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Study Shows Males Commonly Mistake Sexual Intent
seattle-pk writes "Males are apparently clueless when it comes to interpreting sexual intent from females, according to a recent study (PDF) from Indiana University's Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences. Men were found commonly to perceive more sexual intent in women's behavior than women were intending to convey. (A campus survey showed that 68% of college females had an experience where a male mistook signs of friendliness for affection.) However, the study also shows that men were quite likely to misperceive sexual interest as friendliness. 'Rather than seeing the world through sex-colored glasses, men seemed just to have blurry vision of sorts, overall,' according to the article. If you're a male who ever mistook the meaning of a barista's smile, looks like you're not alone."
Nothing to do with deliberate ambiguity fostered by females then.
Deleted
Oh contraire! The girls should be more clear about what they intend to do. They normally say they just wanted to be friendly and are completly taken aback, when some guy understands their cryptic signs as encuragement to get together.
We're MEN... We need CLEAR signals. We've only got enough blood to fill any one of the two organs at a time and most of the time it isn't the brain. Give us a CLEAR yes. You want us to fully comprehend then wear a damned sign - until then? Well... *shrugs*
Bah... Screw it... Until then remember that we've got too many people on the planet already.
"So long and thanks for all the fish."
Or, if you are a true alpha male, the error's boyfriend would be the one left behind in the dust. Now that's natural selection for you. Sad principle upon to build a stable, peaceful society thought, so let's raise above that ;) Me being a spindly nerd has nothing to do with this view of course.
Ambiguity is probably in women's interest. Just like ovulation being hidden from men, unusually in the animal world (which makes men compete sexually for women constantly, and not just at particular times).
Probably gives women greater power (or rather, it increases the statistical chance of the genes of a particular woman being successfully passed on, which is all natural cares about).
Azural - instrumentals
Don't forget the evolutionary advantage in "mis-communicating" by the females. More or less, guys who like you do stuff for you. You can sleep with whoever you want (eg, the alpha male) and the other guys (beta males) will still bust a nut trying to score by being nice / doing your bidding. Sending misleading signals is absolutely full of win for the girls (until you meet a psycho).
Forget thrust, drag, lift and weight. Airplanes fly because of money.
... and men are simple beigns. It doesn't matter if the woman sends any signals. If she's pretty and witty he's intersted. If she's ugly and witty he ONLY wants to be her friend. If she's ugly and stupid he doesn't know her.
I love HTML. Let's try that again.
Wow, that's the most stupid piece of research I ever saw. Not only are they generalizing from a bunch of 20 year olds to "all guys", but the scientific measurement involves trying to derive clues from static photos. Given how much body language is related to motion, timing and so on I'm not really surprised that they found it hard. I'd be interested to know how strong this guys < girls finding really is. Also, if the results change when the photos are replaced with short films ... or even actors :)
I know of a case back home where a known whore bag went home with 2 guys to have lots of drunken sex, bragged about it to everyone and when it was ill received the story turned into rape.
If you mod me down, I will become more powerful than you can imagine....
... that women are useless at communicating non-verbally with men, as they persist in using signals that are in fact only understood by women.
(Just like women dress up and put on makeup to impress each other, not to communicate with men.)
Hey girls, if you want to tell a man something you need to use a language he can understand, not some incomprehensible private girlie language!
Wait . . .
Are you saying that the cute bartender, the one who laughs at all my horrible jokes and cleans up after me after I get really drunk and spill my beer everywhere, the one that I constantly tip very well . . . are you trying to tell me that she might not actually be into me?
The Internet is generally stupid
An interesting follow up would be to look at men and womens abilities to communicate their emotional states to others of the same sex, and also broaden the range of "intents" studied towards the opposite sex.
Also look at if the sexual orientation of the "recipient" has any effect.
There is a known condition, Asberger's syndrome, which identifies people who are bad at understanding non verbal communication. (Which is also more commonly identified in men than women). Might there also be a condition of people being poor at expressing themselves non verbally. Effective communication does require mutual understanding. Of course there will always be people who deliberatly lie and mislead (who most likely have to be amongst the best communications in the human race to do this sucessfully).
Also, how about looking into this across cultures?
When people from different cultures are communicating they may be extra careful to avoid ambiguity. Even if they were to share the same verbal language they may well assume that they have a different non-verbal language and compensate accordingly. Of course you can't test this using just photographs or videos since there is no mutual dialogue involved.
Street wisdom: Ugly girls wants nice boys. Pretty girls want rich boys.
;p
Those in the middle swing both ways. This is also called "land of possibilities"
Maybe women are a lot more self involved and are a little more full of themselves? Nah they wouldn't say that, then they wouldn't get laid!
