Tell me a freakin’ `bout it!

Bollocks. Bollocks. Really. This kind of game-playing crap makes me truly depressed.

Telling a girl you like that actually, you like other girls is designed to what, make her jealous? Make her think that oooh, there might be others interested in you too, you stud, better move quickly to secure you before you end up with someone else? This is just rubbish. All she’ll think is what you’ve told her, you like other people. And not her. That’s like a woman telling a guy she can’t see him for a fortnight because she’s too busy - keep him waiting, make him think she’s popular, fire his interest. Who wants to go out with someone who plays mind games like that?

Do us all, men and women, a favour, and fuck all these things you apparently have to do to make someone like you. They either do or they don’t. Ask and find out, don’t try and artifically engineer the situation by following more and more complicated ‘rules’ or you’ll just end up tying yourself up in more and more miserable knots until you drop from confusion and exhaustion.

Then, to paraphrase, the only way to win in not to play at all. Stop worrying about the rules everyone else is playing by and invent some of your own.

If it’s the right girl for you, she’s not going to freak out on you and think you’re a crazy stalker if you call on the Tuesday instead of the Wednesday or because you tell her you like her instead of pretending to be aloof, for goodness’ sake. She might just say she likes you back, then hoorah, you’ve found someone else who is also sick of doing what other people expect of them and you’ll be very happy together.

If she is the kind of girl that expects you to know the ever-changing fashions in dating etiquette (and fucked if I ever tried to learn them) and will therefore pass up a perfectly nice man just because he didn’t abide by these ‘rules’ for an asshole who did, do you really want to be with her? What loss is it exactly not to be with someone who’ll reject you for not playing games?

Stop stop stop trying to fit in with a system that’s clearly making you uncomfortable and you might realise that wearing glasses has nothing to do with having difficulty in finding a girlfriend. It may not get you laid in the short term, but is that what you want?

(rapturous applause)

EXCELENT response. Very well said.

I second that Green Fairy. Too much game playing going on. Just be yourself. Don’t lie, don’t make up great stories to make yourself seem wonderful (sorry, more wonderful!). If you want to tell a girl you like her then do it if you think it’s right. If she likes you, she’ll stick around. If not then it wasn’t meant to be. Just be you and not a shallow game-player. As GF says you don’t seem comfortable with it - and that will show more than anything.

What will get you the best running shot (and make you a lot more content with yourself in the process) is this: doing what the hell you want.

There will always be girls who don’t like glasses, beards and being skinny. There will always be girls who do. What you have to do is stop analysing yourself in terms of a marketable commodity and think about what you might actually like. You do want, I presume, a girl who will adore the fact that you’re a web geek, right? Then why are you bothered about all the girls that wouldn’t like you telling them that? Why would you care if they think that’s cool or not? They don’t meet your criteria.

Everyone’s nervous about getting it wrong, interpreting things incorrectly, making fools of themselves. No-one can tell you this look means that, this comment means this. But being open and honest about who you are, how you feel, what you want and how you like to wear your blasted facial hair is like holding a key that will only open one door out of ten thousand surrounding you. You can try your key in the lock of all of them, but if they’re the wrong ones they’ll never open, no matter what you do. You could nip down the cobbler’s and copy someone else’s key to open another door, but what would be the point?

As it was my quote that has started this off - I feel my responsibility to have my say.

The first point I’d like to make, which is bourne directly out of these blog replies and countless conversations with the ‘other’ species (I can see I’m not doing myself any favours here), is that woman do not have the 1st clue about what woman are actually like.

I have heard 3 million explinations from woman says that the addage of “Treat em mean and keep em keen” is rubbish and any way to handle woman other than straight up is not what they want. And then I contrast that against the 3 trillions actual experiences I have either seen or been involved in where they behave in a complete opposite manner.

Now I’m not saying that blokes are any better and confess that the more keen the woman seems, the less keen I seem to be - despite me trying not to be so. However, what I am saying is that us blokes…..we know what we are and we’re standing up and saying it. This is a spade and you know what - I’m going to call it that name.

Now you can jump down my throat.

