#877: “Stop texting me about your questionable exploits, bro.”

127 thoughts on “#877: “Stop texting me about your questionable exploits, bro.””

1. It may vary, depending on your location, but it MOST jurisdictions in America, at least, I do believe that his partner being black-out drunk before they engage in ANY sexual activity, kinky or not, qualifies as legal rape. Legal definitions do vary, by area, so PLEASE, consult a local lawyer.

   The lawyer might advise you to show the police the texts. It’s evidence of a crime, or at least evidence that this man is bragging about committing a crime, even if his texts are flat-out lies. If you were to delete it, and keep it secret, and someone found out about it (such as a prosecuting attorney, checking HIS texts, and seeing that he sent the texts to you, and you failed to report), you might be looking at being charged as an accessory after the fact, should the “kinky” woman decide to press charges against skeevy-bro. Again, the laws vary by location, so you definitely need to consult a local lawyer.

   Most lawyers will give an initial consultation for free.

   Alternately, you could just take the plunge and go straight to the police. At any rate, do NOT continue any sort of friendship with this man. He’s horrible.

   1. About the police: Sometimes they help. Often, especially in rape cases, they do the opposite of that. I would seriously hesitate before involving the police in the life of an unwitting sexual assault victim without her prior knowledge and consent.

      1. That’s a very good point.

         Do you know the woman in question? If so, perhaps you should ask her if she even wants your support in this. She might want it, or she might want to forget the whole thing. Or she might one like a certain rape victim I read about in the news, who was so black-out drunk that she was not even aware she had been raped, until she read the texts.

         It’s a very sticky situation, and there are so many variables, we don’t even know them all. But one thing is certain – this guy is a real jerk, and should be avoided as much as possible. What you do about the rest is something only you can decide, taking into account all the information you have that we don’t. I’m not even sure there IS a “right” answer, here.

         1. It sounds to me like his partner is actively engaging in dangerous, self-destructive behaviour. I say this not to remove blame from Dude, was is acting EXTREMELY BADLY, and should definitely not be having sex, especially kinky sex, especially not repeatedly, with someone who is blackout drunk. I say it because a stranger meddling could make things worse for this woman. Reaching out to her and asking if she wants support, like you suggest, is a good idea. Letting her know that this guy is betraying her confidence is… probably a good idea. She deserves to know, even if it hurts. I would NOT recommend going to the police without talking to her first.

         2. Of course, I don’t know this person or her story. And I don’t know what’s really going on here. “Drunk terrible decisions with terrible sober guy who should know better” is actually the best-case scenario here, beside “weird creepy fantasy”. If there’s any way to reach out to this woman, I would take it.

            But if you can’t, don’t beat yourself up, OK? She’ll be alright. It’s not all on you.

   2. Michelle, as the Captain noted, since law enforcement response to sexual assault victims can vary, I vote for her suggestion not to go to the police yourself on behalf of someone who has not given you permission to do.

      On the other hand, one of the way serial rapists get away with it is that victim after acquaintance after friend group after victim keep quiet and avoid making a fuss/calling Mr Rapey out on his actions or starting any sort of negative consequences. Plus there’s the possibility that, as other commentators have said, these exploits may be imaginary, designed to somehow prove to you how wrong you are or to make you jealous or just give him his sexy frisson of pleasure from sending stuff that is socially inappropriate to you.

      I think I see a middle way. Use the Captain’s script but add on to it: “I am documenting and saving all communications from you and if the police approach me about you, I will cooperate with them.” If your gut tells you that these are not fantasies made up to get some sort of reaction from you, please consider doing a sort of invisible block where you just shunt his communications to a saved folder or whatever but don’t look at them yourself (to avoid the emotional agida) but do not give him any response other than cold silence.

      I am not a lawyer but I do follow crime and law enforcement issues pretty closely. You need to consult a lawyer (if the police contact you) but my impression is that if you cooperate with a police investigation you are unlikely to be charged as an accessory. In fact, if you have sent him ineffective “I’m not comfortable with this” or “TMI, dude” messages, you may already qualify as victim of harassment yourself. You will certainly qualify as a victim of harassment if he ever contacts you again after you use the Captain’s script.

      In many (most?) jurisdictions in the US, the police are unlikely to act on information that does not clearly identify the victim, such as her name, city or address, dates and details of assaults, etc, in part because you had a previous relationship with the man you are talking to them about. Law enforcement is likely to assume that you are a scorned girlfriend or even a scorned wannabe girlfriend and not even contact Mr Rapey. Jurisdictions vary but there are patterns of police response that can be seen and even quantified(!).

      Another possible indication of his texts, etc, being all imagination: the sexy pictures he sent you, if they are all of conventionally attractive people, there’s a chance he just copied them off online porn. Particularly if the pictures included the subject’s clearly identifiable face. My impression is that most people in this day and age who send sexy pictures to share them with one single person are smart enough not to include their faces because of the ease of sharing any digital image.

      tl;dr: Get him out of your life but be prepared for the possibility that law enforcement may be asking questions some day.

      1. “I am documenting and saving all communications from you and if the police approach me about you, I will cooperate with them.”

         That seems like a really excellent idea! It protects yourself, if it should come to that, AND it calls him out on his behavior!

         I love reading this site, and all the comments, because people here are so smart, and can share so many different perspectives, as well. There’s so much to learn!

         Thank you.

         1. Hmm. Threatening police involvement, even in this passive sort of way, sounds like a great way to escalate things. In the way that getting injunctions can be the very thing that pushes stalkers to up their ante. I agree with you both that being aware of the potential illegality of what’s happening here and saving the messages and being prepared to cooperate with the police are good ideas, but threatening this creep with it, not so much. I think the Captain’s script as it is is perfect because it calls this guy out on his behaviour, but in a way that aims at shutting down conversation, not starting an argument.

            1. My statistics are old (from the 1980s) and based only on one US state. Back then, restraining orders worked successfully to deter further contact in about 70% of cases. In about 30% of cases, the restraining order either had no effect on the behaviour or escalated it. The victims were actually pretty accurate in predicting which way their abuser would go but there were some discernible characteristics. For instance, abusers who were concerned with keeping up a law abiding type of public image were always deterred; they were usually furious about the restraining order but their dread of featuring in the police reports in the local paper was stronger than their anger.

               My own gut feeling, which could be totally off base, is that this guy would be deterred. It sounds to me like he is trying to make it seem like his behaviour is all okay because he’s just fulfilling the requests of someone (who happens to be “blackout drunk”); in other words, he’s concerned about his image.

               I certainly could be wrong; the LW is in the best position to make that judgment call.

            2. Thank you for sharing that Duly, that’s really useful and interesting information. I completely agree with you that the LW is in the best position to judge this.

      2. “but my impression is that if you cooperate with a police investigation you are unlikely to be charged as an accessory” – I’m not sure how the LW could be charged as an accessory for anything whatsoever.

         And threatening a skeevy creep sounds like a bad life plan.

         1. I was addressing Michelle C Young’s comment where she raised that possibility. I personally consider the possibility she could be charged as an accessory either before or after to be very unlikely, approaching zero percent.

            1. Right, I’m agreeing with you. I found it very disturbing to suggest to the OP that she could somehow be charged as complicit in a crime because some skeezebag texted her unwanted bragging.

            2. neverjaunty, I apologise for misreading your post.

               While most kink is high on sensation but usually pretty low risk, there is a chance for things to go really wrong, particularly if the people participating are doing certain types of activities (such as bondage in extreme positions or breath play) on the spur of the moment with no real understanding of technique or warning signs.

