Savage Love Aug 22, 2018 at 3:46 pm

Savage Love Letter of the Day

Comments

1

As soon as she started talking about Liz and Joe I was like WAIT, what happened to the cool, hot couple?! They sound like one in a million and were obviously still interested, am I naive to wonder why she kept rolling the dice after that jackpot?

2

LW, you have had whole lot of Christian bullshit about not judging people piled upon you, which teaches you to ignore your own instincts. I'm all sympathy.

3

Who's Bob?

4

I got that crazy stuff out of my youth.

Yeah guys are horny and generally an open relationship is not a sign of a healthy relationship. Sure there are happy couples who have an open relationship. But what I have seen and experienced:

Once the other half is gone the guy will try to intimate sex 1on1.
Going places that were never mentioned or asked for (anal can be fun; but having someone poke their dick in your ass unexpectedly... is unexpected)

Then you get the relationships where one person is pressured and your in the middle just sitting there saying to yourself oh crappers how do I GTFO?

Open relationships revolve around a partner who wants more (typically); pay attention to the details as they count.

5

Doesn't seem like a fake letter but that "we're both military" line dropped at the end was very weird. Not that the military isn't a reflection of society as a whole, but what are the odds that a "unicorn" finds a MF couple for MMF threesomes and both guys are active-duty military? And if you were active-duty military with edgy taste in sex, wouldn't you want to be more careful about screening who you play with, since this guy was able to casually drop the "I'll tell your commanding officer" bombshell? Sign me Just Curious.

6

@5 a buddy of mine is a JAG. He says his most common cases are related to group sex and that "running train" is a pastime on base.

7

@5, I assumed they lived on a military base or close to one.

8

@5 military people tend to be concentrated on bases, or in towns near to bases. My experience has been that either half the people in a restaurant, store, bar, whatever, are military, or none are.

9

@5 MMF? I thought LW was F.

10

Either this woman doesn't know what she wants or she's totally ADD, flipping from one shiny object to another even after she's got what she wants. Here's a couple rules for you, DUD.

1) When someone you "would not fuck with someone else’s vagina" creeps you out, maybe NOT continue the flirty girl routine, allowing him to give you neck massages and go to another house with him late at night (even if other people are there). Just a thought.

2) When you connect with a really hot woman who is super cool and smart and friendly, and whose husband is also one of the most beautiful humans you've ever seen in real life, say to yourself, "JACKPOT!" and commence to fucking them both until their eyes pop out. Do this as often as you can, and stop looking for better than best. A bird in the hand beats a bastard in your bush.

11

@9: I thought LW was male until the 5th para when she refers to Joe wanting to lick her pussy. Even then you're not totally sure. What a delightfully malleable letter for all sorts of musings.

12

OF COURSE guys who need to use a female partner to get pussy are creepy. The non-creepy ones can do it on their own.

Here's the rules:

1) If the guy talks to you, and you like the guy, and the guy invites his female partner, you're almost certainly good. (Guys who are pressuring their female partners will almost certainly creep you out. But you can cut even that issue off by talking to the female partner in advance, and meeting in a neutral area.)

2) If you're talking to the woman, and she doesn't care if her guy is involved, then you're good - because the guy can get pussy on his own so doesn't mind if his wife gets pussy on her own which means he's not a creeper.

3) If you're talking to the woman but things are only kosher if her husband is there the WHOLE TIME, he's probably a creeper.

Also, if there's a dude, he's probably a creeper.

But even 2) can go wrong... I've had friends who unicorn a couple and all is well until after the fact and then the guy gets super needy creepy, so you never know.

13

I'm sorry the LW had a bad experience, and people shouldn't treat people like she was treated... but man were there plenty of opportunities for her to end this before it got to where it did. Get on your game LW! If you are going to be out there meeting randos for kinky sex, you've got to protect yourself and have your sketchdar dialed in.

Better luck in future endeavors, LW!

14

@5 @9 @11 Unicorns are always female. Male "unicorns" are called "men".

15

Yeah, LW, this is about par for the course. The true "unicorn" is a couple that's has 2 attractive, non-creepy, non-emotionally abusive people in it. They're rarer than gold, so stick with the good couple.

