I suspect Dan's assumptions are correct. Delete/destroy/trash the sex tape. Move on. There is plenty of other porn out there that does not involve your ex.

Assuming that the "tape" is a digital file and VIDEO doesn't want to destroy it, he should encrypt and password protect it (Google how to do this), drop it on a DVD-RW labelled "RoboCop 3," and stash that among his CDs in the case for Astro Lounge by Smash Mouth.

@2 is the answer. The video is the guy being sexually capable and masterful with someone who's not his girlfriend. He can't delete it. These are also the reasons his gf wouldn't like it (or, rather, wouldn't like that he likes it). Hide it and mean to hide it.

Your ex-girlfriend was willing to engage in hot, kinky sex and memorialize it in video. She also had no problem with you keeping the video after your relationship ended. I'm guessing that your current girlfriend, the possible "1," has never agreed to make sex tape with you because if she did, I imagine you would be far more willing to dispose of this video. I also suspect that if you made a sex tape with your current girlfriend you would have established a better communication channel about such videos in your past, and she might be more open about your keeping a video make with an ex. Lastly, I also wonder if your current girlfriend is at all kinky. All the kinky women with whom I'm acquainted seem to have lots of their own homemade porn, some of which they've made with their exs, and which they have no problem keeping for their own pleasure.

So given all this, I really wonder whether your issue isn't your old video, but whether the woman who you think might be the "1" is really so well suited to you.

In any event, if you insist on keeping this video, try Photo Vault, you can password protect your photos and videos, and you can even create decoy folders, which would further hide your illicit video.

I dunno, I think Dan missed the ball on this one. But @2 did not.

i agree with the others comments. when this guy is no longer with ms. ninny anymore, he'll be kicking himself he trashed that video.

I'm gonna repeat again. I've got the 'one'.

It's like Dumbledore and his cursed hand. Even if you know it's going to be bad for you, you can't bring yourself to destroy it.

So hide it and hide it well. And close all windows and sign out of all accounts when done whacking off. And never ever, click "remember password" when accessing it in the future.

Which means you can't access it when you're tired or drunk and might be careless. You need a pilot-like checklist of: "select stealth mode", "lay towel over keyboard", "access file", "jerk of", "sign out / remove media", "close app / store media", "wipe off screen", "do laundry", "open window to air things out", etc.

Deviate one little time, and you'll have the equivalent of a gear-up landing. You'll walk away from it, but there'll be screaming, yelling, bent metal, and lots of paperwork to fill out. And you'll never be allowed to forget it.

Why is the video hot? maybe because he sees himself fucking, nothing to do with the woman. Whatever floats your boat. And self pleasuring is a private area of one's life, as I see it. Not up to anyone else to involve themselves in it.

@4 There's no evidence that the ex is cool with him keeping the tape. The fact that she might not be might be part of the turn on. But, you make a sex tape, you have to know it may live on past you, even if you really wish its keeper would delete it.

@2 Solid plan, UNLESS the discovery of a Smashmouth CD proves more damaging than a sex tape.

He can do all the encrypting, vaulting and hiding eveeyone suggested. But what happens if she walks in on him while he's masturbating with it? Unless he plans to never live with "the one", and never hand her a key to his place, he can't guarantee that she might not come home early one day, or come over on a surprise visit, or, or, or....

LW, if you need to keep a secret from "THE ONE" for the rest of your life, it shouldn't be one which might blow up on you at any time. Talk to her, and ask if she would mind if you keep it just as porn (assuming that your ex is ok with you still having, and using this tape to masturbate). Who knows, maybe she won't care, or maybe she'll ask you to get rid of it, but offers to make a replacement video with you. I dated a guy once, who showed me some X-rated pics he had of his ex; I didn't care that he had them - they both had moved on, and his past is his past. I did think he should have returned them to her, or at least kept her privacy and not show them to me, however.

Be respectful of your partners, past and present; be considerate of their feelings and boundaries, then you won't be sitting on any unexploded mines!

