Ex; why? (or, I tried to talk to my former boyfriend about kink. It didn't go well).

I've had isolated kink negative moments over the years. It happens in much the same way that misogynist moments happen, most of the time. Almost unnoticeable, almost too subtle to point out in the moment. The sneaky nature of these moments are part of what makes them the most frustrating. When they're obvious, I feel totally fine speaking up, and can point out clearly and discuss with someone - that's the easy one. But when I speak up at the sneakier bastards, I end up feeling like an oversensitive whistleblower. Sometimes it's because I get painted that way directly, sometimes it just worms it's way in.

I sometimes imagine the subtler moments, the ones where I don't speak up (because yeah, sometimes, I don't), collecting in a reservoir somewhere. Like every time I push them under the rug... well, the bulge in the rug gets bigger. So big that, eventually, I trip over it (har har). And it creates a tension that comes out at inappropriate moments. I wonder if I read into things too much, or if I'm becoming actually oversensitive. It's a self-perpetuating problem, really.

All this theory comes in the context of an exchange I had with an ex-boyfriend. We've been trying to be friends again, and I had asked how much, in our e-mail exchanges, he wanted to hear about my romantic life, trying to gage how comfortable he was. Not even trying to gage; I actually asked, flat out, how much he wanted to hear about my romantic life. And he said "Tell me whatever you want to tell me, it's okay." And so I did. I told him a little bit about my current partner, but mostly, I told him about discovering kink for myself, in a way I never had before. I told him about kink fest. I told him about being glad, excited, revelatory in exploring this thing I'd wanted to explore for so long.

And he flipped.

To be clear, the e-mail I wrote him was about all kinds of things: photography, books we'd both read, the college we both attended, Chicago, Portland, etc. There was lots in there, including a few sentences in the middle about kink, and going to kink fest. I mentioned the lectures and the vendors, and mentioned that the play party in the nighttime had been intimidating.

When I got his response, it was all about kink, sex, and how insensitive I'd been in talking about it. It was angry and hurt, and that's okay, and I feel bad about that (even though I'd really, really tried to avoid that by asking in the first place). I was pretty pissed off, though, because parts of his response were borderline misogynist, and just sort of... asshole-ish. Which was surprising to me, having known this man fairly well and thought him to be a pretty decent person. So I wrote him a fairly scathing e-mail back.

And then I went back and re-read his e-mail, a few days ago, and I'm not sure if I was reading in more than I'd thought. Below are the most offensive parts of his e-mail, and at the moment, they don't seem that bad. Or maybe I'm apologizing for myself. Who knows.

"In fact, from my perspective, a lot of our most intense sexual experiences together involved me opening myself up (or trying, at any rate) to being the kind of dominant figure that turned you on.  Do you really---I mean, really---think that I want to hear about how effectively this guy is getting you off?  I'm not sure what's intended by a "totally overwhelming playtime at night..." but I'm pretty sure nobody that was there needs me to know about it."

I really appreciated what you did, accepting my kink, telling me so, trying to expand your own horizons. And that was awesome in it's own right, and isn't threatened (I promise) by what's going on in my life now. And no, I don't think you want to hear about that. WHICH IS WHY THAT'S NOT THAT I TALKED ABOUT.

And like anybody there would care what you knew about their sex life. That woman was paddling her eighty year old boyfriend under his pink frilly tutu! She DOES NOT GIVE A FUCK ABOUT YOU.

"I don't need to be reminded of our sex life, (such as it was) in the context of your new, better sex life.  I don't need that kind of emotional... noise." 

I didn't really even know how to respond to this. I thought, when Edward (let's call him Edward, shall we?) and I were together, our sex life was alright. I mean, we did the weird long distance thing, and it was really tame, but other than that, I didn't have any complaints. And yeah, my sex life is better now, but I wasn't talking about that. Oy.

" I mean, on what planet is it normal to email a guy whose heart you broke eight months ago to tell him just how sexually satisfied you are in your new relationship?"

Okay, 1) I didn't talk about sexually satisfied I was. Ever. And 2) Welcome to Planet We Are Adults. We here at WAA try to respect each others boundaries and speak to each other in mature and emotionally aware ways. And when someone doesn't, we call the WAAmbulance, and they're escorted back to earth.

"...you are either unwilling or unable to recognize that that sort of shit can really stay between you and your man."

The parts that make me most angry still (besides the general... hostility of his tone) is his comment that "that short of shit can really stay between you and your man." We had a few exchanges after this, and I quoted it back to him, except that I mis-quoted, replacing the "can" with a "should." Which of course, sparked a long argument about semantics. Which is pretty irrelevant now, because whether you can or you should, the tone implied is "you should have known better," which is... stupid.

Whether I overreacted or he overreacted, it's pretty clear that we have fundamentally different views of kink. When I wrote to him about kink, I didn't even mention sex, and in his response, it's all he talks about. And I'm not about to try and claim kink as some kind of above-physical-sexuality-über-etherial-hippiewoowoo-force, but, in my life, it's about much more than sex. It's part of identity, a huge part of my sexuality, and intellectually fascinating.

And maybe that's part of what hurt the most. That this person, who I was trying to be friends with again, is someone who I can't share this part of myself with yet. Either because he's not ready for that (which I totally respect), and that un-readiness manifests in focusing entirely on my sex life, or because kink can't ever be about anything other than sex, for him. And that... well, that sucked.

We haven't talked in a couple of months. I wish it were different.