NerdLounge
Would you like to react to this message? Create an account in a few clicks or log in to continue.

Dumbing Myself Down

+8
PintsizeBro
Enail
reboundstudent
BasedBuzzed
eselle28
kath
nearly_takuan
The Wisp
12 posters

Go down

Dumbing Myself Down Empty Dumbing Myself Down

Post by Guest Thu Mar 26, 2015 2:13 am

This one is more curious than anything else: I was discussing my rather half-assed and extremely cynical Tinder profile with a friend, he said something really weird:

"Your problem is that you come off as too smart to most people. Women don't like smart-asses. They want to see optimism and enthusiasm, and you come off like you want to kill yourself. They want to hear your hobbies and how much you love life, nothing else. Women need to be tricked into being attracted to any man."

"Well men are fucking disgusting," I replied. "We smell, we have hair, we smell bad..."

"Right. We used to rape women back in the old days because we oppressed them and controlled them and shit. But now that equal rights is apparently a thing, you gotta trick them. And obviously that's better. But reasonably, lesbians are the smartest people ever because women are hot and men are useless."

"I don't know where you're going with this," I said.

"What I'm saying is that in order to make any girl like you, don't act so fucking smart. They're not stupid because they're women, they're stupid because they're people, and they find people like them attractive. Dumb yourself the fuck down and you'll be rolling in pussy."

My profile has lines like "He's a really nice person according to every person he's ever bribed." I thought it was funny.

I've gotten like six matches total and one response.

I mean, yeah, Tinder is not a good place for virgins in the first place.

Anyway, it was weird because normally girls are told to dumb themselves down for men, and now I'm being told to dumb myself down for women. I know that I'm really fucking weird (latest reason why women don't like me), but if I put some pretentious hipster bullshit, would that be enough to get more matches?

And you can all say how moronic my friend is, he definitely knows.


Guest
Guest


Back to top Go down

Dumbing Myself Down Empty Re: Dumbing Myself Down

Post by The Wisp Thu Mar 26, 2015 2:22 am

First, smart =/= cynical or negative. If you do come off as the latter, yeah that will hurt you. The former shouldn't be an issue. Maybe your friend saw the latter, and conflated it with the former?

And yes, your friend is a moron. Straight women find men attractive, they don't need to be "tricked".

"Well men are fucking disgusting," I replied. "We smell, we have hair, we smell bad..."

This quote is bullshit. Moving on...

Tinder is 95% pictures, don't get worried about coming off as too smart, worry about having quality photos.

And finally, don't get to worked up about OLD. I've come to the conclusion that, for various reasons, young guys like us are at a huge disadvantage on OLD for various reasons. So, six matches actually isn't terrible, to be honest. Smarts are attractive to many women, including presumably the women you would want to date, no?


Last edited by The Wisp on Thu Mar 26, 2015 1:24 pm; edited 1 time in total
The Wisp
The Wisp

Posts : 896
Reputation : 198
Join date : 2014-10-01

Back to top Go down

Dumbing Myself Down Empty Re: Dumbing Myself Down

Post by nearly_takuan Thu Mar 26, 2015 2:47 am

In text, it's difficult to distinguish tone; I might have delivered a couple of his lines myself, verbatim ("now that equal rights is apparently a thing"), but only with the smallest possible degree of sincerity.

And yeah, I think your line is funny. A friend of a friend of a friend of mine has an album out with "ten out of ten best friends say, 'it's great, Jake'" printed on the cover. That shit is hilarious, and nobody can convince me otherwise. (Though I may not be the best person to consult, given that as of today I know there exists a restaurant known as Appethaizing, and I'm aware that that's terrible, and I'm still amused.)

I suspect acting "dumb" is probably the wrong approach. (And again I'll admit I'm probably not the best person to ask because I tend to be fonder of brainy, talkative women/people, and don't consider myself to have many assets other than my mind, and as we all know I'm also Alone, in perpetuity, in good times and bad, in sickness and health, all the days of my life, 'til death bring me Nirvana.) But I wonder if there are related strategies, or certain facets of the idea, that might be helpful anyway?

