SADOMASOCHISTS UNSHACKLED?

This article provides a response to the article in this volume entitled ‘Is Society Still Shackled with the Chains of a 1993 England?: Consent, Sado-masochism and R v Brown’ by Jordan Moulds. It takes issue with the primary article’s claims that consensual infliction of pain and physical harm is now acceptable and may even possess some social value as recreation. It offers three reflections on the topic of criminal liability for consensual harms. The first has to do with the absence of principle in the South Australian legislative developments. The second casts doubt on the cogency of the primary article’s enquiries into the social utility or benefit of sadomasochism. The third draws attention to another peculiarity of South Australian criminal law, which arises because of the fact that the CLCA offences against the person do not include an offence of causing harm by negligence.