What Nobody Is Saying About the London Man on a Leash Is That It's about BDSM

Calm down everyone. He's just a sub.

by kate hakala

"Has he lost a bet or is it a bizarre PR stunt?" asked the Daily Mail when a well-dressed man was spotted on Farringdon Road in London crawling on the sidewalk and being pulled on a leash by a long-haired woman this morning. Morning commuters stopped to stare as the dapper dude was being casually lead by a collar and pink leash.

Some took to Twitter to speculate that the odd sighting was a walking advertisement or a wife's clever punishment for her husband not emptying the washing machine. Of course, anyone familiar with the practices of the BDSM community, as TIME writer Jessica Roy pointed out, will be quick to realize that this is pretty standard Dominant/submissive behavior. In D/s relationships, one person gets pleasure dominating and the other gets pleasure out of being dominated — being paraded around on a pink leash is pretty typical. Whipping, bondage, and slave role-playing are nothing out of the ordinary for BDSM practitioners. Could the man have lost a bet? Sure, but most likely he's just really kinky. And, being a good sub, he's probably getting off on the public humiliation in the media. So keep laughing away. He likes it.

@JuliaHB1 I bet this guy didn't empty the washing machine to the agreed standard. pic.twitter.com/BCVk6wymAF

— Ed Balls (@edbaIlsmp) April 11, 2014

i feel like this is just a bdsm thing? https://t.co/ODsJwpeby2

— Jessica Roy (@JessicaKRoy) April 11, 2014

Image via Twitter.