Eugene Weekly : Savage Love : 5.24.07

Savage Love
by Dan Savage

I’m an early-20s gay guy turned on by hypnosis. During my adolescent explorations of the internet, I found a site with stories about “mind control,” usually involving the seduction of straight men. I was hooked. I’m not beating myself up for being a “bad person,” because my desire to try this in real life is nil for reasons of its impossibility (true hypnosis is something different and I am effectively fantasizing about magic) and immorality (sex without consent is rape). For the latter reason especially, I’m rather uncomfortable with my “addiction” to this fantasy.

Apart from the fact that this suggests I may have some serious sexual-control issues, I was wondering if you had any ideas for weaning yourself from a fantasy. This is not something I’m interested in “accepting.” My attempts at incorporating alternate fantasies into my repertoire have failed.

Stop Thinking About That

 

Sexual-control issues? Sure, STAT, you’ve got some of those. But serious sexual-control issues? Hardly.

A desire to sexually control others, or be sexually controlled by others, is at the root of almost all sexual fantasies and fetishes, from foot fetishes to goop fetishes to BDSM. So there’s no need to feel like a freak, okay? And you’re clearly not a bad person, as you recognized on your own that your particular sexual-control fantasy is immoral (sex without consent is rape) and impossible (hypnosis doesn’t work that way). So cut yourself some slack.

Reading your letter, some folks will blame the internet for your predicament. There you were, minding your own business, beating off in front of your computer, when a hypno-fetish site seized your screen and took over your sex life. That’s not how it works. Running across that hypno porn didn’t instill in you a desire to sexually control others, STAT, it tapped into a desire for sexual control that was already there. A desire to sexually control others was already part of your erotic imagination; that hypno site just lit your fuse.

The only way to wean yourself from your hypno fetish now, STAT, is to accept your bedrock fantasy, which is sexual control, and explore other ways of indulging it. I suspect the “alternate fantasies” you attempted to incorporate into your sex life didn’t include aspects of sexual control, which would explain why your efforts failed. You won’t move your fantasies away from hypno until you find something that satisfies those bedrock desires for sexual control. So find yourself a guy who wants to be controlled, which isn’t that hard to do, and explore dom/sub role-play or bondage or S&M with him, and your hypno fetish may fade away.

Finally, STAT, there are lots of guys out there who fantasize about being hypnotized and seduced—it’s too bad you’ve ruled them out as sex partners.

 

I’m a man who gets off on women hypnotizing men. I’ve learned to be okay with this. However, hypno doms selling MP3 clips on their websites—which cost a pretty penny—instruct “victims” to fall in love with them and crave them more and more. I feel like this could get out of hand. I’m a student and can’t afford too much of this.

Trance Time

 

See, STAT? There are guys out there who get off on being hypnotized. TT isn’t a perfect match for you, as he’s straight, but if you slipped a few bucks to the hypno doms he’s buying MP3s from, maybe they’ll instruct TT to seek out and submit to early 20s gay guys with sexual-control issues. Which would be wrong, of course, as well as impossible, since hypnosis doesn’t really work that way. A hypno dom could no more compel TT to suck you off than she could compel TT to purchase more MP3s than he can reasonably afford.

 

I’m married to a woman I love, but our sex life has become unbearable. We watched an HBO show about women strapping on dildos and doing their husbands. That inspired my wife to buy a strap-on dildo. Once would have been fine, but for the last year she only wants me to get off by masturbating while she does me with the strap-on. She masturbates herself while using the strap-on. She refuses counseling and insists I am being a prude. Does her selfishness signal some deeper problem?

Hurting In North Denver

 

I’m going to assume your letter is legit, HIND, and not the fevered imaginings of a straight guy with fem-dom fantasies. Your wife has some serious sexual-control issues, HIND, and you have some serious doormat issues. Unless you’re tied to the bed, your wife can’t fuck your ass if you don’t let her. I get the impression you’ve been saying, “If you don’t stop fucking my ass sometime soon, honey, I’m going to be very upset.” When what you need to say is, “Once in a while, maybe, but I didn’t sign up for this.” The next time she bounds into the bedroom wearing her strap-on, get your ass out of bed and walk out the door.

 

It’s impossible to find a woman to peg me! I’ve posted many personal ads, but the masses find even the most innocuous fetish disgusting. What is a man who longs to be sensually ravaged in the ass by a woman to do? The thought of a woman taking delight in the rich senses of my ass overwhelms me. I like voluptuous, dark-haired women, though I’m open to anything at this point. Hell, it could even be with a lesbian or a bunch of lesbians.

Man With Hungry Rectum

 

Let me see if I follow you, MWHR: Unable to find a straight woman to ravage your ass, you’ve concluded that it would increase your odds of getting pegged if you offered your ass to a lesbian—or a bunch of lesbians—because if there’s one thing we know about lesbians, it’s that they delight in the rich senses of a man’s ass. It’s really what lesbianism is all about.

Look, dumbfuck, if you’re having a hard time finding someone to peg your ass, it’s because you come across like a desperate, disrespectful, delusional creep, and not because no women are interested in pegging. As HIND can attest, some women are interested in little else.

 

Hey, everybody: In my haste last week to bang out a column about throat cancer and HPV, I overstated the effectiveness of the vaccine. For the record: The HPV vaccine has been shown to be 100 percent effective against the four deadliest strains of HPV, which are responsible for 70 percent of all cervical cancers.

Also, if you’ve got an hour to spare, the Sex Research Team at the University of British Columbia needs YOU. Go to www.christofflab.ca/sexstudy to take an anonymous sex survey. The team apologizes in advance for the heterocentric nature of many of the questions. It has to use standardized questionnaires, most of which were written in the 1970s and 1980s, back before gays and lesbians were invented.

 

A new Savage Love podcast is available for download every Tuesday at www.thestranger.com/savage.

Questions? mail@savagelove.net