Dear Readers: I’m on a vacation (and bed rest) this week. Please enjoy this selection of letters from three previously published columns. — Dan
Borrowing Gen Z’s love for labelling everything, I’m a 46-year-old homoromantic asexual Canadian faggot. For me that means I’d like to love and be loved by another man but I’d hate having sex with him. To add a vexing complication, I also need some sort of power imbalance. Ideally, I would fall somewhere between being a man’s sub and being his slave. I’ve been searching for this since I came out in my early twenties. I’ve tried everything. Online, bars, hobby groups, friends, hookups. Vanilla relationships, single Masters, dominant couples, sex workers. I’ve spent thousands of dollars on both men and therapy, but here I am busted, miserable, and alone. The point is that no one — and I mean absolutely no one — wants what I want. My dream dude doesn’t exist. It’s easy to tell someone to move on, that there are other fish in the sea, etc., but sometimes your sea is a puddle and you really are the only guppy. I’m considering ending my life before the end of the year. I can’t shake the deep sadness and disappointment and misery that I feel, Dan, and this isn’t even touching on my current unemployment or newly-chronic health issues. What would you do if you were in my shoes? How does one switch off the built-in romantic drive?
Sought A Dom Accepting Sad Singlehood
I’m sorry you haven’t found your ideal man, SADASS, or the right dominant couple or a vanilla guy you could love or a dominant sex worker you could see on the side. Not everyone finds their ideal mate/position/situation, despite our best efforts, which is why it’s important we build lives for ourselves that are rich and rewarding while we look for our dream dude(s). Because then even if we’re unhappily single — or we find ourselves unhappily single again — we would still have meaning and pleasure in our lives. And that makes it easier for us to live in hope that, should all the planets align, it could still happen for us or happen for us again. (Please note: I’m qualifying “single” with “unhappy” here not because all single people are unhappy — which is absolutely untrue — but because this single person, SADASS, is unhappy.)
I have to assume it has happened for you once or twice, SADASS. While none of your relationships with any of the vanilla guys, single Masters, dominant couples, or sex workers you’ve met along the way turned into long-term connections, there had to have been some good times and real — if not lasting — connections over the years. Instead of seeing those relationships as a string of failures because they ended, SADASS, you could choose to see them as a series of successful short-term relationships. And while you may regret that none lasted for years or decades, there’s nothing about being partnered that immunizes a person against loss, regret, or future singleness. If you were still with one of those vanilla guys, you might always regret not meeting a Master; if you were with a Master or a dominant couple, you might regret — from time to time — not having a more egalitarian relationship.
Although you say you’re not interested in having sex, SADASS, your interests are erotically charged. If your erotic-if-not-sexual fantasies are causing you distress — if you want to switch off your built-in romantic/erotic drive — anti-depressants often lower and sometimes tank a person’s libido. For most people that’s an unwelcome side effect, but you may find it a blessing, SADASS, at least for now, SADASS, while you’re dealing with your health and employment issues. It’s an extreme move but it’s far less extreme than the one you’ve been contemplating, so it might be worth discussing with a sex-positive, kink-positive, reality-aware therapist. And you do sound legitimately depressed, so.
Finally, please don’t end your life. The world is a far more interesting place with you in it. And while finding a romantic partner is never the solution to our problems — it’s always the start of a whole different set of problems — I’ve heard from countless people over the years who found something close to what they were looking for in their fifties, sixties, and even seventies. But it can’t happen for you if you aren’t here for it.
Crisis Services Canada maintains a 24-hour suicide-prevention hotline: 833-456-4566. In the United States please call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 800-273-8255.
Originally published October 20, 2020.
I’ve always wanted to tie girls up, but I can never convince a woman to let me. Lately, I’ve been exploring “bondage singles” sites online, but I’m totally new to this. How do I know which ones I can trust? There are hundreds of profiles, but it’s hard for me to believe I can really just answer an ad, meet a girl in a hotel room, and tie her up. It can’t be that simple, can it?
The Internet’s Enticing Dames
It can’t be and it isn’t, TIED, because no woman in her right mind is going to let some man she’s never met before tie her up in a hotel room. That’s not to say it couldn’t happen or hasn’t ever happened, but women stupid enough to take that risk are rare — and it should go without saying that any singles website promising to provide lonely guys with an endless stream of stupid women is a scam. But you don’t have to take my word for it. Justin Gorbey is a bondage practitioner and educator, as well as a professional artist and tattooer. Gorbey ties up a lot of women, as you can see on his Instagram account (@daskinbaku), and he doesn’t think you’re going to find someone on a “bondage singles” site, either.
“I would recommend this person step away from the dating sites and step into some educational group meet-ups or ‘munches,’” said Gorbey. “TIED or any new person should focus on groups that match their own desires/interests, and connections will develop organically with time and effort—with a lot of fucking time and effort!”
Kink social and education groups organize online but meet up offline — face-to-face, IRL, in meatspace — at munches (educational talks, no actual play) and play parties (actual play, hence the name). To find the kink organization(s) in your area, TIED, Gorbey suggests that you create a profile on FetLife, the biggest social network for kinky people, and start connecting with other like-minded kinksters at munches.
