The Georgia Straight

Dating apps don’t have to be risky for curious couple

- By Dan Savage

I’M A STRAIGHT guy, married to a straight woman for 15 years. Several years back, I opened up to my wife about my fantasies of her sleeping with other men. I was nervous about bringing it up. Her views on sex had always been traditiona­l, and she had always expressed a very strict idea of monogamy and commitment. So I was extremely relieved when her reaction was intrigue rather than disgust. She was curious about it and wondered if I really wanted it to happen or if it was just something I wanted to keep in our rotation of dirty talk.

Fast-forward to this week and my wife tells me she is interested in exploring this. (Note to other guys who want this from their wives: be respectful, don’t pressure, and give her time to think about it. Your patience might be rewarded!) Here is the problem: we both have careers that could be complicate­d or damaged by the stigma around “cheating”. I know about all the apps out there, but we live in a large city, and there is a non-zero chance that we might run into someone on the apps we are connected to profession­ally or socially.

Are any of the apps out there geared toward folks who want to go about this carefully? Is it possible to minimize the risk of profession­al or social embarrassm­ent here, or is this just something we must accept to pursue this lifestyle?

- Hooking Up, Seeking Help

There are lots of dating apps for people and/or couples looking for casual sex and/ or kinky sex (Feeld, 3Somer, #Open, et al.), and lots of people—single and partnered—looking for casual and/or kinky sex on regular dating apps (Tinder, OKCupid, Christian Mingle, et al.). But hookup/ threesome/swinger apps, while perceived as sleazier, are a safer bet for a couple like you and your wife.

While there’s no way to eliminate your risk of being recognized on an app, HUSH, anyone who spots you on Feeld looking for

extracurri­cular dick was on Feeld looking for and/or offering up a little extracurri­cular dick of their own. The threat of mutually assured destructio­n—if they gossip about you, you’ll gossip about them—is usually enough to restrain bad actors, as is the threat of the obvious follow-up question. (“Wait, why are you on Feeld?”) And most people on hookup apps aren’t bad actors, HUSH, but fundamenta­lly decent people like you and your wife, i.e., singles and couples looking for a little fun, not for an opportunit­y to hurt anyone. A friend or a relative or a coworker who spots your wife in a bar with a strange man—or in the lobby of a hotel or on her way into your apartment—is likelier to cause you headaches than one of your fellow perverts online.

To minimize your risk of being spotted and outed on the apps, HUSH, don’t post face pics and only share them after you’ve establishe­d—to the best of your ability—the person you’re talking to isn’t a bot, a pic collector, or an extortioni­st. Again, there’s no way to fully eliminate the risk, but at a certain point you have to trust your gut and take a risk. You also have the option of creating a profile in a city you visit regularly but don’t live in, HUSH. After you’ve found and vetted a few good candidates, get yourself some airline tickets and a hotel room and have those drinks in a bar that a colleague, a fan, or your father-in-law is unlikely to walk into.

THERE’S A STORY making the rounds on Reddit about people getting those metallic “bejewelled butt plugs” all the way into their asses and needing pretty intense interventi­on to get them out, ranging from partners pulling them out with their fingers (the unfun kind of double penetratio­n) to actual surgery in a hospital. The blame, apparently, lies in the fact that the base of these toys is rarely wider than the widest part of the head, which is pretty damning, and that lubed metal is slipperier then lubed silicone.

So here are the operative questions: are metallic bejewelled butt plugs safe or not so much? Are silicone bejewelled butt plugs any safer? Are there any safe bejewelled buttplug options out there?

- Insertion Toy Extraction Messy Situation

I’ve seen those jewelled butt plugs in shops and in photos online—they’re usually made from stainless steel and have glass “gems” mounted at the end of an alarmingly narrow base—but I’ve never actually seen one in person. Or in a person, at least not in person. But knowing what I do about butts (and how they relax after some play), and knowing what I do about plugs (a flared base is your first line of defense against a trip to the ER), I would’ve worried too much about losing one to use one.

As for safe bejewelled butt-plug options ITEMS, you’re going to want a flared base and a jewel that’s at least the size of Cullinan Diamond, the fist-sized rock on the Queen of England’s royal sceptre, which, come to think of it…g

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 ?? Photo by Anpet/Getty. ?? Looking for the thrill of having your wife sleep with other men but need to make sure you don’t broadcast your kinks on dating apps? Start by not posting face pics.
Photo by Anpet/Getty. Looking for the thrill of having your wife sleep with other men but need to make sure you don’t broadcast your kinks on dating apps? Start by not posting face pics.

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