…Katie:
Councils meet about other things, tribunals are only bad stuff.Scotty:
Oh, okay.Lee:
I was actually going to say that John Weal didn't write porn about it.[all laughing]
Scotty:
So, I think that the Internet really affords us the opportunity to universally adopt an incredibly seductive mythology. That collaring ceremonies are these huge productions where… you know, urine must be prepared for the sharing of the fluids, and… you know, then there's the council vote, and people have to stand up and read from the… I… the sacred script. And, certainly, I mean, yeah.Katie:
The Marketplace. [laughs]Scotty:
But, I mean, who doesn't want to be recognized? I mean, who doesn't want that kind of meaningful recognition from their peers and their partners? It is incredibly seductive, and yet the mechanisms for making it happen really, for the most part, don't seem to exist.Or at least there's a huge disconnect, because it seems to me that half the people feel like they don't deserve to wear leather because they haven't earned it, and the other people feel like they don't have the right to bestow it. So what do we do?
Katie:
Flip a coin?Scotty:
Yeah.Lee:
Flip a coin.Scotty:
And it's supposed to come from a Council of Elders - that has never existed - but man, is that really hot porn.Katie:
Oh, definitely.Scotty:
That's like, oh, you mean there is a back room? Where there's going to be candles and robes and -Katie:
Masks, don’t forget masks.Scotty:
- and masks, and they're going to ask me to demonstrate my flogging skills and my needling skills. And… yeah. What are you guys doing right now? Do we have any candles, and masks, and robes?Lee:
Yeah, we've got a whole lot of rope.Katie:
I've got the mask.Lee:
Yes, we have a very, very dramatic leather mask. That's true, that's true.Katie:
I have a couple of robes, there's one on the back of the bathroom door.Lee:
Oh yeah, it's red and fuzzy.Scotty:
So thanks for listening, everybody, that was the podcast![all laughing]
Katie:
We're going to go cap Scotty now.Lee:
Well, it's interesting that you say it's really hot porn, because what flashes to my mind now is The Upper Floor.Scotty:
Right.Lee:
Are you familiar with The Upper Floor?Katie:
No, I’m not.Lee:
TheUpperFloor.com is Kink.com, who owns Hogtied, BoundGods.com, Wired Pussy… insert many things here. The people who bought the Armory building in San Francisco and converted it into a porn haven.Katie:
Okay.Lee:
They started a website called The Upper Floor, where they took the fourth floor, I think it's the fourth floor, of the Armory building and converted it into a 24/7 fantasy space, based in a lot of ways off the Marketplace books.And they've got slaves who live there half-time, but “on time,” according to all the cameras, and butlers, and the people who own the space, and there's slave trainings, and they have formal brunches, and they invite in, members of the kink community come in, as part of their formal events.
And they've shot, now, porn of people “earning the right to be called slaves,” and having their new name bestowed upon them. And it's literally like the - literally, it's really hot porn videos of a girl in a circle of candles with, you know, Masters and slaves all in leather masks, and they're making the porn real.
And I love it because it's giving the opportunity for people to construct their fantasies. And I say, if you're inspired by something, go make it real, right? Go, go, you know, that's fantastic, but I think the flip side is that people think that it already exists out there, and all you have to do is knock on the right door, and you'll be led into the “real Upper Floor.” You'll be able to join them.
And the answer, in my opinion, is, well, if you're height/weight proportionate, and find yourself in San Francisco, and are willing to sign a model release to have your genitals displayed on the internet, and contact Kink.com… yeah, you can end up on The Upper Floor. And/or you're a really well-known personality, like Laura Antoniou, in which case you're allowed, because you wrote the friggin’ books, and you’re allowed, even though she's [dramatic voice] not their standard aesthetic, whatevs.
I love going to events like Dark Odyssey, because people turn to - or Geeky Kink Event, where people are like, “I want to, I always wanted to be locked inside a TARDIS.” You know what? Now you can be locked inside a TARDIS.