Like, I'm acutely aware via personal experience that someone appearing to be vastly smarter or more knowledgeable than yourself can be intimidating, and particular to courtship can lead to thinking about things in terms of who's in what "league". Maybe especially on venues like OKCupid: I hesitate, or even fail to follow up, on messages to those kinds of people sometimes, just because—what can you possibly say that would impress a genius? And because of what it looks like on my end of things, it's practically unthinkable to me that anyone would think I was out of their league. But I'm working from a limited data set, and the conclusion I've arrived at isn't the only reasonable one. Same goes for you, no?

So. Presentation. To quote one of our wiser members, marketing is not an optional skill. Maybe you don't have to act dumb to reassure people that they're plenty smart enough to interact with you. I include myself in the set of people who need constant reminders that other people can feel insecure about things too, and I doubt it's a coincidence that there are a lot of us on this site.

By the way, there's a remarkable absence of people I don't like on this site, which is especially unusual because it's the Goddamn Internet.




Seconding Wisp's final point: I sure as hell wouldn't want to date anyone who didn't love my mind, or whose mind was so terribly sedentary that I had to hold my own back just to communicate.

Dumbing Myself Down Tumblr_nbk5fyNWSD1twgs7qo1_500

(It's times like these I'm forced to consider how many "standards" I actually do still have.)
nearly_takuan
nearly_takuan

Posts : 1071
Reputation : 461
Join date : 2014-10-01

Back to top Go down

Dumbing Myself Down Empty Re: Dumbing Myself Down

Post by kath Thu Mar 26, 2015 3:44 am

Glides wrote:"Your problem is that you come off as too smart to most people. Women don't like smart-asses. They want to see optimism and enthusiasm, and you come off like you want to kill yourself. They want to hear your hobbies and how much you love life, nothing else. Women need to be tricked into being attracted to any man."

As Wisp said ... yeah, nope. You should come off as though you are somewhat likely to actually like them, which is the actual useful part of "optimism and enthusiasm". Smart has nothing to do with it. How much you hate stuff (if that's a thing you talk about on a dating profile) won't come off as too smart, just like you probably won't like them if you don't like anything, so why bother?

Glides wrote:Anyway, it was weird because normally girls are told to dumb themselves down for men, and now I'm being told to dumb myself down for women. I know that I'm really fucking weird (latest reason why women don't like me), but if I put some pretentious hipster bullshit, would that be enough to get more matches?
Not sure what exactly you mean by "pretentious hipster bullshit" (and hipsters have a reputation for being very ironic - that is, like, the defining characteristic, so I'm not sure many "hipsters" come off as particularly likely to like other people either), and not sure how well it would work, but as long as you were able to back up whatever was on your profile when they met you - so sort of re framing you through "pretentious hipster bullshit" lens, and you weren't mean to the people who replied, you could always give this a shot and see if it works for you. May as well experiment.


The Wisp wrote:First, smart =/= cynical or negative. If you do come off as the latter, yeah that will hurt you. The former shouldn't be an issue. Maybe your friend saw the latter, and conflated it with the former?
+1.

[quote="The Wisp"]
And yes, you're friend is a moron. Straight women find men attractive, they don't need to be "tricked".[/quote}
+1.
kath
kath

Posts : 352
Reputation : 159
Join date : 2014-10-01

Back to top Go down

Dumbing Myself Down Empty Re: Dumbing Myself Down

Post by eselle28 Thu Mar 26, 2015 4:20 am

I have many thoughts on this. I'm just going to make a list, and it's not going to necessarily be gentle on the transitions. Sorry!

