I’m unemployed in Oregon and trying to come up with simple ways to make rent. My dear wife and I would like your opinion on the legality of selling my teenage son’s sweaty gym clothes online. It sounds rather skeezy, I realize, and I’m only half-joking here. If we had a nonsexual website with pictures that weren’t necessarily of my son, would that be buffer enough? Would this be seen as me whoring out the boy? He’s up for it—as long as he gets his cut—but could I go to jail for this? He is 14.
Pimpin’ Out Real Teen’s Leftover, Acrid, Nasty Duds
Speaking parent-to-parent, PORTLAND, informing your 14-year-old son that there are perverts all over the internet who would be willing to pay him for his sweaty gym clothes wasn’t the best idea. Whatever you ultimately decide to do with his sweaty jocks, shorts, and T-shirts—and I vote for tossing them in the wash—dangling the money your son could make catering to the desires of online pervs in front of him might inspire him to go into business for himself, whatever you decide to do. So keep an eye on his internet usage, okay? As for the legal issues…
“Selling a physical property—sweat—might be an issue,” said Chris O’Connor, a public defender in Portland, Oregon. “Also, he could be [charged with] fraud and misrepresentation for selling clothing he says is his 14-year-old son’s but isn’t.”
Even if no dissatisfied customers go running to the chamber of commerce, PORTLAND, there are other potential problems. For instance, as your son’s sweaty gym clothes make their way from his bedroom floor to the hands of underpants-huffing pervs all over the world, some items would travel—via US mail or UPS or FedEx—through different jurisdictions. While there may not be a statute in Oregon that you could be prosecuted under for selling his undies, Mississippi or Illinois or Vatican City “may have specific laws, too,” says O’Connor, laws that you could be violating.
The biggest potential problem: Underpants huffers wanna know exactly whose underpants they’re huffing. That means you’ll have to include pictures and biographical info on your website, PORTLAND, and involving a minor—even a fake/buffer one—in what many police officers, district attorneys, judges, and some sex-advice columnists see as a kind of gateway sex work will quickly add arrest, prosecution, incarceration, crushing legal bills, and a lifetime on a sex-offender registry to your current troubles. Even if the authorities can’t point to a particular law that criminalizes your home business, they’ll find something to charge you with.
I’m sorry you’re hurting right now, PORTLAND, but I think you should come up with another way to make rent.
Six months ago, my 17-year-old son told me that he was seeing [insert male name]. No biggie. What troubles me: My son and his boyfriend are “furries” and open about it. The boyfriend is 18 and sweet, but he’s clearly the more dominant one. I’m worried that my son may not know how to say no to him. Adding to my concerns: I found a dog collar in the kitchen with an engraved tag with my son’s name on it. Dog collars seem like a heavy activity for a lad, Dan, and today I noticed a bruise on his throat that’s the size of a collar buckle. How do I ensure he is exploring safely without freaking him out?
Why This Fetish?
Go ahead and freak him out, WTF.
Your son is being open with you about his sexuality—openly gay, openly furred, openly collared—and you shouldn’t hesitate to be open about your concerns. You won’t be able to talk him out of his kinks, WTF, if they’re his kinks (and not, say, a teenage affectation), so focus on the issues: power dynamics and sexual safety. Tell him it’s important that he be able to say no to his boyfriend, and let him know that you’re there for him if he has questions or concerns or needs a sounding board. Then ask him about the bruise on his neck. Dog collars are harmless—lots of kids and kinksters wear ’em—but if he and his boyfriend are playing choking games with that collar, and that’s where the bruise came from, that’s a very dangerous activity and it has to stop immediately.
In your shoes, WTF, I would bark at the boyfriend about that bruise, too. Furry, schmurry. It’s erotic asphyxiation that you should be worried about.
A friend of mine came out as asexual this week on his blog. A couple of questions:
1. Part of me wonders if this is a “real” orientation. Is this the result of some sort of trauma or psychological stuff that could potentially be dealt with through a therapist? I realize that sounds close to the whole “ex-gay therapy” thing, and of course I don’t want to go down that path, but I guess it’s just hard for me to understand how someone can’t form a sexual connection with another person and still be 100 percent okay psychologically.
