do you consider beating off over porn and chatting with girls on site as cheating?

[lonelybird]

My husband is obsessed with porn lately, he even went further to those immerse sexual site with VR, it looks like real and you are in the same room with those girls. He chatted with girls on sex site, and didn't think it is a big deal, told me that one of the girls is "different"  because she does that for paying her college tuitions. Well, it sounds like he saying "she is special", and i am picturing him running away with this girl. probably less likely, he is not THAT attractive. Since i discovered his chatting, i cannot look into his eyes, and I don't want to be intimate with him, feel like yucky. He put away his VR and tried to engage some activities with me and children. But I still cannot trust him. Let's see how long he can stay away from the chatting and sex sites

Edited July 24 by lonelybird

[lonelybird]

well, he used VR last night again. We have 10 and 11 year old children together. I wonder should I prepare them with what's going on and let them know their father chatting with sex girls. Can anyone shine some light about this?

[Gebidozo]

I don’t consider porn or chatting with bots / AI / VR / whatever isn’t human etc. cheating.

Sexual chats with real women - yes, that I consider cheating.

[lonelybird]

Porn does have a negative effect on our sex life. I am always wondering if he picked up the lines from porns, and I don't want to be one of his hookers. 

He chatted with a real woman on a sex site, tried to make her laugh. In order to chat with her, he would rather sit in the car waiting for me and my children shopping, he would rather chat with her than spending time with me and our children. If he likes to chat with her,  then he will not have me. I probably should think about exit plan.

[Els]

I don't see what the point of asking this question is. In your other post you have explicitly stated that you both cannot stand each other, your bedroom has been dead for a "long time", there is no love left here, and in your eyes he's cheating.

What does it matter whether others think he is cheating or not? You need to leave. There is no point in staying at this stage. 

I wouldn't tell your children that he was cheating until they are older and able to understand. 

 

[basil67]

7 hours ago, lonelybird said:

well, he used VR last night again. We have 10 and 11 year old children together. I wonder should I prepare them with what's going on and let them know their father chatting with sex girls. Can anyone shine some light about this?

Absolutely not!  Do not divulge this level of information to your young children.   They should not even know that sex girls exist, let alone that their father is interacting with them. 

 

 

[MsJayne]

9 hours ago, lonelybird said:

I wonder should I prepare them with what's going on and let them know their father chatting with sex girls.

No! His behaviour is disrespectful to you, it's guaranteed to cause intimacy problems in most relationships, and I can see why you find it repulsive, but this is between you and him, do not involve the children. If he's spending what should be family time sleazing around the internet you've got good reason to assess whether you want to be in a marriage with someone who does that stuff. It would make me feel like I needed to bathe in Pine-O-Cleen, you'd be well within your rights to call it quits and leave him to his sordid fantasies. 

[Gebidozo]

OP, I don’t understand why you are discussing the exact details of his sleazy behavior and thinking of adding more negativity to this by involving your little kids, when the only sensible thing to do here would be to divorce him.

[ExpatInItaly]

12 hours ago, lonelybird said:

We have 10 and 11 year old children together. I wonder should I prepare them with what's going on and let them know their father chatting with sex girls.

In what world do you think it would be appropriate to do so? 

It's frightening that you would evern consider this. 

[LAspen]

Well, first of all, this question applies also to women who masturbate to porn and chat in chat rooms with men.
Now my answer.
I believe that cheating (infidelity towards a partner) is manifested if sexual acts online are performed personally with a specific real person including for money. 
If porn is impersonal (actors, unknown people, strangers, or AI), then I don't consider masturbating to them or chatting with impersonal characters to be betrayal. But at the same time, a person who is masturbating and having sexual chats with porn characters must do this in the strictest secrecy from their committed partner. And they must be prepared to take responsibility for their actions if they are caught. 
Clarifying my point of view.
We are all not angels, and not a single person on earth is free from sexual fantasies and temptations towards acquaintances or completely random people, even if this person is a monk/nun, spouse/partner who strictly adheres to their vows and promises. 
The main thing here is not to try to turn our fantasies into reality with a specific person for whom we feel lust, if we are already "occupied" and have obligations towards a partner.
Sexting with the fruit of our fantasies and other imaginary sexual acts with them, including masturbation with the idea of a sexual partner only in our head, is something that even the saints could not get rid of.

[Els]

On 7/25/2025 at 3:28 PM, LAspen said:

Sexting with the fruit of our fantasies and other imaginary sexual acts with them, including masturbation with the idea of a sexual partner only in our head, is something that even the saints could not get rid of.

