Snobs, Erotica Decoder Rings, and the New-Relationship Gift

by A Dude

I’m in a fairly new (five month) relationship with a man I’m bananas about. The holidays are coming up and already I’m agonizing over what to give him. I read in some women’s magazine that if you give a sweater or other clothing that men associate you with their mothers, and that is not good. He loves watches, but I don’t feel like we are exactly at the vintage Rolex stage yet. Though we are well past the “here’s a book/album I think you would probably like” stage.

What do you say, Dude? What would you like a woman to give you, that would make you think “This little lady is marriage material,” not “Ack! Mom!” or, potentially worse, “Damn, she’s obsessed with me”?

This is the most heart-warming dilemma ever, but ugh, how stress-filled can the holidays make things? If you want to give him a special gift, first start with the card. Get a blank one, and just be honest and mushy and don’t overthink it. We all love being told that we are loved and why. Here are some ideas for the gift itself:

A Night Out — What could be better than time with the person you love? The ideal “special gift” night out (versus a regular nice night out) is one thing that’s kind of fancy and a reach, coupled with one thing that’s personal and nostalgic. Maybe a fancy dinner someplace he’s always wanted to go, followed by drinks at the dive bar where you first made out?

Art — This isn’t for every guy, but if he’s into books and music, maybe he’s into art, too? A framed print makes an excellent gift, and can be a great way to say “I know this is something you’ll like,” while still being a bit more substantial than a record.

Vintage Things — This could be tied into the art, like an old framed Breitling poster, or a really interesting “toy watch” from the ’60s maybe? Or it could be a first pressing of an album he loves, or a first edition from a favorite author. Old things can be surprisingly affordable if you hunt around online.

Something From Childhood — This one can be touchy, and you may be a bit too early for this. But if a woman ever tracked down my favorite toy dinosaur (she would know of this because it’s labeled as BEST TOY EVER I MISS YOU DINO PLEASE COME HOME!!!!!!! in my photo album) I would probably be tracking down pamphlets on “The Four C’s” the next day.

You can also ask his friends. Not only will they know what he likes, but it’ll get back to him that you were trying to find the perfect gift, and the thought and caring you put into it is the best gift of all. Unless of course you track down my toy dinosaur.

[SECOND QUESTION REDACTED]

My boyfriend is a snob. There is no guess work here, he proudly admits it and says “more people should have the high standards” that he has. When I met him, I liked his thirst for knowledge and took his bibliophile behavior as a sign of intelligence. I liked that I had someone to go see arty and indie films with, and who could discuss them. HOWEVER I discovered later that he actually just hoards books, mostly reading comic books instead of the lofty literary works he carries around and talks to everyone about and reads reviews by many critics online of various indie/foreign/art films. Has he seen these movies he talks about, heard the music he critiques and read any of the books he talks about? I don’t know, I can’t tell if he’s just regurgitating articles and reviews, and to top it all off he’s rudely superior and dismissive of anyone else’s tastes and opinions on these things. Unsurprisingly, he also feels great disdain for all “low-brow” art such as pretty much any movie that’s shown in a theater when it’s released, music that isn’t classical, free jazz or avant-garde noise-music, or almost any book with a plot. He loudly and obnoxiously lets anyone around know how much he hates what they like, and just loves to argue in general.

While this tendency was annoying enough to discover when it was dragged out following the honeymoon phase of our relationship, I accepted this as mildly humorous because of its absurdity. We have been together for a year, and recently moved into a big new house (with roommates) together. About now-ish it has come to my attention that his attitude of superiority does not just extend to his taste in music, movies, and books, but to ALL his opinions in general. He talks to me like I am a child, using small words (um, I have a bachelor’s thank you very much, and he dropped out of high school-huh?), dismisses my opinions or argues against them, mocks my inability to form long sentences when I am crying, tells me what he would’ve done in a condescending way when I try to talk to him about tough times in my life, and likes to tell me how women are just irrational, and I must be because I’m a girl. For obvious reasons, I don’t feel I can talk to him openly anymore about much at all.

I am not placated by meaningless apologies, or when the word “darling” is placed after an insult spoken in a smarmy voice. I need a better way to deal with this problem, because he talks me in circles when I bring it up and pushes my buttons until I cry. He always feels bad when it goes that far. I feel bad all the time. How do I communicate to him that I can’t communicate with him because I feel he’s going to judge the shit out of me, and it’s killing our relationship?

I read your question and wanted to talk about snobs and how to deal with them, about how anyone who denies themselves the pleasures of mass culture is cheating themselves out of amazing experiences, and why baroque music (which I love) is inferior to pop music (seriously, anyone who thinks The Jackson 5’s “I Want You Back” isn’t as perfect as “Die Kunst Der Fuge” is dead to me).

Unfortunately, your problem here isn’t that he’s a snob. Or even that he’s a misogynist asshole (which,WHOA, he has some major woman issues). The problem is that he’s being emotionally abusive, and you need to end this.

He does not have the right to talk around you until you are in tears. If it happens once, he’s made an awful mistake. If it happens twice, he is a fool. If it happens over and over, he is an asshole. He is intentionally hurting you, and not valuing your opinions or feelings. This isn’t about books or music or film. This is about a person with a tragic sense of inferiority taking it out on strangers via their cultural preferences and his lover via emotional cruelty. He may feel genuine regret when the tears start flowing, but if he is smart enough to trick people into thinking that he actually enjoys Tarkovsky (I mean, have you seen the original Solaris? It may have amazing moments and aesthetic value, but IT IS SO BORING) he is smart enough to know what he’s doing. And what he’s doing is just not acceptable.