               Although, who knows? Maybe creepy dude’s definition of depravity is playing Mr Roger’s Neighbourhood videos while bonking. His kink is okay, it’s just not my kink and the LW should not be subjected to it without consent all around.

   3. If the partner is black-out drunk, that is almost surely a crime. The relationship between intoxication and incapacity to consent is hard to define, and if defined is hard to prove, and, as Ms. Young notes, it varies from state to state in the US. I have no idea of the answer anywhere else.
      It is not a crime to fail to report a crime you know about. There are exceptions for some crimes (especially crimes against children) but those only apply to caregivers, such as the child’s parent, or mandatory-reporters, such as teachers and nurses. Those rules also vary from state to state, but mandatory-reporters know who they are, and one adult bragging about his/her exploits with a second adult to a third adult sounds unlikely to fall within any exception. So LW is not under a legal obligation to report. I’m a criminal defense attorney, and I have never heard of a prosecution of someone like LW, and I would be very surprised if I did. Those things do vary depending on the state and on individual police actors and police-agency policies, and I suppose that LW should consult with a lawyer if that would make him/her more comfortable (lawyers give this piece of advice reflexively, like the Captain suggesting counseling), but this is not a set of facts that makes me think that LW needs to worry about criminal liability or talk to a lawyer. Finding a free consultation is not a given – I, and many lawyers, will happily consult with a potential client for free, but if LW called me and the events had occurred in my state, I would not think that LW was in need of a lawyer or was a potential client.
      Police response to sex crimes is, as the Captain notes, wildly inconsistent. I’d be pretty surprised if they were interested on the facts provided here. And, because being the victim in a sex-crime investigation or prosecution can be hard, I personally would be very, very reluctant to report this particular set of facts to the police without knowing that the victim wanted a report made, and I’d have to know the victim pretty well to inquire. Skeevy reports about sex partners seem more likely to get the police involved or interested if LW is personally afraid of a skeevy guy and wants police help or a stalking order, but LW doesn’t suggest that, and neither do the facts provided.
      Good luck. Just blocking communication sounds like it will solve the problem.

   4. Okay I am genuinely bothered by you essentially accusing the LW of being an accomplice in a rape because some guy texted her. I mean if he butt-dialed Dominos would they be shut down too? I agree that saving the texts just in case is a good idea but we have no idea what is really going on. Whether he’s telling tall tales to salve his ego, whether the whole thing is consensual but badly explained, or whether a crime is actually happening. I’m not even sure the police can do anything as it doesn’t sound like the identity of the woman is mentioned or if the LW knows her at all and has the right to speak for her.

      1. I don’t think of the LW of an accomplice. I just worry that others will. Because I have met people who would.

         I’m all for LW protecting herself in every way possible.

         Sorry if I gave the impression that I did think that.

         I’ll just shut up, now.

         1. I get it, I may have jumped to conclusions, but I can’t help but feel anyone who would blame the LW for this guy’s potential action is a jerk. She’s not responsible for what he does or the choices he might make.

   5. A neighbor of mine boasts on Twitter about how they’re grooming a neighbor of their desired gender for sex and detailed descriptions of various canoodling. He is proud of his strategy of waiting till his victim comes home drunk from the local bars (on top of being possibly non compos mentis). I took this to the police and they were very underwhelmed. Management told me I need to hospitalize myself if I think Twitter is real life. Neighbors have seen them canoodling in the common areas and heard domestic violence in the victim’s room, so this isn’t just fiction.

      1. Kudos to you for bringing it to the attention of the police, even if you got a really awful response from them. They may not be able to act on what your neighbor is posting on Twitter, but they should have at least explained that and advised you to immediately if you see or hear the domestic violence taking place. In short, they should have demonstrated understanding of your concern about the situation — there are police officers who do care that you care, but there aren’t nearly enough of them.

         1. That was supposed to be “immediately call” — I have to stop typing responses on my damn phone.

2. ughhhhh. This guy definitely sounds like someone to not interact with in the future. What a fuckin creep/probable rapist.

3. I think he knew the sex was bad, and knew this was the reason the attraction fizzled, and that was a massive blow to his ego. In my experience one thing guys absolutely can’t stand is the implication they’re bad in bed because being good at the sex is so deeply ingrained into our culture’s idea of what it means to be a man.

   He’s probably trying to convince you (and himself) that nooo he wasn’t bad in bed, look at all these other girls who are clearly having a blast, you must just be wrong and/or defective. Funny enough I don’t think he’s trying to pressure you into a hookup, I think he’s looking for an admission of you having been clearly mistaken about your experiences with him. It’s clearly been eating at him.

   Either way he’s a creep, mega mega creep, and this was a bullet dodged.

   1. He’s also bought into the cultural idea that kink is “advanced” sex, so obviously he can’t be bad at the vanilla stuff if he’s doing the kinky stuff!

   2. This, 100% this.

   3. I agree. I think it’s funny (and by “funny” I mean “weird and unflattering at best”) that he’s trying to convince her that it wasn’t bad, and also that these other women tend to be drunk…. if you have to get your date drunk to get them to tell you that your sexin’ is awesome, your sexin’ really isn’t awesome. Even if it’s just a fantasy thing… dude, really? Serious side-eye and at least one hive of bees, from my perspective.

      1. At least one! And I like the mental image of a beehive-based rating system, ie, “It’s a 1.5 beehive situation, worrying but not emergent or dangerous,” or “HOLY SHIT FIVE OUT OF FIVE BEEHIVES”

         1. “Maybe three-ish beehives, but they’re ANGRY, so beware.”

         2. Man, my beehives are all well-behaved and productive. Those wasp nests, though… IDK.

   4. I think you’re right, he doesn’t want LW back, he wants LW to say that he was good in bed.

4. I’m trying to figure out a way to say this that doesn’t come across as blaming LW for problems that are ultimately not their fault, so bear with me. Onward: stuff like this is a small part of why a portion of the population thinks it’s okay to have sex with people who are blackout drunk. Those people brag about it to friends, and friends either congratulate them, nod along and chuckle awkwardly, or just say nothing. LW, you are not responsible for the literally hundreds of facets of rape culture, and you are certainly not responsible for your acquaintance behaving horribly, but if you feel safe doing so, *please* say what the Captain has recommended (or something like it). Awful behavior like this won’t cease without people speaking up and calling others out on shitty behavior. Again, this depends on you feeling like you will be safe in doing so, and there’s a solid chance it will have exactly zero effect, but any small voice in the chorus of “stop doing this shitty thing for the love of all that is holy” makes that chorus louder. I’m sorry you’re dealing with this; discovering that someone you liked is engaging in super crappy behavior is an awful feeling. Jedi hugs to you, if you want them! I hope that he hears you.

   1. I get where you’re coming from, and I think this is one of the trickier parts of the fight. In a general sense, everyone can help fight rape culture by not letting it be normalized, but no-one is specifically responsible to do so. So it’s difficult to point out specific examples of how it happens and how to fight it (which is really useful for learning) without it coming across as blaming bystanders (which is the opposite of helpful). There is probably a sociological term for this. It’s one of the lovely contradictions of being human.

      At any rate, LW, best of luck ditching Mr. Skeevy McSkeevson. Sorry you had to encounter him.

      1. I agree that no one should be nominated by anyone else to call out a rapist because it can turn into a nasty mess.

         In this particular case, though, I strongly believe that it is in the LW’s own best interests to make it clear to him that s/he is onto what he is doing. It’s clear that he likes pushing boundaries and while the LW doesn’t go into details, referring to his own acts as “depraved” certainly hints that he may be getting off on some combination of sex and power which may include force of some kind.

