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PaperclipPerfector  1mo ago (text post)   2640 thread views

Friday Fun Thread for September 27, 2024

Be advised: this thread is not for serious in-depth discussion of weighty topics (we have a link for that), this thread is not for anything Culture War related. This thread is for Fun. You got jokes? Share 'em. You got silly questions? Ask 'em.

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This might read as CW, but it's not!

What are The Motte's thoughts on:

Women asking out men, or proposing is.. icky?

To me, it's finnnneeeee. I see no issues or implications to it. I've been explicitly asked out by girls thrice before, and I agreed for two of them. I didn't think of them as lesser "women" or feel emasculated by it, if anything, I thought of them more highly for doing that.

But talking/reading around, it seems to me a lot of people find the idea of a girl asking out a guy, or even more so a girl proposing a guy really icky. They can't explain what's icky about it, but I think it's something like the lines of the girl being a man and the man being a girl. I know their reaction is visceral, but I find it puzzling.

It seems to be a 50:50 split of men and women hating it with, 50% of the people hating it.

A man who doesn't pay for dates is a woman

Okay, read the comments on this insta reel: https://instagram.com/p/C9u0_gqxGRo/

Holy cow, women really hate the idea! Really really hate it.

I can see the defense if it were along the lines of, 'the initiator pays' and since the man is the initiator most of the time, the man pays de facto. Other than not being a fan of unclear messaging, (why describe the inference and not the model?), I don't think most of the pressed women actually mean that. They literally believe the man has to pay.

Once again... I don't see the big deal! Sometimes she can pay, sometimes I can pay. I probably won't bring this up in the future given some women are sooo vehemently against it, I can't make heads or tails of it.

Like I don't get it, if the man is actually a man, his manliness or whatever will be so overwhelming that something as simple as splitting the bill on a date wouldn't even make a dent to it.

Seems like a 90:10 split of f:m hating it with almost all of the haters being female.

I feel like I am peering into some kind of lower class bubble where displays of masculinity and femininity need to be that much more in your face because there isn't that much of it to begin with? IDK, I feel like these people are operating at a more animalistic level than me. And this stresses the fuck out of me because I am evidently in the minority and can't model other humans.

I'm not a progressive or liberal by any stretch, but I really don't see what the "conservatives" are on about here.

Back in my single days, I would pay for the first round of drinks, for the mating ritual.

80% of the time, she would offer to pay for the next round, which I was fine with. I don't think it was a political thing (it was too common for that). Rather, I think she was trying to avoid me thinking worse of her, which I may do if I thought she was a gold-digger or whatever.

Interestingly, if she didn't offer to pay for the next round, that was a pretty reliable signal that she'd say no to a second date.

I haven't been single in over a decade. I remember the norm being to split the bill, I'd sometimes pick it up as the guy. If I picked it up though there was more of an expectation that something physical was happening later. I also tended to date professional working women. It was a point of pride for them that they did not need me to pay for their date.

The other thing I remember was going on "reverse dates" basically one of us went to the other's place first, did some fun activities, then we went out to dinner. I might have picked up those checks more often, but I can't say with any certainty.

In terms of who asks out who, generally it was just men because they had more interest. I don't see anything wrong with a woman asking someone out.

A woman doing a marriage proposal feels very wrong. But I suppose in some specific circumstances it could make sense. Typically men are the more reluctant ones to get married. For the sake of both involved its better if the reluctant party enthusiastically signals that they are over their reluctance and ready to get married. Maybe if a man asks a woman to marry him, and the woman says no, but they continue dating then the ball should be in her court to ask him to get married. Describing and thinking of that kind of scenario doesn't feel nearly as icky as a woman just proposing first.

For the record, I agree with you, but there is some irony in saying that when it comes to asking someone out for dates, the more interested party should do so, but when asking someone for marriage, the more reluctant party should instead.

Asking someone out potentially will benefit both parties and neither risks very much, so it isn't strange to me for either sex to do this. Marriage, however, is generally one-sided in terms of which party stands to gain and which stands to lose, so it is off-putting for women to be doing the proposing. I only really think this because of who is typically the breadwinner. If a young broke guy were with a wealthy woman, I'd also find it off-putting if the broke guy were pushing for marriage.

