Hacker News Reader

Comment by wiradikusuma | Hacker News Reader

There's a saying (which could be specific to my country) about men approaching women. If you're handsome it's called flirting, if you're ugly it's sexual harassment.

Joking aside, I do notice that successful men (again, maybe specific to my country) tend to be attractive and they usually have an attractive and smart partner. Successful but not attractive men can still have either attractive or smart partner (or both, but different persons, and the former is a trophy—and the latter doesn't know about the former).

View on HN

>There's a saying (which could be specific to my country) about men approaching women. If you're handsome it's called flirting, if you're ugly it's sexual harassment.

There's a famous comic meme about your distinction that's regularly reposted on the internet: https://i.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/newsfeed/001/663/485/1f8...

But many women have commented that they find the "attractive" guy's compliments also unwanted.

Selection bias? Most of the women who _commented_ feel that way, in the same way that 70-95% of people who read reddit/hn/whatever only lurk. Vocal minority maybe.

There are also other factors. Attractiveness not only depends on physiognomy but also skincare, hygiene, dress and even medical interventions (e.g. orthodontics) which are often tied to wealth and especially childhood wealth. Childhood eating disorders and childhood obesity/malnutrition for example are hard to overcome as an adult and more common in poorer families. So attractiveness already is in part an indicator of wealth (at least on aggregate if not for every individual).

It's well-known and widely established that coming from wealth makes it easier to get with "gentlemen crimes" (e.g. being caught drinking underage or using illegal drugs is more likely to result in confiscation and a stern warning or "slap on the wrist" if the police officer knows you're from a wealthy family, other biases aside) as well as sexual assault.

So the difference between the two can simply be that the "handsome" guy in a suit is just more likely to "get away with it" because it's riskier to confront or report him compared to the "ugly" guy who is likely on a lower rung of the social hierarchy.

To be completely frank, this applies to both sexes. As a man it feels nice to be complimented by attractive women but when I face the same attention from women I don't consider attractive and just prefer to have normal work relations with, I feel very awkward. I don't want to sound rude and hurt them, but sometimes when you don't react they take it as an approval to go further. But most of the time just dry "thank you" and moving on to the next topic solves it.

If the woman is attractive, it is different? My commercial is a very attractive female (and I mean, very), she flirted with me (my bad really, I sent weird signals, we didn't knew each other enough for the level of friendlyness I showed, it's an issue in my family, my father and my sister have the same), I put a "i'm moving in with my girlfriend" somewhere later in the discussion (it wasn't exactly true), bam, clarified, but I felt really awkward doing it and finding a way to close that door. I think that if you don't see the other as a potential mate, it's always awkward.

Mentioning a partner very early on seems to be a very common pattern in getting to know people.

> But many women have commented that they find the "attractive" guy's compliments also unwanted.

Pay attention to what they do, not what they say.

This notion (step 1: be attractive, step 2: don't be unattractive) comes up a lot in male-dominated online spaces.

It's a fallacy, and actually a self defeating one since it causes guys to ascribe their failures to something out of their control (looks) instead of what is actually in their control (behavior.)

Here's a pretty good deconstruction of the concept IMO: https://www.doctornerdlove.com/understanding-the-hot-creepy-...

The article is more a takedown of the strawman "hot guys can't be creepy".

It seems obviously true that certain behaviors are hot if they're performed when there is mutual interest and creepy when there isn't any. And being hot has a huge impact on whether or not there is mutual interest.

In addition hot people are just given more latitude than ugly people in terms of social faux pas.

> In addition hot people are just given more latitude than ugly people in terms of social faux pas.

No no, that's exactly the point. If an advance is welcome, it's wasn't a faux pas. If it's not welcome, it's a faux pas. This is true regardless of hotness level.

Are hot people more likely to be welcome to a larger set of people? Sure, that's nearly tautological. But the expected behavior is the same: be sensitive to context, read signals, don't violate boundaries. Hot people and ugly people can both do this (or not.)

Hot people are more likely to find people that are into them. But nobody owes or is owed anything regardless of attraction level, and it's every guy's responsibility not to act like a creep.

This has gotta be one of my favorite parts of HN, it's an odd glimpse into how men view the world.

You've got it backwards. In both cases what makes it harassment is continuing to push when it's unwanted. Why you seem to see a difference in results based on attractiveness is because your average guy can't take a hint no matter how attractive they are. So "success" becomes literally stochastic because guys never back off (and bonus take being unresponsive, ignoring them, or outright telling them no as "playing hard to get") so it only works when coincidentally the feeling of attraction is mutual which is sorta related to conventional physical attractiveness but not as 1-1 as it's made out here. 95% of the time I don't want even the hot guy approaching me and even 1/20 feels high.

I kinda wish it worked like Brazilian steakhouse rules where I could wear something that signaled, "open to being hit on by strangers."

What you said there is exactly what they mean though. Hot guys acting like assholes and not asking typically doesn't get issues due to the effects you talked about.

