Three to be BY DAN SAVAGE

Last year I began a sexual relationship with someone from my university. He was graduating, so we just kept it light and had fun. Even though he’s no longer here, we have kept in contact and get together whenever he’s in town. Recently he propositioned me, asking if I would have a threesome with him and one of his male friends, a man I know and trust. I know they would never do anything to hurt me, and from how they have treated me in the past I know they respect me, but they would have a definite power advantage. I would be putting myself in a very vulnerable position. However, the option is appealing. I’m very attracted to both of them, and I’ve always liked the idea of being with two men at once. They are giving me all the time I need and are answering all of my questions. We’re going to meet and talk about this some more before we make any detailed plans to do this. Is there anything else I should do? Or consider? What should I look for in this kind of situation?

Considering My Options

You should be looking for exactly what you’re getting from these two boys, CMO — patience, consideration, respect, and trustworthiness. Stop thinking so hard, CMO! These boys sound like ideal three-way partners! They’re not rushing you, they didn’t spring this on you when you were drunk, and they want to talk things through before they DP your brains out. Could they possibly be more sensitive? Could they be more considerate? No and no, kiddo. If you’re worried about making yourself vulnerable to a pair of good guys like these two, CMO, you’ll never have a three-way.

When I was 14, I was forced to perform oral sex on a stranger at gunpoint. Needless to say, the experience fucked me up — I had a psychotic break with reality, heard voices, saw things. But as the years passed — I’m 22 now — I sort of got over it. I no longer hear things that aren’t there, and I’ve found a wonderful woman who loves me. We’ve been married for nearly a year now. But lately, I’ve been having fantasies about putting my dick in her mouth while she’s asleep. In my fantasies she wakes up and keeps sucking me off. This really turns me on. However, the element of nonconsensuality creeps me out, particularly because of my past. Should my wife and I act out this fantasy? I know fantasies are healthy and that you can’t choose what turns you on, but I feel nervous about this.

This Boy Wonders

And rightly so, TBW. Anyone with your history should think long and hard before he acts on a sexual fantasy that involves power play, which is to say, he should think long and hard before he acts on any sexual fantasies at all, since all sexual fantasies involve power play. But I’m struck by the ways in which it differs from your childhood trauma, TBW. You’re not talking about pointing a gun at your wife’s head. You’re aroused by the idea of initiating oral sex with her while she’s asleep — and helpless, yes, and that’s a power trip, of course, but it’s not necessarily rape.

When it comes to long-term sex partners — particularly live-ins and spouses — a certain implied consent can be taken for granted after a while, and you wouldn’t be the first married guy who initiated sex with his sleeping wife. Penetrating someone who’s asleep does push the envelope, I’ll admit, but so long as you talk this out with the wife in advance, and obtain her consent to either initiate oral sex sometime when she’s asleep or when she’s pretending to be asleep ... well, I’m not going to make you any promises. It might go well, or you might get spooked. But it would be a shame if the trauma you suffered eight years ago deprived you and your wife of the pleasure of exploring your sexual fantasies now.

I was reading a review of the new book that attempts to prove that Abraham Lincoln was gay (The Intimate World of Abraham Lincoln, by C.A. Tripp), and the reviewer quoted the author as writing about "a sexual practice later named ‘femoral intercourse,’ ... one of the most frequently used homosexual techniques." I’ve never heard of femoral intercourse — what is it? Is there a sexier name for it?

Wonderin’ About Lincoln’s Log

To engage in "femoral intercourse," you will need one person’s dick and another person’s thighs. Place dick between thighs, press thighs together, and hump away until thighs are a sticky mess. One man that Lincoln shared his bed with — one of the many, apparently — commented that Lincoln’s thighs "were as perfect as any human being could be," which some scholars take as proof that Lincoln was getting his femoral freak on. Other scholars insist that Lincoln is way too old, way too dead, and way too presidential to have been gay. Unless we’re prepared to exhume Lincoln and test his thighs for trace amounts of other men’s semen, we may never know the truth. Some other names for femoral intercourse: college-style, dry-humping, "English method," and my favorite, "The Weekly Standard."

I’m probably the 6715th person to alert you, but "santorum" was voted the "most outrageous" word of 2004 by the American Dialect Society (www.americandialect.org). One of the judges wrote this on Slate: "The Most Outrageous category is tricky; we never agree whether it’s the word itself that’s outrageous (typically for having some vulgar element, as in 2003’s winner, cliterati, for ‘prominent feminists’) or the concept (as with 2002’s neuticles, ‘false testicles for neutered pets’). This year the strongest contender was santorum, defined (and heavily promoted) by sex writer Dan Savage — in a campaign to besmirch the name of right-wing Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum — as ‘the frothy mixture of lube and fecal matter that is sometimes the byproduct of anal sex.’ We dismissed one potential problem — that newspapers wouldn’t print the term if it won — on the grounds that we shouldn’t censor ourselves. And indeed, in the afternoon’s voting, santorum did win, but many newspapers simply skipped this category in their coverage."

Congratulations on your success!

Wasting Time at Work

Thank you for the sweet note, WTAW, but Christian humility prevents me from taking credit for coming up with the new definition of santorum. My column was merely the platform from which santorum spewed forth. If congratulations are in order, let us congratulate the "Savage Love" reader who suggested I honor Senator Rick Santorum by attaching a new definition to his name, and the "Savage Love" reader who actually came up with the now-infamous "frothy mix" definition when I asked my readers for suggestions. And, of course, congratulations are in order for Senator Santorum. But for Rick’s idiotic anti-sex statements, the frothy mix of lube and fecal matter that is sometimes the byproduct of anal sex would remain nameless to this day. Anyone interested in sending Santorum a message of congratulations or thanks can e-mail him via his Web site — santorum.senate.gov — but e-mail, on an occasion like this, seems a little too informal, don’t you agree? So I would like to encourage my readers to send cards and letters of congratulation and thanks to Senator Rick Santorum, 511 Dirksen Senate Office Building, Washington, DC 20510. Rick is thinking of running for president in 2008, and I think we should all encourage him to do so, if only to get our hands on collectible SANTORUM! campaign T-shirts.

Dan Savage can be reached at mail@savagelove.net