It is easy to see why those who don’t practice BDSM might see it as a violent activity. It is also easy to see why someone who might have been a part of BDSM play in the past could have had a negative experience with it.
From the outside it might appear that the dominant can do whatever they want to the submissive, but when this is happening, BDSM has left the play. The negotiation between dominant and submissive is a highly sophisticated form of communication that is impossible to misread. Submissives have safe words, which are a way of stopping anything they don’t want to do. For those in the BDSM community, safe, sane, and consensual is the mantra they live by.
It is important to get our heads around the difference between BDSM and violence because many straight women are very attracted to the idea of BDSM. We saw the on flow of this in 50 Shades of Grey and its popularity.
When a huge number of women across all demographics inform us that something serves them, we would be wise to sit up and listen rather than dismiss the women and their interests as infantile.
BDSM is exploring something very cerebral. To take it at face value is to misunderstand it.
