Ej Dickson, an editor with MensHealth.com who writes often about dating and sex, wrote Tuesday that the kink community “puts a premium on consent.”

“It is one of the very basic tenets of BDSM,” she wrote. “Often, sex acts will be negotiated beforehand in the form of contracts, and either way, anyone practicing BDSM responsibly will implement a ‘safe word’ to make it clear if they are uncomfortable with anything happening.”

There have been previous cases where a man accused of violence toward women contended that the incidents in question occurred during consensual “rough sex.”