Why do women fail to view the negatives in men they date?

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KevinLA
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23 Apr 2011, 3:15 pm

What other decision do people make in life where they don't view the negatives of something?

Women will date guys that rape them of their self respect, but only view the positives of their partner whatever they might be.

I don't get it.



The_Face_of_Boo
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23 Apr 2011, 3:19 pm

I don't get your question.



wefunction
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23 Apr 2011, 3:23 pm

Do you mean... Why does a woman you know continue to date a man that you feel does not treat her well?



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23 Apr 2011, 3:24 pm

It's certainly not all women, there are plenty who go to the opposite extreme. I think those who need so desperately to have a relationship in order to feel like a worthwhile human being will ignore anything that stands in the way of that goal, while women who are for some reason afraid of intimacy or the responsibility of commitment will search for excuses to avoid it and make it someone else's fault that they are not close to anyone.



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23 Apr 2011, 3:24 pm

:? I can see what you're doing there, without knowing who this is. Let it go.



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23 Apr 2011, 3:36 pm

LisaPizza wrote:
It's certainly not all women, there are plenty who go to the opposite extreme. I think those who need so desperately to have a relationship in order to feel like a worthwhile human being will ignore anything that stands in the way of that goal, while women who are for some reason afraid of intimacy or the responsibility of commitment will search for excuses to avoid it and make it someone else's fault that they are not close to anyone.


:hail: if only more women were like you.


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MarketAndChurch
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23 Apr 2011, 3:46 pm

KevinLA wrote:
Women will date guys that rape them of their self respect, but only view the positives of their partner whatever they might be..


There is what we like, and then there is what we are attracted to.

Sometimes... the two are the same, but not always... you can be attracted to the cute girl at the register at a cafe until you get up there to order something and she says something rude or offensive to you or someone else. Or you can sit in math class next to a girl you don't really notice physically but she always has something funny to say every class and you begin to find her intellectually engaging and end up really liking her.

Sometimes people enter relationships based on attraction, and not on what they like.

(there are also women who settle for scum, and who react favorably(because of being self-conscious or a low self-esteem) to men who put them down or give them a back-handed compliment. I can't explain these women and the men who take advantage of them lol, but for the other half that suffer from what I posted above... that is the reason why - the disconnect between what you like and what you want.


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KevinLA
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23 Apr 2011, 3:54 pm

MarketAndChurch wrote:
KevinLA wrote:
Women will date guys that rape them of their self respect, but only view the positives of their partner whatever they might be..


There is what we like, and then there is what we are attracted to.

Sometimes... the two are the same, but not always... you can be attracted to the cute girl at the register at a cafe until you get up there to order something and she says something rude or offensive to you or someone else. Or you can sit in math class next to a girl you don't really notice physically but she always has something funny to say every class and you begin to find her intellectually engaging and end up really liking her.

Sometimes people enter relationships based on attraction, and not on what they like.

(there are also women who settle for scum, and who react favorably(because of being self-conscious or a low self-esteem) to men who put them down or give them a back-handed compliment. I can't explain these women and the men who take advantage of them lol, but for the other half that suffer from what I posted above... that is the reason why - the disconnect between what you like and what you want.


What you want should trump what you like. That is my point. Why don't women weigh the positives vs. the negatives.

Must be an NT thing that the don't?



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23 Apr 2011, 5:28 pm

I find your question really overgeneralizing. Saying that all women don't weigh the positive and negatives is like saying all men just think with their "hoo-haa". You're making them all sound like they're all unintelligent. Certain women (and men) will stay with someone who doesn't treat them like they're uber special, because they believe they won't find anything better. Every girl wants the movie type romance where they're treated like the most special person in that man's life. However, that doesn't exist. People have to find balance for what works for them or what they can live with. No relationship is perfect. Being an outsider looking at a relationship, you don't get the whole story. Unless the woman has been abused and is fearful for her life to leave a man, it's clear she has decided she can live with the crap he throws at her until she decides she can't. Heck, maybe she's not as great as she seems either. And I agree with Lisa - Some women need a relationship to feel meaningful. Then again, some men do too.



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23 Apr 2011, 5:41 pm

Relationships are difficult to judge from a distance. I can barely figure my own out.

And wishing for some kind of perfect justice in relationships might not be good for any of us. For some reason everyone assumes that a perfectly just world would benefit them.



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23 Apr 2011, 5:50 pm

KevinLA wrote:
MarketAndChurch wrote:
KevinLA wrote:
Women will date guys that rape them of their self respect, but only view the positives of their partner whatever they might be..


There is what we like, and then there is what we are attracted to.

Sometimes... the two are the same, but not always... you can be attracted to the cute girl at the register at a cafe until you get up there to order something and she says something rude or offensive to you or someone else. Or you can sit in math class next to a girl you don't really notice physically but she always has something funny to say every class and you begin to find her intellectually engaging and end up really liking her.

Sometimes people enter relationships based on attraction, and not on what they like.