         Some rapists just repeat whatever type of rape is successful for them, time after time. It works, it gets them what they want, it’s enough for them. A few rapists do change over time, starting out with acts that they believe are borderline enough to escape serious consequences and progressing towards what they really want. Which can be a lot more violent than what they started with. If this guy’s secret desire is to commit a home invasion in order to rape, well, that’s pretty scary to think about.

         Calling him out and then going silent on him is likely to intimidate the guy now, while he is apparently still clinging to a veil of plausible deniability (means he is concerned about what other people think of him, for now). And it will either get him out of LW’s life or give the LW basis to make a complaint of harassment to the police. Or it can be used to support a restraining order in the highly unlikely but within the bounds of possibility case that he escalates in a threatening way.

         1. This is a good, if terrifying, point. He may be trying to soften LW up, in which case, a strong show of boundaries is called for.

            1. It’s possible that the guy is harmless, what he’s doing (including sharing the sexy photos) is all consensual with his partners, etc. In which case, he may be surprised or even offended if he gets a strong back off message but he won’t do the LW any harm.

               The pattern the LW described, though, sure seems similar to one that some rapists employ, usually but not always with younger/inexperienced victims. The rapist bombards their target with what is basically porn in order to de-sensitise and/or normalise what they are doing. Once the rapist thinks the target is vulnerable, ickiness ensues.

               I find it very difficult to believe that this guy does not understand that what he’s doing is (probably) rape what with all the publicity around Bill Cosby for the last, what? 9 months or so. Plus the conviction of Brock Turner on sexual assault charges (even though the judgment rendered was a travesty). Sexual assault via incapacitated victim is getting lots of publicity right now.

               If this guy is targeting LW, then a strong show of boundaries (as you put it) plus making sure that the guy knows you’re holding onto potential evidence that is not in his favour may help him decide to get his sick jollies elsewhere.

         2. There’s another kind of creepy behaviour that this sort of reminds me of. I used to volunteer on a helpline, which was supposed to be there to provide emotional support to people having problems. And the proportion of ‘sex calls’ was really, really high.

            Basically: there’s a whole substrata of guys (and a few women) who get off on telling unwilling women (or, less often, men) sexual details. It comes under the pretence of ‘confiding’, but actually it’s a combination of sneaking yourself some dirty talk, like a free sex line, and the thrill of manipulating or ‘shocking’ an unwilling naif.

            (In reality, you aren’t going to shock a volunteer line worker by doing that. Piss them off, yes, but mostly because you’re wasting their time and tying up the line when other people actually need it. You hear a few of these stories, you start rolling your eyes very quickly.)

            Now, the guys I had to deal with were fantasists – you could pretty much tell when a sex caller came along because many of the fantasies were so similar. But the basic drive was to impose sexual fantasies on somebody who was supposed to be giving you emotional support, because it provided something between the thrill of being a flasher and the girlfriend experience.

            And it’s not impossible this guy is doing something similar.

            It may be that he’s actually raping passed-out women. But that combination of ‘blackout drunk’ and ‘making requests I’d never imagined’? Ie, unconscious or semi-conscious and seductive at the same time? It has a familiar ring to it. Enticing women who act more like porn characters than actual human beings, in defiance of the laws of society, nature and sometimes physics, was a pretty typical marker.

            If he’s got that kind of drive, take it from someone who fielded a lot of these guys: this is a fetish that won’t quit. We had guys who had been calling regularly for literally year after year, knew perfectly well that we’d hang up on them as soon as we realised it was them, and who just kept calling round till they found someone they could string along for long enough. Fantasy-flashers are persistent.

            He may not persist sending this stuff to you. Our sex callers tended to be massive cowards who’d vanish the minute they realised they’d been spotted (though very likely they just rang again until they got someone else). So if you tell him to take a hike, he may shop around for another ex to inflict this on. But if he does have – let’s call it a ‘pestering fetish’ – along with whatever other nasty stuff he’s got going on, then it’s worth knowing that these fetishes are a long-term pattern of behaviour.

            That said, if he is making this stuff up, the advice is probably similar to the advice if it’s true: tell him, ‘If that’s true, then under the law it’s rape. You shouldn’t be doing it, and I don’t want to be made an accessory to it, and I don’t want to hear anything else about your sex life either.’ Sex pests depend on your good manners to allow them to keep control of the conversation, and they vanish very fast when you impose a reality check on that.

            At least, on a helpline. We had some callers who’d vanish pretty fast if they were spotted, but who were also pursuing a kind of sex vendetta against the line, i.e. angry and horny with it at the same time. So even if he is a fantasist, don’t neglect any safety precautions.

            1. OMG, the memories! Ice and Indigo, I used to work a help line in the 1980s and yeah, we had a number of regular sex callers. At the crisis/suicide intervention centre I worked at, we were allowed to hang up as soon as we recognised what was going on but there was at least one other crisis intervention centre (I’ll call it agency X) in the same area code where the policy was that volunteer counsellors were not allowed to hang up before a caller did. They had an incredible short period of average volunteer retention, something like 5 weeks (where I volunteered and later worked, our retention rate was 28 months).

               One of those callers turned out to be calling private home numbers. This was before caller ID and during the transition period where phone companies switched over to computers, which made tracing phone calls much faster than it was in 1980 (took a minimum of 45 minutes on the caller on the line and even longer if the caller was from out of area code). This guy had started his behaviour before the phone company switched over and kept it up during the switch. Then he was stunned when he was caught. The police found dozens of notebooks with notes on the various phone numbers he’d called and what response he got each time.

               During his trial, his defence was that it was all agency X’s fault because their volunteers let him carry out his behaviour without hanging up on him.

               Yeah. I’m happy to say that the jury didn’t believe that experience made him incompetent to determine right from wrong or incapable of controlling his behaviour.

               Tangential thought: something I learned from working there was to call the police first and then inform the threatening person that the police are on their way. Works much better than threatening to call 911.

               Or, as Sun Tzu wrote circa 500 BCE: “Let your plans be dark and impenetrable as night, and when you move, fall like a thunderbolt.”

            2. I used to work customer service for a bank. Callers like these were so common that one of the entries on our version of “Skippy’s List” was “An airhorn is not the proper response to perverts.” (Nobody actually tried it, but a lot of us were tempted.)

            3. Out of interest, what sentence did the guy get? None of our creeps got consequences.

               (There was sort of a culture of, ‘Ok, hang up if you realise, but don’t be too harsh because one day they might be in genuine distress and need support, and they won’t call us if they think we’re ever mean to anyone.’ Yeah, they got a lot of volunteers giving up ober the sex calls too.)

            4. Ice and Indigo, as I recall, he got a couple months in jail and a fine. Seems pretty paltry but local women’s groups felt enormously cheered by it because it was amazing that there was any prosecution at all, let alone a conviction. Back in those days, there was no sex offender registry, so the jail and fine would have been the end to it.

            5. Ice and Indigo, I’ve worked on a rape crisis hotline, and we call these creeper calls. You’re right; what the LW is describing sounds exactly like these guys.

            6. I used to work for a health advice/info line. Despite serving a population in the tens of millions there were phone numbers, which would pop up on the caller ID screen, that provoked an instant “Ugh, here we go again”.

               It’s awfully hard to be respectful, caring, and polite, when you know that someone is trying to file your voice in his personal wank bank.

            7. Wow, I had no idea this type existed Thanks for the heads up! One more filed away…

         3. (Slightly off-topic – this LW asked for gender neutral pronouns, and “s/he” probably is… not so much what they were looking for. “They” or “Xie” would probably be a better option.)

