Relationships are complicated.
Romantic relationships in particular tend toward an uncomfortable amount of complexity.
So, when we introduce a new factor into an already convoluted situation the result is rarely good.
What do you do when whether or not to add this new factor falls to your decision?
That was the issue facing Redditor and Original Poster (OP) warningcammeralert when they came to the “Am I the A**hole” (AITA) subReddit for judgment.
In a now deleted post, OP asked:
“AITA for warning that my friend that the girl he’s seeing is a cam girl.”
OP began with the context.
“I have this one friend Jessica.”
“I she’s a great friend and I’m glad to have her in my life.”
“Jessica is a s*x worker, specifically she is a cam girl.”
“Now, of course, I have never seen any of her streams as that’d be weird but she has told me that when she started, she was doing cam sessions with her ex-boyfriend but started doing solo shows after they broke up.”
“I am in full support of s*x workers and do not think any less of Jessica despite what she does.”
“Jessica recently started seeing Mike.”
“Mike and I used to work together and are still friendly.”
“Apparently they met on tinder.”
“This surprised me as mike is a kinda conservative guy.”
“I didn’t want to be nosy but I talked to Jessica about it and offhand mentioned that he seems like the type of guy who wouldn’t be down with dating a woman like Jessica.”
“She then told me that she hadn’t told him yet and was waiting on till things were a little more serious.”
“I thought this was Ill-advised, if I was dating a girl and I found out was pay-per-view weeks in instead of like date 2, I’d be mad and felt led on.”
“I said that maybe she should consider letting him know soon to spare them both possible heartbreak. She said no.”
Everything was fine until,
“Next time I saw mike I was talking to him about Jess and I felt like I should say something.”
“She’s keeping a massive secret that she thought could’ve been a deal-breaker from him.”
“That’s wrong and I felt like this was one of the rare occasions it was okay to step into someone else’s relationship.”
“I told him and he wasn’t happy.”
“Apparently he almost immediately ended things with Jess and she blamed me.”
“All of our other friends said I was being a dick and need to apologize.”
“I feel like it was protecting mike.”
OP was left to wonder,
“AITA?”
Having explained the situation, OP turned to Reddit for judgment.
Redditors weighed in by declaring:
- NTA – Not The A**hole
- YTA – You’re The A**hole
- NAH – No A**holes Here
- ESH – Everyone Sucks Here
Redditors decided: ESH
Some responses pointed out the complexity of the situation.
“I’m conflicted. ESH”
“So yikes…”
“Going against the grain here but I’d personally want to know if someone was keeping something like that from me.”
“Waiting until you’ve hooked someone along to tell them something that not everyone is okay within a relationship is a red flag.”
“Not to mention a waste of time and quick way to lose trust.”
“Personally that’s something that, in my eyes, needs to be disclosed far before a relationship begins so that the other person can decide to continue with it.”
“Still, you’ve lost trust with her now and went so far as to disclose her personal life without permission, which really sucks.”
“She may have been trying to find the time or right way to tell him, and you went and took that opportunity from her to sit him down and properly discuss it. Not really cool.”
“Also, everyone saying that being upfront may have been dangerous doesn’t seem to understand that regardless of how she went about it there is potential danger because of the position she’s placed herself within the job she’s chosen.”
“If she tells him early, might lead to violence.”
“If she waits and tell him later, probably will lead to violence.”
“D*mned if you do, d*mned if you don’t.”
“It isn’t an excuse not to disclose it. Best she can do is tell him through text, or meet up with him with a friend for safety.”
“EDIT: added a word EDIT 2: added verdict” ~ Dispirited_Ghost
“She seems like she’s barely gotten to know this guy, I don’t really percieve it as ‘waiting until you’ve hooked someone along.”‘
“All she said was that she wanted to get to know him first.”
“She didn’t say she was going to wait until she’s already in committed relationship!”
“I feel OP operated unfairly based on assumptions he’s formed because of his own preferences and stigmas.”
“If she’s a good friend, there’s no reason to assume she’d lie to her partners.”
