Would you find it 'acceptable' for your DP to be messaging women on 'kink' boards?

[CoffeeAtMidnight]

I found a strange username/password to what looks like a BDSM board on my iPad's password manager a few hours ago, logged in, and found out that the account clearly belonged to DP. I'm not proud of this but I snooped through his account and, posts aside, found hundreds of PMs mainly from his 2 'subs' who has him listed as their 'master' on their profiles. Almost all of these messages were sexual and quite a few contained explicit pictures too. From what I've read, they have no intention of meeting IRL and he's never even seen one of their faces. I know it's just online so it falls in the realm of fantasy but it still feels like cheating.

Nope. He'd be gone by lunchtime for me.

Well, it is cheating.

These are real women. He has gone online for the purpose of messaging and sharing sexual pics and details. It is cheating. You are probably minimising it and justifying it in your head as fantasy because you are in shock. He will try every tactic in the book if you confront him, and he will lie and manipulate you until your head is spinning even more. Screen shot, tell him you need space and he needs to leave and tell people in real life. In time you will see that this is cheating and a gross betrayal of your love and trust

Why don't you reframe your question to: how do I feel about my partner sending explicit sexual messages to other women?

Take out the BDSM aspect, take out what we think about it, take out any loaded phrases like cheating, take out your previous experience with your ex.

How do you feel about your partner sending sexually explicit messages to other women?

Then act accordingly.

Is he paying them?

Eugh, regardless. Red card offence.

Why don't you reframe your question to: how do I feel about my partner sending explicit sexual messages to other women?
Take out the BDSM aspect, take out what we think about it, take out any loaded phrases like cheating, take out your previous experience with your ex.

How do you feel about your partner sending sexually explicit messages to other women?

Then act accordingly.
This is great advice. It's not about BDSM or kink. What matters is how OP feels about her partner sending explicit messages to other women behind her back.

@CoffeeAtMidnight

I'd find it about as 'acceptable' as I would find my H going out naked except for a dirty raincoat and flashing his dick at the neighbours !!

Neither would be 'cheating' technically, because he'd not 'touched' anyone !

Fantasy = things that only happen in your head
Cheating = secret, sexual interactions with others.

So um...it's cheating. If you want to split hairs about whether this is better or worse than your past experience of being cheated on because it's a temporary comfort then ok. But it's cheating.

Fuck no. That’s appalling and is IS cheating.

Absolutely, 100%, he is a cheater. And at the risk of attracting a wave of 'it's just fantasy' - d/s is gross. It shows his real values - he doesn't want an equal partner who gets to say no to him, and the women get groomed into thinking it's liberated & empowering. It isn't. When I caught my ex doing similar (in his case keeping very young 'sugar babies') he was out on his ear, end of marriage, deal breaker.

You didn't cause this and none of it is your fault.

The fact that you have to question if this is acceptable or not is very sad, OP

It’s certainly not acceptable and you should not have to put up with it.

Mahatma your situation in terms of housing, children etc if you leave?

Err fantasy is in a persons imagination. Anything more is cheating. How on earth can you not see that? He is directly interacting with another human (in this case two) in a sexual way, of course it is cheating.