I dun think anything has changed in the years since that article, if anthing, things get worse. Doesn't seem like it's been that long, but 2006. :shrug: prolly more opting out going on now.

Personally, I find it utterly laugahble that a wife could 'forbid' her husband from going to strip clubs. Screech and nag about it, sure, but forbid?

I have long since lost patience with 'modern' women in general. A more unhappy lot I have never seen.

People tend to create their own happiness or their own misery, and in this sense I feel bad for the plethora of 'modern' women, they've been taught since girlhood what should make them happy, they grow to womanhood thinking they know the path to happiness...then they find that they are accutely miserable.

They marry, and assume that if they can only go farther down the same unhappy road, they will find happiness at its end, the man cannot of course, be happy, because if he is and she is not, something must be wrong, he must give up more and more and more on the alter of her happiness, and perhaps out of love, perhaps out of duty, perhaps out of social mores that make him believe he is supposed to sacrifice, and men who abandon their wives are scum, etc...and so he does this, until he himself has forgotten how to smile, his now very spoiled and even more unhappy wife blames him for her misery, and it doesn't end until she cheats on him, in which case she finds it OK because her happiness is what counts and it wasn't coming from him, or he cheats on her after getting tired of her imposition of celibacy, and she gets to play up the melodramatic movie of the week victim role.

Of course if she cheats and is found out, its his fault, if he doesn't find out, she's almost mad that he didn't notice, but the satisfaction of the affair is minimal, she can't control that man, and its what she enjoys...but she also feels she should be able to control him, so she's mad at herself for enjoying her lack of control. An anger she inevitably takes out on the husband at home.

And so it goes and so it goes, as modern woman creates her own misery, spreads it, and chews on it like a dog does stale vomit, convinced the flavor will improve if it is only chewed long enough.

They're victims, but not in the sense that they believe themselves to be. Victims of a failed ideology, victims of bad teaching, victims of their own unwillingness or inability to reflect on the impact of their choices and accept responsibility for them.

Its rather sad really, for everyone.

"To most of the women I dated, even the odd date meant a lot, especially women who had been out roaming the singles scene for years in their mid-30s, trying to find a mate amid the serial daters."

Interesting that this man/woman seems to think it was okay to trifle with, waste the time of, and otherwise deceive the various women he/she "dated."

Robert says:

> They marry, and assume that if they can only go
> farther down the same unhappy road, they will
> find happiness at its end, the man cannot of
> course, be happy, because if he is and she is
> not, something must be wrong, he must give up
> more and more and more on the alter of her
> happiness, and perhaps out of love, perhaps out
> of duty, perhaps out of social mores that make
> him believe he is supposed to sacrifice, and men
> who abandon their wives are scum, etc...and so he
> does this, until he himself has forgotten how to
> smile, his now very spoiled and even more unhappy
> wife blames him for her misery, and it doesn't end

Oh my Robert - you described my marriage with my ex-wife perfectly.

That was my thought, too, Consul. Nora you are a sleazy douche.

I heard an interview Nora gave where she answered the "waste of time" question. Her answer made sense. She said the results were only valid if her dates were in the dark, but it was unfair to waste their time. So she limited dates to one date of one hour per person.

It funny how every study where results favor men, we end up talking about how horrible the people behind the study are. Easier than swallowing the results though.

Given the number of women who go on dates for the free meal, I'm less than likely to be sympathetic. Not saying these particular women did so, but if the worst one can say about a date is that it was a waste of time, well boo freaking hoo. Very first world problem. Its not like she strung a particular woman along for 6 months to a year with a promise of marriage or a long term relationship.

I will agree in that regard. I would be upset if i went on a date with an undercover man. Yet I do think the insights are too valuable to disregard.

Snoopy, I'm not surprised, sadly. I hear this kind of sad story from a lot of guys, soldiers no less, who vent about their frustrations.

