High Protocol

High protocol names the most formal tier of a structured set of rules, covering how a submissive addresses a dominant, how they hold their body, and what they may or may not do without permission, within a Dominant/submissive (D/s) relationship. It sits atop a graded system: community writers typically describe high protocol for ceremonies and dedicated scene or service time, low protocol for ordinary day-to-day household conduct, and social protocol for behaviour in mixed public company (Old Guard Leathermen, Protocol Levels in BDSM). The system's roots and its enduring appeal trace to the "Old Guard," the romanticised founding era of post-war American gay leather culture. This article covers what protocol is, where the idea came from, how it is graded and practised, and the questions it raises about consent and history.

Definition & scope

Protocol is a negotiated code of conduct rather than a fixed script: couples and households set their own rules, but the vocabulary of levels is widely shared. In high protocol, a submissive is typically expected to stay silent unless addressed, remain alert and ready to serve, hold a specified physical position, and use full honorifics when permitted to speak. Low protocol governs everyday household life, ordinarily around the clock, and still requires titles, deference and defined duties, but with more latitude. Social protocol lets a couple keep their dynamic intact while appearing ordinary to outsiders, using given names, plain clothes and subtler cues of deference (Old Guard Leathermen). All three sit within the broader landscape of dominance and submission and frequently accompany deeper commitments such as collaring or total power exchange.

History & origins

The Old Guard and its military echo

Accounts of the Old Guard trace its formation to gay servicemen returning from the Second World War around 1946, who had experienced close male hierarchy and discipline in the military and sought to recreate elements of it in civilian life. They gravitated to motorcycle clubs, adopting paramilitary insignia, ritual, and rank-like structures; by around 1970 the scene had settled into distinct, exclusive protocols governing attire, hierarchy and conduct between strangers (Evil Monk, The Old Guard: History, Origins and Traditions). Leather itself was said to be "earned" through successive scenes, seniority followed experience rather than age, and a collar signified that a bottom belonged to a specific top, conventions that fed directly into the graded, ceremonial feel later writers call high protocol.

Codification in print

The most influential documentation came from Guy Baldwin (b. 1946), a Los Angeles psychotherapist and 1989 International Mr. Leather titleholder, whose monthly Drummer magazine column "Ties That Bind" ran from 1986 to 1993 and was later collected into the book of the same name (Guy Baldwin — Wikipedia). Baldwin's late-1980s essay on Old Guard history and rules remains the most cited single account of the tradition's hierarchy and etiquette. Decades later, John Weal's The Leatherman's Protocol Handbook (2010) attempted to systematise Old Guard practice for a new generation, though historians noted it folded in material from varied, not strictly Old-Guard, traditions.

Contested history

Historians of the leather subculture, including Gayle Rubin, Jack Rinella and Joseph Bean, have pushed back on the idea of a single, uniform Old Guard era running roughly from 1945 to the mid-1960s. They argue that both rigid, high-protocol conduct and looser, informal styles coexisted from the earliest days of the scene, and that the strict, military-derived hierarchy often described today is partly a retrospective, idealised construction rather than a documented universal practice. Baldwin's own later writing suggested that Old Guard rigidity would recede as the wartime generation's direct military influence faded, and by the 1980s younger leathermen, without that background, were already loosening its aesthetic and rules.

In practice

Modern high-protocol practice typically appears during collaring or other ceremonies, dedicated service or "dungeon" time, and formal community events. Reported conventions include remaining silent unless spoken to, using a dominant's full title ("thank you, Master"), holding a designated position rather than sitting freely, and requesting permission for ordinary acts such as eating or using the bathroom. Low protocol carries a lighter version of the same deference into daily household routine, while social protocol lets a couple maintain the dynamic invisibly in front of people unaware of it. Individual households vary widely in how strictly, or whether at all, they adopt any of these levels; protocol is understood as negotiated and revocable, not handed down by tradition unchanged.

Psychology

Protocol's appeal is usually described in terms of ritual, structure and clarity: a defined code removes ambiguity about role and expectation, and for many participants the formality itself, bowed head, careful address, a held position, deepens focus and immersion in the D/s dynamic much as ceremony does in other contexts. For the dominant partner, maintaining and enforcing protocol carries a reciprocal duty of consistency and care. As with most of BDSM's structured relationship practices, dedicated empirical research on protocol specifically is scarce; most available accounts are community writing and retrospective history rather than clinical study.

Prevalence & culture

No survey measures adherence to protocol directly; it is a practice within the broader population that reports interest in dominance and submission, which is itself common. Joyal & Carpentier (2017) found that roughly half of a general-population sample expressed interest in at least one paraphilic theme, with dominance and submission among the most frequent, and Lehmiller's 2018 survey of 4,175 Americans found BDSM fantasy near-universal. Within that wider interest, formal protocol is a comparatively niche, deliberately adopted practice concentrated in leather and M/s communities and their events, conventions and titleholder culture, with far less mainstream visibility than dominance and submission generally.

Safety, consent & law

High protocol is legal and benign between consenting adults; its formality is symbolic and agreed, never coercive by definition. Responsible practice keeps protocol negotiated and revocable, checks in periodically outside the dynamic, and treats consent as ongoing rather than granted once and assumed forever. Under the DSM-5-TR and ICD-11, consensual, non-distressing power-exchange practice, protocol included, is not classified as a disorder.