16

I was a unicorn in my former life, for a time. I can get why LW weren't back to their house, even when not into the creepy dude. This shit can be exciting. You're into the one half and want to see what's gonna happen. All that flirting and compliments can get to your head, make you loopy on Endo and ego trips. That said tho, this shit could've gone SO WRONG. I'm relieved it didn't. But I can't lie, I was cringing the entire time, almost expecting it to happen. I hope LW learned the lesson from this.

17

This letter was too long. I got bored and bailed. I hope things worked out ok.

18

I was thinking the same as Dan in his post-post-script, if she found Joe as sexually attractive as Mr. Hot, would she have found his initial texts creepy, or would she have gotten super aroused thinking, "wow, how did this super hot guy know that I'd be into bondage?" Same thing at the restaurant and at the patio, would the offer of a massage or the massage been creepy or thrilling? If the distinction is your opinion of his sexual attractiveness versus his behaviors, then you're not criticizing him for what he has done, but for the way he looks.

And for everyone last week who was adamant that it is wrong, absent consent, for someone in an open relationship to divulge to their partner their sexual experiences with thirds, please note that LW has shared with Dan, details about someone's sex life, drug use, and profession, in connection with providing his photo, and I'm doubtful that LW received his consent to provide all that info along with his personally identifying photo.

19

Just to add to all the other good advice something that came up as a red flag for me once was when in the group chat the dude said he wanted me and his gf to get to know each other better and then proceeded to interrupt everything she said and took over. She hardly said anything and then when he continued to throw up red flags and I called him out ... Politely I might add.. I got a lot of arseholery and then she said nothing which confirmed for me that he was a controlling partner. These were young beautiful people too so creeps don't always "look" like creeps.

20

NAILED it, @ Dan, and @19, you took the words right out of my mouth. No one's saying that this "Joe" guy didn't moonwalk across all of your consent lines, but if you're assuming that Mr. Creepy is going to be the lumbering, slobbery, hunchbacked fellow you see lurking in the woods in horror movies, and heavily breathing into the phone, then THAT'S where you've gone wrong, right there. Hell, "young and beautiful", was socially adept, clean-cut, well-dressed, and driving a convertible...when he tried to kidnap me and drag me into his shiny dream machine.

I can imagine at exactly which point this would have stopped being a fantasy come true; I was lucky to have escaped.

But, aside from all of that, "cute Liz" did you pretty wrong, too, by dragging you, a complete stranger, into "Joe's" life, misinformed and unaware that SHE didn't know him that well and had never met him in person before. To me, that makes her pretty fucking creepy, too, and if not creepy, then maybe just selfish, naive, and irresponsible. "Probably", as her blanket statement, is what safeguarded HER from being responsible for whatever his true intentions were. I'd honestly steer clear of her, too, for those reasons, alone.

Couples love unicorns for a reason, right? They're rare...so go enjoy being their beautiful guest star for as long as they'll have you, LW, and stop meeting strange "couples" until you develop better precautions, filters, boundaries and escape strategies.

21

Correction@20: I confused "Sheila" for "Liz", my bad! The rest still applies, though.

22

DougSF @1: Exactly! Why did she not just stick with the good thing she had going with the first couple?
I haven't read this long letter, but I know the gist. Joe is a creep. Lesson: If you're not attracted to someone ("she’s cute as hell; him, I would not fuck with someone else’s vagina"), don't agree to be naked in the same postcode as them. You weren't a complete idiot, but it seems you got off lightly -- take a lesson from my first experience with a couple where the stated boundaries were that he was supposed to "watch". Yeah, right. Stick with Couple #1, delete these people, learn a lesson and move on.

23

Traffic @15: Nailed it. Rarer than women who will sleep with couples are couples you want to sleep with. Hence the reason there are so many bi women and so few unicorns.

24

@2 spot on, Roseanne.
While other readers have given good feedback about WHAT went wrong for LW and the red flags ignored along the way, right at the beginning you had the excellent insight about WHY it went wrong and why she ignored all those red flags along the way.
It's neurotic and often cruel to be constantly looking for negative subtexts in the behavior/statements of others. But the default setting in the other extreme -- unconditional patience and acceptance, whether pushed upon us by mainstream Christianity or New Age platitudes -- is equally neurotic and frequently cruel to ourselves.

