Years ago in B&D there was a lot of emphasis on 'love bondage', and I liked that. Love is unselfish, isn't it, and so is surrender, and so is pleasing a submissive lover. So it can all fit together.
D/S is based on rules, and mutual respect, and complementary needs, and is also perfectly consistent with a loving relationship.
What has always seemed to me selfish was the sadism part of S&M. The most dangerous partner, it seemed to me, was a sadistic dominant, as it appeared that a sadist would always put his own gratification first, and was likely to get carried away, beyond any previously agreed limits.
If the partner is genuinely masochistic though, is sadism necessarily selfish? Or can it be genuinely loving? If it is loving, is it genuinely still sadistic? It seems to me that love and sadism may be mutually exclusive, in which case loving sadism is an oxymoron. What do you think?