Should I expose a lousy boyfriend?

10–4

Why did you tell him anything? Why would you tell her, for revenge or to get him back or what? What were your motivations for talking with him about that, and what are your motivations for telling her?

It seems like you both are getting off on it in some way.

I think you should find better ways to spend your time than wasting it worrying about jerk offs like him! What a loser!

Email yourself a stern warning that this conversation is toxic and bad for your health. Why on earth are you degrading yourself?

P.S. Your username is not good for you either.

Unless he’s Chris Lee and you’re hoping to be famous just skip it. Pull yourself out of the gutter and simply block the jerk.

Really? You wouldn’t want to know if it was your SO having these conversations?

Why are you talking to your ex? Oh, wait. You’re talking the nasty and want to tell his girlfriend because you want him back, right?

I’m sorry, did I ask, “Am I a fucking moron for trying to maintain a friendship with my ex who is turning out to be a creepy perv?” Let me scroll back up… oh, huh, no I didn’t.

For what it’s worth, he is asking me questions about my sex life that I am actively declining answering and have asked him to consider how his girlfriend would feel if he knew we were having this conversation.

And no, I don’t want him back. I broke up with him in part because he did something similar to me. I will not be getting back together with him. It really bothers me that he’s doing this to someone else.

Why are you still talking to him? Are you into drama? Let her learn her lesson the hard way, like you did.

Why did you call him your boyfriend in the title question?

They always shoot the messenger first. No, run from these people.

I am still talking to him because he was the most important person in my life for four years and sometimes it feels good to catch up with him and talk about what’s going on in our lives. I am not into drama. I called him a boyfriend, not my boyfriend, because he is the boyfriend of his new girlfriend.

If you rat him out to his girlfriend, he won’t be talking to you any more.

I don’t think you should bother trying to maintain a friendship with him. I know it’s tempting… it can see like the right thing to do, but it sounds like he’s being creepy instead of friend-like. Personally, I’d just cut the conversation in this case and not say anything to his girlfriend. It’s awful, but it’s also none of your business. Just remove yourself from the situation.

Don’t let him use you for his own gratification while he has another girl on the side that he pledges himself to. That is the most important issue here. It’s a game to him, whether he realizes it consciously or not.

@mostlyclueless, I think people might have been getting confused about whether or not you had shared intimate details with him because of the fact that you said he is masturbating to it. How could he if you weren’t sharing? Know what I mean?

Anyway, I honestly don’t think that you should tell his current girlfriend anything. I know that we girls sometimes think it might be for their own good or for whatever reason, but like someone said above, usually it’s the messenger that gets shot. You’ll end up kicking yourself in the ass because the girl will only hold it against you. You know how it is, no matter what jerk thing a boyfriend is doing, while you’re in the relationship you’re blinded and will take it out on the other person rather than the real culprit, the asshole boyfriend. It could get so bad that she could start rumors about you, say shit to your ex about you (and that definitely won’t help your “friendship”), and more trouble than you would even want to deal with.

So…I say no.

Oh one more thing – you asked, “you wouldn’t want to know if it was your SO?” and of course we all WANT to know but finding out in such a manner (from an ex-girlfriend) is going to scream of scandal and lack of credibility and make you look like a crazy jealous bitch. :)

I suspect that unless his new girlfriend is entirelyclueless she will figure out what he’s made of before too long and if she doesn’t I think you’re telling her what’s going on is only going to cause you problems and unwanted drama, which you say you’re not interested in. If he we’re dangerous that would be another thing. If you want to maintain a relationship, to be his friend then I think you have to decide whose side you are on, whether he’s worth the effort, then either tell his girlfriend or wash your hands of the whole business and move on

Although you said he was an important part of your life for years, is he really the type of person you even care to maintain any relationship (even friendship) with? You are in a catch 22 here. However, I will disagree with most of the comments. I think she should know what kind of person she is involved with. If she is the one he cheated with when he was with you, she already knows and just move on. If not, I would let her know, but expect her to get mad at you. If you do not want to deal with any drama which will inevitably follow, just stop talking to him, cut your losses and leave it all alone. She will find out about him eventually. I had a boyfriend who cheated on me. After I found out, I also found out everyone else knew about it just nobody wanted to be the messenger. None of those people are my friends anymore (although I understood they were in an untenable position) I could no longer trust them.

No, leave it and him alone. Stop talking to the weasel. You say you don’t like drama, yet you are creating it by still talking to him and letting him masturbate while questioning you. Surely he can find a better way to take care of himself?

I find it absolutely amazing and deplorable that some people are pretending that YOU are the bad party here for suggesting that you rat this rat out.

The misogynistic mentality in American culture that attempts to give men a pass to behave at their lousy best is really evident on this thread.

There’s no logical reason why you shouldn’t exhibit the common decency of telling this guy’s girlfriend what a louse she’s dating. The sexist mentality that “boys should get away with being boys” is not a logical reason—sexism, like racism, is irrational by definition.

@Electra, the attitude is that she isn’t being completely honest about why she wants to rat out her ex-boyfriend to his current girlfriend. She says she is having a conversation with her ex on Valentine’s Day, when he has a girlfriend, and he is using the converation with her to masturbate. Why didn’t she just hang up the phone when it became clear what was going on? Her actions don’t exactly say that she has some sort of noble intent going on here.

I am still talking to him because he was the most important person in my life for four years and sometimes it feels good to catch up with him and talk about what’s going on in our lives. Masturbation over the phone is not “catching up” with one another. Does she really think that after she attempts to break up his relationship with his current girlfriend, that he’s ever going to want to call her and “catch up”?

Don’t bother.;)

@barnaclebill, I guess it is futile to try to continue to defend myself, but to set the record straight, the conversation went something like this:

(general appropriate catching up)
Him: Are you still seeing that guy?
Me: yes
Him: are you sleeping with him?
Me: possibly. Why?
Him: I had a dream about you
Me: neat, what happened?
Him: you were having sex with him. Do you have any stories about having sex with him?
Me: are you masturbating?
Him: maybe. Are you?
Me: how would your girlfriend feel if she knew about this conversation?
Him: not good I guess
Me: so do you just not care about her feelings?
Him: I’m too horny to care right now
Me: did you learn nothing from our breakup?