Perhaps it wasn't right, in fairness, to waste their time on a date under-cover. But as she points out, there was no other way to do it, and given that they almost certainly at least got a free meal and a decent time out of it, its hard to feel to bad for them. After all, men waste their own time on dates allllll the time with women that don't put out, don't entertain, and as the undercover author points out, load a whole lot of expectations on the guys in terms of both money and attention demands. Its just really really REALLY hard to call her out on without holding a serious double standard in your head.

"Interesting that this man/woman seems to think it was okay to trifle with, waste the time of, and otherwise deceive the various women he/she "dated."

If those women had been out roaoming the singles scene all those years, it wasn't Nora who was wasting their precious time all those years. How about them taking some respsonsibility for their own dithering?

And as for trifling with, trifling with men is what she accuses all these women of. But of course it's only sleazy when it's happening to a woman, right?

I do agree with Robert that most of the dates probably had gone on dates where they let a man wine and dine then with zero intent of ever getting involved.

If you view a date that doesn't turn out to blossom into a romance as a waste of time, you're going to have a pretty disappointing dating life.

I date quite often and 80% of them go absolutely nowhere beyond the first date -- usually by an unsaid mutual understanding that it just isn't clicking in that particular way. That doesn't mean that I didn't have a pleasant time meeting someone new and that I didn't enjoy the opportunity to get some insight into some stranger's life. It's fun to meet people. This, by the way, is coming from the guy that is paying the bill.

It's pretty strange for women, who are getting treated to whatever activity it happens to be, to talk about a date being a waste of time.

I can see the false pretense argument, but all first dates are a false pretense to some degree. I can be a real ass sometimes and I have lots of other baggage. I certainly don't let that be known on a first date.

Hey whistle.

I don't think dates that go nowhere are a waste of time. Dating is mostly a decision process. My problem is when someone has decided it will never progress and pretend they are simply to extract expensive dates, trips, and sex.

I think that the important thing, is that we acknowledge that women are always the victim.

Let's just call them Wictims.

----

IIRC Vincent had a nervous breakdown following all of this, probably due to the guilt of having taken unsuspecting women out to dinner.

She's surprisingly candid in her appraisal of other women, and her book likely would have done better if she had been less so.

Vincent encountered what men often see when dating women in their 30's. A lot of single women are immature and self absorbed. It's like they're stuck in their adolescence. Many are also weirdly neurotic and angry; angry at men, their friends & family, television characters, and anything else that they can blame for their frustrations and disappointments.

I really don't think that we do women any favors by coddling them and encouraging them to blame men and society for their problems.

There should be nothing surprising about this article or the book - Men have been saying as much for decades. What bothers me is that it took a woman to do this (however deceptively) in order for these phenomena to get any attention.

The Men's Rights movement relies on women to do the same thing and there are several notable women on Youtube who support men's rights.

It is exactly WHY we need women to help the good men of the world express these challenges. It seems that when millions of men speak of a thing it is misogyny - when a single woman speaks of it, it has external validity.

"I listened to them talk literally for hours about the most minute, mind-numbing details of their personal lives"

Happens - there are a lot of self-absorbed people out there. A first date, you are supposed to show interest in getting to know each other. Women like this don't get a second date.

"Despite all the dirty talk and hiding strip club visits from their wives, they would speak about their wives and their marriages with absolute reverence"

There is no contradiction. Being dishonest is wrong, if that is what they were really doing (may also have been exaggerated, as part of the guy-talk). However, the clubs have zilch to do with their wives or marriage.

"To men, in the mind, women have a lot of power, not only to arouse, but to give worth, self-worth, meaning, initiation, sustenance, everything."

Yes. Women who are not aware of this are a problem, because men need affirmation from the women in their lives. Women who are aware of this are also a problem, if they misuse the power they wield.

Part of it is how as a society we have certain beliefs and biases that are prevalent.

I went to a marriage conference at my church some years ago. It was called Love and Respect, and it was very good. The instructor, Emerson Eggrichs also wrote a book by the same name.

