Santy @Santylx90 - Twitter Profile

talking to guy friends about this, i’ve realised that some of the most respectful men i know are very hesitant to ask women out directly. they’re afraid of making someone uncomfortable and often have very few models for what good courtship actually looks like i think there’s an education gap here. a lot of the explicit advice available to men is PUA-adjacent and often terrible, while the thoughtful men who might actually model this well tend to stay far away from dating discourse because it’s such an unruly place of course we’re all fumbling our way through intimacy, but i do think the cultural shifts of the last decade left some men especially uncertain about initiation and what women actually want from them women can probably help close this gap too, by speaking more directly about how we actually like to be approached, and by being careful not to shame men simply for expressing interest respectfully. every time someone is socially punished for a sincere attempt, other people watching learn that initiation itself is dangerous ideally there should be very little social cost to respectfully asking someone out. she can say no, then you can take it gracefully, and everyone moves on. in many cases it should register for what it is, a sincere compliment that someone found you interesting enough to risk vulnerability the unfortunate selection effect otherwise is that the men most worried about being respectful become the most inhibited, while the men least concerned with making women uncomfortable continue initiating freely. all the wrong sensitive men get discouraged i wish more wise older men talked publicly about how they learned to pursue women with kindness and respect, and more women spoke plainly about what respectful pursuit actually feels like from our side. i think younger people need both sets of stories

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