Consent
Freely given agreement to a specific rope activity, settled before the scene, maintained throughout it and open to withdrawal at any moment.
The American Counseling Association’s 2020 practice brief on kink describes consent as voluntary, free of coercion, given before and throughout each scene, and open to withdrawal or change at any time. Drawing on Williams and colleagues (2014), it separates three levels: an initial yes or no, scene consent worked out in negotiation, and deep consent, meaning each person’s actual capacity to signal distress and withdraw during play. Rope 365 defines consent as all parties wanting and enjoying what was agreed, stresses that it can be withdrawn mid-scene, and extends the idea to bystanders. Anatomie Studio warns that a surface-level understanding is not enough and points readers to further tools such as Betty Martin’s Wheel of Consent. Shibari Study’s glossary lists tagai no gōi as a Japanese expression for mutual agreement between partners.