*everyone

If I found such a video I'd probably be like "oh, an old sex tape, you should probably delete that." But if I knew it was still in USE...yeah that'd be a big problem. There's no way I would believe that there was no lingering desire for your ex, and it's probably not suuuper emotionally heathy to jerk off to your ex's tape anyway? Delete that shit and reuse your favorite aspects for a new video with your current.

Is a threesome a possibility?

@11: good point. The album should be respectable to own. But without anyone ever actually playing it. Hmm ... OK. Rolling Stones, "Bridges to Babylon."

Yeah... jerking off over an old girlfriend is a little weird. Just get new porn. In the day and age of the internet there's infinite options - it's not like you're stuck to this or an old sticky copy of an underwear catalog.

I retract my earlier suggestion and propose you bury it in a deeper, darker secret.

Splice the 10 minutes of sex-with-the-ex between 43:20 and 53:20 of the 1977 Carpenter's Christmas Special.

Anyone who finds out you have the Carpenters in your collection will one RELIEVED that the real reason is just some sexy times with the ex.

Yuiop @2: Have you not seen Trainspotting?

I think he should tell the current girlfriend he has the tape, and wants to keep it for sentimental reasons. He doesn't need to tell her he currently masturbates to it. He could start a cheeky conversation with, "Have you ever done anything freaky with an ex?" Bonus, once he reveals this, he could ask her whether she wants to make a tape with him too. She might be far happier about the idea of VIDEO fapping to a film of himself with his current girlfriend, and not bothered that he kept the tape with the ex.

(Then again, I'm the idiot who accidentally deleted a folder of some self-made porn because I had titled it too obscurely and forgot what it really was. Doh!)

Interesting question. Why would the girlfriend be hurt and angry if she knew?

1. Because VIDEO likes masturbating to porn he finds hot?
2. Because VIDEO has a remembrance of an ex he keeps around?
3. Because VIDEO looks at his remembrance of his ex often?
4. The combination.

I put myself in GF's position.

I have no trouble with porn in general.

I not only have no trouble with my boyfriend keeping photos and letters of exes, I encourage it. The exes are part of what make my boyfriend who he is, and I hope he can look back on the past with happy memories even if the end of those relationships were unhappy.

I hope my boyfriend doesn't look at those photos and letters too often because that would make me think he was going for more than nostalgia and into the territory of being unhappy with me. I'd get jealous.

I'm fully aware that everyone fantasizes about sex with people other than the person they're with at the moment, and like I said, I have no problem with porn, but I wouldn't want it rubbed in my face that my boyfriend was thinking about someone else when he was with me.

I would definitely be hurt and angry if I found out my boyfriend was masturbating to a video of his ex. I conclude that the problem isn't any one of the elements of this by itself. It's the combination.

My advice is to hide the video away, never look at it, and substitute some other hot video for masturbation purposes. Fantasize the ex. Don't mention it to your girlfriend. If she finds the ex video, tell her honestly that you kept it as a remembrance and haven't brought it out for many years.

@20/BiDanFan: Sorry to hear you deleted Aunt Charlotte's Haggis Recipes from your MY Documents folder. Hope you didn't lose any long savored items.

@21/Fichu: I think there are at least a few more reasons VIDEO's girlfriend might feel angry or hurt:

4. She might be concerned VIDEO is comparing her physically and sexually to his ex.
5. Because she might feel VIDEO would rather fantasize about his ex than her.
6. She might be concerned VIDEO enjoyed sex more with this ex than her.

Perhaps there are two broad types of people. Those who enjoy making and keeping images of their sexual experiences, and those who don't (or haven't). For people who enjoy doing this and looking at those images from time-to-time, finding out their partner have their own homemade porn isn't an issue, but those who don't cannot really understand why someone would do this and then want to keep it.

Does your girlfriend get turned on by you getting turned on, even if she doesn't inspire each and every boner?

You're referring to a "Cool Girl". Lots of people will tell you they simply don't exist.

Hypothetical Fichu.

Just out of curiosity. Would you feel the same (about the porn) if your bf was still in contact with the ex (parenthood aside, maybe)? Same question if the ex was someone with whom he cheated (on you) with?

Big problem (more so for females, than males) in making homemade porn is risk of disclosure (and resulting embarrassment) to people who you don't want to see.it. (parents, children, your employer, the world in general). Also why you should destroy the hard drive of any computer you get rid. Also a concern when you are having your computer worked on.