One interesting aspect of Love and Respect is that both the book and agenda are balanced. Exactly the same number of chapters dedicated to husband and wife needs, exactly the same amount of seminar time to both. Yet countless women marched their husbands in and were shocked, shocked I say, to find that it wasn't all about showing love and respect to wives. As a whole, wives do not think they have a problem. To love them is gospel, to respect husbands is nonsense.

Relevant point being that Ned's point of view was only entertianed because it was experienced by Nora. Had Warren Farrel wrote this book he would be denounced as a misogynist even though he is no such thing.

um, yeah, given the number of women who wasted my times on dates...

the whole thing about the injustice of subterfuge for Ned to be taking them out for an hour..

is complete bulsh*t
oh wait, did I say that loud enough?
COMPLETE BULLSH*T

'm not talkin' about puttin' out, or is there a second date.
I'm speaking of women who deigned to go out with me, even though they had boyfriends, and in several cases were married. "We're on a break." riiiight.

the date with the lesbian was even more fun, I could never figure out why a woman who wasn't interested in men at all, would go out with a guy. She was the femme, and her butch partner was out of town and she was lonely. "You cheated on someone with me? OK, we're done..." I didn't even eat the dinner, just paid for my part and left.

I don't even think she thought it was cheating, since I was a guy.

So whining about how the women who went on short dates with Ned, were somehow victimized, show the very bias she mentions in her book.

It's is the pleasure of the woman, that is important... that she agrees to the dat, should be enough for the guy.

OI. Opt. Out.

"To men, in the mind, women have a lot of power, not only to arouse, but to give worth, self-worth, meaning, initiation, sustenance, everything."

I would go further to say that it is verboten to actually mention how much power women exercise over men--it just simply does not fit into the worldview that men are the all-powerful Misogynistic Masters of the Universe while women are the incapable inhabitants of this sorry sphere. Spoilers: this is mostly pressure brought to bear and willful ignorance by women. For my adult dating life (20+ years), I have always known/understood that women possess dominance over relationships. They wield the power of approval. When you ask someone out you are placing a large part of your ego on the line. A woman can never know the cruel sting of being judged inadequate for relationship material, regardless of how nicely it is done. Being rejected always hurts, more or less. Certain people will tell you it is just a numbers game and that you just have to keep asking women out until one says yes. However, those people tend to be women (who are the ones being asked out), attractive guys (who are never at a loss for a girlfriend and are seldom told ‘no’), men with bullet-proof egos (who feel no reaction to rejection and are happy to move onto the next lady), and people in a serious relationship/married couples (who have long since forgotten how the dating game works). Full disclosure: I am a person who tends to take rejection more seriously, to take my opinion for what it is worth.

I have heard the quote said that if women suddenly decided they liked having sex with men who could walk on their hands that half the population would suddenly be upside-down.

Agreed, Coffee! with the additional observation that said power has now increased. It happened when sexual harassment law was weaponized."Hostile work environment." "UNwanted sexual advances." Ask out a woman now in the work place or on a college campus, she can not only hurt your feelings, she can destroy your life. Your asking her out was an "unwanted sexual advance," and the discomfort she now feels around you (only made worse if you continue to work and socialize as before, instead of doing the decent thing and going home to kill yourself in despair over her rejection) has now created a "hostile work environment."
Think I'm exaggerating?
If any man does, I extend my sincere hope you never find out how wrong you are.

Yeah I see no problem with what she did because women date men to kill boredom all the time. I know very few women who haven't used a guy for a date or a free drink. Most women brag about it later.

I read the book a long time ago-so I don't remember it exactly but a lot of women thought she was a gay guy anyways.

As regards women's power over men, I think Amy's repeated advice to men dealing with rejection is the soundest: it's called self-esteem rather then what-others-think-of-you-esteem. With that in mind, female rejection becomes a boo-boo rather than a humiliation.

"With that in mind, female rejection becomes a boo-boo rather than a humiliation."

