this post was submitted on 17 Jun 2025
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This is what "blind to privilege" means.... LOL
I have had more than one. I am autistic with an anxiety disorder and ptsd and I had guys who aren't those things always talk to me about girls like I am super pick up master just because inam decently looking and in shape. They way they talked about their experiences made me kinda not want any, too...
And no matter how much I tried to explain my situation when asking for advice they just gave sabotaging and extremely vague advice that doesn't mean anything. I wasted away my 20s and a large part of my 30s because of shit like that.
The best advice is "women are people too, not some mystical being from outer space". They feel the same emotions, they get hungry, they get horny, they get anxious or shy too."
Look for people who think similarly to you. I found it that I mesh well with other people who are on the spectrum, have adhd, etc. Ultimately nothing matters when you can't approach someone, or go out of your way to find hobbies where you can find people with the same interests as you. So if you can't get over that (or accept a rejection), it won't work.
Also, don't focus on a single person, especially someone who doesn't return feelings / attention, or doesn't have time for you at all. Even the busiest person will find a tiny bit of time to meet with you if they really like you. Obsessing over a single person for years isn't the way to find love. Quoting a song by Tim Minchin, "your love is one in a million, but it doesn't mean that the other 999 999 loves wouldn't be equally nice". If you find someone who returns your feelings, you mesh with well, hold on for dear life.
Honestly, this is terrible advice for guys who are having trouble with women.
I only have real experience being me, and interacting with other people, for knowledge of what "people" are.
Let's say I'm in the park shooting hoops alone. I see someone else walking around in the park, not looking busy or in a hurry. I could wave at them and say "hey, wanna shoot some hoops?"
When I see a woman I'm attracted to, I want to fuck her. Personality, interests, etc - those are all nice and all. Those are things that make me want to hang out with a girl, spend time with her, talk to her. But if she has big tits and a thin waist, my penis says "hey, we should fuck her", and say "what a great idea, Penis!"
So based on my own personal internal experience of being human, my experience interacting with other humans in other contexts, and your advice that "women are just people" - what I should do is see a woman in the park, wave at her, and say "hey, wanna fuck?"
However, based on every other piece of information I have about how to interact with women, I am led to believe that I should not do this. So if women are just people, but I shouldn't interact with them in a way which is very understandable to me, then that must mean that I am not a normal person. That there is something wrong with me.
Now, based on the fact that I've already written this much, and the sheer fact that I'm here on Lemmy, this is probably a valid assumption. But sexually, it is not. Sexually, I'm a pretty normal guy. Guys are mostly aroused by people's physical forms and want sex immediately, with emotional connection being lower on the list of immediate priorities. This is very obvious if you simply look at a gay man's Grindr, where many men set a picture of their asshole as their leading profile pic and allow other users to see their location down to the meter so they can fuck Right. Now.
The reality is, men and women are different. At this point the gender studies crowd usually jumps in and says something about "gender essentialism", or about how "everyone is different." Great, everyone is different. But there are some broad trends we can observe, and for the purposes of heteronormative dating, we can fairly easily divide the world into men, women, and other, where "other" are largely irrelevant to the discussion since - if we are giving advice to heterosexual men - either you don't want to fuck them, or they don't want to fuck you. So we talk about men and women, and how you as a man should interact with women so that they will want to fuck you.
In order for a guy to improve at being fuckable, he needs to understand that women are different than him. That they want and expect different things. And this is fine. Yeah, women are people. But they are also women, and if you want to date women, you need to treat women like women like to be treated when they date someone.
Read it again, women are people too. What your approach is, is to think of them as objects to fuck, a different category to "people". You have your own issues to work through. Don't use people as means to an end.
No, you aren't pretty normal to think of everyone as "someone to fuck" and instead of saying "hey want to throw hoops together" to a woman too, you would say "want to fuck". That's asocial behavior.
And no, it doesn't matter that women and men have differences.
So yeah, drop this toxic line of thinking first.
So now you are treating this person as not a person... Good talk.
I don't know where you got that from, but you do you
I don't think of women as objects to fuck, because the feeling of horniness is an emotion which emerges before rational thought. Rational thought is plastered over our emotions post-hoc. That's how the brain works.
And what I described is how my sexuality works. If that offends you, well... That's your problem. I'm not going to apologize for something I didn't choose and can't change. And if we're going to have a discussion about how dating works, then I'm not going to lie.
Then why do all dating sites put pictures front and center?
Asocial is when you don't socialize. Asocial behavior would be not talking to anyone. What you are thinking of is antisocial behavior - behavior which violates social norms. And that's my point. There are social norms around asking women to have sex which don't exist around basketball or asking men to have sex, because men and women are different.