Posting AC for obvious reasons, I'd just like to say that you're more right than you may even know here. The only correction I might make is in your phrasing when you say that a woman is "trying" to convey something, since, in my experience, it's frequently quite involuntary. It's also not necessarily a direct proferring of sex, but a way of fitting into a role that looks vulnerable and inspires a hopefully sympathetic reaction. I had a jarring experience with my own evolutionary throwback a year or two ago in Japan. I was alone in Japan for a little over a week, not knowing much Japanese, but trying to be independent as possible anyway. Each time I had to communicate with people (hostel clerks, train station receptionists, etc.), male or female, I could feel my eyes involuntarily became wider, my lower lip protrude, my brow knit in an innocently perplexed manner. It went entirely against my usual modus operandi of being strong and solitary, but as soon as I needed someone's help, really needed it just to get by, here was this automatic mechanism to make me look younger and more harmless and, frankly, dumber and in greater need than I may really have been. And it worked. Damn near every time I asked for help in an uncertain, wavery manner, people treated me more kindly and patiently than they usually do ever. I suppose I could have felt empowered by this, but I was mostly balking at my sudden inability to control what the hell my face did, and feeling guilty for manipulating people, even if it was harmless and I didn't mean to.
I don't doubt that there are women who know exactly what they're doing when they pout at you, but you might be surprised by how many more don't
Okay let me try. Situation, and how the communication works.
Situation 1: There's a real interest in a friendship, although there is no kind of physical attraction. The other person seems genuinely fun to be around
Female: Smiles at him, looks straight into his eyes so that he knows that she is not at all afraid of scaring him off and is therefore NOT looking for a serious relationship. However, she picks up conversation to learn about his interests to be able to propose things they can do together for fun.
Male: Asks "Wanna get drunk and play Smash Bros?"
Situation 2: There's a strong physical attraction and interest in pursuing a serious relationship.
Female: Gazes deeply into his eyes to give the impression that she is lost in him. This will provide an excellent "how-we-met" story for their kids. She tries to act interested in his interests because she wants to also be interesting to him.
Male: Asks "Wanna get drunk and play Smash Bros?" with an ulterior motive.
In conclusion, we're all idiots.
It pays biologically for men to err on the side of trying to get laid, for women it's better to err on the side of caution.
"If any question why we died, Tell them because our fathers lied."
FORM: Family, Occupation, Recreation, Money. When ladies talk to you they are only trying to assess your worth. Wealth of an individual can sometimes change with time and circumstance. So ladies put those they believe might become wealthy in the "friends" category, if they do become wealthy they simply pretend they were interested all along.
No. The message should definitely be to women, "Be more clear about your intentions." Because even if men are naturally oblivious, we're not going to become any more insightful, but women can change their behavior. So women, if you don't want to send a message that your interested, quit flirting. If you are interested, go ahead and be forward.
Nonono. When she's pretty and witty, he wants to fuck her and go steady. When she is ugly and witty, he wants to fuck her and stay her friend. When she is ugly and stupid, he wants to fuck her and then move on. Unless she gives good head.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Perhaps you have not met an "ugly", extrovert, witty girl who happens to be equipped with biologically optimal assets (fat in the right places, the correct bone structure, intelligent, happy, healthy) before?
If she has all that,he's not ugly.
Duh.
If she didn't have that much money, she'd still get laid VERY easily. Many guys out there think she's pretty hot looking. And from the sex tapes...she seems to know what she's doing.
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
Should clear communication be the aim? There are advantages to ambiguity. There is caution and deniability, there is the benefit of getting attention without any commitment, there is avoiding the counterproductive effect of showing too much interest (it makes you less interesting).
It's also possible to draw a distinction between an ambiguous and a vague signal: an ambiguous signal can trigger an idea without actually confirming it, like "don't think of an elephant" activating the idea of the elephant in your head. With a vague signal you may not even think of an elephant. So is there value in sending vague signals? Maybe "don't think of an elephant" is often too direct so that you can only send vague signals instead.
Then there is the difference between misinterpreting a signal and hope. If men are getting hopeful based on just a friendly signal, it doesn't mean they misinterpreted the signal.
Maybe he's just modest.
Personally I've no problem whatsoever spotting a girl's interest in someone, except when the someone's me. Then I keep telling myself that I shouldn't be so presumptuous, it must be my imagination, she couldn't possibly be interested in me, etc. etc. Of course, it's a self-fulfilling prophesy, because she soon loses interest if you act like that. You pretty much have to grab me by the lapels and drag me into the bedroom, not because I don't Get It, but because I can't see the appeal.
