Since the courtship or dating process mostly involves men doing the pursuing, men have to come up with their own methods in their approaches to winning a woman over, even if these single ladies are a complete stranger, which can be most awkward
There’s books about “How to approach women”, at least that’s the jist of it, there’s all those “How to get women to sleep with you” books, also.

We even get advice from friends and others about trying “new methods”

There had been some people that, “If you are using the same method to attain a date, and getting rejected time and time again, it must be YOU!”

That is a serious falsehood. Patterns don’t work with dating, because things and situations are in constant flux, in constant change. What may work for some, might not work for others. NOTHING is static.

Apparently the theory of, “If you do the same thing over and over again, and not succeeding, change your method”. Not the case at all.

Why? Because I have attempted this, I attempted to change my approach to women, only to still have the same results…so I figured I’d go back to being my old self, the whole “Be Yourself” method. I think it’s an old school method taught to us way back when, and is quite simple to, nothing complex.

It’s “Being Real”, not trying to act like someone you’re not. I know people are trying to help you.  It just seems sometimes people in general seem more complex, more shallow or superficial and now there has to be strategies to obtain your goals when winning the heart of a mate.

They call it “Playing the game” but it’s something I don’t recommend playing.  It’s stressful and tedious.

Hopefully, Ill keep doing what I’m doing…and I hope others will listen to this and take heed just keep “Being Yourself!”

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He basically paid a membership fee for a social group called “Events and Adventures” he filed a lawsuit against this company for having fat chicks in it. Yep, that’s right Fat chicks.

And it’s NOT even a dating service…just a social group that can go out somewhere, be it skydiving, dancing, movies, etc, he just didn’t like the fact that fat chicks were in the group…so what does the numnut do? He sues them.

Go ahead and read this article from the Orlando Weekly entitled:

NO FAT CHICKS
Ladies of Orlando: You are not up to Kurt Spath’s high standards, so he’s suing 

He stirred up some of the hate from the Orlando population on that article too from all the “Blog Comments”.

This guy is one of those people that refer to him as a “weasel”.

Just read the article and enjoy! It’s a trip!

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They have this long, convoluted set of rules they expect you to read through (obviously nothing simple, and looks like it was pieced together through periods of time).

Specifically with redundant threads…they seem to get their cookies off by deleting redundant threads….some threads are probably variants or perhaps one thread could be posted now, that was redundant to the one posted 6 years ago…and it’s deleted.

I’ve even heard posters complain that they DID read the rules POSTED the thread, and it is STILL deleted.

Basically, if there was no reason to delete a thread or ban a person, the moderators will FIND a reason, or if not that, they have their own intepretation of the rules of the POF message board, which would proably take a month and a half to read through, and believe me, most people have a life and can’t be reading that crap.

Heck, if one individual did take the time to read through it with a fine tooth comb….the moderators of POF would STILL delete it, I guarantee it!

What’s funny is, I saw a post about posting something libelous about someone’s quote or misquoting someone…which is done often times on alot of message boards, but POF seems to come across legal terms now for this, and apparently, as if they could be sued for Bob misquoting or saying crap about another in the same thread.

I feel POF is known for splitting hairs.

Now the geniuses took it a step further, and decided to let the USERS decide wether or not the posts be deleted. LOL Wow, might as well hand Airforce One to the monkeys. Actually it is suprising that they did this, someone got bored with the design of the board, and just figured they’d try something “new”.

Check out the “Deleted Threads” list here.

Lets take a look at the FIRST ONE

Apparently, the poster apparently posted some sports topic (wow, posts other than relationship and dating posts are deleted as well, go figure) Anyways, apparently, its your same “Why my post got deleted” thread…and the moderators gave their same ol’ “Copy and paste links to a billion rules on how to post on POF”

Apparently, the moderator disagrees with the poster (big suprise). I would say the rules are moderated PURELY on 100% opinion of what is considered a violation. Opinion and interpretation of the mods not the user. So if a user reads the rules, tries to abide by the rules, their post gets deleted anyways (or worse, banned) and STILL can’t figure out what they did wrong, then obviously the rules of the site are not being presented in an appropriate fashion in which users can follow.

It’s pretty much like walking on eggshells. I’ve read this site for a few years, and their is a HUGE amount of misunderstandings on the posters side that apparently the mods just think we’re a bunch of idiots that can’t follow the rules, when really the rules just don’t seem to be presented in a somewhat understandable fashion.
Anyways, the user said she read said rules, and as far as SHE was concerned she violated nothing. (Which I contend to side with her on)
Also, the site has been around for a few years EVERY post, esp. the more current ones, are probably ALL redundant to a certain extent.
Apparently, people have tried their darnest to “follow the rules” only to STILL have their threads deleted. When posting “Why was my thread deleted…I followed the rules” Some moderator, like a broken record just copies and pastes links to various vague, hard to interpret FAQ’s, terms, and definitions.

