As part of writing non-consent and gender degradation erotica in a responsible manner, I regularly present Reality Check articles, touching base with safe, respectful, equitable behaviour in kink, in relationships, and in the world generally.
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Author’s Note: This article builds upon my previous writing about positive, enthusiastic consent, and if you haven’t already read that piece, then go do so (link).
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Let’s talk safewords.
My story Sir, Part 7 depicts the use of safewords in relation to D/s and kink – and it does so in a (deliberately) terrible way. (You can read it at this link – but fair warning, it contains strong violence and non-consent.)
In the story, the rogue AI “Sir” has been arranging anonymous men to attend Caely’s house and fuck her – with or without her consent – but it tells Caely if she feels too unsafe she can call out “FORTRESS”, and Sir will protect her. However, if she uses the word, Sir will afterwards submit Caely to electroshock punishment, so she needs to be sure that whatever situation she is facing is worse than that punishment.
An astute reader of that story commented:
“Hmm… Honestly, having a punishment for using a safe word when the AI failed to account for her safety and she was almost kidnapped is not great? There shouldn’t be any repercussions for using a safe word in a dangerous situation.”
The reader is absolutely right. In real-life kink play, there should never be repercussions for using a safeword, and it’s the responsibility of other partner(s) when a safeword is called to thank the person who called it for communicating clearly to keep the scene safe for everyone.
Unfortunately, Sir is not engaging in responsible kink play. He is a technology driven monster, his relationship with Caely is controlling and abusive, and everything that happens between Sir and Caely is intended to be deeply fucked-up. Sir is not attempting to model good kink behaviour, and neither is my story. Do not use either Sir or Caely as role models.
But let’s talk about safewords in real life.
What is a safeword?
A safeword is any way of communicating to your partners that you feel uncomfortable or unsafe that will be understood unambiguously and not mistaken for roleplay.
Safewords are not just for kink! They are a useful tool for any social interaction that involves trust, roleplay, danger, intimacy or physical violence. Many tabletop roleplaying games or LARPs use safewords, particularly if they involve intense emotions, mature themes, or having other players within your personal space. They can also be useful in sports and martial arts – wrestlers “tapping out” of a hold is a form of safewording!
The fundamental premise of responsible kink is that is built upon positive, enthusiastic consent – and as we know from my previous article, consent can be withdrawn at any time– including in the middle of a scene.
Therefore in any responsible kink play, there must always be a way for any participant to unambiguously signal that they want to stop (or that they want to pause, and check their safety, or renegotiate their consent, or more explicitly communicate their boundaries).
What do safewords look like?
Generally, a safeword is a word or action – usually explicitly communicated to partners in advance – that won’t be mistaken for part of the activity.
People who are engaging in kink might want to commit to a scene involving consensual non-consent, power exchange, or pain, and be able to make frightened noises, pained noises, or explicitly say “no” or “stop” without actually having their partner stop.
(To be clear, these actions should *always* be taken as a lack of consent if the partners have not previously negotiated a clear safeword, and play should immediately stop to clarify, regardless of how aroused people look.)
So a safeword is a word that won’t otherwise come up in the scene – or which has been agreed to have a clear meaning when it’s used. A famous safeword is “pineapple”, as it will rarely be used accidentally in the average kink scene.
A better form of safewording (in my opinion) in the system known as “traffic lights”, which I discuss explicitly below.
Safewording does not have to be a literal word. In fact, in many kinds of kink play a person may be unable to speak – such as if they are gagged – or may be unable to be heard – such as if play occurs in a noisy space.
If there are portions of your play where a verbal safeword is not available or reliable, you need to negotiate an alternative. One possibility is tapping your hand three times quickly on your own body, or your partner’s, or on nearby furniture.
Another that’s good for someone experiencing intense play is to have them hold an object tightly in their hand – if they drop the object, it’s understood as a safeword. This is a good option for people who go into “sub space” or a state of altered consciousness during play, who may have difficulty using active safewords once things get intense. The passive action of releasing grip is often easy to do even when other actions are unavailable. (This can also be good where for any reason losing consciousness may be a risk of the scene – although any play of this type is very risky and this note should not be taken as encouragement to engage in it.)
Traffic light safewords
The “traffic light” system of safewords is well-known in many kink communities and used by a lot of people worldwide. It’s my preferred system of safewording, and it’s very simple.
It consists of three words – GREEN, ORANGE and RED.
GREEN means “I love it, do it more”. Many people don’t use this, or feel it’s weird in a scene, and that’s fine. But it can be good for encouraging a partner who’s unsure if they have enthusiastic consent to continue – particularly if you’re doing a roleplaying scene where someone is pretending they *don’t* want something to happen to them, but actually they really do. GREEN can be a way of saying “more, please” without breaking kayfabe.
ORANGE means “pause and discuss”. Whatever is happening should stop, and the participants should have a conversation. It may be “this is good, but the position I’m in is putting too much pressure on my back” or it may be “spanking me is good, but some of those hits are landing too high or too low” or it may be “keep degrading me, but don’t use the specific word ‘dummy’ because it’s a trigger for me”, or anything else that keeps the scene hot and safe for both participants. It’s particularly good in situations where RED would involve taking someone out of bondage or restraint, or anything else that would effectively end the scene.
