Why many women dislike socially awkward men

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I would be pretty stupid if I went around making offensive comments to “every muscular man I see.”

Why would I do that?

I would deserve to get punched……because I would be an idiot.

I agree it would be stupid (because you'd get clocked).

My point still stands though: Some (possibly even a lot of) men will throw fists over an insult. Even though it's against the law.

While going around deliberately making the most offensive comments possible is over the top, here's a more common scenario: You make a mildly insulting comment (possibly without realizing it's insulting; it's easy for those of us on the spectrum to unknowingly insult people). Even then, some men will clock you.

If you don't fight back (which most, if not all, autistic men wouldn't fight back), you're not seen as a protector (which circles back to the initial point that was made on this thread: socially awkward men are not seen as protectors)

Hmm......I used to feel a bit like that when I was a teenager who wasn't getting anywhere with dating. I used to think "would it hurt them that much to give me a chance?" And it did feel monstrous to me that they wouldn't. But it would also feel monstrous for anybody to be shamed or forced into a relationship on the grounds of fair play or egalitarian principles. Partner selection is one walk of life in which people can be as discriminatory and capricious as they like, however ludicrous that may seem to the people they reject. Most people are sexist about their selection, for example. So a gay woman wouldn't have accepted me because I was male. In a sense it's not fair, I can't help being male, and if she was an employer and turned me down for a job on the grounds of my gender, she'd be in trouble. But that's the way things are, and they're not going to change. People don't choose partners in order to help others. The only one who can change is the one who is getting rejected.

Jordan Peterson has some interesting theories. Jordan Peterson says the reason there are a lot of social ills today is because marriage/monogamy is no longer the norm.

He says if we returned to the old days (where society was set up so that the vast majority of the population, no matter how strange, got married for a lifetime), a lot of social ills would go away.

I'm not sure if anyone was "forced" into a marriage in the old days (I wasn't alive yet). But it is true the marriage rate used to be a lot higher (and the divorce rate extremely low)

My wife and I visited some touristy place and while I was off taking photos, a muscular 6ft 4 guy started pestering her, tying a cheap plastic bracelet to her wrist and threatening to hurt her if she didn't pay for it. He was scary as hell but I walked up and got in between them, then took off and threw away the bracelet. He stared into my eyes with the look of someone ready to break my arm, but I just said "No, we're not paying. Get away from us". Then we went over to the nearest crowd.

Some people will seek you out first because they think they've found an easy target, for whatever bad intentions they have in their mind. Confronting such people is proof you won't take crap.

I would say you simply got lucky. He could have just as likely said "Oh yeah, what are you going to do about it?" then proceeded to brutalize (and possibly murder) the 2 of you.

I suppose there's no one-size-fits-all approach. Had you paid for the bracelet (even though you didn't want to), he (in all likelihood) would have left you alone afterwards.

Would you have paid for the bracelet? Not judging, just curious.

Hard to say without being there (plus, we don't always react how we think we would)

I will say there's a chance I would have paid if the price were low enough. An alternative (which I use all the time on panhandlers) "I don't have any cash on me" (which, many times, is true)

I guarantee, however, there's no way I would have said "No, we're not paying" to a character as big and menacing as him.

Saying you don't have cash on you is a gentler let-down. It's like you're implying you would hand over the cash if you could.

Simple answer:

Over and above, not down.

If the old novels are anything to go by, wealthier Victorian parents often exercised a lot of control over who their kids married, and the situation was more or less one of arranged marriages, though it wasn't always the case. The idea of marrying for love and emotional support didn't so much enter into the thing, it was more to do with money and status, a practical business arrangement. To this day, the British monarch has to abdicate if they marry a "commoner" - which is exactly what happened with Edward VIII.

In the days when I was in despair of ever finding myself a partner, I remember wishing my parents would fix me up with somebody, but they didn't. It would have taken away my free choice, but beggars can't be choosers, and for a few years I was essentially a destitute beggar in the love and dating game.

I think monogamous marriage for life is a double-edged sword. My parents did that, but their relationship was very stormy and I sometimes thought that if they'd had as much commitment to each other's happiness as they had for the sanctity of marriage, there'd have been no problem. OTOH, the insecurity of knowing your partner might be unfaithful or leave you must be pretty horrible, for many people at least. I suppose these days I occupy the middle ground, i.e. I prefer it when a couple works hard at their relationship (if they need to) and not to abandon each other lightly by any means, but if in spite of their best efforts it just doesn't work, there comes a point when you have to put the relationship out of its misery and dissolve it.

I haven’t been punched since 1996, 26 years.

And I live in NYC, and take the subway every weekday.

Most adult men, even “macho” adult men, don’t go around punching people just for the hell of it. This is not high school.

Back in high school, I was told by female classmates that I was less than human due to my poor social skills. I was engrossed in my studies at the time. In certain ways they were completely right. They tended to be very shallow people that judged others solely on what they could get from someone. Feelings were weapons that they could use against you. Most of them are now on their 2nd or 3rd marriage after failing for various reasons. I guess I do not have those type of human qualities that they admire.

Sometimes it is better to be happy with yourself than miserable in the company of other people who judge you that way. I do have good friends that I share time with. It is just that they tend to not judge others in that manner.

Those people optimized for something - short-term wins - which makes you an absolute marauder in the social world who gets to drink everyone else's milkshake, especially in high school and sometimes even the business world, but then you fail in all kinds of areas of adulthood that aren't compatible with that game (great example above: marriage).

They have those kind of people in Rome as well, they're super annoying.

I have been made fun of at a class reunion because I was (and still am) the only one in my high school class who has not been married at least once. The one exception to that is a classmate who died young at age 23 (long story, involves drugs). Yet they do not take in account how many of them are unhappy being married (or divorced) with children to deal with. I know about their unhappiness as I hear it from others in the town who spread the news, even when you do not want to hear it. That is the life of a small rural town (glad that I escaped from there), everyone knows your business. To the town gossips, my life is too boring to talk about.

I never have to worry about how I need to split my property between an ex nor how to make a child support payment. Yes, I have large student loans hovering over me, but I do what I can. Funny, I see myself as the lucky one in that aspect. They can drink that thought all they want. I see myself living in an entirely different universe than they live in.

I would never even dream of attending a high school reunion. For a few years after high school, I would occasionally run into former classmates. At this point, I haven't run into any classmates in many years though (and since I live elsewhere, I likely never will run into any classmates ever again). Just as well. I have no desire to see anyone I went to high school with.

As for your classmates belittling you, it could be that they're jealous of the freedom you have (No splitting assets with an ex. No toxic marriage. No child support. No kids in the first place)

Even if they have an easier time mingling socially, it sounds like you're doing better at a lot of the things that really count.