Whatever happened to just asking pretty girls you see on dates? That’s how I met my wife. Total stranger, gave her my number and asked her out for coffee. Been married ten years now.
I'm surprised to hear you describe those odds as undesirable. 50% chance of a positive interaction is an order of magnitude higher than I would have estimated. Even if there's only a 5% chance of a positive interaction, parent poster's advice is still worth it. If you are respectful other other people, those negative interactions will be short and not too bad for either party. The upshot of find love and a lifelong partner more than offsets those short negative interactions that you have to wade through.
It's one thing if it's someone in a social circle, however big. Total stranger? Seems to only result in frustration for most folks.
Besides meeting my wife this way, there was one girl who rather coldly rejected me that I later ran into via another social circle. I apologized if I had made her uncomfortable and she told me that even though she wasn’t interested she was also somewhat flattered and that the incident made her day.
I think with sexual harassment in the world and all these apps everyone overthinks things and think just walking up to a stranger is for boomers or pick up artists. Really it’s just the normal human interaction that worked for a couple million years and still works today. And at least for typical heterosexual dynamics, the ability to make eye contact and say “Hi, my name is” will always be more impactful than a Bluetooth signal.
In my experience, you are 110% correct.
I first saw my wife giving a speech and remembered her name. Two weeks later, I went up and introduced myself, with "Hello, <name>, my name is <ghoward>. Thank you for your [speech] about <thing>."
There are a few interesting things about what she noticed. First, she didn't really notice that I got "<thing>" wrong. (I mixed her speech up with another person's.) Second, the reason she didn't notice is because all she noticed was that I remembered her name!
And finally, as we were preparing to get married, many guys in our community got up in arms about how the community "superstar" was marrying me, someone known to be less attractive. My wife says all of the time that she chose me simply because I actually introduced myself and (later) asked her on a date.
Though all of that doesn't explain how she still finds me attractive, especially since she now knows I'm not that confident after all...
I'm really, genuinely glad this worked out for you.
When feminists talk about the objectification of women, though, I think this is a prime example. (Admittedly there are no details.) The assumption that bothers me is that it is ok to approach a "pretty girl" about entering into a relationship.
Isn't this problem as old as the hills?
> Why can't I walk down a street free of suggestion?
> Is my body my only trait in the eyes of men?
> -- Suggestion, Fugazi, 1988