Our Definition
an agreed-upon term or action that can be invoked by a member of a kink dynamic in order to signal an end or change of a kink-related activity.
Safe words can be verbal or physical, i.e. saying a specific word or phrase or making a specific physical movement.
Common Practices & Experiences
Everyone is different! You'll see this repeated throughout our website and glossary. Common practices for safe words include, but certainly aren't limited to:
- Freedom to be used by all involved, dominant, submissive, top, bottom or otherwise.
- Agreeing upon a specific safe word or set of safe words with partners before play.
- Having a set of safe words for various meanings. Common types are “stop” “approaching limits” “slow down/ease up” “keep going” and “I like what we are doing but I need to pause for a physiological reason, such as an arm falling asleep or need to go to the bathroom”
- Using colors or numbers in a scale arrangement, such as green, yellow orange and red to represent incremental closeness to limits
- Using phrases that have personal meaning to you, such as a favorite line from a book or movie.
- Use of languages other than the primary language used by the parties involved to communicate with each other.
- Non-verbal alternatives established in instances where it would be relevant (gags, non-verbal subspace, etc)
Richard and his partner agreed to use “for the love of god, Montressor” as a safe word phrase, because they are both huge literary nerds.
Helen keeps it simple with the stop light system as safe words.
Beatrice uses “Kill Claudio!” as a safe word, since it’s a phrase that couldn’t be uttered unintentionally.
