Bravo!
And let me add, when you get nothing but a string of rejections, you really start to question your self-worth. (And people advise you project confidence - HA!) A natural result of this is to adopt a defense mechanism, such as blaming it all on women. Not that that’s the right thing to do, but I find it hard to believe that so many people can’t understand how it comes about, and instead write it off as misogyny.
Let’s look at the woman’s viewpoint - if she is interested in a man, she can either a) ask him out, in which case there is a very good chance that she will be rejected on the basis of being desperate, or b) wait, in which case every day the guy doesn’t ask her out is another day of being rejected.
Oh yeah. Women have it easy.
A man can ask a woman out without being assumed to be desperate. I’m not saying there should be a double standard, just that there is one. If a man asks her out, there are four possibilities:
she is really interested, and she says yes.
she is really interested, but she’s already seeing someone else, so she says no. Not insulting to the asker.
she is really interested, but she honestly is unable to go out on that occasion. Usually, but not always, she will make that known. In any case, not insulting to the asker.
she is not interested.
If she is not interested, there are several possibilities:
she doesn’t know you well enough to like you or dislike you, and she’s cautious. Not insulting to the asker, and a very good possibility of change in the future.
she likes you very well, but something just doesn’t click for her romantically. Far more common, again, not insulting to the asker, and some possibility of change in the future.
she doesn’t know you, but can tell on sight that you aren’t her type. This one is harder to take, but can be avoided by getting to know someone before you ask her out (if possible).
she knows you and doesn’t like you. Yes, hardest of all to take. But if she’s been showing overt friendliness rather than cool courtesy, unlikely.
If you get to know someone before asking them out, the likeliest reason for a turndown is the second. It can be hard to accept, particularly if the woman is very much someone who attracts you in a romantic sense. But it is not insulting. Romantic feelings are basically not very controllable, and they have no rational basis. Further, they are highly variable from one person to the next - what really turns me on may totally put another woman off and vice versa. A woman can honestly think that you are the greatest guy she’s ever known, and still not feel that special something that spells romance. Similarly, you can feel (and undoubtedly have felt) that way about a woman. Did you think less of her?
I have trouble imagining anyone out of her teens turning down a request for a date insultingly (unless asked insultingly), but I suppose it must happen. As far as I can tell, that’s an excellent revelation of a character I would consider highly undesirable. Do your asking in private so that you’re not publicly humiliated, and consider yourself to have gotten off lightly - that kind of bitch would only be trouble anyway!
Yes, I know - all the rationality in the world doesn’t really help in screwing up courage or in accepting a ‘no’ gracefully. But this is the ultimate case of ‘nothing ventured, nothing gained,’ and looking at it rationally afterwards can help you feel better. And think of the woman who, by your not asking her out, goes through that same kind of rejection every single day. Because there’s a good chance she’s out there.
It’s not a competition. I don’t think blowero was trying to say “Nya nya, my misery is worse than yours.” He was just saying that asking someone out is not the casual carefree thing that some women seem to think it is.
As to the rest of your post, that’s good stuff. Most men would do well to keep that in mind. And women would do well to remember that to a lot of men, a rejection – of any type – is a knife in the gut.
Exactly my point. It’s HARD to ask someone out when you are risking being rejected. For what it’s worth, though, a woman doesn’t have any worse chances than a man does. I’ve HAD women ask me out, and have most often been delighted that they did so, and said “yes”. And I’m sure I’m not the only man on the planet who feels that way. And honestly, any man who would look down at you for taking the initiative probably isn’t a “small-n” nice guy, so why would you want to date him anyway?
Oh c’mon. When did I say women had it easy?
I don’t assume women are desparate for asking a man out. I assume they are confident and liberated.
I said it was difficult. Why are you arguing against the strawman that it is insulting?
I appreciate the advice, but I wasn’t asking for advice. I was taking issue with was your glib assertion that it’s not a big deal for a man to ask a woman out. I’m saying it CAN be a big deal. I’m not COMPLAINING ABOUT IT, I’m just saying you’re wrong to suggest that it’s something that’s easy for men to do. (I know you didn’t say it was ‘easy’, but you said it’s ‘not the end of the world’ in a way that kind of derides men for finding it difficult.) Comparing ‘asking someone out and being turned down’ with ‘not being asked out’ isn’t the point. I don’t know where you got the idea that I ever said being a woman was easy. I never said that. I just think that until you walk a mile in a man’s shoes, you shouldn’t be so quick to dismiss how tough it is to ask someone out.
You said that much better than I did. That’s exactly right; I wasn’t making any kind of comparison at all.
Naw, I think you said it just fine.
FTR, I don’t envy women’s position at all. If I had to compare their dilemma with that of men, then the only conclusion I can draw is “Wow, sucks to be human.”