I feel like I am peering into some kind of lower class bubble where displays of masculinity and femininity need to be that much more in your face because there isn't that much of it to begin with?

I think it might be worse than that. Sites like TikTok and Instagram take the worst tendencies of the extremely-online typifified by Twitter, 4chan, Tumblr, Et Al and market them to the masses.

They aren't looking for influencers they're looking for influencees

I’d be more than down for a chick asking me out for a change. I wouldn’t feel emasculated either but rather flattered. I’d also feel relieved that for once, I don’t have to do a hard-carry through the entire process (only most of it).

I don’t think it’s happened a single time to me after high school, though. Even when it did (seldomly) happen back in those days, it was in the form of “teehee we should hang out some time 😊”, where I’d then have to take the reins and drive the interaction forward to make any actual hanging out occur.

I can see the defense if it were along the lines of, 'the initiator pays' and since the man is the initiator most of the time, the man pays de facto.

“The initiator pays” is but some retconned excuse for women to justify why men should pay while trying to preserve their Wonderfulness under a lipstick feminist framework, since almost always the initiator is the man. The rule might as well be “the taller one pays.”

That being said, especially nowadays I generally pay for women on dates. Usually for first dates, this just consists of sending her a taxi or rideshare to pick her up to bring her to my place, and one to send her back after or the next day. If we order food later, it’d be through a delivery account of mine and I’m not exactly going to send her an invoice for her half.

If we do go out later to a bar or club or something, I’ll pay as it makes for a better, smoother experience. Having to pause to split a check interrupts the momentum and her feeling of “omg one thing led to another and it just like happened.” Even beyond the first date, it risks offending her princess complex and/or triggering the ick.

Doing the asking out and/or proposing takes a level of agency, courage, and initiative that women generally lack. Bumble requiring women to message first just mostly resulted in women messaging “hi” or “hi :)” such that the men would need to take the wheel and lead the conversation. And even that was too much for women, hence Bumble exploring other avenues beyond women messaging first.

Getting proposed to indulges the aforementioned princess complexes of women. It’s her special moment where her man bends the knee to present her with a shiny expensive trinket that she can wear and showoff around acquaintances, friends, family. In contrast, the thought of doing the asking out or proposing is insulting. She is the prize, why should she need to grovel? Ugh, gross. Romance and courtship should be something that just happens to her.

It’s always funny to see threads in the AIO, AITA, relationship advice type subreddits that involve a female OP complaining about her boyfriend not proposing. Sometimes, buried in Controversial, someone asks “Sounds like you want to get married more than he does; why don’t you propose?” The way female Redditors try to square this circle is by saying that women are Socialized to be proposed to rather than doing the proposing, thus the boyfriend should do the Bare Minimum and propose to her if he cares about her. If not for the oppressive effects of the patriarchy, of course, women would be just as agentic as men.

Mann unprivate ur profile I wanna read ur other comments, always a comedy show

No comment on the bulk of your post, but regarding reddit I'm not convinced the vast majority of the posts in any advice subreddit (in particular relationship subs or AITA ,[Am I The Asshole]) aren't just the same random people typing imaginary, usually wildly implausible scenarios for trolling purposes and/or to keep the subs active.

Most of What You Read on the Internet is Written by Insane People

I imagine that bots have begun to displace the trans-rights tumblr furries in the 6 years since that post was written but the principle holds.

At least one such troll keeps a list.

I don't think it qualifies as successful trolling if your post is removed by the moderators or people just tell you to seek professional help. The whole point of trolling is people taking the bait and getting riled up, that is, spending more time replying to you than you spent time writing the original message.

On the topic of going Dutch on dates, I don't know if the norms are different in India or if I had better luck than usual, but I'm pretty sure that's how I did it for the overwhelming majority of dates. I can think of only one date where she outright asked me to pay, and I would consider that a "vetting" date, because afterwards she offered to go Dutch. All the steady relationships I've had, we've split bills or at least alternated paying.