So you would tell a man to make a dick pic his lead photo on Tinder? Because that's what they do on Grindr.
Toxic thinking is denying reality and trying to invalidate someone else's sexuality because it contradicts your political views.
"I am not going to stop thinking of women as fuck objects and treat them as people, and if that offends you that's your problem"
I'm not "offended" by you, I'm telling you to change your thought patterns and stop being an incel in every sense of the word. No wall of text will excuse this line of thinking, or make it okay. I'm done talking with you - it's obvious you suffer from being chronically online and not understanding how to interact with people.
I'm ethically non-monogamous and am currently sleeping with multiple different women with their very enthusiastic consent. The fact that I understand and can speak frankly and honestly about my sexuality - as well as anything else on my mind - is a turn on for them because it means that they can understand how I'm feeling and appreciate that I am relating to them authentically.
They don't feel dehumanized by the fact that I think they are hot. They feel sexy and appreciated. And they understand that having sexual urges towards someone doesn't mean they can't also be human. Really, being sexually attracted to others and wanting others to be sexually attracted to you is one of the fundamental experiences of being human.
There is a stereotypical male sexuality which is based primarily around physical appearance. And there is a stereotypical female sexuality based around personality. These are not strictly limited to one gender or another, but the stereotypes exist for a reason - because the correspond with broad demographic trends. I have a stereotypically male sexuality. I understand and accept that the women I sleep with have a different sexuality in some ways. So I try to understand what they want, and give it to them, because I like seeing them happy. And they try to understand what I want and give it to me, because they like seeing me happy. We are different in some ways and similar in others, and that's part of what makes spending time with each other fun. So no, I'm not going to apologize or feel bad about my sexuality.
So when my wife wants to fuck me she sees me as an object ? But she never wants to fuck object though ?
I have agoraphobia, enochlophobia, and like to stay home with my cat. Any suggestions?
I honestly think there are a lot more people similar to you than you may suspect
Look for someone who also wants to Netflix and Chill. No shortage of other people who feel the same way.
I said it in the comment above, if you are unable to go out / ask someone out / spend time with them, it is most likely not going to work out. I like spending my time with my cat too - but I am able of going out to meet someone in a park for instance. Maybe an online relationship with someone has a place, but at the end of the day - nothing can substitute being in the same place together.
You seem to have more pressing matters than a relationship to take care of. Finding a partner is secondary to taking care of yourself. A relationship won't magically fix anything, worse yet, it can be detrimental to your health. A partner also isn't there to baby you, or be your therapist. Can't really give you mental health advice more than that, I am not a psychiatrist or a therapist. And even if I was, giving medical advice on the internet isn't something people should be doing.
You probably need to rely on your support network, ask someone for help if possible, or call a doctor. It won't be easy to overcome though.
Agoraphobia is fear of open spaces, enochlophobia is fear of crowds. You assume I want someone to baby me, I don't. I just don't know where to go to meet people like me, and make friends.
Here is the hard truth to understand. You have phobias. Phobias are, by definition, debilitating - they are a maladaptive mental response which makes it difficult or impossible for you to live a normal life and function as normal people function.
Let's say a woman goes on a dating app made by a wizard. On this dating app, she can choose to match with one of two identical guys - they are equally handsome, charming, and intelligent, and she knows this with complete certainty. Because wizard. The only difference is that one guy is missing all his arms and legs, and the other has fully functioning arms and legs. Who do you think she is going to pick? What if one guy has a crippling gambling addiction and the other doesn't? What if one has intermittent bouts of schizophrenia and the other doesn't? And what if one has agoraphobia and enochlophobia and the other doesn't? Because this is essentially the choice women are faced with every day - they can open a dating app and swipe through guys, swiping left on guys with any obvious shortcomings while being quite certain that they will not run out of options for guys without these obvious issues who will match with them. Their problem is sorting through average guys to find an awesome guy while also not getting kidnapped and sold into the sex trade. Your problem is that your phobias make you a below average guy who is not even on the table for consideration.
Even women who are agoraphobic or enochlophobic will be largely uninterested in you, because there are plenty of guys who do not have those problems who are willing to say "don't worry babe, I'll go get the groceries if the store is too crowded right now." Women like tall men with strong jawlines, but more than that they care about personality. Confidence. Social acuity. Leadership ability. You know what's really fucking hot? The guy who organizes pickup frisbee in the park. The guy who starts dancing at the concert before everyone else, and gets everyone else dancing, too. The guy who comes up and introduces himself at a party like he's someone worth knowing. Your problem isn't that you can't introduce yourself confidently yet - your problem is that you aren't even at the party!
