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We typically have no idea unless explicitly told, no.
Even then, maybe she’s just nice. Or canadian
I knew a nice Canadian that had a crush on me once. I still messed it up.
Damn. I’ve watched Letterkenny. You messed up.
i don’t click the link but i know which video it is
Edit: Is she into you? - Casually Explained
Damn, I got here too late, I wanted to make this reference too!
Yeah, see, my girlfriend just right out told me. But we’re both AuADHD. So you know, things happen impulsively and directly.
I asked her on a date, she said yes. We get to the date we have fun, we have a long night out, she goes home and texts me “I like you.”
Yep. Which is a good thing too because I liked her and was a lot nervous about that.
God damn that’s the dream. This chick at the store smiles at me a lot and giggles when I’m nearby. I like hearing her laugh and seeing her smile and don’t want things to get awkward, so I’m not saying anything :/
Just give her your phone number.
Be direct with “Hey, I noticed that you smile a lot at me and giggle when I am around. If you want to talk outside of the store. Can I give you my phone number?”
If she’s an employee and your a customer, don’t ask her for her phone number or out when she’s working. She will feel trapped and pressured to say yes. However. by giving her your number she gets to decide if they moves forward or not. If you are co-workers, same advice. Don’t ask her out or her number. Give her your number, let her decide to move forward or not.
Also respect any boundaries she has.
Aw yeah. There was this beauty at the store that, in hindsight, obviously gave me the eye, repeatedly. I wanted to ask her to a coffee the next time, but then she already wasn’t around anymore. Don’t be too late.
Even if we’re explicitly told the first twenty times we’ll just think she’s being nice.
To a degree that once a woman chatted me up, gave me her number and I somehow still missed it entirely.
Aside from a lot of guys being thickheaded and not seeing it, there’s also selection bias.
A) A girl has a crush on a guy. He notices but plays it safe. Maybe she’s just friendly. Result: no harm done except perpetuating the myth that guys don’t notice.
B) A girl is just friendly but the guy thinks he’s being crushed on and acts on it. Now he’s forever labeled as a creep.
The only safe play as a guy is always, always assuming she’s just being friendly. Unless she comes right out and says she wants to hump your bones, just assume she’s being nice to you.
Thanks for lining it out so well.
There’s a good shot that she’s into me, but if she’s not, I’ll either die of embarrassment or I’ll get bullied by their whole social circle.
Add to this that men usually are not as socially comfortable as women, and you kinda understand it why this happens.
This happens to women too. The embarrasement is real and the societal pressure to not be seen as a slut is everpresent. Playing it safe is a popular strategy no matter the gender.
It’s 2026. Are people still that puritanical that they care about somebody else’s sexual activity?
The places I’ve lived in the last 15 years have been extremely sex positive, which was a slight shift in mindsets from where I grew up, which was slowly coming this way.
Is there a sudden resurgence in this behavior? Is it part of the man-o-sphere bullshit?
Are people still that puritanical that they care about somebody else’s sexual activity?
Yes. Many people devote their entire personalities towards policing other people’s sex lives. Just look at the hatred towards LGBTQ people that continues to go on and on. It never went away, it just got pushed back, often to largely rural areas. Look at the transphobia of the past 15 or so years. That’s all based in the same nonsense.
Even amongst the LGBTQ community, you have the recent “kink at Pride” drama, but there are also decades old issues like gay men using the same homophobia used on them by straight guys against bi men - or saying that they’re not part of the community if they’re dating a woman.
Oh yeah most definitely.
I just wrote this because these memes are rampant and funny, but they do make light of a bad circumstance on our society. And that trope usually targets men, so here’s some context.
Quadruple the caution if it’s a coworker. Hello HR violation.
To quote Amos Burton, “I don’t shit where I eat”
Don’t, “butter your bread where you earn it.”
if romance is a type of shit to you then i’m sorry for all your relationships
I mean, this is Amos. His experience with romance is probably rather different than yours.
never heard of them
It’s a character from the TV show The Expanse.
It’s always good to play it safe unless evidence is so overwhelming that she’s into you. This has cost me some romantic opportunities but has also kept me from being the guy who dates all his female friends.
She’s Canadian.
A lot of the time we do know, but we’re terrified of getting it wrong and getting rejected and maybe worse.
after being rejected 100 times in a row for “ew gross i don’t associate disabled people” when after a couple dates i let them see me take a blood pressure pill (hadn’t even let them see any of my massive collection of scars except my arm and face, which i can’t exactly hide without michael jacksoning) you kind of just start making fairly accurate assumptions about the women in your society
Hahahahahahahaha hahahahaha.
