BDSM is many different typically erotic techniques or roleplaying involving bondage, willpower, dominance and submission, sadomasochism, and other related interpersonal dynamics. Given the wide range of practices, some of which can be engaged in by people who don't think about themselves to generally be practising BDSM, inclusion during the BDSM Group or subculture generally is claimed to rely on self-identification and shared knowledge.

The initialism BDSM is 1st recorded within a Usenet publish from 1991, and is interpreted as a mix of the abbreviations B/D (Bondage and Self-control), D/s (Dominance and submission), and S/M (Sadism and Masochism). BDSM is now used to be a catch-all phrase covering a variety of functions, kinds of interpersonal relationships, and distinctive subcultures. BDSM communities normally welcome any person with a non-normative streak who identifies While using the Local community; this will consist of cross-dressers, body modification lovers, animal roleplayers, rubber fetishists, and Other individuals.

Activities and interactions in BDSM tend to be characterised through the contributors' taking up roles that are complementary and require inequality of energy; So, the idea 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 associate ("dom") takes psychological Management over the submissive ("sub"). The phrases major and bottom also are used; the very best is definitely the instigator of an action when the bottom may be the receiver with the 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, for instance, 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 gets it, they have got not essentially switched roles.

The abbreviations sub and dom are frequently utilized as an alternative to submissive and dominant. From time to time the feminine-unique conditions mistress, domme, and dominatrix are used to describe a dominant woman, rather than the at times gender-neutral expression dom. People who adjust involving major/dominant and base/submissive roles—whether from partnership to partnership or inside a provided connection—are referred to as switches. The exact definition of roles and self-identification is a common topic of debate among BDSM participants.