In BDSM, gunplay is used to refer to the practice of including actual or sometimes simulated firearms into a scene. The motivations for this vary significantly among participants with some using it as another method to experience/control fear while others see the power of a weapon as a symbol for dominance since it has often meant just that in history.
It is rare that the weapon is loaded during a gunplay scene though a minority of gunplayers do in fact use loaded weapons for this activity. More commonly the gun is part of a mind fuck where the bottom is led to believe that there is a real risk of injury or death when no such risk from discharge exists.
Bottoms who are involved in gunplay scenes often describe how easily one can become fearful about having a weapon pointed at them, even when they know for a fact that the weapon is unloaded. Upon examination it seems not that they are dwelling on the possibility of an error by their top or dominant but that the mind's reaction to a gun is visceral and transcends the logical knowledge of safety issues.
Within the community debate rages over whether the use of a gun in a scene can be safe, sane and consensual under any circumstances, loaded or not and this is one of the reasons why gunplayers and others into edgeplay often identify as risk-aware consensual kinks.
