The hunter and the hunted

A great deal of the internal dynamics of a power exchange can resemble that which exists between the predator and the prey. The chief difference coming from the animal under chase in Nature is not one who wants to get caught and turned into the ravenous carnivore's meal. Clearly, between a Top and a bottom, someone in this transaction wants to "get caught".

In my youth, i unknowingly mimicked the game of 'cat and mouse' everyday out on the playground. Instead of playing H-O-R-S-E with the boys on the blacktop, i instead honed in on my latest crush, only to chase her around the jungle gym for the duration of our recess. Either she let me catch her, or i finally managed to do it myself, this conversation would always result in me pinning her to the ground, a potpourri of snickering and giggling, while my victim lay beneath me struggling to get away. Again, sometimes i'd let her wiggle free, or she'd actually escape on her own (i preferred the latter over the former). Still, i never connected this game to the actual task of hunting down and taking another creature's life.

I have hunted animals before. I was raised on a ranch, and i have slaughtered livestock, even those i raised with great care and attachment from their birth. I have pulled an entire evening meal's worth of fish from the ocean, watching these creatures flail the last of their life force in a bucket of sea water. I do not grimace when i watch nature films that depict the killing of an antelope by a pack of lions, nor do i feel the need to shield myself from the notion that the food on my table came at the expense of some other lifeform's demise.

Recently, in a discussion i was having with a colleague, the notion of hunting/slaying/gathering as a dominant trait came up. I had never identified those aspects of myself as related to my dominant streak (especially since it was required of everyone on the ranch to face the fact that in order to live you must commit murder). But i wonder if others feel this way. Do most folks who identify themselves as submissives turn away from the idea of taking another creature's life for the sake of their own sustenance? Are all dominant-types able to hunt and fish without any pause? Something in me rejects this notion as a true delimiter of what makes someone submissive and dominant. I'm very interested to hear what others think.