8/9 - 20 Minutes

Time to set another speed record, even for Homocentric August.

Dear LW4: A golden opportunity lies before you. You have seen first hand how the system works. If you were a member of an oppressed minority, you could resolve to change the system (better from the outside than the inside; people who try to change the system from the inside are mainly Boy Scouts who end up just going on camping trips and telling themselves their minor efforts are Making All the Difference). But I see the conflict in your letter. At first you begin by acknowledging your luck. And you have had luck. But instead of channeling your anger more towards the system, you end by emphasizing your hard work (read - sense of entitlement) and fury at your friends. The Prudecutor's answer is just to continue the system as is - and why not, as it works for her? But she is all wrong, of course. Changing the system is the answer, but you have already indcated that you will (a bit like Phyllida Erskine Brown) Join the Oppressors. Adieu.

Dear LW3: As much as I want to like a woman whose daughter calls her Daddy (a clever nickname - quite out of Vonnegut in a sideways manner), this one is so easy even the Prudecutor can't boot it. Anyone who marries someone who bullies her child ought to be forced to turn heterosexual and have the child taken away from her in court.

Dear LW2: This is a fake question. I have read all about it in a book. Or, what happened might have been real, but it was cribbed from the book. A group of boys at a summer camp did this sort of thing all summer. Your son's mistake was doing this into something which would leave evidence in the event of discovery. Now, in the book, I am quite sure that it was done into a sock, which would surely never have risked expulsion from camp, unless there were a serious attempt at enforcing an explicit rule against self-pleasure - in which case, who'd have been left by the end of the first week?

But it is interesting that you and his other father have managed to rub along so well together despite your many differences over all these years. Let that serve as encouragement. Just because you didn't go to that sort of summer camp (I suppose that your husband did) does not mean that the world is ending. As this is more up your husband's line, let him advise your son on leaving no evidence. You stick to emulating Martha Stewart and making nice potpourri sachets, and the two of you can each support the other and strengthen the household in his own way.

Dear LW1: Until I saw the closing, I was puzzled. But you heterosexuals think you have all the fun, don't you? You automatically assume, just because your sex can result in pregnancy, that there is an automatic default assumption of monogamy in order to assume paternity. But just because there is an assumption in place that is not there for most of us does not free you from having The Monogamy Talk. Not that your late husband's last adventure was not wrong - though quite a lot of people will regard something that did not go beyond exchanging inquiries as actually Out of Bounds (which is why you HAVE THE TALK) - but, given conditions (and how somebody dying could actually have brought about such a tryst with a full-time caregiver is something I'd like to go into in greater detail in future) a generous heart would want to forgive someone in such a situation, especially if there HAD BEEN NO EXPLICIT AGREEMENT ON THE SUBJECT. For better or worse, you are what you are, and your instinct to punish him and his relatives for, among other things, something that might have happened as early as the first incident, shows clearly your punitive nature. With your next husband, be as explicit as if your next spouse were a wife. I do not like you enough to recommend a wife until you have at least one more husband and show you can get this right.