Ask Lemmy

First, they need to find better things to worry about. pressing this is exactly how you end up with regrettable relationships. Second, ignore the gender. Treat women like people. If a situation comes up, like someone makes a scene at the front of a line you are both in, strike up a conversation about that. See where it goes. Lasting things occur organically. That being said, "she's hot and I want to be inside her" is not a good enough reason to strike up a conversation with someone. Appreciate the sight but don't try to capitalize on it.

It is an important skill and confidence booster to approach people in general in public. If you are uncomfortable with women, then start with men.

If that is still uncomfortable, then that means you are uncomfortable to talking with strangers in general. Unfortunately, experience is the only way to combat this. Start small with chit chat in lines, compliment people on their shoes, etc.

Woman here: I'm not annoyed if a person I don't know talks to me, as long as a) they don't interrupt something I'm doing to have conversation and b) they read my body language and fuck off again the moment it's clear I'm not interested. But asking me questions when I have my headphones in to talk about inane shit while I roll my eyes? Nah.

I think you have a point, but also you've cranked that point to 11. Possibly 12.

Like yes, women can be really infuriated by how often they get hit on. I know the main reason my wife wanted a stereotypical wedding ring with a single diamond was that "it'll keep the flies away"

But also... people interact with you in public. It's like... a property of public spaces. Indeed talking to my wife in a public space is how we met.

The way you make it sound from your description would be that asking some woman directions would be a social fopah. Hell, where does just "having a conversation" land for you then? If you leave without asking for a number, is it different?

There's a difference between idle chit chat and approaching like Johnny Bravo.

It's pretty clear what the consensus is here. Yes, talk with women. You can even (politely) hit on women you fancy. Based on your statement about yourself it's unlikely you would be pushy and threatening if she said no, but still, just understand when to stop.

Next question is how to get there from where you are. You're scared you would be seen as a threat, harassing women just by talking to them out of the blue. So you doubtless have little experience talking with women. That's where you are.

I see two possible paths to take. Which one is right depends on why you feel that way. If it's an emotional issue, like if you (for instance) start shaking and sweating at the thought of walking up to a woman and introducing yourself, then maybe start by talking with a therapist. They can be really helpful. On the other hand if you are just nervous because you don't know how to talk with a woman then look into learning how to make small talk. It's actually a skill. It's something you can learn. And once you have learned it and practiced it enough that you are comfortable with it, then approaching and talking with a woman is just about starting and having a conversation. You can even practice with guys if it makes you more comfortable. A quick google search produces a bunch of good ideas on how to start.

Now you have homework. Learn how to carry a conversation. Learn to make people feel comfortable around you. Learn to actually be interested in other people. It shows and it makes a difference.

EDIT: In a reply to another comment you mentioned severe violence in your childhood and the resultant fear as a major deterrent in approaching people. That's definitely something to see a therapist about. You can work through stuff like that in time. And you'll be amazed how much more free you feel once you have.

Learning how to engage and socialize with people of both sexes is a necessary skill. As long as your not being a toxic mess in front of them, you're fine.

If they make eye contact and smile you can chat them up. That's the secret. They won't smile or look at you if they don't want you to talk to them.

The unsatisfying answer: you're both a little bit right.

You're correct that times have changed somewhat. But I think it's overkill to say that "approaching women at all unless you have business with them is disrespectful and borderline harassment".

Of course, context matters a lot. Don't bother women at their jobs, the bank is not a lady zoo. But in a social situation where you would expect to meet other people, it's fine to strike up a conversation with strangers or even ask them out.

However, by your own admission you don't get out much. So I'm assuming you don't get a lot of situations like bars or parties where this would happen. So I would try networking in your community, develop some hobbies, go to functions where you might meet someone in this manner.

Both of you are right. Both are wrong.

My advice, if you can safely take a shot, do it. Fortune favors the bold, not the stupid. Be polite, be flirty, pay attention to their body language, don’t try hard to turn a no into a yes, don’t worry about rejection.

Sure you can do dating apps or try meeting people through hobbies, but cold approaching people you like can turn out as good as it can be nerve wracking.

Got a bit tangled there bud and you're horseshoeing

If you never approach women unless you have business with them then you're treating them as things to have business with or romantic entanglements.

Try just treating us as people. You can have friends, you know.

Look at it this way, it's the same as approaching someone in public to make a friend. Obviously, that's not inappropriate. It's only inappropriate if you're treating it differently (which you shouldn't be).

Honestly, as a woman, I think it’s more about knowing when it’s appropriate to talk to people.

