Robot Hearts: Kissing And Telling The Internet May Have Adverse Effects on Your Love Life (Turns Out)

Jack’s reputation as a womanizing jerk has finally caught up with him, and a girl has called him out via Robot Hearts! Ahh, the internet! Let the dissension begin!

December 16, 2008; 8:54 AM • by Jack Lauterback

In this issue, Jack and Susan get mistaken for a “team,” and everyone calls everyone else names. Do you want to cause the next uproar? Email your problems to robothearts@rvanews.com!

Question #1

Hey Robot Losers, I have an interesting query for you concerning something that my friend “Gina” went through the other night.

“Gina” met a handsome young man at a bar. He was tall with dark, possibly frozen-in-place hair, and he was sort of a jerk at first. The young man bought Gina a shot and a drink and they began hanging out. Gina and the young man hit it off and they exchanged numbers and even shared a nice, not too open-mouth, not too closed, goodnight kiss. Gina was somewhat smitten.

They exchanged texts throughout the week and made a plan to meet the following weekend for drinks. Before that happened Gina was discussing the upcoming date with a group of friends and upon mentioning his name, we’ll call him “Jake”, one of Gina’s friends informed her that “Jake” is a notorious slutbot and even chronicles his sexual experiences in his public journal. Gina was bummed because she likes this Jake character and it dismayed her to hear that he was not in fact, the potential good guy she was hoping for. Gina likes sex, but she doesn’t want some fling where that’s all that is involved or something where she is one of 15 other concurrent flings. What would the Robot Hearts team do in this situation??

–Hot Girl With A Heart Of Gold in Downtown Richmond.

Jack: Okay okay, so I received this email from a girl in my personal inbox and yes I am the “Jake” in question. I’m fairly sure that she expected a cute, private response, but unlucky for “Gina” my email is public domain (as I’ve proven on my blog many times) and a question this juicy must be answered. Of course I asked her permission first.

First off, my knee jerk reaction would be to say that rumors, or “my friend said this..” is NEVER reliable, EVER. This situation is different though, because there is a, ummm, public web log that sort of chronicles some of this dude’s sexual experimentation and could possibly identify Jack, I mean “Jake” as a “slutbot”. So, of course you have valid reasons to be skeptical and even turned off by all this. I would encourage you or any other female in a similar situation (and I don’t mean a situation with me for Christ’s sake!), to keep an open mind. Unless this young, did you say handsome?, gentleman has proven to be a jerk to you personally, I think you give him a chance. Tell him that you know about his past or present affairs, and that you’re not to enthused by it…But, you will have a drink and see if he’s not actually a decent human being.

I know this “Q + A” sounds like a public endorsement of why women should date Jack Lauterback, but think about this; How many times have you heard that you shouldn’t date someone (guy or girl) because they have a sordid past or because they slept with someone dirty? Everyone has heard this. My answer is, fuck the past and fuck what you heard. Most STD’s are curable, or they only flare up sporadically. No risk, no reward Gina.

Susan, I’m interested to hear your opinion on this, but I can already guess what it will be: “Ewww, find a good guy who will take you to the Brio Tuscan Grille and open doors for you, and who wants to wait until date 36 to have sex, blah blah.”

Susan: Aw, Jack, I am touched, because I’m fairly certain this is actually you secretly asking me for advice on how to lift yourself out of the nasty little cesspool in which you unapologetically flounder. Well, tough. You made that bed, then unmade it, then sullied the sheets, and then told the world all about it, so you have to lie in it. Not that I’m a prude. I’m sure a lot of 25 year old bartenders have similar lifestyles, and good luck to them, but sooner or later, my spiky-haired friend, these situations will arise. I mean, am I right? I’d say something like “Do you really want your kid fifteen years from now to stumble upon your website and realize his dad was a huge douche?” but it seems like, at the rate you’re going, you won’t really have kids. At least not any that will be surprised to learn that Dad is a deadbeat.