25

LW here. To those who have expressed sympathy, thank you. @2, yeah, you nailed it. I was fucked up in the head by religious bullshit right through my mid-20s. I was taught to always give people the benefit of the doubt and not ever upset anyone. I’m from the south, too, so multiply that conditioning by a zillion. I’ve gotten way better, but it still takes conscious effort. To those who think I’m an idiot, well, I agree. The hot couple were out of town and I was horny. And they were so great I guess I forgot how rare they are. To Dan and others asking about the thought experiment, yes, I would still have been creeped out if Joe were hot—I bailed on meeting another hot couple because the guy invited me back to their place and got really upset with me when I insisted on meeting in public first. Re: the military confusion, I’m a civilian employee of a different branch than Joe. I’m not active duty, but I work with a lot of people who are, so I know how serious a threat to contact a CO is. I haven’t seen or heard from either of them again, so hopefully that threat resonated, but this guy actually teaches a course in surveillance, so I was really nervous.

27

I haven't read the comments yet, but seems like LW learned her lessons and Dan's advice is good, so not much more to say there.

I want to just add a comment about shoulder rubs. Not sure how other women respond to this, but I find unsolicited shoulder rubs and offers of shoulder rubs to be a major creep red flag. In my experience, men start suddenly wanting to rub your shoulders when you first go through puberty. It's a way to touch someone's body while pretending it's innocent. As an adult, I found the same thing- guys rub your shoulders because they want to make a move and this seems like something they can do without waiting to see if you are interested. And even when it's someone with whom physical contact is welcome- shoulder rubs aren't sexy. They aren't a kiss, they don't feel like a caress, and usually people aren't good at it. The majority of the time, it feels pointless (why are you putting your hands on my shoulders?) and sometimes it just hurts (why are you squeezing my neck muscles like that?). Just don't rub someone's shoulders unless they ask.

28

I mean, to clarify, it's different if you've been out paddling with someone all day and your partner says, "hey want me to massage out that stiffness?" vs when you are at dinner with someone and they walk over and suddenly start rubbing your shoulders or ask if you'd like a massage over your pint. It just feels like the sort of move one makes if they don't know how to initiate physical contact or else aren't sure if a kiss would be welcome.

29

@Dan "Why were you wasting your time on Liz and Joe when this couple...was available?"
@Dougsf "...why she kept rolling the dice after that jackpot?"
@BiDanFan "Why did she not just stick with the good thing she had going with the first couple?"

Why is anyone asking why DUD (aka Tekmessa) would want more than one couple in her life to unicorn with?

Even if it were not the case that per @25 Tekmessa "The hot couple were out of town", a unicorn can have plenty of libido to embrace multiple couples.

32

People keep asking why she didn't stick to the attractive couple - isn't it probable that wasn't her choice?

Sounds likely that the attractive couple just has ONS threesomes and is not looking for something more lasting.

33

@25 You're not an idiot, you just expected people to be decent which is a mistake everyone sometimes makes.

I have a question. Why do you want to be a unicorn at all? You're interested in women, you could just pursue single women. Why does a man have to be there? In the brief period of time between when I downloaded dating apps and when I gave up, I avoided unicorn hunters like the plague. Unfortunately I still encountered them because they are sneaky. They basically don't see bisexual women as people and basically want a prostitute/sex slave they don't have to pay for. I would rather be single and lonely until the end of time than deal with horrible people.

I agree with Dan that you have to pay attention to your own desires. If a guy is ugly, and rapey, and you don't want to date him, you don't have to date him. It doesn't matter how many things he does "right," what matters is what you want. Also, you would have been within your rights to call the police during the domestic dispute and they might have gotten you back to your house safely.

34

@33, I’m not really interested in women as a primary partner. I more just want to explore. I don’t want to mislead anyone on dating apps or pull a bait and switch on a woman I hit it off with who is looking for an actual relationship.

35

Tekmessa @34: What about bi women who are in poly relationships? There are a ton of us out there and we can NEVER seem to find female partners. Not all of us insist that you share our men! (By the way, I did get why you went looking for another couple after the first one worked out so well. Because the first one worked out so well, and because you're keen to make up for lost time, if you're like I was!)