1. People are right about the difference between smart and cynical or negative. Those three things are all a bit different.
3. Your friend's kind of an asshole. He's also wrong, about many things.
4. There's something to be said for getting genre right. I mean, you're a film guy. It generally doesn't work if someone used the tropes and maybe even the techniques common to action movies in a serious drama about death and loss, or vice versa, right? Sometimes it does, but it takes talent and work and maybe some magic, and that's more than most people put in a dating profile.
5. A Tinder profile is a genre and an OkCupid profile is a different genre. There's a bit more freedom to lean toward creative writing and whimsy in an OkCupid profile, because it can be longer and there's more to balance it out. A Tinder profile needs to be short, so pictures that are both good and interesting, a sentence or two about who you are, and another sentence or two to show that you're clever or witty or thoughtful or whatever trait is about right. Since there's less room for balance, I'd say it's generally better to tilt away from the extremely cynical on Tinder.
6. I thought that line was pretty funny. I'd like in either an OkCupid or a Tinder profile.
7. If you've got a bunch of lines like that, I'd say maybe cut a couple, not so much for dumbing down as for the sake of streamlining and using your best material.
8. From what I know of you, I don't think actual dumbing down, as opposed to editing or streamlining, would get you anything you'd be happy with. It kind of sounds like your interactions with people who aren't very thoughtful by nature or who are on a different wavelength from you tend to end up being pretty negative. I think you might end up doing better with a smaller number of matches with women who can appreciate a bit of intellectual sarcasm.
9. There's nothing wrong with hair and (most) men smell great. I agree with everyone else that women who are attracted to men don't need to be tricked into finding them attractive. The smell thing is especially not right, because it's totally a thing among women to sleep on their husband/boyfriend's side of the bed if he's away for awhile so they can smell him.
eselle28
eselle28
General Oversight Moderator

Posts : 1994
Reputation : 999
Join date : 2014-09-24

Back to top Go down

Dumbing Myself Down Empty Re: Dumbing Myself Down

Post by Guest Thu Mar 26, 2015 9:46 am

Glides, I get the feeling from this post and others that you and your friends have a culture of giving each other shit about pretty much everything.

There's nothing wrong with that kind of friends-group culture, as long as everyone is on the same page and bought in.

But I think you have to stop taking the things they say as legitimate helpful advice, because my experience with that type of culture is that people say things because they seem clever or profound or funny in the moment, and it's an opinion they might well reverse the next day. There's also a tendency towards exaggerating for effect.

Serious question: if you'd put a reference to liking something "stupid" in your profile, can you see this guy giving you shit about how you're coming across as a brainless sheep/tool, and any girl worth anything is going to want a guy who's capable of carrying on an intelligent conversation?

If so, maybe just treat their advice as if they were talking about Vulcan mating rituals -- kind of funny, pretending to be connected to your real troubles, but totally not actually applicable to your life.

Guest
Guest


Back to top Go down

Dumbing Myself Down Empty Re: Dumbing Myself Down

Post by BasedBuzzed Thu Mar 26, 2015 10:30 am

The Wisp wrote:

And yes, you're friend is a moron.


Sorry, had to laugh at the irony(unless of course dyslexia, in which case consider my ableism checked).
BasedBuzzed
BasedBuzzed

Posts : 811
Reputation : 267
Join date : 2014-10-01

Back to top Go down

Dumbing Myself Down Empty Re: Dumbing Myself Down

Post by reboundstudent Thu Mar 26, 2015 11:38 am

At first I kind of see the friend's point. Optimism and a fun sense of wit are a lot more attractive to the majority of women than "smart-ass" humor and self-deprecation. Then he started talking about how women need to be tricked and everything is equal now so women are dumb and men are useless and WHAT THE EVER LIVING HELL DID I JUST READ.

Dumbing Myself Down AdwM9

Just.... no. Listen to everyone's points here. And please stop taking your friend group seriously.
reboundstudent
reboundstudent

Posts : 460
Reputation : 261
Join date : 2014-10-01

Back to top Go down

Dumbing Myself Down Empty Re: Dumbing Myself Down

Post by Guest Thu Mar 26, 2015 11:39 am

OMG RBS I AM IN LOVE WITH THAT GIF.

Guest
Guest


Back to top Go down

Dumbing Myself Down Empty Re: Dumbing Myself Down

Post by Enail Thu Mar 26, 2015 1:11 pm

Pretty much seconding what everyone else says.

As well as separating intelligence, cynicism and negativity - and I'd add to that list arrogance, because that's another trait that's easy to land up conveying (or having!) along with intelligence - I do think that it's generally easier to appeal to more people if you present yourself as more average, which can include not seeming heavily intelligence-focused (I think there are kinds of intelligence and ways to express intelligence that are more appealing to folks that don't particularly value intelligence in the sense I think we're meaning it here, but that's a different story).

