# Going through the motions?????? **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [March 15, 2006, 5:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/going-through-the-motions/348484 "2006-03-15T17:21:29Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 12\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![FaerieBeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e95f7d/32.png) [@FaerieBeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FaerieBeth)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2006, 7:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/going-through-the-motions/348484/101 "2006-03-17T19:09:43Z")
> [@betenoir](#): > > Well, I AM hurt. And betrayed. And i thought we were…really talking. Apparently not. > > I don’t know what to do with myself. One minute I think what the hell…we weren’t really …err…boyfriend and girlfriend. The next minute i feel all the stuff we shared over the years and mourn it. The next minute i’m just disappointed at what we won’t get to share. The next minute I want him dead. I don’t know what to think. **Betenoir** , hang in there. No matter the format, when a relationship we thought was meaningful ends, we all feel hurt, a little weird, ticked off, betrayed, and/or mournful. It doesn’t matter how others classify it. It meant something to **you** , and now it’s over. That hurts. I know. ---
**Author:** ![Kalhoun](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/3bc359/32.png) [@Kalhoun](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kalhoun)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2006, 7:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/going-through-the-motions/348484/102 "2006-03-17T19:24:14Z")
> [@Left Hand of Dorkness](#): > > But, and here’ the thing, I’m not coming in and sneering at someone because their relationship sin’t the kind I’d prefer. > > Daniel Nor am I. I threw in my two cents. That’s what I’m supposed to do on a message board, right? No sneer. Just an observation and some advice. I have no problem with the OP, and I can understand falling in love with a person’s words. There are plenty of details we don’t know about, and that might change my opinion about the whole thing. I don’t think I was unfeeling. Maybe I wasn’t syrupy about the whole thing, but hey…we’re not all like that. like I said, I understand broken hearts. ---
**Author:** ![Rilchiam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/2bfe46/32.png) [@Rilchiam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rilchiam)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2006, 7:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/going-through-the-motions/348484/103 "2006-03-17T19:37:47Z")
> [@Kalhoun](#): > > But she also didn’t mention that they had made plans to build a life together, to look for a place, to take trips to see each other, meet family or friends, save money for the trip for either one of them…none of the things that indicate a serious desire to intertwine lives. The only information I’ve seen is that they chatted each other up on line for several years and he freaked when she missed his phone call. _And_ ended the relationship over that. The friendship sounds real enough. But where’s the inclination to move it to the next step? We’re talking \*several years \* here! I don’t have time to check out her earlier posts, but do I recall correctly that she asserted that she was not staking her future on this guy, didn’t think of him as Mr. Right, but just wanted to meet him because circumstances had become conducive to that happening? And that she was not lying on a chaise holding a faded lily, but merely felt confused and hurt, as many people do when they get dissed? ---
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2006, 7:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/going-through-the-motions/348484/104 "2006-03-17T19:46:06Z")
> [@Kalhoun](#): > > I cannot think of a scenario where several years of never having a face-to-face meeting with a potential partner is even possible if you really want it to happen (with the exception of a military deployment…if that’s the case, I apologize). > > Even people who have foreign work-permit problems are able to at least visit each other once in a while. If it’s impossible to do that, the logical step is to move on to a relationship that has potential. In the OP’s defense, she never mentioned if her friend was from another country, which would make it more difficult, for sure. But she also didn’t mention that they had made plans to build a life together, to look for a place, to take trips to see each other, meet family or friends, save money for the trip for either one of them…none of the things that indicate a serious desire to intertwine lives. The only information I’ve seen is that they chatted each other up on line for several years and he freaked when she missed his phone call. _And_ ended the relationship over that. The friendship sounds real enough. But where’s the inclination to move it to the next step? We’re talking \*several years \* here! And yet, in the past, this is exactly what people did. Before mass communication, media, or travel, people wrote letters. Let’s say you have two people, whose parents arranged for them to get married when the kids were still young. They might start writing to one another as young teens for several years before finally being able to meet face to face. This was especially common among royalty and nobility. Now, sometimes these arrangements didn’t work out, and the marriage was pretty bleak. And yet other times, it wasn’t. I agree that online ONLY romances are a bad idea. I won’t do them-I’ll be friends with someone, but nothing further unless we meet and it works out then we’ll see. But to say it’s not a relationship at all, well, every situation is different. ---
