I'm not sure why this keeps happening.

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This is mainly just a bit of a rant.. I just got home from going out with some friends and had this happen to me again, so I'm a bit frustrated about it.

I'll admit that I have plenty of trouble with women. I have virtually no luck with them either. Those that I talk to, tend to freak out at me or stab me in the back later after they get what they want from me (either monetary or emotional support, typically) and then quit talking to me. I understand why that happens. It's because I trust everyone and don't understand subtlety. That isn't really a mystery, and isn't the point of this post.

What is a mystery, to me anyway, is why I have loads of girls who want to talk to me, nay, some who even want to date me, who simply aren't what I want. The girls I want, the ones I like the look of, are always in the former camp rather than the later. I've yet to have a girl who I considered to be attractive actually want anything to do with me. Yet girls which I don't consider attractive, At all, seem to be highly desirous of me. That's great, but I'd be condemning them to heartache and myself to feeling guilty for the rest of my life if I didn't shoot them down immediately.

I don't understand why. Is it that they can sense that I'm broken and therefore no one else will have me so they are trying to take advantage of that? Though, obviously, no one here is in a position to answer this, but do I give off vibes of desperation which I'm not aware of? Or is it that the only girls who are willing to be forthright with their desires, are that way specifically for the reason that they are desperate themselves and are therefore willing to be more assertive in their attempts, due to never being asked out by anyone else?

The worst thing is, most of these girls are extremely intimidating on top of not being attractive (to me). They always seem to suffer from the same delusions of grandeur to boot. Just because you have convinced yourself that big is beautiful or black is beautiful (and I'm sure some people consider either or both to be, and more power to them, everyone needs love) I don't.

Please stop asking me for my number, please stop giving me your number, please stop asking me out, It makes me feel so guilty when I have to say no and then, when pressed for a reason, can only offer you one: that I don't find you attractive. Please stop getting offended by this. Just because *I* don't find you attractive doesn't mean you aren't in your own way. It doesn't mean no one else will find you attractive. I truly wish you the best of luck, but it just isn't going to be with me.

Addendum: This is specifically to black girls, I know I look vaguely like Legolas from Lord of the Rings, I've heard it about a million times, It's flattering, really it is, but when I tell you I'm only into Cate Blanchetts and Miranda Ottos, it isn't fair for you to then freak out at me and call me a racist, I don't hate you, or think my people are better than your people, I simply am not attracted to you and will not lie to you about that, Please accept it and move on.

I'm interested in advice for dealing with this kind of situation (except the race thing) too, with the genders reversed. Well, I'm interested in what this community thinks a woman should do about men she isn't interested in vs. what about should do about women he's not interested in.

You don't have to say you don't find them attractive (esp. if it's because they are black, there are some thought that should stay in our heads in polite company). You can say you aren't interested. It doesn't sound like a big difference and practically it's really not but one is polite but firm and the other is kinda douchy.
Also it's bot a delusion that big or black can be beautiful, people with other perspectives than you aren't deluded.

I totally feel your frustration about being hit on by people you don't really want to be hit on by. It's an issue I'd also appreciate some help navigating but when I ask I usually get told something along the lines of "that's how it is" or "it's just so hard being attractive isn't it "

It is hard, it's awkward and sometimes, in my experience with men, it can get scary and abusive real fast.

I hadn't thought of it coming off as I was saying they were delusional.. I mean yes obviously those qualities are both sought after and no doubt appreciated by loads of people. Just not by me, and I, like many of us, have trouble understanding what other people feel about things.

I never tell them that I don't find them attractive because they are black, or overweight, or for whatever reason. I tend to say something firm but non committal like "no I'm not interested, you might want to talk to my friends?" or "no I'm pursuing other avenues". In the particularly vitriolic cases which I was specifically referencing, the women needed no help to jump to the conclusion that the only reason i would say no to them was that I was racist, all on their own. I was raised with the standard Thumper lecture "If you ain't got nuthin' nice to say.. don't say nuthin' at all", but I've come to realize that unless I am extremely blunt, people tend not to take the hint.