Alot of rules are left up to interpretation. I’m guessing the moderators just get bored and feel as if they have nothing better to do.

The “Rules” are about the size of the encyclopedia Britannica. Personally, I’m not going to read through all the rules, and to expect us to follow the rules to the very snippet, is unexpected. I’ll do what I can, but it will get deleted anyways through moderator “opinion”.
Reasons Forum moderators delete threads and suspend and/or ban users on a whim.

1. They are bored.

2. They have personality types similar that to the office snitch.

3. They enjoy the power they get from this type of work.

4. They don’t know how to properly run a message board.
I refer to them as “Internet Toughguys”.

The site is pretty much biased. You know how some people get let go from a job or get laid off and never have a reason given to them? Well, its typically over some petty reason, (similar to that of POF Moderators banning people.), but…you see, they’ll give a vague reason, because they KNOW it’s a petty reason, but are afraid to say what the real reason is…why? Like I said, because it’s petty.

Here is an interesting thread for How do become a moderator

What’s interesting is….the moderators make the remarks about how lot of people perceive them, apparently they joke about how they get called names or labeled a “Forum Nazi”. This is the only “Dating” site with a message board where moderators seem to lack respect of their peers for obvious reasons….no one likes thier methods.

Personally, I think they should either just delete the forums sub-domain and do away with forums, and just make it an ordinary dating site OR overhaul the forums, re-staff it, perhaps even clean house altogether

It seems, also, that if someone gets offended or disagrees with you, they ban you, OR, if it offends someone else, you get banned.

but use the reason to ban you through some sort of minor infraction you broke on the rules, not because you ticked someone off (which is the real reason.)

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Now, things are getting bleak when someone who is a traditional man sees the “End Times” when it comes to marriage to deceptive and manipulative women.

Take this article for example: Are Abuse Shelters Helping Deceitful Women?

Apparently, women are taking off to these shelters, lying to the people that work there, and using it for their case in the court system. Men don’t seem to even stand a chance at defending themselves….thus “The Marriage Strike” 

Another case:  My mom knew of this married gentleman, well apparently, his wife was planning ahead one year a head of time, having his assetts appraised. Apparently he had a nice car collection and guitar collection appraised by his wife.  After she got all her ducks in a row, she served him the papers.  To cut to the chase, in the end, and now his current status, she got all his priceless collections, got the house (because they had kids, so the mother and kids are living in his home) He got stuck in an apartment, and a rusty beater of a vehicle.  And the mother pretty much dumps the kids on him everytime she goes out with her NEW boyfriend.  So she’s living in luxery on his doe, while he practically lives like a bum.  I heard that it was probably due to the fact he had a bad lawyer or something to that effect.
You see, I hear stories, sometimes OVER-hear stories at restaurants.  THIS story had NOTHING to do with an official marriage.

One day, I’m sitting at a booth, being the single guy I am I was eating alone, kind of hoping I wish I had a nice girl to share a meal with, then there were some gentlemen behind me talking about an issue, an issue where they were talking about a friend of theirs that apparently got “taken” to the cleaners by a woman he just “co-habitated” with.  Apparently, they had broken up like most relationships do, but the girlfriend decided to take it a step further and take him to court.  She got some money out of him for basically being a “common law wife”.

Luckily, this law does not hold true in ALL states, but I couldn’t believe my ears, and suddenly my chicken wings and beer made the best “date” I ever had that evening!!

After hearing all these HORROR stories, no wonder a man wants to avoid marriage at all costs, and just, at the most…have a girlfriend and nothing more.

Pretty scarey…the horror…..the horror! BOO! Happy Halloween!

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In my case, being a male bachelor, I have to concern myself with dating single mothers.  Now , one can be on the fence about this, or just not date single parents at all.

But there are things to consider when doing this.

1. Age of the children - How old are they?  This can be an issue, because if they are youngins (around infant to 12), they pretty much require constant attention.  Perhaps a baby sitter, parent or relative perhaps…if she believes in that kind of thing, then she can have a free nightout.  But some mothers (parents), might feel uncomfortable putting an inconvenience on their parents or relatives, sometimes they just don’t believe in babysitters.
When they are highschool aged, they require less supervision, they can use a microwave, left overs can be eaten, etc., while mom is out on her date.

