Hi friends. Is it fucked up to flirt with someone with no intention of taking it further? I’m in a long-term monogamous relationship. Sometimes I crave a little validation from strangers. I’m not going to cheat on my partner, but I do have a need to feel desirable to others. I don’t feel like a bit of flirting is a betrayal of my relationship, but I’m less confident about how other people feel. Like, I don’t want to waste someone else’s time, but I guess maybe I am leading people on a bit if I chat with them without mentioning my partner.
Recommending therapy is inherently ableist? No.
Doing it like a snarky, condescending redditor to shut people up is.
But that’s not what I did at all. It was a sincere recommendation made in good faith.
I’d recommend you stop violating rule 8 from the code of conduct:
You should just stop violating rule 4. Also no, i will not take the most charitable interpretation when somebody is acting openly ableist and gives off incel vibes, i will call it as it is.
I’d like to chime in here to say that you weren’t exactly observing this when you accuse me of having the “urge to hurt random strangers”.
That’s my opinion of what you described. Using other people, and making them feel bad, explicitly for the purpose of boosting your own self-esteem. That’s not something I assumed, that’s what you described wanting to do.
You are seriously pathologizing somebody for the heinous act of not mentioning their partner when they chat with strangers. What do you expect out of random online interactions like that? Seriously, how desperate are some of you losers? We’re not talking about catfishing somebody and then standing them up after they’ve driven halfway across the continental US, we’re talking about some flirty chats. You make that out to be something that needs psychiatric treatment. And then you tell me my interpretation is uncharitable, you fucking hypocrite.
That is definitely not my intention, and your opinion lacks even a modicum of charitable interpretation. Your suggestion about therapy was actually reasonable, imo. I’m sure I could benefit, as could most people. If I wanted to hurt people, would I have even made this post? If I ever suspect I’ve hurt someone, I feel terrible which destroys my self-esteem.
I completely believe that you don’t have a specific desire to hurt people. But you do have a desire to engage in behavior which would, as a consequence, hurt people. That’s why I said you should talk to someone who can help you understand and overcome this desire, so you will no longer face this urge to do stuff that’s going to hurt people.
The replies to this post have me more convinced that I’m not hurting anyone. Maybe you’ve gotten the wrong idea about what’s happening. As I mentioned in another reply, I’m not initiating these interactions. If I do initiate conversation with a woman at the bar, I mention my partner pretty quickly, because I don’t want someone to think I’m hitting on them. If someone initiates conversation with me, I don’t rush to mention my partner. Partly, this is because it can feel awkward to wedge in there. Like, I don’t know right away if this person is flirting with me. If it transpires, that I do feel some flirtation, yes I do enjoy that, and I’m not in a hurry to shut it down. I am not going to let it progress to anything explicit or physical. Just a bit of fun conversation for 20 or 30 minutes. I would guess they enjoy it as much as I do. I don’t know their situation any more than they know mine.