Your friendly neighborhood bartender is taking a break from his wild dating life to tackle your questions with his patented blend of advice and adult beverages. So slide on up to the bar my friends. Now, what can I get you?
Dear JT,
I'm 25 and live in Romania, and I have a 21-year-old boyfriend with whom I often have nothing in common. He can be very childish and isn't the most intellectually-stimulating person out there.
Now, it's not all bad. He's fun, he makes me laugh, and the sex is great. I DO have feelings for him - whether it's love or not is hard to tell. Do I not want to end it because of love, or simply because of lack of alternative options? Romania is one of the most backwards places in the EU, so the chances of ending up in a proper relationship are very slim.
I will admit I’ve cheated on him twice (but each time I was in a different country/continent, so maybe in a twisted way it doesn't count), but I've admitted it, paid my dues and we've moved past it. We have our ups and downs, but I genuinely feel we could make it ... BUT there's a good chance he'll be temporarily moving to the UK within the month. I'm set up to visit him for his birthday in January if it happens and we've discussed plans for a quick ceremony/wedding in France next year.
I will do my best to maintain the relationship but … do you think it would be better to simply let go? There's a good chance he could find someone very good for him in the UK, he could lead a more open life and be genuinely happy. Even with my family in the know (and mostly in denial) regarding my orientation, the chance of having the kind of family we both want and living free of prejudice won't come along in the near future here. I don't know if I should be selfish and try and hang on, especially if it's because of my fear of NOT being in a relationship, and not because of my love for him. Sooo...help?
Thank you,
Selfish
Literally the only thing I know about Romania. Wait ... what?
Oh, TRANSYLVANIA? Okay, yeah, then I got nothin'.
Wow, dude. I had you completely pegged for an utterly arrogant, thoughtless douchebag until that last paragraph.
You still seem kind of arrogant and thoughtless. Just not such a d-bag. Here’s why.
1) Your letter, as you know, was a bit longer than what I posted, and in the bits I trimmed for space you talk about what a catch you are while trashing your boyfriend.
2) You cheated on him, and if the terms of your relationship were built on monogamy, then it still very much counts as infidelity, despite your attempts to shuck off blame by pointing out location.
3) You call him childish and dumb.
Just think for one second how you would feel if you found a letter he wrote saying these kinds of things about you. That you even suggest you might love him is a joke. No one who loves someone treats them with as much contempt as you do your boyfriend.
If I were him, I would hop on the first plane to England and never look at your mean, ungrateful ass ever again.
However, one quality all douchebags have in common is a total lack of self-awareness. You, on the other hand, seem to know yourself and why you are the way you are, so now I’m going to quit being a dick to you -- uh, I mean, doling out tough love -- and address an issue I fortunately rarely have to deal with myself.
That sucks for you that you live in a country where outdated and discriminatory values still work against you and your right to live as happy a life as you can. That’s not fair, and for that I’m really sorry. I was reading up on Romania, and while certain strides have been made -- according to Human Rights Watch, “a decade of domestic and international pressure led to the repeal of a sodomy law and to the passage of broad anti-discrimination protections,” for example -- you and I and everyone reading knows that countries’ collective values don’t change overnight, and often lag behind progressive legislation.
It’s pretty obvious you’re clinging onto this relationship not because you love your boyfriend, but having someone is better than being alone. I get it. And you get it, too, which is why you call yourself Selfish.
Look, you may be intermittently fond of this guy, but you don’t love him. The one problem, though, is you’ve given me no indication of how he feels about you. If he’s super into you and wants to stay with you, then you need to shape up and treat him how you would want to be treated. That means no more cheating - I don’t care if it’s in Spain or Mexico or Narnia, cheating is still cheating. Figure out how to do right by him.
If he’s as ambivalent about you as you are about him, cut him loose and tell him to find a hot, young Brit.
And I have a VERY good suggestion of where to start. Hey, we can dream, can't we?
Dear JT,
I’m a bisexual junior in college who is taking her first Gender Studies class, and my professor is infuriating and offensive. He spent an entire class lecturing about how priests and pastors were nothing more than "sexually repressed loons doing magic tricks".
He also uses words to describe members of the LGBT community that are outdated and offensive, maintains that the need for an LGBT community is an illusion created by the gays so they had something to do, and that one of the greatest things to happen in the past 50 years was when women started being encouraged to exercise so they all weren't so plump and silly.
As you can probably tell, he offends me on several levels, as I am a Catholic bisexual woman. He also insists that he has an exclusive right to this "knowledge" because he grew up in San Francisco and gays practically consider him one of them by now because he's so "up" on their culture.
How am I supposed to sit through two more months of this? He teaches two separate classes that I am taking and I cannot afford to drop the class.
Annoyed In Ohio
I have good news and bad news, AIO.
The bad news is you have a lot working against you, because short of allegations that could lead to a lawsuit, some colleges can be very reluctant to listen to a student’s complaints about a professor. The reason for this is reprimanding a professor is tricky and uncomfortable from the school’s point of view, and most college students, not knowing what actions they can take against a professor like yours, will ultimately do nothing.
But there are actions you can take. Here’s what I’d suggest:
First and foremost, harness the power of your technologically superior generation and take to the interwebs. Go on ratemyprofessors.com and tear the professor a new one. But make sure to do it eloquently and intelligently, stating facts (but not giving away your identity). Colleges actually read that site, and will pay attention to a sentence like, “He shows arrogance and dismissiveness when challenged, and has a condescending and outright misogynistic attitude toward women.”
But they’ll overlook “Doood, this prof is teh biggest a$$-h0le!”
I feel obligated to say you can speak directly to your professor during his office hours, but if he really said what you wrote, he’s not going to listen to a young woman, so I’d bypass that step.
Then you simply go up the chain of command. Make an appointment with the dean of his department, explaining you’d like to speak to him about a pressing matter concerning one of the professors. Make a list of as many offensive things he’s said that you can remember (and dates would be helpful, if possible).
When you talk to the dean, speak calmly and unemotionally about the professor’s totally heinous assholeries -- uh, I mean, inappropriate actions -- and explain that you’re not looking to get anyone fired, but simply for the professor to be given a professional reminder about how one should conduct oneself in one’s classroom, if one weren’t such an ingrown taint-pube.
Um ... you know what, just leave that last part out.
Hey JT,
I'm new to New York and keep hearing mixed things about the Halloween Parade. Is it worth it? And do you have any other suggestions for fun things to do for Halloween?
Newb
The Halloween Parade, held every year in Greenwich Village, is totally worth it.
Once.
It tends to bring a torrent of weirdos and asshats, and the crowds can get out of control. However, it really is an amazing spectacle, and something everyone should experience at least once in their lives, mostly to say they did it. But let me give you some advice: when attending, DO NOT take the trains that bring you to West 4th Street. I got off the subway there my first time at the parade, and it took me a half hour to get from the train door to the street. Not good, especially if you're claustrophobic.
For other ideas, there's always the world-renowned haunted house attractions, but no way in hell will you get me to walk through one of those things. Mm-mm. I may think of myself as a tough motherf***er, but I know my limits.
To ask JT a question, email him at jtadvicecolumn@gmail.com. Or you can be super tech-sexy and ask via Twitter. Messages may be edited for space (but they're totally more likely to get chosen if they're three paragraphs or less. Just sayin'.)
You can find previous editions of AfterElton's Ask JT advice column here.
