I ghost people

Sometimes I do it because I can’t even with people. Sometimes I do it because I forget we’re “dating,” and sometimes I do it because I can’t be trusted not to beat the ever living hell out of someone. I’ve ghosted partners, friends, study groups, possibly even family. You name it. Ghosting is perfectly adaptable to my philosophy of if someone wants to see you they will make an effort because I’ll only chase anything for so long. Ghosting is just the opposite side of that. For a lot of people, I think they know what they did to get ghosted, and if they didn’t well that isn’t my problem.

Last week I ghosted a dude who I literally, not figuratively, just agreed to a drink and maybe a movie if things went well, which he took to mean he could send me a digital strip tease. I blocked him at three pictures when we hit taking off his pants. I ghosted a friend who I couldn’t tolerate his straight up misogyny with the added bonus that I made all our plans. It is really easy to ghost people when you are the planner. I just stopped making plans with this person, and by the time he realized (two-months after our last fight on the phone and last face to face), I was like sorry not taking your calls either. I don’t think you’re that invested in this relationship either. Look if I feel like the other person is invested then I’ll send a text or tell them why I’m not into it. In a perfect world that is what we’d all do.

But we don’t live in a perfect world; we live in a world where another woman was killed by a partner over the weekend, and one the scariest trailers before Straight Outta Compton was a movie about a woman being stalked by an abusive ex, which much to my surprise wasn’t a Tyler Perry movie. That shower scene man. We live in a world where men feel entitled to your time, energy, and body so no, I don’t feel like I have to walk them through a I’m not interested conversation. Tiny violin gentlemen. For me ghosting is, an escape clause. I don’t owe you an explanation for why I don’t want to see you. I owe myself peace of mind, which might mean I have to tell you why or might mean I’m going to deactivate every online account I have. 

Let’s be clear, being rejected isn’t the equivalent of living in rape culture.

I can’t even with these people. Honestly, when you write something like this, do no alarm bells go off indicating you sound like an asshat? Well, let me help you out, if you ever feel the need to write anything defending men engaging in pick-up artistry, you are an asshat. If this compels you to compare rape to rejection, you’re definitely an asshat. And if you think for one second that not “getting a girlfriend” i.e. ownership and possession of another person is an affront to you because you are owed this much just for being a special little snowflake, you are in fact the largest asshat.

So what exactly am I talking about, well Sam de Brito wrote an article called “Hating the search for love.” Let’s use a flight of fancy and pretend that is what men who engage in this sort of behavior are doing, which we know isn’t true based on the techniques which encourage men to treat women like objects, and the phrase search for love implies giving and receiving, which objects can’t by definition do. But let’s pretend. Sam graciously agrees that men like Julien Blanc are creeps because he doesn’t respect women. However, then he argues that the “scenes on the Yarra River in Melbourne” (where a protest took place over Blanc and his followers) were mean. *tiny violin* See there is at least one incident of violence at the protest, but let me be clear, most of what I read was protesters yelling about rape culture and “walk of shame” as the men exited the boat. I was called a bitch with my sister when we were walking home from school at 13 or 14 for ignoring grown ass men yelling sexually explicit things at us. Sorry your feelings were hurt boys, but grow a pair and walk that shit off. Women do it all the time, where the threat of violence is very real. So you know, hug it out and move the fuck on. You are after all endorsing a man who regularly assaults people and video tapes it. Consequences of your actions, aren’t they fine.

Sam argues that because he has attended a variety of PUA seminars over the years as a journalist, he knows that they range from men like Blanc to speakers who want to “improve their client’s lives and do so in a respectful manner.” I wonder if Sam is talking about respecting their clients alone or if that extends to their client’s prey remember these seminars often use that terminology.