And I also have three trillion experiences of women doing just as you say, and men behaving just as badly, and both sexes denying they’re doing it at all. Some seem oblivious to it - unsurprising, such behaviour is often so ingrained - and many are aware and seem happy to be part of the game. Speaking as someone who’d laugh in the face of anyone who didn’t call me for a week because he was ‘busy’, I’m happy to leave them all to it. Treat me mean, watch me go whistling off into the sunset.

Because the point is, it is not a charade that has to be played, especially when one is miserable attempting to do so. If you want a game-playing girl then yes, you’d better try and figure out what’s going on with women who brandish unfathomable signals and unspoken rules. However, if you’d much rather just say what you think, and that happens to be that you’re a geek with glasses who likes the internet - or whatever your particular stance might be - then it’ll do you absolutely no good to try and play with the women who’ll think you funny if you call to soon or the men who’ll lose interest once you say you like them. Neither of you would be getting what you wanted, so why try? Of course, straight-up men and woman are much, much harder to come by, and I suppose that’s why so many people not into playing games try their hand at doing so anyway. But stick to your own rules if you can. Much better for the soul.

You don’t have to be a hunter to smell stench of stampeding wildebeest.

That is such nonsense (as has already been pointed out by Green Fairy).

I cannot think of anyone (worth knowing, that is) who would not be delighted to be told that they were liked, regardless of whether or not that feeling was reciprocated! There are few nicer, unexpected things in the world than having someone tell you that they really like you. And why on earth would you want to be with anyone who plays these pointless games? They’re almost always more trouble than they’re worth (men and women alike). You seem nicer than that :)

But you are not listening to us:

Experience categorically disproves everything you are saying.

As a logical person one has a choice - believe the theory that woman like good men who are honest, and open and just say what they mean and not think about the consequences (specifically related to trying to win the girls heart). OR - believe the results of 100 000 000 000 experiments conducted throughout the world by us poor misalighned men.

Personally I believe in proof over theories any day (but I still like arguing over the theories)

i have to agree with the women posting here and say that the rules such as they are, are absolute bullshit and the only rule they support is that they are there to confuse everyone who is slightly confused about how to meet/approach/deal with members of the opposite sex.

I say this because I was one of them. Hand on heart I spent years and years worrying about how i should look, act, talk to women to attract them, do i have the right job, the right words etc etc. Whenever I was successful it was short lived because i was acting in a manner i imagined was the best way to get a girlfriend. Turns out that every single one of them was wrong for me. I would also NEVER talk to a girl and just tell them that I liked them as this seemed way too OUT THERE.

Guess what.

I was wrong. As soon as I started being honest with myself and honest with women I wasn’t necessarily more successful but I was a damn sight happier and therefore more confident and thus able to speak to anyone without worrying about the minutiae of dating ettiquette and the direct result of that is that I am hopelessly in love with an amazing girl who doesn’t have to worry that i was putting on a personality to pull or acting via a set of established rules to achieve a certain desired result.

Trust me, looks are essentially secondary…there are no rules to glasses/no glasses, beards/no beards, what you’re saying is we all like something different, it’s unquantifiable and so no rules apply. Looks may apply when your confidence level is low as in you may wear glasses but you look like you don’t like them etc etc

you may think that you are not something widely appreciated or desired, but that’s going to be part of your problem, a lack of self belief, so chin up young man, don’t give a shit about convention and rules and reap the rewards - i can almost guarantee you’ll be happier whatever the result.

I don’t think you’re being yourself in the slightest, or you wouldn’t be shaving (to no apparent effect, take note) in the belief that British women don’t like beards. If you were, you’d wear a goatee if you wanted to and to hell with those that didn’t like it. What you’re doing is running around like a headless chicken trying to make yourself as inoffensive and widely appealing as possible so you don’t rule out your chances with anyone (though I think you should be gladly ruling out all chances with women who wouldn’t get to know you just because of facial hair). If I was constantly worrying about and changing aspects of my looks and personality to reflect what I thought men might like, I’d end up not knowing what the hell was going on, either.

That one woman recoils when you declare interest too early and another when you do it too late should indicate that the rules you’re seeking on how to understand woman don’t exist. There is only one thing you can do, and it doesn’t involve spending all your time trying to second-guess other people.