Ine of the big challenges of interacting with the world and connecting with people is finding a balance between broad appeal and distinctiveness, conforming to social norms and individuality. Some of that's more towards the 'toddlers learning no-one likes a nose-picker' end of things, some of it's more towards the 'do I stand up for my most cherished values even if they're not popular in this social circle," but everyone's got to decide where they want to fall on that scale and constantly renegotiate the details of what that means.

In general, I tend to lean towards it generally being a bad idea to try and damp down your intelligence, (but that there are occasional situations where a more intellectual way of talking isn't that appropriate), a good idea to keep an eye on your level of cynicism and rein it in sometimes, an even better idea to do so with negativity, and people should probably try and get rid of most arrogance and tendency to look down on others, because I think that's a trait that is generally highly socially unappealing and does little good and a fair harm to oneself.

I'd agree with Eselle that it's a bad idea to try to dumb yourself down , for you specifically. Even if it maximizes the number of people who would be interested, you will probably feel unhappy with it and it'll come through that you don't respect them, and generally go badly, so the people it would help attract wouldn't actually be adding to your genuine options. Better to, as she puts it, edit and streamline a bit, and find a comfortable point on the negativity and cynicism, and put forward something that would appeal to people who like the kind of  intellectual sarcasm you enjoy.

Also, women do not in fact have naturally floral-scented silky-smooth and hairless armpits. Women, too, smell and have body hair if they don't take measures against either situation.
Enail
Enail
Admin

Posts : 4853
Reputation : 2868
Join date : 2014-09-22

Back to top Go down

Dumbing Myself Down Empty Re: Dumbing Myself Down

Post by The Wisp Thu Mar 26, 2015 1:25 pm

BasedBuzzed wrote:
The Wisp wrote:

And yes, you're friend is a moron.


Sorry, had to laugh at the irony(unless of course dyslexia, in which case consider my ableism checked).

The perils of late-night typing!
The Wisp
The Wisp

Posts : 896
Reputation : 198
Join date : 2014-10-01

Back to top Go down

Dumbing Myself Down Empty Re: Dumbing Myself Down

Post by PintsizeBro Thu Mar 26, 2015 5:14 pm

Any guy who thinks that men aren't attractive and women need to be tricked into liking us is trying to generalize his personal problems to men as a group. Just because he's disgusting, doesn't mean the rest of us are.

Speaking as someone who has met a lot of men doing online dating, profiles that are relentlessly cynical and negative don't make me think that a guy is smart. They make me think that (a) he's not fun to be around, and (b) he wants me to think that he's smarter than he actually is.


Last edited by PintsizeBro on Thu Mar 26, 2015 5:14 pm; edited 1 time in total (Reason for editing : made a typo, can't let that fly)

PintsizeBro

Posts : 307
Reputation : 233
Join date : 2015-02-13

Back to top Go down

Dumbing Myself Down Empty Re: Dumbing Myself Down

Post by reboot Thu Mar 26, 2015 6:02 pm

PintsizeBro wrote:Any guy who thinks that men aren't attractive and women need to be tricked into liking us is trying to generalize his personal problems to men as a group. Just because he's disgusting, doesn't mean the rest of us are.

Speaking as someone who has met a lot of men doing online dating, profiles that are relentlessly cynical and negative don't make me think that a guy is smart. They make me think that (a) he's not fun to be around, and (b) he wants me to think that he's smarter than he actually is.

Cosign, this, especially the bolded part. I have found that people that are constantly negative and cynical, especially if they are unable to laugh at themselves or unable to respectfully disagree with people, tend to be very insecure and are pretending to be smarter than they are. Once upon a time I was one of those people Smile

There are way sto be negative and cynical that is not as off putting, but it does tend to require some self mockery (e.g. say negative/cynical thing and follow with a, "but then again I am a pretentious twit. Excuse me while I go lounge in the corner and angstily read Sartre....in French." or a level of good natured world weariness and an ability to show that even if there is a metric fuckton of shit in the world you are still capable of recognizing good/beautiful things.
reboot
reboot
Moderator of "Other Relationships" and "Gender, Identity and Society"

Posts : 2514
Reputation : 1005
Join date : 2014-09-24

Back to top Go down

Dumbing Myself Down Empty Re: Dumbing Myself Down

Post by Gentleman Johnny Thu Mar 26, 2015 6:14 pm

Glides wrote:
"Your problem is that you come off as too smart to most people. Women don't like smart-asses. They want to see optimism and enthusiasm, and you come off like you want to kill yourself. They want to hear your hobbies and how much you love life, nothing else. Women need to be tricked into being attracted to any man."