It’s okay if people hit me up at the park or the bar. It’s not okay when I’m doing my groceries in a hurry, or when I’m crossing the street 😆 and if you get “rejected” (sometimes it’s not a hard rejection, my social schedule is just already full), just take it well and go talk to someone else.

I don’t think this is rocket science, and apart from some teenagers whistling me from across the street (which I always pretend I can’t hear), almost all adults get this right.

Human existence is becoming more and more controlled as we lose our autonomy. And either waste our time broken alone or slaving away at a job that doesn't benefit us. Other countries have things like third spaces and culture unlike the United States which has no culture. We don't have the time or the money for culture. So what I'm trying to say is you have to make time to have genuine experiences doing things you like to do in order to stumble upon someone and have a casual conversation. Even these interactions are monetized via apps or whatever. Ad revenue. And these companies that get in between us and our natural experiences are also the same companies that blow up children in other countries. Other than that it is always running to or running from something. The Capitalist meddle too much in our lives. Everyone I know has had divorced parents. And now they want to replace us with artificial intelligence, which is really just our collective work and our human echo of recorded history and contribution. If they literally could just pick us up and bang our body parts together, they would. There is a reason why the birth rate is declining. Things are the way they are for good reasons. We are so separated from nature that we can't feel each other's vibes. I think the kids these days call it vibes. We are all just codependent and not self-actualized. We have lost our sovereignty, our autonomy, and now we just kind of are pushed and pulled in directions to the point where possibly we disassociate. You can go along with all this stuff for a while, but eventually it just snaps in your mind breaks. And they think they're going to draft us to go fight another World War. Just throw me in a box. It's just the same as the other box that I live in. I mean, what kind of future do our future children have? America is not a sexy place. Capitalism is not a sexy system. And now the whole world is capitalistic in nature. There are no alternatives anymore. and the Capitalist have gotten better and better at manipulating all of us. We don't have the time or the money to even plan and fight back. I'm old enough now to see the patterns between the two political parties in the United States. And I will tell you, unless you're kind of like a cult follower of your political party, they will just disappoint you and miss the mark by a mile. They don't work for us. They work for the shareholders. So all that kids have to deal with these days. All these elements, even though they might not acknowledge them, they play a role in mating rituals. You shouldn't have to run up to pretty women to get them to talk to you, or vice-inversal. Every good experience I have had has been through some form of leisure. The word I can think of that reminds me of the current state of things is cringe or icky. Picking up on people's body language. Things that are subtle that take time to grow like a garden. Building relationships, maintaining those relationships, having meaningful conversation. And when trust is built, maybe let loose. I don't know man, it just gets harder. And then you stop caring. Do you want hope? Or the truth?Your parents sold you out and their only concern is if you're gay.

Both of you are right and wrong, it's not so black and white.

You absolutely can make friends, chat with people at the bus stop, strike up convos at bars, the local ski resort, bike park, etc. Friendships can naturally blossom into relationships (or remain friendships, which is healthy and natural too).

You can't approach people and immediately ask them out, it feels weird and unappreciated (and that goes both ways, I've had a complete 180° role reversal and it was still weird and gross).

You're young, you have plenty of time, and honestly the weirdest thing about all this is that your parents are worried you're gay, like there's something wrong with that. There's barely any differences between genders, people overhyped the shit out of it in church, tbh.

Anyways, any% dating really doesn't work, and I feel like your parents should know that. Don't even try for dating, everyone can sense desperation. Just dgaf and focus on having fun and making friends. Love will naturally evolve out of good friendships.

I don’t mind if a man initiates a conversation with me. I don’t mind if anyone initiates a conversation with me. I only mind when I use words like, “no, thank you”, and they persist. Listen to the word NO.

I'll just say you probably shouldn't take dating advice from people who haven't done any dating for the last 30-40 years. The world has most certainly changed.

Just learn to talk to all people in social situations, and don't make it transactional.

The right people will just drop into your life naturally.

When your parents say, "did you talk to any of them," they mean did you strike up a conversation with a woman with no presumption of potential romantic outcome.

When you say it, it seems like you're assuming there's a potential for a romantic outcome in every conversation between heterosexual men and women.

Your goal should be to strike up a conversation with a woman about random topics of interest, including very shallow ones, with no expectation that you're evaluating her as a potential mate, and she's not evaluating you.

Yes, we're all subject to intrusive thoughts so from time to time, you'll fail at this goal and start thinking about a romantic path. That's fine. Just acknowledge it to yourself and endeavor to do better.