Tyrannize: Saying that all your experiences with women point towards them not appreciating openness from you poor, misaligned men is about as much ‘proof’ of the actual situation as me stating that I have never known a single woman who wouldn’t run a mile from the ‘treat ‘em mean’ attitude - both experiences may be true, but both are also equally unhelpful in determining the actual lie of the land. I may just have sainted friends, you may just be hanging around impossible women. The behavioural reality lies somewhere in the middle.

Bravo, Simon!

So is the semi-naked sevitz cam pic that’s been up for the last few days because some girl has said she fancies semi-naked men or are we just into nudie-sevitz-season already?

I’ve had to listen to enough people (normal people, friends of mine, girls and guys) try convince me to not wear my glasses or to get contacts, because I might have a better chance of meeting someone.

Don’t listen. It’s kinda of a wankish thing to do to suggest someone change something about themselves to meet someone and also a little dishonest. Be yourself dude, he is a nice guy.

Hey … I read pretty regularly, but I’m a lurker, only I decided I wanted to get in on this debate.

Yes, there are women who play that game, and who won’t be interested if you’re not playing it as well. Some of those women are my friends, and you know what? Play the game, if all you’re interested in is a one month relationship. They never last long, because no one is being themselves. They’re too worried about who they’re appearing to be.

Women have an ideal of who they’re attracted to, but to tell you the truth, I don’t think they know what they’re talking about. My ideal has always been the long hair, grungy, rock-star look. Want to know who I ended up with? A skinny, glasses-wearing web geek. No joke. I never had any luck with those rock-star types, back when I tried to play the game. So if you hear them saying they don’t like beards, glasses, etc, don’t worry about it. They aren’t going to date your beard and glasses, they’re going to date you. And a woman who’s worth it will see past your appearance and see YOU … and isn’t that the type of person you want to be with, anyway?

If you want to play the game, go ahead and play, but don’t expect anything lasting to come of it. And don’t expect to be liked for who you are, because if you’re playing by those rules, you’re not being yourself.

Also, I agree with everything Green Fairy has said.

Oh God. Firstly, I obviously am quite shallow, otherwise I wouldn’t have a preference about something so superficial as facial hair. I don’t have a problem with admitting that. The thing is, I like beards in theory, but in reality I’m not too keen. Still, I reckon I would probably have kissed you anyway that evening. The least said about the Comedy Moustache Incident the better I feel.

I maintain, and I suspect I have told you on several occasions, that you think about things too much, which leads to you worrying about something so absurd as whether or not someone is going to like you because you wear glasses. Finding someone attractive isnt all about looks. I’m going to stop now, cause I dont really have a point, except for maybe relax, and don’t let it stress you out.

“The rules” are probably derived in the same way a lot of sports stars get ‘lucky socks’. Some guy calls a girl the second day. She says she’s not interested because she doesn’t like him for whatever reason (maybe he’s a jerk, or he smells). He wants to find something to blame, so he tells his mates: “Never call on the second day.” and the rule spreads like wildfire as people want to avoid the awful second day curse.

Here’s the rule that trumps all others: If someone likes you, they’ll want you to call. If someone likes you, they’ll be happy when you sit next to them. If someone likes you, they’ll probably quite like to hear that you like them, too. If someone likes you, they’ll probably be quite pleased to snog you, facial hair and all.

If they don’t like you, you’ll probably fall foul of one of these rules and even if you don’t, they’re easy enough to make up and tell your friends so they never make the same, awful mistake.

I can’t really comment on that specific situation. If someone I liked went out of their way not to sit next to me, but to sit next to a friend, I’d assume they were not interested in sitting next to me, rather than fall back on some obscure rule to explain apparently contrary behaivour.

Now- you’re right in saying that the person may, in fact, be interested in me and simply be following “the rules”. Do I really want to get to know someone so fatuous?

How better to tie this puppy up than to site an example over that happened to me in the last couple of days. I went on a date setup via a friend last week Tuesday. Although there was no long term future in it for me, she seemed fairly nice and we had some common interests (namely my new obsession with Boarding) and looked set up to meet again.