That’s one of those easy things for me to overshare. I take half a dozen pills daily to function. If they aren’t, or at least don’t know why I take them, it ain’t gonna work.
The actual like, really disabling thing about me isn’t any of the things I’m treated for. It’s my sleep disorder. I still have to show up to my 9-5. My kid still has arrival and pickup times at school. Banks are only open 9-5.
I’ve found that women with treated or untreated disabilities understand this shit way more than normies. That’s not to say go look for them, but don’t try to fit into an ablist mask, that’s far more harmful
don’t try to fit into an ablist mask, that’s far more harmful
it took me so so long to learn that one
Been there. Not blaming women either, men are equally ableist.
Women and men are ableist because society as a whole is ableist.
Wouldn’t be better to do it on the first date?
there are better ways to vet potential dates
This makes me think of a conversation between my wife and daughter a while back.
Daughter is angry with her BF and frustrated that he seems oblivious to that
Wife: “Oh honey, no. It doesn’t work like that. If I’m mad at your dad for something I just have to tell him. If he asks if I’m OK and I say, ‘I’m fine’, he takes that at face value. He’s very literal.”
Daughter: “Ugh. Doesn’t that frustrate you?”
Wife: “It was weird at first but once you get used to it it’s actually really nice. You just have to learn to talk to him.”
Me: “Wait, I did something right?”
Wife: “You do lots of things right babe.”
Yeah, I think she likes me.
Yeah communication is key. Even if you are too literal at least you are clear and not obscuring your thoughts.
Yeah, I think she likes me.
Mmmm, can’t be so sure. Better play it safe and look for more signs
I think a lot of people need to learn to communicate more explicitly. There’s also the ask culture vs guess culture dynamic, though I think it can extend past culture and some people lean one way or the other. There’s also the idea that guess culture is feminine coded in America and ask culture is masculine coded.
To a guess culture, outright stating your desires is imposing. You hint and if they’re willing to give it they offer. Furthermore saying no to a direct request is also seen as rude. In general directness is bad, preemptive offering is proper (and obviously they have to reject for fear of imposing), and hinting is acceptable. Think stereotypes of English culture. It’s a stupid social dance that I instinctively fall into. To an ask culture all that’s stupid, there’s nothing wrong with asking for something and it’s not problem to say no. It’s direct and blunt. Think stereotypes of American culture.
It’s generally quite good to be able to navigate and accommodate both, but as a guesser, asking is better as a default, especially in relationships. It’s awkward and difficult to learn, but it takes all the guesswork and ambiguity out.
A girl told me in 8th grade that she knew I liked her, and was cool with it. I thought she was nice for not being creeped out that I liked her, until one day on college when I finally realized what she meant.
Well, don’t leave us bros hanging! What did she mean?
That she might be down to clown if the circus is in town, but our boy left her hanging around at the dog pound
!remindme 3years
do we have a remindme here?
!remindme 1 second
She lived in a refrigerator.
That’s cool
What did she meant?!
A girl in college told me she liked me when we were in high school, took me like two days to realize what she meant…
Well don’t leave us hanging! What did she mean?
No man knows what she means.
I told a girl who told me she likes me that she is bluffing… 🤦♂️
Yeah she played a stupid game and won the customary prize
men are discouraged from approaching women and women dont want to show their interest in clear way. How have we not gone extinct yet?
Because the internet isn’t real life and plenty of people know how to talk to people, including those of the opposite sex.
Fun story: this guy I know on my gaming Facebook group would complain about being single. This was an older men’s group/dad group. He’d repeat whatever the manosphere would say and ask for validation, and we (usually married dudes) usually say things like, “Yeah man dating is hard” and “women give mix signals”.
Finally, mods called out how his last 10+ posts were complaining and his shitty attitude is just sucking the energy out of the group. They warned him that if he kept it up, they’d ban him from the group until he fixed his behavior.
Fast forward to today - he’s telling us about his new girlfriend he met on NYE and how they had a amazing valentines. He shared how after that post, he took a long look at himself and stopped sabotaging himself.
That isn’t as true as you think. Communication is often the weakest part of any relationship (romantic, platonic, professional).
Everyone has their own language and very few people are willing to adapt to someone else’s way of communicating, even when that effort should be mutual.
We slowly are, most western countries have a birth rate below what we need to maintain the population.
That’s for economic reasons that have nothing to do with gender issues.
Nah, it’s a mixture of both.
No, it’s not. Many studies have confirmed this. Do your research.
Yes it is, studies have confirmed it.
It’s not economic, as much as people like to believe.
