This has always been my M.O. as well. If I were a guy and dating a woman who wanted me to spend lots of money on her without any kind of monetary reciprocaton (owing “favors” just squicks me out), I would stop dating her.
Nevermind discourse.
But the way this works is you date the woman a couple of times, feel obligated to pay for dinner, then she’s on to the next guy. Or you’re actually together and things change and get more fair. The first scenario is overwhelmingly likely, over many relationships. The second can be quite rare. It’s not a game she’s playing, she’s not preying on you, it’s just how dating works.
I have posted dozens of polls.
I don’t exactly know what a “poll title” is.
I don’t know where “inside the poll” is.
I don’t know where “outside the poll” is.
Do “Build Poll”. Next, click on the gear icon and you get this:
The “inside the poll” title is at the top. If you do it any other way, it’s “outside the poll”
There’s several other interesting/fun options in that dialog.
If I’ve dated you twice, I’ve either paid for my own dinner, or bought one for you. 
It never occurred to me to click the gear icon!
Non-straight person here… isn’t it kind of obvious that the person who does the inviting pays, and after more than a couple of dates the initiative either starts to come from both people, or it’s not working out? Or is there a rule that women aren’t allowed to ask guys out? I know they weren’t in the 50s, but I would be surprised to hear that that’s still the custom.
My impression was that most of these gendered rules had now either switched from “woman” to “person” (as in “you hold the door for a woman > a person”) or else gone by the wayside (“the man walks on the street side of the woman” or whatever it was).
YMMV, but there are relationships in which, no matter how long it’s gone on, the man is default expected to pay for everything.
…I’ve been in one of them.
Well the cadence is usually the first date is something low key - drinks, coffee. Maybe meet at the beach or park. Dinner may happen but probably next time.
Next date is something you both decided would be fun on the first date. Hiking, biking, dinner, live music, could be anything.
If you bought me - the guy - dinner on the 2nd date, the first ‘real’ date, I’d think things aren’t going well at all and wouldn’t expect to see you again. I’d be pleasantly surprised to be wrong.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
I’ve never made a poll on this site. I don’t even know how to make a poll.
Start a reply in a thread. Click on the ‘gear’ icon at top right:
Choose “build poll” and follow the prompts.
Yeah, me, too. Maybe it’s (was) different in other parts of the country?
Online dating changed the cadence. The first date is when you meet. The second date you go out because you may like each other. Maybe you’re thinking of the third date in this scenario.
When I met my wife she was recently divorced and had three kids and no money. I had some money, so I paid when we went out. Over time, she’d invite me over and cook for me now and then. I was never uncomfortable “paying for everything.”
Yeah, but that’s based on the specific situations and therefore totally reasonable. My husband almost always pays for meals when we go out, but that’s because of how we have agreed to divide our budget, not because he’s the man (or, in this case, one of the men).
I’d hope that any couple would divide their entertainment budget fairly, but what’s “fair” depends on the couple. I suppose one could factor in a tax on male privilege, but I would think that having stuff bought for you 100% of the time would be infantilizing rather than romantic.
For the superheroes, I voted “other,” but only because I’m most fond of various animated series.
It doesn’t necessarily. Even the first date can be split between the two; or can be going someplace that costs little or nothing. Or if going by the ‘person doing the inviting pays’ standard, the person being paid for can say ‘OK, but the next one’s on me’ – thereby making it clear that if there is more than one date, they’re going to be alternating.
I thought that had gone out of style years ago. When the presumption was that the woman shouldn’t have a paid job, it made a certain amount of sense – though there’s never been a time in this society when some significant number of women didn’t need to have one.
If the two people have drastically different incomes, something needs to be worked out. But what gets worked out shouldn’t depend on who’s what gender.
ETA: Sometimes it’s worked out between established couples that one of them pays for everything – because it’s agreed that only one of them has a paid job, while the other one’s doing other things to contribute to the marriage, or the other one’s for whatever reason unable to get or to hold a paid job. That shouldn’t depend on who’s what gender, either. And it doesn’t really apply to a dating relationship.
Maybe I’m wrong, but I get the impression there’s a lot of non-single people here opining about how dating works.
I could not vote in the Joker/Batman/Superman polls because I have not seen them all.
The Superman poll, shockingly, neglected Bud Collyer, star of the first radio program; Kirk Alyn, star of the two matinee serials before George Reeves; Bob Holiday, star of the Broadway musical; and David Wilson, star of the TV version of the Broadway show. 
I was torn between Mark Hamill and Jack N. Heath Ledger gave a wonderfully great performance- but to me wasnt the Joker at all.
Reeves was the best Superman.