BootmanLA

I can't tell how old you are from your profile or picture, but I don't think you're anywhere nearly old enough to remember the Cold War or what it was like, nor able to understand what it was like to be in the Soviet Union (not "Communist Russia", which isn't even a thing). A little grumbling between people on a privately owned internet forum about what should or shouldn't be permitted is about as far removed from the "free speech" issues suffered in the USSR as the USSR physically is from, say, Antarctica.

If you believe Justice Alito's commentary that this abortion opinion (draft) has no bearing on same sex marriage or sodomy laws, I have 50 acres of beautiful oceanfront property in Iowa to sell you. I promise you, the price is a steal. Supreme Court opinions almost always contain language that say, in effect, "we aren't deciding THAT case today because it's not before us" but they do not mean "we'll rule differently in that other case." What they mean is, we couldn't get the votes in THIS case to make a sweeping, more inclusive proclamation like "There are no rights that are not spelled out explicitly in the Constiuttion" but don't worry, we'll be back to take care of those things as soon as things quiet down just a little bit and another case comes along. Look at the Voting Rights Act as an example. They struck down the preclearance formulas contained in Section Four, on the grounds that those formulas were adopted in 1970 and no longer reflected the actual practices of the jurisdictions that the formula subjected to Section Five preclearance. Then they sat back, and a few years later ruled that a law that had discriminatory effects on a protected racial minority wasn't inherently suspect; you very nearly have to prove *intent to discriminate on the basis of race* in order to succeed with a Voting Rights Act challenge. So as long as the racists trying to violate the law are good enough at hiding their motivation, no matter how blatant the effects are, it's very hard to win the case. That's despite Congress making it clear that disparate racial IMPACT was just as much a violation as express racial INTENT. That's how the Court works - it whittles away a principle, little by little, and then eventually it says, well, with all these things we've ruled since the original principle was set, obviously that principle doesn't hold any more, we made a mistake, and we overturn the principle. That's been the history of abortion laws for the last 20 years, almost always upholding increasingly severe restrictions. Don't think it won't happen to sodomy or same-sex marriage. It will.

I think I got exactly what you were saying. I still think if it's realistic medical play, I'm going to be bonerless and completely uninterested. All that would run through my mind is "Does he get off on doing this to actual patients? That's disgusting." And it's an image I wouldn't be able to get out of my head.

I must confess I'm having a hard time getting my mind wrapped around this. Either it's an actual, real medical exam - in which case yes, you do what the doctor tells you to, but it stays professional, or else it's a scene, whether or not your partner is a real doctor not, and you go with the scene flow. But in the latter case, if my "doctor" (or actual doctor) started examining me as he would an actual patient, that would be a pretty fast boner-killer.

I think there are two sorts of married men out there with respect to condom use/bare fucking. The first is the guy that is super-careful in planning his activities, making sure that nothing happens to tip off the wife. He's got condoms concealed carefully somewhere and he uses them regularly to avoid contracting any STI that he might pass on to his wife. He fully acknowledges (to himself, at least) that he likes this kind of sex but wants to keep it compartmentalized. The second is the guy that hasn't really faced up to who he is, but who gives in (regularly or not) to "urges". He can justify this as meeting a physical need that just happens sometimes, that he's helpless to control, which is why he finds himself at cruise spots and the like on a work afternoon. Carrying condoms would mean it was premeditated, and he'd planned it, which he can't do, and worse, it suggests he's going after guys he knows might have an STI. If he goes bare, he can convince himself it's another straight guy like himself who just needs a little release with another man, so it's got to be safe, right? Obviously, an oversimplification, but I think there's a big divide between the two.

I agree that the "cult of personality" around Ginsburg was, on balance, a bad thing. It may have contributed to her sense that she was irreplaceable and that a strategic retirement at a point she could be succeeded by a like-minded colleague was of no matter. And yes, in her later years, after decades of practicing law, and her husband practicing law (and both of them teaching law in some pretty high-end institutions), they were financially very comfortable. But she wasn't born into that, nor was her husband. They were just in that generation that became adults after WWII, when higher ed money flowed like a river and where, with hard work AND a great deal of luck, you could pull yourself up from solidly working class to upper middle class or higher in one generation (which really isn't possible any more).