I find it telling you don’t mention a single good trait of his. You write about a boy (real men don’t intentionally hurt people they love) who is condescending, mocks you, and talks down to you. Someone you feel judges you harshly for everything you say, and who is disinterested in hearing about anything of emotional importance to you. And then you ask how to communicate to someone the fact that they are impossible to communicate with? You can’t. I’m sorry to break it, but that is always a fatal flaw. Halitosis, too little sex, too much fantasy football, dumb sideburns, and even snobbery are things you work through; an unwillingness of your partner to listen to your feelings you cannot. You have moved in together, so it is going to be tough, but please — you need to get away soon. A single insult isn’t as damaging as a violent act, but you cannot, for your own health and well-being, allow yourself to stay with a person who hurts you again and again.

I live with my boyfriend and we have been together for a couple years. I’ve always assumed that he watches his fair share of porn but I’ve never really been one to pry. We each have our separate computers, he has a Macbook, I have a laptop, and we share a desktop to watch shows online. I guess I always assumed he watched his porn on the internet like everyone else, but one day when I was looking for a file, not snooping (it’s our shared desktop, why would I?) I found a secret folder with a bunch of porn. I guess that’s fine. But curiosity grabbed me and I looked at the porn and apparently my boyfriend has a skinny girl fetish. I’m not just commenting on how skinny women in porn generally are, but the names of some of this videos had the word skinny in the title. I looked at most of the files and all of these women are under 100 lbs. It kind of freaked me out because, well, I’m not very skinny. I’m not fat, or even heavy, just an average size 8 kind of girl.

So my question is this: should I be worried? Like if there is some random skinny chick that comes his way will he totally ditch me for her? Or is this just a fantasy thing? And also, is this sort of a weird hint for me to lose weight given that this is our shared computer? Like he knew I might find it? (And if that is the case, well, I like my body just fine and I think that is ridiculous).

I haven’t brought it up with him yet, but it’s getting kind of awkward and I don’t know what to say/do. Please help?

Men (probably women too, if you care to enlighten me, commenters) pick their women in porn for a lot of different reasons. Sometimes they look for clones of the woman that sits in the cubicle across from them at work. Sometimes men like porn in the same way they like Michael Bay movies — over the top, unrealistic, cartoons of humanity. But sometimes it has nothing to do with the women they ACTUALLY WANT to sleep with — I know lots of guys who only date women with natural breasts, prefer the feel of the real thing, and then watch videos featuring starlets with chests like a Barbie Doll, only harder. It’s also possible his fetish isn’t for super-skinny women, but for small breasts — in the world of Straight-Dude Porn, “petite” or “skinny” labelled women are some of the only ones without huge … tracts of land.

So basically, I can’t tell you why he’s got it. Maybe he secretly wants to be with a toothpick and is waiting for his chance. More likely, he’s just curious to see what they’re like naked, since he’s already with the last woman he wants to undress for him. Maybe, and I know this sounds ridiculous, but honestly it happens more than you think, he just got drunk one night, happened to be on a site that had a lot of one kind of porn, and now it makes up a disproportionate amount of his collection. I have an entire sack of porn I don’t even like under my bed because a friend gave it to me when his girlfriend was moving in with him — I don’t want my landlord to see me taking it to the garbage room and none of my other friends will take it, so I’m stuck.

Why was it in a half-assed hiding spot? Most likely, that’s because most guys feel kind of ashamed about watching porn around 30 seconds after we’re, uh, done. Even single dudes in studio apartments keep their porn hidden, because it feels kind of dirty and we don’t want to be reminded of it when we’re not looking for it. And we’re also not always our sharpest when thinking porny thoughts, so our hiding spots are often terrible. I know a guy who got caught when his girlfriend decided to look in his “Recipes” folder — he couldn’t boil water with the ghost of Julia Child on his shoulder.

None of that really answers your question though. How do you talk to your boyfriend about his porn? Don’t bring it up in the context of any other fights. Any honest sex talks need to take place free of other baggage. Don’t assume the worst — he’s probably not trying to make you super-skinny if there’s no other hints (if he starts leaving Diet Books around or throwing out perfectly edible leftovers, reassess. And dump him, because leftovers are delicious). If you’re going to have this talk, it needs to be because you’re honestly curious about what he’s looking for. You say you’ve been together for years, you don’t give any indication (diminishing sex life, increasing fights) that there are problems beyond the porn, so his porn probably isn’t about you at all. If you tell him you found it, and that you’re just curious about how he decides what he likes to look at without mentioning that you know those women are different than you, he’s more likely to not feel a need to be defensive.

It will probably be an uncomfortable conversation, and it may be a fight. Nobody wants to hear or say “I love you, you make me laugh, you make me feel joy and warmth and peace, you turn me on, I’m perfectly happy to dedicate all of the future-sex I will ever have to you, but sometimes I just want to see freaky weird shit I know I will never experience in real life.” That doesn’t mean you’re not good enough for him in any way, it just means that sometimes we like to see some freaky weird shit.

Previously: Love, Bathrooms, and the Older Male Coworker.

A Dude is one of several rotating dudes who know everything. Do you have any questions for A Dude?

Photo by shooarts, via Shutterstock