INTERVIEW WITH A DOMINATRIX

by Sue Scharff


This article originally appeared in Synapse magazine, Winter 1999, Vol 21. Copyright/All rights reserved.
If you wanna see people freak out, mention S/M. If you wanna see them get pissed off, mention sex work. If you wanna see them really hit the ceiling, mention professional dominance, wherein a person (most often a woman) gets paid (most often a lot) to perform sadistic acts on a client.

In the days before and the weeks following my interview with Mistress Matisse, professional dominatrix, I have seen my share of people freaking out, getting pissed off, and hitting the ceiling. I first heard Mistress Matisse on the now-defunct Savage Love Live radio show, in Seattle. Here was a woman doing something totally unconventional, apparently quite successfully, who is very well-spoken and passionate in her mission to destroy the stereotypes about her lifestyle.

In short, your basic fascinating woman.

Mistress Matisse is, by her own description, queer. Currently engaged to be married to her partner, she formerly identified as a lesbian. She also has a "girl," or submissive ("J"., who joined us for the interview), with whom she has a relationship that appears extraordinarily loving and supportive. She earns her living beating the crap out of people, almost all of them straight men. Obviously this lifestyle is not for everyone. And obviously not everyone would require or desire the services of a professional dominatrix. But even if you think S/M is sick, or think sex work is degrading, there is one integral thing to remember about S/M people: while there are plenty of folks out there just waiting to rape, maim, abuse, molest, and destroy you without your consent, Mistress Matisse and her community are not so inclined. They will never do anything to you that you do not want them to do to you. And in some cases, that you do not pay them to do to you.

Sue: How did you get into this, and tell us what you do.

Matisse: I've been pro domming for about 4 years now. To me it's a natural outgrowth of my being an SM person. I've been doing SM since I became an adult, and it has always felt like a very natural thing for me to do. I do not fit into the stereotypes about SM people: I was not abused as a child, I was not molested; I have a very nice family; I like them, they like me; they don't know what I do, which is fine, they don't need to know. And I don't know exactly why I like it, I just know that I do. I know that I have made a study of it for the last ten years and learned all about the culture and all about the techniques, and all about what this means to the group of people that I belong to culturally, spiritually, emotionally, physically -- everything. And then, on a personal level, I have learned about what those things mean to me. I really feel like in a lot of ways that, I feel very blessed that I'm able to sort of share with people and teach people about what SM means to me. and I'm lucky in that. At the risk of sounding really pompous, I think it's one of the reasons why I'm having this lifetime on this planet, is to teach people about certain things, and one of them is about -- I hate to say sexuality, because SM is about so much more than sexuality; it's not just about sex -- but erotic energy is definitely a part of SM, and I think that things that have a basis in eroticism can be the hardest things for people to accept about themselves, when it doesn't fit into normal channels. I see so many people in the world who don't accept themselves, who think that the way they are is wrong, and I think that is the saddest thing in life. If I do anything here that I like the most it's teaching people this: You know, what you want is ok, provided you go about it in a consensual way. You come to me and say "I want this; will you please give it to me?" and I say "Yes, I will," then it's all good. No matter what it looks like to anybody else.

The idea that I could do that, and make money doing it, make a good living doing it, and have fun and get to express a part of myself that's really real to me, just is amazing to me, and again I think that I'm really lucky and blessed. I've been a sex worker previous to this; I was an erotic dancer; I danced at Lusty Lady; I've done a variety of things, and I like expressing that energy.

S: do you consider this working in the sex industry?

M: it is considered by other people mainly to be a branch of the sex industry. It's a real gray area; it's kind of like being a stripper. It's a gray area in that it is generally considered to have at least a basis in eroticism. I don't have any sexual contact with my clients, but I'm not going to tell you that they don't have sexual feelings while they're here. They frequently do.

S: Well, that could happen in a variety of settings.

M: Yes, and I'm not offended by it. I think it's natural; it's fine. I'm not gonna interact physically with that, because a) it's illegal, and b) that's not the kind of interaction I choose to have with my clients. There are people who call me who I turn away, because I sense that what they want is a primarily sexual interaction and I say to them: I hope you find someone with whom you can have this, but you cannot have it with me.