But seriously, Gina, I have this to say: Jack is actually a surprisingly decent guy in real life, whether he wants the world to know that or not. Unfortunately, though, while that makes him a lovely fellow to have around when you are drinking a beer and trading insults, are you OK with having your intimate details relayed to the world via the Internet? No? Would you like to start from the beginning of today’s column?

Jack: Susan, Susan, Susan… Once again I have to explain a question to you. Yes this email was written to me by a girl and yes, I would love to take her out, share two 13 dollar bottles of Pinot Noir and then proceed to end the first date awkwardly dry humping in the front seat of my Altima, but I’m trying to look at the big picture here and not my sordid personal affairs. The real question is:

Can a person’s past transgressions, bad reputation and current lifestyle be overlooked in the name of love? And the answer is yes.

Just forget about my blog for a minute. Whether “Gina’s” friends heard I was a bad guy through word of mouth or they read about it on my blog (and then misinterpreted my writing) is irrelevant. I know many guys and girls who have weathered rumors and bad reps, and guess what? Even though they may or may not have been tag-teamed by an entire fraternity in college, they still just want to be loved.

Plus, any girl that is worried about what her kids will think about their father, 15 effing years from now (!), should not be in the market for an awesome guy like myself. They should instead be searching for an apartment that will house their soon to be large collection of cats. In fact I will henceforth refer to you as “Susan the Old Cat Lady”. Robot Hearts featuring Jack the Blogging Bartender and Susan, the Old Smelly Cat Lady. Hmmm. That’s gold right there.

Susan: I can’t believe I sort of called you a good guy and you come back with Old Smelly Cat Lady. I think someone is a little defensive! Look, I’m in favor of looking over “past transgressions,” – we’ve all done stupid things that we’d like to take back. If that’s the question you’re actually putting out there, then sure. Overlook them. But your specific situation is different. You seem to relish those stupid things instead of learning from them. “Bad reputation” and “current lifestyle” in your case are indicative of personal traits that I can’t in good conscience recommend to a lady who wants to do anything more than dry hump in an Altima.

And let me make it clear AGAIN, because your gel must have gotten in your eyes when you read my first comment, it’s not your sexual exploits that bother me, it’s the way you clearly feel about women. May I remind the reading public that this guy who just wants to be loved advised a poor soul not long ago to hit some “practice holes.” Drink, have fun, sex it up, sure, but slagging women publicly who you were probably pretty quick to compliment the night before just encourages aspiring Jacks to treat them the same way. Yes, it’s funny to read your advice to other people (and hopefully the public knows not to take it seriously), but I think it is well within my rights to encourage this poor soul to read your blog and go with her gut. Hopefully that gut will tell her “Run far away” and not “Maybe I can change him!!” And I also think it’s well within my rights to encourage YOU to use this email as motivation to clean up your act. Or at least quit telling everybody about it. Or at least use a pseudonym.

Jack: This advice column wasn’t created to provide me with a therapy session every two weeks. I know how I live and I likes how I live. We created this column to help the poor souls out there (like Gina) with their everyday dating dilemmas. Unfortunately crazy cat lady and a few sheltered readers/commenters can’t handle someone who breaks the the whole “get married ASAP” mold and instead chooses to live a more unconventional (and public) lifestyle. Although let’s save my current hedonistic, kickass way of living for a future column. In the meantime, Gina, even if I wasn’t the so-called “bad guy” in question, my advice would be to ignore your friends and give this guy (me) a chance. Your friends will always cockblock you (even the ones you trust).

Susan was right with one statement and one statement alone: Go with your gut and take what you feel is the right course of action.

Also be sure to tell your girlfriends, who I’d be willing to bet are aspiring cat-people, that my co-writer Susan hosts a bi-weekly “Cat Chat” on AM 790. It’s mostly just her and her callers discussing how cute their cats are and why they don’t need a man in their life. Seriously, it’s like the # 5 rated cat enthusiast call-in show in Central Virginia.

Susan: I do have cats.