Quote Originally Posted by fwss
I'm a little puzzled by your last comment, Ruby. Many - surely most - dominants are sadists, right? They get off on inflicting pain and/or other suffering. Masochists get off on taking it. Slaves get off on fulfilling their owner's needs.

I therefore cannot see any way in which a dominant inflicting pain 'for the hell of it' should be described as 'dangerous', as long as they are doing it to a consenting partner.
A dominant person should have a sense of responsibility. Afflicting pain just for the heck of it is NOT responsible at all. We described the scenarios in which we think the affliction of pain makes sense to us, and we think that should leave room enough for the affliction of pain. It is the context that is important. If we are given a difficult task and fail to do it or misbehave in any way (and there are lots of possibilities for that), then we certainly deserve our punishment. But that's a big difference to just arbitrarily dealing out pain. Arbitrarily dealing out pain is like moving a knight in a game of chess like a rook - against the rules.