“He even framed it as she was participating in an act of deceit when he told him, instead of saying the more accurate thing that she’s waiting until she knows him more.”
“We should consider that s*x workers can be more likely targets of violence too.”
“Plus, nobody would date anybody if the most stigmatized parts of us or all our perceived flaws were pushed into their face right at the beginning by their good friends.” ~ Whoopsa-doodle
While others were very clear in their opinion.
“I’m not conflicted at all.”
“I would immediately want to know and would immediately break up with a man who hid his profession as a sex worker from me.”
“Opinions about s*x workers are opinions.”
“Most of the world does not view selling s*x positively.”
“Aside from that, the dynamic in romance and relationships is very complicated.”
“I would not be okay with a man being a cam dude calling other women, talking to other women s*xually under any circumstances even if it was for money!”
“Just because there are parts of you that you feel others might reject doesn’t give you the go-ahead to hide it!”
“That’s deception, lying, and building a relationship on an air mattress in the ocean! It’s bound to be a disaster!”
“Tell the truth people!” ~ Salty_Buyer_5358
OP seemed to be in a doomed scenario.
“Ouch.”
“Schrodinger’s A: if you tell you’re an A and if you don’t tell you’re also an A.”
“You had two friends, and had to pick from which ethical violation you wanted to live with.”
“Lotta folks would say YTA, and you kinda are but…”
“Hiding this stuff is actually deceit and it can be bad when they find out later.”
“But you shouldn’t be surprised that the bridge with your friend is burnt. It’s acceptable for them to be upset with you. That information disclosure really wasn’t yours to perform.” ~ AltDogBarkBarkBark
“NTA”
“You informed Mike about something from Jessica that you knew he wouldn’t accept in a potential partner.”
“You saved him from wasting precious time dating her & experiencing a tough heartbreak if he were to have become very emotionally invested in her.”
“Jessica should have ended things as soon as you told her that Mike didn’t like dating s*x workers, because it wasn’t like Mike would change his mind about s*x work all of a sudden just for her.”
“It feels rather disgusting that Jessica wanted to wait until Mike was more emotionally invested in her, because that just feels like some sort of trap.”
“Alternate scenario: Let’s say that you had kept the secret to yourself & the relationship eventually blew apart.”
“You would still be considered an a**hole to some people for not disclosing said crucial information to Mike, despite being friendly with him & knowing very well that the info could have saved him all that time he used to emotionally invest in Jessica.”
“All in all, you would’ve been considered an a**hole no matter the choice you took & you would’ve lost a friend regardless, which is just an unfair situation to have to be in.”
“For this reason along with everything else I stated, you’re NOT the a**hole.”~ Regina-Castellum
While other commenters pointed out the holes in OP’s defense.
“You can tell by the wording and little snide remarks in the post that OP isn’t ‘in full support of s*x workers'”.
“I have to go back to work, so I cant go find specific examples right now, but more than once, I was like, ‘Yeah, that sounds like when people tell me they fully respect gay people, and in the next breath tell me it’s disrespectful to hold hands with my wife and ‘just stop shoving that shot in my face.'”
“That’s the distinct feeling I got – that and ‘of course I support sex workers – I have a ‘pay per view’ (OPS words – this irked me) friend!’” ~ Technical-Exchange-8
“Yeah, this is very much a situation where the attitude/judgement is the problem.”
“Not everyone wants to date a s*x worker, some people feel that’s not in line with the version of monogamy they subscribe to.”
“She was probably still feeling out how he’d take it, and liked him enough to stick around even if he seemed a bit conservative.”
“And let’s be honest, hearing about a somewhat taboo job from gossip is automatically going to put it in a poor light.”
“If Jessica had been able to approach it, she could have said, ‘hey, this is my job (or side gig, or w/e), this is what I do, not a big deal'”,
“Versus ‘hey, man, just warning you, she’s a cam girl, don’t wanna judge but like…'”
“Framing is important, and this approach steers straight into stigma.” ~ nerdprincess73
Relationships are complicated.
Remember that none of us are perfect and that the best any of us can do is to try, sometimes fail, and try again.
Be patient with one another.