Amen. It is so typical that the language of this seems to say the problem lies with men, but the fact is that women often flirt to gain more favorable treatment, etc., but then somehow expect men NOT to think they have a sexual intent. This makes it difficult to tell when a woman is flirting because she wants you, or flirting because she wants something FROM you.
The problem with the article was at the end of it. It stated something to the effect of "men can learn.." Ok, but what about women? Are men the only ones that needs to learn something here? Wouldn't it be better if both learned?
And how do one find this out? Now, I've had my fair share of women and more than so over the years but hearing the results from the study lead me to think about how do people learn how to interpret the other sex intentions? The answer is: we don't! Why? Because anything that tastes or smells like it is sexually related, is absent from any form of education. Until we can talk about sexuality and attraction in a decent form in schools and in media and educate young people, this will continue to be a problem. Cue the religious nutcases who get their pants in a bunch just over the thought of sex and education.
If you mod me down, I *will* introduce you to my sister!
But consider this:
Women will often flirt with a man just for attention. I've met women who simply didn't even know what they were doing was interpreted as flirting. And when I confronted them with this observation, they gave this crazymaking attitude like "I don't even know what you're talking about. I was just being friendly." Yeah, right.
Philipino women are a great example of behavior that can easily be mistaken for flirting. I've never been more confounded by any other culture. The world "no" just isn't in their immediate vocabulary.
Women from American culture can flirt just out of anger. Anyone remember that song, "I know What Boys Like" by the Waitresses? That song spelled it out loud and clear.Women were tired of feeling as if they were being oppressed by men. So they used their power against the men.
Those are just two of the reasons that I've found for the confusion on the part of the women. I know why I've been confused before: I was single. Now that I'm married, that confusion is pretty much gone. I know where I stand with my wife.
It takes two to tango. It's not just that men have blurry vision. Women have fuzzy behavior, too.
The diversity and expression of human opinion is essential to human survival.
I remember that one show from Home Improvement when Tim held up the stop sign, saying "STOP". With the other side having the female way of saying it, reading "If you really cared for me, you'd know what to do now". I found it funny because it's just plain true.
/., my hopes are still there): TELL US, in no uncertain terms, what you want. We're notoriously bad at guessing. We do care for your feelings and needs, but we don't guess them. A man is not constantly trying to find out what's wrong, the way a man works, for him everything is running fine as long as there's nobody complaining. No complaint, no change. We do subscribe to the "never change a running system" theory of thinking. Don't try to poke into a system (or relationship for that matter) without good reason. And some ambigious sigh is no good reason.
We are men. We enjoy a direct, blunt and honest way of talking. Wanna have sex? Then say so. Don't? Works for me either. But don't be surprised that we act it! What this study shows is that we can't "read" women. Ok, we can't. Big news. We're used to saying what we want, and also to being told what is expected from us. The best joke is always a woman complaining that in her relationship, they always do what he wants, be it sexually or otherwise. Guess what: He said what he wants! She was sitting there, waiting for him to guess her interests and desires.
Dear women (in case there are any on
Grab your man and tell him what you want, dammit! Be blunt. We need that.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
And the women even have a book of their own on that subject, so it's a bit hypocritical of them to complain about men "cheating"... ;)
Just one? Have you ever been to a supermarket checkout?
Not everyone approaches relationships in the same way. I was looking for a relationship that had emotional and intellectual depth, which required a very rare sort of woman. It took me nearly a decade, but now that I've found her, I can't imagine being with anyone else.
Well, I don't know about you, but I'm getting old. After a few hours of sex, I'm kinda bored with it and I want to do something else. Like, say, start some sort of communication. I mean, in a relationship I'd expect a bit of that, too. You know, for the stuff you can't tell your buddies or the things they don't care about, like your feelings. And somehow I think dear Paris isn't quite the person I'd want to have that kind of conversation with. OTOH, I don't care too much about shoes, shopping and little dogs that are more suitably cathegorized as rats, so I think the topics for discussion would be somewhat limited.
Personally, I don't find her too attractive. I'm the type of guy that looks a bit beyond looks (ok, there are limits... but generally), and behind the pretty front there's a big nothing, as far as I can tell. I'm also the type of person that wants to have a relationship that doesn't end at the edge of the bed (and no, I don't mean that I also want to fuck in the closet or on the couch).
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
No, it's only just slightly more complex:
If a woman's pretty, then he really, really wants to have sex with her but has no idea how to get from "Hi" to "Let's fuck." There's everything about timing--when's the right time to ask?
As a male gets older sometimes this gets easier, but most remain incoherent as to the little signals that a woman might learn to drop by the time she's past age 30. If the woman would just open her yap and at least say something tangible about the subject instead of hinting around and playing hide and seek with the Secret Snail, things would get a whole lot easier.