You seriously don't see that there's a difference between masturbating to an imagination of someone else, and literally paying that person to do sexual acts on camera for you?

You appear to identify as a cishet man, so let me try to provide an example that might suit you. In one example, your wife is masturbating to thoughts of, say, Ryan Gosling doing unspeakable things to her. In the other example, your wife is paying Ryan Gosling to talk to her while naked on camera, and to do sexual acts specifically for her while on a VR app with her. (No shade on Ryan Gosling, I'm sure he wouldn't do that.)

Still don't see any difference?

[LAspen]

14 hours ago, Els said:

You seriously don't see that there's a difference between masturbating to an imagination of someone else, and literally paying that person to do sexual acts on camera for you?

You appear to identify as a cishet man, so let me try to provide an example that might suit you. In one example, your wife is masturbating to thoughts of, say, Ryan Gosling doing unspeakable things to her. In the other example, your wife is paying Ryan Gosling to talk to her while naked on camera, and to do sexual acts specifically for her while on a VR app with her. (No shade on Ryan Gosling, I'm sure he wouldn't do that.)

Still don't see any difference?

Paying a specific existing person for virtual sex, if that particular person does it for you personally and knows you, is prostitution, infidelity. 
But if you're only doing it in your imagination and the other person doesn't know anything about you and never will, it's part of our natural sexual essence that requires us to be non-monogamous/polyamorous in the interests of evolution and population development (like all other animals). But we, as civilized people, must hide this "shameful" part of our being from those who have been given vows and promises to be exclusive. That's exactly what I wanted to say in my comment. 
And the fact that each of us, including you, constantly "cheat" on our committed partner in our secret thoughts and desires in various forms (from simple romantic interest and imagining them naked to mentally replaying sex with them and even to masturbating to their images) cannot be denied by any honest person.

 

[Gebidozo]

1 hour ago, LAspen said:

it's part of our natural sexual essence that requires us to be non-monogamous/polyamorous in the interests of evolution and population development (like all other animals).

This is really incorrect. Sexual behavior in animals is extremely varied and includes everything from extreme promiscuity to lifelong monogamy. Don’t lump all animals together as though they were all one species. Also, neither monogamy nor polygamy have anything to do with evolution in the general sense, as different species evolve in very different ways.

 

1 hour ago, LAspen said:

And the fact that each of us, including you, constantly "cheat" on our committed partner in our secret thoughts and desires in various forms (from simple romantic interest and imagining them naked to mentally replaying sex with them and even to masturbating to their images) cannot be denied by any honest person.

At the risk of appearing dishonest to you, I declare that I have zero romantic interest in anyone but my current romantic partner, and I don’t mentally roleplay sex with anyone but her, not even occasionally, to say nothing of “constantly”.

I think it would be best if you spoke for yourself and didn’t make such radical generalizations about the rest of humanity.

[BaileyB]

On 7/24/2025 at 9:37 AM, lonelybird said:

I wonder should I prepare them with what's going on and let them know their father chatting with sex girls.

No. You don’t burden children with adult problems.

You file for divorce and tell your children that “mommy and daddy have decided that they don’t want to be married anymore…”

 

[BaileyB]

6 hours ago, LAspen said:

But if you're only doing it in your imagination and the other person doesn't know anything about you and never will, it's part of our natural sexual essence that requires us to be non-monogamous/polyamorous in the interests of evolution and population development (like all other animals). But we, as civilized people, must hide this "shameful" part of our being from those who have been given vows and promises to be exclusive. 

This is called fantasizing and it’s a normal and healthy thing to do. Many people do this - we all have celebrity crushes, it’s the reason why romance novels exist, people fantasize about others in various ways… one can be monogamous and still read romance novels and fantasize about celebrities. I think it’s a stretch to argue that this normal human behavior is “ part of our natural sexual essence that requires us to be non-monogamous/polyamorous in the interest of evolution.” Of course, some may be shamed and feel the need to hide their fantasies from their partner. But, with a loving and accepting partner, there is no need to hide this “shameful part of their being,” one could actually share their fantasies with their partner as part of an expression of their sexuality - within the context of their relationship. 

Of course, when one crosses the line and begins to communicate or establish a relationship with another person, spend marital assets on this extramarital relationship, and can’t stop communicating with this other person - that’s another problem entirely. And that’s what’s happening here…

[Els]

10 hours ago, LAspen said:

Paying a specific existing person for virtual sex, if that particular person does it for you personally and knows you, is prostitution, infidelity. 

