by Yashar Ali

I don’t like to drink. I don’t like the taste of alcohol. And, outside of a handful of memorable drinking stories that my friends and I repeatedly share with each other, I don’t get drunk and I don’t like to get drunk. I also don’t like the loss of time that comes with a hangover and the loss of control that comes with drinking.

And it’s not because I have a drinking problem. I never have. I just don’t like drinking alcohol, it’s simply not part of my life.

Even though I am in my early thirties, I still face this incredible pressure – peer pressure – to drink. I am talking about the kind of pressure we’re reminded of when we think of teenagers, college students, or those in their early twenties, and how our friends, during this phase of our lives, were pushing us to drink.

Although we often think peer pressure in drinking is tied to a younger more footloose group, to twenty-somethings who are still finding themselves, I’ve discovered through my own experience and through learning about the experiences of my readers, that age and professional status really plays no role in whether someone will pressure or be pressured. Men and women in their 30’s, 40’s and 50’s are doing the pressuring.
It seems to me that social pressure to drink is more a cultural issue than an age issue.

I even have friends who claim they could never be in relationship with a person who doesn’t drink. Because that’s what every solid relationship is built on: consumption of alcohol.

In (Western) adult social culture, alcohol is a primary and important component of being part of a group, and people who are not interested in alcohol or dislike the taste, are subject to pressure to drink. They, in turn, are forced to find or create, what are deemed “legitimate reasons” for not joining in with the drinking. Failure to drink creates a barrier between the drinkers and those people, who, for various reasons, choose not to drink alcohol.

Why are we judging and pressuring people who don’t drink and why do we make them justify or explain their reasons for refusing alcohol?

Alcohol (and drinking) is a part of the wide range of social pressures in our culture and it’s part of the fabric of many people’s lives. However, it’s not an insignificant thing to ask and pressure someone else to drink.

I get that alcohol helps people loosen up in social settings, but it creates a barrier between people who choose to drink and people who don’t. And this barrier sets the tone for who talks to, and who hangs out with whom. It’s as if alcohol is the social glue that keeps us together, and if we don’t have it and are faced with some people who drink and some people who don’t, things seem to get off-balance and uncomfortable.

The idea of someone who doesn’t drink is so foreign to some people that we sometimes falsely assume that the person who is not drinking has a past of alcohol abuse or we force these non-drinkers to constantly explain themselves.

Mindy, a reader from Chicago in her early 30’s, often deals with new friends or colleagues who assume she was an alcoholic or member of A.A., because she chooses not to drink.

So when it comes to socializing, do we only have two categories for people: sober alcoholic or drinker? There are so many people that fall in between these two categories, they’re not really sober, but they’re also not active drinkers.

A friend of mine who works in corporate advertising commented on the pressure she feels when ordering a glass of water or lemonade at a restaurant with colleagues when everyone else is ordering wine or a cocktail, “I’m made to feel like I’m not an adult.”

Susie, a 38 year-old paralegal found herself being excluded from activities at work, because she barely drank.

“You won’t want to come out tonight because you don’t drink,” she would hear from her co-workers in an almost sympathetic tone (she would always be included in activities that didn’t include heavy drinking).

“I can still have a good time without drinking. It’s not like I’m standing there with my arms crossed at a bar, frowning. I just wonder if they feel judged if I am not doing shots with them and that’s why I’m not being included.”

For Susie and other people in her situation, the social interaction between colleagues, the same interaction that often aides people in their careers, is something that is stripped from her. Unless she’s willing to drink to intoxication, people just don’t feel comfortable having her around and so, Susie misses out on one part of professional networking.

My friend Erin, who is in her late 30’s, found her second pregnancy to be the saving grace, in terms of alleviating the pressure that comes with drinking, “I find it a relief now that I’m visibly six months pregnant, because I can point to my belly and say, ‘Sorry, I can’t!’”

“It will be a drag when I have to go back to explaining to people, ‘No really, I just don’t like it.’”

Having an excuse, whether it’s an illness or pregnancy, seems to offer a reprieve to those who don’t want to drink. But it still doesn’t make sense to me. I understand (but don’t accept) the social pressure to drink during high school and college-age years, but why are adults so obsessed with their friends, family, and colleagues drinking?

And why do there seem to be real, social consequences for people who don’t care to learn the difference between a Chardonnay and a Cabernet?

Yashar Ali is a Los Angeles-based columnist, commentator, and political veteran whose writings about women, gender inequality, political heroism, and society are showcased on his website, The Current Conscience. Please follow him on Twitter and join him on Facebook.