2. What kind of custody does she have? - If she has joint custody, then that’s good, because at least she’ll have free time when he or she drops the children off at the other ex’s house.  If not, she won’t be able to go out.

3. Ex is not in the picture.  Yes, in this case, the single parent in question, might be better off waiting until the children are older before they can even consider dating, because they take up so much of their time.

4. If you do decide to date a single parent, consider that your disciplinary practices might not be a good match with your significant other’s. This can pose a problem, especially if the kids are misbehaved.

5. If you decide to date a single parent, expect to take on the roles of the NEW parent if it gets serious or perhaps marriage is in the works. Or at least some kind of parent role-model (even though the children already have a father).  This last one is something to seriously consider, since you’ll all be living under the same roof.

So, there you have it, some things to consider carefully when dating a single parent.  If you’ve never done so, if you really like the person, give it a shot, perhaps even the children will grow on you.

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I hadn’t read it yet, but I did read the synopsis and also talked to people that had read it.   And to be honest, it hits “right on” with alot of things about people these days. This not only is true in the dating world, but also in any kind of relationship, friendship, and the like.
Putnam, the author of Bowling Alone states, “In a nutshell, he argued that civil society was breaking down as Americans became more disconnected from their families, neighbors, communities, and the republic itself.” 

Gone are the days where neighbors actually KNOW each other, I hardly know my neighbors. No more, “Hi Fred how’s the wife!” and so on.  No more invites on the block to block parties or BBQ’s.  People have a tendency to stay to themselves these days.

Social Capital, as coined by Robert Putnam in “Bowling Alone” is the idea that you have people in your life as capital.  Friends, family, acquaintances, colleagues, etc.

These people are what help you be able to grow in life.  They are the people who you can network with.  The friend who will help you move.  The colleague who will give you a job tip.  The coworker who will introduce you to her single friend.

You see anyone who lives like an “island” and you see they can’t get far in life.

I have noticed that some people don’t “Get out” as much as they used to either.

We are all “connected” by technology, things are alot more impersonal with other people these days.  We are “connencted” but essentially DISCONNECTED to the people in our lives, even if we are suppose to care about them.

This kind of reminds me of the movie “The Time Machine” by H.G. Wells where the inventor invents a time machine, and goes SO much into the future (a ludicrous amount of years) that humans were “Cattle” to the morlocks.  A paritcular scene in that movie, there was a woman drowning, and there were humans scattered about her just looking, but not doing anything about it, not even attempting to save her, even though they were within arms reach.

This is not unlike the senario of when someone gets shot and is dying in a major metro area, and no one does anything to help the person.

Parents are dropping their kids off at daycare, while they tend to their selfish desires to pursue careers, basically leaving children that are too young without any kind of interaction with their families.  The most they could do is leave them with the grandparents or other relatives.  If they aren’t around, I suggest you become a stay at home mom OR just don’t have children.

It’s all par to the superficial society in which we live. And I find it most definate that it’s affecting the dating world as well, the shallowness and superficialities of this society.  How we take others for granted, hurting others, and also indifference.  Don’t want to answer a guys/gals phone call? Just let it go to voicemail and erase it later, right, don’t return thier calls! And so on.
It’s an interesting read, check out “Bowling Alone” by Robert Putnam

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Sure, it might start off fine, but then one person will eventually get emotional, want to take the relationship to the serious level, and something’s got to give.

I know a variant of this, Friends with Benefits. Apparently I know this woman in her late 30’s, single, never married, no kids, has a “guy that she is seeing” that’s how she puts it, and she does not refer to him as a boyfriend. (As a side note, it’s hard these days to put a label on the status that two people are currenty in).

Supringly she prefers it that way, the distance works out that way, because she doesn’t have to see him alot, and she prefers her freedom, she says HE is the only one that is making trips to go see him, never once has she designated a trip to go see him, very one-sided, and very selfish on her part. But, he’s the fool that’s driving down there, probably just thinking below the belt if you get my meaning.

She mentioned that he does have plans to move back to the home town she’s in, and well, that’s not good…sounds like he plans to have a future with her, and she’s not so enthusiastic about it, because this would mean loss of her freedoms and independence….heck, it’s not like you have to move in with each other, just live in the same town. Her excuse is, that she had been in a long term relationship with a guy, and now she’s enjoying her freedoms.