[Katie laughing]
Lee:
I don't know what a TARDIS is, but it doesn't sound like a good thing. [laughs] But I love the fact that people are inspired by something and they make it happen. It saddens me, though, when they're inspired by something and therefore think they can't make it happen.Scotty:
Exactly. And I think that there are many people who are inspired by this mythology of Old Guard Leather, and yet - they can't, they don't see that it exists, they can't plug into it, and so they're left with like, well, I'm really attracted by leather. I feel the pull. I identify myself as one of the tribe, but I haven't earned it, and so it's not for me, because I can't - I don't have the ticket. I don't have the secret password.Katie:
And that's even more distancing, because unless - so many people think, unless you're a gay man, you're never going to find it.Scotty:
Right.Lee:
And even the gay men are like, where do we turn? Because if there was a Council of Elders, the number of them who probably made it out living… my brain doesn't even necessarily want to go down that path. But like, there is that depressing thought as well.Scotty:
Right.Katie:
But the fact of the matter is, is that the gifting of leathers, the earning of leathers, is what you need to make it to be.Lee:
Right.Katie:
You know, I was gifted leather pants. You know how I was gifted them? “Here, try these on.”Scotty:
Yeah.Katie:
And it's by somebody who's considered one of the supreme elders in the community, and she just threw them to me out of her closet because she thought I'd like them. Someday I'll be able to wear them again.Scotty:
Yeah. The only piece of earned leather I have, happened to me when someone turned to me and said, “Scotty, do you have any earned leather?” And I said, no. And they handed me a little piece of leather and said, “well, here you go. There you go, earned leather.” Right on.Katie:
And the thing is, what does it mean to you? I mean, I recently took a step in my life where I had a marking done, on me, to symbolize some steps I was taking in my life towards being a top. And I did that wearing the boots I was given 12 years ago when my first owner said, “You're a bootblack now, time to get your boots.” They're the only boots I wear because of what they mean to me.Scotty:
I recently had my first cutting done, and wore my boots and my vest while I was having it done.Katie:
It's a lot about what does it mean, and I think everybody needs to kind of take that step back and go, “What does it mean to me, and what do I need it to mean to me?” To be considered a bootblack? Like, I went and competed, and it was a couple of, however many years ago. I didn't win, but it was the people who gave me their tickets that allowed me to walk away and go, “I guess I really am a bootblack, I'm not just somebody who does boots.” And that was because of who gave me their tickets. They were people that their opinion meant a great deal to me.So, if I was somebody who didn't know how to go about doing this, and I wasn't connected to some of the people I am, I would go to my family and go, “This is the path I want to walk, what do we think it should look like?”
Scotty:
Yeah.Katie:
And then make that a decision for my family and I to come up with, because that's how you earn things. The first cow didn't fall on the first Master because he flogged that five thousandth stroke, it's because the first people decided this is what we needed it to be. So that's what worked for them.Scotty:
Wait a second. Was I supposed to be counting strokes all this time?Katie:
Yeah.Scotty:
Nobody told me!Katie:
You didn't get your clicker?Lee:
But - you mean the sacred, Old Guard, clicker. [laughing]Katie:
Exactly!Scotty:
There is, absolutely, incredible power in that external validation and that recognition. For me, there's also something that's very intrinsic, very personal, and very much a part of who I am - that every time I put on my leather 501s, and I feel my black outer skin slide over my naked flesh, that I get to reveal to everyone who can see me a very important and intimate part of who I am, just by what I am presenting on the outside. And so in a lot of ways, I really feel like the experience of sliding those pants on, every time I put them on, is a little auto-bestowing scene.Katie:
Well, it is, because wearing your leathers is not only about a level of vulnerability, because you are saying to the world and everyone who sees you “this is who I am,” but you've got that vulnerability and you've got that armor, because this is part of what I am.Scotty:
Right.Katie:
And that being able to truly be yourself - you know, I often refer to when I wear my vest as my “armor” because it is - I feel the most confident when I'm in my vest and I'm feeling very in my right place. That for me is the dual edge. I feel like I can walk down the street and show everyone who I am, because I am being who I am. And that is a very rare thing in this universe, unfortunately.Scotty:
And so many people struggle with vulnerability, and - particularly because it is frequently judged as a sign of weakness. And I truly feel that there is no strength without vulnerability.And you're telling the story about your vest as armor, and I'm immediately struck by the image of the vest and how it fits and the fact that it's open right at the heart. And so it is armor, but it's also a very powerful reminder of one of the cores of Leather, and our Leather flag, and the symbol, and the heart.
And it is that vulnerability, and that strength, and that showing your authentic self, and standing up, and to be counted and to be recognized and to say, “I am here and this is who I am.”