An internal bruise is possible, though it's not necessarily in your rectum. If the guy was pounding really hard, he'd have been beating your rectum against your small intestines, and THAT may be what's actually sore (and pushing out activates the muscles in the rectum pushing against the intestines, so it's like rubbing the sore spot). So the suppositories might help IF the rectum is what's actually sore, but not otherwise. I'd be inclined to just push through it, but monitor to make sure the pain doesn't get worse. If it does, see a doctor.

I have to disagree with part of this. Yes to the idea that we shouldn't have deified Ginsburg, but she DID have firsthand knowledge of ordinary peoples' struggles. Her father was a merchant (in the Depression, no less), her mother a worker in a garment factory (like many poor Jewish women of her day). Ginsburg was pushed hard to excel from an early age, precisely so that she COULD end up in better circumstances than her parents. Her mother died of cancer while Ginsburg was in high school, and her family was thus reduced to a single parent income. She married her husband the same year she finished college, She gave birth to (and took care of) her first child while her husband was undergoing compulsory military service; she nursed him through testicular cancer while they were both in law school (AND raising children). So yes, she very much had firsthand knowledge of the struggles of ordinary people. Did she forget some of those struggles? Perhaps. I can't point to anything in her writings that even hints at that, nor in any of her votes on the Court. What I WILL say (and what others have said) is that eventually, her ego - which had helped drive her to success after success amidst considerable adversity, including the contempt the legal profession had for female lawyers in the 1950's and 1960's - convinced her that she was essentially irreplaceable, or at least that there was no need to consider being replaced, despite her health problems and the certainty that, sooner or later, the Republicans were likely to win the White House again.

It's not that I want to save racists from their own foolishness. But I do think it behooves all of us to do what we can to help ensure there's a little less racism in the world - not just by refusing to judge on the basis of race ourselves, but calling out others who do, as well.

You have only made 13 posts. You have never been able to message (at least not initiating a message). That ability comes with considerably more interaction online.

Indeed. The alternative is to assume - without regularly re-examining the evidence - that Big Pharma is "out to get us" by forcing us to stay on expensive medications forever, and to become a bitter nasty old queen who doesn't believe in hope. We have an actual cure for Hepatitis C now - a very expensive one, yes, but compared with long-term treatment, it's still a relative bargain. It's one example, but it's clearly one that some group, somewhere, came up with. Despite all the nattering nabobs of negativism claiming Pharma doesn't want to cure anything.

Try searching on here for any of the approximately 879 times people have asked the question before - search for "first time bare" or something like that. More than a decade of advice, all of which boils down to "You just have to try it to find out."

Indeed. I think that's part of the problem - white guys who think "white guys" are the default, and everyone ELSE is "inter-racial". "Sex with someone of another race" would have been a much better tagline.

Here's the thing. You consent to surgery under anesthesia, AFTER the procedure and all of what they're going to do has been explained to you, AND almost always, there are provisions in the consent form for what to do if something goes awry.. There's often (though not always) a designated someone else (relative, spouse, partner, child, whatever) waiting in attendance in case a health care decision has to be made and there's time for someone to make it on your behalf. So yes, it's possible to consent to sex under those circumstances - that you know you'll be unconscious when it happens. But for there to be any parallel, there needs to be explicit disclosure of everything that's going to be done to you while you're out. Otherwise, those particular acts are non-consensual. And before someone suggests that you can give a sweeping "anything goes" consent... really? You mean it's okay if the guy decides to remove your nuts and cock with a box cutter while you're out, that's "consented to"?

Short answer: some do, some don't. No amount of responses you receive here will change that fact.

That's fine - I just like it clear when someone's responding to my words vs. someone else's. Someone skimming posts and reading yours may get the wrong idea. The apology's appreciated. Here's a suggestion, though (for what it's worth): when you are responding to a quoted section of a post, before you click "quote" to reply, click in the quoted section - which will take you to the original poster and his words. Then, if you click "quote" on HIS post, your reply will be directed at the person you're addressing, not an intermediate commenter. If you click "quote" on the intermediate person - like me, who'd commented on the original - you end up only quoting that intermediate person, and none of the original person's quote appears. It's like the "quote" feature can only go back to the specific post quoted, and can't include any prior-quoted material from that same post.

