National Capital Leather Pride Weekend

Woof! Scout wins Ottawa’s first-ever pup fetish contest

Contestants barked, howled and gave inspiring speeches at the first-ever National Capital Leather Pride Weekend Pup contest, held at the Centretown Pub.

The contest was similar to the Miss America Pageant — but for people who like to become puppies, dressed up in fetish gear. Contestants were judged in the jock/thong, speech and formal categories.

“Pup play,” is an international phenomenon, but has only been organized in Ottawa for the past year, said Mr. Leather Ottawa 2010 Mike Tattersall, who emceed the competition, but isn’t a pup himself.

“It’s a human expression of freedom and self-expression,” said Tattersall. “Imagine a room full of Labrador retriever puppies and the chaos those puppies would do to themselves as they play.”

Pups will generally wear leather, rubber or other fetish gear. Some have handlers, others are “strays.”

Tattersall organized the competition, which he believes was the first in Ontario and perhaps the first in Canada.

The runner-up was Karl Couture, who came out as a pup for the first time at Pride last year, helping launch Ottawa’s pup community. He spoke about the courage it took to go out in public as a pup during the speech category of the competition.

“Everyone sees us differently, positive, negative, I don’t care anymore,” he said. “I’m proud to be here and can’t wait to see what we’ll accomplish.”

He had to get over the fear of what would happen to him for coming out as a pup, but now he’s glad he did, he said.

The winner, Scout, wore wore hockey pads, blue underwear and a leather dog mask in the formal wear section of the competition. He gave an emotional speech about seeing Rolph in his full pup gear at Pride, which inspired him to come out as a pup as well.

“I want to say thank you all for allowing me to feel safe and for allowing me to be who I am,” he said.

I had to let them know that we've done a puppy play party and contest for two years now at Rubbout, just to make sure Ontario didn't get the thought in their heads that they were the innovators or something like that, since they like to claim that sort of stuff! ;)