Dating is a numbers game. And you might, by sheer chance, find someone who is interested in you. But it's a slim chance - made slimmer by the fact that you actively avoid the best opportunities to meet a lot of people, ie, out in public where there are... a lot of people. There is no place you can go with a high concentration of women who are interested in people with your specific mental disabilities. The only good advice for you is to become a more appealing man. The only way to get better at the numbers game is to play more times or improve your odds. Self improvement improves your odds. Meeting more women means more chances to play.
So. Unequivocally. Your top, most important, number one priority for your dating life should be overcoming your phobias. Period. I am being blunt with you because you seem to have missed the point the other comments made. Phobias respond well to therapeutic treatments that we have. Go to therapy. Put the work in. If you run into other problems along the way, figure them out. Get to the point where you can live a normal life, have a few hobbies that you regularly participate in outside the house, and have a solid group of friends who you hang out with in real life. Then you are at the starting line for finding someone to date.
Sooo are you able to go out, meet people in the park? No? Then it most likely isn't going to work, as I said in my post before. Take care of your mental health first.
Like what exactly?
Just saying 'go online' and nothing else for starters. I 'went online' in the mid-2000s and found nothing but PUA and early manosphere crap that was utterly stupid and did far more damage to me socially in the long term that I didn't even begin to fix until more than 13 years after the fact. It didn't bring any positive results either. But due to my circumstances I just really didn't know any better.
Also when I did 'go online' or 'to bars' and I described some highly weird experiences that I knew weren't normal they would twist the events so badly that it makes me wonder if they were the autistic ones and not me.
For example when I was 22 years old, I went to a bar and started talking to this woman. She was older than me and kinda vague, lied to me about her name, lied about her martial status (before taking everything back, but never telling me her real name). This was in Dubai I might add, so the social dynamic is a very different place than it would be in north america... and would also really come back to bite me later. The only shit I had to go by was offering her a drink at the start...
But here is a kicker... no one ever bought her a drink before. Apparently she literally did not watch any western media or ignored whatever was on screen. Because the whole concept of anyone walking up to anyone in a bar and buying them a drink was a legit alien experience to her.
Long story short... I saw her a second time a few weeks later at the same bar and she had some friends with her. She treated like I was an ATM and basically thought that as long as she groped at me inappropriately she could ask for a meals and drinks and spending money for her and her friends (without the slightest hint of reciprocal sex). However she and friends were giddy and laughing while doing it.
I described the situation to them as I am here without mentioning the whole 'this person never had a person buy her a drink' but I DID add it later.
However this did nothing to convince them that they were trying to manipulate them, and they insisted that actually I should have gone for it and lost my virginity in a threesome with some MILFs that day. I am mildly exaggerating, but that was the gist of it.
BTW, just as an FYI, in many bars I went to in Dubai, they were lousy with sex workers. I did have plenty of girls touch me and act all giddy (but not ask for anything) and offer me 'massages' (which is a thinly veiled euphemism for sex in case it wasn't obvious) for reasonable prices. The guys I was talking to weren't in the middle east and just could not wrap their heads around my experiences being different from theirs.
Even with going online, they said nothing about where to go, how to make a good profile, what pictures to use or anything. Even trying to message people they insisted that you must never say anything other than 'hi' at first. This is even when they actually showed me what they did and had giant text walls that they sent detailing whatever was on her profile. I wasn't able to replicate those, but their advice was just designed to make me waste my time.
Long story short. I am 41 now. Not a virgin, but dealing with a lot of bullshit. I dont care who I tell this to, but I am prepping to see a sexual therapist. I am practically writing my autobiography so I can just give it to them and bring them up to speed so I don't waste tons of time and money just going on and on with the sessions. I need actual help and not just someone to talk to.
I'm sorry you had that experience. I had a similar, but different, experience. You keep referring to "they" who were giving you advice - who were these people and where did you meet them? It seems like this was a consistent group?
I eventually found some good advice, which boils down to:
Be honest. Be honest with people about who you are and what you are interested in. Some people might not like what you are offering. Some might even be offended. But this is all fine, as long as you are honest and respectful and talk to each woman with the assumption that the two of you are on the same team of figuring out if you are interested in each other.
Improve yourself. For most guys with dating issues, this includes things like going to therapy, building a healthy social life, being physically healthy, and generally being a happy person.
Talk to lots of women. People are different and want different things. In order to find the women who want what you have to offer, who are themselves offering what you want yourself, you need to talk to a lot of women.
Improving at these things is best accomplished from a place of a positive mindset, good mental health, and with a strong support system.
Frankly you sound like you have a great chance of moving past this, and it's not weird to need some help or feedback from others, most of us do. It's a shame the folks you found previously were such idiots, lots of people are really unqualified to give advice there. Keep pushing!