And the he stopped responding.

Of course I dont think I’m totally innocent. Yes, part of me would be satisfied in a really sick and evil way if they broke up. But I do not believe—and maybe you’re right and I’m fooling myself—that that is motivating this. It is clear that I am not going to change anyone’s mind, though, that I am a drama queen and probably a slut to boot.

Why do you answer personal questions at all? Are you still sleeping with him? Possibly. Why answer that? Why when he said I had a dream about you do you inquire as to the details? Then YOU ask him if he’s masturbating. This is what you call “catching up?”

Also, why do you ask for people’s opinions and then get upset when you are questioned as to your behavior?

Let the drama go, if you need friends or catching up with people, ex-boyfriends are not the best way to go.

Wow, really? No, this is NOT what I call catching up. I specifically separated the “catching up” portion of the conversation from the sexual part that I have already acknowledged was inappropriate. Indeed, the POINT of this question was that I thought this conversation was inappropriate.

I asked for people’s opinions on a specific question: should I tell her? Personally, I can make arguments either way, and I can see it having serious repercussions, so I was interested in hearing unbiased third parties’ take on this.

I fail to understand the seemingly overwhelming instinct of people to get up on their virtual moral high horses and tell me all about my personality and apparently horrible decisions with almost zero information about my personality or decisions. There is an awful lot of assuming going on here, and all of the assumptions seem to be highly critical of me. So, yes, I probably will defend myself when that happens.

Meh, drop it. If you want to talk to him still, tell him you will only have a normal, adult conversation.

Allow him to talk dirty and then entrap him? Do you not have better things to do with your time? And then on top of all that, get offensive with people who give advice you asked for? On Fluther, don’t ask if you don’t want to hear it.

You can tell her if you feel like she needs to know what he’s up to. Personally, I’d cut him out of my life if I was in your position. If you are in fact seeing someone else (as you mentioned to him you were), not only are his questions disrespectful to his girlfriend, but also to your boyfriend. How would your boyfriend feel about this conversation if he saw it? I’m not trying to blame you, just pointing out that the whole thing was disrespectful to both of your significant others. I’d personally drop it, drop him (as in not bother talking to him any more), and move on from there. I get that he was a part of your life for 4 years while you were together, but perhaps it’s best if he isn’t part of your life if that is the kind of stuff he does when he is in a relationship and when you are in a relationship.

@Seaofclouds: Thanks for a reasonable answer. To clarify, though, I am not in a relationship per se. The man I am dating is in this country only temporarily, and we are dating very casually and non-exclusively.

@MagicalMystery: I love that I “allow” him to talk dirty, and the other comment above about “letting” him masturbate, like the shitty pervy things he does are somehow my fault. Brilliant. Really useful feedback there.

@electra: I am really curious how this thread would have gone if the sexes were reversed.

You did allow him to talk dirty by answering his question about whether or not you slept with your bf, and then asking for more details about what happened in his dream and then asking if he was masturbating. You led him on with your conversations.

Don’t ask if you don’t want to hear it. That’s Fluther.

@mostlyclueless: Repeat after me. “I am going to hang up the phone. Now.”

Thank you @gailcalled, but I was not asking this to learn how to manage his behavior. I am more interested in the question of whether or not I should tell his girlfriend, which indeed was the exact question I asked.

Again I fail to comprehend the instinct to blame, judge, accuse, assume, and criticize. Are those of you criticizing me really so insecure and unhappy that you need to build up your self-esteem by being sanctimonious to strangers on the internet? Really?

There you go. Ask a question and insult people for answering it.

To the limited extent that I’m insulting anyone, I am doing so to people who are making completely unfounded assumptions about me and my life. Notice that I have nowhere reacted negatively to people who actually answered the question I asked. What I am reacting to is this bizarro-world thinking in which I am responsible for this person’s sleazy, pervy behavior. I find this logical failure incredibly disturbing yet depressingly consistent with how women are expected to behave in society.

@mostlyclueless:“I am a drama queen and a slut to boot.” Who said that?

Out of the 36 responses so far, about 30 are from people other than yourself, and most of those 30 are saying skip it, let it go, stay away from him, and they are mostly saying you should not inform the current girlfriend partly because you are engaging willingly in this behavior, and also, in the interest of trying to live a life that is drama free, you should drop it. Yet you insist on arguing that you want to do it and not taking the 30 pieces of advice.

Go ahead, if it makes you happy, tell the girlfriend. Just make sure you tell her both sides of the story. In fact, why don’t you email her this thread and let her see it for herself.

Nothing productive will come out of you tipping her off, in fact you will be stirring up drama for everyone involved.

She will not see this as you doing her a favor. You will be seen as the enemy and she will be at your throat, not his because in her eyes you enabled him. People are irrational like that and often attack the outside force instead of the person who is responsible for being faithful.

And frankly, you did enable it. You wouldn’t be able to do this without coming off really sleazy. Just let it go, cut him off and move on.

Eh, while you’re probably aware on your own that talking to him might not have been the greatest idea, I’m not sure you should be so harshly criticized over it. I’ve responded and initiated contact with exes, and I wasn’t really sure why. I thought I could maintain a friendship, but realized very quickly that not only was that not possible, but why would I want to? Are they THAT great that I can’t just find some other friends to replace them?

Bottom line is, we all make mistakes. You’ve learned from your mistake here, I assume.

That aside, no, don’t tell her. She could criticize you just as harshly as some here, only, she has full right to do so since it’s her that’s getting the wool pulled over her eyes. I think that would be inviting a different drama that you don’t need. So my suggestion is to just walk away.