I think typically is doing some heavy lifting that simply isn't true. But even if it was surely this isn't what you want to aspire to, right? Get hot enough that you can disregard women's signals because it accidentally works out for you marginally more often seems a lot harder than... ya know not doing that.

I swear the guys that just start dancing on me would do far far better if they just asked first. It goes from "oh god ew how do I discretely get one of my girlfriends to get me out of here" to "eh ya know what, sure."

> But even if it was surely this isn't what you want to aspire to, right?

Yes, most guys don't want to be assholes which is why they talk about this. You might notice that when you are out dancing most guys on the floor aren't grinding their crotch against you. The people who are fine with being assholes aren't complaining, you wont find them in these discussions.

> I swear the guys that just start dancing on me would do far far better if they just asked first. It goes from "oh god ew how do I discretely get one of my girlfriends to get me out of here" to "eh ya know what, sure."

The guys who do that don't want to dance with you, they want to sleep with you. Asking for a dance will probably get them girls who wants to dance and not go further, you instantly rejecting them is what they want.

"But if they danced and did some more work then maybe..." But they don't want to go through that, that is the entire point they want to skip the work to build a connection and just do a one-night stand.

I don't think so. There is a growing movement on places like Instagram and Tiktok, currently it's mostly played as a joke but there are woman complaining about how they said to a guy "No" and he backed off instead of trying again. Many women want to play hard to get and want a guy to try multiple times. The problem is if an attractive guy does it then he "is confident and really wants her", but if unattractive guy does it he's a "creep who can't take a hint".

You can play this to your benefit, though. If you back off confidently enough, it creates ambiguity making it look like you've got no time for "hard-to-get" games. Which is good for you if everyone else is stuck in the "won't take no for an answer, must try again" status quo.

What? I think it's fake women saying that.

My sister was raped by her boss, so maybe she is more sensitive, but she box and spend 6 hours a week at the gym (10 hours total if you count boxing), and truly attractive males hit on her daily. Any guy who hit on her without being prompted, even the 'cute' ones (which is, to be fair, a big part of gym goers), get on her 'red flag' list, that she share with her gym and box friends. Maybe when she was younger she might have thought that.

My personal experience (which was until recently limited to feminist hippies living in vans/tents and playing guitar around a fire tbh) is the same. Just have normal conversation, a bit of small talk, listen and pay attention, flirt a bit, only show off if it doesn't break the rhythm of the moment (better yet, don't show off at all), ask for a date without saying it's a date. If it's no, it's no. Doesn't mean you can't flirt anymore, flirting is always fun (and if it's not for you, think about that: more practice!).

> Just have normal conversation, a bit of small talk, listen and pay attention, flirt a bit, only show off if it doesn't break the rhythm of the moment (better yet, don't show off at all), ask for a date without saying it's a date.

It's really hard to do this well and not be boring however. You have to do all those things and also subtly telegraph that you're somehow attracted to them and don't just want to have "a normal conversation" - mostly by 'showing off' subtly enough, not looking like you're blatantly showing off. It can be done, but plenty of guys are going to try and fail. I do suppose it's better to look excessively boring and inoffensive than to end up on their "red flag, animal, unsafe to be around. Must be avoided" list.

> It's really hard to do this well and not be boring however.

Takes like these are very odd to me. The parent comment is basically saying to have a conversation and if it goes well ask the person out. If said person finds your conversation boring then why would you want to date them in the first place?

So much discourse online about dating is "I HAVE to do X and Y and Z and it's just exhausting", but why? Why go through all this effort if you don't want to? Isn't the whole point of dating to find someone who makes you happy and likes you for who you are?

> Isn't the whole point of dating to find someone who makes you happy and likes you for who you are?

Yes it is, that's the whole point. As a dude, you're not going to signal "hey I like you for who you are, I care about making you happy" with boring conversation. You need something that's not just that, and is not "keep pestering them and don't take no for an answer" either.

I guess I just find the idea of "signaling" things strange. It's like women are fish and men are trying to figure out which bait to use.

A conversation will naturally be interesting if two people are interested in each other, even if it's about a boring topic. That's what chemistry is. It may start out boring, but if there is chemistry, it won't stay that way.

But hey, that's just me. I have absolutely zero interest in "the game" and doing things I wouldn't normally do to get women to date me, and I am lucky enough that I don't have to. I just see people talking about doing all this stuff to get women to like them and I can't help but think that a relationship started that way is doomed to fail. I would find it exhausting to constantly worry about "signaling" things to someone to keep them interested. I want to be myself, always, and if they're not interested, oh well.

You think women don't try to figure out what 'bait' to use? It may be a game, but if so it's a game everyone plays. And we're all fish.

As a general rule, don't seek dating advice from (probably scripted) Tiktok videos. Really, the less you try and learn about the human condition from sources like that, the better.

