Thank you for the kind words Medea. Everything is already better and this is merely me letting off steam from many years ago. The responses are quite interesting and some are unexpected.
Zenster, I found this paragraph particularly ironic. Because the same words can be used to describe a married man’s view of you. Or just an impartial viewpoint describing either side of the argument.
I gotta chime in on the married side (I’m not, but just about as good as)
I love chatting people up at parties, social events, etc.
For a fairly shy guy, I can can be pretty extroverted given the chance.
I love to make people laugh. If I can make them, I will.
Often, if I’m at a gathering and another guy is dominating the conversation/ attention/ laughs, I’ll do my damndest to chime in and one up him laugh-wise. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t. Such is life.
I just take a darwinistic, stongest survive attitude to social gatherings. If you have something more interesting or funnier to say, jump right in. If not, sorry.
I was wondering when someone would notice this. I felt pretty much the same way when I typed it, but left it in out of honesty. All I know is that I refuse to be cut throat about such stuff and I’m real sick of people who are.
I’m a little confused here. You’ve been clear on what you consider the cutthroat behaviour of married men to be, but what are the cutthroat things that you, as a single man, are refusing to do?
Jump into a pre-existing conversation between two other people at a party? 'Cause that ain’t cutthroat, if you do it politely.
Or is it that Taser thing you were talking about? 
I refuse to be so oblivious that I will interfere with the potential happiness of others. It’s a pretty rare commodity these days and I be d@mned if I’m going to shorten the supply.
Zenster, jumping into a conversation is not stealing one single iota of happiness from anyone else. Conversatoins need new input, or they die out. You are not being at all noble, not at all nice, when you decide not to join a pair of people in their conversation.
From what I have seen here over the last few years, you are one of the better spoken dopers, the cream of hte crop. Holding back isn’t doing any guy any favor.
WTF, Zenster are all married or involved men, supposed just stop talking to single women at gatherings, so that you havea clear path in your search for a mate.The op is just not making any sense, do you think that a married man is talking to a single woman because because he’s bored with his wife, C’mon get a grip. Maybe in passing the two found an interesting topic to discuss, what’s cut throat about that?
People talk, sinlge, married, tall, short, smart, ignorant, black, white, all sorts of people, get over it and start conversing, whether or not she is occupied in conversation with a married person or anyone else for that matter.
You know this, the op, has been going on for years, why should the rules change just for you?
The OP strictly address married men who hang all over single women at parties. I do not protest decent conversation or anything of the sort.
I haven’t much in the way of profound to add to this topic. Other than it reminds me of something that happened to me a few years ago. I was taking a night class (Creative Writing.) Met a nice young man in class, we chatted casually for many classes. No big deal. One evening an obviously predatory, attractive female sits next to this guy, horns in, and is obviously interested in the guy. So, I am thinking: “Hey, she’s attractive, he’s single, I’m not really interested in him, so I’ll fade away to give them time together.” So I do just that. And what happens? The guy seems almost desperate to include me back in the conversation. I suspect he was thinking, “Save me!” The woman eventually gives up on him. She was too obvious, he wasn’t interested in her. I suspect he just wanted some nice, easy, casual conversation with someone who had no obvious agenda. (Me.)
So, I guess I am making two points: It’s never a bad idea to “rescue” someone who is being cornered by a “predator”, so jump into the conversation! And another point - sometimes “backing off” is NOT what the object of interest (in my case, the guy) really wants.
The OP said nothing about ‘hanging all over single women’, you were complaining about married men who ‘monopolize the attentions of attractive single women’ by maintaining a ‘stranglehold on the conversation’. I don’t think you would have gotten this kind of reaction if you were talking about married men hanging on single women.
I have to agree with Badtz here Zenster. That may have been what you intended in your OP but it is not what came through at all. It looks like you are back pedaling, trying to make the OP more acceptable in light of the responses.
If you really felt what you described in the OP, fine. It is good to get that out. It is also good to find out that maybe that feeling is based on incorrect assumptions. Maybe it is time to reevaluate that using the responses to the OP.
I don’t believe the characterizations put forth in the thread about you being a single guy on the hunt any more than I believe your characterization of married men at parties as lecherous polecats. Maybe you can see that too?
oh, OK, Zenster…
Do me a favor, though. When the wife and I glide into the foyer, please stop me and let me know you’re there lookin’ to score. Then when I find, much to my shock and dismay, that I’ve accidentally blundered into conversation with an unclaimed female homo sapiens, I can instantly leap free and summon you to take my place. What good fortune I’ve had to discover you on the SDMB today!
Sorry if I wasn’t clear enough on this, but that is exactly what I meant. I think I’ve extolled the dying art of conversation here enough for people to know that I have nothing against social intercourse.
In light of Zenster’s last post, I hereby retract the rude attitude I had in my post. Now I understand your position more clearly. I also disapprove of married men dumping their wives at the door and hitting on other women at a party (unless it’s one of those parties).
I didn’t want to believe that someone who could come up with this recipe for ribs could be such an ass as the OP presented. I’m glad to be proven wrong about you.
Thanks BooBoo I appreciate your decent attitude. I didn’t think I was being so ambiguous in the OP, but evidently I was.
Having watched firsthand the effects of infidelity on my parents’ marriage, I’ll freely confess to a degree of overreaction, but I still maintain that the specific sort of (now clarified) behavior I cite in the OP is reprehensible.
[QUOTE]
*Originally posted by Zenster *
**
No problem, Buddy. I completely agree that the sort of behavior you mention is very improper for married people to engage in at a party, or anywhere else for that matter. Harmless conversation is one thing, but a come on is something completely different.
Zenster,
I guess I’ll have to take your word that the clarification is what you really meant.
However, I have read and reread the OP and responses and it sounds an awful lot like:
“I don’t like cherries!”
“What do you mean you don’t like cherries?! Cherries are great!”
“What I obviously meant was, I don’t like sour, rotten cherries! Regular old cherries are fine.”
I am glad you clarified your position; however, I do think that the fact that you see this behavior everywhere while most of us see it rarely suggests that you are sometimes assuming the worst about people’s motives. I think the reason so many people reacted so strongly to your OP is that it makes all of us married people worry retroactively about every party we’ve been to: “That whole time I was talking to [single guy] were all the single girls resenting me? Did they think I was a slut who’d sleep around because I took the time to tell the host his spinach dip rocked and that grew into a conversation about the Incas?” Remember that gentle flirting is a pastime of many (male and female) and that it dosen’t mean someone is forsaking their marrige vows.
I think that blur has the best response with the turn about is fair play. I think that is the only way to beat them at their own game. I think otherwise guys don’t give a rats ass if she is single or married, if they can get off on a conversation with a pretty girl they will do it no matter who is in the room. They will never change either. It is the selfish nature of men in general. Listen to yourselves. All of you reply with “Hey every man for himself and being married has nothing to do with it” I rest my case.