Do you really need porn? I enjoy it, but I don’t have any trouble polishing the bishop without the Bible, as it were.
I’m completely porn’d out actually. I was really into it when I was younger, but after a certain point, they all look alike, and whatever you see isn’t as good as what you’ve seen before. I would be perfectly fine if my current collection (10 dvd’s, 5 gigs of videos) were completely wiped out. I’m actually afraid to find stuff like 2 girls 1 cup that doesn’t click with my tastes.
Here’s your engraved invitation into this thread: Share actual problems you’ve had that no one will ever sympathize with.
Thirded. If I was a guy and was with a woman with this attitude, it’d be a deal breaker. Hell, as a woman if my bf had an issue with something I do that is perfectly healthy, normal, and not at all a threat to our relationship and he was up at night worrying about it, THAT would be a deal breaker. That’s on YOU, buddy. I can only do so much to help you deal with an issue that is yours.
I say take Giraffe’s advice.
A lot of people think that a guy using porn means he’s not satisfied with the sexuality in his relationship. She’s probably quite insecure about her ability to be sexy.
It’s also a religious position amongst those who believe having a lustful thought is the same as having sex with someone else. It’s based on a misreading of Scripture (and what crazy belief isn’t?)
But I will admit that watching porn makes out-there stuff seem more mundane, so you should temper it, at least. Still, honestly, if I could get a girl to do half of what I watch in porn (and I don’t watch much), I’d give up porn in a second. Visual stimulation just doesn’t compare to tactile stimulation.
ETA: Or am I alone in finding porn boring after a week or so?
Sounds like your options are either a very careful and discreet #2, or a new girlfriend. Maybe take one more crack at talking about it, but it doesn’t sound like a high percentage shot. Or I guess you could try actually giving it up, but that also seems like a longshot because her request is unreasonable and you know it, so your willpower isn’t going to have any internal support.
Whatever you decide to do, ask her to stop bringing it up, because talking about it is going to completely suck whether you’re abstaining or not.
In a perfect world where all relationships are perfect, yes. But you’ve made it clear your girlfriend isn’t comfortable with porn, and you don’t like being asked to give it up.
So the decision in the relationship that you have the power to make is, it’s either the relationship or the porn. She’s either worth it, or she isn’t. Of course, she has to the same decision to make.
Before either of you make a decision, you might want to explore what other deal-breakers are out there. Otherwise every disagreement you two ever have will end up as a big, fat “I did this for you so you have to do that for me,” fight.
As a hetero woman, no, never had a girlfriend who objected to this 
but seriously folks, AS a woman, I have no problem with it. My late DH was never into it as far as I know (pretty damn far) but I would not have objected if he had been. UNLESS he “chose porn over me”…THEN I would have been hurt and PISSED.
As long as you don’t stay up late with your porn while she is in bed wishing you’d come and fuck HER, or if it doesn’t otherwise affect your relationship as far as time spent together or sudden exteme kinks you develop and try to act out on HER when she is all like EWWWWW!, WTH is she so worried about? 
My view is, wrt porn or looking IRL, “as long as he comes home to me, no problem.”
Men like to LOOK (so do many women). Unless there is more to it than that (excessive, addictive looking or cheating) get over it. JMHO.
I myself have a long-time hobby of writing hard-core erotica (some would definately call it “porn”…some HAVE…and I would be/have been flattered:D). So what? I also fantasize, masturbate, sometimes view porn, and otherwise have a normal, healthy sex life aside from whatever relationship I might be in. Despite all this, I never cheated and never chose any of the above over actual time/sex with my partner. And YES, it kept our sex life spicy. He could have given a crap HOW I got so, um, amorous. 
I would be MUCH more upset with a man who LIED to me about viewing porn, as would many women, I suspect, but then many women set men up to do exactly that…lie to them because they are forced to hide something completely innocent which they really enjoy and which has been a part of their lives forever.
So yeah, I don’t get it either. Not sure what advice to offer other than do what you feel is best in your situation. If you lie to her, she will eventually find out and resent it. If you give up something so harmless which you enjoy, YOU will resent it (and her) eventually. I would say, I guess, just be honest. Sit her down, have a long heart to heart about what porn means to you, what SHE means to you, and then maybe try and get her to view some WITH you, followed by a big ol’ fuck-fest. 
Sharing porn has been suggested many times as a “solution” to this “problem”, but it is, imo, only a partial one as long as one partner is hung up over private porn (which, imo, like masturbation, is something EVERYONE has a right to, no questions asked).
Hmm, maybe I should add: there’s a big difference between being attracted to porn and addicted to porn. All men are attracted to porn, and women should accept it. Men who are addicted to porn should be treated the same as drug addicts. If a normally sane wife/gf says “choose ____ or me!” then a man needs to carefully look at what they are doing and see if they’re in the danger zone.
No, you’re not. It is. Not only the terrible acting/writing/lighting/music, but SOOO predictable (ok, first this, then this, then this, then more of this…so formulaic :rolleyes:) and after a while, yeah, BOOORING! But every once in a while, I can really get into it, in small doses. 
Could you explain what exactly she worries about?
If she worries that you won’t find her attractive and that you’ll dump her, that seems like a self-fulfilling prophecy if she continues to force you to stop.