      2. “If you see something that just looks off, be like those guys from Sweden who were thanked by the Stanford ‘swimmer’ Survivor for stopping what *they* were doing to stop someone else who was committing a terrible crime.”

         It makes me sad that we have so many concerns and hesitations about doing or saying something as bystanders to positively render aid on another person’s behalf. This is something often brought up for debate/argument/discussion – at least in my area/social group(s) of kinky people – it’s amazing how much hostility merely DISCUSSING a possible situation where we’re just generally saying to an individual, “What you’re describing is not just gross but criminal, we don’t allow that sh$t here and will gladly cooperate in all ways we can to help anyone who you have victimized should they need that. We will also be letting others in our local (kink) community know you are on our blacklist and why you are on it, because preventing you from getting further opportunities to harm another is important to us!”

         People on either side of the slash/dynamic and interact regularly at events and such have, did, and/or do know at least ONE person that isn’t safe to ‘play’ with but routinely gets invited to things anyway, so a couple of individuals do their best to steer any newbies away and keep an eye on friends who are drinking, some volunteer to be ‘dungeon monitors’ who make sure everyone is consenting and enjoying the activities. Yet the mere mention of starting a blacklist is usually met with the most awful responses, the worst from ‘suspect’ individuals and/or ‘confirmed’ ones followed by their many acquaintances. So the fight to ensure the fun and more importantly, the SAFETY of all, in a meaningful way throughout the kink community continues.

   2. Delurking to say how much I love the metaphor of “any small voice in the chorus of “stop doing this shitty thing for the love of all that is holy” makes that chorus louder.” Like, the next time I think I can’t make a difference to something, I hope I remember that.

      Any small voice in the chorus *makes the chorus louder.*

5. [nope.gif]

   LW, please heed the captain’s advice and cut off contact like it’s a burning fuse leading to a huge keg of TNT.
   You mentioned he was a past client, might there be a way he could find you through your workplace again if you cut off personal channels of communication? It would be wise to cover your bases, the guy sounds like a boundary-pusher with little care for the rules.
   Having had my share of skeevy dudes, there is a small chance (I think, I hope, I PRAY) that he is making this stuff up as a way to somehow entice you back to his tentacles of creep. One guy I knew actually made up a girl that was my close friend with the serial numbers filed off, but way into [insert dubious sexual practice he was WAY too into here] that was always magically out-of-state when I wanted to meet her. It’s not outside the boundaries of believability, especially if he feels like he has something to prove to you.
   Either way, whether he’s telling the truth or making up tall tales, this dude is bad news bears.

   1. Now that you mention it, the asshole ex of an acquaintenance also made up having sex to … smear a friend of mine? I’m not entirely sure what the goal was, but I know that my friend did not have sex with him. So +1: It’s possible he’s making some (or all) of these encounters up. Doesn’t really change the advice though.

      1. I think my comment’s sitting in moderation limbo, but short version: the goal is ‘masturbation fodder for later.’ Some guys get off on making women listen to their nonsense.

6. The thing about boundaries that seems hardest is that you don’t have to allow something that’s past them to continue just because you have in the past. You can set brand new boundaries right this now, and inform and enforce and it does not matter that they weren’t the rules of yesterday, no one *has* to be grandfathered in.

   “You didn’t say you had a problem with this yesterday!” –> Doesn’t always have to end with you ‘being OK with it’ today.
   “Well not anymore, so cut it out” <– is fine!

   I've seen a lot of people (and done this myself) think that they've dug a hole for themselves because they allowed someone to run all over them and failed to set boundaries at some 'magic moment' when it should have been done. F that. A decent person will respect your boundaries whenever you decide to set them, a jerk wouldn't have respected them even if they were printed in the shirt you wore when you met them.

   I have a friend who used to tell a certain kind of joke about herself, so everyone figured those sorts of comments were ok. One day she decided she actually did not care for everyone referring to her that way and let it be known that she'd like it to stop. No one is trying to keep telling those jokes, and anyone who slips up is apologizing.

   I can decide tomorrow that I don't care for pickles and ask that people not give me things with them, and I can decide tomorrow that I don't care for hugs and ask that people not go for them with me.

   1. 100% agree.

   2. Yes! People can change their minds about anything, from personal preferences (including their own names!) to belief systems, and everything in between.

      Even our bodies change on us, and we can develop horrible allergies to things that we absolutely loved in the past! Human beings are made of change, and we need to respect that, in ourselves and others.

   3. you don’t have to allow something that’s past them to continue just because you have in the past

      I once said this to a teen girl I know, and she said, “I didn’t know that. I thought relationships were one-way streets, if something’s cool one day then the next there should be a good reason for it not to be.”

      I told her very firmly that “I don’t want to” IS a perfectly good reason, while inside my heart broke into little tiny pieces.

      LW, “I don’t want to hear about your sex life” is a perfectly good reason for you to tell this dude not to tell you about his sex life. Or to just silently block him–whatever works. If you feel you can safely call him on his sketchiness being super super sketchy, by all means do that, because, wow, that is some sketchy stuff. But regardless, you don’t need to let him keep inflicting that TMI on you.

      I have also had the one-afternoon-stand of “We had great chemistry right up until the mediocre sex” and I sympathize a lot. I’m glad Sketchy Dude got the message about you not wanting to hook up again, and that makes it clear that he understands both overt “no” and evasion–which means he has no excuse whatsoever to continue sending you these messages, since you’ve provided him with zero signs of being really into that. He’s trying to get back at you for daring to not like sex with him, and that’s not okay, and you get to tell him off and block him out.

      1. That is so, so heartbreaking. But so many young people (and not so young people) feel that way. I’m honestly impressed with the teen for being able to express that so clearly. I’m glad you were there to explain why it’s wrong, and “I don’t want to” is always enough.

      2. That teen girl got some very good advice from you. Thank you. It’s another instance of “One more small voice in the chorus makes the chorus louder.”

         That’s how we make the world a better place. 🙂

   4. I’m not sure I understand, in general, the advice to set a boundary and simultaneously block/delete the person from your life so they can (hopefully) never contact you again. I see how that is reasonable here because Skeevy McSkeeverston is having non consensual sex, which is very not okay. I have, however, read replies to other questions from the Captain that also suggested the “I don’t like that you are doing this, never contact me again” approach and I’m confused. Isn’t it more… fair to say “I don’t like pickles, please don’t give me things with them”, and then block/delete people if they continue to give you pickles, than to say “I don’t like pickles so never speak to me again!” I feel like I’m missing something obvious to understand why a warning shot isn’t given first?

      1. In the cases you’re talking about the LWs have already decided they don’t want more interactions with their lousy acquaintances. What’s happening is the LW decides to be ultra super kind and tell Louse why.

         No one is obligated to wait until they are hurt yet again before walking away

         1. What Mrs Morley said!

         2. No one is obligated to wait until they are hurt yet again before walking away>/i>

            Quoted for truth, as they say 🙂 I think of people who have proven conclusively that they’re jerks like restaurants that gave me food poisoning – once that happens you don’t go back, and if the restaurant is very very lucky maybe you tell them why you’re never setting foot in there again. The idea that jerks are owed a chance to jerk some more is just baffling to me. My time has a value, I don’t owe more of it to jerks just because I didn’t realize they were awful right away.

      2. If a person already knows they do not want a particular person in their life, why give a warning that allows that person to stay in their life? It takes a minimum of two people to make a relationship (friendship, partnership, marriage or whatever) but only one person to break the relationship.