It will probably take time and practice. Give yourself grace to try and fail and learn. You'll know you're succeeding when you realize you had a conversation with a woman without her gender being a consequential thought in your mind.

I think there's a lot of nuance that both sides of this are missing. There's a lot of middle ground between not talking to women out in the world at all, and going up to random girls and saying "nice shoes, wanna fuck?

You absolutely can approach people, strike up a conversation, maybe even hit it off and spin it into a friendship or romantic relationship.

I'm far from the guy to tell someone how to do that and try to pick apart the it's and outs of what makes some things ok and others not, but it is something that absolutely can be done.

I'm forty, so a different generation than your parents, but I still grew up and had my first dating experiences before the internet. Online dating wasn't really a thing here until I was in my early twenties.

At least where I grew up the guys who randomly approached girls to ask them out were seen as creepy even back in the 90s. I and everyone I knew met partners through activities like sports clubs, parties, bars etc. (I'm not from the US, so people from my school started going to bars pretty early). While there wasn't a big discourse around men approaching women in public (or none that reached my little town), we did have some guys in town who'd just walk up to girls on the street and ask them out and the consensus was that they were weird and should be avoided.

I met all my partners so far through activities. My first boyfriend was a regular at the same student café and we ended up sitting next to each other during quiz night. I met guys I had dates with in uni - sitting next to each other during lectures and talking about the Prof, going to the same presentation or cooking night etc. None of them "approached me" in the sense of coming up to me and asking "can I have your number" with zero context. We chatted, had an interesting conversation. At the end we exchanged contact information to meet for a coffee, usually without any expectation of it being a date. When coffee went well, someone would ask the other out on a proper date. No approaching, no deciding within a few seconds wether you want to date someone. Just casually getting to know each other before asking for more.

I also met my husband that way. We went to the same event, talked, had a lot in common. We met the next day to continue a discussion about a certain topic we were both interested in. That's when things started getting flirty and by the end we made plans to meet for a real date. I don't even remember who asked whom, we were both heavily flirting with each by the time we talked about seeing each other again so it was very obvious the next meeting would be a date. He didn't ask me out out of nowhere or hit on me, we were just getting to know new people and eventually we started flirted somewhere along the line.

It's okay to approach and have normal conversations with women that you don't have business or school commonalities with. Even if you think you may have interest to eventually escalate it into dating. Just be genuine and don't try to be someone you're not. But once you make that attempt to date, if they say no, accept that no and don't try again unless it's blatantly obvious they've changed their mind.

This thread is not meant for autistic people.

"Yes you can talk to women in public, but also not flirt with them even though that's the obvious context of the post, but also there are some public places you can flirt with them that are somehow different from the other public places, and also it's fine in the places where it isn't."

I've come to the conclusion from this thread that the answer lies somewhere near "actually some women hate it and some women don't, and since the only way to find out which is which is by stepping on the landmine, you might as well flirt with anyone you want at wherever you see them, but do it politely and move on if she says no."

And in all honesty, yeah fuck it, I'm gonna. I don't want to make anyone uncomfortable, but being that the other option is "die alone and get eaten by my cats" I think it's just going to have to happen.

If you wouldn't strike up a conversation with a guy, don't strike up a conversation with a woman. Be comfortable with conversations with strangers of whatever gender with no ulterior motive, and you'll meet more people.

If you meet more people, your likelihood of finding dates will increase as a side effect.

If you are only approaching women, particularly women you find attractive, in places that are not generally for that purpose (bars, parties, swingers clubs), then you're being a creep.

But regardless, it's better to have interests, pursue those interests, and meet people with similar interests. Because when you have interests, you might become interesting, and someone might become interested.

There's a difference between "approaching women" and "APPROACHING WOMEN."

You should be comfortable interacting with women in any environment simply because a) they are human beings and b) they're over 50% of the population.

You can't go outside and just never talk to women, that's actually creepier.

You don't have to be trying to pick someone up to, you know, treat them like a human being and talk to them.

You might be out of touch, but it depends on what you mean about approaching people. For example, it's perfectly reasonable to talk to anyone at all for a wide variety of reasons, including things related to your hobbies or your jobs or simply because you're waiting for the bus. Conversation is generally a safe thing to do with other human beings. If you are specifically avoiding conversations with people because they are women, then I think you should rethink your position.

Maybe your parents are asking you to start flirting with people, which is totally different from simply talking to them. If that's the topic, then it makes sense to be somewhat more careful about the time and place.