If she's ugly and intelligent and witty or slightly ditzy but not intolerably idiotic, then he'd be her friend but might get more interested if she would open up about her wild penchant for oral sex or something else that might get more than wondering looks out of the guy. Ugly women need lovin' too, and most of them have all the right equipment that guys shouldn't ignore. I don't know about other guys, but unless they're really brutally ugly, I'm still wondering what they'd be like in the sack.
If she's ugly and stupid then he doesn't want to know her.
In the time it would take to do the study, the women would change their minds 4 times making the results invalid...
Believe it or not, I would not marry her.
Hell, I would hardly be able to be in the same room with her for any length of time, especially if she actually spoke.
Ignore this signature. By order.
Hate to sound like a biological reductionist (but I am, so I do) but a lot of gender roles (be they hardwired or culturally determined, strictly speaking) boild down to the biological differences. A woman has a huge investment when she selects a sexual partner, as pregnancy is a potentially life-threatening condition (which obviously limits one's chances of reproducing one's genes.) A man on the other hand can have many sexual partners, siring many offspring with different women, with la very low investment. Thus it's in women's interest to be extremely picky about a mate, and a man's interest to seek many sexual partners. (Of course things get a bit more complex when you factor in chances of a mother successfully rearing a child on her own.)
Modern healthcare, birth-control and the social support provided by technologically advanced societies dramatically change the goalposts, whilst leaving men and women still playing the hand evolutionary biology dealt them on the savannah a couple of million years ago. I've a latent interest in (what would you call it?) paleo-anthropology - the structure of prehistoric human society basically - however it's by definition 99.99% conjecture and theorising. Which is why I say: stuff putting humans on mars, let's have a government-funded time machine programme!
The study actually just found that women are unclear about communicating their intentions to men.
For the world's women to accept such a conclusion, it would require admitting responsibility rather than just blaming men. Not gonna happen.
(Yes, I have karma to burn.)
In almost ANY communications scenario in which a message is being received but misinterpreted, it must be the job of the sender to clarify the message. The receiver does not know what is wrong, and therefore has no way to force it make sense. The sender, on the other hand, can often perceive what is wrong, and correct the sending.
It doesn't matter who you blame, the fact is that as a practical matter, nobody can clear this up but the sender of the signals. So before women go complaining that their signals are misunderstood, they should make some effort to make sure their signals are unmistakable!
When did /. turn into Redbook?
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
Funny, except we're not innocent in the whole giving off ambiguous signals thing...
Of course, we only do it because being obvious about it is considered a turnoff, or sometimes because of fear of rejection...
but how about if I was pushing 30 at the time and the clerk in question was still in high school?
;P
By 30, maybe she's hoping that's what you were after, instead of being gay?
Not all women are gold digging hoes. In my experience men do often misinterpret the signals given by women. I learned to just be clear about it. Nothing says I am interested like leaning forward enough to brush against him, whisper in his ear something, and smiling. On the other hand, flirting can be fun and its healthy for you. The main problem, as my geek partner says, is that most men are not confident enough to catch the correct signs nor do they pay enough attention to the subtleties that women put out there. So women...just be blatant and save everyone the trouble. ;p
I also think that women are sometimes seduced by their own uncertainty. It's as though, once they really decide to have sex, the whole thing becomes less interesting. It's more of a turn-on to have the question bouncing around in their own minds, "Do I *really* want this?" For women, the unknown and uncertain are more seductive than a known-good thing.
I don't have scientific evidence to back that up, nor do I have any evolutionary theory.
Let's revisit this when you hit your late 40's.
or for another answer...
Think of it as evolution in action.
The living have better things to do than to continue hating the dead.
No, I'm not. What I'm saying is that my sexual interest is not under my conscious control. Would you rather have every woman you ever slept with *fake it* out of *sympathy*?
No. The message should definitely be to women, "Be more clear about your intentions."
Thats' a great fantasy, but women and men were carved out in very different evolutionary contexts, given that a man's theoretical-gene-spreading-bandwidth is limited only by his ability to get hard and get off -- whereas a woman has one uterus, must carry the child to term, and must ensure that the child gets resources and protection. In short, the evolutionary game for men was very simple: they sought vaginas, and could more easily choose to not take responsibility for the consequences. Women needed to seek someone able and willing to protect and provide.
The modern world -- with birth control, affluence, and virtual extinction of top-predators -- has made things somewhat less asymmetrical today, but our brains are still essentially the same machines they were in deep history.
That said, it is not to a woman's advantage to be clear about their intentions. Rather, it is to their advantage to wait for that one guy in a thousand who is able to pick up on her subtlety. It's an indicator of his genetic fitness. Now you can argue that such a guy would be a skillful player and might be less likely to stick around and support the child, but consider this: if their sexual transaction was initiated in a subtle manner, it's also more likely that it can be completed in secret as well. This protects her reputation and keeps her options open to go grab one of the other 999 out of a thousand who would make a great cuckold for the genes donated by the one guy capable of subtlety.