If you really have a need to be friends with an ex, it’s best to keep the conversation neutral. You also don’t want to be in a position where he can inform your current boyfriend that you willingly engaged in sex talk with him.

@sinscriven: Having been in her exact position—discovering inappropriately sexual conversations he had with other women—I did not blame the women. I blamed him. This was why we broke up. That said, I don’t have any interest in being liked by his current girlfriend or having any kind of relationship with her.

@jca: I am not sure if you’re intentionally being obtuse or if you are genuinely struggling to understand the distinction here. The question I originally asked was “should I tell her?” and not “was my behavior here innocent?” The majority of my responses have been defending my own actions, which I do not think should have even been called into question. Even if I had shown up on his doorstep wearing a whipped cream bikini and begged him to lick it off me, if he then asked me about my sex life while masturbating, he is the one betraying his girlfriend’s love and trust, and the question of whether I should inform his girlfriend—regardless of my own role—stands.

I will gladly tell her both sides of the story, as my original thought was to simply forward her the entire text of the conversation that we had, which took place online.

And finally, to reiterate, I have already explained that I am not in a committed monogamous relationship. I am casually and non-exclusively dating someone who is casually and non-exclusively dating me. I do not have a boyfriend.

Good luck telling her.

@mostlyclueless It sounds like you already have made the decision that you want to tell her. Good luck doing it, just be prepared for her to have a few words for you in return. I don’t think anyone was trying to blame you for what happened. They were just pointing out how it looks and what you can expect from her once you tell her. Yes he’s the bad guy for having the conversation, but she’s going to see you as the bad guy because you knew he was with her and you continued the conversation as well. You’d have far less drama if you just dropped it and him.

Yes, i should have said Good luck telling her despite all the people advising you not to.

@mostlyclueless : Sure, you can speak for yourself but you can’t speak for what’s in her best interests. Not everyone likes having strangers forcing their eyes open, especially by someone who has their hands dirty from that very situation. Some people much rather live in blissful ignorance, which is frustrating but that is their own decision. You’ll be seriously emotionally damaging her because you have a sense of vindictive moral disgust.

If you don’t care about this new girlfriend at all like you said then you shouldn’t be bothered to tell her anything.

@mostlyclueless: You might not have attacked the girl who told you, but nobody would have blamed you if you did. It’s sort of expected. Plus, in her eyes, you might not be simply the messenger, but also an accomplice. I think your method of handling that situation, while noble, might be highly uncommon. You can pretty much expect her to throw some serious drama in your direction, and why invite that when you really don’t need any drama?

Prepare to duck when you tell her, or take the coward’s way out and tell her over the phone or internet.

I don’t think your telling her about the conversation with your ex, her current, would be believed. She will assume you are just trying to create problems between them because she doesn’t have the benefit of four years of experience with the man-whore. She would likely just run to him with it, and he would turn it all around on you [like some posters here are doing?] saying YOU called HIM, or are bitter because HE broke up with YOU. I say just let it go, learn from your experience, and terminate any further contact with him. No good can come of it, I assure you!

I think you should mind your own business. How do we know you are not lying and making it up to destroy him?

If she was a close friend of yours or a family member, I would tell you yes, you need to tell her. We need to look out for each other (friends and family).

Coming from a stranger, you’ll look like a bitter ex-girlfriend. It’s possible she could believe you, but highly unlikely. I agree with everyone here that is telling you to let it go. If he is the dog you are saying he is, she’ll find out.

“Even if I had shown up on his doorstep wearing a whipped cream bikini and begged him to lick it off me, if he then asked me about my sex life while masturbating, he is the one betraying his girlfriend’s love and trust, and the question of whether I should inform his girlfriend—regardless of my own role—stands.”

I’m not accusing you, and nobody here is, but I think that what people are trying to say is that you seem to only want a “straight” answer to the “straight” question you asked. Unfortunately (and fortunately), Fluther isn’t just a simple “Yes” or “No” Q&A forum. We all come on here hoping to get deeper feedback to certain questions we ask. Otherwise, we’d all just turn to a Magic 8 Ball for the answers to our deepest questions.

Your own role cannot be disregarded. Yes, we get your question—but nobody, including your ex, his girlfriend, etc., is going to disregard your personal role in this. You may not care—it seems as though you don’t, based on the statement you made, although I’d like to believe that you’re not that callous—but you can’t possibly expect people in this world to just look at things in black and white and just give you a simple “sure, go ahead and do it” answer without going into more detail about how it would make you look like a not-so-great person.

I understand why you are defensive, but hope that you also can see that nobody here was attacking you and that sometimes the very reason we are defensive is because we are hearing things we don’t necessarily want to hear. I’m guilty of it as well in life—we all are. But try to take a step back from being defensive and understand the reasoning behind what people have been saying. For the most part, everyone is just looking out for you and trying to prevent unnecessary drama that is guaranteed to come if you choose to tell his girlfriend. Even if you have no desire for her to like you, you should think about what you will be inflicting upon her. When you were the girlfriend, you might not have gotten angry at the person who told you what your ex was up to, but that doesn’t mean she’s the same as you and will thank you and dump him or even thank you later. We all make mistakes but it’s up to us to learn from them ourselves. She’ll learn one way or another and it’s better if you don’t get involved.

I am still for letting her know. You said you blamed him for it when you found out. However, many people are not rational. She could easily see you as a meddling ex who is stirring up trouble and he is likely to tell her that is the case. Is she the type of person who is dangerous and/or vindictive? That is my concern in you letting her know because she could easily take it out on you, not him.

He sounds like a jerk, and whether you decide to tell her or not, I would still stop communicating with him. Surround yourself with positive people not those who mess up their own lives and the lives of those around them.

You must let him know your future correspondence has to be clean. Their relationship and lack of trust is not your business (what this or other comments above have to do with misogyny is beyond me @Electra) but your behavior is your business and you need to have some integrity. I’ve been in many hazy situations where I have been involved with taken men or ex-partners. Once I found out they’re married, nothing more would take place or once they took it ‘there’, I’d say ‘sorry, you’re with someone’ and never go there myself.