He will be soon releasing our first short e-book, entitled, A Message To Women From A Man: You Are Not Crazy — How We Teach Men That Women Are Crazy and How We Convince Women To Ignore Their Instincts. If you are interested and want to be notified when the book is released, please click here to sign-up.

Related Posts:
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The Modern Day Version of “Just The Tip”
Men Who E-Maintain Women
He Doesn’t Deserve Your Validation: Putting The Fake Orgasm Out of Business
A Message To Women From A Man: You Are Not Crazy

by Laurelin

The internet. It’s everywhere, connecting everything all the time. People don’t need to shop outside the house anymore, you can just order whatever you want from the internet and have it delivered. Clothes, shoes, groceries and…men? I have been aware of internet dating for a few years now, and I always turned up my nose at the thought of it. Seriously, if you can’t get out into the world and meet and connect with someone on your own than you probably should stop trying.

That’s an ignorant thing to say, I’m acutely aware of that now. Not everyone is [un] lucky enough to be in bars every night where members of the opposite sex are foaming at the mouth and leaving phone numbers scribbled on beer soaked cocktail napkins. But the other day I got to thinking. Maybe I have been going about this all wrong. I know I tend to meet the same type of guy over and over again at bars: young party types with more muscles than brains. Internet dating, while a product of a technological world, seems to take dating back to basics: conversation and actually getting to know someone.

After a talk with a girlfriend about her experiences in the world on online dating, I wound up joining a site that was basically just another app for my iPhone. My girlfriends and I started off my just browsing the guys just like we would online shop. Look at this one, ooooh, look at that one, he’s tall, cute, this one has a good job, this one has pictures of his cat. It was quite addicting. Soon we were getting a few messages a day and spending nights at work reading them and giggling. People have no shame online; some of the messages were dirty, some had poetry, some were simple and to the point. Some actually made me laugh, and one day I found myself replying, and before I knew it I was getting to know this… stranger.

He was nothing like me, and was like no one I would ever normally meet in a bar. Messaging back and forth online, we got to know a little about one another, answering questions that should have come out right away with other boyfriends but that never came up while we were too busy chugging beer and sleeping in. Then this guy asked the inevitable question– want to meet in person? I froze. I don’t know. Was it safe? I HATE DATING. I don’t even like going on dates with people I sort of know. As social of a person as I am, just the though of an actual date with someone I’m trying to get to know is more terrifying than bungee jumping into the grand canyon.

I took a breath and clicked reply. “Yes,” I said. “Let’s meet for coffee.” (Coffee?! Coffee?! It’s not beer!! What do I do?!) So we did. The day before Thanksgiving I found myself sitting in a coffee shop in Harvard Square, awaiting a stranger. He came, and he was just like his pictures. Tall, cute, and so nice. He was in grad school and had just moved to Boston, we came from similar families and while there was sometimes a lull in the conversation we managed to get through about an hour before deciding to part ways. I have never been more proud of myself, thinking outside the box and making myself take a leap into the unknown to try something new and scary.

I don’t think that the whole experience was exactly for me, but I did learn that I can see why it’s for a lot of people. It makes a lot of sense now, and it’s kind of nice to know that in the future should I want to meet someone new I can always try it again. But for now, I gratefully turn back to my safe bar scene, and the comforts of a fully stocked bar to help me get through conversation. I don’t think I want to date anyone for a while, whether in the digital or the analogue. The guys I meet normally, the young and muscled, the hipsters, the career bartenders, they are what I need right now. They’re all helping me get over a heartbreak that, after trying to date someone new, I’ve come to realize is still a bit too fresh. I need some more time I guess, and probably another martini…

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by Brad Warner

Crazy Wisdom Trailer from Kate Trumbull on Vimeo.

Chogyam Trungpa Rimpoche was a lot of things. When he was just 18 months old he was recognized as the reincarnation of a high Tibetan lama. He escaped Tibet’s Chinese rulers when he was 20 years old, fleeing through the icy mountains on foot with a group of 300, only 13 of whom made it across the border to India. He went to England and started the first Tibetan Buddhist center in the Western world. A short while later he came to America where he set up the Shambhala foundation. Then he proceeded to fuck dozens of his students before drinking himself to death at age 48.

Now someone’s made a movie about Trungpa, called Crazy Wisdom. It’s pretty good.