This is the point in the article where Sam writes a swan song about how hard it is to be one of the guys attending this seminar. He lists off every possibility like minority, disabled, etc. to make you sympathetic,  closing with the line “Imagine you turned up at last week’s event with that mindset and had people screaming ‘creep’, ‘loser’ or ‘abuser’ at you and they were filming it?” Um, well, golly gee, I might not be endorsing a man who assaults women or I would expect a backlash. I expect to be called a baby killer, cunt, d**e, etc. every time I wear my “This is what a feminist looks like” t-shirt, and no one was harmed by my fair trade t-shirt. I know, but Kari, how can these guys be expected to be accountable for how they spend their money and who they endorse? Oh, you mean like everyone else? *side eye*

Sam points out, well these poor guys aren’t the real bad guys invoking the whole women only date jerks meme—citing religious zealots, athletes, the wealth, etc. Because nerds can’t hurt women they just can’t except with the fake geek girl meme, or at cons, or in videogames, or in STEM or, well it looks like there is quite a list of where nerds are capable of hurting and exploiting women.

But it gets better, or so much worse depending on the lens you’re using to read Sam’s piece because, “My point is, the demand of seminars such as the one Blanc teaches arises from a very simple fact of life; the dating game is an uneven playing field.” Oh? Do go on. *rubs hands together like a Batman villain* You can see the car wreck coming for this guy.

“Men and women suffer and benefit from different sides to it.

“No man goes out of a night worried he might be raped, sexually abused or catcalled and these are all serious instances of aberrant male behavior that we must address, punish or discourage as a society.

“The flipside of this is your average man can go out every Friday and Saturday night for five years, buy himself a drink and stand at a bar and NEVER have a woman start up a conversation with him.

“In the majority of social situations, men have to be instigators and, of course, there are a plethora of respectful, non-threatening ways to do this.

“Some women, however, are quite happy to overlook, diminish and outright mock the problem this poses for many, many men—the anxiety of approaching women, the fear of rejection, the despair at being completely ignored by the opposite sex.

“This is an experience 100 percent guaranteed for 95 percent of guys. It happens. Over and over and over again. And some guys need help to deal with being invisible.

“I’m not equating the fear of rejection to the fear of being raped, merely pointing out that men—like most of the ones that attend Blanc’s seminars—do not do it to learn how to manipulate women, to sexually assault them or degrade them.

“They do it to get a girlfriend, to have someone to hold, to find love.”

I know, where to begin? Yes, please tell me about how dating hurts women. Are you going to address the social economic inequities that lead to a power differential between potential partners? What about the new study that says men are happy when their women partners fail? You know, the politics of dating. Oh, no, of course not because the only thing women have to think about on dates is whether this dude is going to rape me. Well, yeah that is there. Dating is actually dangerous for women  (see all the domestic violence and stalking stats). But you’re right Sam, this isn’t about women, why have we been talking about them this long? Back to the dudes. Poor, poor dudes who are ignored and rejected because no one deserves that unless your poor, a person of color, a woman, gay—who never show up in this piece at all—oh, wait you see what I did right there.

Sam’s swan song here is all about how men are owed attention because…well privilege, but Sam never says that. I fear rejection too gents, let’s bond over it. I fear being rejected purely because being a man is more desirable in the workforce (research, academia, writing, etc.) unless we’re talking low-wage service work (and try being a person of color in the workforce). Now, as for my personal life, I implement a take them or leave them approach. I have a firm you can seek me out when you want to deal with me or don’t, your choice, your right approach. See, because I’m a grown up, and I know that I don’t have the right to other people’s time, space, or thoughts.

The piece closes in truly shortsighted fashion with language that implies ownership over your partner. I hate the implication that you have to track and trap a partner and then ze will be yours for always and you can all him squish…sorry, I went all Finding Nemo. Women aren’t pets gents; we don’t need you to feed us and walk us.

What Sam never explains is why these men deserve special treatment. These men shouldn’t be yelled at for bankrolling an abuser because… These men should possess girlfriends if they want them because… These men shouldn’t be treated like women or other marginalized groups being yelled at on the street when they are just trying to get to an obligation because… Because men have male privilege, and we can’t go and treat them like women or other marginalized groups. Repeat after men: I am not entitled another person’s time or space regardless of what society tells me. Repeat this until you believe it, and then maybe I’ll buy you a drink.