FTotherR, on the few occasions that women have asked me out, I never thought less of the woman for doing it, I just thought more of myself. 
So, tdn, what is a woman supposed to do if she really isn’t interested? There is simply no really kind way to do it.
If a rejection is that hard to take, perhaps that’s what the Nice Guy (TM - how do you do the subscript?) needs to look at the most in himself. When a person says ‘No, I don’t want to have a date with you,’ why is that so utterly devastating? I suspect that if you find the key to that in yourself, and learn to accept (no one loves it) a reject without it making you less of a person in your own view, you will have found a real key to dating success.
blowero and tdn, one of you used the term “glib assumption,” which in so many words suggested that women don’t know what it’s like to experience that kind of rejection. I was not trying to say our situation is worse than yours, just that we may have a better grasp of that particular pain than you think.
I remember corresponding with a male friend of mine who, despite being highly intelligent, insisted that all the power and control of a relationship with a woman rested with her, because she could say ‘yea’ or ‘nay.’ I pointed out to him that the ultimate power rested with men, because all the yeas or nays in the world are useless without an invitation to respond to. He couldn’t see it at all. All I’m saying is that the potential for hurt via rejection works both ways - that being directly turned down isn’t the only (or even necessarily the most painful) form of rejection in dating situations. Ask any woman who has eaten her heart out over some guy who doesn’t seem to realize she exists - that constitutes roughly 100% of us, btw.
I’m sorry, blowero, if I disturbed you with the term ‘insulting.’ I guess I was using it as shorthand for ‘says something potentially negative about you, the asker.’ Because, honestly, isn’t that what the pain of a rejection is about? It can’t be just disappointment in not getting the date, because in that case you’re no better off at all without asking - either way, you don’t have a date with the woman. No, rejection hurts because we believe that rejection says we’re undesirable, at least to the person in question. And that’s what I meant by ‘insulting.’ Sorry I didn’t make that clearer.
Er, that would be roughly 100% of the straight women. For gay women it may be the same, but not over some guy… Sorry 'bout that.
[hijack]Hmm, I wonder if it is the same for gay women, or is it easier for them? Not that I plan to switch hit in order to find out, mind you, but an interesting question. Any gay women care to comment?[/hijack]
I wasn’t pretending to offer advice on that, but since you ask…
She should just say yes. 
Barring that, it’s better for her to say “Wow, I am so flattered, you big handsome stud, but I have a boyfriend” rather than “Go out with you? No way, loser!” To ba fair, most women over the age of 15 have mastered this. Some haven’t. It’s that type that we fear.
Yep. Not easy, but definitely Yep.
Thank you, Zebra. Not only that, but…
It seems that the OP has had an epiphany with regards to relationships between men and women. Now that he’s a new man, he has the nerve to tell others to stop whining and stop posting about the troubles of being a “nice guy.”
I used to admire the Incubus for his honesty. But this OP has nothing to do with honesty. It’s all about “I’ve got mine and quit whining if you don’t have yours.” As others have posted, it is a classic case of “the reformed [fill in the blank] person” that now despises what he used to be.
I am happy for him now that he has a girlfriend and all. And I wish him all the best. If he doesn’t want to be a “nice guy” anymore, fine. But be careful, Incubus. One head over heals experience may not last forever, and many a “reformed person” have returned to their old ways very quickly when the “new way” wears off, or goes away.
I hope it doesn’t happen to you. But if it does, you had better find a new forum to vent, because you burned the bridge on this one.
Now here’s where you lose me. Yes, for a flashing moment it would be horrible (particularly if you weren’t in private and someone else overheard). But, seriously, after that flashing moment, my reaction would really be ‘Wow, what an asshole!’ Maybe I wouldn’t have the balls to thank her for so revealing herself that I didn’t regret the turndown, but that’s what I’d be thinking. And what a great comeback if I *could * get up the nerve to say it!
This is a fascinating discussion, and I really will be interested in your response, but I’ll be signing off for some hours (possibly overnight) now. If someone makes a really great point and sinks me, please don’t think I’ve slunk off into a corner to sulk!
And does anyone know how to do the subscript thingy? Seriously, I want to know!
You know, I used to give the “oh, I’d love to go out with you but I have a boyfriend/I’m too busy with my job right now to start a relationship/I need to spend some time by myself/etc.” It just doesn’t work well and, in the end, winds up being more painful for both of us than if I flat-out say “sorry, I’m not interested in you that way.”
The reason is many guys (not all, but enough to make me change my tactics) take my reasons as challenges to overcome. The only reason that doesn’t seem negotiable is “I’m not interested in you that way.”