Personally, I'd be rather annoyed if someone expected me to foot the bill. I could potentially see myself doing it if there was a massive gulf between incomes, for example if they were a broke college student, but that would very much be the exception, not the norm. I'd consider someone who never veered from that approach tantamount to a gold digger, and give them the cold shoulder ASAP. I've never felt the need to impress women by flaunting my wealth either. Anyone who resorts to doing that loses esteem in my eyes.

Those are both really stupid ideas, and I lose a lot of respect for anyone who actually holds people to them. In particular, pressuring women into not asking men out is just making things worse for every man out there. Women already have a tendency to not say what they mean and give cryptic hints at things, much to the chagrin of men everywhere. Encouraging them to double down on it is the last thing we should be doing.

pressuring women into not asking men out is just making things worse for every man out there.

In fact, doing so continues to uphold sexist and patriarchal gender norms that stereotype men as active initiators and women birthing persons as passive receptors. All women who do not ask men out are in fact enabling patriarchy and lending tacit assent to the existing status quo.

Questioning such heteronormative cultural attitudes regarding traditional gender roles by requiring birthing persons to ask men out is therefore a civic and ethical duty for every birthing person to fulfill in the fight to smash the patriarchy.

Women already have a tendency to not say what they mean and give cryptic hints at things

As someone who identifies as a birthing person, I demand that you retract this blatantly misogynistic and hateful stereotype of birthing persons.

Not funny, didn't laugh.

If a man has not already asked a woman out, it's either because she has failed to entice him with visual signals and flirting, or he is too socially incompetent or low self esteem to be worthy.

If batting your eyes and saying, "You know, I like spending time with you," doesn't work, then best to cut losses then and there. Guy isn't going to know the first thing about building a good life together.

If batting your eyes and saying, "You know, I like spending time with you," doesn't work

This is clearly ‘asking a guy out’, though.

What is actually likely to happen is that he, in a literal sense, will conclude that she likes spending time with him - that's it. Nothing more.

Sure, if you swallow all the feminist propaganda about men being the same as women, and how just because a woman is sending [insert signal here] doesn't mean she's interested, that makes sense. Otherwise it's just failing the 'tism test.

Women vastly overestimate how clear their deliberate outward presentation is to observer's, much less thoughtless presentation. Leaning forward and pushing ones chest out may be an tremendous effort for a woman that is blindingly obvious to other girls who understand the effort made, but to guys we literally have no clue it could be happening.

Bearing in mind that our own lived experiences will feature a gigantic amount of inconsistent behaviors from different women, and any man who lacks mind reading and errs on the side of caution will find the mental effort of parsing microbehaviors too exhausting.

The alternative is to he a dweeb who thinks every friendly interaction with a woman is a sign of her wanting to fuck. These guys are the worst, mainly because their mechanistic approach to parsing sexual receptiveness captures the error bound of drunk/lonely/bored women who decide to catch some strange for the hell of it regardless of the womans actual effectiveness in displaying receptiveness. With a statistically high rate of success to expended effort for the shithead guys, this reinforces shitty behaviors of both men and women. The guys think their shitty pickup lines and NPC flirt phrases are actually good tools to get women, the women think their subtlest of subtle hints was sufficient to bag a dude without seeming desperate. Women are more likely to regret their choice of bedpartner after coitus, but till the deed is done women are as capable as men in deluding themselves that their chosen partner is a prize worthy of the expended effort.

Unlike others I won't disagree with you, though I'd suggest that what you say is true arguably only after he has reached a sufficient point in life that he accepts the notion that any girl might find him attractive. Many, many guys take a surprising number of years to figure this out, despite the eyelid batting or coquettish arm touching of whatever female has been pitilessly tasked by destiny with sharing space in time and a Buick with him. (Oh for the return of bench car seats).

I suppose this doesn't even bear reiterating but I'll state it anyway: Boys need time to figure out their role in dating. This has always been true, and if it's never modeled for them by anyone (or is modeled, but with grave inaccuracy, in, for example media) the process runs the risk of turning them into man-boys or themselves feminine enough that they wait around for some luckless girl to brain them with a metaphorical steam iron of romantic know-how.

