I just want to talk at the fellas here. Man to man.
If you do this shit, the women will leave and not come back. I know the incels are going to think that’s typical female behavior, and I’m here to say, no, it’s not. It’s typical for someone, of any gender, to want to exit a situation where they feel vulnerable, and that’s what is happening.
Think of it like this: you end up in prison, and your naked, alone, you have no allies or friends, while taking a shower with about 100 other dudes, and Bubba comes over with a grin saying “you’re awful pretty”. How would you feel? I’m guessing you would want to nope the hell out of there and never take a shower with Bubba in the room, ever again. And that’s natural. You were in danger, you want to avoid that danger. While the circumstances might be different for the women you’re interacting with, that raw emotion, the exact same one you would have felt with Bubba talking about how pretty you are, the feeling that gave you, it’s exactly the same.
Now think, after Bubba made such a statement, what could Bubba do to win your trust to shower next to them again at all? Probably not much. Same deal fellas. There’s little to nothing you can do or say to make them feel comfortable being around you when you’ve done something that inspires that unsafe feeling of danger.
Now, how could Bubba avoid the situation of you feeling like you’re in danger and wanting to get out of there. A reassurance? Like Bubba instead saying “don’t worry, I’ll protect you”… You’re going to wonder “from what?” Because until Bubba spoke up, you had no feeling of danger. How does that make you feel? Well, I would feel like there’s danger that Bubba knows about that I don’t, so now I’m on edge, looking for what Bubba is talking about, and all of a sudden, I’m having the same feeling of danger, just this time from an unknown assailant. That’s not good either. I’d still want to gtfo and not go back. Worse now since I don’t know what the danger actually is. Not only would I not want to shower with Bubba nearby like in the previous scenario, but now I don’t want to be left alone with anyone.
Same deal fellas. By trying to reassure the lady, you imply that there’s danger indirectly; she gets creeped out and leaves to not come back.
So, what’s the right thing to do here?
It’s easier than you think. Treat them like you would any of your male friends. Treat them like a person. You don’t need to reassure your male friends that you’ll protect them, nor do you feel the need to defend them when their “honor” is challenged. Let them handle it, but have their back if they need you… and only if they need you.
Be a friend first, and if something happens that makes your relationship with that person, more than just friends, so much the better. Don’t expect it, women aren’t slot machines, where you put in enough tokens of niceness and eventually you win the sex jackpot. It doesn’t work that way. It never has, and it never will. You can’t force someone to like you, and if you try, you’ll either take any attraction that they might have had for you, and destroy it, and/or simply cause them to feel unsafe and creeped out, and they’ll find a way to exit and never return.
People, regardless of gender, just want to do things they enjoy. If you also enjoy those things, then engage in the enjoyment of those things with the other people who enjoy them. Don’t make it about gender. If, beyond that, you both like eachother, you’ll find a way to spend more time together and that’s when things can grow to more than just being friendly, as long as you’re both agreeable to it.
If you continually obsess over the fact that their anatomy is different, you’ll end up filling whatever negative ideas you have about the other gender, and push yourself so deep into a hole of confirmation bias that you may never recover. Just be people. Treat others the same, as people.
I believe in you. You can do better. Always improving.
You will fall, you will be rejected, you will have set backs. And that’s all normal. It’s a part of learning. You got this.
Lemmy is the best social media platform out there, holy shit
Good, that you finally realize. :p
This is some nice advice but
Treat them like you would any of your male friends.
Don’t do this. Understand that you wouldn’t do this with any random guy either. As with any new acquaintances everyone is cautious in the beginning and women more so. Whether you find the new girl appealing or not all you have to do is cautiously get to know her through your interactions with her, like any other relations you may build with initial strangers and get used to their presence and predilections.
You’re telling me not to rip a wicked funny fart and sock her hard in the shoulder when she’s too much of a panty waist to laugh? Pfsh.
Some guys have no idea how to talk to chicks.
SHHH!! Don’t say that shit out loud you’re gonna raise the competition.
Think of it like this: you end up in prison, and your naked, alone, you have no allies or friends, while taking a shower with about 100 other dudes, and Bubba comes over with a grin saying “you’re awful pretty”. How would you feel?
Erect?
Thank you for this. You are eloquently and (hopefully) non-threateningly (is that even a word?) stating a message that really, really needs to be said again and again until everyone friggin’ gets it.
Trust is at its most basic a finite resource. Whenever a person messes up they recover by giving some of that trust away. Eventually that trust runs out. In rare cases you can regain some of it. However, in the vast majority of situations you’ll never get back all that trust lost.
So spend wisely.
Or rather don’t spend at all.
