Professional dominatrix says Vegas doesn’t live up to Sin City nickname

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Rowynn Eire, a professional dominatrix based in Vegas, has made it her mission to educate the local community about the BDSM lifestyle.

If Dr. Drew Pinsky were an Irish woman with a slight accent and expertise rooted in bondage culture and cathartic play, he’d be Rowynn Eire, the woman behind the educational show “Ask A Mistress” playing August 19 at Onyx Theatre.

Since moving to Las Vegas last March, Eire, a professional dominatrix, has been working to educate what she describes as a “close-minded” local population in a city that hardly lives up to its Sin City moniker.

“I’ve done BDSM all over the place,” says Eire, “but this is the first city I’ve been to that really advertises itself as Sin City and it is so sin light.”

Calendar

Ask a Mistress
August 19
7 p.m., $10
Onyx Theatre, 732-7225
Beyond the Weekly
Onyx Theatre

The way Mistress Rowynn, as she calls herself, sees it, Vegas is just a bit naughty. The real sin, her bread and butter, is found more readily in places like L.A. and Chicago.

“There’s a lot of generic sin here – like, haha, sequins and tits – which is great. It’s cute and everything; it makes a great show on the strip. But the scene here is really bad, very close-minded.”

With 10 years as a professional dominant under her belt, so to speak, Eire has made it her personal mission to help Las Vegas take on its more sinful inclinations. Most of the time, that has nothing to do with the paddles, ropes and whips that are the tools of her trade. Eire has found she’s the most useful working just like Dr. Drew – on the couch, taking questions.

“I started a show on the Internet,” Eire explains of her recent foray into YouTube. “We’ve got 10 episodes out now. It’s called, ‘Ask A Mistress.’ It’s just a very, very boring, straight-forward educational show.”

Boring, that is, except for her subject matter and the people who send her inquiries via email every single day. They come from experienced practitioners of bondage with 25 years in the scene and from newbies looking for an authoritative voice to tell them that they’re normal. All kinds of people write to the local dominant.

“There’s a lot of young people who are 18, 19, 20 [years old] just getting out on their own who are like, ‘Is this normal? How do I tell my girlfriend?’ I get a lot of people who have certain fetishes, but they’ve never really asked about the safety for those fetishes, like bondage or flogging or whipping. They just don’t know. But I know, so now all I do is answer questions.”

Over the phone, Eire isn’t exactly what you’d expect from someone who makes a living using what could be considered weapons in the wrong hands. She has an easy sense of humor and a ready laugh that returns often as she jokes about her entry into the BDSM community (as a precocious teenager at 16 years old) and her life outside of her role as a dominant (“I actually do own sweatpants just like everybody else.”).

“This is not all about spanking and leather and beatings and kinkiness. …They’re a way to get from point A to point B. They’re not the entire journey,” she explains. Citing the misconceptions associated with her chosen profession – that dominants hate men or are prostitutes – Eire sounds like a teacher.

It’s time, then, for Vegas to head to class.

Enter “Ask A Mistress” live. Debuting at the Onyx, the show features Eire at her most professorial, but rather than fielding questions from curious people around the country, she will be answering to her audience. The evening will include a Q&A session and then will segue into demonstrations by Eire and an assistant. She plans to showcase hot wax treatments, flogging, bondage and, if there’s extra time, a single tail whip.

“It’s very dangerous if you don’t know what to do with it,” Eire says seriously. “I hear about injuries all the time. I‘ve been playing with single tails for 10 years. I mean, I could turn a light switch on and off with one.”

Eire’s skills with a single tail, however, have less to do with her life taking paid sessions as a professional dominant and more to do with the odd jobs she held before going full time. A former graphic designer, janitor and security guard at the Reno Events Center, Eire’s stint as a professional sword fighter is what helped her get handy with the whip.

“The accuracy in fencing was really, really key. That’s actually why I’m so good with a single tail today. I don’t whip a single tail; I fence it.”

Today, however, Eire is entirely dedicated to her career as a dominant. She views herself as sort of alternative therapist, someone who helps her clients achieve a “cathartic release” through the careful application of various techniques.

“For some people, therapy and chemicals are what they need,” she acknowledges. “I’m not a doctor and I won’t pretend that I’m qualified to tell people what they need, but for the people who happen to contact me, I’m what they do instead of therapy. And for most of them it seems to work.”

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