2. How do I react the next time I see this friend? Not sure about the etiquette.
Does LGBT Need An “A”?
1. Asexuality, according to asexuals and the people who love (but don’t fuck) ’em, is a real sexual orientation… or lack thereof. Usually. Because, you see, some asexuals do “experience attraction,” according to Asexuality Visibility Network (www.asexuality.org), “[but] feel no need to act out that attraction sexually.” So it’s an orientation. Or a disorientation. Or something. But whatever it is, it’s for real.
“I’ve been where your friend is,” says David Jay, the founder of Asexuality Visibility Network. “He wouldn’t have come out without spending a lot of time mulling it over, so respect that he’s done a lot more thinking about this than you have. If he identifies as asexual or anything in the big wide spectrum, you should respect that, period.”
First, I agree 100 percent with Jay. Second, it’s entirely possible that your friend isn’t really asexual, just as it’s possible that I’m not really gay and Marcus Bachmann isn’t really straight. Your friend may have decided to identify as asexual because he can’t deal with his sexuality or wants to opt out because he finds the games required exhausting. Or he may actually be asexual. Whichever it is, you’re not the sexual identity police. So long as your friend isn’t externalizing an internal conflict and making other people miserable in the process—à la Marcus Bachmann—your friend doesn’t need to be confronted or rescued. (And for the record: No one is “100 percent okay psychologically,” and not everyone needs sex and/or a romantic relationship to feel content and enjoy life.)
2. “Hey, how’s it going.”
“Good, man, you?”
“Good. Did you see Rise of the Planet of the Apes?”
“Yeah—terrible.”
“And James Franco was never shirtless—what’s up with that?”
“You know, if you need tits with your science fiction, you should check out Misfits on Hulu. It’s like Lost before it went to shit. And it’s got tits—lots and lots of tits.”
“I’ll check it out—and, hey, I saw that blog post about you ID’ing as asexual. If that’s something you want to talk about, I’d love to learn more. But if it’s not something you want to talk about, we can talk about other shit.”
Kids these days. I recently saw a cute little 14ish(at least they looked like kids) couple in Chicago. They had huge gauged earrings, tattoos, dyed hair, elegantly put together etc etc. I really felt sad for them cause where do you go from there? Petty soon it’s cutting off fingers, nullo or god forbid Republicanism.
I’m worried that the real perv here is the father. Shouldn’t he have thought of selling his own underwear or his wife’s first?
@Ricardo
YES! Seriously creepy. Or god damn, sell your toaster.
@Hybrid
I wouldn’t worry about it. I’m on the front end of that generation and when they grow up, you know what happens? They take the gauges out. Nbd. The tattoos are for life though.
*Cue angry people at my insuination that appearance = maturity*
@ 4 – They might not “hate” gays, but they’ll vote agains their rights to save their career anyway. And that’s the problem.
Thanks for the heads-up on Misfits. Gotta love sci-fi with tits.
As for PORTLAND- dude, no. As a father to two (now grown) boys, I gotta say that’s pretty fucked up. Pimp out your own sweaty gym clothes, but leave the underage aspect out of it, okay? Stirring up the nonces can lead to no good.
I agree with Ricardo @2: That father is indeed an abusive asshole.
I also agree with Dan in regards to the other parent worrying about their son. And yes, it should be communicated to both the child and his BF.
On a somewhat related note: Being a kinkster of some sort- in your own private space and NEVER involve your own offspring in any way- doesn’t mean you can’t be a devoted, loving, and responsible parent.
The half of me that’s not puking would like to kick the half of him that’s not joking squarely in the taint.
I’m curious what makes WTF call his son & son’s bf “furries.” There’s a wide spectrum there — some people like to put on full furry costumes, head to toe, and have sex that way, sure. I’ve never known anyone openly like that.
But I know a lot of people who wear dog collars and occasionally a tail or ears, and act like puppies when they’re at home or the right kind of party. Others who wear bridles and other pony gear; still others who wear no collars or props but act very much like playful kitty cats. In all these cases, their costumes are minimal, and most of the play is carried out by their body language. It seems one of the most harmless of games and not something for a dad to be freaking out about. Unless the boy is wearing a full on plush dog costume and Dad is concerned about the dry-cleaning costs, I guess.