Meanwhile I just try to have normal conversation but they go for avoidance manuever right away.
It can often be how you go about it. If you just dive in and start talking to them, even if well intentioned and you literally do just want to talk to someone new about whatever, because of all those past experiences of guys only trying to do that to get with them, they’ll see you as probably just another one of those creepos.
It’s a dance, and it’s an annoying one at times for sure, and it takes practice. If you can recall the last time you tried to strike up a conversation, or next time it happens, afterwards, really stop and think about it from the other person’s perspective. If you know a woman you trust, try asking her to go over the whole interaction with you.
In college I was a major incel neckbeard loser and truly was the epitome of the green text above. I’m not proud of it. I took a chance and asked a few women I knew why I kept being single and lonely and if they could advise. They did exactly that for me. Took me through some of my interactions, explained where I went wrong, and helped me reframe my thoughts. I now am pretty much always able to strike up a conversation wherever I’m at.
TL:DR - find someone you trust to walk you through the why. You got this
I see, maybe that was it, even tho I did not have intention to get accustomed to. Btw idk why I am downvoted that much, do people think I am lying? Huh. I thought it was possible to be interested in becoming friends, even tho it is towards women…
Also, people do not know of those who avoid just based on looks?
Sure there’s people out there who will avoid you based on looks but usually though it’s something else. If you’re confident, kind, and properly socializing, then looks often don’t matter.
The thing about looks that matter is how you present yourself. Keep up the hygiene, keep your clothes cleaned, and just present your best self as a person.
I say this as a fat dude who hasn’t bought new clothes in 10+ years and even then bought what I liked not what was in style. I still do just fine. For us men, our look is in our attitude.
You seem like you really want to find the answer to getting out there but you’re getting in your own head. Just let it slide, go have fun, don’t focus on other people, don’t worry about past slip ups once you’ve learned from them, maybe find a mentor. You do that, and the rest will happen. It just takes time and patience.
TIL - asking someone on a date is the equivalent of prison rape.
If this is what you gleaned from reading all of that then yes, YOU asking someone on a date may be the equivalent of prison rape.
It’s really unfortunate that the people that need to read that top comment most are incapable of processing it
Bubba here.
I’m a nice guy: I give some small, cute dude a compliment and he acts like a total bitch about it? I’m the “creep” because I jokingly asked him if he wants to come back to my cell? Oh, my comments make him uncomfortable? Give me a fuckin’ break.
Maybe if he doesn’t want guys checking him out he should stop acting and dressing like such a slut.
It’s the implication
So…asking someone on a date implies you’re going to prison rape them.
Found the “Bubba” in this scenario…
Imma be real with you. I ain’t reading all that.
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I can summarize: It’s an appeal to reason written from the perspective of a nice, caring, socially aware man called Bubba, who doesn’t understand why women run from him when he approaches them in the shower.
Tldr?
Tldr?
Don’t be a dickhead.
Treat women as if they were just people
Don’t ask girls out. The end.
for you, probably a good life rule.
Thanks Chat GPT-4, life is so much better since you came along!
This text is not from generative AI like GPT-4.
How do I know?
- Its original, e.g. the part around bubba. And with original I do not mean the exact phrase but the idea of the simile.
- Is is not generic. A genAI always resorts to getting very generic the longer the text it is forced to generate is.
- I does not follow a usual structure. genAI resorts to following a language teachers paradigm. Introduction, main part, conclusion.
and other minor signs.
This is just a fellow human giving solid advice.
Thank you GPT-4.5, you truly are an update.
I really wish this didn’t have a giant kernel of truth to it. I’ve had to leave so many tables because such a large percentage of people insist on making it weird, that I largely have given up.
On more than one occasion, there has been a dude that intentionally played a lesbian character upon learning that I would be playing and not so subtly directed the million unnecessary sexual advances at me in an indirect manner.
Apart from that general incel style bullshit, there seems to always be a fucking white knight nice guy that refuses to see past my rl gender and acknowledge that I am playing something like a male half orc stereotypical barbarian.
D&D has been a huge passion of mine since the 2e days, and I really understand that it draws in people that tend to be socially inexperienced and/or impeded in some way (hell, I’m one of them), but at this point I am trying to play with 40+ year-old men that are fine in social situations outside of the game, but once the session starts they immediately get creepy.
I know this is long and ranting, but I think there are a lot of people that need to hear it. Even if the overall tone of the game is light-hearted and silly, you still need to be a fucking adult when interacting with other adults.
I know when you are pretending to look at your phone as an excuse to stare at my tits. Stop.