Does she worry that it’s an escalating process and that you’ll do more and more things to satisfy your desire? Is there some reason to think that?
And that’s all my imagination can come up with. I’m sure she has a much more creative worry that I can’t conjure.
ETA: I forgot to add: If she’s worrying about the past dishonesty of you saying you gave it up when you didn’t, that’s a whole different issue. For the moment, until I hear her real worries, I’m siding with her on that one.
I don’t honestly care what Dan Savage would say. And what he said there is not really what the OP was talking about. It’s one thing for both parties to do the mutual ‘wink, wink’ thing, while they both know the truth. It’s another for one party to outright lie to the other, just to keep doing what he wants to do and to keep her from getting mad. I don’t think the mutual pretense is a bad thing. I just don’t think it’s the issue here.
Sure it is.
I’m in a situation almost exactly like this, and I find #2 is the best option. If you’re only seeing her on weekends, eschewing porn altogether just isn’t a very fruitful option. Having an open communication won’t work if one of the parties is unwilling to compromise. Drawing a line in the sand will only build resentment. Hopefully, as she becomes more secure in her attractiveness, she’ll realize how stupid her no porn policy is. There’s no need to end a perfectly good relationship over this.
To me this would become a deal breaker. I see these issues as being more about control and trust than sexuality or self-esteem.
Loving someone is a huge risk, and to minimize that risk we all have this inner desire to get into another person’s head completely. We all wish we could be the end-all-and-be-all to another person. We all dream of having perfect security in our relationships.
But most of us come to realize that we love precisely because people are so beautiful and complex. Even the most loving and committed partners have their own lives, both internal and external, that don’t involve our partners. This doesn’t take away from the relationship. Indeed, that maddening touch of mystery is what keeps us fascinated with each other. And so I think most healthy relationships come to break away from this desire to control and operate on trust.
I see a demand like this as saying “You should never have a sexual thought that doesn’t directly involve me, and I believe that I should have the power to make that happen.” Not only is that simply not realistic, but the intent behind it- that you can be made into a fantasy SO rather than being loved for being sloppy complicated self- indicates a difference in thinking about relationships that are so incompatible with mine that I probably wouldn’t stick around to see what else goes wrong.
I agree. The lingering puritanical “porn is bad” stigma makes it look not as bad as it is by giving it a pseudomoral gloss. But imagine if, say, some man was demanding that his girlfriend throw out her collection of romance novels because he was jealous of the characters, and lay in bed at night brooding about it.
It’s my understanding that statistically straight men prefer visual erotica more; straight women prefer written material more; gay men prefer written material more than straight men but still prefer visuals more than women; and lesbian like visuals more than straight women but less than men. In other words, the spectrum of statistically preferring visual to preferring written goes: straight men -> gay men -> lesbians -> straight women. It really does look like there’s some biological differences involved.
[snip]
You’re being very short sighted on this issue. even sven make a good point.
My ex wife was a beautiful, intelligent and one of the sweetest women on the planet.
But you know what broke us apart? Her freaking jealousy!! She was so over the top she would accuse me of watching porn at work. Or if we went out, she would get all pissy because she thought I was ogling women.
And god forbid I should ever talk to another women. Well, I take that back. It was OK as long as they were obese and less attractive than she was. :rolleyes:
So it’s rather ironic. All the extremes she went through to try to guarantee I wouldn’t cheat on her or to put her own insecurities at rest, is the very thing that broke us apart.
I feel sorry for her.
To the OP: Save yourself the headache. Girls like this can’t be fixed. Move on.
Original #5.
You need to be happy.
She needs to be happy.
Its a big world and there really are people out there who can make you both happy somewhere. Now is the time to take that step.
Yes, there are sacrifices you can make to help your relationship work once you are in one, but sex and your sexuality shouldn’t be one of them.
Don’t be that guy who sacrifices a part of himself to be who he isn’t, only to wake up 20 years later and read a thread like this one.
pipes up
Actually, I wouldn’t be crazy about a guy watching porn. This is NOT because I consider it cheating, or because I feel that he can’t have sexual thoughts that are not about me.
What I’m not crazy about is the objectifying of women and to lesser extent to the normalisation of what women should look like (shaving, waxing, big boobs, certain kind of labia etcetc) and what sexual acts they are required to perform to please men. And yes, I can tell the difference between fantasy and reality. But fantasies that are too often repeated, too lovingly adhered to, can and do spill over into reality. Society has become very sexualised in an IMO negative way and do think porn has played a part. I find it hard to look at it as a bit of harmless fun.
I wouldn’t go as far as to bar a partner from watching it if he really got great pleasure from it. But I can’t go along with the “everyone does, who cares, get over it” attitude displayed in this thread.
Nor should they be.
I accept the OP’s taste for porn, and I also accept her distaste for porn. No one’s right or wrong here, just mismatched as a couple. You like what you like, true, but you also don’t like what you don’t like. Any attempt made to alter someone’s sexuality, be they turn ons or turn offs, is doomed to failure, one way or another. If having a sexual partner who’s into some sexual thing that disturbs her is a dealbreaker, then it just is. (This is different than the situations appropriate for Savage’s excellent advice, which assumes that both partners aren’t losing sleep over the porn situation, but both agreeing to a polite charade for both their sakes.) The arguments and angst are merely prolonging the inevitable breakdown of the relationship.