The needs of the submissive.

..... The dominant is the one bossing the other person around; you'd have to be some kind of jerk to want to do that.

While that may seem like it makes sense on the surface, the truth is just the opposite. People who are good at dominating or inflicting pain are, in general, LESS likely than many other people to be jerks or assholes.

Why? Because in order to be good at doing it, you need to be highly in-tune with your submissive. People who are self-centered generally make poor dominants, because they lack the empathy required to be able to read and judge their partner's reactions, and bring their partner where that person wants to go. Assholes quickly find that nobody wants to play with them; and people who are empathic tend not to be assholes. All of the real top-notch dominants I've ever met, without exception, are incredibly cool people.

In tune with your submissive? The dominant is the one calling the shots. What does the dominant care about the submissive?

Believe it or not, the dynamics of a BDSM relationship are often driven by the submissive, not by the dominant. The submissive sets the limits; the submissive decides what places can and can not be explored; the submissive has the ability to call a halt to the scene. The dominant, in many ways, is simply a facilitator. It's the dominant's job to create a setting where the people involved can explore the submissive's fantasies.

(As an aside, it's important to note that these limits can change over time. It may be that something that used to sound like it wouldn't be fun or interesting might in the future tickle your fancy; and that things you enjoy now, you may not necessarily enjoy in the future. People change over time. It's important, when you explore BDSM, to remember that, and to make a habit of talking to your partner about things you like and don't like as those things change.)

Dominating your partners does not mean that you don't want to please them. It is not always, or even usually, true that a dominant is interested in his own gratification rather than his submissive's. In fact, many dominants are driven as much by their desire to please their partner as by anything else; the psychology of a healthy BDSM relationship is driven by the submissive as well as by the dominant, and a dominant can take pleasure from gratifying the needs of the submissive just as easily as the submissive can take pleasure from gratifying the needs of the dominant. This kind of thing is not one-directional.

It's all for the submissive's benefit? Yeah, right. The submissive is the one being bossed around or spanked or whatever. How can you say that isn't abuse?

Simple. Two reasons:

1. In a BDSM relationship, the submissive sets the limits. A victim of abuse doesn't get a vote; the victim can't tell the abuser what to do, or how much to do it. A submissive sets all the limits--what kinds of things can be (and can't be!) done, how much, and for how long.

And while we're on the subject of limits, there is more than one kind of limit in a BDSM relationship. Everybody has "hard" limits--things that they absolutely will not do, and will not even consider. Some people, for example, like to be tied up but don't like the idea of being whipped; if they won't allow themselves to be whipped, ever, that's a hard limit.

There are also "soft" limits--things that someone won't do under ordinary circumstances, but will allow to be "forced" on him or her in the context of a particular scenario that's being acted out. Between soft limits and hard limits lies an interesting psychological territory to explore.

2. A submissive gets a way to opt out. This may be a code word, or a sign of some sort; if the submissive uses it, he or she has had enough and the scene is over. An abuse victim doesn't tell the abuser when to stop.