I’m Worried About Cheating on My Girlfriend With My Wife
S1: Morning, this podcast contains explicit language. Hi, I’m Stoya, I’m a writer and pornographer,
S2: and I’m Rich Juzwiak, I’m a writer and sex hammer.
S1: Welcome to the How to Do It podcast, where we try to help you with all of your sex and relationship issues twice a week. You can ask us anything about sex or your bodies or dating etiquette or whatever. We’re here to help.
S2: Do you think it’s ever OK to lie? I mean, we get a lot of questions from people who are very desperate. It seems to have moral clarity to the extent that things become black and white. Yes or no, always. There’s always that. I tend to think that life is only in the gray area. Very few things are actually within those polls. And so I do think it’s OK sometimes to lie or at least like not bad enough to matter. But I’m wondering what you think of, you know, from a philosophical perspective,
S1: I think I can get on board with not bad enough to matter. I can also get on board with this would cause more harm than good to broach. And there was no direct question. So I definitely see a lot of gray area there, but I’m curious about examples of not bad enough to matter.
S2: I think if someone solicits, for example, direct feedback about their sexual performance, about time in bad, whatever, I take the position that I have one perspective and that my taste just might not include you, which is no failing on your part necessarily. It might be. You might have done something objectively wrong. Violated consent. You might give real, bitey blowjobs. That said, there’s going to be a ton of people who do stuff that is not my particular tastes, but I wouldn’t want them to change their life just because I said so just because I said, Oh, I don’t like that, especially if you’re not my boyfriend, which you probably aren’t. Chances are, if I’m having sex with you, you’re not my boyfriend. You know, I’m not going to workshop this with you unless I really care about you or doing an ongoing kind of relationship thing. It seems in that case, it’s like to kind of grin and bear it and whatever. Seems like the most actually ethical path. You don’t want to mess with somebody’s definition of themself.
S1: Yeah, in that situation, I tend to focus solely on what I did like. Hmm. I don’t know that there ever was an interaction or I didn’t like anything and like a hook up. You know, I imagine if I didn’t like anything, it would have been a very short hookup.
S2: Yeah, discussion probably wouldn’t even be necessary and probably very obvious.
S1: But then the idea of explaining to a hookup who I don’t know very well what they did that made the sex unacceptable to me, like that feels so anxiety inducing. And like a lot of work to put in where there is no relationship.
S2: A lot of work to put in after what you just went through, which was bad sex. Yeah. You know what I mean? It’s like, Oh, now I have to like, explain it to you. I’m like, When does this end?
S1: I don’t think it’s right for someone to say, Oh yeah, the sex was fantastic. You’re an amazing lover. But I do think it’s fine. That’s acceptable in that situation because explaining things to people can actually be occasionally dangerous. Yes. And we’re we’re talking about critiquing someone’s sexual performance and you’re alone with them in what is presumably a private space, or at least frequently a private space that can actually be a safety risk.
S2: Totally, because we can’t forget how intimate and vulnerable we are in these situations. And so certainly, if lying will protect your bodily safety, it is not just ethical, it is necessary. It’s a great point. Yeah. Well, that has to do with with our second question tangentially. But let’s get to our first.
S3: Dear, how to do it. I’m a 38 year old man. I am also in an arranged marriage, which is not exactly common in my culture, but happens frequently enough that it’s understood my wife and I didn’t get the best start together as the marriage was really more about securing a family business arrangement than anything particular between us. After our first child was born, we just began drifting apart. I considered divorce, but there was still all that family pressure to at least keep things together for appearances. So we stayed together and mostly ignored each other, except when in front of our son and allowed each other to go our separate ways. I know she picked up a couple of boyfriends and I myself have had a fairly long term relationship with another woman. My girlfriend knows I’m in a sexless, loveless marriage held together by social pressure and was OK with it. Recently, my wife wanted to reconcile. I’m certainly happy to have an easier atmosphere around the house. But lately she’s also been dropping some fairly obvious hints that she wants to sleep together for the first time in almost 15 years. I’m not sure about the ethics of this. My girlfriend assumed that my relationship with the wife is simply a legal and social formality without any actual intimacy behind it, and I’m not sure how to tell her that things will look like they’ll be changing. I don’t want to cheat on her. I’m not even sure what cheating on her looks like anymore. Signed cheating with my wife.