Lee:
Is there an inference there that if you are not “standing up in a public venue,” that you are not “Leather?”Scotty:
Uh…we could probably work that out in editing. [all laughing] Because I totally did not mean to.Lee:
No, I'm curious, because I think it's a reasonable question. Because there are people out there who say, if you're not part of a public Leather community, then you're not Leather.Scotty:
Well, and I think that it seems to me that there is a very personal, there is the personal track to Leather. And I think that really, Leather is, and how you choose to practice it is very personal. And there are certain histories and traditions that resonate almost universally, and I would say that there definitely is a community aspect to what I believe Leather to be. And there is a service aspect, it's serving something greater than yourself and your own interest. So… now, yeah, that's a really good question.Lee:
Something to chew on, then, for next time.Scotty:
Yeah.Katie:
I think that it's a dangerous thing to say, because if you are in an isolated community, if you are new, if you are not in a relationship, are you no longer a slave or no longer a Master? Are you no longer gay because you don't have a partner? These are part of who you are, and I think Leather is just as much a part of who you are. Whether or not you are a GDI, part of a club, or live in the middle of nowhere, it is who you are.I think that just like whether or not you are in a relationship, and able to be fully who you are, or express who you are fully, or recognize the potential, comes from being part of the community, but I don't think it changes who you are, personally. I mean, I've lived a very isolated existence for periods and I don't think it changed who I was on the inside.
Scotty:
Beautiful point.Lee:
Yeah, very well stated.So: a couple quick things I want to run through before we wrap up.
First one, you have someone, imagine if you will, who you think deserves a piece of leather, or hanky, or a bondage ring, or some other, or a pin, or whatever it is, right? You think they deserve this. How do you give it to them? How do you decide to give it to them? What's the mechanism to get it onto them?
Scotty:
I can tell you, with my personal experience, I've been able to execute it in a way that works best for me when I do it on the spot. Where I see it, I acknowledge it, I take a piece of leather off of what I am wearing and say, “Here.”When… it seems to me that the spontaneity gives me the necessary shove to just do it and make it happen. Whereas if I'm scheduling it, then I'm feeling pressure about the production value, and the ceremony, and the following the book that doesn't exist, on how to bestow leather.
And that's something that's the - just that, overcoming that inertia, with creating a ceremony for the gifting of leather, has been really interesting to experience. Because I take a step back from it, and I'm like, “Why are you waiting?”
Lee:
Well, it goes to the same question. I'm going to be officiating a wedding later this year, and they keep on thinking, “okay, we're going to do this and this, and we have to double check with your mother, we have to double check with your father, and make sure this works.” And then occasionally, they just pause and go, “why aren't we going to Vegas?!”And to me, that notion of - do you spend the time and energy to construct that big, elaborate thing from the “book that doesn't exist,” and/or does exist, depending on where you buy it on Amazon. [laughing] I know, I'm snarky.
But is - between that, and just giving something off your back, is the difference between “are we having a full formal church wedding or are we flying to Vegas and eloping?”
They're all marriage, right? But they come in a thousand shades in between. And so for me, when I think of the question, “so how do you give it to them,” to me the question is “what kind of person are you, what kind of person are they?” Think of it like a marriage. What's going to be authentic to both parties?
And if the answer is, “I'm a flat out Vegas kind of guy, let's go, let's have fun, let's do this now, because we're young, we're passionate, so we don’t necessarily need to get clearance from every single person on your side of the family as to whether or not I can wear blue socks.”
Scotty:
Yeah.Lee:
That's important to know. What about yourself?Katie:
For me, it really is about who it is and why am I doing it. I gifted my boy with his vest at Christmastime, because he's learning to bootblack, and it was time for him to have something that he had earned.And for him, it was a little bit of a “I've done this, so now I've earned it,” because he needs that. So when he turned over my twelve year old boots to me, he got his vest. Done. He didn't know it was coming.
When I gifted that former Owner with his cap, there was a little bit more production value about it, because I'm the sappy slave with the Master in full uniform, you know, gifting the cap.
It really does depend on what you're trying to make that moment, for whatever reason you're trying to make that moment, for whatever reason that moment involves. I've got my pants because somebody threw them to me out of a closet. Doesn't mean that they mean any less to me, because I still know she wouldn't have thrown them to me unless she felt that I was ready for it.