The "cue the foo posts in 3, 2, 1..." posts will commence with no subsequent foo posts in 3, 2, 1...
I had a related thought: What about all the women who misinterpret everything guys do as being sexual, even when it's not? Or who are completely clueless about when a guy IS being sexual? I think I've seen more of these issues than I have of guys misreading girls' signals.
And remember how popular it's become to scream "SEXUAL HARASSMENT" about even the most innocent behaviours -- and notice that the "WTF? how is THAT harrassment?" meter leans WAY over into the female camp, even in situations where women have roughly equal power with men.
As the lead post in this thread said -- I'm not so sure it's male misinterpretation as often as it's fuzzy female signals, AND females who have exaggerated (either too sexual or not sexual enough) interpretations of male signals.
~REZ~ #43301. Who'd fake being me anyway?
Two folks argue,
A: I've met women who simply didn't even know what they were doing was interpreted as flirting.
B: Afraid not. You've actually met women who were really good actresses.
I've seen both. There really ARE women who flirt without realising what they're doing, just like there are guys who apply sexual pressure without really knowing they're doing it. These are biologically primitive behaviours. And both types are astonished and insulted when you call 'em on it, cuz they really had no idea.
The actresses, in my observation, are more overtly flirty, but the big difference is that they WATCH the guys for their reaction, rather than having no idea how the guy is reacting.
~REZ~ #43301. Who'd fake being me anyway?
ah the old toupee and corvette theory
Money is stability and resources for a child, at least in modern societies.
If you want to get completely evolutionary-psychological about it, women want attractive, confident and strong men as fathers for their children. And wealthy, gentle and patient men to raise them. Sometimes, they are even the same man.
By the time you're in your 40's many of your peers will have married and have families, already. Nor will those be (just) babies, they'll be into Scouts, sports, band and chorus, Odyssey of the Mind, etc. (Trying to be P.C. and hit kids' activities for everyone.) At that point if you're still single, you're disconnected from a major port of the interests of a large part of your peer group. Or to put it another way, many of the people I associate with also have families. Interestingly enough, your kids give you another way to meet more people - the parents of their friends. (They've met the kids of our friends, too.) Don't knock it till you've tried it.
There's also a secondary goal - to hit grandparenthood while I still have enough energy to really enjoy it. My wife's and my parents were really all too old for much of this. Kids can be a blast, and a lot of stress and angst. Grandparenthood offers a chance to enjoy it again, knowing that you've survived it once, and can focus more on the good parts.
The living have better things to do than to continue hating the dead.
I'm almost 40. A few years ago I got a dog, and now I can't imagine trying to raise kids. And "being a grandparent" has never even occurred to me. Its not even a blip on my radar; my radar isn't even configured to look for it. Honestly responding to your post is the first time I've ever in my life that I've given grandparenthood even this small amount of thought (though now that I'm thinking about it, its kind of intriguing). I guess I'm just wired differently than you.
I'm curious. Have you always wanted to be a grandparent, or did grandparenthood become a "secondary goal" of yours *after* you had kids? I wonder that if I were to have kids, would I also eventually want to be a grandparent, or is the "grandparent gene" something I don't have.
Women are simpler than men. If they look back or talk back, they're interested, too.
What? You think that women don't get you're interested? You think they lack this insight?
Dude - the reason you can't get women to say yes and grab your dick is because women don't say yes - they only say no.
You had them at hello. After that, YOU talked your way out of the deal. You think THEY want to talk to you if their not interested?
It's really that simple. Sorry to be the one to break the news to you - but look at it this way: now you know.
Pathological kinda promises Path + Logical - but instead, you get stuck with pathetic.
Not sure why your post was moderated insightful. Funny maybe. Slashdot it news for nerds. That's why a _scientific_ study about human behavior is interesting here. Redbook is (as I am slightly aware of it) unlikely to be publishing scientific information about human behavior. Likely they'd be publishing whatever they thought would most appeal to their readership.
Awesome furniture, accessories and cabinetry in Santa Rosa, CA: http://humanity-home.com/
I said it with a straight face because I didn't sit around any drinking campfires a few million years ago, but I have been with Egyptians, Ethopians, Thais, Chinese, Japanese and Norwegians - to name but a few - at campfires and bars in their own countries as well as here.
Flirting is very cultural, that is, the rules are centric to the governing cultures. I speak from firsthand experience.
I can't believe you're countering firsthand experience with people with YouTubes of birds doing mating dances - with a straight face.
