[repletewithyou]

So, there's this boy. He is a very dear friend and I've known him for years and years and last summer we fell in love. He goes to school about a thousand miles away and he didn't want to try a long distance relationship. We got back together over winter break and had sex (both of our first time); he is one of the most genuine and gentle and smart and adoring people I have ever known. BUT we talked the other day and he says he "doesn't tend to think about people much when he can't see them." I think about him all the time and it makes me sad to think he doesn't think about me.

We talked tentatively about getting back together this summer. I hate it when girls care more about their guys than their guys care about them. I don't know whether he really doesn't care about me anymore or if he is just a dumb boy with a bad memory. I'll be seeing him soon and I don't know what to do.

[bklynhermit]

i don't have a problem with porn because i'm insecure about myself. i have a problem with porn because for three years i dated someone who was basically addicted to the stuff.

let's see. we could start with when he told me he was going to dump me because i was 'fat' and 'unnatractive when naked' -- i weighed about 115 lbs. at the time and every other partner i've ever had, before or since, has had no problem with my body. however, i don't look like a porn star therefore i am 'fat' and 'unnattractive'.

we could then go to the way he was fixated only on porn-ish sex acts. all of his fantasies, EVERY SINGLE THING he wanted to do in bed was centered around cliche porn stuff: from behind, deep throat, anal, S&M, cumming on my chest. he never ever wanted to do anything in bed that he hadn't already seen in porn a zillion times. incidentally, this also meant that he had virtually no interest in pleasuring me in any genuine way, and that if i didn't have loud rapturous orgasms all the time (despite having sex that was in no way pleasurable for me) he would accuse me of being an ungrateful cunt or taking his totally hot sexual prowess for granted.

then there were all the times he wanted me to watch porn that he knew specifically made me uncomfortable. rape, hardcore s&m, gang bangs, girls physically in pain choking on cock. and if i refused, he would wait till i was in bed to blare the porn i'd refused to watch and then loudly get off to it.

this is why i 'have a problem' with porn. because i've seen the guys who are really into it, and they're fucked up. because i hate the kinds of sex and attitudes towards women's bodies it promotes. and, yeah, because of all the classic feminist arguments, too.

i dont' hate porn because i'm insecure, i hate it because i'm confident enough in myself to honestly know that porn isn't what sex is supposed to be about, and i don't want it in my sex life.

which means, yes, i'm willing to dump someone if they seem too into it for me. and, yes, i want to know whether my partners use it a lot. it's not about codependence or control. i have a right to know what makes my partner tick, sexually. and if it's something that disturbs me, i have a right to not want to be with that person. had i known all the ramifications of that previous partner's interest in porn, i would have broken up with him before i got in over my head. it would very much have been a matter of my safety - mental and emotional safety, perhaps, but even so.