Dragon: A Parable

In general I think that the original writer hit it on the head in her note that those who doth protest too much are usually the culprits.

Yeah, for those of us who don't read innuendo and body language as... eloquently as others, it's a bitch. Which is why I try to be upfront with people about those issues and explain why I'm blunt and dense. Thank goodness too or my boyfriend would have broken up with me 9 times over. Instead we're quite happy and succesful.

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benndragon.livejournal.com

I agree whole-heartedly. The vast majority of social behavior is learned, not inherent, and some people are just better at picking it up than others. I suspect that geeks, who usually have the experience of learning scholastic subjects with ease, get very distressed should they realize they're having problems learning the social stuff because it implies a lack of learning ability, which is what they pride themselves on. In other words, not getting social stuff is a blow to the ego, which makes it difficult to get over themselves enough to actually learn it. There are geeks who get social stuff as readily as scholastic subjects, and geeks who don't have "picks up new subjects with ease" as a point of identity/pride, and I would bet they tend to have fewer Nice Guy problems.

I've never found you socially difficult, btw. To the point where I'm occationally confused when you bring it up. I suspect my metric for such things is calibrated oddly, however.

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Well thank you. There are a couple reasons for that. First, I've learned to compensate in a couple ways (including essentially keeping lists of innuendo in my head). Second, you're easy to be comfortable and blunt around and in such situations I get much better at it. The acceptance of the problem (without trying to use it as an excuse) has helped a lot with finding ways around it. Being around anyone I'm not familiar with takes actual physical effort to be socially effective.

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randysmith

I suspect my metric for such things is calibrated oddly, however.

Maybe by the fact that you hang out with a lot of geeks? :-} :-}

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randysmith

I think my defensiveness is around the boundary between "being attracted to someone" and "only spending time with them because your trying to get into their pants". I perceive there as being a stereotype out there that's always ready to pounce (:-}) that if I'm attracted to someone then that's the reason (implicitly, the only reason) I'm hanging out with/expressing interest in them. And it's not just fear of that stereotype; I've moderately internalized it, which results in a fair amount of internal second guessing around my own motives. And that sucks.

I think I do ok at avoiding being a "Nice Guy" (tm), but at the cost both of tending to spend *less* time with people I'm attracted to and of not generally expressing attraction when I feel it. Not surprisingly, I'm not completely happy with that balance :-} :-J.

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randysmith

Caveat on the above: I skimmed the beginning of both posts you described, but haven't read all the way through them.

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I think there's an unspoken difference between "hanging out with someone" because you think they might be someone you'd like to date and "trying to instantly be their bestest friend." Obviously if you find someone attractive you'd like to get to know them better, it's when people jump straight to trying to be the best friend before really knowing them with the purpose of pants jumping that it's an issue.

But that's just my reading.

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dragonvpm.livejournal.com

Hmmmm.... I completely missed that particular perspective when I originally read it. It wasn't clear to me that they differentiated between normal "getting to know someone for possible friendship or romance" and "I'm going to say/do A, B, C, D, and E so they think I'm great and want to sleep with me". That distinction actually helps a lot.

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randysmith

That's fair. If I didn't think I was overreacting, I wouldn't think I had a problem :-}. But I also think there are a range of sensitivities around this issue, for all that I suspect the average is a lot closer to what you describe than what I describe.

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Oh most definately, as much as there's a range of any sort of sensitivity. Some people aren't comfortable with the idea of someone being attracted to them, no matter how pure and sincere the emmotion.

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1. In my CFT, I've been musing about "Cute Girls", who are in some ways the contrapositive of Nice Guys. (Quick summary: they're not cute, though they might think so or act as if other people should think so, and use it to push relationships the same way Nice Guys use Nice.)

2. It's all about the intention. This is the thing that I think a lot of people are "Nice Guys" are missing. Unfortunately, no one bothers to explain this, and in fact culture teaches the opposite. E.g., movies (especially during the 80s!) made it perfectly clear that hanging out with a woman for the express purpose of sleeping with her -- heck, blowing up buildings or shooting people or kidnapping her with the goal of impressing her enough to sleep with you -- was perfectly acceptable, and further more that doing so basically guarantees attraction and sex, unless you're a malformed freak.

So men (especially) got encouraged to take certain actions. But intentions color actions the same way intonation colors speech. The root action -- say, taking the girl out to the movies -- might be the same no matter the intention, but the execution of those actions ends up very different; creepy vs. sweet. Then the less-clueful guy mentally reviews, "Hey, I did just the same things as Bob, why am I getting hit with a harassment suit?", and ends up very confused. This is worse for the rules-based mind, since "obviously" there is a clear set of steps that you follow and then the girl puts out -- which I think is the real correlation with Aspergers' / INTJ / whatever.

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aerynne.livejournal.com

I'd be psyched to read a diatribe on Cute Girls, since I fear I may be one occasionally.

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I can already imagine how it might sound.
Cute Girls are girls who act all sweet and totally interested in a guy, purely to get them to buy them things, or pay their way at the bar/ resturant. They use body language and or flirty behavior revealing outfits as their aids. They like the attention, and subconsciously or even consciously see it as a sort of power worthy of braggng rights.

cute girls do all the aforementioned things not because they want attention , drinks, or other items. They exhibit these behaviors because they are genuinely attracted and intersted in the guy/girl. The fact that you might be willing to pay for dinner/drinks/other entertainments is an appreciated and possibly even reciprocated side perk.