36

BiDanFan@35, I would be fine with that, as long as everything was above board. That was one of my (many) mistakes. I was a little smitten with her and I took him at his word that he would be fine bowing out and just letting the ladies get to know each other (he identifies as poly). That's the only reason I went in the first place--the possibility (spelled out by BOTH of them)--of just that scenario. And yes, you're right about the making up for lost time bit! Thanks for not crucifying me--I'm surprised more people haven't and really appreciate the insights. I guess I just have to stop expecting people not to be assholes :p

37

Tekmessa: Hey, no judgment - that's for those other shits that acted badly - you behaved decently. But yeah, those more familiar to the community will tell you, @33's right - most Unicorn Hunters are absolute garbage (that's also the answer to 29's question). You didn't know that, so you had one good experience and you were like "oh wow, there's lots of great steak for 99 cents," and then discovered that no, there's not.

Also, Sublime @18: any unsolicited noncon stuff (done or referred to) is absolutely a deal breaker because there's a word for unsolicited noncon - sexual assault.

38

@37 Traffic Spiral "most Unicorn Hunters are absolute garbage"
That is incredibly depressing.

39

Dan: I love you, but you REALLY need to read your letters ALL THE WAY THROUGH and then EDIT them! Instead of leaving us to read them through and be bored to zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz by the end. There were valuable lessons here, but your SLOD are getting way too long.

40

I read often and never post, but I just wanted to weigh in on this one. I'm not a unicorn (I would only, maybe, be willing in a context where both parts of the couple are phenomenally queer). I am a queer genderqueer person who often gets unicorn hunted (less so, but not never, now that I've had top surgery). And my experience also is that most unicorn hunters are creepy garbage. Not the least because my online dating profile clearly states that I'm only interested in other queer people, and yet straight man/heteroflexible woman couples still creep on me. I've even been in the situation where it turned out that a friend of mine did unicorn for a creepy hetero man/heteroflexible woman couple that I had rebuffed, so I got the downlow on the creepitude. Which included (entirely unexceptionally) that they expected her to be "disease free" and recently tested, but despite the fact that they were clearly looking for a casual third, the male partner was also clearly put out that she wasn't willing to ever have barrier-free piv with them. Ah yes. The standard: you are supposed to be our casual toy, but also tested and monogamous to us so that we get to do everything we want. I totally concurr with assessment of other people above that non-garbage unicorn hunters are way rarer than unicorns, and that's a good part of the reason unicorns are so rare.

41

Tekmessa @36: Just assume that the majority of men are sleazeballs and proceed accordingly. And unfortunately, with a couple, they are committed to each other but they don't know you from Adam, so two-plus-one can easily become two-against-one when it comes to applying pressure to do something you don't want to do. I learned this the hard way myself, so I completely sympathise.
OKCupid has LOTS of poly women seeking women on their own. Good luck!

42

Sexscholar @40: Hide your profile from straight people. Best thing I ever did.
I agree that a lot of unicorn hunters seem to want an unpaid sex worker. It's all about fulfilling THEIR fantasy; they haven't even thought about what the unicorn might want out of the experience. To date my worst threesomes have been with established M/F couples...

43

DUD should know that what "Joe" was up to was boundary testing. The guy pretends the touch is no big deal, "just" a shoulder massage, "just" a hug, "just" a little friendly kiss. But what he is doing is gauging how far he can push, and see if he can wear down your boundaries until you feel you can't say "no", because you said "yes" to everything else. See how that works?

I got really good at sussing out whether a guy was a good guy or a creep, and you were 100% right when you saw "Joe's" message about bondage as a red flag. A normal, nice guy would not assume you were up for a sexualized message like that, especially right off the bat when you are still just talking. Any guy who starts out too quickly with the sexual questions, instead of letting YOU lead, is going to turn out to be a creep.

I also suggest meeting up with the wife by yourself the first time - only her. If the guy won't agree to that, then he is probably controlling the situation and you definitely don't want to be with a couple where the man has more say over the Special Guest Star than the wife does.

Always write the wife first. Then meet the wife; and if she is cool, agree to talk to the husband online. Then meet her and the husband somewhere away from where you live. Never give a clue as to where you live, OR where you work.

If you get along, they should be more than accommodating to your speed, your rules, your comfort level. Any couple who try to control the situation, e.g., do not let you lead or try to pressure you, is not a couple you want to meet.

