One of my real-life nightmare scenarios was my dad reading my stuff without permission when I was in college, especially since I was having a lot of gay thoughts at the time and hadn’t exactly told him yet. Ever since that horrifying “what does this story mean” moment, I’ve been big on, you know, ASKING PERMISSION before reading someone’s work.
Cue perfectly timed segway to an AITA (am I the asshole) post where a man managed to double down on those YTA (you’re the asshole) points.
AITA for pointing out the historical inaccuracies of my girlfriend’s erotic writing? https://t.co/Pen4iRBcjg pic.twitter.com/aNTI597OEy
— Am I the Asshole? (@AITA_online) April 19, 2022
Why are you reading your girlfriend’s stuff without permission?
The man’s girlfriend let him use her computer since his was broken. While using it, he came across a story she’d written back when she was 16 (she’s 20 now and her boyfriend is 23). Instead of asking her if he could read it, he decided to just … read it anyway.
We find out that this is a personal story she wrote—as to be expected when it’s a, quote, “erotic” piece written by a teenager (unless you’re reckless like me and passing around your smutty DBZ fanfic in class for the other students to read). Even if it was, like, a school paper and not something she wrote for fun, he should’ve asked before reading it. It’s too late now, though, and he’s gone ahead to read her high school romantic work of fiction. Instead of leaving well enough alone, he decides to … critique her old story?!
Also I’m upset that OP called it erotic writing but then said it only had sex in the end. Nothing upsets me more than a book being labeled erotic but it not having sex through out. If you say it’s erotic I want to be blushing by chapter 3 & it better be FILTH.
— Je suis Fatty-Gay (@TimeIsNotGiven) April 19, 2022
Did she ask you to critique her writing from high school?
“I am a train enthusiast and know a lot about the history of rail transportation in the United States,” is not the sentence I expected to read when going through a post about a guy reading his girlfriend’s old work, yet here we are. Because it’s not the story itself he has an issue with, it’s the representation of … trains.
Won’t somebody think of the trains?!
Not to mention , she let you borrow her computer and you decided read something you had NO BUSINESS READING. You’re TA for that ALONE, but then you decided to really just put your foot in your mouth and tell her you’d not only read it, but CORRECT HER!
— Angel loves Moon Knight (@angelt18) April 19, 2022
This is your home now. pic.twitter.com/LTWwzwyzyQ
Needless to say, his girlfriend got upset. Not just because of the invasion of her privacy, but because he’s picking at her story like she’s asking for legitimate feedback. My guy, the story is FOUR YEARS OLD and something she wrote for the hell of it, why are you coming at her about the accuracy of trains?
I’m just trying to imagine how this conversation even went down. “I found your old ‘maid has an affair in the antebellum South’ fiction, I want to ask a question about the trains.” I’m not siding with this man by any means, but I gotta say if I found an old story my partner wrote back in high school and saw the words “maid” “affair with the man of the house” and “antebellum South,” I probably wouldn’t be questioning the trains.
Sir, you’re definitely the asshole here, and a rather peculiar one at that.
(Image: Disney)
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