Your spouse/SO may not snoop, but your (precocious) children will (probably) and they will be (in most instances) far more tech savvy than you are

BDF If you just deleted the file from your hard drive then the file is likely recoverable if you still have the hard drive and did not overwrite (or demagnetize) the sectors in the hard drive containing the file. All deleting a file does is remove the link to that file, which is why care needs to be taken in disposing of the media on which it was stored.

@23 @Sportlandia, re: 'You're referring to a "Cool Girl". Lots of people will tell you they simply don't exist.'

Lots of people can't find Iraq on a map either. In both cases the issue is never having learned where to look.

(It also helps to be a cool guy, so that if you find one, you can interest her.)

22-Sublime-- True, there are more reasons for anger and hurt than the ones I immediately thought of and listed, but that doesn't change my advice. If VIDEO puts the video away and doesn't look at it, the subject might not come up. If GF does find it after a time, he has plausible deniability.

24-- More interesting questions. I think that if Boyfriend was still friendly with his ex, I wouldn't mind. I'm friendly with a few of my exes, and we all manage to go out to dinner together. I don't have porn of these folks, but I do have (non-sexual) photos and letters, nice remembrances that I don't think bother my boyfriend. If he has the same (I actually don't snoop), even if the pics were sexual in nature, I don't think I'd mind-- as long as I was sure it went in the fond memories category, not in the active masturbatory one.

How does cheating change the equation? At that point, the cheating is the problem, not the porn, so everything has to be seen in light of whether it raises suspicions that he's still cheating or can't be trusted not to cheat. I'm thinking a video in that instance would bother me more.

Jang@14 ~ "...There's no way I would believe that there was no lingering desire for your ex,..."
Totally depends on the guy & how much he deserves trust. I have old photos of girlfriends, and am Facebook friends with a half dozen. A few of them were fantastic fucks which makes for spank bank material, but there is no active desire to get back together with them, been there done that, it's just nice to remember a part of my past that made me who I am today. Current GF accepts that and has met a few of them when we got together for drinks, etc...

So ask yourself, "If I'm looking for "THE ONE!" is she really someone who is going to get all bent out of shape by a fantasy or memory?" We all have pasts. Would you get upset if you found out she occasionally thinks about an old boyfriend while jilling off?

And finally, DO NOT save this video in DVD format! Odds of that DVD getting found and played are directly proportional to how much you want it NOT to! Bury it deep, deep, deep in your computer files and label it "Football Picks" or "Deer Hunting" or something like that. If Girlfriend is such a snoop that she's going to sift through thousands of files buried on your hard drive, well, see comment about "THE ONE!"

Fichu@21 ~ "I hope my boyfriend doesn't look at those photos and letters too often"
Yeas, that' the key. This is a whole 'nother animal if he's constantly going at it to the old video.

Now that I'm thinking about hypothetical questions, let me take an even more abstract view of this one. Let's say there's Activity Q which Boyfriend thinks is no big deal and that Girlfriend thinks is horrible. Under the best of circumstances, the two of them talk it over, come to some understandings and compromises, and make decisions together on the best way to proceed as regards Q, something that's fair and respectful to both.

I think it's trouble if BF takes the attitude that GF is unreasonable and therefore he gets to be deceitful about Q without notifying her. If BF is so sure GF is unreasonable, why does he want to be in a relationship with someone he thinks is so irrational? Why is she The One when she's not thinking clearly? Why not look for someone he has more fundamentally in common with?

Or if he does agree that Q is horrible, why is he still doing it?

It's not really a matter of whether *I* think Q is okay or horrible or whether Dan does or the society at large. What matters is what they come up with together. Try substituting smoking dope or getting drunk on weekends or saying disparaging things about her family or leaving his dirty laundry in the living room for masturbating to old girlfriend porn, and see how that changes the answer.

@26/Fichu: I didn't intend for my comment @22 to highlight that there are many reasons that VIDEO's girlfriend, or any person, might find it objectionable that their partner retains and views homemade porn made with a former partner.