      3. If a hypothetical person was going to cut you off without warning for giving them a pickle, even though they had never said “no pickles please” or “I don’t like pickles,” and you tend to put pickles on the plate with all your sandwiches, and include them in your chicken salad and your pot roast, you probably aren’t a good match.

         In most cases that aren’t as cut and dried as this skeevy caller, the boundary is closer to someone saying “I am not going to talk about my weight with you” or “stop asking when I am going to have children,” and then, in response to protests about “but I only want…” a statement like “I am not going to talk about that. Goodbye” and trying again next week.

         Yes, there are differences between “stop doing this thing that everyone knows is inappropriate, and don’t call me again, person I dated once” and “stop pressuring me in this socially acceptable way. Let’s talk about your cats” or “Yes, you’re my mother, but that doesn’t give you the right to bully me.” People generally don’t want to cut off their parents or siblings, even for behavior that they would never tolerate from an unrelated stranger. Done right, boundaries can be a way to keep a relationship with someone who does some things that are problematic for you.

   5. A decent person will respect your boundaries whenever you decide to set them, a jerk wouldn’t have respected them even if they were printed in the shirt you wore when you met them.

      qft

7. It may not be true, and he might be exaggerating/flat-out inventing to make you jealous. From my recollections about being blackout drunk (nothing horrendous happened. It mostly just involved being dragged along to midnight junkfood runs,) I did not SUGGEST anything. I was mostly just unable to protest/articulate anything beyond “uhhhh.” So he’s exaggerating her state of inebriation or exaggerating her consent or just inventing the whole thing. It doesn’t actually matter, as the fact that he is telling you about something which, whether it is a fantasy or not, involves serious inability to consent on the part of his partner is a giant screaming alarm claxon. With flashing lights.

   Seconding the Captain’s script. The one bright side about this is you actually know that he’s potentially a danger and an all-round skeevy dude because he is telling you so! Believe him when he tells you and block away.

   I’m sorry he turned out to be an arse.

   1. Yes! This bit, QFT with extra-boldy goodness:

      “The one bright side about this is you actually know that he’s potentially a danger and an all-round skeevy dude because he is telling you so! Believe him when he tells you and block away”

      LW – I think you (and his ex-wife) have had a lucky escape. Scorch the metaphorical earth of this dalliance, then salt the ground, so that none of his skeeve seeds can take root.

      1. I once had a dude use the “mad, bad and dangerous to know” line on me. I blinked at him, said “Thank you for telling me,” and proceeded to avoid him like he had smallpox.

         1. Haha! That is awesome.
            “Believe them when they tell you who they are” is such a great and usefull lesson I’ve learned here through the years.

            1. Related: once in an interview, the person we were interviewing told us several times that the employees who worked under him called him “a dictator” as though that was a badge of honor. He also told us “I just don’t get along with some people” and every work story he gave us involved him besting his coworkers. And so, so many other things. He pretty much spent the entire interview going “I’m a confident asshole and a jerk, isn’t that awesome?” It was kind of amazing.

               Thing is, he was so qualified (and he did know his stuff), he likely would’ve had the job (even after being 45 minutes late) if he hadn’t clearly told us how awful it would be to work with him. All of us came out of that interview going “WTF? Did he really just tell us how horrible he would be like he was proud of it?” We were in such disbelief that it went down the way it did that we spent nearly an hour going “yep, that just happened.” And once we fully grokked that he was super proud of being a jerk, we noped that candidate off the list.

            2. I once had someone in an interview offer, with cheerful pride (and not in response to a ‘your greatest weakness’ type question, either!) that she is “a total jerk” when she “knows she’s right” and “other people just can’t see it.”

               She was extremely surprised when I said, “Well, that’s a problem, because this role requires collaboration and working with others, and respecting their expertise where relevant,” and backpedaled so fast you could almost see the smoke from her brakes.

               I think, in that case, it came from being pretty young (right out of college) and having internalized that playing well with others is only for the stupid. But boy, that made me scratch myself off the list immediately. If someone tells you that they’re a difficult jerk up front, in an interview, where they are at least theoretically trying to put their best foot forward… I’m inclined to believe them, and I’m disinclined to want to work with them, ever!

            3. this: “Related: once in an interview, the person we were interviewing told us several times that the employees who worked under him called him “a dictator” ”

               This reminds me of a scene in “The Big Short,” where these two mortgage brokers are telling that they steer risky clients into high-risk high-cost mortgages even though they know they shouldn’t qualify, and that they choose the high-risk, high-cost ones because THEY make more money. One character asks the other, “Why are they confessing?”
               The answer was: “They’re not confessing. They’re bragging.”

               They don’t see it as wrong.

            4. Me too! I’ve had a few times when I had someone tell me something about themselves that I wouldn’t have expected (for example, someone calling herself an “abrasive asshole” 3 or 4 times during our initial [admittedly long] conversation) that I used to Nope my way right on out of that relationship. Thanks for letting me know!

         2. Right? Back when I was actively dating, I had SO MANY guys plop down across from me on a first date and proudly announce how they 1. had no filter! they just say anything! they’re radically honest! 2. they’re an asshole, as though that were something to be really proud of and 3. they just COULD NOT with relationships, yaknowhatI’msayin? and were then shocked – SHOCKED, I TELL YOU – when I called for the check and walked out.

            The ironic thing is at the time I was really only looking for NSA sex and had no interest in a relationship, but far be in from me to stop someone from shooting themselves in the foot in the first 45 seconds of our encounter.

            1. They think this is charming because this is the kind of guy Hollywood tries to pass off as charming, not realising that it only works in fiction, and even then, it’s more of a power fantasy (“I wish I gave that little of a fuck”) than an actual I-would-hit-that fantasy.

            2. Truth. It’s the aspirational crush vs. the Firthing-worthy crush–I, myself, want to be Han Solo way more than I want to bone him!

            3. Heh. So many dudes don’t get that “NSA” does not mean “be a total asshole.” I’m easy, not desperate.

   2. Your experience of black out drunk is not everyone’s experience.

      I don’t want to come off as defending this cavernous anus of a human being, though. He is STATING that she is black out drunk before they do stuff… which is so very very ewwww.

      1. Yeah, my experiences with being blackout drunk involve… not remembering? But I’ve had friends definitely think I was more sober than I was because I was making cognizant-sounding suggestions and asking considerate questions, and I only learned about those interactions from third parties because I’d had enough to drink that I was no longer writing to long-term memory.

         The larger point is this: you can’t tell when someone is blackout drunk. If they’ve been drinking, you shouldn’t be doing stuff you haven’t discussed when sober. If YOU have been drinking, you shouldn’t be doing stuff you haven’t discussed when sober. Some people get completely lit on one drink. Some people look like they’re more sober after five drinks than after two. Sometimes you can’t even judge your own sobriety. Don’t f***k that person! Getting drunk with someone and doing things that drunk!them suggested that you never heard sober!them bring up is the kind of thing that makes my cranky feminist skin crawl.

         1. Seconding this. Never assume that you know how drunk someone is based on the number of drinks they’ve had or how they sound.

            When my fiancé is NOT on his meds, it takes more shots to get him drunk than anyone else he knows. When he IS on them, half a glass of wine is enough for him for the night. Either way, the only way I know he’s drunk is that he gets cuddly and rambly — and even then sometimes I don’t notice the signals and it’s a surprise when he coherently, clearly says something like “I’m so drunk right now.” If I can’t gauge the sobriety level of my own fiancé, one can’t gauge the sobriety level of one´s new fuckbuddy. End of.