This is a problem on sites like OKCupid also, where I get almost completely ignored by anyone I'm even remotely interested in, but wind up having to block people who message me because they won't understand that I'm not interested.

I can also sympathize with the lack of empathy on behalf of other people when you explain this problem.. They tend to get offended by the fact that you would turn down anything.. I've had lots of male friends get mad at me for "Turning down tail".. even though they should know me well enough by now to know I'm not interested in meaningless sex.. and female friends get mad at me for "Being shallow" or "Being mean".. to these poor girls who "Just know what a great catch you are" ... which tends to just piss me off since most of my female friends started out as girls who I was interested in but then decided I wasn't quite right for them.. Apparently it's all well and good for me to date below the level I qualify for .. but not for them.

All I can really say is, unlike one of my friends.. at least i don't get hit on by guys.. that would be extremely awkward.. and I've seen them trot out all the tired saws "Well how do you know unless you've tried it?" . I told my friend to reply that he'd not tried cutting his own hand off either, but was pretty sure he wouldn't like it just from the basic premise.. boy does that make them mad..

Last edited by rabbittss on 29 Apr 2012, 1:29 am, edited 1 time in total.

It's simple.

You don't seek validation from the girls you don't fancy so you don't give off vibes of desperation.

You seek validation from the girls you do fancy so you give off vibes of desperation and insecurity.

"Just because you have convinced yourself that big is beautiful or black is beautiful" this is the phrase that got me, sorry if I misinterpreted you
Ok, to me that sounds like you're being totally polite. Maybe there's a tonal thing you don't notice you do or maybe there are just some nsecure women chatting you up (if they're supplying the reason on their own it's probably something they are insecure about, unless you're renown for being a racist or something which I doubt)

Sometimes people hear "thanks but no thanks" as 'try harder'
very frustrating

Well that is impossible to change, so is there some way I can get the ones I don't fancy to leave me the hell alone?

you're on the wrong planet?

EDIT: or everyone else is?

You say a ton of girls would like to date you, and yet, you are attracted to the girls who look only a certain way, and they are not interested in you. I think finding out the roots of why you are attracted to one style of woman, and not the other is imperative to this conversation.

I hate to tell you this, most women are "average," so it is silly to block out 90% of all women as potential candidates. That is perfectionism, and will lead you with nothing but heartbreak in the end.

I am going to have to agree with your friends who say you're being shallow and mean. Sorry. It's the shallowness and meanness that puts people off. [I just edited this because I realized it could be taken as a personal attack for me to say you ARE shallow and mean rather than BEING. I think it's the mode of behavior that's the problem here, I don't think YOU are essentially these things.] People can tell these things. That's why the people you mentioned didn't "need any help" reaching the conclusion it's a race thing with you. People are smart. Believe you me members of the groups you find unattractive know what you think of them by the way you move, talk, and look at them and while most will be immediately put off by this others will take it as the affront as it is and not let it slip past without challenging it for the RIDICULOUSNESS that it is, because it hurts a human being to be cast into an "untouchables" group by another human being. That is why very gregarious people come up to you, they are asserting their right to be attractive whether or not your life experience has endowed you with the ability to appreciate various kinds of beauty. You don't need to find every single person attractive but when you're not attracted to anyone of a certain RACE that's a sign your worldview could use some widening. Seriously. Standards of attraction are much learned as they are innate.

The "Cate Blanchetts" ignore you because they too can sense the shallowness and meanness and if someone behaves in a shallow and mean way everyone is a target for this behavior, not just the people you deem not good enough. They can see that you see them as a commodity and they don't like it.

Trust me, trust me, trust me. People can tell.

No no, I was using those actresses as examples of an approximate look due to their coloring, not because they are the ideal, but because they are in the same film as the character which I seem to repeatedly get told I look like.. I'm not arrogant enough to think I could actually attract a woman like that.

I think turning down 90% of women is an overstatement also.. Granted I probably do turn down about 70% of women subconsciously due to various factors.. but anyone under 18 or over 30 is out too, so I suppose that makes me an ageist.