True enough. But I will say that an unbroken string of rejection gets to you after a while. How the rejection is done has a lot to do with it too; as others have pointed out up-thread, if a woman is offended at being asked for a date by a man she does not find attractive, she can do a lot worse things that just say no. When I was single, there were times when I passed up an opportunity to ask out a woman who seemed to be friendly with me, just because I could not bear the possibility of drama at that particular moment.

AMY: "By the way, I also don't think what she did is right, but I decided that the insights were valuable and I'd publish them. (I didn't end up using her book for my column because I had problems with what she did. Even if you just take an hour of someone's time under false pretenses, it is not your hour to take.)"

Don't get me wrong, I found her "insights" interesting (but not exactly revelatory) except that it took a woman just a year to come to them.

By the time I had to suffer through dating 30-something women, I had nearly two decades of dating experience to rely upon.

“it's called self-esteem rather then what-others-think-of-you-esteem.”

While I totally agree with your point, in the abstract, I can speak from personal experience that even the (thankfully) nicest rejection still stings and is a hit to one’s normal, healthy self-esteem. As said from the lyrics of Nada Surf ‘Popular’:
“Even if you've gone together for only a short time,
And haven't been too serious,
There's still a feeling of rejection
When someone says she prefers the company of others
To your exclusive company,
But if you're honest, and direct,
And avoid making a flowery emotional speech when you brake the news,
The boy will respect you for your frankness,
And honestly he'll appreciate the kind of straight forward manner
In which you told him your decision
Unless he's a real jerk or a cry baby you will remain friends.”

But even then, it still is an expenditure of ego when you ask someone out. You are basically asking if you are worth something as an individual, if someone else feels you are worth their time--i.e. you are asking ‘Am I worth spending time with?’ I have appreciated a girl’s honest response to my dating queries but have not felt any the less shamed that I was ‘inadequate’ (for whatever reason--probably because of my novelty-sized genitals). Again, for those of you who are not women, handsome/charismatic, sociopathic or married, it is not an easy prospect to just go and put your ego on the line to a complete stranger (i.e. dating). You are asking a person to, relatively, evaluate you as dating potential. To be honest, unless you are sociopathic (i.e. have no regard to what other’s think of you, not in a good way), this honest evaluation of your value can be devastating if you are found lacking. Some bounce back from this judgment faster than others. Regardless, women stand aloof and are (using a quote from ‘W’), ‘The Decider’. You can put all the positive spin on it you will but non-egocentric men will experience a negative hit to their self-esteem (i.e. what-others-thing-of-you-esteem). This is just how it is. Please don’t presume to optimistically believe how the rest of us respond to rejection.

What TheWolfMan, coffee! and Cousin Dave said. I'm sick of being told to "just get over it" when women I like don't like me back, or being told that "just being yourself" will attract quality women. I spent *20 years* "being myself" and got a positive response from exactly ZERO women.

And I admit it: I've become openly bitter about women as a result. One of the reasons I'd love to move out of SoCal is because I find so many women here to be superficial, money-grubbing and just plain cruel when it comes to men they consider beneath them trying to get their attention. I know I've said if before, but too many apparently believe that if they just reject and humiliate enough regular guys, George Clooney will someday just happen to show up at their door and swoop them away.

Just remember your sexual harassment training.

"With that in mind, female rejection becomes a boo-boo rather than a humiliation."

It is much different when it is your spouse of 20 years rather than someone you are asking out for drinks.

I had no idea everyone hated each other so much.

Well that's what happens when you get over 7 billion, I guess. Suddenly no one can STAND each other.

Have you loved your pug today? I have, so I'm cool with ever'thing.

@CousinDave If a woman gets offended when asked out by an man she's not attracted to, then perhaps she should stick to her vibrator.

Trust: "So she limited dates to one date of one hour per person."

Nora Vincent: "I listened to them talk literally for hours about the most minute, mind-numbing details of their personal lives..."

coffee: "I have appreciated a girl’s honest response to my dating queries but have not felt any the less shamed that I was ‘inadequate’ (for whatever reason--probably because of my novelty-sized genitals)."

