Teaching at the college level has a lot to be said for it, especially if (like me) you're at a small, private college where the teaching is valued and the research expectations are not extreme. On the other hand, research facilities aren't that great either but you can't have it both ways.

It would be good if the LW could have some teaching experiences before committing to this line of work. You need to be at least a little extroverted, you need to have a thick skin at times and a lot of the work such as grading is just tedious, even painful: this week I have to participate in a hearing for someone I charged with plagiarism. I'm not complaining, I really like teaching but these are things that an inexperienced person doesn't necessarily think about and that might be deal-breakers, ultimately. The other thing is: you spend a lot of time working on a degree for a job that isn't really going to pay that much. While I don't agree with all the gloom and doom, it might be easier to get a job and you'll have a greater affect on others if you teach younger people (but I'm sure that's also more work).

Oh yeah, the fetish video thing: I don't know anything about that stuff but if you can do the work without your face showing and you're not nude and you work under an alias, maybe it's not so big a deal. It would depend on what you had to do.

"Anti-Christian bigotry among American secular Jews is an old story by now"

You know, I'm not familiar with that story and I live among Jews. I am familar with the reverse, though.

Newsflash: few people dislike Christians for being Christians. They dislike the in-your-face and down-your-throats approach of "Christianists" who have for all intents and purposes usurped the word "Christian" and are working hard on usurping "family". I am aware that for some, proselytizing is part of Christianity but your religious rights don't allow you to trample on my religious rights. That's, in my mind, what Weinstein's case is all about.

On the other hand, if religious beliefs allow you to follow practices without regard to their impact on other people, I might start a new religion that places great value on patting young men on the butt. Rob Anderson, shut up and come over here.

Doesn't count!!! I'm female. But I'll pat you on the butt just the same. Maybe more so.

Total agreement with football as a religion, BTW, although I had thought of their hand-to-butt contact more as "slapping".

If the guy can't handle it, he can't handle it. But he has no right to torment his girlfriend and hold it over her head. And the two other people in her past don't qualify as competition. They're IN THE PAST. The only person standing in the way of the LW and her BF is...the BF.

I'm not a good person to ask, though, as I must not be insecure enough. When my sister-in-law asked me why I allowed (!) my husband to keep some pix of his old girlfriends in HIS photo albums, I told her "What difference does it make to me? He married ME". On the other hand, a student who wrote for a local college paper stressed EVERY WEEK that it was best to be a virgin when you married because you wouldn't compare the guy/girl to someone else and that the hottest sex ever was between two virgins because there was none of that icky comparison business going on. It was obvious to every one but him that he had some serious performance anxiety. The LW's BF sounds like that guy's kid brother.

This relationship doesn't look like all that when viewed from my end. The LW didn't feel he could tell her what he did for a living for TWO YEARS? Y'know, people get married and have a baby within two years. And she snooped through his stuff looking for signs that he'd been unfaithful? That would be a deal-breaker for most people, I think (I hope). So he finally told her and that's supposed to fix anything? Somehow I don't see that reuniting would bring all snooping behavior to an end.

I don't think the LW overreacted to the search of cellphone/house by breaking up with her. I think that was possibly the most sane thing he describes doing. It's not like this relationship is based on those pesky things like mutual respect and trust or anything. And if those things are present after two years, I suspect Santa's not bringing them on his sleigh.

It does seem a good idea to bring the dealing to an end though. I suspect that sooner or later, a source or buyer gets caught and sings like a canary about you.

NNG, by any chance did you type some of those preceeding posts with one hand?

Anon is obviously experiencing impaired reality testing with attendant paranoia and cannot be expected to hold up an end of a discussion, y'all.

On a different note,,,How does having one threesome at one point in a person's life make him or her a slut? I thought that required a much more extensive resume. And I think it's abundantly obvious that many women had a lot of fun early on and yet married happily when they were ready. If that's not your type of woman, so be it.