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Comment by konart | Hacker News Reader

>Not much. Maybe a house of worship

Literature clubs, language classes. Literally any hobbie that does not require you to stay focused on device that may cut off your fingers if you look away.

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Trying to "flirt" in those spheres is looked down upon just as ferociously as doing it at the office. Have you not seen the viral TikTok of the woman that was "angry" that some guy was "checking her out" at the gym, while the man was barely paying attention at her at all?

Treating hobby scenes as pure dating opportunities is definitely looked down on. If you show up to Introductory Spanish and start dropping pick-up lines on strangers, yeah, people are gonna show you the door.

But hobbies are an opportunity for repeated exposure to strangers. Lots and lots and lots of people start casual friendships that can turn into romantic ones.

Using a hobby as a meat market: deeply uncool, and people will notice very quickly.

Using a hobby as a way to meet people, and having one of those relationships turn romantic: totally natural!

It’s a very fine line, yeah, but trust me, it is extremely obvious which one people are doing.

I don't use TikTok but I understand the problem. I wasn't talking about visiting those places just to pick up a partner. I was talking about opporunities provided by a place were you are basically forced into communication.

The hardest part in any relationship (at least if you are a shy person without much of experience) is to start talking. It's much easier to talk to someone if you already know each other. Work\clubs etc - provide a great ground for a first step(s)

Obviously people will turn away from you if you just came by to flirt.

>as ferociously as doing it at the office

People always flirt in the office thouth. In many cases they do this naturally and even without any thought about any kind of continuation. In many cases they are in a relationship even.

Flirtin is not only about sex, in fact it is more about sharing with other people "youtube pickup masters")

Is it? 1 Tik tok video doesn't really prove the point (seems to me it proves the opposite).

Also it depends what you mean by flirting. If you join a class and immediately start trying to pull every person of the opposite sex (or same sex if that's your thing), that just gives the vibe of being there for the wrong reason. If on the other hand you meet someone doing a thing you wanted to do anyway, and a friendship blossoms, that seems to be the point at which you start flirting.

The problem with hobby relationships is not only that it is just awkward in the first place as people said above. The other significant problem is that hobbies are long term activity. Say you sign up for a club/class/sports team and you genuinely interested in that activity. You meet 10-15 new people, and lets say there are no single people of opposite gender. Now what? Cancel your kayaking club after few weeks and sign for the hiking club? Then if that one is a wash too, cancel and move to learning chess? Etc.

In the case you're describing, the hypothetical person is going into the hobby for the wrong reason. The primary objective should be the hobby, if you happen to find someone you get on well with all the better.

I understand your point. But the original premise is to find a relationship via hobby. Then some said it's wrong. You should have a hobby because of the hobby itself. People looking for relationships in hobbies would be a turnoff.

So the original question is how people find relationships IRL (outside dating apps). Some answer just get a hobby. But then the same problem remains as you can see.

The same thing can be applied for working in an office. People do get relationships in an office but you would be a turnoff if you said you're looking for a relationship when applying for a job.

So for people looking for relationships primarily, what should they do outside dating apps? Or should they just repress their desire and live their life? If they meet one in hobbies or offices, great! If not, c'est la vie.

The idea is that romantic relationships are a side-effect, pursuing them head-on is often the wrong approach. It is better to set up your life in a way that makes them more likely, and to forget about them being any sort of goal.

So yes, get hobbies that you are genuinely interested in, but cultivate ones that can be pursued in a more social way and that have a decent representation of the demographic you're interested in. Then be open and friendly, but don't actively look for romance. Get the rest of your life in order in that manner and it'll happen as a side-effect.

The problem of course is that it is easier done in certain cultures and environments than others. E.g. probably much easier in some slower university town in continental Europe than in some busy car-centric US city. Also easier if you have a more relaxed working life than a busy career with only barely enough free time to eat and sleep. And if people are generally are more open and social and are not all holed in in their apartments online.

Arguably, in a lot of the developed world the culture and the environment has become very unconducive for such things, especially in the last 15 years. Watching older European movies from the 70s, you can really see how much things have changed.

These are all valid options but they result in a much smaller pool of potential matches. Colleges depending on the size have tens of thousands of potential matching opportunities. These are further enhanced by the social nature of college. Work while a smaller pool provides repeated exposure to people under a long time frame. Clubs and individual classes provide a very reduced pool of potential mates under a stricter timeline to establish a match. I am not arguing that what you are saying is wrong and indeed they are far superior than just sitting at home checking your tinder profile each day. They are just difficult and are more challenging with lower odds. Probably equal opportunity to just hit the gym for a few months, do what you can to work on your individual attractiveness and go to a bar a couple times a week. At least then there are better odds that the people there are looking for a match as well.

> Literally any hobbie that does not require you to stay focused on device that may cut off your fingers if you look away.

Ugh, last time I checked there's an awful lot of hobbies - a wide range - which requires you just that.

Computers aren't for doing some specific thing. They are for doing pretty much everything - through them.

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