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Post by missparkle on Dec 16, 2019 12:12:40 GMT -5
brinzerdecalli , I feel tired, drained, exhausted trying to explain it, but somehow as if I lack proper tools to dissect my heart and brain, words fail me in this case. I understand it is the easiest for guys, even on this board, to simply think they are, with their disabilities, hot AF for a dev. Not to "fetish-ize" it completely, it is understood that few more personal traits are needed, to be smart, witty, charming and that's about it! But I am afraid that is just a beginning. I have been dev literally all my life and I have always been aware of these feelings of mine. I have dev- flesh memories that go as far back as my memory and even some older than that, that my mother loves to tell stories about, not being aware of its devness, but I easily see connection from nowadays perspective. It was not sexual in its roots, but as my sexuality developed, it became sexual, too. Now, that can be argued that it is not possible to make self introspection after so many years, because past would be observed through the glasses of experiences that followed. (Un)fortunately, I have a niece who is 10 now and some of her reactions I can very easily connect with (my) devness. I am not really happy about noticing that in her, I believe it is easier to live this life without that "gift". On one occasion, when she was 6 and I took her ice skating and in the full changing room, among other people there was high AK amputee father on crutches, who brought his son to ice-skate. Now guy was absolutely cool, relaxed and comfortable in his own skin, nonchalantly chatting with other parents around, while fixing his son's skates. My niece was deeply disturbed with his presence, she was not horrified or concerned for her own comfort, but it was very obvious she was feeling deeply for him. As if she was experiencing pain just watching at him. And she kept talking how hard his life must be for him, how much he must struggle. I was trying to lighten things up, to "normalize" it, telling her he is no different than any of us, that he can still do many things, that she should look how happy he seemed, that he brought his son to ice-skate, being proud like any other father. But no matter what I tried to say, to explain, calm her down, comfort her, there was nothing I could do to make her feel better. That locker room was full of other kids, same age, brought up in same environment, my nephew was also there and it seemed like no one else really gives a shit. There were probably some curious looks, but nothing more than that, everyone was minding their own business. This summer I was driving with her and her friends in my car and we passed next to guy with hybrid BATEC. In just glance of an eye, she noticed "weird" device and immediately started asking questions. I explained briefly what it was, not giving to much importance to it, trying to deliver it as "normal" as possible, she was really thrilled about it and said: "Wow, that's so very convenient for him!" She was, in a way, excited and happy for him! It is NOT ordinary, usual reaction from 10 year old. I again have to add that other kids in my car at the moment couldn't care less. Now, I don't know how much conclusion you can draw from these examples, but it is very clear to me that her feelings are not conditioned with any "mainstream" aesthetic preferences, she doesn't have Ken doll, sitting in a wheelchair. It is not her fetish, it is not her preference, it is not her orientation, she is not even sexual being yet! It is simply just how she feels, it is in her, disability for some reason affects her more than others, she is for some reason more interested in it, like moth drawn to light.
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brinzerdecalli
Full Member
I hope to encounter some interesting and uniquely minded people.
Posts: 217
Gender: Male
Dev Status: Disabled Male
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Post by brinzerdecalli on Dec 16, 2019 13:08:30 GMT -5
Thank you so much for writing that out, missparkle ! I actually just posted in the other thread "This is NOT a dating site, but..." I don't want to take over 2 threads with nearly the same topic, so with linda 's blessing I'd like to direct that conversation here. I still truly believe if there was more favorable and appealing PWD representation in media, that sign of a dev would be far more common, but you may not pick up on it as much because it is no longer a rarity, but more of a standard. I, in no way think every dev finds anyone who is disabled "hot AF". I hope my opinions and writings demonstrated more nuance than that. I apologize if not!
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Post by Dr. BiPAP Sachin on Dec 16, 2019 14:30:13 GMT -5
Thank you so much for writing that out, missparkle ! I actually just posted in the other thread "This is NOT a dating site, but..." I don't want to take over 2 threads with nearly the same topic, so with linda 's blessing I'd like to direct that conversation here. I still truly believe if there was more favorable and appealing PWD representation in media, that sign of a dev would be far more common, but you may not pick up on it as much because it is no longer a rarity, but more of a standard. I, in no way think every dev finds anyone who is disabled "hot AF". I hope my opinions and writings demonstrated more nuance than that. I apologize if not! Hey I don't blame you brinzerdecalli for having your unique take on devness. In fact, many of us recent PWD members of PD, are still on various learning curves in terms of a full understanding of devness, as am I.
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brinzerdecalli
Full Member
I hope to encounter some interesting and uniquely minded people.
Posts: 217
Gender: Male
Dev Status: Disabled Male
Relationship Status: Single
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Post by brinzerdecalli on Dec 17, 2019 4:11:02 GMT -5
I wish I dated that way sugarmag . haha I always date people who make my life more interesting and complicated, not simple. I blame being an artist...