Even socially democratic utopias like Norway ,which have such massive sovereign funds that their citizenry don’t need to work a day in their lives, have a population birth crisis.
And while I obviously am not arguing against it, the biggest correlation with declining birth rates are education and women enfranchisement.
Honestly, a demographic implosion needs to happen with some generation. Better now, to reset capitalistic expectations of unsustainable growth then later when it’s compounded.
In Norway, housing costs have skyrocketed like in the rest of the rest of the western world. This plays a significant role in the decline of birth rates. Also, as populations increase in wealth and education, birth rates tend to go down, because parents prioritize focusing on fewer children rather than having more to support an agrarian economy. It is economy-driven. The effects on female empowerment are interwoven with that. Women tend to do better in better economies, because better economies focus more on service industries rather than material ones, which favor women over men.
We compensate with ✨horny✨
When women can’t communicate and frustrate themselves.
Autism is severely under-diagnosed in women. Probably just a coincidence…
If you want to know why men with basic decency are so oblivious, head on over to the womens stuff community and see how many posts boil down to “all men are rapists”. I’m friends with several real life women, and most of them hold that same opinion and have damn good reasons for it (“Except you glitch, you’re one of the good ones”). More than one have expressed to me that they hate being straight because they’ve never dated a man who hasn’t taken advantage of them.
So yeah, I’m not making a move on a lady, well mostly because I’m gay, but even if I wasn’t I wouldn’t unless she explicitly asked for it. (I’d also have to run it by my boyfriend, and ask if she wanted a threesome with us, but that’s another topic.)
Let’s check out womens stuff… arts and crafts, cute outfits, articles on women’s health, weekly accomplishments, friday games, memes… did not see a single comment or post calling all men rapists. Probably because it goes against the rules.
sounds like today is a good day. To be fair, I only pay them a visit when they hit the all feed so my observation may be heavily skewed.
I was looking at the last month. Mind linking where they call all men rapists?
I block those posts when I see them, so no I don’t have links
That’s because you made it up. I’ve been commenting and posting to that community for months. Most of the comment sections don’t even mention men.
So how do I move into the universe you live in? Sounds better than the reality I’m in.
You stop taking crazy pills provided by manosphere grifters.
You can start when you stop lying about benign shit.
head on over to the womens stuff community and see how many posts boil down to “all men are rapists”.
basically online feminism is super toxic. don’t take it serious. women in real life are not like that, at least most aren’t.
in fact i even suggest that these people are online because they can’t deal with real life.
Why are women even taught/expected to behave like sneaky spies when it comes to romance? “Ok, time to do my personal hair signal that I’m interested and want him to approach”
Being clear about your desire also means that rejection is clear, and that hurts.
The girl in the OP isn’t happy with being ignored tho
This is a selfmade problem, don’t try to pin it on anyone but women.
It seems women don’t know what they want until their choice is validated by someone else.
Probably because historically the patriarchy took away women’s rights to be able to choose mates and had years and years of arranged marriages. Then couple that with women being in those forced relationships who could not chose their partners looking for comfort outside of the inhumane treatment of forced marriages and you get societal pressures that taught women they dont get a say in romantic relationships and as such them showing interest had to be covert as it was typically to those outside their prescribed marriage and if caught they could at the very least be socially disowned or at worst be literally killed for it. So yeah im not surprised women have a tendency to be less obvious about it its only very recently in human history that they got to have a say in finding partners.
I don’t think that’s it.
Only half true, not every western society was made entirely of arranged marriages; those were the norm in aristocratic circles, but for people closer to the bottom of the pyramid it wouldn’t matter as much.
Women always had less rights in general in the west, especially after Christianity took over, but it wasn’t a case of “every woman has always been at a real peril of being killed if they’re seen openly flirting with a man” - similar to how not every Christian country has made prostitution illegal, not even back in colonial times, or how even when it was, it wasn’t equally enforced everywhere.
I imagine, it has also manifested in our culture for women to exert an abundance of caution and to try to gauge reactions as long as possible, because playing it entirely open can lead to the man developing feelings, and if you then have to break things off, it can get ugly. Some men, even if it is just a tiny fraction, may then turn to violence and rape.
In particular, the men may “blame” you for their feelings and they might feel “”“justified”“” in raping you, because you did tell them that you find them attractive. No, none of this makes sense and I’d need to order another bucket of quotation marks, if I wanted to try to continue making sense of it, which I don’t, so let’s not do that.
Yes, the same can happen with the genders reversed, but typically the men are physically stronger, which is why this power dynamic made it into our culture, at least according to my pet theory here.
