November 17, 2010

I have been married for 16 years and have three children. My marriage isn’t the best, nor is the sex. I have strayed many times, and it’s always been with women—I love women and I love having sex with women. However, for years I have had a fantasy about being with a transsexual. I recently paid to be with a T-girl escort. She was flipping gorgeous. She had a dick, sure, but she was the hottest fucking girl I have ever seen—absolutely gorgeous. She talked like a girl, looked like a girl, smelled like a girl, had the body of a girl—she was all girl, except for the unit. I have no interest in being with a man. Does seeing this T-girl make me gay?
Walked On The Wild Side

You’re not gay, WOTWS, but you’re not exactly straight either.

There are other points along the gay/straight continuum, WOTWS, and anyone resourceful enough to track down a flipping gorgeous T-girl should be smart enough to figure out where he falls along the gay/straight continuum. But let me end the suspense: You’re a teensy, weensy bit bisexual, WOTWS, just another mostly straight dude who’s into women, into cock, and into women with cocks. But you’re not into dudes, not at all. Just women. And cock.

I’m going to catch hell for this, but hey, I don’t have three “Catcher” T-shirts for nothing: While you’ve got a touch of the bi—just a bit, mostly around your tonsils—you’re not obligated to identify as bi.

An awful lot of “rounding up” and “rounding down” goes on when it comes to sexual identities. There are bi women out there who round themselves up to lesbian because they’re with women or primarily attracted to women or afraid of mean lesbians who hate bi women. (Some of those mean lesbians are, predictably enough, bi themselves.) Some bi guys in gay relationships round themselves up to gay; a small number of gays and lesbians round themselves down to bi in solidarity or something; and lots of bi men and women in straight relationships round themselves down to straight. (And there are gay men and lesbians—100 percent homos—who identify as straight. These closet cases aren’t rounding up or down; they’re lying.)

Backing way the hell up: Sexual identity is a combo platter. There’s who you wanna do, who you are doing, and who you tell people you are. You can’t control who you wanna do—sexual orientation is not a choice—but you get to choose who you wind up doing and who you tell people you are. Don’t wanna have a miserable sex life? Do who you wanna do. Don’t wanna be a messy closet case à la Ted Haggard, Larry Craig, and George Rekers? Tell the truth about who you’re doing.

It all seems so black and white, doesn’t it? But that’s because we backed way the hell up. Pull in close, and you’ll be able to see the gray—grays like you, WOTWS, guys who are flamboyantly, flamingly, screamingly gray.

It’s because I’m a big supporter of gray rights that I’m not telling you that you’re obligated to identify as bi, WOTWS, even if that is the black-and-white, backed-the-hell-up truth. But “bi” means “attracted to men and women,” and you’re not attracted to men at all. You’re into girls who talk like girls, look like girls, smell like girls, etc., and some of the girls you’re into happen to have dicks. And since trans women are women—even those trans women who’ve decided to keep the genitals they were born with—it’s closer to your truth, if not the truth, paradoxically, to identify as straight.

Someone who wants to be loved and accepted for the person she is, WBC, shouldn’t mislead her gentleman callers.

That said, WBC, I assume your husband didn’t find out about the booze and cigarettes yesterday. So the booze and cigarettes, if those are the only reasons your husband gave for wanting to end this marriage, may symbolize a larger pattern of deceit that has long troubled your husband. Or it’s possible the booze and cigarettes are a face-saving dodge: Perhaps your husband is blaming the booze and cigarettes to avoid telling you some harsher truth and thereby spare your feelings. Or maybe there’s something about himself that he would rather avoid disclosing. (Another woman? Another man? Another man and another woman?) Or maybe he’s an asshole and he’s blaming the booze and cigarettes in order to shift all the blame for the failure of this marriage onto your shoulders.

We can sit here speculating until your lungs turn black and dissolve inside your chest, WBC, and it’s not going to change anything: Your husband doesn’t need your consent to obtain a divorce.

Now, you don’t say whether your husband offered to stay if you quit drinking and smoking—and if he didn’t, WBC, then booze and smokes aren’t the issue—but you’re clearly unwilling to give up your indulgences to save your marriage, as you do not wish to be “controlled,” which means that your marriage is over.

Do I have any obligation to warn women about him? My friends and I were debating this hypothetically until two days ago, when I saw him on a date with a woman I know. Do I tell her what a douche this guy is, or do I let her discover it on her own?
What Would Dan Do?

If this douche weren’t so transparent—if women didn’t see through him instantly—Dan would feel obligated to warn his female friends. But as this douche is transparent, WWDD, Dan wouldn’t feel obligated to warn women away. Don’t get Dan wrong: Dan would still warn anyone he knew who 1) has a pussy and 2) isn’t a crazy bitch, because Dan’s a meddling douche. But Dan wouldn’t feel obligated. So it’s your call, WWDD.

There’s more to this question—a lot more—and I actually answered it already. BALLS’ question was the Savage Love Letter Of The Day last Wednesday. Folks with the Savage Love app (SLAPP) for iPhone get the letter of the day delivered directly to their phones. To find out what happened to BALLS’ balls, and what he told the wife, you’ll have to get SLAPPed.

Find the Savage Lovecast (my weekly podcast) at thestranger.com/savage. Got problems? [email protected]