My response before I looked at your actual ad: I loved the first part “describing” yourself. I didn’t like the part describing your mate. I thought “enough already.”
Thoughts after I looked at your ad: Holy shmoley! You’re gorgeous. And the rest of the profile gives enough detail that the lack of detail in the main part isn’t a problem. And I still agree that you should cut the part describing the “mate.” Please tell me that the “turn-offs: sarcasm” part is a joke.
But I probably wouldn’t respond to you. The fact that you’re looking for a younger shorter woman is a big turn-off. (And I’m 5’3" and 34 years old, so it wouldn’t even exclude me.) Everything about the ad just screams “looking for trophy wife.” I am just about a 100% perfect match for you based on everything you say (except that I’m fat, geographically unsuitable, and married). I’m even a non-religious Jew. But IME, the types of guys that want only younger, shorter women just aren’t that cool.
Wha?.. Reverse descrimination?.. Here of all places?..
Only a couple of months this time around. The first time was two years ago and only for a month. I’m just a little frustrated with the “sameness” of it all. On email I’m completely personable and not the slightest bit arrogant.
An “I get it” or a simple acknowledgement of an attempt to be funny or even remotely original is enough. I think the fact that somebody contacts me despite the profile usually means they get it.
Why the (small) rash of contacts completely outside my search demographic is a mystery at this point.
:dubious:
But women who look for tall handsome men are? What’s the difference?
I’ve had a “trophy” wife. And “trophy” girlfriends. (No, not at the same time! ) What does “trophy” mean anyway. That they are attractive by most standards? And that makes me/them shallow and arrogant? You can’t be serious.
None taken, of course. You and I miscommunicate about stuff like this all the time, then wind up in a “sorry if I offended” – “sorry for making you think that you offended” – “sorry for making you think that I thought I offended” loop. :smack:
This has got to be one of the oddest things I’ve ever read: if he were average-looking he’d be funny and witty, but because he’s handsome he’s a jerk?
I don’t get why “shorter” bothers you: don’t most men prefer a woman who is shorter than them? I met a guy for drinks the other week who was my height, and one of the things I didn’t like about him was that he was my height (I’m 5’3 and 34 years old, too, btw … and fat, but not married ;)).
I know what you mean about “younger,” but it’s not like he’s only interested in women under 30. Those are the guys that give me a bad vibe: 45-year-olds (and older) who say they’re looking for women age 18-25. ::shudder:: QuickSilver’s only 41, and would prefer a woman who is 40 or under: that doesn’t send up any red flags with me.
Merc, a “trophy wife” is a looker who marries a rich guy for his money. They both know each other’s motives and are okay with it. To each his own I guess.
The profile works. A balance of creativity, sarcasm and important info about yourself. As mentioned, the type of woman you’re interested in will appreciate your profile. Guess I should send condolences regarding that last lady we heard about. Chin up.
I don’t like the cynical, sarcastic part of your profile. In my opinion, online dating is somewhat like job searching - there are certain standards and clichés that are used in all résumés, and while you don’t have to like it, to a certain extent you do have to play along with it if you want good results. An online dating profile needs to be an extremely fine balance of original and traditional.
I would not send you an email after reading your profile, and except for the “slender, athletic and toned” part, I would be a very good match (leaving the issue issue aside.) Why not? I don’t get a good vibe from it at all. Like you said, it sounds cynical and jaded, shallow, unrealistic, and guarded. Your true personality doesn’t seem to come through at all (unless your true personality IS cynical, jaded, shallow, unrealistic and guarded, in which case I wouldn’t want to have anything to do with you anyway.)
How to improve it? Lighten it up. Make it more inviting. Drop some of the pretense. Make women want to get to know you better because you’re so damned interesting. I guarantee you, it’s not the picture that is preventing women from responding.
Well, I like self-deprecatory humor, as a counterbalance to confidence and arrogance. Quicksilver’s post is ambivalent that way; he could make fun of the whole dating thingy, including himself, or he could be just making fun of everybody on the dating site 'cept himself and the future Quicksilveress. But if I was looking on a dating site and came across this profile, I wouldn’t know which.
And there’s where reverse discrimination comes in (“guilty, yer honour!”) because, on average, goodlooking guys are more arrogant then plain looking guys. And yes, that is fear talking rather then experience. I’m about an 8 myself, and there’s a lot more to rejection and attraction besides just “market value”.