I'm just going to ignore that last sentence entirely so I can get to the point instead of ranting. You be enthusiastic, love life, have hobbies, be positive and still come across as intelligent. Put Stephen Hawking in your book list, or the planetarium in your to-do list. Say you spend a lot of time thinking about whether or not your mirror universe evil twin is plotting to invade this reality when CERN opens a gate to an alternate dimension. Yes, being snarky can be good but use snark, sarcasm and self-deprecation very sparingly. Coming off as funny or smart in a dating profile is difficult at best, at least directly.
Gentleman Johnny
Gentleman Johnny

Posts : 555
Reputation : 213
Join date : 2014-10-02

Back to top Go down

Dumbing Myself Down Empty Re: Dumbing Myself Down

Post by fakely mctest Thu Mar 26, 2015 9:32 pm

eselle28 wrote:7. If you've got a bunch of lines like that, I'd say maybe cut a couple, not so much for dumbing down as for the sake of streamlining and using your best material.

I agree with pretty much everyone else, but wanted to tease this out a bit.  I like your line, Glides!  I also think there's a sweet spot, as GJ was talking about, between humor everywhere and straight-faced sincerity.  Whenever I encountered a profile that seemed to be wall to wall jokes and riffs (even if they were funny!), I'd wonder if the guy could take anything seriously and I'd wonder if he'd just constantly be laughing at me or teasing even if there were something I was genuinely upset/serious about.  I'd wonder if hanging out with him would feel like I had to constantly provide an audience.

reboot wrote:I have found that people that are constantly negative and cynical, especially if they are unable to laugh at themselves or unable to respectfully disagree with people, tend to be very insecure and are pretending to be smarter than they are. Once upon a time I was one of those people Smile

+1  I came of age in the grunge era and slightly beyond, so I'd always sort of attributed it to that, but I think it may be something certain people go through when they're working on refining their humor.  I also think that there's this pernicious idea floating around out there about what sorts of things "signify" smartness. Some of them are definitely found in this delightful (though no longer available) t-shirt from Threadless:

Dumbing Myself Down 636x460design_01

Also, as one of the resident hipster-adjacent members, I wonder what you mean by hipster bullshit?  The hipsters I know, we like what we like and the whole irony thing is kind of overblown.  I've said it on DNL prime but I think it bears repeating: most hipsters are really just nerds who went to art school or are interested in the arts.
fakely mctest
fakely mctest
General Oversight Moderator

Posts : 298
Reputation : 74
Join date : 2014-09-24

Back to top Go down

Dumbing Myself Down Empty Re: Dumbing Myself Down

Post by Guest Thu Mar 26, 2015 11:38 pm

The Wisp wrote:First, smart =/= cynical or negative. If you do come off as the latter, yeah that will hurt you. The former shouldn't be an issue. Maybe your friend saw the latter, and conflated it with the former?

And yes, you're friend is a moron. Straight women find men attractive, they don't need to be "tricked".

"Well men are fucking disgusting," I replied. "We smell, we have hair, we smell bad..."

This quote is bullshit. Moving on...

Tinder is 95% pictures, don't get worried about coming off as too smart, worry about having quality photos.

And finally, don't get to worked up about OLD. I've come to the conclusion that, for various reasons, young guys like us are at a huge disadvantage on OLD for various reasons. So, six matches actually isn't terrible, to be honest. Smarts are attractive to many women, including presumably the women you would want to date, no?

I won't even bother going down the "but I'm not tan and muscular" route to defend that one.

Maybe I'm biased in finding most grown men to be disgusting, maybe it's something I've been taught through the media. I mean, I find myself disgusting because I don't look like a Calvin Klein model, what fucked up shit is that? But then again, Tinder is designed for Calvin Klein models, and OKC allows ugly people inside. So who knows?

