pktechgirlbackup (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
pktechgirlbackup) wrote2012-09-13 10:40 pm
pktechgirlbackup) wrote2012-09-13 10:40 pm
The Audacity of Hope
What is the cost of asking someone out? We claim it to be nothing- "they weren't going out with you before, they weren't going out with you now"- but that is clearly bullshit. I know it looks like humans make up things to be stressed about for no reason, but that turns out to very rarely be the case. The popevopsych* is that the other cave men will know about your rejection and it will lower your social standing, but that doesn't make sense to me either: all the other cave men knew you weren't having sex with her before too.
So what additional information is conveyed by asking? That you are interested, which prevents you from telling the other cave man that she's just not your type. Okay, that's fair, no one likes being vulnerable. But also that you thought you had a good enough shot for it to be worth risking that vulnerability, and you were wrong.
This explanation makes a lot of sense to me, and not just because my friend just had to talk me into asking for something (non-romantic, non-sexual) from someone (who I did not regularly interact with) with the phrase "It's not presumptuous to ask." Human beings do not like it when other human beings cheat the hierarchy. It also explains a lot of stuff that otherwise looks quite ugly, like men cheerfully accepting "I have a boyfriend" but not "I'm not interested." "I'm not interested" doesn't have to mean "you were wrong to ask me out", and it would be a better world if we could decouple those, but it is heavy with that implication. "I have a boyfriend" has no such sting.
Also worth noting, fear of seeming presumptuous is exactly what keeps me from responding to subtle "I'm interested" cues with explicit "I'm not" words. What if he wasn't interested, and it was all in my head? I would have to be an arrogant bitch to have so grossly misinterpreted overtures of friendship or simple politeness as interest in me. Interestingly, I get at worst a mild version of this when asking men out, whereas it can approach near-pathological levels when rejecting them.
So the stigma attached to "presuming" someone could be interested is clearly serving no one's interest. Not even the super hot people, if the beautiful women complaining that no one ever approaches them are to be believed. I want to talk about the system that led to such a stigma against presumption, but honestly I've just barely got my head around the smaller issue and I can't hold any more thoughts.
*which is a totally different thing from actual evolutionary psychology which is a perfectly useful line of investigation in science.
So what additional information is conveyed by asking? That you are interested, which prevents you from telling the other cave man that she's just not your type. Okay, that's fair, no one likes being vulnerable. But also that you thought you had a good enough shot for it to be worth risking that vulnerability, and you were wrong.
This explanation makes a lot of sense to me, and not just because my friend just had to talk me into asking for something (non-romantic, non-sexual) from someone (who I did not regularly interact with) with the phrase "It's not presumptuous to ask." Human beings do not like it when other human beings cheat the hierarchy. It also explains a lot of stuff that otherwise looks quite ugly, like men cheerfully accepting "I have a boyfriend" but not "I'm not interested." "I'm not interested" doesn't have to mean "you were wrong to ask me out", and it would be a better world if we could decouple those, but it is heavy with that implication. "I have a boyfriend" has no such sting.
Also worth noting, fear of seeming presumptuous is exactly what keeps me from responding to subtle "I'm interested" cues with explicit "I'm not" words. What if he wasn't interested, and it was all in my head? I would have to be an arrogant bitch to have so grossly misinterpreted overtures of friendship or simple politeness as interest in me. Interestingly, I get at worst a mild version of this when asking men out, whereas it can approach near-pathological levels when rejecting them.
So the stigma attached to "presuming" someone could be interested is clearly serving no one's interest. Not even the super hot people, if the beautiful women complaining that no one ever approaches them are to be believed. I want to talk about the system that led to such a stigma against presumption, but honestly I've just barely got my head around the smaller issue and I can't hold any more thoughts.
*which is a totally different thing from actual evolutionary psychology which is a perfectly useful line of investigation in science.