Rather, it was to suggest that people who make their own homemade porn tend to enjoy keeping and viewing it and don't mind their partner doing likewise, while people who do not engage in making homemade porn tend to want their partners to dispose of any such material as a condition of dating them. VIDEO and his girlfriend appear to be on opposite sides of this divide, and possibly (likely) on opposite sides of the kink divide too. My sense is that people who make their own porn, like people who engage in kink, tend to be more uninhibited lovers, so there is a dimension of sexual compatibility wrapped up in VIDEO's situation.

Given that, as I noted at @4 above, VIDEO may want to rethink whether his current girlfriend is "The One."

Jodo @7: I am bookmarking this page and I WILL hold you to that.

If this woman is the one, then test how right she really is. Tell her the truth re the tape, if it's really important to him. First, he should check how important it really is. Put it away for a month and watch other porn, see how letting it go effects his feelings for his current gf. The narcissistic aspect of watching oneself having sex, what's that about.

Ah, I misread Jodo's @7 as "I'm not gonna repeat again." Wishful thinking.

Come on, folks. We all have secrets. This one is a bit creepy but not that big of a deal. Just be sure to hide the video well enough so that she can't find it for at least 100 years, and then hope you both expire before the 100 year period does.

@ 16 - Bridges to Babylon is NOT respectable. No Stones album after Exile on Main Street is. (I know, I've got a few of them.)

Something by King Crimson (Islands-era, or anything post mid-90s) or Soft Machine would do the trick. Extremely respectable, and highly unlikely to ever be listened to again anywhere on Earth.

@24: "BDF If you just deleted the file from your hard drive then the file is likely recoverable if you still have the hard drive and did not overwrite (or demagnetize) the sectors in the hard drive containing the file."

Usually by the time you hear this from someone, the HDD is long gone and the sectors well overwritten.

@32: "If this woman is the one, then test how right she really is. Tell her the truth re the tape, if it's really important to him. First, he should check how important it really is."

Eeeek to the telling her at an early stage in the relationship :o

I might suggest a slightly different angle.

...wait. That's all. If she's "the one", many people would feel less of that neurotic taboo/clinging onto the past and feel comfortable with the future, keeping some wistful images but less flagrant ones.

@7/23: All spectrum of person exists in this world, but he would know already and not be actively hiding it from her in this case.

FICHU@26

How does cheating change the equation? Yes, the cheating IS the problem. Lies, deceit, and betrayal are inherent in cheating which do not otherwise come into play.

Basic (vanilla) rules/requirements (specific circumstances may alter) to successfully save a (monogamous) relationship/marriage (if you, the cheater, really want to) after disclosure of affair/cheating. It (whatever) MUST stop (and be shown to have stopped). You don't owe the other person(s) anything (explanation etc) The other person(s) feelings are not your concern. There can be no further contact of ANY kind (a real problem if it is a co-worker, family, part of your network of friends, a co-parent). Everything (gifts, letters, photos, momentos, porn etc) you have from or involving the other person(s) MUST be destroyed (preferably in the presence of your partner). Answer (unreservedly) any and all questions by your partner. Accept suspicion and paranoia from partner. The cheater does not get to set the terms of reconcilement.

There is no easy way or shortcut. If the cheater can't or won't do these simple (but admittedly hard. emotions are involved) things then there is no point in even trying and couples therapy is useless.

Yes, I know life is complicated, but you have to start somewhere/some how.

Why on earth would anyone want to keep reminding their partner that they can't be trusted? Recidivism is a whole different kettle of fish and will be a on going concern.

I am NOT nor do I aspire to be the fount (The Fountainhead) of wisdom/knowledge/whatever. Just another flawed (clueless?) person trying to survive as best as I can

@25: "@23 @Sportlandia, re: 'You're referring to a "Cool Girl". Lots of people will tell you they simply don't exist.'

Lots of people can't find Iraq on a map either. In both cases the issue is never having learned where to look."

I don't know, do you think nobody else is aware of sex clubs, fetlife, adultfriendfinder, Tindr or whatever sex-specific dating sites?

Of course "cool" (more accurately to me as cool with) people exist, but I think most people balance wants with needs and that's simply not the only factor persons are looking for, just as the ample-busted LW on another thread.

