[Savage Love] If You're Looking for a Label, What's Wrong With 'Exhibitionist'?

I am a heterosexual male in my 20s, and I need some help putting a label on my kink/fetish. I usually don't care much for labels in any aspect of life, but I'm hoping that knowing what to call this may help me find others who share the same interest: I love it when a woman watches me masturbate. She doesn't have to touch me at all, take off her own clothes, or play with herself. However, she has to enjoy watching me for me to enjoy performing. I have no interest in "flashing" or otherwise imposing myself on someone who doesn't want to watch. Also, I don't want to show just anyone; I just enjoy being watched by a woman.

Wanting A Named Kink

If you're looking for a label, WANK, what's wrong with "exhibitionist"? It's a fine, serviceable term, as well as an honorable sexual pursuit—provided, of course, that you exhibit yourself exclusively to women who wish to take in your exhibition. A flasher may be the first thing that pops to mind when people hear the term "exhibitionist," WANK, but while all flashers are exhibitionists, it doesn't follow that all exhibitionists are flashers. Perhaps you could start a movement to reclaim "exhibitionism" from the creeps?

As for CFNM porn—that's "clothed female, naked male"—most of it features strong subtexts (or domtexts) of humiliation, even seemingly vanilla-ish iterations, but that's unavoidable. CFNM upends all the usual gender-power dynamics: The man is naked and vulnerable and subject to the woman's gaze; the woman is clothed and in control and assessing the man. Perhaps the role that dom/sub dynamics play in your turn-on is so subtle, WANK, that you honestly believe humiliation has nothing to do with it. But it's in there.

I'm a gay man who never experimented with girls when I was younger. I've been in a relationship for a little more than a year now, and it's great. We have an "open-enough" relationship that allows for some exploration of our sexuality with other people, and we talk openly about it. The only thing is, I don't know how to tell him about this fetish I've developed for CFNM. I don't want to have sex with a woman, but I really want to find one who wants to stay fully clothed while watching me masturbate. I also have a fantasy for a woman to watch me have sex with my BF or another man. Attempts to find a woman via various websites have so far been unfruitful. I want to blame the prudes in Minneapolis for this, but I'm starting to think women just aren't into watching a man get naked and jack off.

How do I ask my boyfriend to get involved in this kink? And how do I find a woman who is into watching?

Horny And Clothed In Minneapolis

Make some lesbian friends, HACIM.

Lots of dykes watch gay-male porn, a phenomenon I would unpack in this space if, um, I had the faintest idea what was up with that. (Ladies? What is up with that?) And on more than one occasion, lesbian pals have asked me and my boyfriend to put on a live sex show for 'em. They apparently wanted to see what gay sex looked like without the bad lighting, waxed eyebrows and faked chemistry. Equal parts modesty and performance anxiety have sadly prevented my boyfriend and me from obliging our lesbian pals. But you, clearly, could do better by your lesbian buddies.

And how do you ask the boyfriend to go there with you? Just like any smart kinkster asks a partner to indulge, or consider indulging, his kink, HACIM: with a smile and a sense of humor. Kinks should always be presented as perks, as something that makes you a more interesting and fun sex partner, not as something that makes you a defective or problematic sex partner. And if your boyfriend isn't willing to go there, HACIM, it doesn't sound like you'll have much trouble getting his permission to go there on your own.