Getting called a predator? Want to know how to avoid becoming known as a sexual predator? I recently wrote a piece asking people to take accountability for their words and choices before calling people out. Here is the other side to that story: how we need to take accountability for our own reputations and control the public narrative that springs up about us, including that we are predatory.
How to not get known as a sexual predator
For many men especially, getting labelled as a predator, consent violator or abuser is a big fear, especially on the kink scene where unbalanced power dynamics are all part of the appeal. So, in an age where consent isn’t entirely yes and no, how can we all make choices beyond a simple, ‘But they said yes?’
Everything in life is about sex. Except sex. Sex is about power.
Disputed source
Why am I getting called a predator?
I have, to be fair, spent many years teaching people (including men) how to be more effective sexual predators, in the lightest, loosest meaning of the term. I taught pick up, I wrote a book on how couples can present themselves to unicorns more successfully. Though the book was intended to really lay the sneaky tricks out their for judgement and some personal soul searching, it is fair to say that flew straight over a lot of heads. I’ve given advice on cultivating a dating profile, presenting yourself as a good party partner and tips to be charming, fit in and work the room, all in that most primitive of quests – successful mating action.
It’s now probably only fair I also advise you on how to exercise some PR damage limitation with this turbo-boosted seduction toolkit.
What is the allure of the predator?
In some ways, everyone loves a predator. We domesticated dogs and cats. They live in our homes and accept (or, in the case of cats, begrudgingly tolerate) our love. We worship the grace, beauty and power of predators in the animal kingdom far beyond those of their prey. Equally, a powerful type-A personality, strong, confident and exciting can be a whirlwind experience.
How predators delight us
Whether we admire someone’s savvy and intelligence to always come out on top, their commanding presence, their sexual intensity or their sheer certainty of winning us over, a certain set of predatory characteristics are very alluring. Very sexually exciting. Humans (and particularly women) are biologically and socially conditioned to select someone strong. A leader. Someone who can protect them and their offspring. Provide for them. Someone smart and powerful. Who doesn’t want to be selected (and validated) by someone like that? Chosen above the others to be their partner or companion? It is only when they realise they are the prey and not the partner that the problems start.
Being hunted by a predatory man depends entirely on your own self image and self worth. Such men can identify a target from twenty paces. They are charming while luring you with their compliments and can be a little intoxicating. Until it all goes wrong!
Lady R, recovering predator-prey dynamic addict
How to connect with your inner animal predator
These noble attributes are the characteristics of predatory animals that we admire. It’s primal. We are more attractive for embracing these elements in ourselves, and people like us more for it. There are even workshops to help us reconnect to our inner animal, such as those by Temples of Eros and Divine Theratrix.
Predators vs. Predatory
Embracing the power and beauty of our inner animal is quite a different thing to being called predatory. It carries none of the noble and desirable qualities we associate with predator animals, but is a statement about your intent. Indeed, people often have and do both, but not always. Someone can equally be a predator by feigning helplessness, weakness and their need for you, in order to manipulate.
‘Predator’ is a word that gets thrown around a lot. We used to know what a sexual predator meant. Or thought we did. So if you aren’t leaping out the bushes attacking women or dosing their drink to have your wicked way how come you are still getting called out as predatory?
What is a modern sexual predator?
Truth is, the human justice courts (highly flawed and fallible though they may be, especially with sexual assault cases) are very different to the court of public opinion. It’s not enough to not be a flat-out rapist or paedophile. Predator has a wider meaning these days.
With the rise of the ‘Me too’ movement people started calling out coercive sex, power-imbalanced sex and other kinds of shady ways people have approached women that don’t exactly scream enthusiastic, informed, continuous and freely-given consent.
Kangaroo Court of Gossip and Predator call-outs
The court of public opinion goes even further. On the kink scene particularly, where consent is such a nuanced, studied and examined subject, you can get called a predator for being misleading. For using your position, experience or the situation to obtain sexual access. For, frankly, doing things or doing people that simply give other folks the ‘ick’. Gone are the days of privacy in the bedroom, shrouded by secrecy and shame. You’d better bet folks talk. Angry, hurt folks talk a lot.
Am I a predator or a player?
Now, we could say there is a big difference between being a player, a f- boy and a predator. And indeed, people can be one without the other two. But there is often overlap. So let’s have a think about how enthusiastic consent, freely given, might still get you called out as predatory in the eyes of the public and the scene.
Biting peaches
Let’s take a hypothetical situation with me, as a woman. As a writer. Let’s say a 20 year old woman reads my posts and gets a crush on me. She reaches out to me to meet up. She’s cute, adoring, sees me as exciting and knowledgeable. Really wants to come home with me. What should I do? Should I let her eat me out? Take her to parties as bait for threesomes and to draw in other cutie pies for group sex? Show her off as my new trophy to bolster my reputation as desirable?
Or should I, at twice her age, be aware that this is probably transference from unresolved issues with a parent? Should I remember that her pre-frontal cortex isn’t fully formed until 25? Should I consider that in a year or two she’s probably going to regret the things she did to try to impress me, because she looked up to me? What should my horny, bisexual self do?
Hunter or predator?
Ultimately, do I turn her down, make her feel rejected and unworthy, or do I take advantage of my position of relative power and her adoration to get my kicks?
How about this? Maybe I recognise the power disparity. How about I give her validation as a friend, mentor her and try to guide her into making good and safe decisions. Like the substitute parent she is probably looking for.
What creates a power-disparity?
