I’m talking here about a woman being in a non-social situation, like sitting on a bus or having some food at McDonald’s, or being in a library, and some strange dude starts chatting her up.So some questions:
When a guy is doing this, isn’t it almost always to get you to have sex with him in the near future?
I notice most women are polite and laugh at his jokes. Is this because you actually find him interesting, because you feel the need to be polite, or is there a fear element since you don’t know this guy or how he’ll react?
Does a woman in this world get even a moment alone outside her own abode?
Are you wiling to listen to a guy’s pitch, or is there no way in hell you’re giving a stranger your phone number just because he was charming on a bus?
If you could stop guys from approaching you in non-social situations, would you want to, or do you figure for every 100 frogs there’s a prince?
Should there be a more commonly known etiquette around such situations, like “don’t approach me at McDonald’s, but it’s okay to approach me in a club or at a party?”
I’m a guy who values his alone time and gets really cranky when someone approaches me. 90% of the time it’s because they want something. But I’m a guy, so it’s not a common occurrence. Maybe once a week. But I see women sitting alone at fast food places, libraries, on buses, and it’s never too long before some dude starts chatting them up. I can only imagine how crazy that must make you. I’d have to stab someone.
I (a man) think we make grave mistakes when we assume that women are markedly different from men in every way (The OP didn’t say that, I acknowledge). I bet that a woman would react to being chatted up similarly to how the OP would:
Are you in a place in life where you are looking to meet new people? Or are you in a committed relationship, or not dating, and not looking?
Are you feeling good? Did you leave the house feeling positive feelings about yourself? Or is today a day where you are literally sick, and just trying to make it back to bed? Or having a day where you’d rather not be sociable, for whatever reason?
Is the person attractive to you? Even if you aren’t looking to “meet someone”, being approached by a beautiful person is going to be more enjoyable than somebody who you find repulsive.
Is the person “normal”? I mean, are they making socially appropriate comments or is this lecherous grunting, at best? Again, even if the person being approached isn’t looking to meet somebody, I bet this can determine how long they are comfortable making pleasantries.
I only see women as different in this case because of how frequently they get approached. When I’m approached, it’s always because someone wants something, or they are a little nuts and want to tell me about the aliens, and occasionally someone just wants to talk. The latter case is rare but not unpleasant. But I also know there’s no expectation that I’m going to be giving this dude the time of day after I get off the bus or leave the McDonald’s.
But for me, if it’s an actual social situation people coming up to me is wonderful and interesting. A party, a club, a synagogue gathering, a wedding. When I’m at a bus stop, that’s unwelcome, although I’m always polite if nothing of material gain is desired. Some people just want to know when the bus might be coming or where it goes.
And sure, attractiveness has a lot to do with the pleasantness of these encounters, but it’s rarely attractive guys chatting up these girls. Attractive guys don’t generally need to aggressively sell themselves to strangers on the bus.
If she’s some combination of young, slender, and attractive, nope.
4)Oh hell no. I have talked again to someone I met on a bus exactly once, and I was the one who made contact. We were FWB for a long time, until he met his wife, since then we’ve just been good friends.
5)Oh gods yes. Please.
I’ve never gone to clubs to find someone to date, and the times I’ve done so at parties I already knew the person, knew they’d be there, and knew I wanted to hook up with them. In general, if I’m interested in you I will approach you, and I’m not subtle - otherwise, feel free to fuck off.
In my younger days, yes. Even when I thought the dude was just making conversation to be sociable, I usually later learned that he hoped he’d get sex out of it.
I’d say 80% just being polite and 20% actually finding him interesting.
If you’re young and/or cute, barely at all. I never thought I was cute, but when I was young I would get approached a lot. Even stupidly offensive things like some guy yelling out his car window as I passed him on my bike, “I wish I was your bicycle seat!” No, that’s not flattering. I can go out without being hassled now that I’m 54 and matronly, though. Isn’t it sad that a woman has to be seen as unattractive in order to be left alone?
No flipping way. Once in college when I was having to work graveyard shift while doing classes during the day, some guy came over in the school lounge and tried to chat me up. Because of my exhaustion, I was annoyed to be bothered by his transparent attempts to chat me up. When he asked me what kind of music I liked, I said I liked hard rock bands like Judas Preist. His eyes bugged out and he asked if I know what the name Judas Priest referred to. I said yes… and grinned ear to ear watching him beat feet out of there.
hell yes. Keep your hormones to yourself.
Maybe but I can’t think of any. The creeps sadly ruin the party for all of the nice guys. Girls quickly learn that a guy never wants to just make friends, he’s always got ulterior motives. Like the time I agreed to go play billiards with this guy who was married. In the middle of the game he started coming onto me and admitted that he expected to have some bed games after the pool games. ew ew ew!
I have made a personal study of this. I have 2 beautiful young daughters. I have watched at malls, in line, even at Doctor and dentist offices, from a distance. You would not believe the men that hit on them. 7th graders to 70yr. olds. My younger daughter was 16, she had the flu and the check in lady put a mask on her. And , no kidding, a 40ish man ask for her number in the waiting room. I was sitting right there. Needless to say he left quickly after I got done with him! My older daughter had a baby on her hip and a man ask her to run away and marry him, we were at a childrens fair at the time. It is seriously scary some of the things happen to my girls, I can only assume it is universal.
