Guide for Women, cont'd

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Guide for Women, cont'd
by trippy_hare at 10/29/2009 4:53:49 AM

Almost as bad as the angry, I-hate-everything-with-a-penis rants are the "won't anybody please love me? (sniffle)" type comments. My advice- don't say "love" on your profile. Anywhere. At all. Remember, your profile = what you say when you bump into someone at a Starbucks. You would never tell a total stranger you've never met before in your life "I'm just looking for somebody to love me", would you? Of course not- because it practically screams "I'm desperate for attention". There are two guy reactions to this: (a) "A desperate chick will put out right away, and then I'll never have to see her again because she'll find someone else to pay attention to her!"; and (b) "Uh, I just met you, lady, chill the f**k out." Option (a) is usually the younger man, who only thinks about sex because that's all he is capable of thinking about. Men develop empathy later in life than women do. As in, late-20's or so. Meaning, if a guy is younger than 25ish, he can't really understand how you feel at all, because the Guy brain just hasn't gotten there yet.

Explains a lot, doesn't it?

So- unless you want young idiots (or old scumbags) sending you pictures of their penis because they understand "looking for love" as "I want a good pounding", don't mention the L-bomb on your profile. It sends a mixed signal. While some men may correctly interpret it as "I would like to take the time to develop a casual acquaintance into someone with whom I share a level of trust in which a relationship can form and with time and effort grow into romance", most men will see it as a desperate plea for attention.

The exception being if you have children- then it's ok to say you love your kids. While for the most part, that's implied by simply being a mom, it's ok to mention loving your kids. It tells guys that you: (a) have kids; and (b) those kids will be more important than him for the foreseeable future. Ixnay on the complaining that guys run away as soon as they find out you have kids, though. That's another mixed signal- telling the world you hate it when men don't immediately want to play the role of Surrogate Father upon meeting you for the first time is plain insanity. Remember the Starbucks, ladies. If you asked a total stranger to raise your children, you wouldn't want him to say "yes". That'd be creepy.

Next, the classic "I love to laugh" line. You all do it, so don't bother denying it. You know what that tells us? No, it doesn't say "I'm a fun girl with a bright sense of humor who will laugh at your jokes", it says "I'm exactly the same as every other human being on the planet". We know you love to laugh. Everyone knows you love to laugh. Seriously, do you know anyone- anyone at all- who doesn't?

Instead, try talking about the sorts of things that make you laugh. Men like it when a woman laughs at their jokes, but men often have absolutely no clue just what sort of jokes or antics will make a woman laugh. So if you like dry humor but hate slapstick, you might want to mention that.

Men aren't mind readers.

That one's important- so I'll say it again, with all the emphasis and zeal I can possibly imbue into words typed on a screen: MEN AREN'T MIND READERS!!1 That means that we are incapable of taking hints, or reading between the lines, or noticing subtle suggestions, or anything like that at all. The extent of a man's hint-taking ability is that if you make eye contact, you may possibly want to have sex. That's it.

Which means: you have to tell us what you like, or we will never, ever, EVER figure it out. If we ever do somehow figure out something you like without your direct instruction, it's a fluke. A lucky guess. A wild shot in the dark with our eyes closed while standing on our heads and spinning around while air-raid sirens go off six inches from our ears.

I cannot possibly stress that enough.

A good way to transmit to a man the sort of things that make you laugh is by telling us movies or comedians you find amusing. Since Jim Carrey is much, much different than Jim Gaff*gan, we can use your instruction as to which comedian/movie made you laugh to determine the sort of shenanigans we can pull that will have the same effect. Failing to inform us of what amuses you results in comedic mismatch- better known as "guy does something embarrassing or obnoxious to try and make you smile, but in reality only pisses you off or creeps you out".

Next- the laundry list of ideal traits, which usually consists of four or more of the following: loyal, affectionate, caring, funny, trustworthy, respectful, open, honest, intelligent, open-minded, friendly, outgoing.... and so on. These are redundant- nobody wants a backstabbing, cold-hearted, antisocial, aggressive, boring, deceitful, abusive, solitary, dumb-ass liar. Telling men this laundry list is like giving an ultimatum, and that doesn't usually inspire confidence. One of the most effective ways to get a guy to drop you like a sack of potatoes is to get on his case over every little flaw he has. Again, it's the male ego thing. Guys know they are flawed. Reminding them of it makes them feel like shit... and putting up a "You MUST be ALL of these ALL THE TIME!" list is pretty much guaranteed to make a guy feel like Dogshit Mountain.

Possibly the most frustrating thing you can say is anything along the lines of "I want to take things slow at first" mixed with anything remotely close to "I want someone to keep up with me". The first says you don't want to do anything beyond the Friendzone, and the second screams "just kiss me already!" As I mentioned above, guys have two gears- forward and reverse. We can't do both simultaneously, which is what those statements are asking us to do. It's another mixed signal with a big fat "you must be a mind-reader" stuck to it: those are the two things males are the absolute worst at doing.

Speaking of redundancies- the ever-popular "if you want to know more, just message me!" line. If a guy is interested, he'll message you. If he isn't, he won't. Not only is it useless filler, but it might actually make a guy who was mildly interested notmessage you- men don't like being nagged. At all. And saying "if you want to talk to me (message me) then talk to me!" feels a bit like nagging. Seriously, just omit that one line.

Also, try to insert a few line breaks- i.e., hit Enter twice every now and then after a sentence. Staring at a long block on unbroken text makes the eyeballs hurt. If a guy is interested in you enough to read your profile, making it a huge pain in the a** to do so isn't a good idea.

Finally, the very last bit of advice- make the first move now and then. Studies show that some men (meaning, every single one of them) don't really know if a woman likes them until she says so. So, say so. It's ok, it doesn't mean you're a cougar, it doesn't mean you're too forward, and it doesn't mean you're desperate. It means that, in the E-Starbucks line that a dating website mimics, you smiled at him while he was waiting for his latte.