@Simone: The way the OP was treated on this thread has a lot to do with culturally grounded misogyny, in that the woman is “guilty” for being a seductive, evil influence, of having these sexually illicit intentions and going after this **innocent** man to fulfill them. If you’ve even read anything at all by Catherine Clement and Helene Cixous (that is, if you’ve read even the most basic, elemental feminist texts), you know how cultural assumptions appear in discourse and how women are always designated as the guilty one. And the OP of this thread was most definitely treated as the guilty one: how DARE she continue a relationship that was necessarily a very important one in her life? How DARE she want to be friends with an old lover when the old lover has already replaced her with another woman? Women, according to the misogynistic cultural assumptions of our day, are replaceable; this is seen in the attitude that when one woman leaves a man and he gets another woman, the first woman has no place in his life as a friend—the basic idea smacks of being replaced even if the first woman doesn’t want to be a lover. And who among us really wants to see an old lover with a new one? Anyone, deep down, doesn’t feel really bad if we hear that someone we’re way over breaks up with someone he may have replaced us with—sure, we’ll lie about it to be socially acceptable, but really, in all honesty, I don’t think the OP is behaving like a bad person or even an extraordinary person; she’s being an honest person and she’s taking a lot of punishment for it on this thread.

For evidence of my observations, observe BarnacleBill’s response to me: he wonders how I could miss this woman’s evil intentions, in a word. Every single thing he says condemns her actions as though she were on trial—and on trial for what? For wanting to keep a person who is important to her in her life?

To the OP—if this thread had its sexes reversed, the man would be an innocent victim of the girl’s evil intent to masturbate with him on the phone—he would have simply not known enough to hang up in time to avoid the advances of the wicked female.

Seriously, threads like this make me think that the level of cultural awareness the general public has has fallen back to that of the 1940s.

@Electra I know what you’re talking about and the authors you mention. I also know that not every single situation involving a woman or sex involves misogyny. Because the OP was the one that asked the question and provided details about her behavior, most comments had to do with her behavior as that’s what most people here have to go on rather than his behavior which we only hear about from her point of view. I think most people were simply advising to put the end to drama. I am a third-wave queer feminist, I am not on the level of the 1940s and I caution you against assuming every situation is misogyny driven and especially against the following kind of comments “had its sexes reversed, the man would be an innocent victim of the girl’s evil intent to masturbate with him on the phone—he would have simply not known enough to hang up in time to avoid the advances of the wicked female” – that is simply not true here on Fluther, people wouldn’t do that here, they’re many intelligent culturally aware flutherites that would tell him the same thing they told the OP. It is no more culturally appropriate to assume that EVERY time the genders are reversed in favor of the man that nobody would criticize him. Generalizations in either direction are counterproductive to our fight against sexism.

Had these been three males or three females with the same scenario, I would have responded the same.

The information was provided by the OP, and thus we reacted to her. Had she been a he, nothing would have changed for me.

@Electra You are letting your feminist rage get the better of you and none of that was what @BarnacleBill said or even implied. He mentioned nothing about friendships or maintaining connections with old flame, but rather that if a person is put into a uncomfortable sexual situation and isn’t removing themselves from it immediately, it’s not a leap to guess that it’s either not as “uncomfortable” as they let on, and/or we are not getting the entire story.

The questioning of her motives is not about her sexuality or any other sort of flavor of ‘opression’, but rather whether it’s a good idea to be telling someone that you screwed around with their partner. And no bit of enlightened feminist thought is going to keep the girlfriend from wanting to choke the ‘bitch’ who messed with her man.

—And this reaction isn’t a sexist thing either. Both sexes can resort to that violent reaction.

A man will sooner kill the man who slept with his wife than to blame her for her infidelity.

My advice would have been the same had it been a man in this situation. I myself have been used for a girl’s masturbatory fantasies when she had a boyfriend. I was sort of pissed off by it, but It’s not my place to tell her boyfriend what had happened. I just removed the possibility of it happening again.

@gailcalled: Of course people with what is probably your mentality would SAY that. To say otherwise would be self condemnatory. Next? :)

@sinscriven: The very fact that you used a demeaning expression like “feminist rage” shows your ideological standpoint. Making silly leaps and silly denials of those leaps doesn’t make a good argument.

And how the heck is “questioning of her motives”[sic] when the subject WAS a relationship subject NOT involving her sexuality? That’s a hilariously bad attempt to cover up what was done to the OP even for someone with your mentality.

@Electra: Please describe my mentality to me. I am eager to learn what it is, not knowing myself well enough to know myself.

@Electra Oy, it puzzles me, this desire of yours to divide the world into your mentality and some other group mentality. Your knowledge of historical and current sexism is valid but is often misapplied, as I’ve looked through some of your responses. You have to learn about nuance, not in terms of your vocalizations but that people are nuanced and their ‘mentality’ is intersectional and though I myself find this difficult sometimes, it’s a good lesson to learn.

@Simone: The vague (and actually misapplied) terms you’re attempting to put me down with out you nicely: Merely because I used the term mentality FOR INDIVIDUAL PEOPLE, it hardly follows that I said that different mentalities can’t exist within class / cultural sections.

@gailcalled: I don’t respond to silly people with chips on their shoulder—which is what you showed yourself to be in the above post. :)

@Electra Out me nicely as what, exactly? You’ve used the term ‘your mentality’ for different people and when I see that kind of pattern (no matter who employs it), it makes it really hard to engage with you on any level. The intersectionaly I mentioned was not class/culture related but that each person’s ideas aren’t ever about one single thing an outsider (like you and I) can attribute until we get to know them. You’re new here, it would help to get a sense for people before applying easy labels on their foreheads and thinking that you’re fighting the good fight.

@Electra The chip seems to be on your shoulder, not on @gailcalleds shoulder. She answered the question, you are ranting.

