Are safewords necessary? Since I became aware of BDSM, a safeword has always something which I'd thought was necessary, and I didn't know there were different thoughts about it. However, I was recently reading a thread in which it was being argued quite well that it wasn't. Some key points were: A Top should know how far to go with His or Her bottom; Saying "no" firmly should mean "no"; Remembering a safeword can be difficult when playing hard, with adrenaline running, emotions...