this post was submitted on 07 Apr 2025
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Women as a whole want different things, and often don't know what they want from moment to moment. In my experience, most women prefer to be approached in public under some circumstances, and what those circumstances are differs wildly from woman to woman.
women ought to have a signal that they are open to being approached, like a PvP flag or something
The thing is, there are signals - open body language, frequent glances around the room, etc.
The tougher bit for some folks is also seeing, and respecting, when they clearly want you to go away, AND not taking it personally. They may want someone to approach them, but for whatever reason not you. That's perfectly OK, and says nothing about your general worth, just their interest at the moment.
Go, initiate contact, and if you're getting one word replies, crossed arms/body facing away from you, refusal to meet eyes, inauthentic laughs, etc., exit cheerfully, move on with your day and let her move on with hers.
The biggest problem I've had women tell me about is not being approached, but guys not taking the hint if it's not clicking and leaving them be. Be the guy who reads the situation, takes the hint if present and doesn't get all fucked up about it, and you'll probably end up talking to someone who does want to talk to you later.
Should note this is often just human stuff, and holds for a lot of guys as well with the caveat that they're often, though not always, more direct.
I remember in college being mildly devastated when a friend I had a thing for was talking about how she just wanted to meet someone that (superficially) seemed a lot like me, but then was not into me.
Of course, in retrospect I realized I'd done that to couple women without realizing what was happening.
Yeah, I'm autistic so reading behavioral cues more or less doesn't work for me. It's not impossible but my error rate is significantly higher than most people's. I just focus on being friendly and honest. I always take an opportunity to be introduced to someone. I always take an opportunity to become closer to someone if they want that. I also focus on being pretty (I only attract bisexual women, lol)
In my perception, approaching women like the days of old (pre social media) is dead as a concept. There are two ways forward: women become more explicit about when they want to be approached, or they themselves do the approaching. It seems to me that the latter is the path they've chosen. Every woman I've ever dated has come to me and made it clear they want me in that way. Is this a good solution? Probably not. More people are single than ever but that is caused by a lot of factors, not just this social change.
Reading minds isn't a "signal"
I'm sorry but if men and women want equality in their relationships then women need to stop this middle-school behavior.
There are reasons subtlety and body language evolved.
Some men don't take direct "Not interested. Please leave me alone" well. They'll call you a [slur, slur] and maybe get violent. But fake laughter and dead-ending the conversation has lead to safer outcomes.
So, yeah, it sucks people can't be direct and honest, but it's not just coming out of malice.
Also a lot of the time people don't really know what they want, or want contradictory things.
I understand the excuses people make to not act like mature adults.
I'm sorry if men were rude to you, them acting like children doesn't give you a pass.
It's not acting like children. It's acting like adults. Most adults use subtlety for a variety of reasons. Personal safety and letting someone down gently are just two that come to mind.
You can want everyone to have a standard API with nice json output, but that's just not how humans are. Expecting it is folly.
Giving peolple the wrong "hints" because they are completely subjective is a childish thing to do in place of communication.
My fellow sapient, do you engage with real people in the world? Your position has merit in a "imagine a frictionless, spherical cow for this physics problem" kind of sense, but is absolutely unrelated to the real world of humanity the entire time we've existed, and probably going back to earlier primates as well.
I talk to people every day.
It's not acceptable to hit on people who are trying to do their errands or their jobs.
There are acceptable places to meet people (bars, clubs, dating events)
Do not target women and approach them to try to fuck them in public when they are minding their own buisness please.
Those are true statements, but seem to be a whole other topic from what we were talking about. You were rejecting the ideas of body language and subtlety by saying that's asking for mind reading and childish.
People can not read body language, you shouldn't assume anything based on body language ever.
I bet you're one of those people who also push the definitons of consent and equality.
Im done giving you attention troll. I hope no woman has to suffer you stalking and trying to fuck them in public when they are just trying to exist.
You are making some wild assumptions about me. At no point did I ever say it was appropriate to engage women who are just living their lives in public. In fact, in the post you're replying to, I said I agreed with you.
Body language has been a part of humanity since before modern humans existed. You can tell, I hope, the difference between a frown and a smile.
If you don't mind me asking, how is this reading minds? This is watching for behavioural cues, which lend some evidence of interest/disinterest. Men exhibit similar cues as well - think about the guy sitting at the bar, facing the interior with a grin looking about, versus the guy hunched over with a scowl counting the bubbles in his beer. Unless you're moved by pathos to clink scowling guy's glass, who seems more approachable?
Will admit there are folks who see a single behavioural cue and immediately jump to "They want to jump my bones"/"They wish me and my family were dead", which is dumb. What I'm talking about is more "Oh, looks like they may be open to chat with someone, go say hi", then noting if that impression stays or dissipates on fresh evidence. Again, the biggest problem I've heard of is people, but particularly women approached by men in a social setting, not wanting to tell the approaching party to fuck off (politely or otherwise) because of a perceived or real threat of violence. But this feeling often comes across pretty clearly in body language - if you're a decent person, reading those cues and and exiting gracefully just makes sense.
Discounting non-verbal cues in IRL communication is silly. We give out a lot of information about how we're feeling with our bodies to those paying attention. I'll admit it can sound kinda creepy when writing it all out, but for some folks this is all intuitive. For other folks, thinking about this a bit helps with being more at ease in talking with new people, whether platonically or with an eye to something more.
Adults use their words to communicate.
Children play games.
This is going to come off terribly, but do you talk to many people IRL? There's no game here, just humans being humans.
That said, perhaps not your preferred types of humans, which is perfectly fine. If anything, not engaging people the way I describe here could be a filter for the kind of people you prefer to interact with. Really isn't anything wrong with that, though others may find it a bit constrictive.
If what you're doing makes you happy and secure in your relationships with people, then more power to you!
No why the fuck would I talk to random people?
And yes, charades is a game, it's not flirting.
People don't want to be approached in public unless they are boomers or older.
Maybe you should ease up on giving advice and making proclamations on how to talk to random people then
That is how you talk to people.
You don't unless they make it clear they want to be bothered.
Sure if you are in a bar or a club that's expected, but anywhere else please ffs don't approach women.
What is how you talk to people?
Also I'm not sure how to square "unless they make it clear they want to be bothered" with your rejection of body language and subtlety.
If a woman wants to talk to you they will.
Don't try to fuck women in public.
Don't approach them.
It's as simple as that.
No one is saying to try to fuck women in public
That's not reading minds though. What was being described are social skills you very likely already have, but are used to applying to non romantic interactions with men.
This is like saying common sense is common.
It isn't. And we can't expect people to know everything so sometimes we have to use words.
I have no idea how that is anything like saying common sense is common. That did not address what I said. Someone has failed in some aspect of this communication. Since it may have been me, I'll try rephrasing.
Do you talk to people you are not romantically interested in sometimes? Are you able to generally guess whether they would be receptive to interacting or not? Could you conceivably guess if a person waiting in a waiting room might be open to chat, versus wants to be left alone?
The point I was driving at is people often behave as though interacting with those they are sexually attracted to is different. While it can be in some ways, the way you can identify whether someone you're not sexually attracted to would like to interact can be used with those you are sexually attracted to as well. It's not mind reading.
If you cannot do these things with people you are not sexually attracted to either, that's a skill that can be developed, and the issue is not an inability to read women's (I'm guessing) minds.
Nah these are child games and should be left in middle school.
Tell me how you feel I'm not a fucking mind reader.
Could you see how I might perceive that reply to have failed to engage with anything I said?