Yes, and that appears to be what the OP's partner is doing...

Quote

But if you're only doing it in your imagination and the other person doesn't know anything about you and never will, it's part of our natural sexual essence that requires us to be non-monogamous/polyamorous in the interests of evolution and population development (like all other animals). 

Personally I have no issues with people using their imagination however they please.

The "all animals are non-monogamous" line is straight up wrong, though. If you actually read about evolution (from actual textbooks, not manosphere social media posts), you'd realize that there's a wide range of sexual behaviour in animals. It ranges from monogamy (90% of of birds, several types of mammals such as otters, beavers, etc) to various kinds of polygamy (polygyny, polyandry, and polygynandry), to promiscuity.  So no, "evolution and population development" don't necessarily require polyamory, not all animals are polyamorous, and neither are all humans.

There's nothing wrong with choosing poly IF you and your spouse have discussed this from the beginning and both people are on-board with it. It is most certainly not "part of our natural sexual essence", however.

 

[LAspen]

Thanks for the reply, Els. Of course, you are right in many of your judgments, and this is not the place for extensive discussions.
I want to make just one comment about monogamy in the animal kingdom. In the world of animals, birds, and fish, everything is subordinated to individual survival and the survival of the species. Any monogamy is not a feeling of mutual "love" between "individuals", but convenience and the best way to raise offspring. At the same time, all cases of "swan fidelity" are just beautiful fairy tales, swans, in case of loss of a partner, immediately find another one, just like all other birds. 
But it is also a fact that females choose the best males as fathers of their chicks from the point of view of procreation (this is why male birds organize "beauty contests" during the mating season). 
The higher the development of animals, the more clearly the signs of sexual behavior of females and males in relation to sex and procreation appear: females choose the strongest and most beautiful males, and males use force to defeat other males in the struggle for a female or for a "harem". We can give vivid examples of this idea in mammals, but man is the most perfect animal to whom nature has given intelligence. Our primary animal instincts are smoothed out under the influence of civilization, the result of the development of collective intelligence. The 'love" we feel for the opposite gender is always associated with sexual feelings and procreation, although at the current level, people have learned to use sex solely for their own pleasure, having come up with means by which conception and sexual pleasure are separated. 
But we continue to follow the call of our nature and constantly evaluate members of the opposite sex primarily in terms of their appearance and the possibility of having sex with them. We try to suppress these instincts in every possible way, because we consider them shameful, but there is nothing we can do about our essence. A penchant for porn, for masturbation, as an imitation of real sexual relations with other partners, does not make us "bad" as long as this is not a manifestation of infidelity towards a particular partner, nor will it lead to their suffering and damage the committed relationship. That is why I am convinced that each of us CAN dream of sexual acts with others and perform imitation acts, but we SHOULD NOT show this to a committed partner to whom we have made vows/promises to be monogamous. Is this hypocrisy, a lie? Yes! But none of us can do anything else. This is one of the inevitable evils in our imperfect world.
And each of us being in a committed relationship SHOULD NOT turn our fantasies into reality in the form of sexual acts with other specific people. This is exactly what is called betrayal. 
Each person is emotionally a tangle of love, hate and indifference of varying degrees of intensity, but we MUST distinguish good from evil and act in accordance with the morality developed over the centuries.

[Els]

9 hours ago, LAspen said:

Any monogamy is not a feeling of mutual "love" between "individuals", but convenience and the best way to raise offspring. At the same time, all cases of "swan fidelity" are just beautiful fairy tales, swans, in case of loss of a partner, immediately find another one, just like all other birds. 

I think you are muddying the waters here. Being monogamous does NOT mean that you can't find another partner after you lose your first partner... all monogamy means is that you aren't with more than one person at the same time. 

Whether animals feel "love" in the way that we describe it is another matter entirely and irrelevant to the issue of monogamy. Plenty of monogamous human marriages don't involve love, by the way.

Nobody is saying that the OP should police her partner's every thought and he should never be allowed to even think of another person during masturbation. I'm not sure why you're so hung up on that. The OP is talking about her partner literally paying cam girls for virtual sex. 

