Eugene Weekly : Savage Love : 3.1.07

Savage Love
by Dan Savage

 

Serious question: I have always had a thing for Anna Nicole Smith and frequently masturbated to her Playboy photos. I’ve always felt some guilt about masturbation to begin with, but since her death, I now feel a little creepy doing it. Do you think it’s okay to continue now that she has passed away?

Missing Anna Nicole

 

No, MAN, I don’t.

But not because it’s disrespectful—there’s nothing you can do to Anna Nicole Smith in death that could possibly outdo the shit Anna Nicole Smith subjected herself to in life. No, the reason you feel creepy about beating off to Anna Nicole’s photos now, MAN, and the reason you must stop, is this: Whacking off to the dead violates the hope that masturbation represents. When Anna Nicole was alive and young and beautiful, MAN, a tiny part of your brain somehow managed to convince your dick that your fantasies existed within the realm of possibility. If the right set of circumstances, however improbable, were to occur, you might actually find yourself in bed with Anna Nicole Smith. So long as she lived, MAN, you lived—and whacked off—in hope.

But masturbating to the dead inspires only feelings of hopelessness and despair. Which is why no one beats off to James Dean or River Phoenix or Marilyn Monroe or Mary Todd Lincoln without feeling a little creepy, a little hopeless, and a little closer to the grave himself. Knock it off.

 

I’m intelligent, attractive, and have a great sense of humor. It’s taken a little bit of time, but I’m really comfortable with who I am. What I am is a 25-year-old virgin. I just keep missing out on sex, usually because there are no condoms around. Recently, though, I’ve noticed that the guys I date just can’t seem to get past the virgin issue. I think they don’t want the “responsibility” attached to deflowering me. In the past two cases, the guys were willing when we were naked, but there were no condoms. Then when we were not naked, there was a step back and we stopped seeing each other. I am also growing increasingly frustrated. What do you suggest?

Should I Be Honest?

 

In these modern times, many reputable pharmacists will sell condoms to women—even single women, SIBH. So I would suggest that you purchase a box of latex condoms and place them in your medicine chest, so that a condom will be close at hand the next time you and a suitable young man find yourselves naked and on a bed.

 

I feel like I’ve missed out on life. I grew up on “the mission field” in a conservative Christian home where “gosh” and “heck” were bad words. I was homeschooled for most of my life, and when I got back to North America, I enrolled in a Christian university. After years of dealing with the crap fundamentalists dish out to their young, I finally became an atheist, and a year later I’m still going strong.

My problem is that after spending my whole life immersed in the evangelical culture, I have no idea how to function in the real world. I’ve never had a girlfriend, never had sex, never kissed a girl. I’m a fairly attractive, healthy, well-adjusted young man, but the only women I know are Christians, and starting a relationship with one of them would be pointless. I read stories about people in college hooking up and getting laid like nobody’s business, but I never had the chance to get involved in anything like that. I’ve gone to bars and clubs, but I just have no idea what I’m supposed to do or how to meet people.

Former Fundie

 

Between 90 and 95 percent of people in bars and clubs on any given night have no idea what they’re supposed to do or how to meet people. Which is why most people go to bars and clubs with their friends, i.e., girls with packs of girls, guys with packs of guys. By going to bars and clubs with people you already know and like—your posse or your peeps or your entourage or whatever you wanna call the people you’ll never see again after you’re married—you’ll not only have a good time, FF, but more importantly, you’ll be seen having a good time. And that, my ex-Christian friend, is the secret to success in the bar and club scene.

That and money. And blow. And looks. Good luck.

 

I’m a 20-year-old female college student, and I have a boring history of serial monogamy. I’ve been in three long-term, committed relationships since I was 15, and I’ve never had a dick in my mouth that I didn’t think was attached to a boy I could love forever.

The problem is this: My current boyfriend is wonderful. We’ve been together for a year and a half, we’re sharing a room in a house we rent with friends, we’re very compatible, and we love, respect, and trust each other. But I am starting to long for that lurid history that I never had. Is it normal to feel this way when you realize you really are with someone you plan to stay with for years? I hate the “we need some time apart” line because it seems irrational to part with the expectation of getting back together, but I’m afraid of losing this guy for good over my wanting some quality slut time.

Maybe I just need to be single, whether I sleep with anybody or not. What should I tell him? Should I just wait it out? We’re so close and I hate feeling this way.

Restless And Heartbroken

 

You’ve convinced yourself that you can have this boy or you can have sexual adventures, RAH, a classic false choice. Who says you can’t have this boy and sexual adventures, too? Okay, he might say you can’t have him and sexual adventures, too—at least the kind that involve you putting a dick in your mouth that’s not attached to him—but who knows? If you scrape up the courage to tell your wonderful boyfriend how you’re feeling, you might find out that your boyfriend is anxious to do a little lurid adventuring, too. Or your might wind up alone. Either way, you’ll wind up having your sexual adventures.

 

I read your column faithfully every week in the Orlando Weekly. But I need to ask two things. What does the abbreviation GGG stand for? And what was the website that you mentioned a while ago for men to meet transsexuals?

A Faithful Reader

 

GGG stands for “good, giving, and game,” which is what we should all strive to be for our sex partners. Think “good in bed,” “giving equal time and equal pleasure,” and “game for anything—within reason.” And that tranny website I mentioned was, I believe, www.freerepublic.com.

 

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