I'm cute compared to an Alabama redneck, does that help?



nearly_takuan wrote:In text, it's difficult to distinguish tone; I might have delivered a couple of his lines myself, verbatim ("now that equal rights is apparently a thing"), but only with the smallest possible degree of sincerity.

And yeah, I think your line is funny. A friend of a friend of a friend of mine has an album out with "ten out of ten best friends say, 'it's great, Jake'" printed on the cover. That shit is hilarious, and nobody can convince me otherwise. (Though I may not be the best person to consult, given that as of today I know there exists a restaurant known as Appethaizing, and I'm aware that that's terrible, and I'm still amused.)

I suspect acting "dumb" is probably the wrong approach. (And again I'll admit I'm probably not the best person to ask because I tend to be fonder of brainy, talkative women/people, and don't consider myself to have many assets other than my mind, and as we all know I'm also Alone, in perpetuity, in good times and bad, in sickness and health, all the days of my life, 'til death bring me Nirvana.) But I wonder if there are related strategies, or certain facets of the idea, that might be helpful anyway?

I don't even come off in the profile as smart, I come off as a total wiseass. My friend showed me his ("Loving life and loving my guitar" made me giggle) and apparently it works. What seems to work is listing your interests and being optimistic and joyful to the point where it gives me nausea. But then again, most of the profiles on Tinder give me nausea with how stupid they are. And apparently girls use it for validation of their appearance except when a truly gorgeous man shows up, I don't fucking know what my own generation does. My friend is good at taking pictures of himself, maybe, he's actually fatter than me now.

Like, I'm acutely aware via personal experience that someone appearing to be vastly smarter or more knowledgeable than yourself can be intimidating, and particular to courtship can lead to thinking about things in terms of who's in what "league". Maybe especially on venues like OKCupid: I hesitate, or even fail to follow up, on messages to those kinds of people sometimes, just because—what can you possibly say that would impress a genius? And because of what it looks like on my end of things, it's practically unthinkable to me that anyone would think I was out of their league. But I'm working from a limited data set, and the conclusion I've arrived at isn't the only reasonable one. Same goes for you, no?

It would be cool to be a genius, I secretly want to be one.

I just assume women see my profile, see my face: NEXT. I found the closest to photogenic pictures I could find, so I don't look totally hopeless, but I'm not quite cute enough for Tinder. Having my nasty Eastern European gorilla face makes it tough to compete. I wanna get those "American" plastic surgeries that some Korean chicks apparently get. I look like a pinko commie and that's what I'm going to blame for my lack of experience today.

Trust me, it's not a particularly intelligent profile, nothing about euphoria or katana collections and shit like that. But I do come off as massively cynical, because I am. And cynicism is a huge turnoff, this we know. Women like optimism almost exclusively, because why be around a total downer?

So. Presentation. To quote one of our wiser members, marketing is not an optional skill. Maybe you don't have to act dumb to reassure people that they're plenty smart enough to interact with you. I include myself in the set of people who need constant reminders that other people can feel insecure about things too, and I doubt it's a coincidence that there are a lot of us on this site.

By the way, there's a remarkable absence of people I don't like on this site, which is especially unusual because it's the Goddamn Internet.




Seconding Wisp's final point: I sure as hell wouldn't want to date anyone who didn't love my mind, or whose mind was so terribly sedentary that I had to hold my own back just to communicate.

I'm bad at marketing myself, let's say that's my problem then. That girl I was dating kept on making statements about how I'd be cuter if I had a fashion style (t-shirts and gym shorts are literally the only clothes that look good on me, that and jeans), how I'd be cuter with a different haircut, cuter if I looked more masculine, it got annoying. Apparently I'm an androgynous Eastern European gorilla with no style or something. I come off that way in my profile, I'm not wearing designer labels (and Doc can go fuck off, his fashion suggestions cost up in the thousands by themselves. Some of us are in massive debt right now, asswipe).

I suppose I could attempt acting like I'm not suicidal and see where that gets me, but trying to be other people hasn't worked for me either. It's another Catch 22.

kath wrote:

As Wisp said ... yeah, nope. You should come off as though you are somewhat likely to actually like them, which is the actual useful part of "optimism and enthusiasm". Smart has nothing to do with it. How much you hate stuff (if that's a thing you talk about on a dating profile) won't come off as too smart, just like you probably won't like them if you don't like anything, so why bother?