No sexual innuendo, no sexual pictures, no sex talk. Period, until you know whether or not you actually LIKE them as people. That way, you will avoid the creeps and weirdos as well as the controlling dominating males.

44

This whole "unicorn" stuff seems way more trouble than it's worth. For the unicorn, I mean. I guess they are "unicorns" for a reason.

45

She led Joe on, she went home with him and his girlfriend, after a night, week, of innuendos. They were all cozy, drinking around a hot tub. He wanted her, he said too much, did too much, but he is not a terrible person all by himself. Joe and Liz failed, they broke the cardinal rule of threesomes, don't fight in front of a third!

46

Antiserumite @45: Uh, THAT'S the "cardinal rule of threesomes"? Where did you read that?
I thought the cardinal rule of threesomes was to be considerate and respectful of everyone involved. (They did break that rule.) But hey, what do I know...
And she didn't "lead Joe on," FFS. She stated her boundaries. Joe seemed to think they were there to be disregarded. Joe led HER on: He led her to believe he could be a decent human being, but she found out otherwise. Thankfully before he had the opportunity to rape her.

47

@BiDanFan, I think not fighting in front of thirds falls under your more considered Cardinal rules, agreed there. But LW had plenty of opt outs with Joe and Liz, the worst thing he did was express his interests, scorn the fact that she had been scared off, and while, creepy, make sure she got home safe, calling him a potential rapist seems extreme, considering he was so concerned with the other woman portraying herself dishonestly to her partner. But what do I know?

48

For all we know this guy was, ineptly, trying to be an ethical non-monogamist. And our LW just thought he was gross.

49

"the worst thing he did was express his interests"
Really? You think that was worse than continuing to express his interest after she'd told him to back off, touching her without consent, yelling at two adult women, or FOLLOWING LW HOME? (You don't think he could have -texted- to "make sure she got home safe"?)
I think he was concerned about not getting laid, that's all.
Calling him a potential rapist is not extreme given that I myself was raped by a man in a very similar situation to this one. But what do I know? Only that he showed himself in this brief time incapable of respecting boundaries, which is a giant waving red flag that Tekmessa herself fortunately saw before anything too awful happened.

50

@49 BiDanFan, Sorry, I'm sorry, when the red flags are there, it is best to err on the side of caution. And you're right, he probably did hope to salvage a sexual encounter, but he is not a rapist, and he was upset when the other girl was being dishonest, which to me says he wanted transparency in their sexual interactions. He played this terribly, but are you committing to the idea that he is a terrible person?

51

@49 BiDanFan, I am sincerely sorry. It is not my intention to mitigate any part of sexual assault, or the circumstances that lead up to it. Please know that.

52

@50: Being upset with dishonesty is one thing. Berating a woman for someone else's dishonesty and then proceeding to blame her for the LW leaving is scary as fuck. It betrays serious anger issues, a tendency to shift blame, a lack of self awareness, etc. Any desire for transparency does not mitigate that absolutely unacceptable behavior.

You say he's "not a rapist"? He's already demonstrated he doesn't give a shit about consent by reaching out and grabbing before he gets an answer to "do you mind?" Circumstance, not scruple, stopped him from being a rapist.

53

Also I think we should set the bar for "not a terrible person" higher than "doesn't rape people". I've known several terrible people, and none of them (that I know of) have ever raped anyone.

54

Antiserumite @50: I can't tell you whether Joe is a terrible person or whether he is a rapist -- and how can you definitively say he wouldn't have raped her or that he hasn't raped before? Saying he's a "potential rapist" is not saying he is a rapist, it just means there are warning signs. Joe's getting "upset" (which I'd describe more as "throwing a tantrum") with the other woman's lying says he has anger issues in addition to his boundary issues. Maybe these don't make him a terrible person, but they make his behaviour and attitude terrible. And he followed her home, which is fricking scary. You can't really argue that it was "to keep her safe" when he himself was the threat she was fleeing!

I think we agree: "When the red flags are there, it is best to err on the side of caution." That's all I'm arguing. Thankfully we will never know whether she would have been raped if she'd stuck around. Joe does not respect boundaries. Rapists do not respect boundaries. Does this make Joe a rapist? As I said... potentially.


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