Quicksilver, I don’t know you well, so you could very well be the least arrogant guy on earth. But you asked for first impressions to your profile, and here’s mine, which is worth what you paid for it.
Special for today only – buy one, get one free! I’m gonna second Maastricht on it being unclear to me whether you’re including yourself amongst the mockworthy or not.
No, no thread missed. It wasn’t worth bothering over. She’s just got some serious issues with what I would call “balanced” human behaviour. Pretty, smart, educated, successfull. But also, as I found out, highly strung, very insecure, trouble prioritizing things, lacks balance and perspective, goes about her life with all the restraint and delicacy of a Panzer tank division.
Give you an example?
She called upset over the fact that her son was being accused of being a bully to his friends and classmates. She assumed that it was true because she noticed the other children’s mothers were not calling for playdates and were being distant of late. She asked me what I would do in that situation if it concerned one of my kids behaving that way. I shared my best advice about first sitting down with the teacher, maybe the school counselor to get some leads on what may be bringing this on. Then sitting down with my kid and talking about it. Anyway, blah-blah-blah, long conversation about it and she had some good ideas as well. Next evening, I get a phone call from her at Toys R Us asking me what would be a better game console for a kid his age, Xbox or Nintendo? WTF? I don’t fucking know… my kids don’t even have one! Really got me thinking about her parenting priorities and style. :rolleyes: And what does it say about her that she rewards bad behaviour this way?
Anyway, it’s just one example in a list of many of her simply not dealing with situations in her life but instead throwing herself into something else that would take attention away from where it needed to be paid.
It’s a shame really. She had potential. If only she would channel her powers for good instead of just more.
I’m no angel. But I’m not so full of my own bullshit to actually buy into the entire lot. I’m definitely making fun of myself. I don’t have my original profile at work but it did serve as fodder for much of my sarcasm. It (the idea) occured to me when I was trying to make it more original because every profile read exactly the same way as mine.
So yeah, plenty of me in there as well.
And here is where it gets into this entire social evolutionary psychology. It won’t come as a surprise to anyone that people tend to date within their own social class and physical attribute class. Yeah, there are dramatic exceptions but they are annecdotal. Mostly 6’s date 6’s and 8’s date 8’s with a fairly common drift up or down the scale by one notch. So I hardly feel it’s necessary for me to applogize if I’m interested in dating someone a bit younger (not unusual for a man) and slim/athletic (similar to me). No more than I can appologize for the fact that I find myself attracted to brunettes more than blondes or women in the mid 5 foot tall range.
So if that’s what constitutes arrogance, well, we’ll just have to agree to disagree on the subject and still respect one another in the morning.
I’m not sure. A lot of men love tall women. Besides, I didn’t pay attention to your height, but for most men, it’s quite uncommon to meet a taller woman. So, I’m not sure it would cross their mind, and if it did, I’m quite convinced that many would like the tall girl, even if she were taller than them.
(As for myself, I don’t care…actually, I never pay attention to a woman’s height. It’s probably the last thing I pay attention to, to a surprising degree. I’ve known a friend for years and only noticed she was very short (1m 48) when she mentionned her height)
Also, a lot of women don’t like men shorter than them.
Ok, I see what you meant now: it’s not so much that the exact same profile is wrong for attractive men but right for average-looking men, it’s that you couldn’t really tell whether he was including himself in the parody and that’s where the reverse discrimination came in. I’m not denying that how someone looks can affect how their profile comes across, it just seemed like an odd kind of … well, reverse discrimination.
I’m not saying that most men wouldn’t go for a taller woman if they met at a bar or something (though I disagree with you that they probably wouldn’t notice), I’m just saying that when you ask a man how tall his ideal hypothetical woman would be I don’t think most – most, not all – would say “taller than me.” And I don’t see anything wrong with that.
Also, the height thing is one of the areas where there can be a difference between real life and online dating. Another example is that online, I’m not interested in anyone younger than 30, but if I were to meet a guy in real life who was great but happened to be 28, I wouldn’t necessarily say “no way.” There have to be some filters online, and I don’t think that a man wanting a woman to be shorter than him is an unreasonable one.
) What does “trophy” mean anyway. That they are attractive by most standards? And that makes me/them shallow and arrogant? You can’t be serious.