Not sure what exactly you mean by "pretentious hipster bullshit" (and hipsters have a reputation for being very ironic - that is, like, the defining characteristic, so I'm not sure many "hipsters" come off as particularly likely to like other people either), and not sure how well it would work, but as long as you were able to back up whatever was on your profile when they met you - so sort of re framing you through "pretentious hipster bullshit" lens, and you weren't mean to the people who replied, you could always give this a shot and see if it works for you. May as well experiment.

Actually, I was rude to the one girl who responded, really rude. I literally said "it doesn't matter what I say, I'm going to inevitably ruin everything."

Self fulfilling prophecy, as it turned out. We actually argued a bit ("stop being so goddamn negative, the world is wonderful!") and then nothing. I completely earned it.

Like what my friend had on his: "Loving life and loving my guitar! Can't wait to see what adventures I go on!" That actually works for him. And writing something like that even in jest makes me sick. It's so...sickeningly joyful, like something Marilyn Monroe would write ("if you can't handle me at my worst...")

I dunno, I might just delete the fucking thing.


reboundstudent wrote:At first I kind of see the friend's point. Optimism and a fun sense of wit are a lot more attractive to the majority of women than "smart-ass" humor and self-deprecation. Then he started talking about how women need to be tricked and everything is equal now so women are dumb and men are useless and WHAT THE EVER LIVING HELL DID I JUST READ.

Dumbing Myself Down AdwM9

Just.... no. Listen to everyone's points here. And please stop taking your friend group seriously.
[/quote]

I have no sense of wit. That's my latest problem right there. I can't force myself to be optimistic, that's the problem.

I wish being a smart-ass and constantly insulting yourself to make people laugh was sexy Sad

If it helps, my friend is pretty self-destructive on his own, and tends to say the horrible things he says because he's secretly even more of a misanthrope than I am. He doesn't just hate women, he hates everyone. He's racist, anti-Semitist, anti-gay, he takes positions he knows are wrong because he just enjoys getting people angry. And in retrospect, a horrible person to ask for advice.

He claims he hates women because he was raped by one (which is actually true, sadly enough), but I dunno. He's a fucked up guy. We're friends because of it, because who better to be friends with when you're fucked up than another fucked up person?

I dunno, I could just rant about how ugly I am and blah blah blah, and therapy hasn't been helping. Disregard this post, I'll find something else to get insecure about in like two minutes.

Guest
Guest


Back to top Go down

Dumbing Myself Down Empty Re: Dumbing Myself Down

Post by Enail Thu Mar 26, 2015 11:51 pm

Glides, please cut it out on calling entire ethnic or regional groups ugly. If you have to insult your own appearance, you need to find ways to do it that don't involve insulting other people.

Glides wrote:
Actually, I was rude to the one girl who responded, really rude. I literally said "it doesn't matter what I say, I'm going to inevitably ruin everything."

Self fulfilling prophecy, as it turned out. We actually argued a bit ("stop being so goddamn negative, the world is wonderful!") and then nothing. I completely earned it.  

Like what my friend had on his: "Loving life and loving my guitar! Can't wait to see what adventures I go on!" That actually works for him. And writing something like that even in jest makes me sick. It's so...sickeningly joyful, like something Marilyn Monroe would write ("if you can't handle me at my worst...")

So, I don't think it would be a good idea for you to do something like your friends' profile (or to listen to him about most things, he sounds awful), you can do something more genuine for you for sure, but saying stuff like "I'm going to ruin everything" is also not a great idea. It's not exactly that it's rude, more that it's bringing out the issues squid in ways that are really unsuitable for the context. A person you're chatting with on Tindr is not someone you should be handing your issues squid to to look after.
Enail
Enail
Admin

Posts : 4853
Reputation : 2868
Join date : 2014-09-22

Back to top Go down

Dumbing Myself Down Empty Re: Dumbing Myself Down

Post by Guest Fri Mar 27, 2015 12:09 am

Glides wrote:This one is more curious than anything else: I was discussing my rather half-assed and extremely cynical Tinder profile with a friend, he said something really weird:

"Your problem is that you come off as too smart to most people. Women don't like smart-asses. They want to see optimism and enthusiasm, and you come off like you want to kill yourself. They want to hear your hobbies and how much you love life, nothing else. Women need to be tricked into being attracted to any man."