What’s really odd is that she is a WOMAN. That’s right, a woman, I thought it was the women that got seriously and emotionally attached to a guy, even if it was a fling! But are the tables turning now that women just want a fling, and nothing more? Yeah, big suprise, I guess women are playing the man’s role of “player”. Alot of women, esp career oriented women, apparently are so focused on their “Career” that they don’t want to have to deal with a boyfriend or something. (Personally, I don’t see how it could interfere actually, I mean, you go to work, come home on the weekends and have fun with your sig. other).
At any rate, people attempting the whole friends with benefits thing is probably going to open up a whole can of worms, and I would strongly advise against it. At least be a boyfriend/girlfriend couple while doing this.

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1. Hoping the person even responds to your initial email, some say that it depends on what the content is, but from experience the content of your ad is pretty much irrelevant. Okay, it might be SLIGHTLY relevant, if you’re a bit more original than “I like new adventures and meet new people”. But even if you’re not as cliche’d sounding, still…even.

2. Hoping the person is attracted to you in your picture. This is actually considered more important than the actual content that you type.
3. Okay, let’s say the person found you attractive enough to want to correspond with you. You wind up finally getting an email from someone after you have already sent out 1,000 emails and it’s not from a fake person trying to hook you into their webcam service.

Great, congrats on Objective 3…hurdles/objectives 1 and 2 basically is can be tedious, but once you finally land someone on number 2. You can breathe a sigh of relief that someone actually found you interesting.

4. Email correspondence. Basically you correspond with the person back and forth a few times. This is an ongoing objective.

5. Hoping the single person you’re corresponding with still continues to respond to your routine emails, because face it, they CAN drop off the face of the earth, and never contact you again without notice….or in some cases, they are “Short” with you. Sending you a brief response, “Okay, yeah, things are going well here, been pretty busy, hope you have a nice day” The End. Then after that nothing. Yeah, pretty tough objective there.

6. Getting her to meet with you or getting her number after you get tired of online correspondence. Either 1. Get her to get over the fear of doing this with you because “I’m not ready to meet yet”. It’s pretty much pulling teeth her, because

They typically freeze up when you try to coherce them like a mouse with a piece of cheese to get them to come out of their homes to meet with you. Apparently, they have a “Ted Bundy” complex OR they could be married.

7. You FINALLY get them to agree to meet up with you.

8. Hoping they don’t

a. Stand you up

b. Cancel a the last moment.

9. They actually DO show up! WOW! Man, when you’ve made it THIS far, that is a SERIOUS accomplishment, almost to that of parting the Red Sea.
What happens after that is not relevant to this post, because it’s all real life from there on.

10. Read some publications for online dating such as:

I Can’t Believe I’m Buying This Book: A Commonsense Guide to Successful Internet Dating, Online Dating for Dummies, and Sex, Lies, and Online Dating

This will give you a headstart and these self-help books can guide you along.

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Well, I had recently started participating in a group in my area that does these kinds of activities. They have a dates set, a place and time to meet, and we get moving.

Well, in this case, there was this hiking event going on. A good amount of members showed up. Alot of new faces too.

Well, I was getting to know this female “new face”, we spent most of the afternoon getting to know each other, even after the hike, even when everyone went home. I walked her to her car, and when we got to the vehicle, I thought that was it, she was going home, but turned out she just put some of her personal items in the car, she shut the door and locked it, and we continued on to a more smaller casual nature trial. We took part in some “Spur of the moment” air-potato collecting contest. Just for fun.

Later, we had lunch together. I had a great time getting to know this lovely woman, I even found out she was, strangely enough, into Sci-Fi related movies and TV Shows.

It occured to me the following week, that I was attending such a show, and I asked her if she’d like to join me. She agreed to it. I got her number, called her before the convention to let her know at about noontime to meet up, she stated that she had her brothering coming into town around that time, but said he wasn’t going to be around that long, so it might be a couple of hours past noon-time. She said she’d let me know when her brother left, and she’d be on her way.

Welll, I went on ahead to the show, got my ticket. Well, I didn’t get a call from her on my cell phone, and the show was about to end soon. So I called her….no answer, and I got her voicemail…and I left her a message stating, “Hey, what’s up, was wondering where you were…..just give me a call when you arrive so I can meet you up front.” or something to that affect.

At any rate…she never showed, she never called, she never even called AFTER it was all over to apologize or to even make an excuse!! Heck, I’ve had situations where women at least cancelled at the last minute or blew me off…but I hardly EVER been LITERALLY “Stood up!”

However, I did not fret….well, not too much, I was indeed annoyed, my friends were stating, “So how’d you date go!” They were happy for me apparently. And when I told them, they seemed more upset than I was. lol.

“That little *itch! I’d call her up and leave a message on her machine and call her on her B.S.!!”

I was like “Nah, it’s not worth it.