S: How can you tell?

M: The way that they talk; the questions they ask. If someone starts to ask "So, what do you look like? How tall are you?" and be very focused on touching and nudity in their conversation -- No. That's not what it's about. And I think that the women who are doing that kind of work are great and they are wonderful blessed people who can give that kind of energy. I'm not willing to do that right now. I think that the laws against it are ridiculous, against private consensual adult behavior; it's ridiculous, that you can have sex for free, but someone can't pay you to have sex. I think that's a joke.

But knowing that this is the situation, my partner - who is an attorney - and I sat down and looked at the local laws really carefully. He has worked with sex workers before who were dancers or dommes or what have you, so he's very cognizant of, like, "this is what you can do; this is what you can't." and I stay within those limits.

S: Is there a lot that you can't do or is there still plenty of leeway?

M: Oh, I have plenty of leeway. What is also true is if the police wanted to be real mean, they could come in here and just bust me on suspicion. Doing SM is in some ways a status crime the way homosexuality used to be, and in some states it still is. (At this point we were joined by J, Matisse's submissive "girl".) About 5 years ago, there was another domme here in town, and an undercover officer made an appointment to see her and he went in and talked to her for a few minutes, and after talking to her for a few minutes got up and said "you're under arrest"; swat team came in; they searched her whole place. But eventually the case was dismissed, because she had not done anything wrong! I think that made an impression on the police department to say that because someone is a domme doesn't mean they're automatically committing illegal acts. So, if I was arrested, it probably would not stand up in court, but you know what? I don't want to go through that! It's a long, expensive, painful process. So even though I'm as careful as I can be and as legal as I can be, you don't ever not worry. If you want to not worry, you should not do this! There is a case up in Canada where a woman who was a domme was arrested and she was convicted, even though they could not prove that she was doing anything sexual. Canadian laws are written a little differently than ours, and she just got a fine. That relieves me a great deal, but yeah, there's an element of fear to this. I need to be very careful, and I do have to prepare myself for the fact that this could happen.

S: I had this conversation recently with a friend, who insists that women who work in the sex industry are all being degraded and it could never be a good thing--

M: Has she worked in the sex industry?

S: No. And I've talked to people who have and I read Blackstockings (local sex workers magazine) and I think: let's let the women who do it speak about it. Some women hate it; they're just doing it for the money; and some women kind of enjoy it. So what do you think about that?

M: I think it's like any other job. I mean I will say that in sex work in general - some people are cut out for it; some people aren't. I don't think that there's any higher incidence of women in the sex industry of women who have been abused or who are there because they're forced to be than in any other job. I mean when I walk into Fred Meyer's and look at someone working at the cash register for a VERY low wage who's getting, you know, people snapping their fingers at her, and her boss is on her back all the time, giving her a hard time-- THAT- to me -THAT'S degrading. and I've had jobs like that. I've waited tables; and I've worked retail; and people were rude to me and I had to just take it and smile, and my boss fondled my butt, and I had to just take that and deal with it, and that was very degrading! And for no money! I had to deal with this! So my experiences in the sex industry have been fine and yes, I've dealt with jerks, but no more so than in any other job. It isn't any more inherently degrading than anything else and because you have the potential to be your own boss, in a lot of ways, in the sex industry, you can free yourself from that. Anytime you're in the customer service industry, you're gonna deal with customers who are a pain in the ass. But because it is so stigmatized and criminalized, these women have less recourse, and they are seen as people who are easier to victimize. It's attitudes like your friend's that keep that in place. In some ways, I think it's gonna have to be the women who change their minds about this before the men are going to.

S: It usually is!