About money and relationships

I prefer to keep my finances separate. I get that sometimes it comes up like if one of you make a lot more than the other, well partner B might not be able to afford everything partner A wants thus compromise and a direct conversation about it. This comes up with partners and friends, and somehow we all navigate this just fine. Of course, when it is an intimate partner relationship, things get unnecessarily complicated. But my father taught me never to give or loan people more than you’re willing to lose so if you need something ask for it and let’s move on. There is a lot we could say about relationships and money. As a woman I’ve dealt with partners obsessing over how much I make in comparison to them (one fight ending when I lied just to put an end to it—might have contributed to the disaster that was that relationship) or how some people feel they can purchase your time and attention through implicit contract when they send you drinks you didn’t ask for (I have all the feelings on this). However, I want to talk about a blog post, “If you don’t make money, I won’t date you,” I read earlier in the week when I was laid up sick. It was written by Elle for YourTango.com, but I read it on blogher.com. And I guess all of this was in response to someone else’s post about not wanting to date men who make under s certain amount.

Immediately I went through the oh hell no emotions, then I figured I knew where this is going, and I was right because of course I was this is my blog. All that said, the blog is about how this woman writing is very successful, and that success has put strain on any relationship she has with men outside her economic social class. She is looking for her financial equivalent. I don’t know about her data, but anecdotally, her view is that she has had more successful relationships with men in the same economic zone; meaning “Similar socioeconomic class=better match.” She argues that less affluent men are intimidated by her because she is successful. She continues to argue that when the man she is with has similar means then he has to show her who he is without his possessions and status interfering. She makes some large assumptions about men in her economic status—and by extension herself, which we’ll come back to. She concludes by arguing that she isn’t shallow.

So here is my dilemma (and insecurity), I come from a working poor family in a low-income neighborhood. There is nothing super shocking there. That said, I have academically surpassed most (if not all) the kids I grew up with, and without taking into account cost of living (much cheaper in Ohio) I probably out earn all of them too. On one hand that doesn’t matter at all right? Except, I can’t have conversations with a lot of them anymore. Our conversations circle gossip and the superficial because we don’t care about the same things. The flip side of this is that sometimes I date men who have no idea what they say with their PhDs and “important jobs” like the chemist who thinks poor people bring poverty on themselves. Sometimes I find myself sitting there thinking “this is not my life” “what am I doing here? This dude is making such unintentionally aggressive and boarding bigoted statements.” Any woman reading this knows what I am talking about because you’ve probably been out with a man (friend, partner, whatever) and he has said something really sexist. You can just tell he has no idea what he has said, and now do you start an argument over it or not. I also imagine most people of color have had this experience with white friends or strangers or all white people. These are called microaggressions, the often unintentionally verbal and nonverbal slights that lead to negative feelings, perceptions, etc. to persons of a specific marginalized group. A good example for women, a man saying, “You’re not like other girls.” Is there something wrong with being like women? For a person of color, “Wow, you’re articulate!” Anyone else having flashbacks to the 2008 Presidential campaign? Because obviously black men aren’t articulate so you must be the exception. In these examples these statements are intended as compliments, which to me always makes them worse.

I know everyone can’t be aware all the time. I was talking with a friend of mine about microaggressions against black people at work. She sees them when I sometimes don’t because I’m white and my privilege can blind me to things. Once she mentioned them, I knew she was totally right, and I couldn’t believe I didn’t see it. Then others were way more obvious. All that said, microaggressions are often reflections of institutional and systematic oppression.

All of this brings me back to some of the assumptions about class the author of this post holds:

Wealthier people are more invested in the future

Wealthier people are stable

Similar education is related to similar intellectual capacity

Hard work and economic yield are related. For example, if I work hard I make more so if my partner works hard he will make more.

When you pull these out you see immediately why they are problematic and classist. There are also boarder implications for example, the standard being used here is the white privilege standard. We know the pay gap exists between races as well as genders, and obviously social economic access. I believe Hispanic women make the least compared to white men. When you put it in those terms if financial gain or expectation of that gain then isn’t the author dating down? I mean she would have to control for pay discrimination in her calculations on whether a partner would be a good match. Really this argument could be made for dating outside of any socially constructed group. I reject it. Let me be clear, I’m a dating disaster, and I have a type (tall, skinny, thinks he is the smartest person in the room—that’s the guy I’m into every time), but I don’t intentionally rule people out because of social constructs. There is of course room to discussion gender presentation v. sex here, but maybe another time.

Single Women in DC!

You know exactly what this means. I hope Stewie's expression gets across my feelings on the subject.