         2. Agree completely – blackout drunk/inebriated is not always obvious.

            A few years ago, I had some wine without realizing how it would react to medication I was on – I have no recollection of the evening past a certain point (the point where I had finished all the fancy knife work and cooking thankfully!) Apparently, my mom was ragging on my very recent ex husband (not even ex yet – he had moved out only a week before …) and expressing surprise that I wasn’t angrier than I was and I calmly told her that anger was not helpful to me and then said that I actually wished him the best and hoped he found a way to get his life together, that it made me sad, not so much angry … and that my anger would only hurt me, not him.

            I learned this a few days later when my brother complimented me on the way I had handled myself – how I was so calm and how he admired the way I had stuck up for myself and that he respected that even though I had been hurt, I hadn’t let it make me into something I am not (angry and vengeful.) I had to get him to tell me the story of the evening because I had no recollection. And he had no idea! He was stunned I had no memory of any of that! On the way home my mom had apparently even commented that I seemed to be doing really well! In the eyes of my mom and my siblings, people I am very close to and know me well, I had been perfectly lucid. That scared the hell out of me – I was with my mom, brother and sister and in my own home so I was safe in that respect, but not remembering any of it really freaks me out and I made damn sure to learn what doesn’t mix well together …

            1. Yep. I accidentally blacked out not that long ago and when I woke up and realized I had a hole in my memory of the night’s events, freaked out and tried to piece together what I had done–which was apparently socialize and watch entertainment in totally normal fashion for about an hour, post accurately on Facebook that an item I was selling had been spoken for, change out of my going-out clothes to my pajamas, do an annoying skin treatment routine and put the stuff away properly afterward, and then go to bed. Blackout me was apparently totally compos mentis, except for the fact that I wasn’t “recording.” It was bizarre.

               (No, I was not driving.)

               It makes me wonder whether he really means “passed out,” as a lot of people get these two things mixed up, and passed out would definitely mean rape.

      2. Oh, understood. My (badly-phrased!) point was that HE is stating that she was blackout drunk. Whether true or not, because of his statement it’s really skeevy and makes him someone to avoid.

      3. And also, you don’t know someone won’t remember what happened at the time.

         You aren’t “in blackout ”

         You’re plastered. You’re puking. You’re passing out. You’re silly. But blackout is how you describe the experience later. When you don’t remember.

         You can’t actually be “in blackout”

         1. No, you are in a different state at the time, that’s the entire reason you aren’t forming memories. It’s hard for others to tell, but your memory is malfunctioning during the intoxication period. In a total (en bloc) blackout you have no recall beyond a couple of minutes at the time. In a fragmentary blackout you have no recall of specific episodes at the time they are happening or immediately after they happen. These are not normal brain states, drunk or otherwise.

            And people aren’t always puking or passing out or plastered when they black out. It’s sort of weird phenomenon – some people are very susceptible to them even if they aren’t completely wasted. Others never blackout, no matter how much they drink. (I’m really susceptible, and you wouldn’t be able to guess at all from what people have told me.)

            1. Exactly – a person in a blackout might not look different from them when sober at the time, but if the dude knows they are in a blackout they should not be doing sexy stuff (especially not Advanced Sexy Stuff)! Like, come on, “You won’t remember this later” is sketchy as hell! Sarah Hepola’s book, Blackout: Remembering The Things I Drank To Forget is a good resource. And she specifically gets into some of the sketchy sex she can’t remember, and wonder how many dudes could have helped her but decided to fuck her instead.

   3. “It may not be true, and he might be exaggerating/flat-out inventing to make you jealous.”

      This was my immediate thought when I got to “depravity” (dude, you’re so cool and mature and, like, edgy /s) and the claims of black out drunkenness. Is this a creepy letters to penthouse situation? Pictures of hot chicks and descriptions of vanilla exploits didn’t make LW come running back/jealous, so now he’s making up harder fantasies?

8. Oh GOD, I have had an interaction like this. D: LW, I’m so sorry this happened to you! How awful. I second the Captain’s advice to say “stop” — in fact, I might lead with that if I were you, to make it clear that any other sentences in your message are NOT an invitation to an argument. (Not that you would intend them that way, but Creeping 101 teaches these guys that argument = more interaction with you = getting back into your life, which is what the creeper wants and the opposite of what you want.)

   A possible script: “Stop sending me these messages. They are not appropriate and not welcome, and I do not want any further interactions with you.”

   You can add to this, if you feel comfortable doing so, a clear statement about his sexual practices, for which the Captain’s script is very good. But part of your letter seemed to me to be asking whether you are *obligated* to comment on his skeevy consent issues (“should I tell him his practices sound extremely questionable?”), and though I might be in the minority here, I would like to say: you have permission to save yourself first. The odds that you will change this guy’s behavior with one text are low. If you are afraid of retribution or otherwise feel frightened or unsafe, do what you need to do in order to cut off contact and get away from this guy. I agree with above commenters that what this guy is (reportedly) doing with other women is HELLA gross and non-consensual and he should stop, but his behavior is not on you to change. That way lies madness. If you feel able to tell him that his practices sound extremely questionable, in the hopes of getting women away from this guy, that is a good thing to do and you should go for it, but *you* are also a person who needs getting away from this guy.

   Sorry to be so long-winded! Good luck, LW.

9. Radio silence. This dude needs a serious dose of radio silence from you. Delete him from your life, so both of you can move on.

10. One of the things that hasn’t been mentioned is that there’s also a lot of skeeviness in the sexy photos he’s sending. It’s possible that the people who are in the photos wanted them widely distributed, but it’s not particularly likely. What is much more likely is that they are photos that were supposed to go to only the person they were dating, until he distributed them further. That would be another breach of trust, and while it’s not the most sketch thing described, it’s still pretty sketch.

    I suspect the actual situation is more of a combination of blatant lies and photos pulled out of a search engine, but even if it is that the guy chooses to present himself with these lies is telling. Something to the effect of “You’re an asshole; fuck off” followed by radio silence is probably a good idea.

    1. Yeah that actually skeeved me right the hell out. (Like you said not that the other stuff wasn’t WORSE but this, by itself, is bad.) That’s a clear sign that this guy has no idea what appropriate sexual boundaries are, and doesn’t respect the women that he’s hooking up with at all.

       And that’s the biggest problem with his behavior. He’s not thinking about women as people whose lives, desires, health and safety should be considered. He’s treating them like hunting trophies. It’s gross. Yuck. I love the Captain’s script.

    2. And even if he has consent to send the photos, it’s important that people consent to receiving them, too. Unsolicited sexy photos are never okay, regardless of content.

       1. Absolutely. Every photo sent is at least one violation of consent, and probably two. The distribution without consent part is a lot skeevier though – there’s the violation of privacy aspect, there’s the opening those people up to victim blaming assholes aspect (not because of the LW, but this sort of stunt is exactly how leaks get started, and it inevitably turns into “they shouldn’t have taken those pictures if they didn’t want random strangers to look at them” eventually), so on and so forth. Even if that isn’t the case though, because there either is permission or because those aren’t actually photos given to him in the first place and are instead pulled out of a search engine, the sending part is still a boundary violation.

          Point is, that’s another aspect of being messed up that’s worth highlighting. These problems are coming in droves.

11. You haven’t mentioned what business you have that he was a client of yours, and really it’s none of my business and I’m not asking. However, I do want to bring up that you haven’t mentioned whether your job or any licensing agreements you have mean that you have to report things like this.

    If you are a mandatory reporter of any sort, are there guidelines for suggestions to help keep yourself safe?

