Safe Words: Why they're NOT what you think they're for

Hey, all! A lovely friend of mine on FetLife recently posted up a blog I feel folks should read.

There's often a debate on safe words here on TMF, and this may shed some light for a fair few of you who may have questions about safety during play. JenniferLong gives us her take on the subject:



"In my workshops on creative bottoming I ask, "what's a safeword for?" and nearly everyone gives me the wrong answer.

Usually I get something like,

safe words are a way for bottoms to let tops know they're reaching a threshold of tolerance or want to stop the scene.

Wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong!

Of all the overused cliche's and hackneyed concepts in the kink world, nothing much rivals the 'safeword' for misunderstanding and misuse (other than the phrase 'topping from the bottom' but that's a topic for another blog).

Safe words don't exist to slow down or stop a scene
Safe words exist to keep scenes going

Usually at this point in my workshop, I'll get a lot of confused looks.

I point out that if you want to slow down or stop a scene you can just SAY so. Why not say exactly what you're thinking?!

See, from one point of view they're right, but introduce a subtle shift in mindset and you've just gained a powerful tool to create much hotter scenes.

People forget or (worse) never learn that safe words were created so that we bottoms can completely let go, scream our lungs out, beg for mercy, send cries of "PLEEEEEEEEZ STOP!!!!! DEAR GOD STOP!!!!!!" echoing throughout the dungeon (doubtlessly pissing off the guys practicing their single-tail cracks) safe in the knowledge this incredibly exciting and liberating form of self expression won't freak their tops out and cause them to hesitate or doubt what they're doing.

If you're not screaming, and yelling, and begging your top to stop during the scene and want them to slow down or stop - you can just fucking say so. Why bother with a safe word?! And that's exactly what a lot of people do.
What a missed opportunity

Think about it.

When's the last time you've heard anybody begging their top to stop?! Imagine if you heard somebody really letting go like that at the dungeon. People would stop mid-scene to make sure you were okay. You'd have to warn the dungeon monitors in advance. Worse, your top would probably freak out. It's almost never done.

Frankly, most bottoms can't even wrap their head around the concept.

I've even tried to negotiate a few scenes as a top where the only way I was going to increase intensity for the bottom was for her to use words like 'NO, stop, etc." during the scene.

The bottoms couldn't do it. It confused them.

They would try but there was such an obvious internal fugue going on ("why on earth would I say, "No" when I'm enjoying this so much?!!!) that I finally had to show mercy and just give up on the concept.

The thing is for a lot of tops, it's a massive turn on and increases our sense of power over the bottom when they're begging us to stop... or hearing their agonized cries knowing it's cool. As a bottom, it can be incredibly hot to feel helpless, to vent the pain we're enduring verbally and loudly - and yet, almost nobody does.

Hell, even I tend to whimper quietly when I bottom. We're social creatures that tend to emulate what we see - and the current social 'norm' in dungeons is pretty damned tame and boring in my humble opinion.
Please Don't Misconstrue

I'm not suggesting anyone should stop using safe words.
I'm just suggesting it might be fun to *give more reasons to need them!

So if you're of a mind to consider using safe words for what they were intended, to really LET GO and scream in protest, pretend that you hate what's being done to you - and get into the headspace of a victim. I know that's not for everyone, but it can be incredibly hot for those who are.

Be wicked, be naughty, and have fun and
make some god damned noise!

Huggles,
Jennifer"

You can read the blog here https://fetlife.com/users/30224/posts/2829808#post_comment_11068835.

...what?

People use them too frequently or early, or...

I barely followed any of that.

This made no sense at all. Did she ever come to the point and I didn't get it, or was there no point?

When's the last time you've heard anybody begging their top to stop?! Imagine if you heard somebody really letting go like that at the dungeon. People would stop mid-scene to make sure you were okay. You'd have to warn the dungeon monitors in advance. Worse, your top would probably freak out. It's almost never done.

Click to expand...

Here's some news for Jennifer: not all of us play in dungeons! Some of us play one-on-one in private!

I don't get it...

Let's see if I can TL;DR this, because I got it right off the bat:

Communication, whether playing privately or in public, is key.
Hearing the common reaction phrases like "No!", "Stop!", and "No more!" should galvanize the top to increase intensity rather than slow down.
Only until a clear and concise signal that the bottom is ready to quit should play end.
Be as evil as possible (within limits and boundaries already set pre-scene).

Hope that clears it up.

cloudgazer2k said:

Let's see if I can TL;DR this, because I got it right off the bat:

Communication, whether playing privately or in public, is key.
Hearing the common reaction phrases like "No!", "Stop!", and "No more!" should galvanize the top to increase intensity rather than slow down.
Only until a clear and concise signal that the bottom is ready to quit should play end.
Be as evil as possible (within limits and boundaries already set pre-scene).

Hope that clears it up.

Click to expand...

But that's basically the point and setting a safeword apart from the words "stop" and "no". To let the top know you really need it to stop, rather than have it intensify.

Amon said:

But that's basically the point and setting a safeword apart from the words "stop" and "no". To let the top know you really need it to stop, rather than have it intensify.

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Exactly. The safeword should be something that would never come up in normal dungeon conversation.

With Mistress Zara, my safeword was "Lavender!"

So during a session, I could say, "Mercy! Stop, please stop!" and she would know that I was loving it and wanted it to continue. If and only if I said, "Lavender," she would immediately stop and ask "What's wrong?"

Horrible use of scientific method, you're conclusion was not supported by your data.

I don't know anything about dungeons.
But in videos the concept of the safe word is to ignore all of the screaming NO STOP DON'T... for every word other than the safe word.
This helps producers and models to exaggerate (and some times fake) how torturous the tickling is.
How many times have you seen OMG stop I cant take this within 10 seconds of a 10 minute video yet some how the lees come back for more or do another video or 2 that same day?

oldgeezer said:

I don't know anything about dungeons.
But in videos the concept of the safe word is to ignore all of the screaming NO STOP DON'T... for every word other than the safe word.
This helps producers and models to exaggerate (and some times fake) how torturous the tickling is.
How many times have you seen OMG stop I cant take this within 10 seconds of a 10 minute video yet some how the lees come back for more or do another video or 2 that same day?

Click to expand...

This. So very much this. Maybe when you're whipping someone they're not going to start crying "STAAAAHP" but that's often the first, and involuntary, reaction to tickling. If we stopped every time they said stop we'd never get anything done.