Admit it - you're just upset because you didn't know to lick the alphabet(*), did you?
(* - RIP, Sam Kinison and thanks for the roses a buddy's wife sent when I turned him on to that bit.)
Pathological kinda promises Path + Logical - but instead, you get stuck with pathetic.
oh ok. in that case. consider me an alien. :) seeing as how you obviously cant detect one. j/k. lol
agreed. women do tend to talk sometimes for the sake of talking. in my studies towards my degree I am finding that a lot of people with socializing problems gravitate naturally towards computer interaction more so than social real world interactions. I only say this because my partner points this out in his own peers. They are simply more comfortable. I also have found that there is a high incidence of people with autism/asperger's that are more comfortable in the online world (dont take offense to this just making a point). Perhaps some of the activities they use to build social skills might help. Often signals are misread, its either a failure to be clear enough or a failure to interpret. There is no real solution except to be clear and concise in what your desires and expectations are.
I think it has a lot to do with guys being shy...especially geekier types, and once you do finally get some pussy, it is the best thing is the world and you don't want to risk giving it up, so you basically focus on the one girl, and often, do the wrong things. You cater to her every whim, do what ever you can to be nice and follow along so you don't piss her off where she might cut it off. And that is the wrong thing to do...as that she will not respect you, and then WILL often dump you.
You have to be a little aloof, and be in charge...and let it be known (although it can be unsaid) that you won't take shit off her very much, because there is plenty of others out there. If they know they have you...then you lose the game...and they don't respect you. I'm not saying you have to be an asshole...but, don't be pussywhipped... Being a little big of a jerk often is required, how many times do we see asshole guys, that are constantly getting laid by good looking chicks? I think somewhere down deep, they are a little masochistic by nature of their DNA, I don't know any other way to explain it.
I used to be the classic "good guy"...and it always failed. I became a 'friend'...and didn't get any. Or....I got stomped on by girls I did date...
I saw how friends of mine acted, that got the girl and had them following them. Once I started trying to act a bit more like that (and it was NOT in my nature)...I started having much more luck.
Don't forget...there are plenty of girls out there, and these days..MORE and more of them are willing to sleep with you than ever before at any time with the possible exception of the 60's when "the pill" hit....
So, don't get stuck on 'one' girl. Try to hit as many of them as possible...and if by chance you do want kids and family...then along the way, you will find one you want, but, don't just try for one, and settle on the first one or two that gives it to you.
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
I've got some friends that have been married and have kids, but, that doesn't keep them at home every day/night. I have one friend, that has had a standing rule since marriage, that Friday night...is his to go and do as he pleases. 99% of the time, he comes out to hang with me and other guys. He isn't ever about to cheat, but, that is his night to get out of the house. He still does this even past having kids. I have other married friends...sure, they kinda disappeared when kids first came out..but, once old enough to not need 24/7 attention..the come out to 'play' still. They also have single girls they know that I get to meet too....so, it isn't like marriage and kids have to be the 'death' of a social life.
You can't be pussywhipped when you get married...have a little backbone, and demand some time for yourself...it works, I just dunno why more men seem to lose their spine once they get hitched. Your life doesn't have to disappear.
Also...I get along with just about any age group. I don't look old, don't look my age. Maybe that has to do with not having the stress and strife of having kids...I noticed most of my friends that got married turned grey faster after marriage...and lost hair quick after the kids came....hehehe. But seriously...I make friends of people older than I...my age, and I'm always making friends with people younger than me. I think that keeps me younger at mind too. You are as old as you feel my friend.
I'm not saying your life has anything wrong with it....just that it is not something I've aspired to have. I like my free time, my expendable cash, freedom to travel, buy a motorcycle (all of this withOUT asking 'permission'), and do as I please. Everyone has to do what they like, but, life is way too short to not do what makes you feel good and makes you happy. Your route isn't for everyone...and it is not hard to keep up a single, free lifestyle in 40's and beyond if you are active, open minded to new things, and try to stay in shape and not want to 'settle' into a routine life....it takes a little work sure, but, there are payoffs, and you do not have to even come close to being lonely. I'm alone when I want to be....it is nice at times, but, it is a choice.
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
That can be and is frequently faked. Those signals and a bit higher body temperature in the extremities might mean something. Otherwise it is just "let's recruit this geek to take care of my computer" or "I want to punish this geek for being male by persuading him to listen to the romanticized story of my unhappy love life".
Personally I appreciate it when men are a little bit chivalrous and do things like holding the door open for me. I don't mean going way out of their way to get to the door and open it but holding it open and giving me a smile always brightens my day.
I hate when girls take every polite action from men as an oppressive action. They really do spoil it for the rest of us and let's face it, they're being plain rude.