@40 @undead: It's true, people have to balance all sorts of stuff when looking for a partner. I was probably overly snarky with Sportlandia (sorry, Sport), but it bugged me to have it implied that only the fictional "Cool Girl" of internet legend would enjoy her partner's sexual enjoyment even when it wasn't about her. I sincerely hope that isn't a rare trait in a person. It hasn't been rare in my friend/relationship group; hence my comment. To me, wanting/getting-turned-on-by your partner being turned on is like wanting/being-happy-when your partner is happy: it shouldn't be a trait restricted to people on fetlife, it should just be a reasonable response.

Then again, maybe reasonable isn't all that normal...

@19. BiDanFan. I'm not sure you understand the motivations of the two people involved ;). For my money, the gf wants to feel that her lover is absorbed in her--that he doesn't want to wander, has put his roistering days behind him, might want to settle down. He wants to think that he could still do it with another woman. He likes seeing himself put his dick in his ex's mouth or up her ass, to see her love it and yield to the moment. That it's ex and not the current gf is important to his self-esteem and to the pleasure of it; but there would be little sense for me that he's carrying a candle for this past lover--this would be a misunderstanding. Partly he sees his ex in the tape in a dehumanised way, as an ass or superb rack. But I wouldn't think his current partner could understand this. Holding onto the vid is in part his way of feeling that his youth hasn't gone the way of all things, that he isn't about to be assimilated to a (largely female) narrative of maturation and domesticity.

He doesn't think that differently to his current lover. They may not have as wild times as he had with his ex; but he probably feels they are a better fit for what they want in life--say that she's good for him or drives him forward. He shouldn't have to give up his tape but he should take good care to keep it from her.

@21. Fichu. But it isn't a tender memento. It's a hot strop. It's his dick and another woman moaning and exposing herself with a huge smile on her face. He likes it and needs it now for where he is in his life. If he's gradually coming to a place where he doesn't want to look at it so much, well, probably good, but let that happen organically. If it's a release valve in a variety of senses, then well--he needs it and needs to hide it.

I would be thinking about the person I'm with less than 20% when I top and no more than half the time when bottoming. For the first, I have to become a more capable lover than I (believe I) am--almost a cartoonish fantasy figure able to dominate, even to channel a degree of vindictiveness, certainly to get lost in the moment. None of this means I don't want to be with any long-term or established lover I may be with. Sex, for me, and I'm sure for many men, is much less a spontaneous response to loving feelings between a couple than VIDEO's gf might imagine; and whether people are good in a relationship together won't always hinge on whether they can have mutually mind-blowing sex.

@43: I mean, is it a "tender momento" if you wouldn't share it with your grandparents?

It may not be "cheating" in the strictest sense but it's definitely a sign that he's not yet comfortable with his new girlfriend. I'd be willing to guess that his retreat to the past drops off with time and security.

If not, I wonder how much longer they'll be together.

@44. UndeadAyn. I don't think it's a sign he's not comfortable with the new gf at all! He's been with her one and a half years. We don't know how long he was with his ex but it may well have been shorter. He sounds as if he's in his early-to-mid twenties, if his frequency of beating off given the opportunities of partnered sex he has is anything to go by. My reconstruction would be that he's in the first relationship he's had that _could_ lead to marriage; that he has no reservations in principle about the heteronormative concept of a monogamous marriage--even using the standard, predominantly feminine phrase 'the one', but that he wants to hold onto this one outlet of a riotous youth. Maybe what he likes about his gf of one-and-a-half years is that she's classy, doesn't have kinky sex and would be above a sex tape.

Other than he may have been fond of his ex and may have talked her into making it, there would be nothing about the tape that would differentiate it from him from his performing the same hot sex acts with a one-night stand.

I do think, though, that he should try to negotiate some light kink with his gf. He may be surprised at how receptive she is!

@45: "I don't think it's a sign he's not comfortable with the new gf at all! He's been with her one and a half years"

I wasn't suggesting he wasn't comfortable at all, but perhaps not secure enough in their future yet to let go of this uh... erotic security blanket?