12. Captain – it sounds in your response like you are saying it’s equivalent to “make your opinions known ” on the kink and on the consent. As a kinky person, I was very sad to hear that. The scare quotes around “the dapravity” and enjoying it refer to actual people, actual friends of mine. Now, not everyone wants to know about my kink (this is what it sounds like the author feels) and that’s obviously their (and the author’s) right. But that doesn’t mean I need them to tell me that I am not feeling what I think I am feeling. Can you consider that for future advice?
    That said, this guy is clearly not acting like someone the author needs to work hard to salvage hanging out with. Not a good lover and not sounding like a good friend.

    1. The Captain put “depravity” in quotes because it’s Creepy Dude’s word, not hers. She suggested LW make her opinion clear on safety and consent. There’s nothing in the response to suggest she has a problem with kink.

    2. It didn’t read that way at all to me. I took CA’s response to mean a) unwelcome sexting should be shut down, b) a guy bragging up something that sounds an awful lot like rape calls for a scorched earth policy, and it doesn’t matter if he tries to backpetal or justify things, b/c just making the brag was gross and awful. I thought Mr. Unwelcome Sexter was the one conflating kink with violations of consent, not the LW or Captain Awkward.

    3. I’m not kinky, and I had the same reaction. This guy’s problem is not that he’s kinky (if in fact he is); it’s that he doesn’t believe in consent, boundaries, or women as humans.
       We’re all entitled to tell people “TMI!” but we don’t have the right to tell consenting adults that they’re doing sex wrong.

       1. Unless his partner’s specific kink is getting blackout drunk and him doing things to her that they never discussed sober (not impossible, but highly unlikely), she’s not consenting. That’s the problem here. Nobody’s kink shaming.

          1. Yeah, I think the advice would be very different if we had confirmation that the women in question are consenting to this. In that case it would be a situation of “hey, rock on with your kink, but seriously, stop sending pictures to random involved people; that’s not cool and also possibly illegal”.

             1. Er, random UNinvolved people. Crucial prefix there.

    4. This isn’t really about you and your friends though. Plus, it was the LW who did the original scare quotes, not the Captain.

       The problem here isn’t that kinky people exist, the problem is THIS INDIVIDUAL is doing creepy fucking things. He’s talking about his “depravity” in terms that sound super duper rapey and he’s forcing his sex life on a person he had sex with in a way that made them feel extremely uncomfortable and violated.

       I get that it feels upsetting and sad when someone uses kink as a force of evil, but being upset that some kinky person is a jerk isn’t the same as kink itself being bad.

       As a kinky person myself, I worry when other kinky people focus on the part where kink is criticized (and they feel bad, personally) and ignore the part where someone is using kink to be predatory. Kink isn’t a magic force that keeps out rapists and abusers, and criticizing predators isn’t the same as criticizing kink. Over the years I’ve noticed the Captain to be very good to kinky people while still holding jerks accountable.

       Personally, someone who refers to exploring kink as exploring “depravity” just sets off warning bells. Maybe it’s because it isn’t usual nomenclature where I live, but to me it smacks of “Look how DIFFERENT and SPECIAL I am, you’ll never understand because you’re one of the SHEEPLE. If you don’t do kink MY WAY then you’re a CONFORMIST (gendered/racialized/homophobic slur).”

       Also, I think if someone can only do something while ridiculously drunk, either they 1) Don’t want to do it and have to use liquid courage to convince themselves or 2) Do want to do it, but are ashamed and conflicted, so they need liquid courage (and will feel bad about it the next day.) In both cases, I’m not down with it at all. I’m not okay with being the tool someone uses to inflict harm upon themselves.

       1. “Kink isn’t a magic force that keeps out rapists and abusers” Yes! Say it again for the people in the back.

          1. SRSLY. And that attitude just ends up protecting the shitty predatory people in kinky communities. Argh.

       2. Kink isn’t a magic force field, hence my comments about him not being someone to associate with. Still doesn’t need scare quotes.
          And I am a little more sensitive because that phrasing might not everyone’s experience but is the experience of people I know that have felt pretty shamed for it. One more reason the scare quotes hit the wrong tone for me.

          I guess I think this guy is already a probably rapist jerk and doesn’t listen to the author’s boundaries. That’s plenty of reason to get and stay away without the shaming in the advice, no?

          1. But… they aren’t scare quotes. It’s an actual quote from the guy. The only shaming I see is shaming the guy for his actions and views and his precise language.

    5. The Captain was quoting the LW quoting the creepy d00d who is sending her pictures.

    6. I read this as maybe this is above board, but the LW is allowed to express that they are concerned about the situation bc they don’t know whether it’s above board or not and to them it therefore looks like bad news. If it’s all prearranged and consensual, that’s fine, the dude in question can ignore the LW’s concern about that and just listen to the request to stop sharing it with LW and sending LW photos.

    7. Unless your kink involves getting blackout drunk and doing things that you never discussed sober, the Captain is not talking about you.

    8. Fellow kinkster here, and the quotes didn’t even blip my radar. Partly because, frankly, outside of a scene or dirty talk, “exploring depravity” sounds hilarious. There are so many ways to express the same thing without sounding like an overwrought, gothy 14-year old. “pushing my own sexual boundaries”, “exploring fun sex”, “exploring power exchange”, “trying out bondage/spanking/diaper play/whatever”, etc. At the very least, using that phrase necessitates a level of self-irony that this dude does not posses.

       Yeah, there is societal pushback against kink and people who will call us “depraved” with a straight face, but most actual kinky people know that kinky sex is just as fun, awkward, sincere and sometimes silly as vanilla sex. Run fast from the kinksters who believe that it makes them super edgy and special.

       It doesn’t sound like it’s the captain who thinks kink is super edgy and dark and dangerous. It’s the dude.

       1. Thank you. If I can’t make a little fun of a man who styles himself some kind of Sexual Morrissey I don’t even want to have a blog anymore.

          1. This is definitely a tangent but for whatever it is worth, I wanted to comment here.

             I’ve never read of anyone else describing the phenomenon but I call it the host effect in my own mind: the effects on the organiser of any large group activity, which has the effect of tending to concentrate a lot of negativity on the organiser. I used to run a weeklong summer camp for a particular set of hobbyists, mostly but not all middle aged women; room, board and all the entertainment they could endure for 75 to 85 people and 7 instructors. By the end of the week, I’d be so used up and worn out with dealing with complaints that I viewed the whole event as a horrible failure. And then I’d be surprised to get thank you cards (pre-internet) from so many people, telling me how much they enjoyed it and how incredibly smoothly the whole thing ran. And then I’d get another surprise over the following months to get inquiries as to whether the camp would be held next year and how to get on the waiting list from people who had heard about it from campers.

             I think hosting a blog must be something of the same thing. You get all the complaints but while you get some of the praise it tends to be more diffused because a significant amount of it is in the form of readers referring their friends to your blog.

             I’m not sure what my point is. You probably already know all the above because you are clearly way more socially adept than I am! But there it is: it is a thing and I think it happens to you.

13. I don’t agree with your interpretation of the Captain’s advice.

    I think the Captain used the quote marks around ‘the depravity’ because she was quoting from the letter writer’s email which appeared to be quoting the words of the man involved and wanted to make it clear that she was not necessarily condemning whatever activity this represents IF, as her footnote made clear, it is all aboveboard, the subjects of the sexy photos have given consent for this man to distribute them to other people, everyone involved really is engaging in consensual acts, etc. Mmmmmmaybe.

    I’m hard put to imagine any ethical kink that is okay when there isn’t consent from all parties involved. At the very least, this guy is engaging in a form of exhibitionism aimed at someone who does not want to be his audience. That’s not okay and it’s not because he’s texting about kink, it’s because he is doing so without the recipient’s consent. It would not be okay even if all he was sending was descriptions of missionary style het sex.