As for why I'm attracted to women who look like that? That's because I find them to be the most attractive. Do we really have to get into a discussion on aesthetics? Even if Beyonce Knowles (apparently voted the most beautiful woman in the world?) came up to me and asked me out.. I'd still say no. I'm sure she is a lovely person, but I'm not interested. No amount of discussion would ever make me change my mind on that, and no amount of trying to convince me would ever make me see these other women differently. But if the reason they are approaching me is to 'Widen my worldview' then they are barking up the wrong tree.

I can't agree that I'm on the wrong planet, I'm simply on the wrong part of the planet.

They're not trying to widen your worldview. They're flirting with you because some people are especially flirty and I think these are the only people who will have the I-don't-care-what-you-think-of-me attitude required to make it past an aura you give off of only being interested in those with certain superficial traits.

The "most beautiful woman in the world" title is given mostly based on media politics and who will be good for the cover. Obviously an actual poll wasn't taken. Beyonce will sell a lot of magazines cause she's really famous and just had a baby people are interested in. Beyonce isn't everyone's idea of the most attractive person on earth, and she isn't the "prototypical Black woman" or anything like that either. So if you find one Beyonce unattractive you have found one Beyonce unattractive.

An attraction to a certain "coloring" might be less innate than you think. That experiment done during the civil rights era when little girls who were Black were asked to choose between otherwise identical dolls with white (pinkish) or black (brown) coloring, and overwhelmingly chose the white doll to play with. The experiment was repeated recently with very similar results:

http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/story?id=2553 ... 51Vm1K9tac

Point being that people are trained from an early age to see human appearances that have been given higher status in society as more attractive. Since we're talking movies, have you noticed how "white" the Oscars are?

http://www.foxnews.com/entertainment/20 ... -on-young/



If you read the article, Vanity Fair puts the 2 of 11 actresses of color on pull-out folds. It has a history of showcasing white actresses in issues like this, not surprisingly since they have so very few Oscar contenders of color to choose from, but then they also relegate them to background character/token level. I am focusing on one example but this is true of most endeavors involving models/actresses/other people held up as being beautiful in society.

People are trained to see women of color and especially Black women as not attractive. Look through any bunch of catalogs/magazines/online equivalent and see how the models are placed. It is pretty ridiculous the extents that are very often gone to take the focus OFF of women of color's attractiveness. I am pretty certain this is the kind of thing that goes into making it so that very young kids regardless of their own race in this society will choose a white doll over a black one. The group that has inherited higher status also inherits power with it and it uses that power to reinforce its status by basically brainwashing everyone into not seeing certain kinds of beauty so that all the focus is on members of its own groups'. See: Academy voting membership

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-DPS96yWOLao/T ... ales27.jpg

(Two very (bias-)revealing pictures)

I'm not trying to politicize your aesthetic taste but to point out that it's already been politicized since you were little. I do this because I think you're selling yourself short by telling yourself something like "I'll never be attracted to ________."

Yes, but if I wasn't living in the United States, and I was instead say.. living in Iceland.. or Latvia.. or even parts of England.. no one would question my aesthetic preferences. The only reason anyone does is because I live in a place where 50% of the population is a different race* than I am.




* I really really hate that word, we aren't multiple races.. humans come in.. well.. breeds.. like dogs. underneath they are all dogs, but on the surface.. are you a corgi or a rottweiler or a chihuahua etc. We just happen to be self aware enough to take notice whereas dogs aren't.

Agreed on race being a dumb and inaccurate word.

Don't be so sure no one would question your preference if you lived in Iceland, Latvia, or some (I'm guessing "whiter") parts of England. The world is a small place and getting smaller all the time. Being as you are living in the world in 2012 you will increasingly find yourself in contact with a variety of people no matter where you live.

Even if FEWER people questioned your preference, does that mean you're still not selling yourself short?

Sure you could go move to one of those places. You could find the whitest, least full-bodied population on earth and go there and avoid confronting the diversity of the world at large for as long as possible. In pragmatic terms that seems like your only option if you want certain categories of people to "leave you alone" in the flirting sense. I think that would be a loss for all involved though.

I know, it's a horrible state of things.

CloudLayer, these are excellent posts (not that you need my validation, just saying)
I've enjoyed reading them