S2: Wow. I think it’s pretty telling that our letter writer seems to have no position on reconciling with his wife or having sex with her.
S1: There’s nothing of this man’s agency. Yeah. In the letter, except his desire to find out what the ethics are like. That’s a little bit of agency towards not making a decision himself. So the first thing is like, what do you what do you want to keep things exactly as they are? Do you want to leave your wife? He needs to figure out what he actually wants. And then from there, he can think about, like, what he’s actually willing to do. Yes, it could be that he wants to leave. The wife still isn’t willing to.
S2: I just think that this arrangement is by any standard unconventional and that requires some conversation to get there. You know, the girlfriend is aware of his situation and is aware that they’re working outside of the bounds of societal expectation. And actually, they’re kind of like rebuffing this pressure by figuring it out themselves anyway within this framework. So you’ve already had that conversation? Well, now it’s time to have another one. I mean, it’s really the same thing, I think, as having and opening up the relationship conversation. Like, there’s this thing that is now complicating our relationship, and now it’s time to check in and talk about it.
S1: You know, if it’s possible, I think talking to the wife as well. Yeah, be good, right? Like, he should talk to the girlfriend and be like, Hey, this is what’s going on. Here’s what I want to do. Even if he wants to be kind of like soft about it and say, here’s what I think I’d like to do, but also I think speaking with the wife of being like, Hey, like, here’s what my life has been while we’ve been essentially apart. Are you OK with that? Here’s what I want my life to look like. Can we build something together?
S2: Also, I mean, if I were living with somebody and not having sex or even an approximation of a loving relationship with them for 15 years and all of a sudden, they want that to change. I’m curious as to why what happened? OK? How do you propose that we do this? You’re asking for this change? Why don’t you pony up and do some work here for me, because I’ve just been floating along doing my best in this, you know, unconventional framework. So what do you propose?
S1: Lady Lady? Yeah. It just all feels like vaguely like an 1840 novel about British high society. Totally. Nobody has any agency. Nobody’s speaking directly and respecting Mr. Darcy to appear.
S2: Yes. I mean, I don’t know. They’ve made it this far. Really working outside of the norm? I have full faith that they can figure this out and be satisfied from it. They’ve already kind of stretched the limit of what this union means. Anyway, stretch out of this point. You can get in there and do some more poking around without disrupting the integrity.
S1: You know, I think regardless of whether he and his wife become physically intimate again, the girlfriend needs to know that there’s non-physical reconciliation and yes, intimacy happening there because the situation has changed. And so maybe that’s an easier way to have the conversation is to do it in chunks. So it was like, Hey, this is what’s happening right now. So he can’t address that sooner. While he’s also thinking about what he wants in this situation and then escalate to lake and sex is on the table once he’s had a conversation with his wife and verified that because also like why freak out the girlfriend?
S2: Yeah, totally. No matter how you slice it, the prescription is for more talking. So get to it. So let’s do our next question, dear.
S4: How to do it. I recently started talking with the guy who I’ve been interested in for a long time, both emotionally and sexually. The topic of sex came up and we started having a pretty in-depth conversation of what we liked and disliked. While I’m well versed in using toys to please myself for masturbation. I lied and told him I wasn’t a virgin as much as I hate that word. I lied because I’m 25 years old. I’m embarrassed that I haven’t had any real human sexual experiences up until this point in my life. I know I won’t be doing myself or him any favors if I let the lie remain. I’m scared of him losing interest because I made a stupid mistake. I let my pride get in the way instead of being honest. How should I approach this signed? White lie.
S2: I no, this isn’t that big of a lie to me. It’s not like we’re dealing with a sociopath. You know, at least not from what we can tell.
S1: I think it’s absolutely possible to just circle back and be like, Hey, I was embarrassed. So I told you I had had sex before and I haven’t had sex with another person before.