In fact, I used to say “you’re really nice, but I’m not interested in you that way.” In most cases, it’s true. However, many guys would hear that and assume the reason I wasn’t interested in them was *because * they were nice. That was never it. It was always some other reason (that I may or may not have been willing to tell them). But they were nice and I thought it would soften the blow to tell them that. It didn’t. It just made them assume “nice” = “not interested.”
I agree. In fact, I think sometimes people do a disservice to others when they think they’re sparing thier feelings. Much better to be clear about how you feel up front, and stave off any possible misunderstandings. If you’re not interested, by all means be clear about it. You can do it without being rude. As tdn suggested, “I’m flattered, but…” or something along those lines is fine.
Good advice. I’d say the same to women who, like in your example, sit and home and feel depressed because nobody asked them out. So go ask a guy out. Likewise, if he says no, it doesn’t make you less of a person.
I didn’t say anything about what “women” know or dont’ know, I was directing my comments specifically to you and what you wrote.
Really? Because you said a couple things that really seemed like that was the point you were trying to make:
and
It just sounded to me like you were saying that it’s easier for men. But I’ll take you at your word that you didn’t mean that.
You didn’t disturb me. You merely misconstrued what I said, so I corrected you.
O.K., but I’m not arguing about why rejection hurts; I’m only telling you that it often does. That’s all.
Boy, I’ll never understand the mind-set of people who won’t take no for an answer. If someone tells me they’re not interested, I assume they are an adult and are capable of conveying their wishes to me, so I’m not gonna ask again. But I’ve had friends say things like, “Why don’t you ask her again?”, and my response is always, “Why?” If she wanted to go out with me, she was free to say “yes” the first time.
This particular woman wants to be treated as an individual, not as an instance of class “woman”. I don’t understand the appeal of finding out “what women want”, since people are so variable it seems a lot less frustrating to find out what particular people want instead of trying to construct a doomed-to-failure generality.
In a couple of communities where I hang out, people discuss “lesbian sheep syndrome”. The joke goes something like: a sexually available sheep, when confronted with an attractive ram, will respond by standing very still, thereby making herself sexually available. So imagine the fate of the poor lesbian sheep, madly wanting to be with each other and standing . . . very . . . still . . .
(In my experience, most of the places where this comes up it is actually discussed by people of all genders and orientations as a useful concept, but I believe it originates in the gay community.)
I guess I’m a freak but I don’t get why women have to wait to be asked out. I’ve never really waited to be asked out, if I wanted to go out with a fellow I asked him. Frankly if a chap had a problem with that minor level of assertive behaviour then there’s no way he’d be partner or even dating material, because I’m pretty much a bossy-boots.
Well, what you’re hearing from us is tip-of-the-iceberg frustration, not clear evidence of misandry. When so many of the “Nice Guy” posts start off ranting about how all women only date assholes, a girl’s fuse can start to get short. I don’t like having total strangers tell me what my taste in men is. Sorry, but I don’t. And while I’ve done my level best to keep my patience and try to sort through the story enough to give some sort of useful advice, I can’t say I don’t sympathize with those of us who fly off the handle. If you think about it, that whole “women only date assholes” thing is pretty insulting. The implication is that for whatever reason, be it greed or hormones or stupidity or that whole “ladder theory” nonsense, women simply cannot make good decisions about their romantic lines. And when you hear it over and over again, it gets tiring.
All I’m trying to say is that generalizations are bullshit. It’s true on both sides of the argument. We need to stop coming at this as All Women and Nice Guys and just approach each individual situation, and the actors in it, as individuals. Because the shouting is never going to stop until we do. Unfortunately, I have a feeling that this means that the shouting is never going to stop. But I’d really like to be proven wrong.
I totally agree. Maybe I don’t have that great an idea of what it’s like to be a young dater (I’ll be 46 in a few short weeks), but I don’t ever remember thinking a followup phone call “too soon” or stalkerish. Unless of course the followup phone call came 2 mniutes after I walked in my door, and was requesting that I set a wedding date and pick out the names of our kids. A light and easy “hey, nice date, I’ll call later on this week to see if you’d like to get together again maybe” isn’t considered “stalkerish” by a normal woman.
[QUOTE=tdn]
Allow me to answer with 3 different examples.
One guy my sister was dating had firm ideas about what a romantic date was: Take her out to some sleazy dive, get drunk, then pick a fistfight with a complete stranger.
One guy a friend lived with: Shiftless sponging pothead who couldn’t hold down a job.
The new boyfriend of a girl I fancied: Insufferable snob who felt compelled to dump on everything he saw, including her.
And I’m sure we’re all familiar with the woman who says “He beats me, but he needs my love.”