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blindLeap
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The right-side-up edition
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Post by blindLeap on Dec 17, 2019 6:01:19 GMT -5
I have been asking myself this as well. When I first heard about devs, it was from someone in New Zealand. The first dev I met was from the US and a bit later I found PD. And where Germany seems to have a lot of devs, I can literally find absolutely nothing about dutch devs. Googling devotee in Dutch sources mainly gets you religious results, and I honestly wouldn't know what the Dutch translation would be if that's what I'd need to google for. So ...yeah ...it appears rather rare at leastto me.
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Post by infinatedreams on Dec 17, 2019 6:03:55 GMT -5
Well this is an interesting thread and good question linda but it is kinda hard to give a more definitive answer without first understanding what ‘devness’ is. And that is a whole new thread in its own right. I dare say if you had a room of devs and asked what their devness means to them then you would get a whole different range of answers, simply because it appears to be and is incredibly personal and specific to each dev. There is a whole spectrum out there, which does range from non-sexual to sexual with everything in between. So the term ‘dev’ seems to be more a generic term to describe someone with some kind of interest and/or attraction so someone with a disability, for many its been there since early years so not likely to be something that has been influenced by media or social attitudes. In fact the opposite, many devs have repressed their feelings because of those social attitudes and negative media. Which is why a place like here has to exist. And its that ‘interest or attraction’ which is incredibly rare and I would go out on a limb here and say it will remain incredibly rare. No amount of media exposure or social acceptance is going to increase that number, if you’re a dev, you’re a dev media exposure, social acceptance or not ……. much like back in the 80’s when it became more ‘socially’ acceptable to be gay, there wasn’t an explosion of men identifying as being gay. They had always been gay it just slowly (very slowly) became acceptable to see 2 men walking hand in hand. So I don’t think social attitudes or favourable media exposure of pwd is going to increase the number of devs. A lot of pwd do have relationships and I have seen it questioned does that therefore mean that those partners must be on the ‘dev spectrum’ somewhere. I suppose if those partners have exclusively dated pwd or have had more than one pwd partner then that may be the case. Now ive had a fair few relationships some long term others short term none of my partners had dated a pwd before and none (that I know of went on to date another pwd) after it ended. So what does that mean? Were they all on the dev spectrum or was it something else? … maybe I put them off para’s for life! I think to answer my own question and this is something some guys are oblivious about is that the thing women tend to be interested in more and find more attractive is what goes on between our ears and not whats going on below the waist. There will always be exceptions to that but in general ive found my ‘physical’ body to be less important to my ‘personality’ when its come to dating. So yeah, a lot of pwd have partners but I don’t think that directly equates to them all being devs, the majority are just non-dev women/men who have fallen for someone who to them has a beautiful mind but who does secretly wish the disability wasn't there or at the very least does not find any aspect of it attractive. Sure she may find the broad shoulders and thick biceps of a para attractive or like the cheeky smile and twinkle in the eyes, but the atrophied legs, the squishy para belly, the lack of sensation …. she doesn't like that but because of other attributes its something shes willing to compromise on. A dev on the other hand is attracted to the ‘full package’, the mind and the body and for that reason alone they will remain incredibly rare and also why some of the guys who come here get the ‘hump’ when knicker elastic doesn't snap when they announce their arrival and disability, they just don’t understand that it is more than just the ‘disability’. What a shallow relationship it would be if it was just all about the physical disability.
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Post by missparkle on Dec 17, 2019 7:21:14 GMT -5
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Post by linda on Dec 17, 2019 7:47:12 GMT -5
Great points, infinatedreams! You seem to be new on the board. Would you like to share a bit more about yourself? Maybe post an intro? Nice to have smart new people on board who participate with good contributions.
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Post by Amee on Dec 17, 2019 13:32:50 GMT -5
I wanted to come back to this after thinking about it a little. One thing I wanted to add to my first post here is that I think it's quite possible that my personal "gut feeling" that we aren't quite so rare, could be a bit of wishful thinking, too. The examples I mentioned that stuck with me over the years may have been statements that had absolutely nothing to do with any dev tendencies, but my wishful and searching mind picked up on them and interpreted them the way it liked. Perfectly possible.
The other thing I really wanted to ask was: What exactly are we talking about when we say devness is or is not super rare? "Rare" is quite a vague term... I just did a quick Google search and it seems that homo- and bisexuality for example have a prevalence of anything between 1% and 5%, sometimes up to 10% in different surveys and countries. I would certainly expect devness to be rarer than that. I know we have no way to say anything remotely reliable or scientifically serious about this, because whether you base it on personal dating experience as a PWD, social experience as a dev or membership on PD or other sites... it's all still extremely anecdotal.
But just out of curiosity: What kinds of percentages are you thinking of, when you say it's extremely rare or "not that" rare? 1% of the population? 1 in 1000? 1 in 10000?
If I had to ballpark my gut feeling, I would say anything between 0,01% and 0,1% actual devs in the general population wouldn't surprise me. Anything below or beyond that would.
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brinzerdecalli
Full Member
I hope to encounter some interesting and uniquely minded people.