As far as erotic asphyxiation, though, WTF might also want to mention to the boy the specific dangers of autoerotic asphyxiation.
@ 9 – I think it’s because the son and his BF are self-identifying as furries, and WTF doesn’t want to sound furry-phobic by casting doubts on their furriness because of their young age.
But seriously, you’re right, EricaP, the asphyxiation thing is something he needs to address RIGHT NOW.
(Oh, and by the way, you were right too the other day about enemas not being something one should do unless necessary, as it fucks up the digestive tract in the long term, but I just got tired of the pointless debate)
Let’s put a different spin on PORTLAND:
I’m a marginally employed skeevy mother who is always looking for a way to make a few bucks. I have a 14 year old daughter, and I am planning to peddle her panties online. I’ll post a picture of another underaged girl, maybe a few vidoes as well. Does this make me a lowlife and borderline child pimp?
Answer: YES.
What the fuck? Bad enough that there are people out there who want to sniff a 14 year old’s skivvies, but a parent who’s willing to be the source? And a kid who’s down with it as long as he gets his cut. Good old American values at work here.
I hate to say it, but PORTLAND could probably make more money selling used 14-year-old boy underwear than used middle-aged housewife panties. And unless he’s a total DILF, he certainly couldn’t make much selling his own used underwear.
Obviously the prospect of making money doesn’t mean that it’s a morally acceptable thing to do – I’m just responding to the question about why he’d consider selling his son’s underwear, rather than his own underwear, or his wife’s.
At one point, there was an episode of one of the Law & Order shows where a minor part of the storyline was that a teenage girl’s elderly aunt (who was her legal guardian) made a small fortune from selling the girl’s “genuine used prom queen panties” online. That may be where he got the idea (I’m pretty sure the plot involved the teenage girl getting a “cut,” too.)
For the record, though, in that episode, one of their regular customers tracked the girl down and traumatized her sexually (he masturbated right in front of her, after getting her to trust him, and see him as the father figure she never had), so if PORTLAND got the idea from that episode, that just makes it creepier.
italics tag now closed! you’re welcome 🙂
Monkeywithcarkeys @8 so glad I found you
No, I’m not the abusive parent so please don’t kick me.
This is in relation to your post couple of weeks ago. Please go to: http://www.thestranger.com/seattle/Savag…
And check #164
@ 14 – Thanks! Didn’t think I could handle it anymore.
@ 12 – I agree with your first point (although there’s a market for everything, I believe), but from the tone of his letter, it just seems like he didn’t explore any other options. “Hey, everyone, we need money, but I’ve got a great idea: we’ll sell the kid’s underwear online!”
I would never have had children because I always knew I wouldn’t be a great father (to say the least), but if I had, I’d definitely would have thought about many other things before involving my child (or any other) in something so vile if I needed money to pay the rent. (And just so you know, I cleaned toilets and picked up junkies’ syringes for a few years, so I’m not talking hypothetically.)
I meant “I definitely would have thought”
@5
you’re on fire! I agree again.
@9/Erica
I don’t think the parent is freaked out, but in fairness, the harmless premise of furry..ism… whatever you’d call it, is based on the idea that there’s no beastiality crossover. I certainly hope there isn’t! but it wouldn’t be an unreasonable idea to think that there is, or could be.
I hope we can all agree that beastiality is not harmless.
P.S. I’m pretty sure in that episode, the panties actually belonged to the grandmother and she was a FORMER prom queen. They busted the house looking for Ellie or whoever and this old lady steps out of her bridge game to greet them.
… not that I’m a rabid SVU fan or anything
furries can go yiff in hell
@19 the ones I know have human lovers who are their “owners.” It’s just a different way of doing D/s (owner/pet) and does not involve bestiality.
@10 “WTF doesn’t want to sound furry-phobic by casting doubts on their furriness because of their young age”
LOL
Unrelated: is there anyway to subscribe to both Savage Love and Dan’s Slog via Google Reader?
It boggles my mind that PORTLAND even thought of selling his son’s underthings. That’s insane. You want to make money pandering your child to pedophiles?
WHAT in HELL.
There is something seriously wrong with a parenting thought process that could even spawn that thought.
