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Joined 1 year ago
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Cake day: June 19th, 2023

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  • Very common.

    A lot of people, I’d even hazard to say the majority, want mutual possession to some degree. Not necessarily ownership, as in all freedom removed, but the idea that each person is devoted to the other, to the exclusion of any outsiders in some cases, but at least as a primary priority except for children being higher.

    There’s been a ton of debate over the years, tons of money thrown at research into human bonding and relationships, trying to figure out exactly what “normal” or “natural” is for us. But, even among people that aren’t monogamous, there’s some that use, and find comfort in, the idea of belonging to each other, it’s just that the non monogamous folks tend to have a broader range of what that means.

    It’s similar to (or maybe the same as) belonging somewhere. You belong at home, it’s the place where you are supposed to be, it’s the default state. It might not be home for everyone, obviously, but the sense of having something that is akin to that feeling of coming home, of belonging, that’s a powerful thing.

    As an example of non romantic belonging, to illustrate what I mean, I used to bounce at a drag club. For a lot of the gay kids that came there, that club was the one place they could really, truly be themselves. I literally can’t count how many times someone said that it was the closest they’d ever had to a real home, a real family, and many of them said the only place they ever felt like they belonged.

    I know, for myself, no matter how much pain I’m in, what ugliness is trying to drag me down in my head, the certainty that my wife loves me, and is there for me, it keeps my head above water. I’m her’s, she’s mine, in every way that matters. We belong to each other. That’s despite the fact that we’re both free to end the relationship if we so choose. There’s no slavery in belonging to and with someone.

    Shit, now I’m crying lol.

    But maybe that’s as good an example as anything else. That feeling? That sense of comfort and surety, of knowing that there’s someone right there that is such a deep part of yourself that just thinking about the fact is enough to bring tears of joy, that’s what it’s about.


  • Can we be real for a minute though?

    It’s still better than not having it as an option.

    By telegram existing, it diversifies the non private messaging landscape. It’s obviously not better than actually secure and/or private services, but the more options that are out there, the less centralization there is, which is a net positive.

    You just have to be aware of its limitations and don’t use it for anything significant. In that regard it’s no worse than something like discord.

    You already covered the warnings about not trusting it for privacy or security, so that’s really the beat you can do in informing people. Once you’ve done your due diligence for the people you care about, you gotta let them do what they’re gonna do. It’s either that or go hard and refuse to communicate on anything other than the services you deem best for your preferences and hope for the best


  • I’m going to give a longer explanation than was already given.

    So, imagine yourself at a hospital. You’re about to have a minor surgery, and get knocked out. While you’re under, some nurse comes in and fucks you in the ass.

    Is that rape?

    Switch things up. You’re at a bar, having a good time, someone slips something in your drink. While you’re under the influence of that hit of whatever, they take you into the bathroom and fuck you in the ass, and you agreed to that, you may even like it.

    Is that rape?

    On a fundamental level, if someone is visibly drunk, or even olfactorily drunk (meaning your can smell the booze on them), they are in a state of mind that is the same as being drugged. It doesn’t matter if they are initiating contact, they are unable to give meaningful consent.

    Now, if you want to argue we need another term instead of rape, I’m okay with that. We can call it whatever. But we have statutory rape already, which exists because we recognize that even when someone is the initiator, there are states of mind and being that simply can’t make a choice to have sex in a meaningful way. So using the term rape for violating meaningful consent is fine, even when it’s an adult, and even when they initiate.

    I am also aware that there are edge cases where consenting before consuming a substance could/should count as meaningful consent. And I’m aware that there is a range of inebriation where meaningful consent is still possible. However it is nearly impossible to tell without testing what a person’s blood alcohol level is, so we’re limited. That in turn means that the standard for (at least colloquial usage) what is and isn’t inebriated rape has to be broader than it would be if we had reliable testing on the fly.

    I also agree with your point that she was ignoring consent, and being an absolutely horrible person, and if she had persisted by force or coercion and he had given in, I wouldn’t accept her being drunk as a defense against any charges brought.

    But there’s a fundamental inability to consent when drunk. How drunk? That’s something that would need to be addressed by medical science and then legislated. What’s the maximum BAC someone can give meaningful consent for other things? But that fact is there, that alcohol serves to break down the ability to consent, and sex without consent is considered rape, on at least a colloquial level, if not always on a legal level everywhere.



  • It’s mid tier, but there’s a certain degree of richness to it that’s interesting.

    You’d get much better making your own. You can tweak things to get the levels of bitterness, sweetness, earthiness, etc.

