Face
Ya know, most of my petplay time spent doesn’t include my hood. Sometimes not even a toy or a collar. The scene evolves naturally from our interactions and I don’t always have the thought of “WAIT! Stop everything! Let me go put my gear on so I look right.”
He doesn’t really care. He sees his pet regardless. And I feel like his pet regardless. Sure, a set up scene with dressing up is fun, and he finds my hood cute/hot, but it’s almost rare that I wear it.
It’s not about the gear.
“Sure, easy for you to say!” someone without the resources or ability to get a hood protests. You’re right! I really wanted one and was able to have one. So it may sound canned from me. But the point I’m making is that my hood has very little to do with my actual petplay dynamic and everything to do with my blog.
I enjoyed hosting a kink blog years before I discovered petplay, but faced limitations in content creation due to needing to hide my face. You can only do so much if you need to keep your face out of photos. A hood - and a high quality, unique one at that - provided me that anonymity while simultaneously allowing me to cultivate a community persona. I enjoy that very much. I like making friends/mutuals, and sharing photos, gifs and stories. But I enjoy all that on an entirely separate level from petplay itself and our actual dynamic.
A hood makes it easier to share content and create a (safer) kink/petplay community persona. I agree with that. It makes you recognizable and it gives your content character and freedom. It can, as a direct result, increase your follower count and popularity. I agree with that too. It’s an advantage.
It does not define your worth as a pet, however. Not even a little bit. Your role is in you, not in any piece of clothing or gear.
I wanted to share this post to reiterate that if you are someone who can’t access gear, please do not worry that you are a less likable pet. Be yourself, do your pet play thing, have fun, and know that internet popularity (even as niche as this) has nothing to do with your worth to your partner or your pack or yourself.