Anyhow, to the point of this whole story. How you can turn this kind of thing into some kind of positive event, both before and AFTER.

1. When you make a first date with a woman, make sure to make it at a place on your OWN terms, a place YOU enjoy. Because with the current trend of single people standing others up, blowing people off, etc is skyrocketing (at least in my opinion). So, if she does not show up, at least you can enjoy what you do alone. Heck, I got to talk to famous comic book artists, and old-school playboy bunny that was rather still attractive in a current “Christie Brinkley” kind of way, and so on.

2. When you make a first date, (now this may seem a little unorthodox) EXPECT her NOT to show up. You know they say, don’t have any expectations, well, this advice pretty much takes the cake, doesn’t it? That way, you won’t be as disappointed, don’t get all your hopes and dreams up, because it just seems dating in this new century is quite different, it’s a rather “me” mentality. It seems people don’t seem to show an inkling of respect in the dating world, it’s all for themselves. My dad found out about what happened with me, and he’s like, “Man…women these days…..”

And I stated, “Well, what can ya do, you know?” No use complaining about something you can’t do anything about nor have any control over.

With those 2 pieces of advice, it can leave you with a lot less bitter taste in your mouth, plus you can always move onto the next single person.

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actually a chain of businesses. To look it up just Google “Just For Lunch Scam”.

I read an article about this article from Consumer Affairs. I felt the liberty to comment on it.

Apparently there were claims of women being stalked by their matches, not being matched up with men/women that fit their criteria and other issues.

Do you think if someone “Stalks” you, should the company that matched you up be blamed? That is indeed questionable, however, people have been stalked by people who they met out in public, without the need for a dating service. Just use good common sense and judgment, I personally don’t think a dating service should be held accountable

Should we blame or sue dating sites if the person we met up with starts stalking us? I wouldn’t think it would be their problem

Of course, everyone is suing for any thing and everything these days, so who knows?

Another thing, I think the woman in the article said about the man who didn’t meet her 2 requirements “College Degree” and “A full head of hair”

I think it should serve her right, and would be considered a form of “Poetic Justice” for her to be shallow for just limiting herself to a man with a full head of hair. Perhaps the dating service is probably, in some undeliberate fashion, try to care about more about the heart, and not outwardly appearances. “Scam of the heart? That woman has no heart! She’s only concerned with looks. What if the agency said, “Sorry, but we currently don’t have any men that meet your criteria in our database.” Then she’d probably would have a problem with that as well.

And the woman that complained she was matched up with 3 guys that SHE didn’t think were “professionals” at least by HER standards. It is all subjective.

I’ve actually seen the word “Professionals” when it comes to the dating crowd and matchmaking services. “This is a dating service for professionals!”

Of course the Handyman is a professional, right? He’s a professional handy man! Heck, the men probably think they are professionals, however, she thinks otherwise.

Also, the dating service is probably doing the best of their ability to match someone up, so if they match someone up that doesn’t meet the limitless standards of that person’s criteria…they get mad at the service for that? I think it would be considered foolish to have those kinds of expectations of a dating service.

I know I wouldn’t last in that business (at least stress-wise), because of all the dirty emails I’d be getting from clients and possibility of having to deal with lawsuits, because of some single woman was matched up with a guy that didn’t meet some height requirement. I am surprised some of these places stay in business trying to cater to every superficial need of the clients. If they did, they would be out of business, because the person would probably always find something wrong with their “match”.

Like I said, it’s all subjective. So to expect to be matched up with exact criteria, is unrealistic at best. For example, with the “no full head of hair” case, the guy might have had a receding hairline, and didn’t consider him totally hairless, and match him up with the woman anyways. It’s all a matter of opinion of what is defined as a “full head of hair”

But as they say, “A fool’s money is soon parted!” or “Buyer Beware!”

Heck, people here get ticked off in these free dating sites for having people email them that don’t meet their criteria.

I did read though that some of these agencies go through the process of selecting matches through specific criteria. Again, that’s a matter of opinion. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. To join ANY kind of dating service both online and out in public, and having those kinds of expectations would be foolish.

But, on the defense of the consumer, perhaps the website should put some sort of disclaimer up stating they cannot really make any hardcore guarantees that they’ll find someone.

I went to their website, they talk about the success rate and that many first dates result in second dates. Well, the client should think to him or herself “Define many.” It goes back to “Buyer Beware”

I mean if you’re going to go into something like this, as a client, you really should do your research before investing $1,500.00 in it, it’s considered good consumer practice.

I’ll stick with the cheaper online dating option. Anyhow, please stick around when I talk about “What’s in a Screen Name”.

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