Emotional S&M and Safewords
I don't believe there's any kind of emotional S&M that isn't edge play. And when it comes to emotional S&M, safewords don't really work.
When I say “safewords don’t really work,” I mean there’s no way that a bottom communicating they want everything to stop can be relied on to stop the activity. I’ll be clearer.
This applies even for those of us who don’t use safewords.
There is no communication that is adequate.
This is a thing to be considered before you even start.
Because when we say that communication stops play, we’re talking about the removal of what’s causing harm. But the second that play happens in the head and involves fucking with one’s sense of self, or values, or security, we’re no longer talking about something that can be so simply stopped.
Let’s say you need to get out of rope immediately. The rope can be cut. If you need to get the forty needles out of you, sure--it can’t be done in an instant, but the process can begin.
But say you need to stop being degraded or humiliated. The scene itself, the words being spoken, the whatever-is-happening can immediately come to an end. But can the play?
Well, maybe. If you’re especially good at compartmentalizing, if play has only touched on the imaginary and everyone is aware of that, or if it’s only been roleplay the whole time and nobody has any doubts to this. But for those of us who play dark enough to touch upon the real, emotional play is planting a seed and burying it deep.
And suddenly, it’s there, germinating.
Stop escalating it? Sure; that you can do. But what happens next week at an important work presentation that requires your confidence? What happens if there’s a rift with your play partner soon after? Will things stay compartmentalized then, or will you wonder if maybe what was said was really true? Will it affect your behavior? How you eat? How you speak? How you move through the world?
When play happens mostly in a bottom’s head, are they able to safeword out of their own ruminations?
All this doesn’t even address that speaking up when a scene needs to change or end is difficult for many bottoms under the most un-emotional circumstances. If a bottom is being degraded effectively and is believing, at least in that moment, that they are dumb, worthless, annoying, or any of the above, it may very well make them less likely to speak up the larger that the problem becomes.
So what’s the solution?
In many ways, this all depends on the individual, like anything else.
But start with making sure everyone knows all of this. Let there be no doubt as to the possible risks. Discuss and consider. A lot. Lab out just how certain words feel to the bottom. Share videos and stories and ask what the other party thinks of them. Talk about curiosities and concerns. Ask a lot of questions.
What I can tell you is that for me, hard limits I once had around this kind of play have turned into the most rewarding kind of fucked-upedness that I crave more than anything else.
But when they were still limits for me, they needed to be. Because there’s no tool quite as powerful as the imagination. And once that’s started, you can’t just put it back in the box.
Which I suppose, for many of us, is the reason we do it at all.
About the Author: Vahavta is a disabled writer and educator with a decade's experience as the s-type in a 24/7 CNC-based total power exchange.
