this post was submitted on 07 May 2026
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I'm a healthy outdoorsy athletic woman, never touched drugs or alcohol or junk food, a lifestyle which is intentional & ESSENTIAL criteria I work hard for.

So WHY the only men who approach me with amorous intentions are unhealthy, cigarette, alcohol, junk food men??

Update: Thank you for your thoughtful responses & the humorous ones too. I upvoted my favorites & laughed at the funnies and you've given me plenty to think about & work on.

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[–] favoredponcho@lemmy.zip 2 points 25 minutes ago

You should give drugs a try though. They’re pretty great.

[–] calcopiritus@lemmy.world 3 points 39 minutes ago* (last edited 39 minutes ago)

Have you tried approaching men instead? That way you choose who to approach.

[–] LH0ezVT@sh.itjust.works 3 points 1 hour ago

Have you seen my cigs? I left them somewhere between the burger and the vodka bottle. And maybe you'll find my weed while you are looking? Oh, by the way, can I have your number?

[–] blarghly@lemmy.world 79 points 20 hours ago

Two reasons.

I think /u/trem gives a reasonable statitical explaination. But it likely goes farther than that. The reality is, these days it is generally considered impolite to start a conversation with a stranger without pretense, and especially so to start a conversation with a woman with romantic intentions. The zeitgeist of our time is that women, by default, are not interested in men's advances, and that making an advance on a woman for no reason other than her physical appearance (which is all you can know before approaching) is chauvinistic. Thus, almost all intelligent, pro-social men have been trained not to make advances on women they might be interested in in public. So who are you left with? The dumb, not-forward-thinking, idgaf crowd. The kind that spend every night at the bar, and then don't care if anyone thinks they are a trashy peice of shit. And so that's who approaches you.

The second reason is probably something about the vibe you are giving off. Reading your post here, and a few of your other comments on lemmy, I get the impression that you are walking around with an expression like you have a smear of shit under your nose. Like, I get that you aren't interested in these men - but the way you say it, you sound like a very judgemental person who believes she is better than everyone else because she doesn't eat fast food or something. And the problem with this vibe you are giving off is that it is going to repel the guys you want to attract - healthy, ambitious, intelligent, nice guys who want a healthy, ambitious, intelligent, nice girl. Maybe they interact with you a bit and think "oh, she's judgemental, I don't want to date her." Or maybe they simply see the default look on your face and say "hmm, she looks pissed - I bet she'd yell at me if I tried to talk to her." The girls who get lots of attention from attractive guys are the ones with golden retriever energy - they love meeting everyone, which means the attractive guys feel less nervous about striking up a conversation and asking them out. It reassures them that, even if this girl isn't interested, she will at least be nice about it.

[–] CombatWombat@feddit.online 71 points 20 hours ago

I suspect what you're finding is that the kind of men who make amorous advances aren't the kind of men you're interested in, and the kind of men you're interested in don't make amorous advances. Have you tried amorously approaching a man who you're interested in?

[–] trem@lemmy.blahaj.zone 74 points 21 hours ago (2 children)

Not sure, if you're actually looking for an explanation or rather just want to rant and/or hope for dating tips, but maybe still helpful to be aware of:

Diagram of a normal distribution

With your specific expectations, you're somewhere to the far left or far right, whichever way you want to read it.
For example, this graph could be applied to alcohol consumption, with 0 on the left and lots on the right. Then you're on the far left.

The Y-axis shows how many people exist in that range. There's some median alcohol consumption, which is going to be in the center of this diagram, where most people are. At 0 alcohol consumption, there's very few people, because it's an extreme.

Obviously, this simplifies a lot. In a real survey, there's probably actually somewhat of a bump at 0 alcohol, because certain religions prohibit consumption.
But yeah, in general, you're hoping for relatively many extremes, so the number of people that match that are quite low. You will naturally get magnitudes more romantic interest from Average Joes, because there's just magnitudes more of them.

As somebody else already said, try to find groups that naturally attract folks from the extremes that you look for, like outdoor sports groups.
Online dating, as problematic as it is, can also be rather good at finding very specific extremes.

[–] jacksilver@lemmy.world 9 points 11 hours ago

Haha, I came here to say the same thing. Basically the average person (at least in the US) will probably be overweight (4 in 10 adult men are obese in the US - https://www.cdc.gov/obesity/data-and-statistics/adult-obesity-prevalence-maps.html)

Add in any other negative factor (smoking, drinking, misogynistic) and you're probably covering 60-70% of the men in the US!