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That's a real issue, but a different one than I'm trying to isolate. Like Nice Guys, my Cute Girls rely on the expectations of society to force their prey to act a certain way. Your Cute Girls are using an asset at their disposal to manipulate, but not really "guilting" men into doing things...

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plymouth.livejournal.com

This is worse for the rules-based mind, since "obviously" there is a clear set of steps that you follow and then the girl puts out -- which I think is the real correlation with Aspergers' / INTJ / whatever.

I'm definitely an INTJ and probably borderline asperger's but somehow I managed to internalize at a very young age the idea that rules are not always as straightforward as they seem. I think I learned this from science class when we talked about designing experiments - for a proper experiment you need to create a control that only varies from your experiemental sample by ONE variable - if more than one variable differs you will never be able to tell what caused your result. Interpersonal realtionships have a damned lot of variables and if I do the same thing twice and get different results, clearly there was simply a variable I failed to control for - it doesn't actually throw my rule out the window. Thus I can preserve my image of the world as a logical rule-based place :)

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New thesis topic: "Women as independent variables: a double-blind study." :-P

While I grok what you're saying, it's hard to be that rational about relationships, especially when you're (ahem) horny...there seems to be a tendency to ignore all evidence of disinterest and go with what is supposed to work, just trying to do it better and more correctly. ("Wave the flags just like they did, and the cargo planes will arrive and drop off magic goodies!" "Speak *louder* and *slower*, and the foreigner will understand you!" "Show up at midnight with flowers and a boombox and sing love songs, and she'll HAVE to go out with you!")

I suppose that your approach is a sanity-saver for those who fit the above criteria and get rejected. (I'm something of a non-expert at rejection, so I can't really say much about it from a first-hand perspective...)

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It's only recently that I was able to rationalize why the 'hey baby yo baby' technique is still so often used.
If you are a)looking for sex and not much else b) care very little about the possibility of a repeat/actual relationship of some form, and c) are willing to put up with a rapid fire string of rejections until you find someone who meets conditions a & b, then it's in many ways the logical way to go.
It persists because in some way or another IT MUST WORK.
I still hate it though.

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It's the spam of the interpersonal relationship game; low-cost, high-volume, with a low but non-zero success rate. Sometimes it works, and that's enough -- even if it hasn't worked yet for that particular guy, the legend is there. And of course it's upsetting like spam, for exactly the same reasons.

(On top of this, hooting at mate-able women appears to be a biological imperative in men; we apologize in advance. Doing something that gets your attention, even dipping your pigtails in the inkwell or whatever, elicits a pleasurable internal response. It's just that those of us with half a brain work to fight down the reflex...)

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benndragon.livejournal.com

It's real-life spam, complete with nonsense sentenses to get past filtering software and catch-phrases to catch the unwary.

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Then there are more advanced techniques like the 'low level compliment snare'
This is when a guy/girls praises your appearance in some way but somehow makes it seem like you are 'deficient' in some way. Example: "Wow. I find you really attractive. You're like a 6 or maybe a 7." This is supposed to prey upon your insecurties so that you might protest this only slightly over middle of the road rating. If you take the bait, this proves to the guy/girl in question that you can somewhat easily controled and will suggest things that you can do to convince him/her of your attractiveness. Counter attacks are to completely ignore the bait, or else tell so and so that you think it's utterly presumptious of them to assume that your actually attractiveness/self worth has any bearing or real dependancy on their opinion. If anything this ploy has the power to completely turn off any genuine or budding interest I might have had in the first place. It's like the kiss of death.

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doctorellisdee.livejournal.com

the trick is not better or more correctly, it's more frequently.

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doctorellisdee.livejournal.com

like everyone else said better with the spam analogy. buggerment.

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perspicuity.livejournal.com

i'd be psyched to see your version of the contrapositive. i have some odd views on this, based on my solo explorations into dating early on - new to area - no possee to hang with or learn the ropes. HS was the pits and college was too busy studying and trying to make something of myself to date seriously or with intent. by the time i was seriously ready to Date, i was done for. i found the market predatory and harsh. too many games and odd expectations. i've met a lot of Nice people, and was horrified. i'm sure i've come off that way sometimes, but i'm betting i've had it "done" to me more often.

as for defensive, that's fairly natural. most people are about something, true or not. even if one ISN'T, one does not want to be perceived as. for anything.

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I also think that many women unwittingly 'reinforce' or 'enable' certain forms of 'Nice Guy' behavior, by depending on body language and not stating directly that they are uninterested because of 'not wanting to be perceived as a bitch'. Saying as calmly and politely as possible, "Thanks, but I'm not interested.", is not really all that bitchy IHMO. Using profanity and yelling that you're not interested is usually OTT, and generally is generally uncool. I've done it, but it's something I try not to have to resort to. If I tell someone clearly and directly 'no', more then twice, then I will call in, management, a bouncer, or friends to help me feel safe, and get my point across. But really, don't unwittingly enable bad behavior. Be assertive.
For gods sake, don't resort to fake phone #'s. That's a shitty thing to do, no matter how much so and so is hounding you.

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