I would recommend learning how to play roll20 (free to play virtual table top) and finding a westmarches Discord server. I moved to an area where I have zero friends and got into playing dnd that way. It’s pretty fun, flexible scheduling, out of game roleplaying whenever. I’m a 38 y/o cis male so I can’t say there will be no issues, cus I never really experienced them at all. I’d totally imagine you’d have a different, and hopefully better, experience than irl games. Feel free to DM if you’d like more info.
I second this. There are some really great Discord communities to play on that I’m part of. Generally, it’s much easier to keep the creeps out by just banning them. It doesn’t have to be a Westmarches server, but any TTRPG server with an actual community that runs game on the server itself, instead of just another LFG fishing pond.
I know when you are pretending to look at your phone as an excuse to stare at my tits. Stop.
While this may be true, I brought a laptop on a game yesterday and I’m not sure the girl on the opposite side of the table didn’t think something like that when my eyes were on top of the screen. Which was a lot of times, because naturally all the people are above the screen and only the keyboard and the table are below the screen.
So - please consider the fact that if there’s a direct line of sight to your tits, and someone has to look in that general direction, they may occasionally from time to time look there. And also that due to, eh, basic uncontrollable instincts they may do that unconsciously a bit more than they need. Like looking at a bunch of pencils and noticing the red ones more than the grey ones.
Also when I talk to girls about my hobbies, they very often apparently perceive this as some nonsense to get romantic. Usually that means that they gradually ignore me more and more and refuse to believe that it’s more complex. Though kinda recently (and long ago before that which led to a trauma, but eh) it was me who thought that they are fine with talking about hobbies, while being more romantic was expected, eventually led to being ignored too.
At least in the adult world, I think most women can differentiate looking around the room/staring into space and staring at their tits.
I assure you, they’re the experts. 🤣
I also included staring at their tits unconsciously, when not thinking where they are staring, or unintentionally. All more probable due to instincts.
… How the hell do you pretend to look at your phone but also look at tits… I need to know for… Reasons lol.
camera? also, no.
No way people actually do that
Yeah that’s why I’m wondering. Do they point their camera at her tits and look at them through the phone and pretend to type or something? Wouldn’t everyone else see the boobs on the camera?
Why not just stare off into space? I already hate looking people in the face so looking at their chest is like second nature to me. Where is anyone else going to look when everyone is ideally facing each other around a DnD table. Up?
I’d be bored of seeing Diana of Ephesus’ tits after the third session even if she came in without a shirt lol.
This is why a lot of women keep our nerdy hobbies to ourselves and don’t really talk about them much in public.
People get weird.
Really liked your work in The Baby
It’s spelled Barbie
My wife plays FPS games and doesn’t even speak because the moment she does, half the dudes feel like they need to show off and get her attention, and the other half get sexually frustrated and laser focus on only her.
In counter strike it seems to manifest pretty quickly as misogyny.
There’s no need to speak in online games anyway. I never use a mic or headset to play games like that, I still just use the chat. Voice chat always off.
I only play FPS in VR and the male/female interactions are weirdly wholesome. Literally never seen the behaviours that are sadly the norm in flatscreen gaming. I’m still not sure why this is the case, maybe the reporting system is just better, or it’s something to do with feeling more present in VR.
I’m done with the bars and their drunks, and the apps with the spying, out of school, and don’t date coworkers, the advice given to me every time I complain about the fact that there are no other “third places” to meet women romantically 100% of the time is “get a hobby.” Well, see above. There is no place, women do not want to be talked to anywhere but the bar or apps which ime have been bad places to find long-term companionship.
Can we do something about this? Can we maybe start “bars” where the focus isn’t alcohol but it is socially acceptable to say “hey I think you’re cute wanna go get some damn coffee?”
I love tabletop gaming but unless it’s a very large very active group that meets frequently, it’s not a great choice for meeting people for dating purposes. (It is great for making friends, though).
Even when it is a large group, there are better choices, in my experience.
Better ways, IMHO: Volunteering, joining a large church, joining a coed sports league, or joining a large music ensemble (choirs in particular are great).
But you still need to use common sense. To meet available people, you need to go where the available people are. If you volunteer to deliver meals to the elderly, that’s truly wonderful, but you probably won’t meet the person of your dreams doing that.
Volunteering maybe. Church is crazy, you want me to join a whole ass religion just to meet a woman and then what, pretend to be christian for the rest of my life?! I’d sooner go back to the drink! Sports I’m not really into, and everyone keeps saying “don’t just do it to meet women” but like, that’s exactly what I’d be doing. Idk maybe like ping pong or something but idt we have a local ping pong league near me, I’ll look. Choirs are very churchy are they not? That’d be the same as either sports or church in either case, depending.
