Intenet Nooky
By Lisa Daily
Every week I receive lots of letters from women complaining
that their boyfriends or husbands are engaged in a little
online lust-fest. Is cybersex really cheating? Does it mean
he loves me less? Is looking at porn on the Internet as bad
as flirting with someone anonymously in a chat room?
Most of the women who write to me believe that cybersex
is cheating. Here's the rub: a surprising number of men (54%
in fact, according to Divorce Magazine,) believe it's not.
Sure, typing words on a keyboard is not exactly the same
thing as making out with a stranger in a bar after too many
cosmopolitans, or sleeping with a coworker on a business trip.
Unfortunately, what women seem to understand that men frequently
do not is that online relationships mean intimacy between
two real people, whether they are in the same room (or Jacuzzi)
or not.
Lots of guys use Internet flirting or cybersex as a sort
of interactive girly magazine, and frankly, they leave their
emotions at the bathroom door. The problem is that to women,
both the woman in their lives and the woman on the other end
of the DSL, the interaction is real. A cyber-relationship
holds promise, and to a wife or girlfriend that promise feels
like a very real threat.
There's more. According to recent studies, (Greenfield and
Rivet - Internet Use & Abuse Survey 1999) evidence proves
there is a high correlation between online cybersex and subsequent
real-time sexual affairs. The same study stated that a whopping
31% of people have had an online conversation that has led
to real-time sex.
Which means that cybersex, whether you think of it as cheating
or not, poses a real hazard to relationships.
So, what can you do to protect your relationship against
cyber-nooky? Well, your best defense is to let your partner
know exactly what your position is. He'll either respect your
feelings, or he won't. (Which is telling in itself.) But either
way, you'll know where you stand, and exactly the type of
person you're with.
© 2002 by Lisa Daily. All rights reserved.
Lisa Daily is the author of Stop Getting Dumped! All
you need to know to make men fall madly in love with you and
marry "The One" in 3 years or less. At bookstores everywhere.
As seen in/on Cosmopolitan, The Other Half and Ricki Lake
Get our FREE Dating Tips newsletter - chock-full of man-snagging
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