Lee:
Mm.Katie:
And she and I can just do that. So it really is that unique relationship., and what does that look like? Just like the collaring, just like the wedding, just like anything else.Lee:
And so, is it fair to say that people can give shit to people that they care about?Katie:
Yes.Lee:
Are we all in agreement?Scotty:
Absolutely. I mean, yes, if you feel inspired to recognize, by all means, recognize. And it can be done off the cuff, without planning and production, or it can be done with planning and production.Katie:
And every level in between.Lee:
Every level in between.Scotty:
Exactly, yeah.Katie:
I think one of the things that also needs to be remembered, though, is if you accept it, remember what that means, as well.Scotty:
Yes.Lee:
Mm-hmm.Katie:
This isn't an iPod you got at Christmastime, if you don't use it, you don't use it. This is something that you're accepting a certain level of acknowledgement, and with acknowledgement, with that line, “with great power comes great responsibility.”Lee:
And that also means something I think is “forgitten” - forgotten - “forgitten?” Hello, words, good English, yes.What I see get forgotten is that people can say no. Somebody can present you with a cover, or a pair of gloves, or whatever, and if they say, “and this represents X, Y, Z, and Q,” you can say, “you know what, I am so grateful that you appreciate me, but I don't feel that I want to represent X, Y, Z, and Q. Thank you so much for the intention.”
Because sometimes, whatever that statement is, is it what we really want to rock? Like, I had a club offer me to, you know, like, “oh, so we're really working towards giving you a backpatch,” and I'm like, “I really appreciate that intention, but I've been with you guys for less than six months, and that kind of weirds me out.” I think I phrased it more politely. I think.
There's also other pieces of leather that I have personally, that weren't given in joy or in - like, my leather gloves. I stole them. As a thief! I stole them, and my Daddy at the time, when he found out, when I said I can return them, he said, “No, you've earned those gloves.” Every time I put on a pair of leather gloves, though, they have a certain meaning to me because I've “earned them.” So sometimes these messages can be complex, I'd say.
So, my Council of Elders - I know, I'm making fun of both of them, I have to.
Katie:
Calling me old.Lee:
No, no, I'm calling you “Eld!” Eld.[all laughing]
Katie:
That makes you “der.”Scotty:
Der![all laughing]
Scotty:
I've been called worse.Lee:
Do we have any other wisdoms to put out into the world, which - I'm making fun of it, but I think it's because… I'm making fun of it, because it means a lot to me. And if I present it out there with all of my own personal seriousness, I'm afraid I'm going to scare people, and I want to make this palatable for our listeners.Katie:
It's more important to talk about it than talk about it seriously.Lee:
Yeah.Katie:
Start the conversations.Lee:
And maybe that's it. At home, start having conversations about what these things are, that we give to each other. And, you know, do you feel like you need to have been given it, or can you have bought it and somebody else says, “no, that's cool that you wear it.” Like, how’s that in your world?How is it for you to be given a latex dress? Can a latex dress have just as much meaning for you? A piece of hand-me-down rope?
Like, does “Leather” have to be made out of leather? What does that mean for vegans? Like, let's start having some conversations about it.
Katie:
Exactly.Scotty:
Yeah, and let's stop letting this Old Guard mythology cockblock our community, because I'm sick and tired of this notion alienating people who hear the call. Who feel the draw to Leather, and are just not at all exploring it, because of this ridiculous Old Guard mythology.Lee:
Well, and what's worse is that there is truth to Old Guard, and I think it invalidates the truth of people who were struggling to have an authentic sexuality in the face of homophobia, and racism, and sexism, and classism, and people who were… I have a friend of mine whose girlfriend was beaten, to death, because of her alternative sexuality. And so the idea when we're like, oh, there's this hidden… I think we also invalidate the experience of people who actually lived through those.Scotty:
Absolutely. Absolutely.Lee:
So with that, go out. Have fun. Be you.Earn your leather, gift your leather. Gain some truth of who you want to express for yourself.
I want to thank, again, Katie. Thank you so much for sharing your history, and your truths, and some story about your pants. Thank you, thank you, thank you.
And Scotty for coming out, and talking again on the podcast, and being willing to be bold and brazen once more, even in your complete informality.
[Scotty laughs]
Katie:
Thanks for having us.Lee:
Yeah! And to everyone at home, have fun, enjoy yourselves. Explore! Delight! Get to know one another and get to know yourself. This has been Erotic Awakening with Lee Harrington.And please: be you.
[music outro]