I never met Trungpa myself. But my first Zen teacher worked for him for a while as an instructor at Naropa Institute, the Buddhist university Trungpa founded in Boulder, Colorado. It was the first Buddhist university in the West. He used to tell me wild stories about Trungpa’s excesses. One time Trungpa threatened my teacher saying that demons would fly through his window at night and tear him to bits. One guy I talked to watched Trungpa down two 40 ouncers of beer during a public dharma talk. Then there’s the story I’ve heard from about half a dozen people about the time Trungpa forced a couple to participate in an orgy by ordering his uniformed guards to strip them naked against their will.

And yet for all his scandalous activities, Chogyam Trungpa is still revered 24 years after his death as one of the great Buddhist masters. Johanna Demetrakas’ new film Crazy Wisdom seeks to understand this contradictory figure. Was he merely a madman who conned thousands into thinking he was a guru? Or was his crazy wisdom really more wise than crazy after all?

I’ve never been quite sure just what to make of Trungpa. His book Cutting Through Spiritual Materialism is still one of my favorites on the subject of pursuing the dharma authentically. And yet he was a drunk and a sex fiend. Even his closest students admit that. He never hid any of this, though. And that’s what made him different. While poor old Richard Baker Roshi, head of the San Francsico Zen Center was getting flayed alive for having a brief affair with one student, Trungpa was out there screwing his followers like there was no tomorrow. And nobody seemed too fussed about it.

It turns out that perhaps sex isn’t the real problem. The real problem may be spiritual teachers who present themselves as one thing and then act completely contrary to that image. This is something Chogyam Trungpa never did.

Crazy Wisdom is a wonderfully entertaining film about this amazing contradictory man. Although the filmmakers are followers of Trungpa and naturally seek to present him in a positive light, they don’t gloss over his faults either. Trungpa never attempted to define himself according to the categories others created. Neither do the filmmakers attempt to do so. It’s left to the viewer to decide if Trungpa was insane or saintly.

Documentaries about spiritual masters aren’t usually my thing. They tend to be dry, boring and exceedingly reverent. But Crazy Wisdom isn’t your run of the mill fluff piece put together by people who want to show you why their guru is better than yours. It’s a serious film, but it has some truly laugh out loud moments. The cast is a who’s who of luminaries associated with Eastern spirituality in the West including Allan Ginsberg, Ram Dass, Stephen Batchelor, and Trungpa’s student Pema Chodron.

My only complaint is that the filmmakers chose to ignore the darker side of Trungpa’s legacy, his followers who understood their teacher’s crazy wisdom as a license to do anything at all regardless of the potential consequences. In particular I’m thinking of the story of Osel Tendzin. Tendzin was Trungpa’s successor who liked to suck and fuck just as much as his teacher. The problem was that when Tendzin was diagnosed with HIV he continued having unprotected sex without informing his partners of his condition. Stephen Butterfield, a former student, said (though this is not in the film), “In response to close questioning by students, he first swore us to secrecy and then said that Trungpa had requested him to be tested for HIV in the early 1980s and told him to keep quiet about the positive result. Tendzin had asked Trungpa what he should do if students wanted to have sex with him, and Trungpa’s reply was that as long as he did his Vajrayana purification practices, it did not matter, because they would not get the disease. Tendzin’s answer, in short, was that he had obeyed the guru.” Trungpa was wrong.

I’ll grant you that even addressing this subject at all may have pulled the film in a whole different direction. It’s a movie about Trungpa, not Tendzin. Still, to completely ignore this very significant effect of Trungpa’s teaching style seems a little like keeping something hidden. And Trungpa never hid anything.

In spite of this shortcoming I still highly recommend the film. It isn’t the kind of snore fest these sorts of documentaries usually are. In fact it’s highly engaging and entertaining as well as informative. It presents a (mostly) honest portrait of a Buddhist master who doesn’t fit the stereotypical mold.

Brad is on tour right now and may be in your area. To see where Brad will be speaking next take a look here.

Brad Warner is the author of Sex, Sin and Zen: A Buddhist Exploration of Sex from Celibacy to Polyamory and Everything in Between as well as Hardcore Zen, Sit Down and Shut Up! and Zen Wrapped in Karma Dipped in Chocolate. He maintains a blog about Buddhist stuff that you can click here to see.

You can also buy T-shirts and hoodies based on his books, and the new CD by his band Zero Defex now!

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by Yashar Ali

When most people are seeking love, they have a basic list of check boxes they hold up to their prospective partners. On this list are questions like: Is he single? Is he ready to be in a relationship? Is he emotionally available? Does he want to be in a relationship with me?

It makes me wildly uncomfortable when all the boxes on that list are checked. I am attracted to and fall in love with unavailable men.

