I've been reading your column for a while, and you always advise kinky people to go seek the same within the kink community. But in my experience, the kink community is very "sex right away, get to know you later"–oriented. So I have two questions. First, as a gay man who's a bit of an old-fashioned romantic, is there somewhere I can go to find sexually compatible people who are willing to let me get to know them before we fuck? And second, it's very difficult for me to come in vanilla situations, which has caused some awkwardness in the past. My fetish is intense CBT (cock and ball torture), it's pretty specific, and in my (admittedly limited) experience, most guys aren't very willing to let me inflict that kind of pain. Seeing as I'm probably not going to...

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I've been reading your column for a while, and you always advise kinky people to go seek the same within the kink community. But in my experience, the kink community is very "sex right away, get to know you later"–oriented. So I have two questions. First, as a gay man who's a bit of an old-fashioned romantic, is there somewhere I can go to find sexually compatible people who are willing to let me get to know them before we fuck? And second, it's very difficult for me to come in vanilla situations, which has caused some awkwardness in the past. My fetish is intense CBT (cock and ball torture), it's pretty specific, and in my (admittedly limited) experience, most guys aren't very willing to let me inflict that kind of pain. Seeing as I'm probably not going to stop dating people from the general pool (shy 24-year-old cub, not into hookups—I take what I can get), do you have any advice for making conventional sex a little better for me?

Horny In SanFran, Bitching About Lacking Love Scene

"Congratulations to HISBALLS for admitting to himself that he has a creative sex drive," said Donald Roger, the sadistic entrepreneur behind Shotgun Video (shotgunvideo.com), a gay BDSM porn studio that specializes in CBT. "Instead of wasting his time on why-am-I-bored-with-this sex, HISBALLS can look forward to a passionate and fascinating sex life."

To say that Roger shares your kink is putting it mildly: Just torturing another man's balls—listening to that man moan and groan—is all it takes to make Roger come. "People say that has to be trick photography," said Roger, whose "no-hands loads" are featured in Shotgun videos. "But it's not a trick! Doubters are welcome to purchase our 100th video, Loose Cannons. I think it's my masterpiece."

I'm going to quickly answer your main question, HISBALLS, and then let Roger give you some advice that might actually be useful: Hardcore kinksters—kinksters who find it difficult to come in vanilla situations—make conventional sex a little better by entertaining fantasies about their kinks.

But you know what's better? Dating guys who share or are open to your kinks.

"Finding appropriate partners is harder for seriously kinky men, but it's a lot easier now than it used to be," said Roger. "Recon is a worldwide cruising site (recon.com) that caters to alt-sex men. HISBALLS can choose a profile name for himself (like MuscleCBT—that guy is notorious), he can put up a few pictures, and most importantly he can write out what he's looking for. He can tell people if he's a top or a bottom, give some indication of what experience he's had, focus on what he wants, but also tell people what his no-fly zones are—as in 'no unsafe sex, no drugs, and no Republicans.'"

You can also find kinky guys at Adam4Adam, Manhunt, and BigMuscle—and you'll find kinky guys in the general dating pool, too—and you're not obligated to jump into bed and/or immediately start torturing the cock and balls of someone you've just met.

"HISBALLS can suggest going to a movie or dinner, or taking in the entire opera season together first," said Roger, "or go straight to bed if it seems right. He should go at the speed that's right for him. And he'll be surprised—or more likely stunned—at just how many romantic, CBT-oriented men there are out there."

A quick programming note about CBT: You can really hurt someone—you can really damage someone—if you attempt CBT without knowing what you're doing. That's why Roger produced a series of instructional videos for men who are curious about CBT. Look for videos number 59, 60, and 62 at shotgunvideo.com, a series of lectures/demos. They're just $10 each. Follow Roger on Twitter @RogerOfShotgun.


I lost my dad young and I had a bunch of issues growing up. I'm probably gay, I love the idea of light bondage, and I've been this way for as long as I can remember. I feel like I've been on a self-discovery thing over the past year and have caught tidbits that bothered me. I have depression/anxiety and the old "abandonment complex," and I'm still insecure about a lot of this. Is it reasonable to blame psychological trauma for my sexuality—the possibly gay thing and the kinks?

Troubled Over Yearnings

The inclination to blame your sexuality and kinks on your loss is understandable, TOY, but it's not reasonable. (Sorry about your dad, kiddo.) Because when you think about it—when you apply reason—you quickly come to this: There are lots of gay men out there who are into bondage who didn't lose their dads at a young age, who don't suffer from depression or anxiety, who don't have abandonment issues, and whose childhoods were comparatively issue-free. It's natural to wonder how you got to be kinky, TOY, but kinks are pretty random and pretty inexplicable.


Your advice to UGH last week was fine in general—he's the frustrated man whose wife isn't interested in sex—and a pretty solid rehash of your standard advice for people trapped in sexless marriages. But I'm writing because you missed something that may have been key: "Currently, she can last having sex for nearly half an hour before feeling exhausted and stopping, regardless of me reaching orgasm or not." Two things: (1) Half an hour of PIV sex when you're not feeling it would take a vat of lube and probably still be painful. (2) His wife lies there getting the inside of her vagina sanded off by Jackhammer McGee here and then has the nerve to ask him to stop when it's too much "regardless" of HIS orgasm?!? What about her orgasm? What about her delicate vaginal tissue getting torn up? Not that he will magically consider her pleasure if he's blind to her comfort and general well-being, but it might help him put his marriage in perspective.

Engaged Reader Represents

Thanks for your e-mail, ERR, and I really should've spotted that. We all have our blind spots, and this is definitely one of mine: When someone says they were having sex for half an hour, I don't think of 30 minutes of PIV/PIB, as I don't define "sex" as "penetrative vaginal or anal intercourse." My working definition of sex includes mutual masturbation, oral, fantasy play, and PIV/PIB. So when someone says, "My partner can only last having sex for half an hour," I imagine half an hour of oral and mutual masturbation and penetration all jumbled together. I need to bear in mind that not all of my readers define sex the same way I do—indeed, far too many people believe penetration is sex and vice versa. Thanks for the reminder, ERR.


CONFIDENTIAL TO AMERICAN WOMEN: Did you watch the big GOP debate last week? Scott Walker said that he supports a ban on abortion with no exception to save the life of the pregnant woman, and Marco Rubio said that women impregnated by rapists should not be allowed to get abortions—and not one of the other eight men onstage objected, not even the one supposedly pro-choice candidate. That would be George Pataki, the "pro-choice Republican" who bragged about defunding Planned Parenthood when he was governor of New York. recommended

On the Lovecast, Dan and Amanda Marcotte on Planned Parenthood and Republican lunacy: savagelovecast.com.

mail@savagelove.net

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