I have only ever been able to tell when it was someone I did not want to have a crush on me, someone I was definitely not interested in. If it was a woman I was interested in, or even someone not on my radar but that I probably would’ve seen how things went had I known she was interested in me, I have not figured it out until years later, if ever. My now-wife had to come right out and tell me she was interested. I would not be surprised to find out there were people I’d completely missed hints from decades ago.
I feel seen. Been with my partner for over 10 years and I feel the same way as the dad in this text exchange.
In the sense of “…if she likes me still” or “… if she ever liked me”?
This feels like “haha men stupid” and I dont like it.
Unfortunately I’ve very definitely had this problem many times in my life. I really don’t like to assume someone’s interested in me unless it’s far beyond obvious.
but it’s in the context of husband and wife, not even dating. I can understand dating, but married? long term? what?
damn I think it’s worse now, just boomer humor wife/husband bad. aw damn.
I get the dating side of the joke.
I thought I knew my wife after 20 years, but she surprised me. Apparently, being direct with me was terrible for her, just the most emotionally draining experience imaginable for her, and she got tired of it- but rather than tell me that, she just stopped being direct and expected me to pick up on it, and when I inevitably didn’t, she decided the relationship was over- but again, she didn’t tell me that, just started boinking our son’s best friend’s dad, then when I started to figure it out, told me I was crazy for thinking it, that he was just a friend… When she finally did tell me she wanted to divorce (one year ago today, matter of fact), she didn’t want either of us to move out, she expected me to be ok with continuing to live together sharing a house (and bed!) while she screwed her side piece… I moved out so quickly I didn’t even have furniture, just slept on an air mattress on the floor for the first couple weeks… Then after I had signed a year lease, I found out the other guy lived right around the corner from my apartment… Rather than randomly bump into each other at the grocery store, I decided to call him (son’s best friend’s dad, remember?) Turns out, she had been lying to him too, told him we had been separated “for some time”, just living together for the sake of the kids… He seemed genuinely horrified to hear that wasn’t true, apologized for his part, and said he was going to break it off with her. I didn’t really believe him at the time, but as things have played out since, while she was trying to make me think they were still seeing each other, I could tell they weren’t - my son lamenting not seeing his friend much anymore for one. Some months later after I had dropped off the kids with her, she let it slip that “he’s always busy now”. Gee, I wonder why…
Anywho, you think you know someone…
People change and feelings change in 25 years, and with children in the house we’re more like coworkers than a couple now. There’s plenty of opportunities for conflict and so little time for each other. So yes, it’s natural to doubt in such circumstances.
It’s putting all responsibility on others. Like, honey, use your words. Communicate. Don’t expect people to read your mind. If you set the expectation that you want people to guess how you’re feeling, then you’ll have to deal with the fallout of some wrong guesses. It’s easier to just make yourself clear.
In the context of marriage??
Like, we can assume there were years of intimacy involved, followed by formal proceedings.
2 things:
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It has provoked a lot of great conversation, if you haven’t come back to read it.
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I’m approaching 20 years and very much still need my wife to tell me how she’s feeling. My wife appears to be in tune emotionally and often is right, but from my perspective sometimes she seem to be overreaching.
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This feels like “haha men stupid” and this is why I like it
EDIT: Are the MRAs upset, and missing all of the men in this thread saying “lol literally me”?
Haha women stupid
The only way a person can definitely know what’s going on in your head is by telling them with your words.
Dad might be anxious though, lol. “I do” usually means informed consent 😂
You’ve obviously never been married
I tell my husband I love him 18000 times a day, and incessantly compliment him. Been there for thick and thin. I definately compliment him wayyy more than he compliments me.
“if they didnt want to be there they wouldnt be”
how the hell do you stay in a realtionship, married for that matter, if you dont know your partner likes you?
Anxiety and mixed signals?
“If they loved me, they wouldn’t have done xyz. Right?”
“if they had done xyz when we were dating we would have broken up on the spot” is also a fun thought to have, especially when it is true. relationships can be hard work.
It’s called codependency, and it’s running rampant amongst my peers.
My highschool buddy has been “dating” (they’re basically married at this point) his girl for over 15 years, and they can’t stand each other. No kids, not married, no real obligations. Hate each other most days, and terrified of the idea of breaking up. It’s fucking surreal at a bbq.
No, but in a close-to-a-decade LTR. We’ve got by so far lol
No, like, a merchant at the bazar will typically charge higher prices when a customer is specially interested.
The issue many women face is that they fear they get a worse deal if they show too much interest.
I think the best solution might be a liberalization of the market, i.e. ending monogamy.
She’s just being polite.