Please, don't let the actions of a few girls stop you from doing what you think is polite/a nice thing to do. There really are some crazy ones out there who convince themselves they're really that important that every guy wants to take advantage of them, then there are the rest of us who take it as a friendly action and will appreciate it for what it is.
Ok, on the whole sneaky, manipulative, underhanded thing: we're all (girls) guilty of this. This is how women interact with each other as well. That doesn't make it right but I'm afraid we can't always see that we're doing it so from my whole gender: sorry. Being a CS student and surrounded by men for the majority of my days I've become a little more understanding of the difficulties I can pose when I'm not being clear but it's kinda hard to stop doing it all together.
Silly rabbit
It depends on the type of women you want to approach. My comment was about long term relationships which are based on mutual trust...a relationship that may lead to a family.
Personally, I find these relationships more satisfying than short intense erotic relationships. There is much enjoyment to be had from hand holding as well as from making love.
If you want to attract the more adventurous women, you can try to play the really daring type, the playboy, the guy with the Harley Davidson which is an easy rider, but would it be really you? women can easily understand pretenders. I prefer that women like me for what I am, even if what I am is not very exciting or adventurous...
gb2/b/
DRM: Terminator crops for your mind!
I'm curious as to why you'd abandon a decent enough practice because of one encounter with one asshole.
"All that is necessary for evil to succeed is for good men to do nothing." - Edmund Burke
It's a smidgen different if it's someone you're in a long term relationship with. But still, women like being admired, and they like being wanted. What sometimes makes this awkward is that they like these things independently of liking sex, and it can get frustrating when one's partner wants to feel desirable (and so deliberately works up some sexual tension) but isn't actually interested in sex.
Rampant carbon sequestration destroyed the Dinosaurs' tropical paradise. I'm here to help repair the damage.
Don't try to be the jerk. It's not you, and you'll screw it up in tiny ways that you'll never be able to understand. As someone who was in the same boat, I'm sure you've already experimented with being a toughguy at some point and got called out for it, and couldn't understand why, I mean these people do worse stuff all the time. No they don't, you screwed up. The ones that pull it off are that way all the way down. If you have to think about it, your mannerisms will be slightly off, your timing will be wrong, you'll say shit way out of line and just generally make a mess of things. Mostly you'll just look weird and unnatural, like some poorly wired robot trying to handle a task it was never meant for.
In order to pull it off successfully, it can't just be a mask you put on. You have to change yourself. Here's how: play. Do things just to see what happens, not to try to get the girl, or if you do do things just to get the girl don't put any emotional investment in it at all, because when it finally works it'll be a fluke and you won't even understand how it happened the first few times. Mostly it will just blow up in your face. Step one is being able to take that and be affected by it, you'll get rejected plenty of times.
Eventually you'll start to figure things out. Then you'll get real confidence. Then, depending on who you are, you might end up as the jerk. Hopefully not, it's a shitty thing to be. The thing is, you probably see a bunch of guys doing things and you think they're being a jerk, but the truth is you have no frame of reference. Maybe she deserved it. Maybe it's a game they're playing. Maybe they just had a fight. Maybe that's just the way those people are. Whatever. Don't pass judgment on other people's relationships, it's none of your business. Worry about yourself, or if you think you can do better, go rescue the girl or something.
Fact is, as a timid or inexperienced guy, a lot of perfectly normal things are going to seem "jerky" to you. Well, go out and experience it, find out for yourself, and everything that's holding you back will just melt away, but you can't get where you want to be just traveling to it in a straight line.
<xml><I><am><so><damn>Web 2.0</damn></so></am></I></xml>
There are ups and downs to hitting as many as possible.
Back in november, my wife of 6 years and I seperated. I was in school and decided that I was in fact going to hit as many as possible. Before being married I was quite unshy, unless it came to intimacy, then for some reason I'd clam up. After, mainly because I had no intention of caring for anyone or commiting or any of that type of thing, I was significantly less shy. Not to brag but I was quite sucessful and within a month or two I went from being the hunter to the prey. I'm not going to say I was a jerk as I was rather straightforward with all the women I've encountered since then.
The real problem came when I started meeting women that I actually cared about a bit, or started having feelings for me while I was seeing others. Sometimes it was a no-brainer when it came to shedding someone or letting them know that my feelings hadn't changed and that they had to deal with that. Sometimes it made for some really serious decisions and some sleepless nights when I had to decide between two women with great qualities. I've also very recently been seeing this one girl with a developping seriousness, and another girl that had really captivated me but until recently had been unavailable told me that she was now single and shared these feelings for me. This has made for a really really tough situation for me.