[quote]
I understand, and we women have just as many real life examples of the man who is a really GOOD man, but who is stuck with a mean (but HOT by God) ball-breaking, gold digging, cheating lying slut for a girlfriend. It happens. On both sodes, it doesn’t mean that “WOMEN” only date assholes, nor that “MEN” only date hotties who are ballbreaking, cheating sluts. What it does mean is that sometimes, good people that we know, here’s the important distinction, ** end up with** bad people.
To state, seemingly with impunity, that “women only date/want assholes” is to imply that they purposely seek OUT said assholes. I assure you, having been in a relationship with a verbally, emotionally, mentally abusive man, that they don’t advertise, and can present themselves as just as nice a nice guy, as the REAL nice guys. The change is a creeping, insidious one. Like the fable of the frog in the slowly heating cooking pot.
Second, even if it were true that some women DID specifically seek out bad men, or assholes to date, this is NOT “instead” of nice guys or good men. It just happens with some people. Too many nice guys (and I know some friends, coworkers, brothers of friends, since I don’t have my own brother, who are guilty of this IRL), men seem to draw some sort of “if A+B=C then C=” conclusion from this. (don’t ask me to do that equation correctly, I’m HORRIBLE at algebra, I know you know what I mean:D). Anyway, they seem to assume "if the girl[s) I want are with an asshole instead of me then it must mean that girls/women PREFER assholes. Not true. It’s merely an unhappy happenstance.
I know, and BELIEVE me, I’m not trying to add to your or their frustration level. My point is, that the mentality, and giving vent, especially to women who aren’t with ANYONE (as has happened to me on occasion), with the whole “oh yeah, of course you won’t go out with me, women only date assholes” thing, is self-defeating. Even if the man in question doesn’t specifically come out and voice that thought, it’s in his demeanor. And again, yes, some (please men, STOP already with the “women” only date assholes) women in your viewport ARE currently dating assholes. Please stop making the correlation of "the woman/women I am attracted to, is/are dating an asshole(s) therefore, women only date assholes.
GAAAAAAH!! It’s not that I don’t GET that you’re baffled, annoyed, or hurt by it. The WAY that nice guys voice this hurt, bafflement, etc is what is getting them the business from the other side. As to the “what other conclusion woudl you have us draw”? question. Well, I’m SO glad you asked that. There ARE other reasons than “women only date assholes” why a particular woman, or women aren’t going to be attracted to you. To understand and accept that is going to get you a LOT further along than trying to pin it on something false.
Sometimes “IT” is just not there. It just isn’t. It happens to all of us, all of the time, we see someone that really turns US on, but to them, we don’t have that chemistry, or worse we have “anti-chemistry”. It hurts but it’s NOT personal. And has nothing to do with whether men are “nice” or not. Plenty of women get with nice men. And as I stated in my above post. Believe me, women in marriages with nice men gripe and complain about the things that make them mad, or sad, or want to annihilate THEIR husbands TOO.
You think it’s “nice” to give a woman a hard time about “women only date assholes” merely because she turns you down for a date? Though I CAN see where if it’s a sister/friend/coworker etc a “well GEEZ sis, you’re dating a jerk of COURSE you’re being treated badly” would be in order. But that’s not what I’m talking about, I’m talking about the unsolicited painting with a broad brush of all women by “nice guys” in these threads and out iRL over the suppsed “fact” that women only date assholes.
Not one girl? Not a fattie, or an ug? Not a plain mousy wallflower? I’m not saying that YOU are this way. But a lot of the men I see in these threads, and on my own board (specifically a men/women what do they want kinda thing), and out in real life, well when they say they can’t get a date, what they mean is they can’t get a date with the HOTTIES. They disdain normal girls.
Which brings me to another point. Not a nice one, but I’m not CONDONING it, I’m merely pointing it out as reality.
People, by virtue of genetics, socioeconomic niches, personality (or lack thereof), all have a certain “merket value” out in the dating world. One CAN change their market value of course, but we all do have one.
I’ll use myself as an example. I’m 45, I’ve got two kids, one grown, one a teen, although normally I make a middle class living, I’m currently getting back on my feet from a sabbatical I took last year from work, I’m reasonably okay looking, but I AM 45 (almost 46), so mean old Mr. Gravity has had some say in the looks department.
My current market value is NEVER going to net me Ricky Martin. I suddenly get a great job, plastic surgery to nip & tuck a few problem areas, a trust fund…Hmmmm, I might have a slight shot. Well at an older, poor girl’s Ricky Martin anyway. 
A person needs to be honest about their market value. 10 Bucks won’t buy a cadillac. And sometimes, even after you add to that market value it still won’t net you the hotties, sometimes a person’s market value will only even after the max improvements, net them a plain jane, or an ordinary guy.
Sorry tdn to answer only one and run, I will be back later, work calls so if you had other comments I’m not ignoring them!!