Outside of a social situation, I don’t want anyone to talk to me or even acknowledge I exist. Actually, same applies inside a social situation but I don’t want to appear asocial.
So, I would rather not be approached by anyone. But I do feel a little more threatened if it’s a man, just because of past interactions. (“Smile, sweetheart.” Me: No reaction. Certainly not a smile because fuck you. “Okay then you stupid stuck up bitch.” This scenario has happened. More than once.) I am a stupid stuck-up bitch because I don’t smile on command? Okay then, maybe I should just get a t-shirt that says that.
Female here; some times guys do just want to chat. Normally on long bus journeys and the like, when everyone’s just bored. You can tell these guys because they show you a picture of their wife and kids, or say something like “One sec, better text my girlfriend, let her know the bus is running late,” approximately 30 seconds into the conversation.
I actually don’t get guys chatting me up much on the street or generally in public, but I did get them all the damn time at work. Probably because at work I was paid to drop the ‘Fuck off and stop bothering me’ face, which I mastered at about the age of 17 (really, I had a group of guys in a rock nightclub tell me I was kinda terrifying, age 17).
I wouldn’t automatically rule a guy out because we originally got chatting at a library or something, but only if it did feel like a real 2 way conversation, and he was someone I would be friends with. I’m not listening to a ‘pitch’.
Yeah, there can be some exceptions like if you’re on a plane and you happen to be sitting next to a woman, although nowadays with everyone’s nose pointed at their smartphone you’re always going to be interrupting someone if you talk to them. So I just don’t ever bother anyone. I only approach people at social gatherings where you’re supposed to mingle and meet new people. and of course work, since work requires communication and it can be good to network.
You know, The Onion didn’t get to be America’s Finest News Source™ simply by trademarking that phrase. They’re also home to reporting you won’t find anywhere else, including this groundbreaking study out of Stanford a few years ago:
Actually, I enjoy random conversations with strangers. Now that I’m fifty plus, I get the occasional harmless waiting in line talk.
When I was younger, I’d say most of the guys who talked to me were looking for action, but not all. Unless the guys from the latter group just forgot to bring up the action part. Or I missed it. I was kinda naive in those days.
Unless the guy is another John Oliver, I’m not likely to laugh out loud at his jokes. I’ll smile and nod. Yes, it’s mostly politeness. I won’t tell him if I think I’m funnier than he is. I usually am.
Yeah. It’s called Menopause.
I’ll listen, but no, you’re not getting my number. Perhaps if I see you a number of times around and about, and we’ve had some good long talks at the local Starbuck’s for maybe a few months or so, I’ll think about it.
I’m not freaked out by guys talking to me as long as they behave themselves. So no, don’t hang any “Fuck off bozo” signs on me. My answer might’ve been different when I was twenty though.
I’d say back off from someone reading a book, or eating alone in a restaurant. Not sure what iPhone etiquette is. It’s not smooth to yell at them to get through the headphones.
I think it is pretty well known where babies come from. This is not going to happen unless a) someone courteously and tastefully breaks the ice in a public venue, or b) someone is dragged back to the cave by the hair, or c) formal introductions are made at picnics after church.
Well, back in the day, when the birth rate was pretty high, men and women got together by men asking permission from a woman’s parents to court her. Okay, so we live in a more liberated age now, that’s great. But why is the onus still on men to make the first move? Men’s first move is threatening much of the time. So women should make the first move. The current “rules” of society pretty much demand it. At every step.
The simple answer is that division of labor has survival value. If it is assumed that every couple has one hunter and one gatherer, all the hunting and gathering will be done with maximum efficiency. So gender roles are established.
But that comes with some tolerance of aggressive behavior in men, which we’re trying to move away from because in modern society that comes with more bad than good. The only thing women really need protection from these days is men themselves. Which could best be solved by men not being aggressive, rather than finding “good” aggressive men.
Normally I see posts like this and think, “that’s too ridiculous to bother with.” Other times I think it’s just barely worth it to post what a ridiculous bit of ex post facto rationalization something is.
I’m pretty okay with an “introductions and social events only” universe. In fact, I daresay that if that was the universe we all lived in, my social life would be pretty much exactly the same as in this universe.
Or, (d) you’re introduced to each other by a family member or mutual friend, or (e) you use an online dating service. I’m probably not even thinking of several other, more common venues.
It’s one thing if a woman goes to a bar or club that’s known to be a singles’ bar – in that case, there’s a tacit expression that, in that venue, at that time, she’s likely to be interested in meeting men. It’s another thing entirely for a man to walk up to a woman in any public venue, and start to chat with her, with the explicit intent of seeing her as a potential romantic partner. To me (and I’m a guy), I just see that as presumptive and rude.
I absolutely agree with Two Many Cats’ points 4 and 5. Starting a brief, pleasant, respectful conversation with someone in a random place may be OK (but acknowledging that many people aren’t going to be comfortable with Random Person doing even that!), but seeing that as the immediate lead-in to sex or a relationship is, IMO, way off base.
not to mention that “how are tasks divided between the sexes?” bears only fleeting tenuous relationship to “what’s a good method of finding a person you’re interested in, and who finds you interesting?”