Parasocial relationships refer to one-sided relationships in which a person develops a strong sense of connection, intimacy, or familiarity with someone they don’t know, most often celebrities or media personalities. These relationships exist only in the mind of the individual, who experiences a bond despite the lack of reciprocity.
Forming parasocial relationships is fine.
Fapping (masturbating) to nsfw content is fine (unless it is illegal or unethical).
But forming a parasocial relationship with someone you fap to feels like cheating if you are in a relationship and a poor substitute for a relationship if you are single.
This is an extremely normal opinion, have you been fraternizing with people who think otherwise? Parasocial relationships are commonly mocked
Right, this post sounds like maybe stuff like Onlyfans has caused some % of the population to think that’s somewhat normal, which is a shame.
Recently I saw a post by a guy who said he made a great living as the chat manager for online porn models. He was a guy who operated the chats for women online, posing as the women and engaging the men to fulfill their chat fantasies, to get more money. A great example of why nobody should patronize those scams.
I see some people have forgotten rule 29 of the internet.
Rule 29: On the internet men are men, women are also men, and kids are undercover FBI agents.
Unless you’re a minor in which case all minors are 40 year old pedophiles
I wouldn’t mock a person for having parasocial relationships, but I would mock them for paying a lot of money to an OnlyFans model. I think that there is a spectrum of acceptable parasocial relationships and I am trying to draw a line where “ok” ends and “despicable” begins.
Maybe we just don’t mock people? Why do you even care if other people do this?
I just think that such behaviour is unhealthy and we’ll see just how unhealthy it is in the coming years.
But why do you care what someone else does whether its unhealthy or not, especially when it doesn’t affect you. I don’t disagree though
I don’t know. Getting old and conservative in my own way, I guess.
straight to gulag
Despicable? I’m curious about where this line is, can you elaborate?
Also, what is your attitude on people who have sex with many partners (with informed consent etc). That could be polyamorous or simply dating & one night stands.
There was an AMA on reddit last week from someone who managed DMs for OF models. Their job was basically to get people hooked and thinking that they had a real relationship with these models via DMs…when the people weren’t even talking to the actual models at all. I think that probably qualifies as despicable.
I think this is problematic because being deceptive is inherently wrong in most cases. But are these buyers getting what they paid for? Social interaction? If the model was doing the chatting, would that make it more moral? I think it’s not so black and white
I wouldn’t generalize this behavior to all OF models or pornstars either, not that you are. I think people who do porn are tacitly entering into a kind of parasocial relationship with the audience, and it’s a two way street.
Despicable? I’m curious about where this line is, can you elaborate?
I don’t know specifically, but I think masturbating to a person you have formed a parasocial relationship with is close to that line.
Also, what is your attitude on people who have sex with many partners (with informed consent etc).
I do not condemn nor condone such behaviour, it might be against my personal moral compass, but as long as both sides know what they are doing it isn’t bad.
How do you feel about the use of AI chatbots for that kind of thing?
Kind of a tangent but I’d be curious to hear your thoughts considering a lot of them are paid services and people can develop connections to those personalities. I feel like the word parasocial gets real muddy at that point.
First of all, ai bots will probably steal all kinds of information from people. And the money that is spent on them could be useful for so many more useful things. I would suggest to seek genuine connections or even go to chatrooms over bots, ai or otherwise.
Not to mention how dealing with bots might warp your ability to socialise. A lot of things that are acceptable to bots are unacceptable to real people. Some people use them to play out fantasy scenarios of non-consent, abuse, etc.
Having said all that, if somebody wants to play around with that stuff, it’s fine as long as it’s not your only way to socialise or seek intimacy. I remember The Gift of Fear by Gavin de Becker and it talked about how video games are not inherently bad and don’t make us more violent, but they take time away from us that we can use to do social things instead.
Depending on how hard it is for a person to socialise, a group hobby or even group therapy sessions might be the solution.
Forming parasocial relationships is fine.
They really aren’t, before this egirl insanity began people who obsessed over some distant celebrity were considered pathetic to dangerous (when it came with stalker behavior).
The fact that it becomes more widespread is a symptom of the failing societal fabric and community.
People are so detached and lonely even amongst millions of others they seek emotional support and validation, even romantic fulfillment, in these unhealthy ways.
Hmmm. I want to push back on this a bit…
We can all recognize deeply, egregiously unhealthy parasocial relationships, so I’m not going to bother talking about those.
But there are plenty of what I would call parasocial relationships the track back quite a long time in human history that I think are completely normal.
Take, for example, the famous athlete. If you find a particular athlete to be your favorite, and you watch their interviews whenever they’re available, and you get excited when they get paid a bunch of money in a trade, that’s a low-key parasocial relationship. Maybe you even send them regular fan mail, cheering them on when they do well or consoling them when they do poorly. You are invested in their life without reciprocity, and find joy and value in simply observing their existence.
There are lots of actors and actress that we love to love, where many people have formed a parasocial relationship: Tom Hanks and Keanu Reeves are two that come to mind.
These are situations that go beyond “yeah I’m a fan” and into feeling some level of investment in their success. It doesn’t have to be extreme.
I think, as with many things, there are healthy ways to engage in parasocial relationships in moderation. It becomes a problem when it becomes detrimental to your daily life, especially if it begins to replace other forms of human interaction. If it’s just a thing you enjoy on top of other, more typical relationships, them IMO there’s nothing wrong with that.
IMO there’s nothing wrong with that.
I agree. My original point was that it’s okay to have a relationship like that, but it’s not okay to sexualise it.
Sorry, this was pushing back on the person I replied to, not you. I generally agree with your take
Point taken. But it might be a matter of degree of how strong a relationship is.
The parasocial part is enough, fapping is just a step beyond.
I don’t think people should idolize other people. You can respect someone, but parasocial seems just all around unhealthy to me. Then the person does something out of line and stans will defend them with their lives and find them all other excuses in the book.
Yes, I agree that people you like online are not your friends and you should not defend them when they get called for their toxic behaviour.
The money is better in parasocial relationships than commodity pornography.
Illegal fapping!
BONK go to horny jail
I could wear a cage.
BONK go to even hornier jail.
What’s gonna happen in there?
Yeah the moment money gets involved I just lose interest.
What would your reaction be to finding out everyone you’ve ever known faps to you?
That would be weird, because there’s definitely better people to fap to. I am just an obese, depressed 32 year old male.
