Last night I got an OkCupid message from a dude who had been peppering me with “small talk” messages for two weeks. It had gotten to the point where seeing his name in my inbox made me heave a belabored sigh. As a raging introvert small talk is something I hate under the best of circumstances, 2 weeks of messages that gave me nothing to hold onto was like slow water torture. Side note, in Portland I’m running into more guys who want to exchange daily “hey, how you doing?” messages. I’m not one of those people who says “let’s just meet right away, none of this extended message stuff!” on the contrary, I like to get to know people a bit before we meet so that when we do we can jump right into talking with out the awkward small talk (which we’ve established I hate) but the endless messages that say nothing hold no interest for me. Consequently I stopped answering this dude. Rude? Probably. But life is short and I just can’t… Anyway, last night I opened my email to find this:
Clearly the gentleman didn’t like being blown off and decided to (what?) yell at me about it? Change my mind by insulting me? Make me feel bad? What? I was annoyed. And then I was pissed. I thought of every guy online who messaged me over and over, making me feel like they were trying to bully me into going out with them. I thought of every time I’d ignored strange men talking to/yelling at me/telling me to smile on the street only to be asked “what’s your problem?” I thought of the guy who, after being told I didn’t want to see him anymore proceeded to ignore that and continue to text me demanding that I “stop dicking (him) around” and you know what? Fuck’em, all of them.
No one deserves to be harassed and everyone should have their boundaries respected but I’ve been thinking lately about my specific boundaries. In my quest to better understand people in general and myself in particular I’ve been learning more about introverts. I’ve been coming to understand a lot about why I am how I am but I’ve also been thinking about all the times I’ve been called a “bitch” for not engaging with men the way they want. I’ve thought about how often I turn up the volume on my ipod, bury my nose further into my book in an attempt to be invisible. I’ve thought about how often I’ve apologized to people who decided to try to get what they wanted by berating me for not acting in the way they’d like. Then I cried (I am me after all) and blocked this douche, something I had never done on OkCupid before.
I realized that I’ve been blocking folks on Twitter for a while. Every week or so someone will take offense to my assertions that women are people or that gay people are people or that people who have sex are still people etc and try to goad me into one of those ridiculous internet fights. That’s not how I interact with people, it causes me to shut down, I hate it. So, I stopped tolerating it. It took until last night for me to carry that action into my real life.
I’m done with feeling shitty for being a “bitch” when I don’t feel comfortable with the way people approach me. I’m done with living in fear of folks yelling at me. I’m done with all the shit. This is who I am and if it makes you angry that’s your own damn problem.
ps- I’m actually really a nice person and can be quite outgoing and talkative (as my blog indicates). Seriously when you see me out on my tour or at a conference come talk to me, we’ll have a blast! Just skip the small talk, please.
pps- I’ve been reading this and it’s been tremendously helpful:
Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking
ppps- This is the first post I’ve ever had to come back and close the comments thread on. I did it because some douche left a 2 comment, 700 word long screed against women and then came back, a month later, with an abusive comment when I wouldn’t publish it. Thank you, sir, for proving my point.
Blocking people on the internet can be very liberating. People have no right to make you/us feel like shit, and when they do, they deserve to be eradicated from our internet lives. FIN.
I used to be on OKC and the number of times I would get bugged, yelled at, or outright threatened because I didn’t respond favorably (or at all?)? Shocking actually. I used to have a bunch of posts about it. Well I still do I mean, they’re just really old. I got so fucking sick of that place. I either would meet a great guy who I had great conversations with but wouldn’t pull the trigger, or I’d get messaged about sex/my tits/something else unwanted when I said don’t message me with that shit, and wow. I had to report a few of the guys for being downright SCARY. Since you’re supposed to be truthful about your home city, those like me who now live in a small town have valid fears. What if some guy recognized me from OKC and decided to “teach me a lesson”?
I have zero tolerance for anyone who is disrespectful, online or offline.
Block and move on.
There’s a great way to avoid being insulted and labeled, as a woman, at least in the world of online dating. It’s called taking five fucking seconds out of your day to tell the guy you’re not interested.
Now, don’t get me wrong: obviously, harassment is extremely uncool, and it’s one thing to blow a guy off and block him if his first message is a comment about your chest or something. However, there are plenty of good men out there too who are simply frustrated that they’re not even being acknowledged for polite, genuine messages that they’ve put their time and thought into. I’m not saying you have to spend a ton of time on it, but at least have the decency to tell those kinds of guys “thanks, but you’re just not what I’m looking for,” even if it’s through a form letter, for God’s sake.
Gentlemen have feelings too, and when they make an effort to show women they like that they value them as HUMAN BEINGS, they naturally want that idea to be reciprocated. When you don’t reply to somebody’s well-meaning message, what you’re saying is “I might be worth your effort, but you’re certainly not worth mine” — You’re implying that they’re trash, for you to discard without care.
Honestly, I feel like women have a big-time sense of cynicism and entitlement when it comes to online dating, and while that is most assuredly the fault of perverted, asshole guys, most women have become so uptight as a result that it’s almost ridiculous. It’s nigh impossible for any actual conversation to exist between two people on sites like OKC and POF, because if a perfectly nice guy makes one mistake, he is likely to be labeled a “creep,” and his interaction with a woman is almost certain to be terminated immediately.
When I first started online dating I answered every single message I received (even the “hey, DTF?” ones), which resulted in sending out a bunch of “thank you for your message but…” messages. Do you know what happened? The bulk of those received responses that were either insulting (“you’re an ugly bitch anyway”), threatening (“fuck you bitch, you better hope I don’t find you!”) or trying to explain why I was wrong (“I think, that if you just talk to me for a while you’ll see…”). You think women dating online are cynical? Damn straight we are! Because we are often reminded that we are one “wrong” answer away from the “nice” person we’re talking to calling us a whore or threatening us, we are operating in a world where our “no” is not seen as the end of a conversation but as the jumping off point for negotiations and we are dealing with folks who think they have some god-given right to the attention of women.
So, yeah, now I don’t answer everyone. Why? Because, as my piece (which I suspect you didn’t actually read) says I’m done accepting my assigned role as a dude harassment target. Does that mean I am sometimes rude to people who don’t deserve it? Yes. Is that unfortunate? Yes. Am I sorry about that? Fuck. No. I am not a geisha. I am not a concierge. I am not here to make sure all the men have as pleasant an experience as possible. I’m here to keep myself safe and I’m prepared to be impolite if necessary.