@Electra It’s kind of hard to ignore you have a massive chip on your shoulder. And you certainly aren’t one to talk when you make straw man statements about “people of my mentality” and making editorial marks because I ignored my grammar and spellcheck. I say you’re overreacting and you make ad hominem attacks because i’m calling you out on it.

Sorry, I do have a small level of contempt for “feminist rage”, but not because I’m a misogynistic person. I have egalitarian beliefs, so the fact that you or anyone else having either a vagina or a penis is completely irrelevant nor do I approach any situation with black and white views like that. I think women who treat themselves and other women as paraiahs and martyrs do more harm for universal equality than help it.

And her motives aren’t about her own sexuality in my eyes. I’m giving the benefit of a doubt that it was completely unwarranted and unwanted. I would question her motives of wanting to tell the girlfriend as being more of an act of malice towards her ex being an asshat than of any concern for her fellow female, she even explicitly said she doesn’t care about the other girl.

I can’t even tell if you’re being serious or just trolling at this point. If so, then well played.

@sinscriven, I call troll either way. Serious or not, she’s definitely accomplished getting this discussion off track and talking about how bad someone spells and whatnot. LOL.

Could we maybe return to the original question if anyone has any thoughts about it?

I’m kind of surprised that OP hasn’t chimed in but I do understand people are actually busy and at work, unlike me. LOL.

The OP got tired of defending herself against totally unfounded accusations, since the defense was going nowhere anyway.

Even if I wanted to break them up (I don’t), even if I encouraged the conversation (I didn’t), even if our friendship was toxic (it’s not), none of this helps me solve the problem of whether I should inform his girlfriend of his actions or not. Yet the preponderance of the answers I received dealt with these ancillary issues, and I can’t help but wonder if @Electra is correct—that the people who chose to respond in such a manner were, on some level, motivated by a very subtle and perhaps subconscious sense that I needed to be reprimanded for my sexual behavior because I am female.

@mostlyclueless Well, I will speak for myself when I say that my responses certainly had nothing to do with that.

@mostlyclueless Get to know these people a little better and you’ll see that just isn’t true.

@mostlyclueless I just wanted point out to you that you did receive several non-inflammatory responses, it’s just that the vast majority of them did not favor you informing his girlfriend. I definitely tried to make my own personal response to your question as helpful as I could, and I’m not trying to defend or take sides but simply try to show that there are a lot of different POVs on here and we all have to try to understand each other (not just you, same goes for everyone on Fluther) and empathize in order to provide support.

Very, very few, if any, people on this board are targeting this discussion or you because you are female.

I actually think everyone on here would like to LURVE you as much as possible so just give them a chance. :)

I always have a good chuckle when someone tries to argue with @Simone_De_Beauvoir on the subject of sex or gender stereotypes.

@poofandmook Dude, me too!

@hurtntired: I understand that, and I do appreciate the genuinely helpful responses. But I think even these people insisting that they don’t have a misogynistic cell in their bodies need to remember that often these things are insidious and subtle and we are often unaware of our own biases.

@mostlyclueless But but but, trust me – some of us have totally achieved deconditioning in this matter, promise, cross my heart.

Wow, don’t sign on to Fluther from 10:00 pm Tuesday to 5:00 pm Wednesday and there are 20 new responses!

For me, the responses and advice I gave would have been regardless of whether the participants were men, women, leprechauns. Whether or not the person calling the OP was man, woman, boy, girl, Queen Elizabeth. Whether or not the OP herself was a herself, himself, itself, man or beast.

If someone tries to lead another into unwanted sexual conversation, the way to shut it down immediately is to either attempt to change the subject or say something indicating that this is unwanted. Instead, he asks her personal questions, she responds (honestly, which is admirable but honesty is not always necessary), he says he had a dream about her, she says “neat” and then asks for details, and later on in the convo she asks if he is masterbating. She was equally “guilty” in this conversation and then she is going to turn around and invite drama and malice by telling his girlfriend. OK, so about 30 people say to let it alone, live a drama-free life, drop it, and she argues with them (us). We try to point out that it takes two to tango, and she is not just an innocent bystander in the conversation. She does not seem to like that advice, even though it is the advice of the majority. OK. Why ask for advice and then argue about it. Just do it. Nothing to do with gender, really, No insulting people’s mentality. OP should do as she wishes. Simple. If it makes you happy, do it.

@jca All right now. I draw the line at leprechauns. grrr

@jonsblond: gnomes and sprites too!

@jca I think she’s looking for permission which I truly doubt anyone in this thread will give her.

@mostlyclueless It’s totally your choice. You’re the one who has to live with the consequences foreseen and unforeseen.

@SimonedeBeauvoir: Thanks for showing you are ignorant of the use of the term mentality and the ways in which I have used it.

To break this down for the uninitiated: everyone comes from a particular social background, and this background appears in word choice, idea choice and the manner of expressing these ideas. All this together amounts to the mentality manifested by the person in question, au fond. While many people share multiple discourse communities, the signs of the communities they belong to and associate with are marked pretty clearly in their language usage and the tone they take with others on specific subjects.

Your claim that I seem to be looking for a fight when “gail” basically dared me to knock the chip off her shoulder, as it were, in the last post of hers that I answered thus far, shows that you have an axe to grind in painting me as uninformed or over-eager to seek Internet wars. That sort of behavior is typical in someone who observes my level of discourse, feels insecure about her own level of discourse, and frantically attempts to discredit me. While I feel rather sorry for people like this, I don’t choose to talk with them—it’s usually a waste of time on my part. :)

@chyna: “gailcalled,” in her response to me, tossed in a nonsequitur known as baiting, and that was what I responded to; it was hardly a valid answer to any question. Since you can’t scroll up and look at it, apparently, here it is:

gailcalled: Please describe my mentality to me. I am eager to learn what it is, not knowing myself well enough to know myself.

The tone is obviously testy and dares me to tell her what her mamma is, in effect—it amounts to an invitation to play the dozens.