For years, especially in the past three years, I have slept with married men, men in relationships, and emotionally unavailable men (the latter would be fine if sex was all I was after).

And with some of these men, I have developed serious romantic attachments as a result of our sexual relationship and friendship. I would wish, even hope that they wanted more than sex, that they would want a relationship with me.

Why have I been so self-destructive?

I have put myself in these emotionally trying places out of fear that my imperfections and weaknesses would be exposed in the course of a serious, long-term relationship. I didn’t want anyone close to me because closeness calls for a release of all pretenses; I would be forced to expose my strengths and my faults. In a healthy relationship, accountability and questions are part of the deal. I didn’t want any questions; I didn’t want to be accountable when it came to my problems. So I chose men who I knew would not or could not be in a relationship with me.

My entanglements with unavailable men allowed me to avoid men who would see the real me and also gave me the opportunity to experience the feelings of love and emotional and sexual attraction that we all need.

I always knew going into these situations, that the men I was seeing weren’t available for actual relationships. I never had to be told by others that, “He’s just not that into you.” None of the unavailable men with whom I have had sexual relationships can say I pushed them to do anything. I never bothered pursuing romantic relationships with these men because I knew, point blank, that they were unavailable. Instead, I stewed in my frustration and sadness, sharing my pain with one or two friends.

Over the years, my friends have made multiple attempts at setting me up with prospective boyfriends, but I always knew these men would be emotionally, mentally available. What a turn off – right? So I would refuse the set-up, or I would find a reason why that particular man wouldn’t work for me after going out with him.

I would occasionally date romantically available men for short periods of time; I gave them a small chance. But I would never allow them into my world, they wouldn’t meet my friends, they wouldn’t be a part of my life. And soon, they would either tire of the situation or I would find a polite way to move on.

The concept of unavailability in men comes in many different forms and it’s an issue I’ve seen many of my friends struggle with. For some, it’s about being in a relationship with a man who could physically be in the same room, but is a million miles away in terms of his emotional commitment. For others, it’s about falling in love with a man who will never be open to a sexual or romantic relationship. For me, an unavailable man is someone who gives me enough to live on emotionally and sexually, but is someone who is totally and literally unavailable for a relationship.

Sometimes, when we chase after things, we are not necessarily chasing after something that is inaccessible. My relationships with unavailable men have nothing to do with wanting what I can’t have. These relationships are about doing everything to avoid what I want the most.

The way I would fall in love with unavailable men was always the same. In fact, it had become so textbook that a few close friends would often notice and point it out when I was heading in that direction. I would sleep with a man, whether I knew he was available or not, and once I confirmed that he was unavailable, I would become more attracted to him. It wouldn’t take much for the emotional attraction to happen. If he said something sweet to me, or asked me the right questions, I couldn’t help but feel drawn to him. Whether the attraction would last for days, weeks, or months, it was incredibly intense and emotionally draining. And I lived out that pain in private.

The process would only be prolonged when I received a perfectly timed text-message or phone call from one of my unavailable men. These connections would provide the warmth and sense of closeness that I desired. Those text messages and phone calls were enough to keep me giving them what they wanted — so I could get what I needed.

My problems, my imperfections are the kind that everyone has. But for some reason, I felt like I had some sort of invisible cloak that prevented people from noticing these flaws unless I let them in. I was wrong. Everyone saw them, as any attempt at covering up problems only leads them to be revealed more publicly. My choice to engage with unavailable men stemmed precisely from this fear of intimacy and a fear of exposing my faults and inadequacies.

My attraction towards unavailable men taught me a big lesson, a lesson about my aversion to revealing my shortcomings to the world. I have fundamentally shifted how I see privacy and what it really means to be private.

Our need for privacy, for secrecy, for keeping our imperfections hidden is seriously taxing our lives — it took me away from myself and nearly destroyed me. We ironically admire this internal suffering as a strong character trait, “Oh, she’s so private,” or “He’s so private.” We seem to think this kind of silent suffering is honorable. It’s not.

For me, sharing my time with unavailable men was a major way to hide parts of myself. Being with these men was my version of privacy. Being forced to talk about my relationships with these unavailable men or being forced to talk about the resulting pain made me feel like I was being exposed to the world. For me, talking about my problems was a weakness. And that’s why I never did it. Until now.

Our tendency towards privacy often relates to our desire to hide our problems and our desire to conceal our fear of exposing personal issues and imperfections. But problems are generally not solved behind closed doors. I also think it’s nearly impossible to cover up or hide our general imperfections or issues — human beings are so perceptive that most people will soon realize that something is wrong. For me, privacy is now about keeping things special or keeping other people’s secrets. Privacy is no longer about burying my own secrets or imperfections. I just don’t care anymore about being judged.