I recall my first prelude to actually having sexual intercourse (apologies if this is TMI but I won't get graphic) I was with a woman considerably older (or so it seemed at the time I was 22 and she was 31). We were sprawled on some church steps under the African night sky, having left our companions at some outdoor bar. Her exact words to my fumbling passivity: "Are you afraid to screw me?" Only the fact that she was clearly wanting me to pursue the matter (I didn't, not at that moment, that would occur another night, in a tent, largely by accident) kept me from having to excuse myself to step out into the bush (no pun. I mean actual bushveldt) from the shame of it. I felt like a boychild both rewarded and scolded at the same time. This rapidly accelerated my level of prowess however. I did not immediately become Rico Suavé (I probably never did) but through this moment and others like it I reached a level of sufficient competence that enabled me to function romantically. And though I eventually broke up with this same woman rather (unintentionally) cruelly, she taught me a lot.

Whenever I hear of a couple who hitched up young and with both having relatively little or no experience, I think they're either extraordinarily lucky or just blessed with great tolerance.

This is the perfect microcosm of the female vs the male view of reality.

Has a guy ever asked you out by saying that he likes spending time with you and leaving it at that?

The best way I've heard it explained is that it's not asking a guy (or anyone) out if there's plausible deniability. Batting your eyes and giving hints doesn't meet this threshold.

No. No it is not.

I feel your bewilderment too... I've had married women say shit like this to me and much worse, so they are willing to be homewrecked but not ask explicitly? But at the same time she a girl whos single and lives alone could say this just as a friend!!

Is the woman saying this while batting their eyes? Acting bashful or coy? Are her hands clasped behind her or is she leaning forward? She might actually want you to flirt back. But that doesn't mean she would accept a proposition. She might want a proposition, to stroke her ego, but she wouldn't accept it.

It's about posture and context. "I would like to spend more time alone with you" is way different from "I'm glad you were the one assigned to this task" or "I like to hang out with our group of friends, of which you are one." It's the woman's job to figure out how to get across "I would like to spend more time alone with you" without crossing the line of plausible deniability (because if she has to throw herself at a man, he's probably not invested in her.)

Is it fair that it's this way? Women have the more vulnerable role in continuing the species. She needs a man who will actually support her, and that is generally a man who seeks her out.

She needs a man who will actually support her, and that is generally a man who seeks her out.

This is not true at all. There are a lot of men who are good men and are going to support their woman, but aren't mind readers who can magically tell that a woman's statement of friendship was actually meant to be taken as a statement of romantic desire. If anything, choosing men who read into things is going to select against getting decent men, because jerks are more likely to not care about the woman's intent and just go for it.

It worked for me.

because jerks are more likely to not care about the woman's intent and just go for it.

That's one good reason to avoid being alone with a guy for the first several dates and to save sex for marriage. Helps weed out the jerks.

All the traditions work together, we can't just throw away one and expect it to work.

It worked for me.

Well, I met my wife online and she initiated contact. So that means waiting for women to ask you out is a winning strategy, right? ;)

My point wasn't that it's impossible to find a good man following your heuristic. My point was that a) many people ruled out by your heuristic are in fact good men, and b) your heuristic is more likely to rule in bad men. You're right that you can compensate for point B in other ways. And point A doesn't mean all good men are ruled out. But it's still a very flawed heuristic even if you can succeed while following it.

More comments

Some of the split might be terminology then. For me, "asking out" means to set the time and venue for a date.

Unfortunately for the nerds out there - no it is not.

If batting your eyes and saying, "You know, I like spending time with you," doesn't work, then best to cut losses then and there. Guy isn't going to know the first thing about building a good life together.

Or he's young and literal minded ..

It's the same picture.

Furthermore, odds are that he's stringing you along.

Re the second point, it's been shown over and over and over that if someone likes someone they'll let them get away with vastly worse behaviour than splitting the bill. I think it's spoofed status signalling. Those women like to be seen on social media as so in demand that they can reject any man who doesn't cater to them.

I wouldn't be surprised if it was exactly the women who have previously failed to reject the worse behaviour who feel the need to make these counter signals.

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