@electra That was after you said this to her, and since you can’t be bothered to scroll up, I’ll copy and paste it here: “Of course people with what is probably your mentality would SAY that. To say otherwise would be self condemnatory. Next? :)”

Don’t act like you didn’t “bait” her first. As of now, I’m done with reading your meaningless rants.

@Electra Pot, meet kettle.

Sinscrivensaid: @Electra It’s kind of hard to ignore you have a massive chip on your shoulder. And you certainly aren’t one to talk when you make straw man statements about “people of my mentality” and making editorial marks because I ignored my grammar and spellcheck. I say you’re overreacting and you make ad hominem attacks because i’m calling you out on it.

Electra: I’m not the one attacking people with terms like “feminist rage”—that would be you and your chip. You managed to misuse all the logical fallacies that you mentioned. My mention of your mentality was not a strawman argument; a strawman fallacy is creating a weaker argument than the opponent made instead of dealing with what the opponent said. I analyzed what you actually said. And since I didn’t call you anything but what a sociologist might dub you, I haven’t committed any ad hominem.

And considering that you apparently hailed out all the terms that you believe sound intelligent, albeit you grossly misused them, it appears that you are reacting much more strongly than is warranted by the discussion; coupled with the fact that you accused me of “feminist rage” right at the onset of our discussion, this shows you have the burden of being unduly emotionally involved here.

sinscriven: Sorry, I do have a small level of contempt for “feminist rage”, but not because I’m a misogynistic person.

Electra: Anyone who demeans women with terms like “feminist rage” is a misogynist.

sinscriven: I have egalitarian beliefs, so the fact that you or anyone else having either a vagina or a penis is completely irrelevant nor do I approach any situation with black and white views like that.

Electra: No, you just refer to articulate women as having “feminist rage.” I dare you to find me one instance where you accused a man on this site of having feminist rage. That’s so not black and white, right? ;)

sinscriven: I think women who treat themselves and other women as paraiahs and martyrs do more harm for universal equality than help it.

Electra: First I have “feminist rage”; now I “treat myself and other women as paraiahs [sic] and martyrs.” I’m afraid you are too illiterate to be able to paraphrase anything I actually said in a recognizable form. This, my friend, is what is known as a strawman—inventing arguments for your opponent. You are more than welcome to show me where I manifested feminist rage or treated anyone as a paraiah [sic] or a martyr. :)

sinscrivn: And her motives aren’t about her own sexuality in my eyes. I’m giving the benefit of a doubt that it was completely unwarranted and unwanted. I would question her motives of wanting to tell the girlfriend as being more of an act of malice towards her ex being an asshat than of any concern for her fellow female, she even explicitly said she doesn’t care about the other girl.

Electra: Where did I say that the OP’s motives had anything necessarily to do with sexual identity or gender interests on HER part? I pointed out how others reacted to her in a misogynistic, sexually typed way and that the OP’s reactions were simply those any human could have understandably made (e.g. any human, male or female—women ARE human, you know).

sinscriven: I can’t even tell if you’re being serious or just trolling at this point. If so, then well played.

Electra: I brought up a valid ideological point; you can’t answer it in a remotely rational way, and instead you accuse me of a lot of silly nonsense, not to mention three logical fallacies that you do not understand correctly—and you accuse ME of trolling?

It’s typical of a troll to accuse people he can’t debate rationally of trolling, actually. But I’m sure you know that—at least let’s hope you know what you do. ;)

chyna: @electra That was after you said this to her, and since you can’t be bothered to scroll up, I’ll copy and paste it here: “Of course people with what is probably your mentality would SAY that. To say otherwise would be self condemnatory. Next? :)”
Don’t act like you didn’t “bait” her first. As of now, I’m done with reading your meaningless rants.
chyna (22135 )

Electra: Again, you fail to scroll up—the person in question made a blanket denial of her tone in this discussion (hence I refer to what she already SAID).

And the fact that you can’t debate me rationally hardly says anything negative about me. But feel free to sling insults—your illiterate friend can tell you about his knowledge of logical fallacies and how you’re not implicated in any of them. ;D

hurtntired: @sinscriven, I call troll either way. Serious or not, she’s definitely accomplished getting this discussion off track and talking about how bad someone spells and whatnot. LOL.

Electra: You mean I got everyone off the track of making what are essentially sex based condemnations of the OP by pointing out what your collective denunciation of her IS discriminatory? Wow, how terrible of me. Heavens forbid someone is not sitting with your clique in the box of your private little rigged jury.

poofmoof: I always have a good chuckle when someone tries to argue with @Simone_De_Beauvoir on the subject of sex or gender stereotypes.

Electra: Sure, what else could be so devastating a defeat as having the said Simone (I hate to see the name of the philosopher and novelist taken in vain, by the way) misuse my terms, accuse me of doing what she did and then stand back while her valiant coeval demonstrated that he did not understand the meaning of the logical fallacies he accused me of using. I’ve never been so put down. :D

@Electra Pot, meet kettle.
meiosis (3929 )

Electra: Ooooh, look at the little one who emailed me to absolve his little hurt ego and now doubtless has read my request that he not email me with nonsense. What a brave and mature way of salving his ego—jump on the bandwagon of the other one who can’t follow a discussion but prefers to sling names about it. Hilarious, people. I’ll have to stick around here for the sheer amusement value! :D

jca: For me, the responses and advice I gave would have been regardless of whether the participants were men, women, leprechauns. Whether or not the person calling the OP was man, woman, boy, girl, Queen Elizabeth. Whether or not the OP herself was a herself, himself, itself, man or beast.
If someone tries to lead another into unwanted sexual conversation, the way to shut it down immediately is to either attempt to change the subject or say something indicating that this is unwanted. Instead, he asks her personal questions, she responds (honestly, which is admirable but honesty is not always necessary), he says he had a dream about her, she says “neat” and then asks for details, and later on in the convo she asks if he is masterbating. She was equally “guilty” in this conversation and then she is going to turn around and invite drama and malice by telling his girlfriend. OK, so about 30 people say to let it alone, live a drama-free life, drop it, and she argues with them (us). We try to point out that it takes two to tango, and she is not just an innocent bystander in the conversation. She does not seem to like that advice, even though it is the advice of the majority. OK. Why ask for advice and then argue about it. Just do it. Nothing to do with gender, really, No insulting people’s mentality. OP should do as she wishes. Simple. If it makes you happy, do it.