Now, this isn’t to say that great age gap relationships don’t or can’t exist. I’ve previously sung the merits of cougaring. Daddy dom/LG is a very popular kink too. Sometimes the status and power can be the very attraction. And who doesn’t want to feel admired and adored for the things they have achieved? But we need to be more careful. Before we go, ‘Oh this is enthusiastic consent’ we need to actually think about how this is going to look and sound to the world later on, when they are annoyed with us or feel we took advantage of their innocence, fragility or age.
Predator vs. Status lay?
I’ve hosted private parties in my early days where almost all the women there jumped on me to play with me. They were gorgeous, partnered, there was no age gap. But why did they all want me in that moment? Because I was the host. Because as the host, I became a status lay. People are primitive like that. We crush on our teachers. Try to seduce our university professors. Fetishize people in uniform, especially those with jobs that give them power.
What should our tick list be to check we are not abusing our position?
-Is there a power difference in some way, because of age, money, experience or role? Can we be sure that it is not this that they are really attracted to, rather than us without it?
-Are we the organiser or host of an event that is the context they meet us in? Would they want to play with us if this context were removed from the interaction?
-Is this person trying to work through pre-existing psychological damage in some way? Is this something we could or should help them with without involving sex?
-Would they, if they turned us down, be at reasonable risk of fearing losing something? Whether it’s a job, invitation to an event, accommodation or access to a social circle?
– Could they conceivably reasonably later claim you misled them (even by omission) as to your feelings, intentions or who you are, in order to obtain something from them, such as sex, money, connections, work or attention?
-If this person were to retrospectively regret their choices and tell the world about it, what is the word that the court of public opinion would use for you?
Planning to preserve your non-predatory reputation
So, ultimately, you don’t need to be a rapist or abuser in order to get known as a predator. You just need to be blind to the motivations of others and the likely fall-out when someone gets hurt (intentionally or otherwise). Think with your compassion and not your loins. You need to think about the public narrative this will hold in two years’ time.
The impossible choice
How, you might ask, are you supposed to seduce anyone without the gravitas of your position? Well, this is the problem. If you’ve got used to using this, it’s a big shift to try to find another way. To be told your empire, event, status or power needs to be removed from your attractiveness arsenal? That you have to work without it, exclude it and somehow separate yourself from what you may rightly feel is your life’s work.
No saint without a past?
Truth is, for many people this won’t be easy. Or even possible. You may not even see why it should be necessary. And if that’s the call you are going to make and how you are going to run your affairs, then you may feel vindicated that you aren’t actually doing anything illegal. That doesn’t mean that your legacy and your reputation are going to survive intact. You’ll be called creepy, predatory, people will speculate. And that’s the choice you are making.
How to stop people calling you a predator
*All images created by MidJourney Ai under license, for the purposes of illustration and amusement. No real people are featured and any likenesses are due to the random nature of Ai. The exception being Alice Hunter, contemplating biting the peach. Which is not Ai.
Want to try to do something different? A reputation is hard to repair. Even if you seek out mediation with those who have called you out and try to change your ways, it will follow you for a long time, whatever other good you try to do in the world. But we are all capable of change, growth and better understanding.
Would we want to see our daughter, or our sister, with someone like us? Why not? When we shift our perspective we can realise that we justify too many things to ourselves, and fail to hold ourselves accountable in the ways we think that we do. We make too many excuses for ourselves, in order to do the things we want to. Know how we know? Because if we actually stopped to ask a friend before we took action, they would tell us it’s a terrible idea.
Am I a predator?
Ultimately, the term predator can mean many things to different people. But in its simplest form, it means, ‘Someone I trusted who deliberately or recklessly left me harmed‘. That’s something we’ve all done to someone at some time. Because people make mistakes, and there does need to be space for people of any age and history to learn and improve. What is the alternative?
Yet we can do better. Make better choices. We can be more careful, tell ourselves less stories about what we ‘deserve‘ or ‘have earned’. We are what we do, not what we get.
Why am I being called a predator?
All this sits poorly with the very draw of the kink and swing scene, where indulgence, hedonism and excitement is the centre of the dopamine hit. But ultimately, someone needs to be the grown up in every situation. And if it should clearly have been you, and you didn’t step up? That’s what the world is calling you out for.
How to be less predatory
Nobody is a baby duckling on the scene forever. At some point we all need to be the one who shelters the others under our wings. For once, what we think about ourselves matters less than what those around us believe – not from pure rumour and conjecture – but those who we hurt directly. Those for whom the ‘predator‘ narrative is the only story that makes sense. And if this is something people are telling you, take time to consider why.
Are all your exes really psychos? Did you pick them that way for a reason? Or is that how they ended up after their experience with you? Food for thought, lovely libertines…
A scorpion wants to cross a river but cannot swim, so it asks a frog to carry it across. The frog hesitates, afraid that the scorpion might sting it, but the scorpion promises not to, pointing out that it would drown if it killed the frog in the middle of the river. The frog considers this argument sensible and agrees to transport the scorpion. Midway across the river, the scorpion stings the frog anyway, dooming them both. The dying frog asks the scorpion why it stung despite knowing the consequence, to which the scorpion replies: “I am sorry, but I couldn’t resist the urge. It’s my character.
Wikipedia
Want to know how to be a much more effective predator instead? Get the book HERE and try out all the top tips!
*This post was written as an alternative perspective and counter-piece to the previous post, ‘Bite Your Tongue’ and is not directed at any specific individuals. All circumstances and examples are fictional. Ultimately, we all have to survive in this scene together, and whether you see yourself as the victim of a predator, or the victim of unfair labels, we all have to take some accountability if we want things to get better
*These blog posts are intended as an exploration of concepts to promote understanding and perspective for all on the swing, kink and alternative scene. It is not a substitute for legal advice or psychotherapy, and no liability is assumed for any choices made based on the content. You are most welcome to comment and debate respectfully below.
