vvvexation (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
vvvexation) wrote2005-07-06 10:20 pm
vvvexation) wrote2005-07-06 10:20 pm
Another take on the "nice guy" conundrum
A comment (and addendum) I posted elsewhere--fortunately not a propos of anything in my life at the moment, but I've been chewing on it for a while:
Dan Savage had some scathing things to say once to a disabled guy who wrote in complaining that he couldn't get chicks--mainly because, as Dan pointed out, he was only looking for "hot" chicks and didn't seem to have considered dating disabled women for a moment. I've since been convinced that what all those guys who complain that women won't date them because they're "too nice" really mean is that beautiful, bitchy women won't date them. Maybe if they actually went looking for nice girls--and bothered to include shy girls, plain girls, and nerdy girls in that pool--they'd have better luck finding a few who genuinely like nice guys.
(Okay, so I have known some genuinely nice guys who can't seem to get dates. In fact, that description fits a fair number of my closest friends. But you know what? Absolutely none of them, to my knowledge, have trouble getting dates because they're too nice. Some of them have self-confidence issues, and some of them are just nerds surrounded by too few nerd-loving women, but niceness is definitely not what holds them back.)
Dan Savage had some scathing things to say once to a disabled guy who wrote in complaining that he couldn't get chicks--mainly because, as Dan pointed out, he was only looking for "hot" chicks and didn't seem to have considered dating disabled women for a moment. I've since been convinced that what all those guys who complain that women won't date them because they're "too nice" really mean is that beautiful, bitchy women won't date them. Maybe if they actually went looking for nice girls--and bothered to include shy girls, plain girls, and nerdy girls in that pool--they'd have better luck finding a few who genuinely like nice guys.
(Okay, so I have known some genuinely nice guys who can't seem to get dates. In fact, that description fits a fair number of my closest friends. But you know what? Absolutely none of them, to my knowledge, have trouble getting dates because they're too nice. Some of them have self-confidence issues, and some of them are just nerds surrounded by too few nerd-loving women, but niceness is definitely not what holds them back.)
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Maybe it goes down to schema: we learn things from watching, and we learn how to date by watching movies and television, and mostly from people older than ourselves. Regardless, we seem to fall into the trap that a guy is expected to make the first move, and women are supposed to attract a man.
I'm not making value judgements on this, just saying that it happens. If I'm right, it's probably a problem because the situation encourages aggressiveness and sexism (the schema is very close to competing for a resource, and I can safely say that human beings should not be treated as such) and screws with our ability to relate to each other. The "nice guy" is often a person who is too respectful of space and boundaries to take a chance at an unwanted advance... he's not going to attempt to assert his presence on a female. Which get's into a whole other slew of moral dilemnas, because if that's the schema going on in the Nice Guy's head, he's kind of bought into the "women as resources" concept.
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Alternatively, the over-respect for space and boundaries originates from buying into "males must stop being evil oppressors" that (thankfully) is getting a lot less play these days.
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However...
Recent discussions I've had both on-line and real life have made me aware how much boundaries get crossed, and I for one have been erring on the side of caution. Without placing blame, it's very easy for situations to get uncomfortable, and if you want to be friends first and get laid second, then this is something you really have to think about.
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