"Well men are fucking disgusting," I replied. "We smell, we have hair, we smell bad..."

"Right. We used to rape women back in the old days because we oppressed them and controlled them and shit. But now that equal rights is apparently a thing, you gotta trick them. And obviously that's better. But reasonably, lesbians are the smartest people ever because women are hot and men are useless."

"I don't know where you're going with this," I said.

"What I'm saying is that in order to make any girl like you, don't act so fucking smart. They're not stupid because they're women, they're stupid because they're people, and they find people like them attractive. Dumb yourself the fuck down and you'll be rolling in pussy."

>women need to be tricked
>men are disgusting
>lesbians are the smartest people ever
>don't act so fucking smart
>mfw

Dumbing Myself Down EedrVDo

All right, let me tell you this, it's fine to be smart or smart ass. I love girls that are snarky and or witty it means they can dish it as well as take it. I'm not as witty but I can be pretty clever sometimes and I can also be pretty funny -- IDK if I've made anyone here laugh (pls tell me if I have ;-; ). IDK about you, but I've seen a lot of girls value a dude with a good head on his shoulders. Or maybe a clever one to say the least.

Glides wrote:
I've gotten like six matches total and one response.

I mean, yeah, Tinder is not a good place for virgins in the first place.

Six matches? That's pretty gorram good, I'm terrible at Tinder and get very few matches. But I will add that Tinder in general is just a terrible place depending on where you live. Down here in San Diego, there's nothing but bots, everywhere.

eselle28 wrote:
9. There's nothing wrong with hair and (most) men smell great. I agree with everyone else that women who are attracted to men don't need to be tricked into finding them attractive. The smell thing is especially not right, because it's totally a thing among women to sleep on their husband/boyfriend's side of the bed if he's away for awhile so they can smell him.

Dumbing Myself Down UOicl3Q

Wow, that actually warms my heart. Hope to find someone that awesome one day.

Guest
Guest


Back to top Go down

Dumbing Myself Down Empty Re: Dumbing Myself Down

Post by Barretts_Salt Fri Mar 27, 2015 10:42 am

The Mikey wrote:

IDK if I've made anyone here laugh (pls tell me if I have ;-; ).

Yes, there've been a number of times you've made me laugh or smile:)
Barretts_Salt
Barretts_Salt

Posts : 59
Reputation : 6
Join date : 2014-10-21

Back to top Go down

Dumbing Myself Down Empty Re: Dumbing Myself Down

Post by Guest Fri Mar 27, 2015 10:55 am

Barretts_Salt wrote:

Yes, there've been a number of times you've made me laugh or smile:)

Aww, yay! :3

Guest
Guest


Back to top Go down

Dumbing Myself Down Empty Re: Dumbing Myself Down

Post by reboundstudent Fri Mar 27, 2015 11:03 am

+1 for excellent gif-fu, Mikey. :-D
reboundstudent
reboundstudent

Posts : 460
Reputation : 261
Join date : 2014-10-01

Back to top Go down

Dumbing Myself Down Empty Re: Dumbing Myself Down

Post by Guest Fri Mar 27, 2015 1:31 pm

reboundstudent wrote:+1 for excellent gif-fu, Mikey. :-D

Dumbing Myself Down JzOJTbl

Thank you, I try. ;D

Anywaaaay...

Guest
Guest


Back to top Go down

Dumbing Myself Down Empty Re: Dumbing Myself Down

Post by PintsizeBro Fri Mar 27, 2015 6:22 pm

You don't have to look like an underwear model for someone to find you attractive. Yes, that means unlearning a whole bunch of media bullshit. But unlearning media bullshit might be the best thing you can do for yourself.

PintsizeBro

Posts : 307
Reputation : 233
Join date : 2015-02-13

Back to top Go down

Dumbing Myself Down Empty Re: Dumbing Myself Down

Post by Sponsored content


Sponsored content


Back to top Go down

Back to top


 
Permissions in this forum:
You cannot reply to topics in this forum