    I mean, obviously the story is fake or exaggerated, but I can imagine someone getting hit with a wave of nostalgia from the taste of it, especially after a long time of not drinking anything chocolate like that. Denny’s is better than you’ll get out of machines, or if you use water to make it at home. I don’t know how they make theirs, but it’s as good as the packet hot chocolate made with milk, but a little less “gritty”. None of it is really gritty really, but there’s a degree of something similar in the mixes that has a similar feel. I’d say chalky, but that isn’t right either.

    But if you’re on the road and in need of a pit stop and something hot, it’s better than their coffee for sure


  • You know, I know a guy that had to come out as straight.

    Pretty fucking hilarious story.

    Edit: decided to tell it here for ease of finding.

    So, this story goes back to 1992. This was before the boom of awareness around gender and orientation, etc. That’s the key to the whole thing.

    My buddy is this kinda goofy kid, never really fit in well, but ends up building a friend group in high school (including me). This group is unusually chill and inclusive for the era, and included three gay guys.

    My buddy and one of the gay guys (also a buddy) fall in love. After we all graduate, they move in together, and live happily ever after. To appearances anyway.

    Truth is, the guy really loves his partner. But he didn’t enjoy the sex. They try every combination they can think of, and it just doesn’t ever satisfy them both. However, the guy could orgasm from oral, and would do hand jobs, so they made it work, because love.

    But, guy ends up meeting a woman at work. Ends up cheating, and the sex was fulfilling in a way sex with his partner wasn’t. He figures he’s actually bi, and once they move past the betrayal, it kinda helped.

    But, the entire time, everyone not aware of the details just sees them as the perfect gay couple; and the guy was out as gay to everyone. And they really were a great couple. Finish each other’s sentences, silly in-jokes, outlasting every other relationship anyone in the friend group. It was only the sex that was bad. The guy’s partner is increasingly feeling undesired as the sex happens less and less.

    Things come to a head around 2003. The partner cheated, and they decide to open the relationship. The guy starts seeing women for sex, the partner men. This works for a while, until the guy and the partner both fall in love with other people. Now, they kept all this private. It wasn’t until they broke up and started moving into their own places that anyone other than me and one other friend knew anything was wrong at all.

    So, they’re apart, and people are surprised, extra so since they stayed friends. The guy, however, is fielding attempts to hook him up with other guys.

    And that’s when he starts telling people he’s hetero. Which was not met with the kind of friendliness and open minded goodwill you might expect.

    His parents were upset because, one, they felt they lost a son-in-law (despite the guys not having married); and two, that they had had a bumpy road to being parents of a gay son. They weren’t exactly overjoyed back when it all started. Some of the friend group were outright nasty about it, particularly one of the gay guys. His co-workers were largely unimpressed, but gossiped about it to the point that the guy quit and went elsewhere.

    Hell, I was confused as all get out, and I was/am sort of the default “safe closet exit” person for my family. We had a conversation about it all, maybe three months after they split. I had known they had troubles, but the dude always said he was gay or bi, so it always seemed like things they were working on.

    During that conversation, he talked about how much he loved his partner, and still did. But that it wasn’t fair to either of them to keep hurting each other by not being enough for each other, and expecting each other to keep trying anyway. He said that he’d never really liked men sexually, and had never had any sexual attraction to any other men than his now ex. He went into detail that I won’t share because he asked for me to never tell anyone, but suffice it to say that he tried really hard to be gay, and only gay.

    So, some time passes, and he calls me out of the blue (which is rare because I’m known for not answering the phone, I check messages and call back, so ppl text me instead). He starts babbling joyous things about how he’s figured it all out.

    He ran across the term “pan-romantic”. And it was a magic word that unlocked a lot of emotion for him, but it ended up being joyous. He is pan-romantic, but heterosexual. For him, it was proof that he wasn’t just weak, or didn’t love his partner enough, or a bad person, he just didn’t have fully matching romantic and sexual attractions. He could love anyone, under the right circumstances. It explained how he could have crushes on guys, and girls, but only ever sexually wanted women.

    Seriously, he was on the phone with me for about three hours, just venting, and vacillating through emotions.

    So, yeah, he found a label, an idea that finally gave him a way of thinking about himself that didn’t involve the shame and self hatred because he’s straight in almost every way except being able to love anyone. Love isn’t always enough, so he knows not to chase it with someone he won’t be sexually attracted to.

    Now, I had to ask, “dude, how were you having sex with a guy if you weren’t sexually attracted to him?”

    He thought that if he kept trying here and there, that maybe it would be enough. That it was his “duty” to do something, and it wasn’t so bad that he couldn’t do it at all, he’d just fantasize and get through it because he loved his partner.

    But, yeah, dude had to fully come out, and he said it was just as nerve wracking as when he came out as gay back in the nineties, because “people thought I was joking, and then got mad because they thought I had betrayed gay people, or them by somehow changing. but I didn’t change, I just didn’t know.”

    That’s the story