BDSM is a number of frequently erotic procedures or roleplaying involving bondage, self-control, dominance and submission, sadomasochism, and other associated interpersonal dynamics. Offered the wide range of practices, some of which can be engaged in by people who do not consider themselves being practising BDSM, inclusion from the BDSM Local community or subculture usually is said to depend on self-identification and shared experience.

The initialism BDSM is first recorded inside of a Usenet write-up from 1991, which is interpreted as a combination of the abbreviations B/D (Bondage and Discipline), D/s (Dominance and submission), and S/M (Sadism and Masochism). BDSM has become applied like a catch-all phrase masking a wide array of actions, forms of interpersonal interactions, and unique subcultures. BDSM communities generally welcome any one by using a non-normative streak who identifies With all the community; this will likely contain cross-dressers, body modification fans, animal roleplayers, rubber fetishists, and Other folks.

Actions and interactions in BDSM are frequently characterised with the participants' taking up roles which are complementary and require inequality of electrical power; So, the concept of educated consent of the two the associates is crucial. The conditions submissive and dominant tend to be applied to distinguish these roles: the dominant lover ("dom") requires psychological Regulate more than the submissive ("sub"). The phrases top and bottom also are utilized; the highest is definitely the instigator of an action though the bottom may be the receiver of your action. The two sets of phrases are subtly distinctive: for instance, an individual may perhaps decide to act as base to a different human being, as an example, by currently being whipped, purely recreationally, with none implication of being psychologically dominated, and submissives could be requested to therapeutic massage their dominant associates. Even though the bottom carries out the action and the very best receives it, they've got not automatically switched roles.

The abbreviations sub and dom are routinely used as opposed to submissive and dominant. Often the feminine-precise conditions mistress, domme, and dominatrix are made use of to explain a dominant woman, instead of the at times gender-neutral phrase dom. Individuals who modify amongst top rated/dominant and base/submissive roles—irrespective of whether from relationship to partnership or inside a offered connection—are referred to as switches. The precise definition of roles and self-identification is a common topic of debate among BDSM contributors.