Drawing 24 and Relationship Terminology

[tealin]

I might have posted this one before, but when I uploaded it to Photobucket, it didn't give it a different filename, so bombs away!

Heeheehee.

On a slightly related note: I have been a stranger to the dating scene for most of my life, but thought I'd learned the basics in high school where I was designated counselor for all my friends and their woeful dramas. However, I have recently discovered that the world of human relationships is even more fraught and imbued with baffling subtext than I'd feared, and even the supposedly harmless world of terminology has layers and layers of hidden meanings. I had thought that any couple who were dating were 'boyfriend and girlfriend' but I now learn that only applies to a serious, committed relationship, one level down from engagement. It's become impossible to talk about anyone's relationship to anyone else because I never know what to call them, for fear of misrepresenting their status and starting who knows what. So I ask you, oh knowledgeable internet, what terms to use when defining the following sorts of couples. Both verbs, for defining their state, and nouns defining one or the other member of the party (to replace 'girl/boyfriend'), are welcome. Smart-aleck answers from the religious right are not helpful.

1. Just starting to go out but not serious yet, sort of testing the water

2. Have been together for a few months but have not declared any sort of committment

3. Testing the water but also having sex

4. Long-term non-committed but having sex*

5. Long-term committed but not having sex

*and I don't mean 'f—buddies,' I need a term that can be used in polite company if that's possible

Comments

[blahblahcakes64.livejournal.com]

I have the SAME problem. Seriously. These are the answers I seem to find most common, even if I might designate them differently:

1. Just starting to go out but not serious yet, sort of testing the water---> "TALKING"--basically casual dating and making out.

2. Have been together for a few months but have not declared any sort of commitment---> "DATING"

3. Testing the water but also having sex ---> "HOOKING UP".

4. Long-term non-committed but having sex ---> Um, who does this? Okay. Hrm. I'd say 'hooking up', but just clarify that it's a...frequent...thing? Eesh.

5. Long-term committed but not having sex ---> "TOGETHER" or "GOING OUT".

Hope that was helpful! :)

[virusq.livejournal.com]

I would generally refer to any of those as "significant other," "your boy" or "your girl."

Some people seem inseparable, but do not have any romantic chemistry they want to own up to. Those would be "other halves."

I would also refer to 2 and 5 as "The other voice in their head." They communicate and relate as if they are together, but don't want to be seen as together.

...But, honestly? I'd just call them boyfriend/girlfriend until the parties in question correct you. Obviously they're sending the wrong signals and need to clarify their relationship.

[twirlynoodle.livejournal.com]

I have been explicitly informed that boyfriend/girlfriend is, in broader youth culture as a whole, only ever used to describe a serious relationship. Maybe it's a California thing?

I like that 'his girl/her boy' thing, how delightfully 1940s. I think I shall use that from now on. :)

[noodledaddy.livejournal.com]

Being of the wrong generation, I only know one for sure:

5. Long-term committed but not having sex ---> "PARENTS".

[virusq.livejournal.com]

I know enough people that cycle through boyfriends and girlfriends that it is most definitely not explicitly serious relationships in my neck of the woods.

Alternatively, my boyfriend and I have started referring to each other as "Super Girlfriend" and "Super Boyfriend." It tends to elevate such a simple term.

[conga-chili.livejournal.com]

Ugh. I wish those terms would just stay within the confines of confusing, paranoid-about-everything youth. Some people use those terms as badges of honor and others seem to be allergic to them! Personally I don't care so long as they don't shove every single bit of useless information about their significant other to me.

I tend to just use "significant other," or "husband/wife" if they appear to be joined at the hip anyway.

Good luck probing these waters!

[lostieborden.livejournal.com]

4. "FRIENDS WITH BENEFITS"

Not something I've had much experience with myself (I swear!), but my best friend is in a super-long-term "relationship" along those lines. Honestly, eventually you stop referring to it at all, because everyone already knows what you're talking about and it gets too awkward.

[conga-chili.livejournal.com]

PS: Dang that is a nicely drawn skirt and boot!

