Who are the Self Proclaimed Nice Guys here?

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There's nothing wrong with being genuinely, inherently nice (and I don't think mouthyb was implying there is). The behavior pattern that is resented (and harped on) is the "but I'm a nice guy - therefore I'm ENTITLED to attention from women, and all those women who don't give me attention are filthy, evil beeyotches because they prefer a**holes over nice guys like me!"

....im a nice guy!

Let me hold the doors!
Pull out the chairs!
Lie my jacket in the puddles for you to tread on!
Pamper you unexpectedly!

But when I say drop those panties!
Don't give me any lip!

As far as I can tell, it seems that the general assumption on this forum is that Nice Guy = someone who is most likely not a murderer and a rapist

I have to say, I have come across some really nasty posts since I've been here and really worrying attitudes. Yet even those people have others think of them as 'nice guys'. Don't ask me to name names, I don't remember them.

I think basically the problem is that all men who can't get a date seem to think this is because they are a nice guy because they have come across more than one non nice guy who is getting laid. Obviously, these people are nice people, just not very good with logic.

I did read what you wrote. Did you read what I wrote? I specifically replied to that comment about manipulative behaviour with this statement:



Can you define what you mean by manipulative? The problem I have with this characterisation of being manipulative is that some guys here just simply don't have the social skills to know how to talk to women about their feelings (most likely because of their Asperger's) and then when they post about on the forums they are accused of being manipulative for no other reason than the fact they haven't spoken to them (which we've already established that they probably don't have the social skills to do). Their reasoning is usually that because they aren't honest with their feelings, they are trying manipulate them into falling in love them. Again, for the record, how can you tell them about your feelings if you don't have social skills to do that? So in my mind, though their reasoning also corresponds somewhat to your definition of a Nice Guy™, they are really just being condemned for no other reason than lacking social skills because the lack of the social skills needed to talk to someone about your feelings is somehow interpreted to be "manipulative". Some of those guys have tried said that they've tried to be friends with the person that they have feelings for simply because they said that they would prefer to be friends with someone before they considered having a relationship with them but somehow that preference of being friends your potential partner is also considered "manipulative" and that the desire to friends is "not genuine". I don't understand this can't be genuine because I thought that you can be both friends with someone and romantically involved with them.



It specifically directed at you. I was talking generally about how the term Nice Guy™ is used in this forum.



Again, can you define what kind of manipulation you're talking about. If you're talking about being friendly to someone when you really want a relationship with them, I've already explained that some people simply do not have the social skills to initiate a relationship with them directly and maybe that's why currently just being friendly with them, not because the have ulterior motives with their friendliness. Again, most people use the same definition as you for a Nice Guy™ but in practice, it seems to have become a slur for those kinds of people.



No, I'm not interested in your private life. I didn't even know that before you wrote that sentence above. What I meant by that comment was that in general, from what I've observed, female aspies have trouble keeping relationships while male aspies have trouble getting into them in the first place. I just meant that anyone who has had a string of relationships because they have had trouble staying in them has at least had some more success than someone who has not been able to get into one in the first place and thus has had no relationships at all. I was not talking about you specifically.



Again, I was not talking specifically about you. I was talking about the general attitude of the forum. Everyone uses the same definition of Nice Guy™ as you do but the point is that it's misused with people interpreting lack of social skills with "manipulation".

Jono: Okay, I'll bite. The following are types of manipulative behavior which are or can be employed by people fitting the "nice person" description. (Please notice the use of quotations--for the sake of clarity, when I'm talking about pseudo-niceness, I'll use quotations.)

Lying to someone to get them to like you.

Attempting to use any combination of the following to cause a relationship to occur, force some sort of intimate contact and/or perpetuate a relationship: force, coercion, guilt, threats, emotional blackmail (the "if you cared about me" sort, typically), actual blackmail, whining, backstabbing, passive-aggression and/or cruelty.

Attempting to use the friends and/or relatives of the other person to cause or perpetuate a relationship or some sort of intimate contact.

Attempting to stalk or force interpersonal contact on someone for the sake of forcing them into a relationship, perpetuating a relationship of forcing some sort of intimate contact.