I may not have explained my point clearly. Your own response, though, touches on what I mean: it's not that PrEP enters any cells, but it does build up a barrier TO infecting certain cells, and that can take place either within the bloodstream or within certain types of tissue, specifically mucosal tissue, found in the vagina and rectum. PrEP, in other words, definitely enters certain tissues, even if it doesn't exactly enter the cells within the tissue. As I'm sure you know, HIV replicates by invading a cell, coopting the cell's reproductive capabilities, and using them to produce more virus particles. So in that context, PrEP exists to disrupt that interaction between the cell and the virus, and that's what I was referring to: as long as there's sufficient PrEP in your system, the virus particles can't enter your system, and eventually they're filtered out or break down. The thing about mucosal tissues is probably what explains why taking PrEP longer (after sex) may be more important for a bottom than a top. There aren't nearly as many points of entry (via the bloodstream or mucosal tissues) on a cock as there are in a rectum. If a top's on PrEP and has sex with an HIV+ bottom, infection by the virus is not only prevented by the PrEP, but he's likely to be at risk only until his next urination or so. A bottom, on the other hand, may have active virus trying to invade through his rectal mucosal tissues for a good while, hence the need to keep the level of PrEP high in his system for a longer period.

Yes and no. There's a difference between the virus being inserted into your system, and the virus being able to actively reproduce within your system, and the virus can continue to exist (it's not "living") within your system for a period before it breaks down and can no longer infect. The point of PrEP is to prime your body's cells with the ability to prevent HIV from replicating in your system until it naturally breaks down and is no longer a threat. So both the amount of time the drug has to build up in your system before infection AND how long it remains in your system after infection are both relevant. If the penile/vaginal tissues have sufficient drug levels at the time of sex, they may be able to prevent the virus from ever entering your bloodstream to find other cells through which to replicate. But if it does reach the bloodstream, it's also important to keep priming the pump, so to speak, with additional drug levels (the day after and day after that doses, at a minimum) that continue to block replication by the virus.

Yes. Kind of like "As someone who is also a crappy human being, finding out he's also a crappy human being makes him much more acceptable to me."

There is no guarantee that's what they mean. He could just like those images, or the scorpion could be a horoscope thing.

Race play can take diametrically opposing forms, actually. Sometimes the dominant player is of what is normally (within the particular society) the advantaged/majority race, and the submissive partner is of a less-advantaged/minority one; think a white top and a black bottom in the US, for instance, particularly in the southern US. Such play might well involve slavery themes or Jim Crow themes ("you talking back to me, BOY? Gotta learn you some manners!"). Sometimes the roles are reversed, with the less-advantaged/minority player as the dominant one, sometimes with themes of retribution and reversing control ("You been looking at that big black MAN's cock, white boy? You gotta earn that!"). And so on. It's variable, but those are a couple of examples of how it can play out.

You quoted me, but I'm simply quoting the poster before me who insisted that everyone sorts by race. I'm not claiming that everyone does - he did. Please be more careful - rather than quote me quoting someone, why not quote the original comment you're objecting to, so it doesn't appear to the casual reader that you think I said the offensive comment?

That depends on the ring. If it's not too snug when you're soft (but snug enough to not "fall down your pants leg"), then yes, you can. That's a matter of personal taste. I know some guys who prefer silicone rubber because it's durable and yet stretchy. Some prefer leather with snaps (though I see fewer of those in recent years, for some reason), because they can be unsnapped and removed if they get painful without having to have the erection subside in order to remove it. There are also leather rings with velcro, which makes them even more adjustable. Some guys like metal; those that do tend to prefer wider (ie 1/2" to 3/4" ) rather than narrow rings. And that's before getting into alternative designs like the teardrop-shaped ones that prod your taint. Unfortunately, because the ring goes around your balls as well as at the base of your cock, it's really hard to say what the right size ring is for a given guy, because some balls are close up to the cock and some are farther back, and the size of the sack can affect the fit. If you can get to a leather event where there are vendors, you can sometimes try on some ring types (they can wipe them down with alcohol to sterilize them between customers), but not all vendors will permit that. Otherwise, your best bet may be to find some inexpensive rubber rings in a few different sizes - start with, say, a 2" diameter and go up and down from there) to find the size that fits you best. Then you can find other rings in other materials in a similar size. Bear in mind that some materials may fit you better than others, and you may need, say, a 2" ring in metal but a rubber one, being stretchy, can fit at 1 1/2 or 1 3/4 inches. Lastly: if you go with metal, go with stainless steel, not chrome plated (which WILL wear off, with body fluids and lube and other things on the finish).

In other words, sociopathic liars.

That presumes, on that day, that there's enough of his mind left to know he once ranted on here about how much he was looking forward to turning his life to shit. I suspect there won't be.