S2: I feel like letting the lie ride until you have sex and then in fact, aren’t technically or by any definition, a virgin. Well, then you’re not lying anymore. Now you’re not a virgin. You know what I mean? I believe in being honest and transparent with your sex partners, of course. This is, in fact, a white lie. I’m not so concerned with it, I think a lot of people are compassionate enough to understand why somebody would lie in this context and wouldn’t hold it against the person, necessarily. So you can, like, operate off of that assumption and say, this is a cool guy. He’s not going to care anyway. Whatever, just, you know, fake it till you make it and then you’ve made it. And now you’re not a virgin anymore because you just had sex with, OK.
S1: I set a goal scenario. OK. They’re faking it. They start making it. They’re really not good at faking it. The guy asks, So how much sex have you had? And then you have to really lie. Or without the high ground, then it comes out. And I think I think that’s enough of a possibility that it’s worth addressing this.
S2: I mean, you’re absolutely right. Lying begets more lying. Absolutely. That’s why if you tell the truth, you don’t have to have a good memory and you don’t have to keep lying. You get to not have it stick around as opposed to hoping that that one lie you told will be the last lie. But you have to telling you not have to deal with it anymore because you have this moral conflict, whatever. It’s very, very true. That said, there are definitely people that I’ve had sex with that were objectively bad, let’s say, like giving head or something to the extent to which I wondered if they’d ever done this before, but always just kind of chalk it up to like, well, different strokes, whatever. So I think to if you want to keep going on my like, keep lying, beat. I feel like even if he notices, he won’t notice, you know what I mean? Like, I feel like there are enough people who are objectively bad or whatever. There’s somehow just it’s not making the connection that don’t present themselves as virgins that you just chalk it up to general cluelessness. That’s the human vessel has a large capacity for not being good at stuff. You know what,
S1: if they date for like a year and then it comes
S2: out? Yeah, I mean, all of these are very good points. They’re all reasons not to lie that the lie shouldn’t have been told in the first place. You know, you could filter him out if he’s not a compassionate person by coming clean. He’s like, Oh, no, like, I don’t even want to contend with your point of view and what would cause you to lie in the first place? OK, well, then you know what? Maybe he’s not the right person to have sex with the first time. That’s a fine path as well. But I do think that you there is a scenario in which you escape buying. You never have to reveal yourself. It is a lot of risk, and Stoya is obviously on the right side and the right side of history here, et cetera. Personally speaking, if I found out somebody lied about something like this, I would not be offended. I could only understand why somebody would do that.
S1: And the whole concept of virginity is so stupid.
S2: So it’s so stupid. It’s so ridiculous. And it’s all coming from without. This person would not have had that shame that caused them to lie in the first place where it not for these bullshit external sources. So lying isn’t the best way to deal with that, but I can’t hold it against you to deal with it whatever way you can, because it’s like the weather. What can you do? There’s this concept of virginity is important that is bestowed upon you upon entry into this culture. You got to like, do what you can.
S1: It makes people nervous and like, no one wants to have sex for the first time with someone who like, Oh my god, this is the person’s first time and the stresses about it. Yeah, and say, get your position. And if our writer decides to keep quiet about this, I also respect their choice.
S2: I think probably the best thing to do is to use this, however painful it might be as a filtering moment for you. Come clean if he’s cool with it, if he understands you have a good indication that this is somebody that you will want to move forward to and actually have the sex with. If he freaks out, if he doesn’t understand it, if he doesn’t get where you’re coming from, that lack of understanding could likely manifest itself in bad and make for a really bad first time, which you don’t want to have agreed. OK, that’s all for now, but we’re not done this week on tomorrow’s episode, just for Slate Plus members, we hear from a letter writer who wonders what to do after a long anticipated hookup didn’t end the way she’d hoped to hear that discussion. Sign up for Slate Plus at Slate.com. Slash HDI Plus
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S2: Our show is produced by Channel two. How did you? Its editor is Jeffrey Blumer. Our letter readers are Sasha Leonard and Benjamin Frisch. And if you’ve been loving the show, please rate and subscribe. Thanks for listening, and we’ll talk to you next time.
