Savage Love

I’m a middle-aged guy. My
boyfriend just left his teens. We originally got to know each other
because I like to tie up muscular young guys and he’s a muscular young
guy who likes getting tied up. But he’s a smart kid and after a few
months we started actually liking each other. At some point that like
turned to love.

Here’s the problem: My boyfriend’s
parents—who are a little younger than I am—were snooping
and found video clips on his computer that clearly illustrated our
activities. He still lives with his parents and they were, prior to
this discovery, entirely ignorant of their son’s sexual orientation and
interests. They’re now threatening all the things asshole parents
threaten: to kick him out, to stop paying for school, to disown
him.

My first reaction was, “Come live with me,
you don’t need that kind of crap in your life.” But the more I think
about it, the more I wonder if it’s the right thing to do. They are his
family. Would I really be acting in his best interests if I helped him
walk away from them, even as horrible as they’re acting? I can put him
up at my place. I can pay for his schooling. I’d be proud to do it. But
I wonder if I’d be facilitating a decision he’d one day come to regret.
Plus, we’re in Boston and he isn’t yet 21. On top of everything else,
is there a chance the law could decide to bite me in the ass?

Not The Bad Guy

I can’t do my best work, NTBG, without
seeing those video clips. But let me give it a shot…

Your boyfriend is of legal age, so I don’t
see how you could possibly be in trouble with the law. (Unless those
bondage videos were made before he reached the age of consent, which
I’m hoping they were not.) His parents might not like the fact that
their son is gay and a bondage freak, or that he’s involved with an
older man, but there’s not a lot they can do about it.

Besides, of course, tossing him out,
disowning him, and refusing to pay for his education.

If they do toss him out and refuse to pay
for his education, NTBG, you should take him in and pay for his
education. Don’t do anything—anything else—that might
antagonize your boyfriend’s parents. No confrontations, no accusations,
no scenes. Write them one polite letter. Tell them you appreciate how
distressing it must have been for them to learn about their son’s
interests the way that they did, and tell them that, despite how they
may have interpreted those video clips, you mean their son no harm, and
that you intend to look out for him and keep him in school. Close by
telling them you will encourage your boyfriend to keep the lines of
communication open with them.

It could be emotionally tricky for a while,
perhaps a long while, as his parents adjust to the big kinky news. But
that’s what happens when you snoop: Sometimes you find out things that
you didn’t want to know, didn’t need to know, or weren’t ready to
know.

As for the boyfriend, it’s entirely possible
that he may one day blame you for his estrangement from his parents.
You can inoculate yourself against those charges by making sure he sees
you doing whatever you can to lay the groundwork for an eventual
reconciliation.

Moving on, NTBG, you say you’re in love, and
that’s swell. But just between us grown-ups: Very few people wind up
with the person they met and fell in love with in their teens. At best,
you’ll have a few great years with this kid. But this can be a really
successful relationship even if, as the song goes, “it’s only for
now”—if you play your cards right. And unless his parents
are seriously nuts and your boyfriend desperately needs the legal
protections of marriage—he needs you to be his next of kin in
case of a medical emergency, for instance—I wouldn’t marry his
hot and kinky 20-year-old ass. And if he does need the legal
protections of marriage, make him sign a prenup.

Speaking of hot teenagers and asshole
parents and vows that you may come to regret…

The 17-year-old daughter of Sarah Palin, the
GOP’s vice-presidential nominee, is pregnant. The news was released by
the McCain camp during a busy week—a hurricane, the Republican
National Convention, Dick Cheney getting us into a war with
Russia—so it didn’t receive the coverage it deserved. To
recap:

Seventeen-year-old Bristol Palin got her ass
knocked up five or so months ago by 18-year-old Levi Johnston. Among
the hobbies listed on Levi’s since-yanked MySpace page—”fishing,
shoot some shit, and just fuckin’ chillin'”—was this revealing
tidbit: “I don’t want kids.” But Bristol, says her mom, “made the
decision on her own to keep the baby,” and is now engaged to Levi
“Shootin’ Shit” Johnston.

As the adoptive parent of a child born to a
pair of unwed teenagers, I’m certainly not in favor of abortion in all
circumstances. But I believe that it’s a choice teenagers should be
able to make for themselves—with input from their families
whenever possible—and, so it seems, does the GOP’s VP nominee.
Sarah Palin is pleased that her daughter made the decision—on her
own—to keep the baby.

But Sarah Palin doesn’t believe that other
girls should be able to make their own decisions. Sarah Palin believes
abortion should be illegal in almost every instance—including
rape and incest. So Bristol Palin is being celebrated for making a
choice that Sarah Palin would like to take away from all other American
women. Apparently, today’s GOP believes that choice is a special right
reserved for the wayward daughters of Republican elected officials.

Oh, and Sarah Palin also believes that birth
control shouldn’t be made available to teenagers, she opposes medically
accurate sex education, and she backs abstinence-until-
marriage
sex “education.”

Sigh.

The GOP has poured hundreds of millions of
dollars into abstinence “education” programs during the Bush years. I
believe this enormous investment of public funds begs the obvious
question: Is our children abstaining? Sarah Palin’s aren’t.
Despite this massive outlay on the part of the American taxpayer
and the example set by her Christian parents, Bristol Palin
became sexually active while still in high school. Excuse me, but if
abstinence education can’t keep the daughter of the evangelical
governor of Alaska off the cock, what hope is there for the
daughters—and some of the sons—of average Americans?

I’m a cad for writing this, of course,
because shortly before Bristol and Levi were paraded before cheering
throngs at the Republican National Convention, the Palins asked the
media to respect their daughter’s privacy.

Another special right: When it comes to
respecting your family’s privacy, Palin and the GOP see no need.
They want to micromanage the most intimate aspects of your private
life. And if their own kids fail to live up to the standards
that Palin and the GOP seek to impose on your family, well,
that’s a private matter between the Palins, their daughter, their God,
and the thousands of screaming imbeciles in elephant hats waving
McCain/Palin signs on the floor of the Republican National
Convention.

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