Rejection That Makes No Sense

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yeah...even in your account above, AngelRho, you're partially blaming the woman for your own behavior. Which is also very common and I think maybe how so many guys wind up with the "how do you find such awful guys!" reaction when they hear women's stories. (My experiences are pretty run-of-the-mill as far as that sort of thing goes.) You get this "I'm really a good guy" thing (seriously, so many guys have actually said this out loud to me, told me that they're good guys) that's incompatible with "I really behaved like that", so the behavior has to be blame-shifted at least to some extent so that it's an equal-blame sort of thing. Then maybe it doesn't occur to them that they are, in fact, the story the next guy's reacting to, because how could they be? They're good guys.

The other bit's the standard "but women do this too" defense. The problem there is that women are generally quite a bit smaller than men. I'm 5'1" and if I really go nuts with the treats and restaurants I might make it to 120 lbs. A guy can actually pick me up and stop me from going anyplace, and do it pretty handily, and a guy who's getting angry and physical because a woman's looking like leaving is a serious physical threat. This sort of thing makes a difference. I can't remember who it was, on the other thread, who tried to point out the difference to goldfish, making plain that for the same level of physical intimidation, he'd have to be coping with 7'10" guys weighing in the 400-500 lb range.

eta: Unfortunately the "man, you really pick' em!" reaction has the effect of, again, blaming the women -- it's much easier to believe that those particular women probably make horrible choices, prolly because they're screwed up somehow, than to believe that -- oh. Actually this happens a lot and yeah, it's a normalized enough behavior for men that women will just, in fact, fade.

Possibly thinks she's "better than you" in some form or another. That's often the real reason when it appears that you've been randomly deleted from someone's friend-list, so it no doubt applies to being added to it as well.

^^^

In all fairness, I have met women that will encourage some bad behaviour from men and I have learned not to get too involved with them. These types are dangerous as well.

Right, don't get involved. Because end of the day, you are still responsible for your own behavior. No one is "making" you do anything.

I read a great piece in the Chicago Reader several years ago, a long interview with a guy who ran a program for domestic abusers. Violent guys. To a man, the guys blamed the women for beating them up, insisted they weren't abusive guys. And these were guys who'd put their wives and girlfriends in the hospital. They just could not, could not own up to their own responsibility in the matter, and admit that -- you know what, there really isn't any excuse, ever, for being that guy. Nor is there a "well, I might have been awful, but at least I didn't break her face, so I'm not that bad." If the woman's that maddening, that awful, leave. Just leave.

well yeah if you're actually having FIGHTS, then the explanation really already occurred because you had an argument.

Wow, I haven't been missing ANYTHING. I guess it's just as well nobody's ever taken even the first step in getting to know me for the purposes of a relationship.

Seems like you are jumping to a quick conclusion about how I might be involved. My example:

My boss at a gas station I worked at a few years ago hired on a girl that was manipulative. I could tell there was some tension between us when she started out. She brought in her bf (claimed it was ex at the time) during a shift change as she was taking over for me and I refused to leave until the guy left (didn't want him knowing where we hid the cash from the end of our shifts). Instead of leaving when i asked him nicely after getting verbally abusive, he continued to stay and started getting even more verbally abusive towards her. When telling him it was time to leave, he turned his attention towards me and laid some insults at me and continued the verbal abuse towards her. He had left his coat for her, and I picked it up and threw it towards him and told him to leave. He said something hurtful to her and left.
Later on, I found out the girl was manipulating this because she wanted more hours and because she knew I was attracted to her. She also knew how her boyfriend would behave considering that they had been together for quite some time before this. She was able to see what could potentially happen and she didn't want to have to deal with the bad consequences of it either. She felt trying to offer me a date would make up for what happened, but I turned her down as she already proved herself untrustworthy by this action alone. She tried to get me fired after I turned down her offer (calling me tell me my hours were reduced when they were in fact not, telling me I was to not work the next day if I couldn't change shifts, complaining to the boss if I was apparently rude to customers, etc). She eventually got fired for making a mistake that cost the boss (should mention that he was also the owner) quite a bit of money. I got to leave on my own terms.

Could I have handled the situation better with the boyfriend coming in? The answer is yes. Picking up the phone (even pretending to dial 9-1-1) would have been a better option as he may have exited the store the second I did that. Throwing the jacket towards him or at him can be perceived as assault depending how you look at it as well. However, it's called live and learn. What I dont like is this notion that she doesn't have to be responsible for her actions though. She had reason to know that things could have played out the way it did or worse, yet still thought it would be a great idea to go ahead with this plan to bring him into the store.

Sure, and that's definitely live-and-learn. (I wasn't jumping to any conclusions, btw; the Reader story wasn't indirectly (or directly) aimed at you, just related subjectwise.) The thing is, when you learn how to handle situations like that, manipulative people do wind up disciplined or otherwise out of your hair a lot of the time.

If I'd been your boss, I'd have wanted to know what was going on, because there's no faster way of screwing things up at work than to have a troublemaking, lying employee like that. With that kind of thing you're bound to have trouble with the drawer or inventory sooner or later. If you'd have come in and said, "Listen, I need to talk to you about some things that are going on," and I later talked to the girl or other employees and found out that what you were saying was reasonable, she'd have been gone. We'll mail your last check, bye, don't bother coming in again, and don't even think about references. Of course if the girl's the boss's daughter, you may have some problems. But if it's clear that there's a troublemaking employee, a boss needs to know. Likewise, even if there isn't really a problem but one employee is misreading or perceiving a problem, that needs to be dealt with.

It's true, though, not everyone who behaves in a sh***y manner will pay. The main thing, I think, is to make sure you can do your own work in a decent environment, and to look out for others when you can.

Well I can remember back in my late teens a girl said that she wanted to end it becauseI was too good for her. She did not deserve me. I was puzzled. Baffled. But now, I respect her choice. It was hers. You cannot make people like you--or think how you want them to think.
But later in dating, most women did not care to tough it out with me because I have no vehicle or I am not "country" enough. But with some it was like; ummm.....you already knew I did not have a car--and my positions. But you still went with me? And now, "It's just I think we should spend less time together?" Hmmm??

But I have always come to conclusions: whether it is shallow, deep, unrealistic, whatever the standards are, people have the right to like whatever the hell they want. You cannot really take it personal. The past hurts. But you can either run from it or learn from it.
I have had some cases where a woman would just stop contacting me altogether. Those kinda bothered me. Because it's like; okay I know
you broke it off with me, but I kinda wanna know why?

I feel like this. I have no clue what love is like. But I know that when you are with a person that you connect--like on all cylinders with, you
will know! You will laugh at stupid s**t together. Tons of inside jokes. You'll hug tighter when the other needs the shoulder to cry on. I think with many folks. They be playing themselves. Hanging on to something that's not even there to begin with.