I can’t even fathom it. Dan was much kinder to PORTLAND than I could be. I wanna just give him a sound smack on the back of his head and say loudly and sternly “NO, NO, NO, YOU MORON.”
It’s your job to protect this kid, PORTLAND, not pimp him out, even if you feel you’re doing so in an abstract way, you’re still trying to sexually sell your child.
I hope you will one day be as disgusted with yourself as I am with you right now. That you even discussed this with him was seriously inappropriate. Consider family counseling, because your dynamics are fucked up.
Yeah, if you knew nothing *about* furries, I could see where they’d confuse things w/ bestiality, maybe. Good on you, WTF, for being open-minded about your son’s choices & wanting to make sure they –are– his choices. HE could just have a furry phase. Talking to both of them, even if it’s uncomfortable, is necessary. What a great dad you are.
But speaking of dads – “PORTLAND” – seriously? When I was the brokest I’ve ever been, last year, I sold tons of stuff dear to me. Jewelry, artworks, half my shoe collection. Stuff I still miss & think about. Even those of us living close to the bone likely have a pile of things we don’t need or want, we just have as shelf filler. I did some really crap, mind-numbing temp work. I echo 16 in saying, it doesn’t sound like you’ve done absolutely everything else you can do before coming up with this really bad idea. Trust me, it’s a really bad idea. Even if your kid says he’s okay with it, even if you research the laws the everywhere you were gonna send the sweaty skivvies, it’s just not okay to make money off of sexually exploiting your child. Or anyone else’s minor child. & who cares if the son gets a cut: what kinda message are you sending, here? When things get tough, sell yourself! GAH.
All I can do this week is nod & say – Dan! Great advice.
This; @24.
The stupid we will always have with us. Forbid it the kid should find this out.
-Isis Jane
Hey PORTLAND– did you see the cultural headlines this week? The West Memphis 3 were released after 18 years, Damien Echols spent that time on death row. They were found guilty because they wore black & listened to heavy metal music. Yep. There are judges, juries & prosecutors just as, if not more so, ignorant as that.
This just goes to show that it hardly matters if what you’re doing is legal or not. This is America, and if the Terrified Right get a hold of you, your goose is cooked.
Just something to think about.
Echoing the WTF sentiment about PORTLAND. Good thing he’s anonymous cause god damn if someone said that to me about their kid in real life I’d be calling CPS so fast.
The fact that there are a LOT of ways you could be making money – including whoring yourself and your presumably consenting wife out, dealing pot; never mind the legally legit routes of selling all your non-essentials or applying for govt assistance – without involving your minor son in sex work really makes me think this is something you’d like to do and you’re looking for an excuse. Get help.
“Food is the first thing, morals follow on” B. Brecht
Dan, you are right. The family is hurting.
@13, 14: Andie! We’ve been trying to figure out how to do that for a while. Do you just do a close italics HTML tag by itself in a comment?
As one, let me say that “furriness” is not easy to shake – kudos for ‘accepting’ it (the perceived and real drama in my life around *explaining* it and trying to come out as a sexual critter in my mid-teens wrecked me, even if my folks really couldn’t have given two shits as long as I never tried to meet anyone out of my age group).
So, point here: Have the ‘choking’ talk, but don’t panic. Collars have their appeal for certain people, but from someone who’s spent enough time in one – humans don’t have fur, our necks are quite sensitive, and just sleeping in one can leave a terrible mark (as well as being uncomfortable!) if you roll the wrong way.
There’s also a motivation to wear them too tight to get them to sit ‘right’ – not to be asphyxiated, but to feel fully wrapped and ‘collared’ rather than ‘necklaced’ (and to try to stop the thing from sliding down and scraping your shoulders). It takes a while to get over that, if someone’s going to, and just enjoy the wearing.
A trick hint – “I dunno, kid, I’ve never seen a dog with one tight enough to get bruised” – might do the trick and get him to move on to exploring a new and even-weirder kink (while still imagining he has a tail).
Anyone have a link to the previous week’s column? The one on the main archive page doesn’t lead to the column, if there (presumably) was one…
Motherfucker, you sell everything in your fucking house on eBay and “donate” your fucking blood. You pimp your wife out (you know, because she’s a consenting adult) if you really need an X-box that bad. And your kid? Maybe he goes and shovels some driveways, mows some lawns. Retrieves carts at the supermarket. Whatever light labor they allow CHILDREN to do these days. But his underwear? Fuck you. I don’t care if you’re living in your car, your kid’s underwear is not for sale to the general public.
