Safeword

Some safewords stop the scene outright. Others say something narrower: keep going, but lighter. The system met most often is the traffic light — red to stop, amber or yellow to proceed with caution, green for more. Its advantage is that it needs no explaining to a new partner.

Groups that run play events often set one safeword for everyone present, so that nobody has to guess whose word is whose across a room. Setting it belongs to the same conversation that sets limits: what will happen, what will not, and how to stop it.

Not every pair uses one. Where ordinary speech already does the job, the safeword is redundant. A smaller number agree to give up the safeword altogether — a practice usually called consensual non-consent, described in the same source as uncommon and contested.