Ma’am & Sir

[Sa****]

New to the LS and doing research & reading… I don’t know where to ask these questions so here goes.
Ma’am & Sir is honorific and shouldn’t be used unless your in a dynamic but here in Southern USA it’s instilled at a young age as a sign of respect to where it’s almost automatic response. How do you toe that line without being disrespectful?

[DD****]

Ask your D. Vetting is important

[od****]

Agreed with the above commenter. Open communication is best and they have to know themselves. For me I was in the military and I'm not royalty so I don't like the sir aspect. For me it's giving undue authority to tyrants. There should be only a few authority figures in your life and that doesn't include law en***ment or the government. Imo and that's a slippery slope because sometimes in order to avoid undo self and pose suffering you almost have to play the game occasionally.

[Mr****]

I think it's up to you to say what you fill comfortable with

[Li****]

As someone who has had doms and dommes raised in the south with them, usually ma'am and sir are only used with elders out of respect, just because manners, but it depends dynamic to dynamic and dom to dom

[ho****]

I only allow a sub to call me Sir with a capital S in text but there is no difference in speaking but it really does show the level of a Dom or a dom and Sir and a sir

[Sa****]

I agree that Vetting is very important. I don’t have a Dom
and was asking before i went to munches bc Yes/no Ma’am & Sir are taught to kids and are ingrained in us. I say that to a lot of people but in this LS it’s honorifics and shouldn’t be used or said to a person unless you’re in a dynamic.

[Ki****]

My sub is a Southern born lady and has always used Sir when speaking to me or others, even long before submitting sexually. A Dom should NEVER try to change your upbringing or personality unless it was agreed upon prior to service.

[Wh****]

I challenge your original premise that you shouldn't use "sir" unless it's within a dynamic. the honorific is implied (as is the Capitalization) when directed to one's own Dom.

[Gl****]

There are endless ways to address your dom/me that don’t have to use ma’am or sir, with or without capital M/S. You can reserve those for keeping with your upbringing and work out a different address for your person.

[Jo****]

As a southerner I use ma'am and sir to everyone I do business with but I love that my submissive calls me sir and I'm proud to call my dominant Ma'am even even though she's much younger than me

[Jo****]

2 hours ago, KinkDaddy78254 said:

My sub is a Southern born lady and has always used Sir when speaking to me or others, even long before submitting sexually. A Dom should NEVER try to change your upbringing or personality unless it was agreed upon prior to service.

That's the way it should be if it works for your situation it's good for you I've just reached the point in my life and career where young adults refer to me as sir but it's cringe but it's a turn on for me to hear yes sir from my sub and it brings me pleasure in many ways to say yes ma'am to my mistress 😊

[Jo****]

10 minutes ago, Jorambo said:

As a southerner I use ma'am and sir to everyone I do business with but I love that my submissive calls me sir and I'm proud to call my dominant Ma'am even even though she's much younger than me

Very well said

[ge****]

I think a lot of this comes down to context - and there's a huge difference between politely addressing random strangers in public as Ma'am and Sir and addressing a dominant as Ma'am or Sir.
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With the former a lot of the time I am guessing you use Ma'am or Sir where you don't know the other person's name? Whereas with the latter if you're far enough down the line to be addressing them as Sir or Ma'am you would know them better.
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It also comes down to tonation, a casual Sir or Ma'am to a stranger out of politeness is very different from an intended Sir or Ma'am to a dominant.
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I wouldn't stress it too much and just carry on using whatever feels natural to you for a given situation.

[DarkArts1066]

3 hours ago, gemini_man said:

I think a lot of this comes down to context - and there's a huge difference between politely addressing random strangers in public as Ma'am and Sir and addressing a dominant as Ma'am or Sir.
.
With the former a lot of the time I am guessing you use Ma'am or Sir where you don't know the other person's name? Whereas with the latter if you're far enough down the line to be addressing them as Sir or Ma'am you would know them better.
.
It also comes down to tonation, a casual Sir or Ma'am to a stranger out of politeness is very different from an intended Sir or Ma'am to a dominant.
.
I wouldn't stress it too much and just carry on using whatever feels natural to you for a given situation.

I agree completely with gemini-man’s comment here. It does totally depend on the context and the situation one is in.

Perhaps consider it this way -
It’s highly unlikely that a client will ever be your Domme or sub….. therefore those two paths will never cross.
Honorifics in a BDSM context, and in your everyday life are similar -in that they are a mark of respect for another person, however the two outcomes are different -because the relationships you have with those two different groups of people are different.

[ni****]

Ma'am and Sir are instilled in my brain to use out of respect for people I don't know. I was born and raised in the south and I will never stop using them. But also as a sub I have a special use for Sir in respect for my Dom. He would know that it's for him and only him in given situations. There is always a difference and being from the south it's just facts. Like the facts that everyone calls people honey or sugar, but we also call our s/o honey. It fits into different scenarios.