**Author:** ![Kalhoun](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/3bc359/32.png) [@Kalhoun](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kalhoun)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2006, 7:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/going-through-the-motions/348484/105 "2006-03-17T19:46:18Z")
> [@Rilchiam](#): > > I don’t have time to check out her earlier posts, but do I recall correctly that she asserted that she was not staking her future on this guy, didn’t think of him as Mr. Right, but just wanted to meet him because circumstances had become conducive to that happening? And that she was not lying on a chaise holding a faded lily, but merely felt confused and hurt, as many people do when they get dissed? Yes, she mentioned that after my first post. She sounds conflicted on the whole thing based on her first two posts. Knowing one thing but feeling another, had a real-life boyfriend, etc. She said that the whole thing got very intense over the last couple months, knows logically he’s not a real boyfriend, etc. She feels shitty and I feel for her. ---
**Author:** ![Daithi\_Lacha](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/daithi_lacha/32/5430_2.png) [@Daithi\_Lacha](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Daithi_Lacha)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2006, 7:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/going-through-the-motions/348484/106 "2006-03-17T19:55:08Z")
> [@Waverly](#): > > No, I’m a disembodied web phantom. To that end, then, you can never form any sort of real relationships, you being unreal yourself, because nothing on the web is real, after all. Ergo, you don’t exist, and the 'Dope collected non-existant money for your subscription. Expanding that view, then, since most of us will never know each other _except_ through here, and if here isn’t real, in a sense, none of us exists at all! ---
**Author:** ![Plynck](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3e96dc/32.png) [@Plynck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Plynck)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2006, 9:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/going-through-the-motions/348484/107 "2006-03-17T21:18:11Z")
[hijack] > [@Ensign Edison](#): > > I got ‘meatspace’ from the MUD/MUSH/MUX community (mu\*) probably…geez…about thirteen years ago now. I don’t know where Finn got it, but I don’t see it often. My first notice of the word was in [_“Neuromancer”_](http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0441569595/qid=1142629283/sr=2-1/ref=pd_bbs_b_2_1/104-8594455-8490365?s=books&v=glance&n=283155), first published in 1986. So, twenty years ago\*. Also the first time I read the word “cyberspace”. And, just a guess here, it may be where **FinnAgain** was inspired for his name. > [@FinnAgain](#): > > Interesting, I had no idea… thanks for fighting some of my ignorance, I guess I’ve got some research to do. I know it’s been answered by **JohnT** , but in addition to the Internet, folks could also log onto bulletin boards with modems since at least the early '80s. [The Well](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WELL) is a classic example. [/hijack] \*Twenty years ago. I remember when this book was the beginning of the New Wave of scifi. God I feel old… ---
**Author:** ![Eleusis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/f4b2a3/32.png) [@Eleusis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eleusis)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2006, 7:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/going-through-the-motions/348484/108 "2006-03-18T07:24:10Z")
I know it’s been addressed already, but, holy motherfucking Barbra Steisand shit in a burrito supreme. Meatspace. … ? _MEATSPACE!!?!??_ :smack: I hereby curse thee with the fleas of a thousand camels. ---
**Author:** ![FinnAgain](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/finnagain/32/12500_2.png) [@FinnAgain](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FinnAgain)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2006, 8:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/going-through-the-motions/348484/109 "2006-03-18T08:15:59Z")
> [@Plynck](#): > > [hijack] > My first notice of the word was in [_“Neuromancer”_](http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0441569595/qid=1142629283/sr=2-1/ref=pd_bbs_b_2_1/104-8594455-8490365?s=books&v=glance&n=283155), first published in 1986. So, twenty years ago\*. Also the first time I read the word “cyberspace”. Actually, Gibson coined the word “cyberspace”. > [@Plynck](#): > > And, just a guess here, it may be where **FinnAgain** was inspired for his name. Nope, check the sig. ---
**Author:** ![Larry\_Mudd](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/f14d63/32.png) [@Larry\_Mudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Larry_Mudd)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2006, 8:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/going-through-the-motions/348484/110 "2006-03-18T08:46:17Z")
> [@FinnAgain](#): > > Nope, check the sig. Or the location, for that matter. 🙂 That reminds me – I never use _my_ sig: ---
**Author:** ![Plynck](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3e96dc/32.png) [@Plynck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Plynck)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2006, 6:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/going-through-the-motions/348484/111 "2006-03-18T18:10:11Z")
> [@FinnAgain](#): > > Nope, check the sig. Oops. Well, I \*did \* say a guess. But let me be more specific: “…Just a bad guess…” 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Ensign\_Edison](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7ab992/32.png) [@Ensign\_Edison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ensign_Edison)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2006, 6:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/going-through-the-motions/348484/112 "2006-03-18T18:20:00Z")
> [@Eleusis](#): > > I > _MEATSPACE!!?!??_ Hey, man, I just think it’s funny. I hate Gibson, I didn’t know it came from there, though it’s possible he ripped it off the culture, too, I guess. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/going-through-the-motions/348484.md?page=5)