So much going on lately....so little time.
Pretty in Pink,
I went through a great deal of the same soul searching that you are doing now, and for some reason the "let them do what they do, and I will do what I do" logic did not satisfy me either.
Of course, I was raised in a lesbian, feminist household...so the conservative male-dominated religious language was an anathema growing up, and then to discover reading DD message board and websites, and to discover that some of this stuff resonated with me created a great deal of cognitive dissonance.
One thing though, abuse not only runs the gamut of race, culture, socioeconomic status, etc., etc., abuse also runs the gamut of couple power dynamics. I have known so-called "egalitarian" relationships that were horribly abusive, and traditional, heterosexual, conservative, religious, male-dominated relationships that were beautiful and loving. There is nothing inherently abusive about a loving, consensual, power exchange, and despite conventional wisdom, egalitarianism has just as much potential to be abusive, violent, and unhealthy as a negotiated power exchange relationship. In fact, it *might* have even more potential, because in a TTWD relationship, there is a negotiated method of dealing with conflict. It is not full-proof by any means, as I, umm, demonstrated this week

, but I know that Obsidian and I do a lot better now then we did before DD/TTWD.
It is hard though, and at times, I struggle with this, too. Less so, now, but it is still there.