I agree that men should be better at taking a hint, but I think there are a few reasons why men continually push, which mostly boils down to survivorship bias. First, you have plenty of pop culture movies where the guy strikes out time after time, but then eventually is able to win the heart of the girl. There is also the family stories of how "grandpa" kept asking "grandma" out and she finally said yes. A guy who never tries will never win, so you have to try to have any hope of winning. At this point is it baked into men's genetic code for survival.

> In both cases what makes it harassment is continuing to push when it's unwanted

I worked at a place that had lots of young people and HR's definition included even a single time, and intent does not matter, perception does.

They would also punish without letting the person know who/when/where they were accused by.

This was not theoretical CYA policy, I saw one guy fired and another lose promotion and both swore they did not know why.

A workplace is a very special setting though. Your coworkers are people you have to be around day in and day out, and to mix any kind of romantic pursuit with that is just asking for trouble. Especially in this day and age when "perception" can easily shade into outright paranoid attitudes.

That should be standard HR policy everywhere. There is no appropriate way to hit on coworkers. It's unprofessional at best and a company-ending liability at worst. HR's job is to protect the company from both.

> I kinda wish it worked like Brazilian steakhouse rules where I could wear something that signaled, "open to being hit on by strangers."

The "pear ring" is trying to make this happen but it hasn't really caught on much.

This is great. No idea why it's some weird product when the whole value is teal silicone ring for straight, light purple silicone ring for not straight which you can get same day shipping on Amazon but if they manage to get it to catch on guess I don't care about the means.

I got SO many downvotes on Reddit for suggesting that.

Much of reddit is incapable of generalized or abstract thought, especially when done in humor.

So you're saying that all reddit users are incapable of dealing with generalisations!? This has been debunked by science experts. It's called reading a book.

You sound like a redditor. /s

Everyone is stupid except me.

Are there real people on Reddit on anymore? I’m not sure how the hell they’re going to IPO. The app is horrible and the users are too.

> The app is horrible and the users are too.

Good thing none of this matters as long as the number goes up!

They are going to IPO cause capital has no other ideas about where to put their money and they will show a line going up and to the right in terms of user base.

Maybe there is more women and socially competent humans in general on reddit?

Creeps are mostly people who aren't socially aware or don't care. And another side to this discussion is that if you hit on someone substantially more attractive than you, you're already signaling that you aren't very socially aware or don't care i.e. a creep.

Any guy who hit on my sister without being prompted, even the 'cute' ones (which is, to be fair, a big part of gym goers), get on her 'red flag' list, that she share with her gym and box friends.

I think it's typically wishful thinking. Just act like a normal human being, it's often enough, even if you're ugly.

I've been fat from 24 to 29 years old, and obese from 26 to 28. I did not have any sex during that time (my libido was quite low tbh), but I did have a few date, maybe half a dozen?, despite being quite ugly (23 to 27 especially, I didn't took care of myself at all). I assure you I wasn't attractive. But I was a normal human being who could listen and find cues before asking someone out.

How did that work with Donnie and Ivana :/ ?

I think you're engaging in a bit of humor, here, but Trump was born at the top of the socioeconomic ladder. There's nowhere for him to go but down. I don't think this study applies to people like him.

Was he actually ever considered attractive when he got "on the scene", so to speak?

If you ever found his daughter Ivana attractive well then she came from ...

You mix an average male with an attractive model and something decent may come out. Plus she could afford surgeries.

Outside of ones feelings for Trump ...Ivana holds the standard of beauty. Those who loathe him prior to their dislike of him ..those ppl and the majority of them thought the same about her looks. That she is natural beauty even prior to any plastic surgery.

Attractiveness runs in Trumps family. He afterall was the Paris Hilton / Kardashians of the 80s and early 90s. Those types of socialites have beauty and wealth and society loves to follow them because of it.

Money is attractive, too. I'd be pretty flexible on my standards for a partner if it meant I could never have to work again in my entire life.

I feel like age hurt him for sure. You see Donald Trump in Home Alone and he looks like an average white dude. But now he looks like a troll.

What's the deal with the orange? When do you think that became "a thing" and why do people do it? Its beyond repulsive as a similarly fair person...

Plus, an average-looking dude in the 90s had a chance regardless.

Yet another quaint thing (affordable housing, education, chick's standards, boy are we all gettin screwed)

And an average-looking billionaire has even better chances.

What is Trump's main pathology as it relates to his wealth? There's always this conjecture that he was like Nouveau Riche and wanted so bad to be accepted in line with the Old Rich? Why does he care so much, did Fred beat it into him that they needed to assimilate or why's it such a huge fucking deal to him?

Trump was conventionally attractive by the standards of 1977: https://cmg-cmg-tv-10020-prod.cdn.arcpublishing.com/resizer/.... He was 6’2”, had a straight, narrow nose, clear skin, and straight white teeth. His face was chubby but back then it was boyish and youthful. If you look at old pictures, he and Ivana weren’t an obviously mismatched couple.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com