Electra: The amount of anger and venom that was directed at the OP for fairly human behavior (who would not engage in an amusing conversation? Who would not contemplate informing an ex’s gf if he’s been bad?) certainly did smack of a more serious condemnation than it would have been if the OP were male. You very conveniently summed up the discussion without including the tone and the language that was directed at the OP.

And as for “insulting your mentality,” you again show in your phrasing that you don’t understand the term: I insulted no one’s mentality; I merely diagnosed it. If you (gen. you) do not like the implications that your discourse incurs, you should rethink your ways of thinking and talking about things.

mostlyclueless: The OP got tired of defending herself against totally unfounded accusations, since the defense was going nowhere anyway.
Even if I wanted to break them up (I don’t), even if I encouraged the conversation (I didn’t), even if our friendship was toxic (it’s not), none of this helps me solve the problem of whether I should inform his girlfriend of his actions or not. Yet the preponderance of the answers I received dealt with these ancillary issues, and I can’t help but wonder if @Electra is correct—that the people who chose to respond in such a manner were, on some level, motivated by a very subtle and perhaps subconscious sense that I needed to be reprimanded for my sexual behavior because I am female.

Electra: The proof of that, my dear, is in the fact that they’re now willing to befriend you in order to present a unified front against me. I wouldn’t have been the universal “bad guy,’’ complete with my “feminist rage,” if I’d stuck up for a man in equivalent terms. You have my word on that one.

If you admit that you’re wrong, that you’re guilty, that you have behaved shamefully, they’ll all be your friends. They really just want you to admit that you deserve to be chastised and that you really came to this site to be chastised, to verbally kneel at the feel of those who wield the voice of social displeasure and be humbled and verbally whipped. If you tell these good people that you indeed came here to be “set straight” and “chastised” and to learn of your own guilt in this matter, they’ll give you a great cheer party. I’ll bet money on it. ;)

Wow! You all read a lot more into this than I do. Somewhere midway through, I just figured mostlyclueless had mostly made up her mind to tell the girlfriend, but wanted backup or a real reason not to. Even if she had baited him, which it does not sound like she did from what she said, it is his responsibility not to take the bait. If she did bait him in order to have something to tell the girlfriend, I doubt she would have asked the question. She would have just gone on with her original plan.

Wow, I’m so sorry I missed this! Well, this thread is certainly a good argument for lurking for a bit when you come aboard, and learning to not push an agenda right away (any agenda!) before you know to whom you are talking would be a valuable lesson. Sorry, @Electra but your rant is mostly accusatory cliched “feminist” rhetoric from the 60s and 70s and doesn’t sound like you’ve thought out your responses based on the individuals you’ve found here. Painting most of us with a “misogynist” brush and assuming hidden motives is silly and counterproductive. Most of the women in this thread (and many of the men) have lived through the wars and have repeatedly shown their (our) responses are considered and cogent. There is no black and white sexism going on here, we respond to the Qs as written, without assuming greater hidden agendas. Take a look around, here, we don’t much like ranters, but we embrace people with considered and cogent points of view, whether popular or not.
Unless, of course, you are a seasoned Jelly here under a different username in order to be a troll.

And that’s my rant.

Wow.

I sort of feel bad for anyone who has THAT much time on their hands.

So, just out of curiosity, @mostlyclueless, what did you ultimately end up doing?

lol

@Electra – you’re adorable. but so tiring.

@Electra : Eh, you can say what you want but I’m excusing myself from this argument, it’s irrelevant to the discussion and there’s no point in being a male arguing with a misandrist.

Last I checked, my penis was still in my pants and not oppressing all the females on the planet.

@optimisticpessimist : I agree, seems she was just looking for encouragement to her already made decision, and the nearly unanimous suggestion that it’s a bad idea was just not what she wanted to hear.

It’s a morally gray area to tell or not, but why cause more destruction than necessary?

@poofandmook I am still thinking about what to do. I am leaning torward telling him that either he can tell his girlfriend himself what kind of relationship he is trying to have with me, or I will.

I might just let it go, though. I feel in my gut very strongly that he should be exposed, but the reaction I have gotten has been so overerwhelmingly negative I am doubting my instincts.

@mostlyclueless If he is as bad as you have said he is, she will eventually find out on her own. I still say leave it alone.

@chyna but I was with him for four years before I found out. I have been in this girl’s exact position… I feel for her.

@mostlyclueless : The choice is ultimately yours, whatever you decide will have a backlash. If you tell, she will probably not thank you, and be angry. If you don’t, you’ll feel guilty (obviously) and have to deal with that. Weigh the pros and cons, nothing about this is easy.

@mostlyclueless : The feeling is pretty understandable. If the guy’s that big of a creep then the girlfriend is probably somewhat aware of it already, or will find out in due time. You spilling a bomb on her like that will make her feel like you are the reason to blame for her life crashing to a halt and it will either destroy their relationship, and or your ex will rally her to his side playing the “my crazy bitch of an ex is trying to break us up cause she’s jealous” card. You’ll lose your friend either way because you either meddled in their relationship, or squealed him out for being a pig.

The unknown is that you don’t know how vile and vicious either or both can get if you cross them. Could be a situation where she’s the stalker one screw loose kind of crazy and she’ll take active steps to make your life a living hell cause in her eyes you “ruined” hers, regardless of what happened or how you felt about it. All the more reason why just to stay away from crazy. D:

I’m sorry but every time I see “Should I expose a lousy boyfriend” in my activity, I think someone’s planning to pants him.