(there are also women who settle for scum, and who react favorably(because of being self-conscious or a low self-esteem) to men who put them down or give them a back-handed compliment. I can't explain these women and the men who take advantage of them lol, but for the other half that suffer from what I posted above... that is the reason why - the disconnect between what you like and what you want.


What you want should trump what you like. That is my point. Why don't women weigh the positives vs. the negatives.

Must be an NT thing that the don't?

Maybe it's just that there's more to the whole picture than that. If you look further down the road to marriage, why is it so important that "for better or for worse...sickness/health" be part of the marriage vows?

If I go crazy, then will you still call me "Superman"?

Very often, even when we have the best hopes and best intentions, the miserable human beings we end up being is not what we started out as. I think "no matter what" is something we're really born with. Combine with co-dependency and self-esteem issues, you have couples that are really toxic to each other because one or both didn't realize that the person they ended up with was the person that was there all along. For example, when someone acts deceptively in order to attract a mate. We all do that--it's just part of the game. Our belief that "love conquers all" holds out that we can either change the person who abuses us or we can merely wait out the storm, not checking to see whether we are actually caught in the storm and being dragged with it.

When two people who really are good for each other get together, the love they share looks beyond the faults.

My wife and I don't always get along. But "getting along" was never what our relationship was about. It was about the deepness of our friendship, and anyone with friends knows agreement is not assured in all things. One of my pet peeves is when my wife gets upset with me and shares her feelings with other friends. One of her closest friends, the one she talks the most with, actually told her to pack my bags for me and send me away. Is that really appropriate advice for two very close friends who've pledged their lives together and sometimes have issues to work out just as any pair or group of friends do? That's not really very fair, and it is plainly a projection of her friend's projection of her own problems onto our lives together (divorced, contentious relationship with the ex, and the recent discovery that her kids aren't perfect!).

The negatives have to be addressed at some point. But by dwelling on the negatives ALL the time, you ignore those things that make the relationship worth hanging on for. Now, if the relationship really is abusive or even dangerous, that is not the same as "he turned 30 and hair started growing on his back! EW!" or "he doesn't make enough money to take me and the kids out like he used to. He's working two jobs and telling me I need to start working if we want to maintain this lifestyle. This is not what I signed up for, and I want out." Sometimes a good mate says, "look, I know he has some anger issues. But He's working through them, never hits me or the kids, and it's been 5 years since the last time he lashed out at home. If you'd known what his father was like, you wouldn't be so hard on him."

My wife dated a guy who grew up as a foster child, and he was actually one of the luckier ones. It could have been one of those fairy-tale success stories, but in the end his true colors shone through and she had to come to terms with the fact that her situation would never change. If she ended up dead from trying to get away from him, at least she'd die free. It was a risk she was willing to take, and she's much happier than she would have been. I suppose it all comes down to whether the negatives are really WORTH considering. Some guys are outwardly jerks but have hearts of gold and really are different in different situations. I'm a WYSIWYG kind of guy, and I got to a point that I laid all the cards on the table--said, "THIS is me. THIS is what I want/expect in a relationship. If you think that being with me will hurt you or you don't want to be expected to be what I want, do not allow me to waste your time. We can just be friends and nothing will change." In a good, thriving, functional relationship, the negatives don't really count that much.



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23 Apr 2011, 6:04 pm

Where is Bethie when you need her? :)

There have been some women I knew that were with bad guys, and treated those women like crap. They loved these guys. There are some women out there who like the bad asses. I don't know why, seems like some sort of physical attraction or something. I usually get ignored by women who like bad asses. But those women are usually not women that I want to have anything to do with anyway. If they ignore me and reject me for an a**hole, then it's their loss, not mine.


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24 Apr 2011, 12:20 am

As a woman who can speak for all women since we are all the same, I can definitely say that it's because we're stupid. It's because we want to screw the nice guys over. Forget female CEOs and Prime Ministers, it was a mistake to unchain us from our sinks and let us out of the house unsupervised in the first place!


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24 Apr 2011, 2:14 am

More nice guy crap.
Self proclaimed nice guys aren't "nice" for the last time.

Stop bitching about the opposite sex and live your life.



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24 Apr 2011, 2:18 am

KevinLA wrote:
What other decision do people make in life where they don't view the negatives of something?

Women will date guys that rape them of their self respect, but only view the positives of their partner whatever they might be.

I don't get it.


This isn't a sex specific phenomena. There are men who stay in relationships with abusive partners as well.



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24 Apr 2011, 2:35 am

Chronos wrote:
KevinLA wrote:
What other decision do people make in life where they don't view the negatives of something?

Women will date guys that rape them of their self respect, but only view the positives of their partner whatever they might be.

I don't get it.


This isn't a sex specific phenomena. There are men who stay in relationships with abusive partners as well.


Yes. I'd say one example of a male version of that is a woman who s very good looking but treats her partner badly. As long as he is more intoxicated by how she looks (or the thought of how she looks on his arm, to others), he's going to keep on eating the abuse. Add fear of not being able to get anyone else, or anyone "that good" again, and so forth, and it is reinforced even more.

I also suspect that as a guy (and straight, I would guess), there may be sides of other guys that you don't see, because they only show those sides to women.