Do you think more girls would have said yes when you asked them out if you didn't show them your genitals? ;)

The comment at the end, about Violence and denial of sexual agency is interesting. It's very hard to have any kind of sympathy for rapists, but I wonder how much of it is a kind of twisted form of denying rejection.

There are men who are sexually rejected their whole lives. This is not something that women can ever understand because every woman, by virtue of being a woman, has sexual value. Or in Amy's evolutionary terms (which I agree with), women are the biological limiting factor. The number of women will determine how many births there will be. Biologically speaking, we simply don't need that many men and there are men who never or rarely get sex.

Personally, I think there are two kinds. I think there are the super aggressive date-rape guys who just stay on aggressive mode and don't ever take no for an answer.

But I also think there are the really scary guys who have faced rejection their whole lives and are so broken, they see violence as their only means of ever getting sex.

It's just a theory, but it makes me wonder

Pirate Jo,

My dad has my pug while i am training for a job. My dad is an older man that loves long walks in the park. It's his favorite part of his day.

The pug, a young dog, screams at him to take him out.they walk ...and then the pug demands he be carried back home. Yes, carried. My dad obliges.

And then if you ask the pug if he wants to go for a walk again, later that day? I swear if that dog could talk he'd say:

"Hell fucking no"

And my dad loves that dog.

"If a woman gets offended when asked out by an man she's not attracted to, then perhaps she should stick to her vibrator."

I wish that was all there was to it. If a woman feels offended by a man's approach, she can cause him a lot of trouble. I've had personal experience with that. I think this sort of thing used to be limited by other women, but that constraint is gone now.

I am wondering why Amy is bringing this story up now, but no matter I guess.

In the interviews and articles I remember seeing her observations seemed accurate though like here it sounds like she was starting to go off the rails and from what I heard, in parts of the book she has some really weird ideas.

What prompts me to right is last night I went to bar for their Monday night special. There is usually a group there and last night there happened to be a girl (I would guess late 20s) who I had previously assumed to one of the guys girlfriends. She got on the phone with her friend (I assume) and the main topic of discussion was how some guy had approached her on Saturday and how dare he think that he might be acceptable to her. I felt sorry for the guy (hopefully he didn't know her rage at him) and made a not to steer clear of her. Was she super hot? No, an extremely overweight women. I am remind why I hate dating.

'She got on the phone with her friend (I assume) and the main topic of discussion was how some guy had approached her on Saturday and how dare he think that he might be acceptable to her. "

You know how there are nicknames for all kinds of schmucks? This one is called a Princess Fish Sauce. She's the kind that thinks she is God's gift to men. She is the clapped out old baggot who is loudly moaning at 35 about how there are no good men around, after shitting on men for 15 years who dared approach her when they weren't up to her movie star standards. Poor thing.

What a bunch of whiners. This is no different from the women being attracted to men that treat them badly and then wonder why they get treated badly. Duh.

I've seen guys go right by ten females with decent manners to hit on the hot, crazy, mean chick.

Just like I've seen women go right past the polite and kind guys to drool on the shitheel.

It happens all the time.

Especially if you are asking a stranger out based only on initial outward physical attraction. You know nothing about their personality or morals or anything except looks.

What do you expect?

Nora tells a good story, but I'm not buying it. Too many episodes lack the ring of truth.

Yeah, I'm with Laura. It's completely fine for women (even fat ones!) to be annoyed at being hit on in a way they don't like, just like it's fine for men to be annoyed at being turned down. There is a crucial difference though---guys know an almost-foolproof way to avoid their advances being turned down, which doesn't involve their looking bad. Just don't make advances to strangers. Meanwhile, a woman who gets dressed up nice at all and goes out in public has little way (aside from body language that people don't always recognize or respect) to avoid being approached. That's life.

Also under the category of "that's life": You're not entitled to be liked back.