M: Yeah, it usually is. So, if women like your friend, or everyone, can just say, you know what? It's an individual choice. I mean, it's like abortion: people who are pro-choice believe that a woman owns her body absolutely, and she should have a choice to do whatever she wants with it. To me, sex work is like that. I own this body. I can decide what to do with it. And if I wanted someone to give me money in exchange for sex, I should be able to do that, from a philosophical standpoint. It's my choice. And you may not agree with it; it may not be the right choice for you; you may think it's unhealthy or it's degrading or whatever -- it's not your choice. It's just like abortion. Not your choice - my choice. I don't think anyone should be forced to work in the sex industry. There are already laws in place about that kind of abuse, and I think that that kind of thing should be prosecuted vigorously. Children should not be in the sex industry. I read a lot about third world conditions in the sex industry that are just awful, but that to mean is a human rights condition; that is not a sex work/female problem exclusively. And I don't have anything else in common with a woman who is being forced to work in a brothel in India besides the fact that we're women. Our experiences are a thousand miles, a million miles apart. And it would be arrogant and pompous and stupid of me to say "Well I know what it's like for her." I have no idea. No one's ever made me do a damn thing I did not want to do. And I think that in some ways the things that I've done in this industry have taught me you have to decide what you will and won't do and make a really clear boundary, and say "I will do this; I won't do that." Because there's a real immediate sort of reaction if you do something that you don't want to do -- at least in my case -- you feel like: oh, I don't like this; I don't wanna be doing this; I'm not gonna do this again. And even places like the Lusty Lady where you're behind glass and it is, in some ways, a very safe place, you can let yourself be pushed into behaving in a way that you don't want to behave by a client, by someone on the other side of the glass who's trying to prompt you: do this, act this way, bend this way, portray this image...But if you don't wanna do that, don't do it! For anybody! I think that's true for anybody in any given circumstance: any job, any relationship, anything. Anyone who tries to force you to do something you don't wanna do, walk away from them. So. That's my little tirade.

Really, I think it's away of splitting good girls and bad girls, this whole, you know, it's just a new way of saying you've been bad. Poor girls, they're being degraded, they just don't know it. Anyone who wants to tell me, I know what's better for you, more than you do? Oooooh now that's really scary; that's really orwellian. I know what's best for me, more than anybody else. As long as what I'm doing doesn't infringe on you - and I'm gonna make sure that my life doesn't infringe on anyone's.

S: So tell us about people you do infringe on. Like, who are your clients; what do you do with them; do you have men and women clients...

M: Yes, I do have female clients as well as male. SM is a really broad ranging thing. I cannot say that there is a typical session... I see a lot of people who are fairly new to SM and who just don't really know what their options are in terms of: Is there a community, what is this culture, what are my individual likes and dislikes? In a lot of ways, I sort of function as; I'm gonna give you a little tour. It can be it verbal, or I can show you different things physically, how it feels. I can give them permission. "You can feel this way. You can want to come here, and be the one who's not in control, and be told what to do." I see so many people who come in and say "You know, I am so in control in my life; I am running my business; I am taking care of my family; and I just want to come here and have you tell me what to do. I don't want to think."

S: So that's not a stereotype? That's sort of a standard picture of a submissive, someone who's really on top of everything else?

M: It's a generalization, but it has, I think, a root in reality. I'm not gonna say that every single person is that way, but I hear that a lot. Both in my clients, and just some people that I know in my life, people who want to be submissive in SM. They are generally very in control people. So the myth that submissive people in SM are people who can't make it in life and just wanna be controlled -- it's a myth. I mean this (indicates J) is my bottom, and in her life she is as on top as anyone can be. She is running it; she is in charge. But - when she and I are together, I'm in charge of things.

I think, too, that in some ways people live in their heads a lot in this world. And you can sort of forget that you're walking around in this thing, this physical body. There's a tendency to divorce ourselves from our bodies, and not be in touch with them. So to not be in charge and to not think, it helps get you out of your head a bit. It can be simple things, like if you put somebody into bondage, it reminds them of their body a little more, because their movement is restricted. So in a lot of ways, it makes you feel your body more, in a good way.

Then, there are people have little bits of their lives that somehow got really highlighted for them, like a moment in some way that was significant. And people come back and they want to sort of revisit that time. Whether it was an awakening of a sexual feeling or something that made them more aware of who they were, of who they want to be. And they can come to me and say "I remember this time, and I want to try to feel like that again." I see people who are more experienced too, who are temporarily without a partner, an SM partner, and say "This is a kind of extreme stimulation that I enjoy, would you please perform this?" It's hard for people who aren't in SM to understand that someone would enjoy being caned. That someone would enjoy what you would call pain and what I tend to call extreme stimulation. But some people are wired that way. I could talk a lot about why I think that's true.