Posts: 217
Gender: Male
Dev Status: Disabled Male
Relationship Status: Single
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Post by brinzerdecalli on Dec 17, 2019 13:53:17 GMT -5
I completely agree personality is more important than aesthetics @infinitedreams but when dating, I've found physical attraction to be the gatekeeper to developing something beyond a platonic relationship, even with sapiosexuals and demisexuals [of which I identify]. Have you really dated someone who expressed no physical interest then as you got to know them they wanted to date you? How did you meet these people? Because in this swipe culture there's so little room for getting to know someone before determining attraction. The only way I had any success in relationships was playing the odds until I find someone who finds me at least cute and nurturing that spark of attraction.
I feel like that is not true about media not empowering gay and bi/pan culture. The numbers of people who are openly of different orientations has dramatically increased over the years. To see an equal increase of open devs of different spectrums would be very impactful.
I'd rather compare disability to the BBW and the male equivalent BHM communities as there's a large difference between physical ability/fitness and sex/gender. I like to look at the fat acceptance movement to see how media changes the way people are viewed in society. It's actually amazing if you study how social influences crafted the ideals of sexuality over the existence of recorded history, and how these ideals even shaped legislation and policy!
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Post by missparkle on Dec 17, 2019 14:30:34 GMT -5
I completely agree personality is more important than aesthetics @infinitedreams but when dating, I've found physical attraction to be the gatekeeper to developing something beyond a platonic relationship, even with sapiosexuals and demisexuals [of which I identify]. Have you really dated someone who expressed no physical interest then as you got to know them they wanted to date you? How did you meet these people? Because in this swipe culture there's so little room for getting to know someone before determining attraction. The only way I had any success in relationships was playing the odds until I find someone who finds me at least cute and nurturing that spark of attraction. I feel like that is not true about media not empowering gay and bi/pan culture. The numbers of people who are openly of different orientations has dramatically increased over the years. To see an equal increase of open devs of different spectrums would be very impactful. I'd rather compare disability to the BBW and the male equivalent BHM communities as there's a large difference between physical ability/fitness and sex/gender. I like to look at the fat acceptance movement to see how media changes the way people are viewed in society. It's actually amazing if you study how social influences crafted the ideals of sexuality over the existence of recorded history, and how these ideals even shaped legislation and policy! Oh dear, it's not easy for me to follow you and I like to believe I am not particularly slow. LOL. Are you label-sexual, too? LOL
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Post by Amee on Dec 17, 2019 14:40:22 GMT -5
I completely agree personality is more important than aesthetics @infinitedreams but when dating, I've found physical attraction to be the gatekeeper to developing something beyond a platonic relationship, even with sapiosexuals and demisexuals [of which I identify]. Have you really dated someone who expressed no physical interest then as you got to know them they wanted to date you? How did you meet these people? Because in this swipe culture there's so little room for getting to know someone before determining attraction. The only way I had any success in relationships was playing the odds until I find someone who finds me at least cute and nurturing that spark of attraction. I feel like that is not true about media not empowering gay and bi/pan culture. The numbers of people who are openly of different orientations has dramatically increased over the years. To see an equal increase of open devs of different spectrums would be very impactful. I'd rather compare disability to the BBW and the male equivalent BHM communities as there's a large difference between physical ability/fitness and sex/gender. I like to look at the fat acceptance movement to see how media changes the way people are viewed in society. It's actually amazing if you study how social influences crafted the ideals of sexuality over the existence of recorded history, and how these ideals even shaped legislation and policy! Oh dear, it's not easy for me to follow you and I like to believe I am not particularly slow. LOL. Are you label-sexual, too? LOL Haha missparkle , I had to google all those terms as well Here's what I found to spare others the trouble: sapiosexual = finding intelligence sexually attractive or arousing demisexual = person, who does not experience sexual attraction to another person unless or until they have formed an emotional connection with that person BBW = big beautiful woman BHM = big handsome man You're welcome!
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Post by linda on Dec 17, 2019 14:52:07 GMT -5
Oh dear, it's not easy for me to follow you and I like to believe I am not particularly slow. LOL. Are you label-sexual, too? LOL Haha missparkle , I had to google all those terms as well Here's what I found to spare others the trouble: sapiosexual = finding intelligence sexually attractive or arousing demisexual = person, who does not experience sexual attraction to another person unless or until they have formed an emotional connection with that person BBW = big beautiful woman BHM = big handsome man You're welcome! Amee , you’re fantastic! I‘ve seen sooo many people referring to themselves as sapiosexual! I think it’s ridiculous and nothing but an invention of people who like to appear as especially smart, even relating their sexuality to intelligence. I don’t think there is one person in the world who finds dumbness especially appealing. Not in a sexual way, nor in any other. It’s just normal that you want to be with someone who is at least at your own level.
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Post by Braced4Impact on Dec 17, 2019 14:53:34 GMT -5
Without being a dev myself, my own two cents are: If you look at in terms of black and white, you're either a dev or you're not a dev, then it's pretty rare. If you look at devs as a spectrum like "super devy" vs "sort of interested" I would say it's a lot more common.
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brinzerdecalli
Full Member
I hope to encounter some interesting and uniquely minded people.
Posts: 217
Gender: Male
Dev Status: Disabled Male
Relationship Status: Single
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Post by brinzerdecalli on Dec 17, 2019 14:57:15 GMT -5
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