“Going to munches will not only give TIED a chance to meet people,” said Gorbey, “they’ll give him a ‘guide’ for how to act — most groups generally go over house safe words/etiquette/rules and consent/risk awareness at the beginning of a munch — and they’ll also give what I call a ‘visual vocabulary’ of what a real-life scene looks like. Porn and fetish fantasy often distort our perceptions of what is plausible or even possible for real people in a real-life scenario. Just watching others play helped me identify the things I found attractive as both a top and a bottom.”
There are lots of men and women out there who are interested in bondage, TIED, and the organized kink scene is the best place for someone like you to find both mentors and play partners. You’ll be able to interact with kinky women at munches and parties, women who will be a lot likelier to let you tie them up after you’ve demonstrated you’re safe and sane yourself.
“There are hours of intimacy before and after the moment captured for an Instagram photo,” said Gorbey. “These relationships require trust, vulnerability, and communication. These acts require a lot of hard work and commitment, and they expose a person to risk. That’s why the only responsible answer to TIED’s question is to seek education first and play partners second.”
Follow Justin Gorbey on Instagram @daskinbaku.
Originally published November 13, 2018.
I’m a fortysomething gay male professor at a small college. I try hard not to get attracted to students, and usually succeed. But it’s tough to resist temptation when you’re surrounded by hot, smart, fun, horny young guys in a rural area with not many other options. Over the past several years, I’ve ended up having sex with several students. None of them were students I was currently teaching or likely to teach, and two had graduated. I’m not actually violating college policy, which only bans faculty from getting involved with students they’re currently teaching. I haven’t ever done anything on campus or made the first move—and when one of them starts trying to hit on me, I’ve usually mustered the willpower to ignore him. On rare occasions when I’ve ended up letting my cock do the thinking, I’ve treated my younger partners with kindness and respect and observed your campsite rule. All of these younger guys solemnly swore to keep our extracurricular activities secret, but still, word might leak out, and I don’t want to become known on campus as one of “those” professors. Most important, I don’t want my queer male students—many of whom look to me for mentorship—to think I’m grooming them for sex after I’m no longer teaching them, and I don’t want my female and straight male students to feel like second-class citizens. On the other hand, I’m a sex-positive person who believes that happy, consensual banging has its own intrinsic value. I tend to be attracted to younger guys, and I think part of the attraction is that they’re less jaded about sex and more excited. Fucking them feels less transactional than the typical hi-bang-jizz-wipe-bye Grindr hookup that seems to be the norm with gay guys in their 30s and older. I’m struggling with how I should feel about these off-campus romps. We’re all adults, and we’re not breaking any rules. Obviously, the behavior is professionally risky for me, probably foolhardy. But is it immoral? Above all, what should I do when future opportunities present themselves?
Professor Horn-Dog
Can we please not describe one adult subtly and perhaps unintentionally telegraphing their attraction to another adult as “grooming”? That term refers to adult sexual predators insinuating themselves into the lives of minors, slowly gaining their trust and the trust of their family members, so they can abuse those minors sexually. It means something very specific, PHD, and we shouldn’t confuse or cheapen its meaning by applying it to your behavior — which, while not criminal nor immoral, is incredibly stupid.
Yes, these relationships are permissible, in the sense that the school where you teach permits them. They aren’t against the rules, those young men were all consenting adults, and you’re doing your best (you claim) to honor the campsite rule (leave them in better shape than you found them). But this is an advice column, PHD, and you’re not asking me what’s permissible, but what’s advisable. And what you’re doing is crazy inadvisable for all the reasons you cite: the risk of promising and hot gay male students misinterpreting your interest in them as sexual, your straight students feeling like they may not be getting the full benefit of your attention, and your mediocre and not hot gay male students — sorry, your mediocre and not conventionally attractive gay male students — interpreting their failing grades as sexual rejection.
I, too, am a sex-positive person who believes in happy, consensual banging, and I don’t think what you’re doing is immoral. But it is incredibly reckless at this particular moment on any American college campus. Power and consent are minefields that students, professors, and administrators are tiptoeing through, PHD, but you’re humping your way across them. Becoming known on campus as one of “those” professors — because you are one of those professors — could wind up being the least of your problems. What if your college revises its rules while you’re balls-deep in a student? What if you have a falling-out with a student you banged and he files a complaint? What if you want to move to a different school that has different rules and your reputation both precedes and disqualifies you?
Finally, PHD, it’s fine to be attracted to younger guys. But if all your experiences with guys in their 30s have been dispiriting and transactional, well, it sounds like you were the common denominator in a lot of meh sexual encounters. Speaking from experience, I can say that plenty of guys over 30 are excited about sex and good at it. If every guy over 30 that you’ve been with has been underwhelming, well, it’s possible they were picking up on your lack of enthusiasm/attraction and reflecting that back at you.
Originally published November 19, 2019.
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