Stranger On the Internet, I Don’t Owe You The Level Of Intimacy You Desire

I have boundaries for a reason, and apparently, you are one of them

I have a public email address so that people who want to submit stories to my publication, Sensual Enchantment, can ask to be added as a writer. It’s never been a problem for me — until now. Mostly, I correspond with prospective contributors and sometimes I get a thank you for touching the note-writer in some way with a story of mine. I cherish those emails. I also get questions now and then for my Ask Elle advice column. Last year I got apology notes from three different men who had been rude or belligerent with me that week. What an interesting time that was? It’s been all good so far!

Yesterday I got a friendly-seeming email from a guy who had apparently commented on the same story as me and found my response interesting. He told me he’d gone on to read some of my stories about polyamory. We chatted a little, and he asked me about my name. Then he wanted to know my real name. He said he wanted to become friends and couldn’t do so without knowing my real name. Otherwise, I was hiding something from him and we couldn’t have a real friendship. We had just started talking yesterday. The red flags were starting to flap wildly but still, I decided to try to take the high road.

I told him that all of my Medium friends whom I have developed deeper friendships with call me Elle (all except for the one who calls me Ellie). I told him that I strongly identify with that name and persona and do not consider it to be a shield to keep my friends at arm’s length. In fact, I consider it to be the real me. But using that name, rather than the one my parents gave me, also means that I can talk about the kinds of things that I talk about (my personal life, including by rather adventurous sex life) while still maintaining a certain level of privacy, which is very important to me.

The more that I held fast to my boundaries, the ones that make me feel safe and comfortable, the more he pushed that I was out of line. This kind of entitlement and gaslighting has probably been experienced by every woman who has ever written about sex on the internet, but it was still tiresome, and ultimately distressing. I’ve got a lifetime of dealing with the unwanted attention of men under my belt, but I’m also an HSP (a highly sensitive person) and so I feel very deeply. The thing about this incident was less about this man in particular and more about the fact that it triggered for me all the other times in my life that a man has felt entitled to my time, my attention, my caring, my sexuality.

Yesterday I read Yael Wolfe’s powerful piece, Learning To See Myself Outside The Male Gaze. Although my experiences were not exactly the same as hers, there was so much there that I resonated with. “Can I express my sexuality without inviting danger? That’s a question that most women are intimately acquainted with. I know that I am.

This guy, who I don’t know from Adam, demanding to have the level of intimacy that he wanted with me because he’s read some of my sex stories and wanted to be my “friend” just kind of brought all of that front and center for me again — all of the times when expressing my sexuality (or even trying to hide it) has invited danger. It also reconfirmed for me why I do not use the name my parents gave me in this context. I’m probably not in any actual danger from this guy, although I don’t know that for sure. That’s the part that is disconcerting.

At one point I had said to him, “You do you, but I intend to keep doing me and maintaining the boundaries that I feel safe and comfortable with.” If polyamory has taught me anything, it’s that I always have the right to do that. I don’t owe anyone, particularly not some strange man on the internet, something that violates my comfort zones.

Trust is earned over time, particularly in the virtual world where there are frequently no other points of reference. If you want to be my friend, then be friendly, show respect for my boundaries, and build relationship and comfort over time. If you want to be my “special friend” because something that I wrote about sex aroused you, then you need to guess again.

“No one’s openness with their sexuality, online or in real life, should be confused with an undiscerning invitation for sexual advances.” Queen Jayne Renault

Apparently this guy had tried to demand this level of intimacy from other women on-line before, with no success. He spoke about a pattern of this type of response from each of them. You think that would tell him something. I recommended that he take it to not be about him in particular but to be the things that women, and particularly women who write about sex, feel they need to do to be safe on-line.

On second thought, maybe it is about him in particular. This level of intrusiveness, and whining about being shut out of a stranger’s personal world speaks to a level of pathology that is prudent to guard against. Whether it’s narcissism, sociopathy, or just garden variety male entitlement, this kind of person is the reason that the Block feature was invented. You are not entitled to be my “special friend” or even my regular friend, and you are really not entitled to know anything about me.

I have worked hard to establish and maintain the boundaries that I have and to deprogram myself from an upbringing that taught me that one of my main functions as a person was to help other people around me to feel comfortable and happy, particularly if they were male. There is no way in hell I am retreating from those boundaries and that reclaimed self now. Particularly not for some stranger on the internet!

© Copyright Elle Beau 2020 Elle Beau writes on Medium about sex, life, relationships, society, anthropology, spirituality, and love. If this story is appearing anywhere other than Medium.com, it appears without my consent and has been stolen.