I’m a little afraid of @sinscriven now.

@chyna Because I think in worst case scenario? D:

Yes, goes to show how your mind works.

@mostlyclueless A few years ago, when I was still with my ex, he cheated on me with a girl I knew. At the time, I was so pissed off (not saying this is how you feel, just telling the story) that I was about to call her and tell her that he had a girlfriend because she didn’t know. At least she supposedly didn’t know. I got so far as to ask a mutual friend of ours for her phone number but I stopped there. I am thankful every day that I didn’t “expose” him to her at the time because all I know is, it wouldn’t have made anything any better.

I understand that you feel for the girl for being in a position you were in, but ultimately (and I don’t say this because I think your behavior was right/wrong good/bad) I think it will serve yourself better to not expose him. This is for your own mental health and well-being. Nothing good for you can come out of this because somebody (your ex or his girlfriend or their friends or your friends) will have something bad to say about it and turn it against you. So even if you feel it’s for her own good, and it might possibly be, it won’t be for your own good. Does that make sense?

Adding on to what others have said, I think if you tell her she is likely to be suspicious of your motives, since you are not just anybody, and not her friend, you are the ex-girlfriend.

@chyna I don’t see how. I’m more often optimistic to a fault, but it’d be foolish to expect someone to take horrible news in stride.

I was over dramatizing a bit. But it really serves her no good, and it doesn’t serve the girlfriend any good besides giving her a target to blame

@sinscriven I was teasing. I actually liked your answer.

Not that it matters or will affect my decision but I continue to be confused by a lot of the logic employed on this thread. Of course she’s going to doubt my motivations, but if I send her the actual text of the conversation, which took place online, how will her opinion of why I did it have any influence on any outcome? Is she going to say, “yes youre a dishonest little perv, but your ex only sent this to me to be a bitch, so youre off the hook”?

There was even a post above that suggested I might be making this whole thing up in order to destroy him which got GAs… Why I would ask for advice on a made-up situation and post it here without any identifying information to destroy him… This logic eludes me.

And the continued assumptions about my motives and behavior—that I had already made up my mind to tell her and was just looking for yes men—really just serves to underscore the inability to make reasonable analyses on the part of some answerers here. Since, as stated above, I have not in fact yet decided what to do.

@mostlyclueless. Please, I implore you, decide already.

@mostlyclueless : It’s a possibility that she could react like that, denial is a very powerful thing. It’s irrational as hell but love isn’t rational. And I wouldn’t be surprised that your friend would quickly sell you up the river to cover himself when she confronts him with it.

There’s no right answer, just a matter if you value harmony or brutal honesty more. Not an easy decision when you’re burdened with making a dramatic impact on more than one life here that you won’t have to deal the fallout with.

@mostlyclueless Okay, it sounded as if I meant you were looking for yes men. I meant even if the split was 51% for telling and 49% for not telling, you were leaning that direction. I jumped at this conclusion because you when people said not to tell, you argued against it. However, several times people said tell and you did not argue against that. To me, it implied you were leaning in the direction of telling. It is a difficult decision to make. But you asked for OPINIONS. I see why you would be offended at personal attacks on your motivations and/or character, but none was implied or implicit by me. I said I felt you were looking for backup or a real reason not to tell. Meaning, I felt you already knew why you felt you should, but you maybe were not sure exactly why you should not and wanted further opinions in this area.

It seems as if all aspects of this decision and it’s implications have been discussed.

@mostlyclueless: Good Luck with whatever you decide to do. I will ask you as I have asked many others before you, please post an update as to your decision and the outcome, if you wish.

JCA
The Update Lady

I would like to point out, @mostlyclueless, that it’s been several days now. The credibility of the whole scenario is wearing thin. And by that I simply mean that if she’s naive, she could well think that you’ve made it all up in these past couple of days, and then you’re screwed out of a friend and she’s still stuck with a pig.

So again, but now for different reasons, I’d suggest you let it go.

jillthetooth: Sorry, @Electra but your rant is mostly accusatory cliched “feminist” rhetoric from the 60s and 70s and doesn’t sound like you’ve thought out your responses based on the individuals you’ve found here.

Electra: I didn’t use any cliches, actually. Merely because you don’t like an idea, and because someone used the same idea before, does not mean it is cliched. The individuals I found here provoked my responses; if they don’t like people’s reactions to their posts, they should think about their posts. On that note, the rest of your post was too much of an unfocused rant, complete with all the real cliches loaded on people you simply disagree with and can’t debate in favor of your buddies and likes, so I don’t feel the need to address it further. :)

@Simone_De_Beauvoir : Faux condescension toward someone you can’t rationally debate shows loads about you and nothing about me. Next? :)

[mod says] Flame off, folks. Please remember to disagree without being disagreeable.

@Electra: Perhaps ask your own question and let those who feel like debating you do so on your thread and not that of @mostlyclueless.

Okay. I am not going to tell her. I feel in my gut that this is wrong—if I were in her shoes I would want to know (did want to know), and I feel like it is a moral error to withhold information from someone that could have such a strong influence on her life and decisions.

But the response I have gotten from other people, including here, has been so overwhelmingly negative that I have to question my judgment, and since I can’t unring a bell, I guess the only thing to do is not to ring it in the first place.

The next time he does it, though, I am going to tell him that either he can tell her or I will.

Thank you for letting us know.

@mostlyclueless; Would you allow there to be “a next time”?

@gailcalled: Enough, please. I refuse to be held responsible for his behavior, and I am not going to cut him out of my life simply because you seem to think it’s the right thing to do. I have little doubt he will attempt to have another sexual conversation with me, and when that happens I will again point out that it is inappropriate. I understand that you would handle the situation differently, and I respect that, but for my decisions in my life, I have to respectfully disagree.

I was looking for a “yes“or “no” answer. No such luck.

Update: I never sent it. She saw the conversation anyway and broke up with him. There’s justice in the world?