Usually people wait until they’re extremely successful or well past their problems to discuss them. We are often willing to talk about our secrets or our problems once we have solved them. It’s so much more comfortable to say, “That’s how I used to be.” I’m not there yet. I thought about unavailable men yesterday, I thought about them this morning, and I am thinking about them now.

While revealing this issue about my life may be embarrassing for some to hear or know about, I no longer have an issue admitting that I have never felt truly close to anyone. Until now, I have not truly felt close to myself.

I really want to be in relationship. But I know I am not ready. There’s nothing I want to do more than respond to the text from one of my unavailable men that I just received. That text still gives me enough, even though it truly offers nothing. I still have the desire to get what I need from someone who doesn’t want to give me more than sex and a kind word, someone who won’t ask me any questions, someone who won’t require me to be a better person, someone who let’s me keep my privacy, and someone who allows me to keep all of my faults and shortcomings at bay.

But I know I have to stop sleeping and falling in love with unavailable men — because my need for privacy has left me feeling incredibly lonely.

I’ve been knocking on a door when I know that no one is home. I’m tired of waiting around for him to answer.

Yashar Ali is a Los Angeles-based columnist, commentator, and political veteran whose writings about women, gender inequality, political heroism, and society are showcased on his website, The Current Conscience. Please follow him on Twitter and join him on Facebook.

He will be soon releasing our first short e-book, entitled, A Message To Women From A Man: You Are Not Crazy — How We Teach Men That Women Are Crazy and How We Convince Women To Ignore Their Instincts. If you are interested and want to be notified when the book is released, please click here to sign-up.

Related Posts:

When Everything Is On His Terms
Now…Give Your Uncle A Kiss
The Modern Day Version of “Just The Tip”
Men Who E-Maintain Women
He Doesn’t Deserve Your Validation: Putting The Fake Orgasm Out of Business
A Message To Women From A Man: You Are Not Crazy

by Daniel Robert Epstein

Doing the interview with Veronica Monet was the first time I’’ve ever talked with a professional escort that didn’t end up costing me $300. Monet is a semi-retired escort that has just written the book, Sex Secrets of Escorts. It details all the things men want that she has gleaned from her 15 years of servicing them. While some may look down on the idea of women making money from having sex, Monet is a bit different. She’’s written a number of books, is a certified graduate of San Francisco Sex Information’s Sex Educator training and has appeared on such television shows as Politically Incorrect and A & E’s The Love Chronicles. So stop yapping about pocketbooks and listen up.

Read our exclusive interview with Veronica Monet on SuicideGirls.com.

by Blogbot

Let’s talk about sex, love, body dysmorphic disorder, and self-acceptance. This Sunday our very special in-studio guests will be author Monah Li (Beauty and the Feast – a Hollywood Memoir of Binging, Purging and Healing), gender writer and commentator Yashar Ali, and SG’s Red, White and Femme post-feminist columnist Darrah de jour. Prostitute and porn star turned academic and sexologist Annie Sprinkle – who has much to say on the subject of our society’s fat-phobia – will also be calling in.

Tune in to the world’s leading naked radio show for two hours of totally awesome tunes and extreme conversation – and don’t let yo momma listen in!

Listen to SG Radio live Sunday night from 10 PM til Midnight on Indie1031.com

Got questions? Then dial our studio hotline digits this Sunday between 10 PM and midnight PST: 323-900-6012

And cyberstalk us on Facebook and Twitter.

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by Yashar Ali

“I’m not going to talk to you when you’re acting this way.”

Whenever I ask my women friends about this phrase and what it means when they hear it from the men in their lives, they always have a strong reaction. One of frustration, anger, and annoyance.

You know how it makes you ultimately feel. This statement is about communication, a way to shut down the potential conversation that should happen. Men typically use this phrase as a way to avoid an uncomfortable or awkward moment — usually a situation in which they are being held accountable for their actions.

More significantly, this phrase is about taking control. When someone says this sentence, they are defining the situation on their terms — a man’s terms.

It’s gaslighting.

 But this phrase is related to a larger issue I’m exploring: why is the tone, tenor, nature, path, and dynamics of the relationships (and not just romantic relationships) that women have with men, so often on the man’s terms?

The man setting the terms of a relationship may seem obvious when we think of romantic relationships, or perhaps, even work dynamics, but I want to engage in a larger exploration about all the kinds of relationships that women have with men, from male relatives, to male friends and co-workers.

[..]