The point I'm trying to make here is that there's no one formula for happiness with the opposite sex. Real feelings for someone have to develop and both parties have to have the same interest in one another. To be someone you're not to get a girl might work for a night or two but if you're looking for something fulfilling and rewarding, acting like someone you're not will not work. It's simple as to why...you can only keep a charade up for so long.
Howe due yoo keap uh gramur natsee bizzy four ours?
It's not a game, it's war. War between the sexes which has been going on since sexual reproduction began. Neither side ever gets the upper hand. In regard to the human species I happen to think the battle has been pretty even for at least the last several millennia (contrary to what feminists will tell you).
Now human females are particularly good on picking up and putting out subtle communication clues. That's one of their superior weapons and they are unlikely to give it up.
Of course, you can choose to step outside the 'game', which can be a noble calling. But then of course, you're no longer a player. And as you mentioned a wife it doesn't sound like you've made this choice.
(The following is entirely IMO, and backed purely upon several years of marriage and observation)
The problem is that in order for this to happen, society and women in general need to audit each other's behavior to the point where abberant, malign, or ambiguous behavior simply is't tolerated. Given what I do understand about how women work amongst each other, they're more likely to simply let one another screw up than help or intercede thanks to a very agresssive competitive instinct.
From what I've seen, it's actually worth a girl's time to let her peers fail at dating, then spend any effort ensuring that everyone has a fair shot. This is due to the fact that while it's easy for a woman to get a guy, it's considerably harder to find and *keep* one that's actually worth keeping. So there's a percieved scarcity that undercuts most efforts at cooperation, when it comes to dating and mating.
The biggest problem, as I see it, is that there are several rulebooks with conflicting rules at work: social, religious, sub-cultural and instinctive biases all come into play at varying degrees from person to person. The "feminism vs traditional social mores" is just the tip of the iceberg here - try dating a rebelling goth who was raised Catholic, or a born-again christian from a single-parent family. So you never know what someone's particular bias twoard sex, sexuality, dating, romance and commitment is going to be (kind of like DnD character sheets I guess) until you get to know them.
Of course, you can choose to step outside the 'game', which can be a noble calling. But then of course, you're no longer a player. And as you mentioned a wife it doesn't sound like you've made this choice.
Marriage doesn't mean you have to play.
- She say, "...but I wanted..." I say, "Well, you should have told me so." When she tells me what she wants, she gets it.
- She acts like she wants to, but then falls asleep or manipulates the situation so that the act is impossible to carry out. The next time she acts like she wants to, I ignore her. She gets upset. I remind her how she feel asleep or called friends over at the last minute the last time.
The bullshit only continues because men let it.
Aah, change is good. -- Rafiki
Yeah, but it ain't easy. -- Simba
Have a spine and don't take crap off of them. Either they'll treat you like a human being, or they'll ditch you for someone they can bully. In the latter case, the pussy isn't worth living like that anyway.
Yep, my wife complains about the same thing in regards to other women. She says that's why she doesn't have very many female friends. She used to work as a legal secretary, and has all kinds of horror stories about the "bitches" she used to work with in law offices, and all the sneaky, underhanded things they did to each other. And that's just the other secretaries, who were underlings; she has even worse things to say about the attorneys, most especially the female attorneys.
She's now in school as a helicopter pilot, and she's much happier. According to her, everyone is so much more direct with everything, including the other female students and instructors. So, again according to her, it seems that females in general tend to use very sneaky, underhanded tactics in getting things they want (which is really very evil if you think about it), but this doesn't apply to all women of course, and that the worst ones seem to gravitate towards certain professions (like law), and the best ones gravitate towards other professions (like pilots, engineering, science, etc.). Incidentally, she's also been very happy with the lesbian females she's had to work with, saying they tend to act a lot more like men, being very direct in their communications.
It sounds to me like women for some reason aren't given any instruction on how to treat people when they're little girls, and develop some really horrible habits. For us boys, many of us did things like Boy Scouts, where we learned good morals and how to behave properly. Girls don't seem to have such a thing; Girl Scouts exists, but it's pretty lame compared to Boy Scouts, and not many girls go into it compare to Boy Scouts. Instead, parents seem happy to just let them grow up and develop without any real structure in their lives aside from attending school, so they spend all their spare time watching TV or having sleep-overs at their friends, until they're old enough to go to college and major in MRS.
I still hold open doors though. Because, fuck her. I'm not going to let her malignant attitude affect me. Perhaps she should wear a sign that says "I'm a bitch, and I don't respond well to kindness."
Of course, I just smiled and shrugged and didn't say any of that to her. What would be the point? To hurt her or embarrass her? I couldn't possibly say anything that would hurt her as much as her attitude will.
Don't put advice in your sig.