General Chat

before i put it here ,please can i have honest opinions and not a free for all.ta.

mate at works sister has met a guy from the internet.her family are fuming.as i listened to all peeps views on this i thought .well im not sure where i sit here.yes it can be dangerous .but she has met him and she had spoke many times on the phone to him .so they had built up a frienship.
on the other hand ya never know do ya ..........ive listened to thi all week and held back .what do you guys think ...pros and cons .etc.xxx

I know people who are in steady relationships with people they met on the internet including marriage and children. However, they met a few dodgy characters on the way.

If she met a stranger on a night out at a pub would they feel the same ?

As long as shes sensible and builds a relationship slowly, there are no more risks than starting out on any relationship.

hey girls were doing well two sensible answers.lol

yes you did my little cherry picker .xxx

also theres the safety factor of a screen being between ya .at least to start with .the family are well angry ,and have said hes not welcome etc etc .so my mates kinda stuck in the middle .thats why i asked.

I do know people who are going out with guys they met online. But I can understand this girl's family's reaction. I think I must just be getting old :(

You can meet good and bad people anywhere, any way.

My No.1 and I have been together 10 years now. We met when he answered a "personal" of mine that had been on the net a while. I was tired of answering the messages I got from people I wasn't interested in, so I kind of gave him the brush off, with a message back saying he should give me his opinion about "x".

That was Friday end of day, and he had left the office. Monday morning, I had 8 messages telling me his opinion about "x", a bit at a time.

He came to my town for a weekend and stayed with me. We got on like - what gets along well? We did. ;) He came up for a week. Then I went there, and dragged him along to my sister's to meet her and her partner and my mum and my brothers, or whoever was there that weekend, and eat what was in her fridge.

We started in late March, and by the end of the year he moved here. By then I'd met his parents, and they liked me, and mine liked him, and even my obnoxious brothers apparently liked him.

So -- would you meet somebody in a bar and marry him six months later without ever introducing him to family and friends? Course not!

That's the big thing about meeting on line. It has to get real, real soon.

Your friend's daughter has met her new beau, and talked to him on the phone. Has he met her parents? Has she met his? Have they met each others' friends?

No point in the parents fuming if they haven't even met him!

The parents probably do need to be reassured, because if they're of an older generation, they've heard the horror stories but don't have any experience of their own to compare them with. I had to reassure my mum constantly that I'm not a nitwit, and I am very very choosy, and if I got together in real life with someone I'd met on the net it was because I'd made very sure of the person first.

Now, young people may not be quite that careful, or have quite the understanding of how not everybody is what they seem. There are people using the net to find victims. Just as there are in the bars of the world, of course.

If your friend's daugher's new friend hasn't met her family and friends, it's time he did. And time she met his. In fact, although I couldn't do the family part because my parents were in another town, I *always* arranged for a meeting with friends on the other few occasions when I got together with someone by way of the net. Otherwise it's fantasy world, not real world.

And ... I was well over 40 when this was going on. Still took No.1 home to mummy and daddy as soon as I could!

Oh, you wanted advice.

I would suggest that your friend ask her daughter to invite him over for a casual visit. If he balks, there's a problem. If they meet him and don't like him, he's just like any other boyfriend they don't like. If he's 20 years older, or an obvious alcoholic, or unemployed and not bothered, or any of the usual danger signs, then they can talk.

If you feel like being mouthy, and haven't heard any reason for them fuming apart from this being a net thing, suggest they take a deep breath and stop being silly. ;)

im gonna copy this for my mate .its her sister not daughter .and she feels caught between .ive sat on the fence on this .dont know enough about it .but shes spoke on phone ,speaks everyday .shes on his facebook and has spoke to his sisters .so i think she could be safe .maybe if she took someone with her ...i dunno.xx

Not sure......first off I would say...Hmmmm!....does he live nearby so that they can build a 'normal' relationship?;......tis iffy butty and a worry....but you never know.....it may last.....personally..being sceptical....not for too long though.

edited -- oops, I was confused, the person who has started this relationship *has* met the new man, but nobody in her family has?

Just a general idea - how old is she?

not sure of distance .....and janey shes 27 lolol

At the moment I would say that it is exciting for her to be doing something with her life as apposed to just waiting for it all to happen.

I am not sure that she will be happy or make a lasting relationship, however she is old enough to realise that the internet is a dodgy place to meet anyone let alone a life time partner, and should take all the necessary precautions to ensure her safety before letting her heart rule her head.

I know a young fellow who met his wife on the internet and all is wonderful. I know of a young fellow and he had a very disastrous experience that cost him all his savings and his pride. My daughter married the fellow she went to school with and knew for 5 years before they married and had a family - and he took off when the responsibilities got too much for him. My next door neighbours married after 6 months of knowing each other - have bought a house together and have a brand new baby daughter. It's obvious to all they dearly love each other. You take the chance - if we never opened ourselves to love then we'd all be sad lonely people.

Sue xx

hmmmmm........lots of good points here.i think if she takes the right precautions .she should be ok.but it seems theres no stigma like there used to be .i think thats whats bothered her parents .keeping safe is the right way .then see what happens .thanks for all your input.lots of food for thought.xxx

I don't know a lot of other people who've met on line.

I met someone on line who had met his partner on line!

When No.1 and I travelled to Florida a few years ago to help my mum deal with my dad's stuff, after he died, we stayed with people on the drive down from Canada that I knew from on line. They were all great people. Just like us. ;)

So this man was about our age - somewhere in the 40s. His new partner, whose ex was a deadbeat dad, had a 12-yr-old son with quite obvious ADHD, who came to dinner with us. My friend had fallen for the boy's mother on an atheist discussion board, she moved from another state to be with him, and he took on parenting the boy like he was his own.

Not everybody on the net is nice, but nice people are on the net!

Oh, and it turned out that No.1's good buddy the bartender was married to the best friend and next-door neighbour of a woman I had become friends with on the internet just a while before I met No.1.

(how many degrees of separation is that ...?)

So the first weekend I visited him, we met up with all of them too!

Most people in the world are ordinary. ;)

I see nothing wrong with how a couple meet - but if there is a great distance between them, they need to be very careful and make sure they visit and get to know each other's family and friends before they make any rash decisions.

I wasn't really prepared for this to-day, as our morning's news had the story of a priest who formed a cyber relationship with a 13y.o. girl and arranged a meeting for the purpose of having sex - only the girl was an undercover police officer. This type of thing is what you do have be aware of.

I hope all goes well for you Ann but I am still a pesamist I am afraid....enjoy the time for what it is and be careful, don't let your heart rule your head. You may be one of those it works out for...but for a lifetime?...this I am not so sure of!......Sometime even in a few years....the rosy glow may fade and a person could see for themselves what others saw in the beginning......I could of course be wrong.....so just take life with a pinch of salt but don't let the salt deter you from reality :-) ( just make sure you have more in common than GR and family History...tis not enough to converse on for a lifetime)

Sheesh Janey!....why are your stories so complicated and intriguing?...You really must write a book.

thanks Susan - we have decided it's a case of no pressure, enjoy each other's company, nothing more at the moment

well i just spoke to her and sent her copy.i said my bit which was.............as long as she keeps safe.she should be ok.and her family need to let things take there course.so lets hope all goes well.have really enjoyed the coments.thanks guys you done me proud.xxxxx

The for side

A very good friend of mine met a lady on a chat site, they talked for ages then met. 4years ago they married and are very happy