    On some level, I strongly believe this guy gets off on boundary crossing. Not okay.

    1. THIS ^^

       If you are involving someone in your sex life without their consent, that is a violation, whether it’s sharing photos or having sex where someone can see you without asking if that’s okay with them.

       I don’t like Dan Savage that much but he has pointed out in past columns that you cannot involve someone in your sex life without asking them if they want to be involved beforehand.

       Maybe the woman this gross creepster is taking pictures of is okay with him sharing them (I am gonna go not very far out on a limb at all and say she probably is not!) but EVEN IF SHE IS, he should still not be sharing them with anyone if he hasn’t asked them first if they want to see sexy pictures!

       Ainomiaka, from a fellow kinkster, I think you are making this about you in a way it does not need to be about you. Whatever kink may or may not be going on here is really beside the point – which is that the dude is involving the LW in his sex life against her consent AND is also potentially crossing the line of consent with other people.

       1. Thus my line that it is the letter writers right to not know/be involved. That’s absolutely true. The writer doesn’t need or want to be involved, thus involving her is what makes guy sound like not a good person, which I also said. Still doesn’t need scare quotes.

          1. They’re not scare quotes. They’re literal quotes. The OP is quoting what skeevy dude said to her about his exploits, and The Captain is quoting the OP. There is zero shaming going on except for what you’re (wrongly) projecting.

             1. That’s the only word in quotes but not the only word quoted. So I would also say the snark is not necessary.

             2. THANK YOU. Ainomiaka, no one can stop you from insisting on reading something into the Captain’s reply that isn’t there, but this is a derail from the OP’s question and I think you are deliberately missing the point.

    2. Side note: LW asked for gender neutral pronouns.

14. I was 23 when a man I thought was my boyfriend introduced me to a drinking game that resulted in my blacking out and him taking polaroids to share with his coworkers.
    He was not my friend. LW, this man is not your friend, nor is he a friend to the women he is photographing. What he is doing is illegal in most, possibly all, states in the US.

15. Sharing sexy photos of people without their consent is a crime where I live (UK). Sending sexy photos in harassing messages to people who don’t want to receive them is also a crime. Having sex with someone who is too drunk to consent is an even more serious crime.

    It’s hard to know what’s best to do in terms of reporting these things to the authorities, without being able to talk it through with his victims, and find out how they would feel about being the subject of a police investigation.
    It could justifiably fall under “none of your business”, unless one of his partners wanted to file a complaint and you had the evidence. I would, however, argue that if he’s given you cause to believe he is doing harm to others, then you may feel a moral duty to intervene. Seek legal advice and remember to protect yourself from any fallout, too.

    Either way, you need to get this dude to stop crossing your boundaries, like, pronto.

    I think you should say to him something along the lines of “She sounds too drunk to consent”, or “I don’t think any of the women you sleep with would want me to see these messages, and I don’t want to see them either.” “Please stop contacting me”.
    I also love Duly Concerned’s suggestion: “I am documenting and saving all communications from you and if the police approach me about you, I will cooperate with them.”

    You should be communicating that
    A) what he is doing with his sex partners is dubiously consensual, and possibly illegal.
    B) That his communication with you is dubiously consensual, and possibly illegal.
    C) That he should stop doing both those things.
    D) That you are in a secure position of having documented evidence of his wrongdoing, and a viable means of enacting consequences.

    You are probably not in a position to fight on behalf of the other people he’s been skeeving on, but if you manage to get him out of your hair, that will still be a win for you.

    Your instincts are strong, and you are a good person to be looking out for other people. I really hope he is just making most of this stuff up to “prove” to you how you were wrong about his lack of sexual prowess, but if he’s clueless enough to see nothing horrifying about these messages he’s been sending you, then he’s probably a sex offender.

    1. I realize this may be not be possible, LW, but if you know the women he’s dating at all (like he takes her to a party you’re at or you’re Facebook friends or whatever) I think it would be a good idea to tell her that he’s sending you private pictures. I highly, HIGHLY doubt that she gave consent and is okay with him sending pics to other people.

       I would say something like, “Hey, this is really awkward and unpleasant, but I wanted to tell you that Guy has been showing/sending me pics of you. I’m really uncomfortable with it because I don’t know if that’s a thing you’re okay with. I deleted the pics he sent me, but I thought you should know.”

       I wouldn’t go out of my way to track these women down, but if you do touch base with them I think it would be kind to tell them. If they’re okay with it, then all you have to do is focus on getting him to stop involving you. If they didn’t know and weren’t okay with it, they have a valuable piece of information–that this guy is an untrustworthy, dangerous person.

16. Dear LW,

    I’m sad and angry that a person who seemed both nice and sexy is neither.

    That said, I’m with the Captain. As you don’t need to stay in contact for business reasons, and he’s a lousy person: drop him.

    You can tell him how foul he is (I hope I would) but you certainly don’t have to.

    Good luck

17. I would likely tell this guy “the more you tell me about your life, the less I find I want to know.” and then block. Doesn’t have to be about his sex life either. He’s turned you off to the entirety of him.

    With the “yes I did it yesterday, I don’t want to today” thing I’ve told people “the more I tried it, the more I realized I don’t enjoy that.” Seems to be well accepted and easily understood when dealing with somebody who isn’t pulling some kind of power play.

    1. Great phrasing.

18. *icky dance*
    *flail*

    I got nuthin but a huge upvote to the Captain’s advice and a giant pile of eww at his behavior.

19. This sounds like some redpill nonsense to me.

    Redpill has some disgusting ideas. This black-out drunk fantasy he’s relaying is textbook with that message. I really doubt that is even a thing that’s happening, because this is not a guy that’s as skilled at impressing women as he wants you to think if he’s hanging around trying to make you jealous like this.

    I even partially wonder if some of the pictures he’s sending aren’t something he just google searched.

    But to LW: he is definitely manipulative, he’s definitely playing mindgames, he has poor understanding of consent (hence the manipulation garbage), his gross ventures into sexploit fiction territory are meant to impress you and try to make you think about him again in that way, he was not and never was remotely feminist, and you should block him, because hell with everything about this person.

20. Gosh I hate this guy so much, ugh. It does seem like his ego was hurt after the mediocre hook-up and is now going out of his way to “prove” his masculinity and sexual prowess in the worst way possible. I’m worried for his new partner and the consent behind their acts of course, but even assuming there is consent there is absolutely no reason for him to be sending any of those messages.
    LW, my heart goes out to you, I’m sorry your hook-up went south and this once nice charming guy has now shown his true colors of a Skeeve Monster Extraordinaire. I would say send a message of “This is inappropriate to send to anyone, stop”, and then block him. Nothing good can come from any more contact with him anyway, just maybe be prepared for him to be whiny about it to any mutual acquaintances. You might want to save the messages he sent to you about being with the girl while she’s “blackout drunk” just in case, though. Even just to screen shot them and leave a note for date and time “Skeeve Monster Extraordinaire sent me this message on Thursday at xx o’ clock” or whatever.

    Slightly related, more to the community here: It’s……very discouraging and unwelcoming to see the LW explicitly say to use gender-neutral pronouns and still see 99% of the comments gender them anyway. I know it’s not done out of malice, but it’s still very disrespectful.

    1. I guess I was confused that after using twenty or so he and him pronouns the LW would request that commenters use gender neutral pronouns.

       1. Gender neutral pronouns to describe themselves, not the dude texting the grossness.

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