Tuesday, January 28, 2014

And That's Why You're Single

And That's Why You're Single

If You Want Someone To Go Away, Tell Them

Posted: 28 Jan 2014 02:55 PM PST


Name: Dangelina_jolie
Question: Can you help me understand why some men never give up? When I first started dating I was eager to meet people quickly and see what he had to talk about over dinner or coffee. Well two different guys kept texting me after I told them I wasn’t interested in continuing to see them. One texted for a few weeks then a month and a half later out of the blue. The other texted weekly for about two months straight. I finally had enough and asked him why he continued texting me when I wasn’t answering. He began begging for another chance and even asked if he could come over and talk to me (I thanked God aloud that he didn’t know where I lived and am now wary of allowing dates to pick me up even though I’m a bit old fashioned and love that kind of thing). I told him no then I ended up getting nasty when he accused me of not wanting to date him because he’s white (which was not the case since I frequently date white men). He then had the nerve to get offended that I was rude to him when clearly I had tried the nice approach earlier. (This guy works for Abercrombie and looks the part. I fully believe he wasn’t used to and didn’t know how to handle rejection. But you’d think he would have enough options not to care?)

And even online, if I simply don’t reply I get harassing messaging cursing me out and calling me conceited.  Is this normal behavior? Is there. Way to avoid it? Why don’t they just give up?
Age: 23
State:

 

These men continued to text you because you didn’t explicitly and directly tell them to stop. The real question is why you chose this approach rather than just be “honest.” I’m finger quoting that because I don’t expect you or anybody to be totally honest in those situations. As I’ve said before, it’s best to be diplomatic as long as you’re not disingenuous. An ex has resurfaced, you’re not over an ex, you decided to pursue a different guy that you met before him, etc. It’s okay to lie as long as you don’t keep them on the hook.

Clearly, since you didn’t hesitate to get nasty with this guy, you didn’t fear him in any way. And since you didn’t think twice about serving up a side of sass, then it stands to reason that you also wouldn’t hesitate to tell someone if you didn’t want to see them again. When I truly feel that there is something off about someone, I do what I can to avoid confrontation. I make up a lie to explain why I don’t wish to see them again. So all the pearl clutching about how relieved you were that he didn’t know where you lived can stop.

You replied to him and asked him a rather hurtful question with the intention of fanning the flames. How did you think he was going to respond? What would you have said had you been in his shoes and some dude shot off a text like that?

Maybe you have yet to experience what it feels like to be strung along or mislead, intentionally or unintentionally, but I can assure you that it sucks.  I don’t think you’re totally at fault here. No answer should be the answer. These guys chose to continue to attempt to contact you. If they do not take the hint you’re giving by ignoring their messages, the best course of action in a situation like this is to put them out of their misery by communicating your lack of interest. The reason why is that it’s the humane and kind thing to do. If you’re a relatively decent human being, you don’t want to cause other people discomfort or pain.

Everybody gets messages from people online who are perturbed that they didn’t receive a response acknowledging their message. That is not at all uncommon. Don’t get it twisted. You’re not experiencing something extreme or atypical. Even the most average looking of people (i.e. most of us) have to endure this annoyance.

None of  really has nothing to do with you or your desirability. Consider the possibility that you actually enjoyed their attention and wanted to get them worked up in order to create drama just for the sake of creating drama and feeling in demand.

 

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