A recent experience left me confused, bewildered, and rather hurt.

Like most normal humans, I believe that everyone should be respected and treated as a valuable and unique person. However, I'm also a dom. I like to dominate, control, enjoy, use (and other slightly loaded sounding words) females. To there is no conflict between these two parts of who I am.

This recent experience showed that under the surface, in only a semi-conscious way, there was an assumption that because of who I am and my sexuality, I must think less or not respect women. This then boiled over when something I said was misinterpreted as being cauvenistic in a way that could only be done if it was being looked for.

To be clear, I don't blame this person nor anyone else to be cautious. Obviously there's elements of being a dom which could appear to some as an indicator of real bigotry.

But if you're reading this and it hadn't crossed your mind before, be sure to check your own assumptions and subconscious stereotyping when interacting with a dom. You may be unfairly jumping to conclusions.

I'd like to hear from anyone but particularly women, what are ways that both subs and doms can adjust the way they think or act to avoid this sort of common misunderstanding?