So after the date, emails went as follows (abridged) [T=Tyrannize, NC=Nutcase]

TLook at this great place to stay when boarding. Just lacks the massues for the end of a hard day on the slopes NCWell depends on who you take doesn’t it. If your companion is duffed up on the slopes they can’t help much. My massages are legendary. However you have said of yourself that you give the most awesome massages and are a good kisser. I know the second point is true, but I have yet to explore and substantiate the other claims. TWell I would hope my companion is good enough on the slopes so as to still be able to give massages at the end of the day. NCI’m afraid you would not consider me a very good companion then - as all I think about on the piste is speed and thrills. I very rarely give though to much else when boarding. TSo spending money on a luxious accomadation is wasted on you. Noted, Thanks NCI feel obliged to tell you at this point I am seriously insomniac and rarely sleep more than 4 hours a night………..so I enjoy accommodation more then most.

Right so that was Friday’s email and Nina then texted me again on Friday night (which I never replied to), on Monday - I sent her this mail:

T … blah blah blah … how was your weekend … … blah blah blah … I asked my mate about XScape and he said the boarding can be pretty good. If you gonna go for a ride this week, then let me know and I’ll come along!! So what you think? We should also make a in between plan for us. NC To tell the truth, I’m finding that my time is a bit on the lean side, and I’m going to have to curtail my activities a bit until after my finals. My employer’s invested a lot of time and resources preparing me for my exams, and I need to give them as much back. So I’ve decided that there will be only one night out per week from here on in. On that basis, I’m fully occupied until June….see I said I was a poor choice of companion.

Apparently the verdict on the NC is that although she was inviting me around to her house under loads of different guises (come get some sugar and some face cream. Or have a look at the pole dancing course I’m doing!) and texting me at nights after 1 meeting - after some consideration I was deemed too keen, which is ironic as I’m not even sure I was…….Still worth it just for BLOGS sake!

Oh, you think that’s bad? Check dis [true story, just happened this weekend, names changed to protect the guilty]:

• Alice got dumped by Gregor.
• Alice started going out with Guy.
• Gregor got jealous, said he wanted Alice back.
• Alice dumped Guy, got back with Gregor.
• Guy was sad, tried to win Alice back, failed.
• Guy moves on, started dating Kylie.
• Alice finds out, gets jealous, says she wants to be with Guy!

So, in this case, the gotta be mean to keep em keen theory bears out, although I think it’s actually more a case of grass is greener syndrome.

Look. There’s an easy solution to this. Just do what I did: find a girl you like and persue her for as long as it takes for her to get sick of saying no. Bingo! Instant relationship. We’ve been together for two and a half years now and she’s even almost forgiven me for the whole stalking thing and that.

Chris: I like the way you think!

In all honesty, I do know a girl who pursued a guy for about four years solid, against all rhyme and reason, when he’d told her a thousand times that nothing would ever or could ever happen.

They’re married now!

However I should note that this is the EXCEPTION and all my personal experiences with stalking have Not Gone Well.

I like to pin all my restraining orders to the wall in ascending date order.

Tek has been saying something similar to earlier comments in the thread:

Life is too short to expect that other people are going to make you happy or that you can make other people happy. You just gotta do what you gotta do to make yourself happy, and hope that along the way, someone falls in step with you

Ok - just to add confusion to this whole discussion, I asked the exact same question to a friend of mine - and this was the conversation:

MeIf you walk into a pub/bar/anywhere with seats…. and you are immediately attracted to someone, do you sit directly next to them - or next to their friends… Wo-ManHmmmm.. Do I know him? CoopHmm - well lets suppose you do. Wo-ManIf I know him and I’m attracted to him most likely I will go as far away as possible at first…. but that me - and then I’d make an excuse to go by him once or twice, approach the bar where he is sitting etc., but that’s obviously because I am a …. little different… But… that’s actually more if I think he knows I want him if he is oblivious, then I would sit next to his friends and talk to them a lot. Most likely would not talk to him at all. How stupid! :) CoopYeah… he’ll never know otherwise.. Wo-Manif I’ve hooked up with him and still want him….forget it, I am way across the room and never passing by him…way too scary. I guess its because I have this stupid romanticized view of it where he should notice me no matter where I am and if he wants me HE’LL make a move. Oh…and.. none of that last part makes sense (the he should come up to me) because if you base anything on what I like, its usually shy guys so I don’t know why I do that. Its all just nonsense!!

We’re all screwed!