I've made myself sad with data :(

[–] HeroicBillyBishop@lemmy.ca 42 points 21 hours ago (1 children)

A stats lesson in response to a dating question?! Awesome

Thank you for taking the time to write that

[–] Triumph@fedia.io 12 points 18 hours ago (2 children)
[–] bradorsomething@ttrpg.network 5 points 14 hours ago (1 children)

86.9% of all statistics are made up on the spot.

[–] HeyThisIsntTheYMCA@lemmy.world 1 points 11 hours ago

27.3% of people know that

[–] pipe@lemmy.world 8 points 17 hours ago

Especially lies and damn lies 😆

(Not the case this time though, nice breakdown by trem)

[–] BorgDrone@feddit.nl 24 points 18 hours ago

The outdoorsy athletic healthy men are too busy exercising at the gym to hit on you.

[–] massive_bereavement@fedia.io 28 points 20 hours ago (1 children)

unhealthy, cigarette, alcohol, junk food men sounds like an unsuccessful clone of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.

[–] SnotFlickerman@lemmy.blahaj.zone 18 points 20 hours ago (2 children)

It was very successful and it was called Aqua Teen Hunger Force featuring Carl Brutananadilewski.

[–] thesohoriots@lemmy.world 6 points 20 hours ago (1 children)
[–] EbenezerScrew@lemmy.world 4 points 19 hours ago
[–] Rhynoplaz@lemmy.world 4 points 19 hours ago (1 children)

HEY! WHATCHU DOIN IN MY POOL AGAIN, FRY MAN?

[–] SnotFlickerman@lemmy.blahaj.zone 4 points 19 hours ago

SVETLANA! BABY?

[–] Rhynoplaz@lemmy.world 26 points 21 hours ago (1 children)

How are these guys supposed to know that without approaching you?

[–] sic_semper_tyrannis@lemmy.today 5 points 21 hours ago (1 children)

Good point. Maybe she's suggesting she looks fit and healthy while these people don't

[–] Rhynoplaz@lemmy.world 17 points 19 hours ago

That's exactly why I'm a drugs and junk food kind of guy. I just got sick of constantly getting flocked by horny women.

[–] dbtng@moist.catsweat.com 20 points 20 hours ago (1 children)

We want to ruin your life too.

[–] SnotFlickerman@lemmy.blahaj.zone 9 points 20 hours ago (2 children)

Drag them down to our level.

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[–] disregardable@lemmy.zip 25 points 21 hours ago (1 children)

There are more of them that are single than healthy men. Finding your person takes time and effort, but it is worth it.

[–] GrayBackgroundMusic@lemmy.zip 4 points 21 hours ago

It's a survivorship bias.

[–] MintyFresh@lemmy.world 13 points 19 hours ago

Maybe you're putting out junk food vibes? Like you have an aura of dorito dust and Marlboro smoke?

[–] MummifiedClient5000@feddit.dk 13 points 20 hours ago

I don't know. Are you a beer?

[–] herculeskan@lemmy.zip 17 points 21 hours ago

Cause healthy good man already had woman

[–] iamericandre@lemmy.world 17 points 21 hours ago

Maybe try joining a running club or something more suited to what you’re looking for.

[–] BreadOven@lemmy.world 4 points 16 hours ago (1 children)

Where's OP in the comments?

[–] JennaR8r@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 points 16 hours ago

I left my comment up top, updated the body text. Don't feel like responding to everyone individually because it's overwhelming & personal.

[–] THE_GR8_MIKE@lemmy.world 11 points 20 hours ago

Because that's the majority of us. Gotta do something fun when every day is a nightmare.

[–] Deestan@lemmy.world 9 points 21 hours ago

Hang around healthy men more.

[–] j4k3@lemmy.world 8 points 21 hours ago* (last edited 21 hours ago) (12 children)

Submissive om is a dead theory. I do not seek out anyone unless there is some indication of interest. In a truly egalitarian world, you are invited to someone's home. You do not show up unannounced or unsolicited.

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[–] roofuskit@lemmy.world 6 points 21 hours ago (1 children)

Join a group that gets together to share your interests.

[–] zuckey78@sh.itjust.works 4 points 16 hours ago

Community, solidarity, and connection. Find a meetup. Find your people, then you’ll find your people.

[–] arin@lemmy.world 2 points 19 hours ago (1 children)

What's worse is that some of them aren't even single. Go do the approaching yourself

[–] HeyThisIsntTheYMCA@lemmy.world 3 points 11 hours ago

No that's too hard

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