Q: I am a young gay man who has been so freaked out by the idea of catching an STI that I haven’t gotten with anyone for two years. But last night, I hooked up with a cute 21-year-old FTM trans boy, and maybe because it was a person with lady parts, I let caution go, and no condom was used. How worried should I be about having made a baby with a person who is way too young to have one? (P.S. He is on hormone therapy.)
Cautious Homo In Loopy Dilemma
A: Here’s a good rule of thumb for all you sex-havers out there: A new sex friend who’ll have unprotected sex with you has probably had unprotected sex with other sex friends. Yes, typically cautious people have been known to “let caution go” on rare occasions. It happens, CHILD. But the odds that two typically cautious people will both simultaneously decide to “let caution go” and have unprotected sex with a brand-new sex friend just this once are pretty slim.
Which means you should be less concerned with pregnancy — your sparkly new concern — and more concerned with that old concern of yours, sexually transmitted infections. The odds that you got that FTM trans boy pregnant are pretty slim; there’s only a 1-in-20 chance that a single act of unprotected penis-in-vagina sex will result in pregnancy. The fact that this guy is on hormone therapy may make him slightly less likely to conceive. But if your cute hookup was having unprotected sex with others, then you’re at greater risk of acquiring an STI than you are of acquiring an heir.
Go and get tested, CHILD, and while you wait for your results, ponder this: Health workers and HIV-prevention educators tell me that the more freaked out someone is by the idea of catching an STI, the likelier that person is to have unprotected sex when they do have sex. Your recent experience is common enough to be a depressing cliché. So working to conquer your irrational fear of STIs — and actually having sex once in a while — will leave you less likely to contract one.
Q: Twenty-one-year-old furfag here. I consider myself a bi guy, I check out men and women, but I’m a virgin. I have a boyfriend of three years, and we do role-play online. He’s sweet, nice and sometimes a stubborn dick, but otherwise always there for me. We met online, and I fell in love with his personality two years before we traded pics. He is totally OK-looking, average, and I am fine with this because he’s a sweetheart. He’s also four years my senior. I’m working on my bachelor’s and trying to get into graduate school. He swears that no matter where I go, he’ll follow me. Is this a strange relationship? I know it’s unorthodox, but is it a bad move? I don’t want to ruin his life. What if we meet and try gaying it up and I’m not into it? It’s my senior year, and I think I love him. I’m certainly more fond of him than any other relationship I’ve been in. Sex doesn’t hold a big interest for me, and porn doesn’t do ANYTHING for me — gay, straight, it’s like watching a sweaty, breathy anatomy class. I’ve never even masturbated. Am I going about this wrong?
Fella Unsure Regarding Feelings About Gayness
A: Maybe I’m behind the times — maybe I just don’t get this “online relationship” stuff — but I don’t think two people who’ve never met in real life should be planning a future together. Attraction is about more than just shared interests, emotional compatibility and kinks in common. There’s an ephemeral, unquantifiable aspect to attraction, something that can only be established when you’re face-to-face/tongue-to-tongue with someone. Call me old-fashioned, but I don’t think you can know for sure that it’s love — a love worth moving across the country for — until you’ve tasted each other’s spit.
Don’t get me wrong: I think it’s great that you two got together, FURFAG, and I don’t doubt that there’s a real connection. One of the wonderful things about the Internet is the way it brings people with rare kinks together. And sometimes people with uncommon kinks have to go to uncommon lengths to be together — which can include taking a big risk like moving across the country. But before you do that, you need to meet in person at least once to establish that (1) you’re actually in love with each other, and (2) you’re actually into men. You can’t resolve those doubts until you’ve acknowledged them, which means a truth-telling, doubts-airing, non-role-playing Skype session is in order.
This week on the “Savage Lovecast”: When gays ATTACK! Find it at savagelovecast.com.