Hey Tim,

I really enjoy your column (reading about other people’s problems make mine seem a lot less stressful) and for the most part like the advice you give. However, I take issue with something you tweeted: “I think the most deeply unsettling thing I can see these days is a YOUNG bigot. Elderly, I get it. But young, in today's world? Horrible.”

As someone who will in the not too distant future qualify as “elderly,” I take a lot of umbrage at this ageist remark. Just because someone has lived a long life does NOT excuse any bigotry, and just because someone is young doesn’t mean they’re going to be a good, tolerant person.

H

You’re definitely right that being young doesn’t guarantee tolerance and acceptance, H, and I didn’t mean to disparage the elderly. I probably could have phrased that a lot better, so let me try now, without the limit of 140 characters.

My tweet was spurred by an overheard conversation between two early-20-somethings in an LA coffee shop. Both of them took the position that increasing acceptance of gay marriage was ruining the country. It was pretty jarring to hear, specifically because of their age. Let me explain why.

Let’s say you grew up in a small, isolated town somewhere in Middle America, and the year is 1975. Most of your worldview will be shaped by the people around you. You’ll catch a few movies that show a wider world, and maybe glimpse people of different persuasions on one of the three networks on television, but your town and the people in it - your tribe - shape you into what you are.

Tribal living - the way all human beings lived until very, very recently - is based on this principle: the Tribe is safe, the Other is scary.

Now let’s take that same scenario, but the year is 2015. While your neighbors, parents, and friends still wield a strong influence, you have access to essentially the entire world through your computer. The main cause of bigotry is ignorance - if you don’t know or understand a certain type of people, you can’t form empathy for them.

For an older person whose worldview was constructed before the advent of the Internet, they wouldn’t have had access to those different perspectives. But no young person living today with Internet access can claim they just don’t know or understand anyone different from them.

So when someone in their early 20’s is against gay marriage, it’s not because they don’t understand it or have never seen a gay person. It’s because they choose to embrace bigotry.

That's what I was trying to express, and I'm sorry it came across as ageist. I'll choose my words more carefully next time.

Dear Tim,

I know you don’t get a lot of letters from moms, but that’s what I am. I started reading TheBacklot because my son came out to me a few years ago at 15 years old, which was not a problem for me at all, and I had expected it as he was always very effeminate. I thought it would be good for me to be up on pop culture so we would have fun things to talk about, and I found myself enjoying the discovery of new television shows that I otherwise never would have known about.

However, the story got a little more complicated when my son went off to college. When he came back for winter break, he told me he was actually transgender, and this past semester has begun dressing as a woman and asked me to start using a new chosen name and feminine pronouns. I want to be nothing but supportive, but I admit that this is really hard for me. I’ve tried to start using “her” instead of “him,” but I mess up a lot, and when I do it in front of my child, she gets mad.

Do you have any advice for this complicated situation?

Conflicted Mom

It doesn’t sound like you need advice, CM, because you’re doing everything right to the best of your ability. You thought you had a gay son and you let him know that you’ll accept him no matter what. Now you’ve learned you actually have a trans daughter, and you maintain your support. But that doesn’t mean it’s as simple as saying “she” now.

The fact is we live in a very gendered world. When you meet someone new, their gender is probably the very first thing you notice about them, and it's so ingrained we don't even think about it. When someone you know transitions, it can cause some conflicted feelings, but it doesn’t mean you love them any less.

I remember back when I was teaching at the Harvey Milk High School in New York, I had a fabulous, effeminate male student who had the quickest and sassiest wit I’ve ever encountered. I loved having him in my class. Then one day he came in with a wig, a new name, and a new gender identity. While this new girl in my class was no less fabulous or witty, I found I missed the boy she had been. I still loved having her in class, of course, and over time her new gender became as normal to me as her first. But it did take some getting used to.

It’s okay to miss the boy your daughter once was - although you should keep that to yourself for now. Give yourself some time. Let your daughter know that you’re not perfect and you might slip every now and then with a pronoun, but you have her back and completely support her. The thing for her to remember is that you still love and accept her as much as you always did, and in time it will become the norm for both of you.

Man, these were some heavy topics. Let’s talk about lube!

Okay so recently I was trying out Amazon hour service and since I was spending a lazy afternoon with my new paramour, we decided to order lube. The first thing on the Amazon search for lube was "jizz". It was advertised as "musky" and jizz-scented, which I found hard to believe. Lo and behold an hour later I was the proud owner of a bottle of lube that LITERALLY looks feels and smells like jizz. It is so unappealing. Is this a thing???

Every now and then a personal friend will ask me something in the context of my job as an advice columnist. I woke up a few days ago and found this in my Facebook inbox. It was sent by my friend, J, with whom I’ve spent many drunken nights, and I can always count on her to brighten any morning. And really, I mean, if you can’t ask your friends about jizz-scented lube, what is this world coming to?

So, here’s the thing. Since jizz is a frequent byproduct of sexy time, people have attached a lot of meaning to it, and for some people, the substance itself turns them on. Since the real thing is in limited supply - and often signifies the end of a romp, rather than the beginning or the middle - the crafty folks at Master Series created a synthetic stand-in that also doubles as actual lube. Everybody wins! I mean, if you’re into that.

Remember in Jurassic Park when Jeff Goldblum schools Richard Attenborough like a boss and says, “Your scientists were so preoccupied with whether or not they could that they didn't stop to think if they should?”

That’s sort of like Amazon Hour Delivery, J. Just because you can get something in an hour doesn’t mean that you should. Sure, today you got jizz-scented lube, but I don’t want to hear you complaining next week when velociraptors are chasing your ass down Seventh Avenue.

More of the column formerly known as ASK JT! here.

To ask Tim a question, email him at askoleary@gmail.com (and try to keep it to three paragraphs or less). Or you can be super tech-sexy and ask via Twitter.