Yes, “where are the people” is essentially my question. Some insist “literally everywhere, just do the thing and let em complain, fuck em” which seems to be the leading suggestion. Another dude said his area has singles hikes and shit so I’m gonna check that out too if my area does.
There are plenty of non-church choirs and music groups. That is, if you live in a decent-sized city. If you have some musical ability, it’s a great way to mingle.
Community theater and improv groups are other possibilities. Sometimes they are looking for volunteers to do a variety of jobs. It’s not all about performing.
I wasn’t suggesting you fake being religious just to attend a church. I’m an atheist myself, but I was raised in the church. The only things I miss about it are the socializing and some of the music. I thought if you were already religious, you could find a larger church. (I got flirted with a lot in church.)
And I’ll point out that some religions like Bhudism and New Age spiritualism can be more like philosophy than religion, depending on the group. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with attending out of curiosity. They expect a few “seekers” to visit.
There are also things like adult education. Cooking classes, dance classes, and the like. Also book reading clubs. Not ideal, but better than sitting at home.
Good luck. I know it’s highly challenging in these cynical times we live in.
Book clubs might be good, and tbh I could probably use cooking classes lol.
Thanks! Seems I need the luck lol.
I’ve heard of a club in my country where you put on a colored bracelet based on whether or not are you looking for a partner. Seemed like a cool idea but I think it didn’t catch on.
I’m into it tbh, I’d join up! Sounds like a good idea.
Try searching for “Traffic Light Party” or “Stop Light Party”. Bars/clubs don’t usually do it as a continual thing now but some still host them as special events. Heck, if you can find a place that has done it in the past you could always just ask them if they’ve thought about doing another.
There’s also group activities where you can meet friends of friends who are single. Baseball games, concerts, weddings, camping trips etc.
My friends have mostly moved, the ones that are still here we chill when we can but we’re all adults with lives and known each other for years, not many new faces usually.
It can be a little bit of a pain making new friends as an adult, but it’s totally doable. If you make yourself available you’ll find em. I found what works for me (30s dude) is to just ask. A friend complaining about having to go to a cousin’s wedding? Just ask if you can join and try to make it fun. Then just start listening to conversations and joining in. Doing that I met one guy who does music production on the side for local bands and because of one comment we got talking about AI (something I’ve done some small work with) and how I thought it would impact him in the near future. He reached out through a mutual acquaintance to get my number and is planning to now invite me to his wedding next year.
I’ve got more examples but feel I’m rambling. My friend group had majorly shrunk when I moved two ish years ago and I just went through it. Even adults with kids like friends and can become good ones.
I have never seen this actually happen and I have a lot of experience with gaming with randos (I’m old and I also started a gaming club in college that had over 75 members with at least 15 of them being female). I’ve been playing MTG and D&D at local shops for decades now and I’ve never once seen other dudes simping or fighting over a girl at the table.
Not saying it can’t happen, nerds are nerds and do often lack social skills. But from my experience (and from what I’ve heard from my female gamer friends), this has got to be a rare situation.
Just be fat, it worked for me.
Are you serious? It doesn’t work that way where I am.
Be fatter/s
Or move out of Alabama
Thats like saying stop being related to your boyfriend kek
Beef Adders are the most dangerous and delicious snakes
This is why all of my gaming groups just start with an orgy and get that out of the way right off the bat. Everyone gets everything. Sex communism solves all. (Major /s if not obvious)
How do I sign up comrade?
“willing and able”
To monitor the emergency exit door of the orgy room.
Sex communism solves all.
Controlling the means of reproduction!
Found the Greek!
Wait, isn’t this what session 0 is for? Getting all the tension out and working through your issues?
Find a group of mostly older/married people. It might not solve the problem, but it’ll delay it enough that you can get a solid playtest of your latest build before things go to shit.
When I was young, the more females that joined, the less it happened. DND, MTG, whatever.
females
They are called girls, you know.
I always wondered why some nerds (affectionate) use the terms males/females. Maybe they’re copying some science fiction book they read?
Up until like 7 years ago, the word lacked major misogynistic connotation. It used to be fairly common in certain subsects, including nerds, and it all but died in them. I wonder when “female” will become kosher again. This century is unlikely, given the Tate taint. The evolution of language is fascinating.
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My friend, you’re 44 and haven’t learned the art of not giving a fuck what people think of you? Wear that sick trench coat. Worst case scenario, someone laughs at you, and you brighten their day a bit.
.
Upvoted and I’m technically in agreement with you, but at the end of the day most of us humans are social creatures and how we fit in is, on some level at least, important to us.