RED means “stop everything and make me safe”. If someone calls red, you get them out of any restraint they’re in, ask if they need any accessories removed (such as clamps or plugs), give them a clear path to their belongings and the nearest exit in case they need to leave immediately, and then ask what they need from you (if anything). If they have nominated a support person to contact in case of something going wrong, ask if they want you to ring / find that person. (Accept that, however intimate your relationship is, you might not be the appropriate person to support them right at this moment if something has gone wrong with the scene, and don’t try and force yourself on them.)
Sometimes RED doesn’t need to be as dramatic as that – but the person who gets to decide that is the person using the safeword. It’s okay to use a safeword in a way such as: “RED. No face slapping.” In this situation the partner would ask, “Are you otherwise okay to continue?” and then continue if they get an affirmative answer, with the knowledge that face slapping is completely off the table.
You *don’t* get to negotiate what RED means if you’re not the person who called it. If a partner calls RED, act like it’s a complete emergency shutdown until/unless your partner explicitly tells you otherwise.
Negotiating safewords
Safewords should be discussed in advance, and you should be clear on exactly what each word means, even if it’s a popular system (like traffic lights).
With a new partner, I generally start by explicitly saying “What does GREEN mean?”, “What does ORANGE mean?”, “What does RED mean?” “What do you do if you want it to stop immediately?”
I often also play a game before we start that goes like this:
- Propose something they definitely don’t want. “I want to saw off your leg.” They should say RED.
- Propose something they *do* want, and tell them to say RED to it regardless. “I want to give you a scalp massage.” When they say RED, make it clear that you respect that and it won’t happen.
- Propose something they *do* want, and tell them to say GREEN, but only if they’re really enthusiastic about it. (Maybe the scalp massage again.) Then do it if they say GREEN.
- If they don’t say GREEN quickly and enthusiastically, respect it, and keep proposing things until you find something they say GREEN to.
This builds confidence in the sub that it’s safe to say RED and GREEN, and builds confidence in the dom that they will say RED when they need to. (I don’t want to play with anyone if I don’t trust them to tell me to stop when they need to.)
As mentioned above, plan your safewords so that you can verify the consent of all parties at all times during the planned play. If it’s going to be difficult to talk or hear, have non-verbal safewords. If it’s going to involved obscured vision or dim lighting, have non-visual safewords.
You want that constant confidence that everyone is enthusiastically consenting, because that’s what gives you the ability to safely take a scene to as dark and intense a place as the participants want to go to.
Support safewords
Coming back to the chapter of “Sir” that I mentioned at the start of the article, it’s essential in real-life that safewords don’t have consequences. The only consequence of using a safeword is that the scene pauses (on ORANGE) or ends (on RED).
There should never be punishments for safewording, or any negative judgement. It can be disappointing when a scene goes wrong, but it’s not appropriate to express that disappointment or frustration to the person who called the safeword.
In fact, once they’ve been made safe, and they’re in a position where they feel safe communicating with you, it’s ideal to thank them for safewording, because it was the responsible thing to do and it kept the scene safe for everyone.
Trust me – when someone should safeword, and doesn’t, that’s going to be a much worse experience for everyone, including the other partners in the scene. Those are the kind of scenes that can leave people badly hurt, and wreck people’s reputations in the kink scene (often for good reason).
It’s important generally in talking about kink to normalise and encourage safewording, even with people you don’t personally intend to play with. Everyone should feel free to use safewords whenever they need to, with repercussions – and that’s the environment that will help them feel safe to not use their safewords until they really need to.
Doms / tops can safeword too
We most commonly associate safewords with the partner on the “receiving” end of a scene, who may be restrained or receiving pain.
But anyone involved in a scene can call a safeword, including doms / tops.
I personally have called RED when I felt dizzy and unable to safely continue the scene, and ORANGE once when a “disobedient brat” scene came too close to feeling like an interaction with an actual child, and I had to pull it back into everyone clearly being an adult. They’ve also been used at other times where things went in unexpected directions, or touched upon topics that were outside my limits or had bad associations.
You don’t need to provide an explanation for using safewords if you don’t want. It’s sufficient that you’re not comfortable in the scene and want it to stop
Have fun!
Safewords aren’t intended to cramp your style or stop you having fun. They’re intended to support and enhance that fun. They let you say “no” but mean “yes” – because you’ve negotiated a way to actually say “no” when you need to. They give you the space to turn a sub into a whimpering, broken slave – because you know if she wanted it to stop, she could at any time.
There’s no one right way to do safewords – work out a system that works for you and your partner – but the main thing is that they facilitate constant communication at all times during the scene, even if that communication is simply the absence of actually using the safeword. Communication is the central, key skill of responsible kink, and this is one of the most important tools in your kink toolbox.
Get out there and be great, responsible kinksters – and keep reading All These Roadworks stories, which are absolutely not good guides on how to do that!
All These Roadworks
6 February 2023