Dating terms etc

[ruby sparks]

So this is a thread to offer examples of and discuss the various terms and phrases that are used (or that you use) in relation to dating, romance, sex, physical intimacy and so on.


I'll offer 'making out'. This is not typically or traditionally used here in the UK very often, in my experience, though it is commonly heard on US tv programmes etc.

What does it entail, or what sort of things can it entail, depending on usage?

I hear it as 'heavy petting', including 'snogging', but typically not going as far as sexual intercourse. Possibly (but not necessarily) including rubbing of body parts, but typically with clothes on (ie rubbing through clothes).



Other possibles might be 'seeing'. When I was at school, if you had a girlfriend, you wouldn't say 'girlfriend' you'd say you were seeing her.

'Slept with someone' is arguably interesting too, as it does not describe the thing being mainly referred to, which was hopefully done while awake.

Other terms and discussions about them are welcome.

 

[DrZoidberg]

I'm going with that this isn't just for countries but also regional. It's also different depending on class. Fancy people have a more subtle language for it. I somehow doubt rich people "snog".

 

[Tigers!]

In Australia foreplay for some males is "Are you doing anything right now?"

 

[TSwizzle]

In Australia foreplay for some males is "Are you doing anything right now?"

Also, "Brace yerself Sheila !".

That old joke cracks me up.

 

[ideologyhunter]

friends with benefits, tricking, hood rinse, bonemance,
bang and boot, cat call, workie, charity dip,
bang and bolt, waccident, hit & run, knock off a slice,
booty tang tang, raw dog, dip the wick

 

[Toni]

So this is a thread to offer examples of and discuss the various terms and phrases that are used (or that you use) in relation to dating, romance, sex, physical intimacy and so on.


I'll offer 'making out'. This is not typically or traditionally used here in the UK very often, in my experience, though it is commonly heard on US tv programmes etc.

What does it entail, or what sort of things can it entail, depending on usage?

I hear it as 'heavy petting', including 'snogging', but typically not going as far as sexual intercourse. Possibly (but not necessarily) including rubbing of body parts, but typically with clothes on (ie rubbing through clothes).



Other possibles might be 'seeing'. When I was at school, if you had a girlfriend, you wouldn't say 'girlfriend' you'd say you were seeing her.

'Slept with someone' is arguably interesting too, as it does not describe the thing being mainly referred to, which was hopefully done while awake.

Other terms and discussions about them are welcome.

In the olden days when I was in high school, making out meant prolonged kissing (first base for those of you who enjoy sports metaphors) vs a quick peck on the cheek or lips, and perhaps, if you were going steady, it might include some petting (i.e. touching of breasts (second base) and/or genitals (third base). Intercourse, of course, was a home run.

In those days, nice girls only engaged in the petting and/or sexual intercourse stuff if they were 'seriously dating' someone, as in going steady (monogamous) and quite often, there was a ring involved: a promise ring might include a tiny diamond and then there was some other 'level' of ring that was all before an engagement ring. I wasn't really into jewelry so I never paid attention to that sort of thing but among a certain set of girls, it was quite the thing.

Of course, in those days, dating meant going to the movies and grabbing a burger or pizza or playing miniature golf or bowling, etc. From what I can tell nowadays, dating among the pre-geriatric means having sexual intercourse and may do as well for the geriatrics. Dinner, movies, and other non-sex related activities are not necessarily included in 'dating.' And actually were not by the time I was a poor college student. At least among college students although as far as conversations with our parents were concerned, dating meant pizza and maybe a movie or miniature golf or bowling.....

 

[TSwizzle]

Other possibles might be 'seeing'. When I was at school, if you had a girlfriend, you wouldn't say 'girlfriend' you'd say you were seeing her.

When I was at school the term was "going about with".

 

[ruby sparks]

In southern Ireland they say 'shifting' instead of 'making out with'.

As in, "did you shift that woman you met in the bar last night?"

 

[TSwizzle]

As kids/adolescents we used the term "bag off with" instead of "shifting". As in "The girl I was talking to at the club, I bagged off with her at the end of the night."

At the club, when the lights went down for closing time and the last couple of songs were slow, that was when you would try to get a "bag off" with someone.

Ugh, totally cringing.

 

[Derec]

So this is a thread to offer examples of and discuss the various terms and phrases that are used (or that you use) in relation to dating, romance, sex, physical intimacy and so on.


I'll offer 'making out'. This is not typically or traditionally used here in the UK very often, in my experience, though it is commonly heard on US tv programmes etc.

What does it entail, or what sort of things can it entail, depending on usage?

Being from Northern Ireland, you may not be familiar with baseball and the analogy of bases.



Although maybe being British and all, you have a cricket version. "Second wicket" instead of "second base" or something.

I hear it as 'heavy petting', including 'snogging', but typically not going as far as sexual intercourse. Possibly (but not necessarily) including rubbing of body parts, but typically with clothes on (ie rubbing through clothes).

Snogging?

Other possibles might be 'seeing'. When I was at school, if you had a girlfriend, you wouldn't say 'girlfriend' you'd say you were seeing her.

One I've been hearing lately is "talking". As in "X is talking to Y". Weird.

'Slept with someone' is arguably interesting too, as it does not describe the thing being mainly referred to, which was hopefully done while awake.

Yeah, that's a weird euphemism too.

 

[ruby sparks]

Although maybe being British and all, you have a cricket version. "Second wicket" instead of "second base" or something.

The UK & Ireland being so flooded by US culture via tv etc during my lifetime, the 'bases' thing did get some usage, but only in very vague terms, and it wouldn't have been used very much. I don't think there was ever any agreement about what each base meant. There may be cricketing equivalents (I bet there are) but I don't know them.

Another set of terms that was used (instead of bases) was 'upstairs outside' (squeezing a breast through a blouse), 'upstairs inside' (similar but involved you putting you hand up inside the blouse and bra), 'downstairs outside' (rubbing the crotch through her jeans) and 'downstairs inside' (involved shoving your hand down the front of her jeans). These terms would have been used by 14-year olds snogging in the bike sheds outside the school disco. Actual sex was not an option and neither party would probably have ever had it, at that stage.