My first thought regarding PORTLAND: Fucking Christ, what the fuck is fucking wrong with you you fucking fuckhead?
And good on you for pointing out that WTF’s son being a furry isn’t the issue (too bad you couldn’t make that same distinction for the podcast this week). That said, odds are they’re not trying out choking play: the kid probably just doesn’t yet know how to wear the collar right and either had it on too tight, slept with it on, or both.
Agree with @34. Also, the 14 year old kid isn’t old enough to consent to the use of his images for sexual purposes, so his consent is a nullity.
And since everything on the internet is permanent, your plan to exploit your child will stay out there when he is at college, applying for jobs, etc. I look forward to your son writing to Savage one day: “Hey Dan, I have this great girlfriend and we are very serious. Problem is, she googled my name and found out my parents used to sell my underwear when I was 14…..”
At a minimum, PORTLANDs plan violates the campsite rule.
Portland isn’t selling his son’s clothes, he’s selling the sexual fantasy of his son. How can any parent think it’s right to let their kid know that’s OK? Fourteen year olds don’t have the most common sense, how long before he’s meeting old dudes on his own?
Uhh, couldn’t the bruise on WTF’s kid just be a hickey?
“the ones I know have human lovers who are their “owners.” It’s just a different way of doing D/s (owner/pet) and does not involve bestiality.”
Logic: premise (NO crossover between furries and beastiality) is disproved by a contradicting case, not proved by a handful of confirming cases.
I said the idea that it’s harmless is based on the idea there is NO crossover. I wasn’t even saying there WAS any, but just because you haven’t seen it, doesn’t mean it’s not there.
I’m not even being anti-furry or whatever the heck, I’m just saying we don’t need to jump on a concerned parent for being concerned. It would be intuitive that if someone likes their partner to look and act like an animal they might be fantasizing about the real deal (which, while squicky, isn’t inherently immoral since they’re not harming a living thing). Again: I said, it would be intuitive, not that it’s what’s actually happening.
If a guy asked me to put my hair in pigtails, put on some frilly pink panties and bring one of those oversized lollipops next time we get together… well… I’d have some questions. Especially since I could pass for 16, no props necessary.
But I’m old-fashioned, so whatever.
Finally: hickeys are traditonally on the side of the neck, collar buckles are traditionally on the front.
I never do this but I call fake on PORTLAND. This seems like an attempt to discredit Dan by seeing if he would green light this.
@39 mydriasis
“I’d have some questions”
Such as?
@ 39 – “hickeys are traditonally on the side of the neck”
You are indeed old-fashioned. I leave hickeys all around, but especially on the back of the neck and shoulders (if my partner’s into it of course).
“http://socialmoderatefiscalconservative.…
not all republicans are bad and hate gays!! “
And are there any Republican candidates who espouse those positions? No? Then yes, all Republican politicians are bad and hate gays. If you are a fiscal conservative who doesn’t hate gays, then why not vote for one of the Democratic politicians who’s a fiscal conservative but social moderate? They’ve been the dominant force in the Democratic party for a long time.
@39 Didn’t mean to suggest no one ever. Just meant, perfectly possible for it to be totally harmless fun, as it is with the people I know. For the record, lots of people are into “Daddy/baby” games, too, without being interested in pedophilia.
I have a question about the asexuality letter. Do asexuals masturbate or become sexual aroused? Also, are there asexuals who identify as gay or straight? Seems like this would be the case.
I have a question about asexuals: Do asexuals masturbate? Experience sexual arousal?
@32 – “I dunno, kid, I’ve never seen a dog with one tight enough to get bruised” — excellent suggestion!
@9 – I’m with you on this one. Furries, pet play and collars are three different things. Correct me if I’m wrong (and forgive me for my shitty spelling, English is not my first language), but a furry is a anthropomorphized animal character that may or may not be sexualized – the furry fan wears full a full-body fursuit. Pet-play is a BDSM type of roleplay that where one or more of the participants acts out in a way characteristic of an animal (usually a dog, cat or horse) and another participant plays the role of its owner – although a pet could be wearing a collar (leash), he may or may not be *collard* by the owner. A collar is a symbol in the BDSM community that the submissive/slave is owned by a Dominant/Master.