Cousin Dave: if a woman is offended at being asked for a date by a man she does not find attractive,

Since we are repeatedly told -- especially (although not exclusively) by women -- that what makes a man attractive and sexy to a woman is confidence, it must be that if a woman turns down a man's request for a date (or phone number), it has little to do with his looks and much more to do with the fact that he was just wasn't exuding enough confidence.

mpetrie: As regards women's power over men, I think Amy's repeated advice to men dealing with rejection is the soundest: it's called self-esteem rather then what-others-think-of-you-esteem. With that in mind, female rejection becomes a boo-boo rather than a humiliation.

Well, this is true for any kind of rejection, whether it's rejection by someone you'd like to go out with, a business you'd like to work for or numerous other ways you can be turned down.

What I wonder is: if there was a parallel universe, where women asked men out instead of vice-versa, would they be any different than men in the way they handled rejection? My guess is no. I'm sure some would be able to shrug it off, some would find it humilating (or even devastating), and most would lie somewhere in-between.

Nora Vincent: If you have never been sexually attracted to women, you will never quite understand the monumental power of female sexuality,

I think the power is monumental if the woman is very sexy and/or very attractive (on his superb album Mr. Dave, David Lindley has a song called "Pretty Girl Rules The World") If the woman is reasonably sexy/attractive, she still has more sexual power than a man -- because, as the saying goes, "man proposes, woman disposes" -- but I wouldn't exactly call it "monumental." And, as for women who are very unattractive, they probably still have more sexual power than their male equivalents -- very unattractive and very low status men -- but that doesn't mean it's a lot.

Interesting that this man/woman seems to think it was okay to trifle with, waste the time of, and otherwise deceive the various women he/she "dated."

Posted by: Consul-At-Arms at March 24, 2014 7:24 AM
___________________________

I know. I read the book and thought that was pretty callous.

On the other side, though, I believe that when dating, at least, one should try to avoid dwelling on one's past - it's too easy to start expressing the feeling of "poor me."

And I definitely believe that when one has serious problems, financial or otherwise, it's a near-sacred duty to stay away from the dating scene until one has them reasonably under control. It is not some innocent person's job to clean them up for you, and when you're feeling sorry for yourself, it's too easy to go looking for someone to guilt-trip.

The question is, how does one politely avoid such unscrupulous people in the first place, when neither Googling or avoiding online dating helps?

There are men who are sexually rejected their whole lives. This is not something that women can ever understand because every woman, by virtue of being a woman, has sexual value.
__________________________________

Somehow, I doubt that. Ever since WWI or so, when photography, movies and magazines became a social influence as never before, the odds have been pretty high that the most beautiful woman that most men have ever seen was a model or a celebrity stranger they were never going to meet - not someone who lives in the neighborhood. I.e., thinness and mere prettiness don't have the power they used to, even in an age of obesity; there's always someone more glamorous to look at online, and being over 40 still takes its toll on women in a way it doesn't, necessarily, with men. (Even if she looks a lot younger than she is - sometimes.)
__________________________________

Personally, I think there are two kinds. I think there are the super aggressive date-rape guys who just stay on aggressive mode and don't ever take no for an answer.

But I also think there are the really scary guys who have faced rejection their whole lives and are so broken, they see violence as their only means of ever getting sex.

Posted by: Andrew at March 24, 2014 8:59 PM
_______________________________

In the first category, you can include those who are quite popular - such as young athletes - who get angry easily because they're not used to hearing ANYONE say no to any demand of theirs. Why more adults don't keep a sharper eye on both male and female athletes with a growing sense of entitlement (think Tonya Harding, for one) I don't know. Such people are often made, not born that way.

35 years old, almost 36, and have yet to be on a date the was not paid for by the woman in part (her food and drinks or just the tip) or in whole. There must be something to that entitlement. I really think halfsies should be a given on a first date. I simply stopped dating for a while because I couldn't afford both of us. For that matter, why are free dinners/drinks/whatever almost always on the man?

The closest things to dates that actually felt like dates were with a lesbian, we covered our share and could talk without overt pretext so we could get to know each other... and later bitch about our jobs.

Apparently I only ever dated women that Amy Alkon would throttle given the chance.