If you talk about pain, if you try to think about what you're talking about. What is pain, when you really think about it? It's a feeling; it's a stimulation. But why is it pain, why does it hurt? I think that if you break it down some, a lot of stuff we have about pain is actually about the emotions that we associate with physical pain. Pain is usually accompanied by fear, anger, things like that, things that we don't want to feel, that we don't like to feel. And if you divorce the sensation from those emotions, it can be very different. It's not to say it's not gonna be intense, it's not gonna be extreme: it is - but in a different way.

I like this example always: if you've ever been making love with your partner and had them bite you, scratch you, slap your ass, it feels really different than it would if he just came up to you out of the blue and did it; you would probably go: Hey! what are you doing? But at that moment, you're processing sensation differently than you would be anywhere else. So the sensation is different. and I think that's what a lot of masochism is about.

J: You know how sometimes you'll be getting a massage and it hurts so good? It's really like a control thing, 'cause like if someone falls off a stool and breaks their arm, in the backyard, pretending they're a gymnast, but it's sort of an uncontrolled thing. When Mistress is hurting me, it's very controlled...and how intense it is. And that coupled with...all realms of your entire being...but it's most like, in simplest terms, a massage that hurts so good. ...

S: it's hard to understand for people who've never been there.

M: Everything I do, whether with my clients or with people I'm emotionally bound to, is based on consent and trust. I don't ever do anything to anyone who doesn't want me to do that thing to them. and it's important to underline that anything I do is negotiated; everything I do is consented to, and if there was a point where someone was having a problem, there's something called a safeword and they would say: stop; I don't feel okay, I don't like this; this is not okay with me; and everything stops. Anyone who doesn't stop when you tell them to stop has crossed the line from SM to abuse.

S: If someone is just coming into the SM community and they want to avoid the abuse, and they want to find someone who is gonna treat them safely, like if you're just coming out as gay, there's a lot of resources, but if you're just coming out in SM--

M: There are a tremendous amount of resources, and I'd be glad to give you some at the end of the interview. What's really important for everyone in SM, and I think everyone in the world can take a lesson from this, is knowing your boundaries. Thinking about: how do I want to feel? What do I want? What's okay with me? What's not? And being really clear about that all the time. So that you don't tell someone " You can do whatever you want to," and then you later think "oh, I didn't want to do that; I didn't like that." Well, you have to say that. Before it happens is better, but even at the time, you have to say: "I don't like this. I don't want this. Stop this." That's how you keep from being abused, by saying "Stop; stop; stop; I don't want this." and if the person didn't stop, then what you have is an abusive person.

S: I think there's also sort of a common fear that the top might lose control somehow; does that happen? or is that just a myth?

M: No, an SM top does not lose control. I get what's called the high, comparable to a runner's high: I get the endorphins flowing, get that sort of feeling, but you don't get so out of control that your bottom is might be saying No No and you don't hear it or don't process it.

S: You're still in the world here.

M: Yes, I am in the world with my bottom, definitely. I don't know if I am in the world the rest of ya'll are in...(laughs) And you're so connected -- or you should be -- with the person that you're playing with, it's kind of like everything else in this world just goes away, there's just you and this person, and there's this tremendous (gestures)...between you. How could you not be aware? You're aware of the flicker of an eyelash. You are so connected with this person.

S: And is that true for any SM person or is it just advanced SM people?

M: I'm not any SM person, so its hard for me to say--

S: Do beginners have that same sort of connection?

J: I didn't. No, not at first... I've had tremendous experiences with this person (Matisse). It is like being two parts of a circuit. It's the safest place in the world to be, being tied up with this woman with sharp objects, or implements of all sorts of horrible things. It's an incredible safe place to be. I've never had to use the safeword. I feel as though we're so connected during scene that she knows when I'm being...she knows what my boundaries are, how far to go-- it's right there. An amazing thing.