Please note that some of these behaviors are actually criminal in your respective jurisdictions. The use of the word "nice" indicates how the person adjudicates their own behavior, and NOT how that behavior would be otherwise adjudicated. There is a relationship in between "nice" and how that person is perceived--for instance, while most people agree that stalking someone is over the line, one can still be adjudicated nice by others while doing things like using coercion to get sex, based on the knowledge available to the person doing the judging.

If you do the things I listed above, you are not nice, even though you may think you are because you give to good causes, or you hold doors open for other people, or believe you have the best intentions. People who do those things are "nice guys/women", NOT nice guys/women, no matter what they tell themselves.

The issue of being identified as nice vs "nice" by others is important because of the value which is placed on certain kinds of niceness (like being polite) in many societies--you can be polite and still be a very bad person (potentially by doing some of the things on the list above), and people who don't know you have done those things may think you're nice because all they've seen is you being polite.... right up until you behave badly in front of them (at which point, it's typically too late to stop you).

Being considered a nice person comes with some perks, depending on who you are. There are people, for instance, who use the appearance of being nice to get away with some seriously bad things. This would be why it's important to understand the difference between nice and "nice."

Then let's just call them by what they are: Manipulative jerks.

Criminals may say "but I am innocent!" but still we don't call them "Innocent guys".

Innocent Guy™

Reading back through the thread, one quote springs to mind:

"The guilty think all talk is of themselves." - Geoffrey Chaucer.

The Face of Boo: We call them "nice guys" because they say, in response to criticism of their behavior, that they are nice and nice people don't do that thing we just witnessed them doing/they just talked about/there's a good reason that the behaviors in question are excusable and they're still nice.

At least with a criminal, you know they're a criminal. "Nice guys" hide behind being considered or considering themselves to be good people.

I have known some criminals that I would consider nice people and I have met some self professed 'nice people' whose behavior was cruel and reprehensible.
Ethics and morality are whatever people make of them or whatever best serve their desire in many cases. I believe people who have experienced truly unethical behavior are more likely to examine their behavior and how it may affect on the lives of others and take ethical responsibility for their actions whereas someone who has not known the torment of unethical treatment sleep soundly comforted by whatever delusions they justify their behavior with. It is ironic to me that so many 'good people' could be considered monstrously bad by other 'good people'.

It is how such a small percentage of the world manage to sleep soundly and feel good about their daily actions, warm and well fed, safe remembered and acknowledged for their existence.
while the rest of the world starves, bleeds, weeps. mourns. Hidden, forgotten, shamed.

I've noticed that kind men who can't get dates and wonder why are, quite often, immediately deemed "Nice Guys," and a group of women (and some men) will often come down on them in these forms.

A lady here started a thread recently about Nice Guys and how horrible they are, and I tried to address this point. I think a lot of guys are afraid to even question what's wrong because they're immediately met with the "Clearly you're a manipulative jerk who feels entitled" line. Not very supportive.

Interestingly, I don't claim to be a nice guy, but the OP of that thread deemed me such, without ever addressing the point I was making. She was just looking for an excuse to go after one of those dreaded "nice guys."

Yes, I think some people claiming to be Nice Guys might be self-entitled manipulators, but I think there is also a feel-good emotion women (and some men) get from putting down socially unsuccessful men who are simply wondering where they went wrong. It's almost like these women get off from reiterating the debased social status of the man asking the question, rather than offer any advice or support. Like he deserves it, simply for asking the question.

[quote="mouthyb"
.....Attempting to use the friends and/or relatives of the other person to cause or perpetuate a relationship or some sort of intimate contact.... [/quote]

is this like a family member trying to set you up or asking one to? intimate in this sense mean sex? or intimate like in a relationship?

sly279: I had a boyfriend when I was in high school who deliberately made friends with all my friends and family so that when we broke up, he got regular updates on where I was and what I was doing, and often "accidentally" showed up where I was. He filled their ears constantly with how much he cared about me, and they interpreted his interest as benign and helped him find me and/or told him any time I did anything with anyone else.

He was... not... benign in private.

So yes, some people will do that sort of thing.

I consider myself a nice guy!

Ahmadinejad is certainly a Nice Guy™.

For that matter, shouldn't his avatar be Hassan Rouhani?