Quote

The higher the development of animals, the more clearly the signs of sexual behavior of females and males in relation to sex and procreation appear: females choose the strongest and most beautiful males, and males use force to defeat other males in the struggle for a female or for a "harem"

I strongly recommend that you pick up a biology book if you are interested in this topic. There are many, many intelligent animals and a vast range of sexual behaviour among them. Dolphins practice promiscuity among both genders with a high incidence of homosexuality. Ravens and parrots are monogamous. Elephants live in female-dominated herds. I could go on and on... but really, pick up a book. Preferably one written by a zoologist or biologist. 

Edited July 29 by Els

[LAspen]

Els, you misunderstood me again, or most likely I couldn't explain my position and it's my fault. 
I did not claim and do not claim that there cannot be the same range of sexual relations between animals as between humans. I just wanted to say that in the animal kingdom monogamy is in some cases the best option for procreation and raising offspring in a hostile environment. At the same time, the "primary" choice of a partner is always the CHOICE of the best available in terms of gene transfer to offspring. In addition, cases of monogamy are also explained by the fact that estrus in animals leading to mating is in the vast majority of cases a temporary and short-term phenomenon, and after it, sexual desire ceases to play a role in the behavior of established couples and they stay together, because this is a good strategy for the individual survival of each of the members of the couple. Sex between periods of estrus is not necessary and practically does not occur. Humans are in estrus 24/7 all year round, and sex has turned from a means of procreation into an everyday pleasure, but we continue to subconsciously constantly simulate in our heads the choice of a partner for mating in terms of its advantages or the scattering of genes. Constantly. But this should not determine our morality, dictated by reason, intelligence.
I repeat, nature requires ALL living beings to fulfill the main task of procreation, and man is no exception. I don't want to argue about biology and physiology of animals and humans, I'm not an expert and this is not the place. I'm just justifying my opinion about our fundamental inability to get rid of the "curse of non-monogamy," which is expressed in the constant  assessment  of members of the opposite sex in terms of their sexuality. 
That is why women care so much about their appearance and try to emphasize/expose their body parts, even being in a monogamous relationship. They don't do it for other women, but for ALL the men around them. 
Men also like to show off their "virtues" by wearing tight clothes that show the size of their genitals and muscles, and they like to show off facial and head hair (although this is not as pronounced as in women, because their urge is to have fun and disperse genes).
In my comments, I'm just expressing my opinion, which, of course, may not coincide with the opinions of others.
And I respect your personal opinion and I'm trying to figure out what you really want to say. I'm probably not thinking straight, and I apologize for my incomprehensibility.
I think our public discussion has exhausted itself and has long been of no interest to anyone except the two of us. 
That's why I suggest we end our argument here. 
Thank you for withstanding my rantings for so long, not everyone succeeds in this.
I wish you good health, longevity and lots and lots of joy. I hope we will meet again at this forum.

[Els]

Edit: Misclicked.

Edited July 30 by Els

[Els]

@LAspen fair enough. I'm just concerned because I see echoes of red pill/manosphere dogma in your posts, and I wanted you to know that most of the things that are said by these communities are not true. They like to take one or two true examples, then twist and bend and project it into an all-encompassing "truth" that is completely false.

I hope eventually you'll understand that nature and sexual behaviour - both humans AND animals - are not as black and white as you think it is. Neither is gender and sexuality as rigid as you believe - it's a continuum, for humans and many species of animals.

[enterthevoid]

Quote

do you consider beating off over porn and chatting with girls on site as cheating?

It's not about what I consider, or what other users consider.  It's about what you are comfortable with it.

If you did not consent to those things and he is doing them behind your back, then it is dishonest on his end.

 

Edited July 30 by enterthevoid

[enterthevoid]

On 7/24/2025 at 11:57 AM, Gebidozo said:

I don’t consider porn or chatting with bots / AI / VR / whatever isn’t human etc. cheating.

I generally wouldn't either, in moderation.

But if its becomes an obsession or addiction. 
If he's spending less quality time with you. 
If less interested in satisfying you sexually because he's more focused on porn, then yes, I would consider that cheating.

Edited July 30 by enterthevoid

[longdue]

Your motivation to tell your kids seems to be parental alienation. If you are so frustrated, it is clear that you need to leave. Don’t use the children as pawns. 
 

As for chatting with vr chars, I have done that as a novelty. But they are nowhere close to the real thing. Neither is porn, but there are reasons men get used to it. There must be something really missing in your relationship for him to prefer tele sex. I am not blaming you, just saying you aren’t compatible. 
 

you can tell him you feel hurt and see if he cares. If not you have your answer. Cheating is secondary.