[mauraplaid.livejournal.com]

1. Just starting to go out but not serious yet, sort of testing the water -> "not-boyfriend" or "not-girlfriend," definitely a term I learned from Buffy the Vampire Slayer

[bonnieslasher.livejournal.com]

I'm clueless too, as many of my friends seem to be. Everyone's operating with different ideas of what dating is and what boyfriends/girlfriends are. Then there's the drama when one of them assumes something the other has no idea about, and I want to scream at them all to just be clear with their intentions regardless of labels.

Then I find myself happy to be out of the dating pool :P

[raddishh.livejournal.com]

Personally, I think "Seeing each other" could apply for any of those except 1 in most cases.

Can you tell that I like to simplify everything?

[frodobaggins252.livejournal.com]

**Sporfle**

So true...so true...

[rakkenfloofer.livejournal.com]

Love her left hand.

[ks-claw.livejournal.com]

about the f-buddies.. Some like to call it "friends with benefits"

[wicked-vasquez.livejournal.com]

1. boy-thing, girl-thing
2. boyfriend, girlfriend
3.
4. Friends with benefits.
5. partners

[spence137.livejournal.com]

For anything that isn't an explicit boy/girlfriend situation, I just stick to "that girl/guy you've been seeing."

I.E. "How are things with that guy you've been seeing?" OR "Oh, I just saw that girl you've been seeing recently. Did she take you out to lunch?"

[twirlynoodle.livejournal.com]

So what would you call either partner in this relationship? A 'beneficiary'?

[twirlynoodle.livejournal.com]

Aaargh, so many syllables! :)

[twirlynoodle.livejournal.com]

4. I'm leaning towards calling either party a 'beneficiary' but would that be too snide to use on someone you're actually friends with?

[twirlynoodle.livejournal.com]

Why thank you. It was a life drawing doodle, those always turn out the best.

[anathelen.livejournal.com]

Here on the uptight, conservative ol' East Coast boyfriend/girlfriend can still apply to all of those, at least for people in their mid-early twenties. The younger or more technologically obsessed, who I hear worry a good deal over whether or not they're 'facebook official', probably have finer distinctions, but in my circle of friends we'd call the above pairings simply 'dating', or, if we want to be more vague, 'seeing each other.'

California is weird. Hooray for bitter winds, long winters, tiny states, and the Puritan legacy.

[twirlynoodle.livejournal.com]

Haha, sometimes I think I'm an East-Coaster who's lived my entire life on the West Coast ....

[jolly-kraken.livejournal.com]

Criminy, I'm only 18 and I have the exact same problem. I don't see what's wrong with saying "boyfriend/girlfriend" or "significant other" either, or when that started to mean "soon to be engaged." o___o" I'm learning some interesting new things here. XD

Among my group of fellow teenagers, I really only hear "boyfriend/girlfriend." When a relationship is starting it's usually "the guy/girl you're interested in/have a crush on/are stalking," until the person corrects you with whatever the correct term is.

I've heard the other phrases from the skankbags I refuse to associate with, so I'm not sure exactly what they mean by "this guy I'm seeing now." I presume that to mean "this guy I'm having sex with now," but I don't know for sure. *rolls eyes* Kids these days.

[pandoras-chaos.livejournal.com]

1. seeing each other, the boy she's seeing/the girl she's seeing
2. dating, his/her date for the evening
3. still dating, though it gets sketchy on that
4. well, fuck-buddies is the preferred term, but 'friends with benefits' works as well, as does 'seeing each other' if in polite company that wouldn't particularly care for the innuendo
5. married.

[twirlynoodle.livejournal.com]

or when that started to mean "soon to be engaged."

It doesn't necessarily indicate inevitable engagement – in fact I hear it most confidently used in reference to couples who probably never plan on getting married but basically are, already, without the paperwork (living together, etc). Perhaps I should go edit that to take out the implication of a timeline...

I'm glad to know I'm not the only one out of the loop, and that someone actually in a youthful peer group is similarly confused. I'm used to being out of touch with popular culture but I had thought this was more or less straightforward...