To: Rambi who wrote (35728 ) 10/27/2001 10:04:17 AM From: E Read Replies (3) | Respond to of 82486 I was serious about asking the masturbator son what he thought about when he masturbated. It's important, really. You know why? Well, let's say the announcement by the gay son had been followed by a conversation in which he revealed the following information: "You know something odd, Mom and Dad? Even though I only have sex with males and am happy with my boyfriend, my fantasies are about women, and the only way I can come with my male lover by imagining that he is Pamela Anderson, or the girl that sits next to me in Biology lab, or some other female I've seen recently." ... I might, if my gay son said that, think he had been a bit premature in concluding he was definitively gay, and that other things might be going on that made him trusting and comfortable in intimacy with males and fearful of real, physical sexual engagement with females. If the masturbator son replied to the question about what he thought about by saying, "My fantasies are about screwing a sheep," (or about sex with children, or necrophilia, or raping nuns), I'd say "LOVE THYSELF, MY SON, GO for it! Masturbating, yay, never change, good choice!" But if the masturbator son said, "My fantasies are about Pamela Anderson," or "My fantasies are about Brad Pitt," I'd be very sad for him, because I'd be sure he was alone because of fear. Here's another way of getting to the same key question, which is, who would be his erotic partner of choice, the one with whom he would most likely find true sexual and emotional bliss, if he were freed from a limitation imposed on him by some sad reluctance or other... I'd ask him if any category of pornography aroused him, and if so, what category was it. Landscapes? Pictures of empty white rooms, an empty bed? Snapshots of himself? A full length mirror? What?