I will say though if dressing like a neckbeard is fundamental to who someone is, they should absolutely go for it. But for me, who thinks fedoras (sans modern context) do indeed look cool, that’s not enough to overcome the stigma. It’s all about finding our personal balances, I guess.
I think we just realized how overly clinical and dehumanizing it is and it just became an easy tell that that person probably, whether they realize it or not, doesn’t really see women as equally human to men, like women are only the sex characteristics that make them biologically female.
To be clear, im referring to the phenomenon where someone, despite frequently using the word ‘men’, is seemingly only able to refer to women as ‘females’. You almost never see ‘males’ used in that standalone way outside of clinical contexts. So yeah, blame those people for ruining it, not the rest of us for wising up to it.
I blame the ferengi
Isn’t “women” preferable over both terms? Pretty sure if I used the term “girls” around most women I know they’d find it offensive. But most women I know are between 25 and 50 years old.
I’d say “women” in a professional setting, but among friends I don’t see it as an offensive thing. It’s just an informal or casual thing. I’m a guy, and the group of women often includes my wife. But it’s said in a friendly tone.
I think singular vs plural matters too. I would say “good night girls” to a couple of friends leaving, but not “good night girl” to one friend leaving.
most women I know are between 25 and 50 years old
Oh, so you only hang out with FEMALES AFTER THEYVE HIT THE WALL AND ARE NO LONGWR VALUABLE AND THEY PROBABLY ARE MANIPULATING YOU WITH THEIR VAGINAS EVEN THOUGH THEIR VAGINAS ARE POINTLESS AFTER 20
(I literally felt gross typing that. Even though the people who genuinely think that way would probably say, like 17, not 20. Yuck.)
17 is ok if you’re into older girls I guess. /s and also yuck
It’s crazy how wrong it feels typing that, right?
Possibly. They didn’t say how young they were, so I assumed teens, not 30s.
No one on 4chan believed her because of rule 30 and because “they didn’t know that you can play games in the kitchen”. I can read the comments without the comments.
You know, it really makes it feel like those comments are particularly useless when, just by having used the website for a long enough time, you can imagine them simply by the scars they have branded onto your thinking goo. It becomes totally redundant at that point, totally useless, even worse than it having contributed nothing but empty space in the first place, it now occupies empty space in the brain. It’s like old farts constantly remembering and bantering about ad jingles from their youth, it fills me with dread.
The things I have seen… 1000 yard stare
I’ve got some lemons, let’s have a party and scrub the things from your brain that you’ve seen and leave a nice citrusy scent instead. We can call it a lemon party.
Yup, and no matter how the DM handles it, it’s still a pain in the ass.
My table? That shit don’t fly, but it’s still going to mean some dude getting butt hurt and needing a firm talking to. Might go years without it happening, but I don’t know a DM that hasn’t run into it it once or twice with new groups or new players.
One of my long term players is a woman. She was a “girl” when she started with the core group, if you count 16 as a girl still.
She’s a great player, and a good friend. The number of times I’ve had to tell guys to fuck off and not come back is absurd. Shouldn’t even be once, though you’d expect teenagers to pull it. No, it was grown ass men. The last one, we were all 40ish in the core group, and the guy that pulled it was older than us. He was an acquaintance from where I used to work, and had always been chill with women. No bullshit, no problems. But he still couldn’t get past the idea that she was there and obligated to give him a shot just because they shared a hobby.
Your best bet is to try and find groups with better ratios of guys to gals. These groups tend to self regulate and give the creeps the boot.
People play fantasy games to live out their fantasies. And for some sad people, their fantasy is to touch women because they act so repulsively no one wants to risk getting close to them.
Aw :(
That sucks.
For real, I was just reading this and thinking: “Damn, that was totally me back in the day, those poor girls.” 🙁
millions of years of evolution wiring our brains to make sex feel good so we don’t accidentally kill off the human race by forgetting to do it
dumbasses want to play badminton or some shit instead
Well ok.
Hang out with more LGBT people. If I wanna get laid, I can turn on Growlr and have a dude deliver himself to my basement.
… So what you’re saying is you’re choosing the bear?
He is the bear.
I always have to remind myself that I was introduced to and raised in nerddom from my godmother. Everything was through the lens of her curated tastes.
So when I hit puberty later in life all the deranged horniness suddenly clicked in me as MY problem since for me it wasn’t normalized. Playing D&D and MMOs just didn’t have that foundation, so I could compare.
Thanks godmother for keeping me somewhat normal. I’ve been often alienated from gamers due to my application of basic respect and sometimes just plain apathy towards women.