@mydriasis
re: kinksters..
I’m 29 and I really don’t get the whole ear stretching thing, plenty of people my age do this, but really, when you take them out are your ears not permanently stretched?? Ever seen those pics of tribal women in National Geographic when they take their ‘gauges’ out? Jesus, can’t wait to see what these people look like when they are 50+.. Ugh. The urge to cover one’s self with tattoos is also going to look pretty fucking stupid past a certain age too.. well good luck to them I guess.
@39:
The problem with that premise is that it’s inherently flawed by the nature of 1. people being able to have multiple interests, and 2. asking even furries themselves to pin down the definition of what “furry” is is like trying to nail Jello to a wall.
Speaking as someone who has longtime knowledge of the subject, I (and the vast majority of furries I know) find it a tad annoying that being a furry automatically makes folks unfamiliar with the fandom assume that you either like to have sex in fursuits or with real animals. I’d say easily that 95% of self-identified furries/furry fans/whatever they feel like calling themselves do NOT even own fursuits (expensive, hot, difficult to transport, etc) and the small community that does, very few of them choose to deliberately get them messy for *any* reason (mostly due to the expense and difficulty of cleaning something that large, made out of pretty pricey specialty material). Even at the largest furry convention in the US (an event where one might imagine wearing a fursuit would be the most likely), out of 4400 attendees this year, there were less than 900 fursuiters in attendance.
I do not believe that furry itself has any crossover with bestiality (as the point of furry is animals with human characteristics, or humans with animal characteristics–furries tend to treat their characters as if they were simply people that happen to look like animals, and perhaps with some touches of what one might imagine animal behavior would be like in a humanlike society), but that being said, much like there are an assortment of furries who are into BDSM and assorted kink play, there are furries who are also interested in less than…stellar conduct. Especially with bestiality, people outside the fandom sometimes have a hard time understanding the difference between “animal people” and animals, and the fact that the fandom is often seen as heavily sexualized only adds to the misconception.
I often see the sexual kink assortment of the furry community as kinda just mirroring the world at large…furry fans are just people, after all…if a tad geeky, and a tad more open about their sexuality. (The most boring answer is never the one people want to hear, though. Haha.) That being said, bestiality is actually one of the few things I’ve seen the furry community at large truly and loudly shun, despite being open to much else. Are there some folks who do? I don’t deny it. But over and over again I’ve seen those people get mocked, harassed, and often banned from events and online communities when found out, so the idea that being a furry automatically puts you under suspicions of bestiality inclinations is, well, an idea that only gets formed on the outside, I think.
I often use this metaphor:
Many people like chocolate. Some people are HUGE fans of chocolate and read books about it, think about it often, like spending time talking to other chocolate fans, or even learn to create their own chocolate art. Some people involve chocolate in sex. It does not logically follow that EVERYONE who likes chocolate wants to have sex with it.
@48:
Not all furry fans wear fursuits, but outside of that I think you have the idea, yes. (Also, some furry fans call themselves “furries” as well as the actual characters themselves, which only adds to the confusion…)
You know, hubby and wife could sell their plasma for around $500 a month for the both of them.
It’s been said we are all the funny-cartoon animal of the stories of our lives.
It’s like in “Understanding Comics” when Scott McCloud talks about how even though we don’t see ourselves when we interact with others, we still hold an image of ourselves in our imagination. Because of the remove, this image of ourselves tends to be more idealized from how we literally present ourselves. This relates to how anime is suited to drawing-in readers to identify with their protagonists. This association carries over into the presentation of funny-animal cartoons.
In this way, the appeal of furriness could be in reconciling the idealization of something like porn with actual sex, since the participants are literally adopting the roles. Associating furriness with bestiality rather than this dynamic isn’t inherently something the practitioners bring to the kink, it’s something the outsiders do. It’s like when children are made ashamed for things that are completely innocent. It’s crapping on what it takes for the practitioners to be unself-conscious when they have sex. We should hope to do better than to walk away from others with chunks of them in our stomachs.