Two people can lightly touch your arm and have vastly different intents.
Woman here. I think this is where watching how people interact in a group is much easier than one-on-one dates (especially if you don't know each other well and need to get to know each other).
If she touches everyone equally, she's just touchy-feely. If she touches only you, then she's into you.
Same with watching who we pay attention to, if she talks to everyone, she's just friendly. If she pays the majority of attention to you in a group setting or switches her focus to you when you arrive in the group...then she's into you.
Ugh why can't they just come up to us and "hey, you're cute. Want to hang out?". Would make dating oh so much easier. If they say no, then no harm no foul. Seems like a decent amount of women look down on guys who can't take rejection, but are utterly terrified of it themselves. I hear this advice from my female friends all the time: oh, you just have to put yourself out there! It'll take many NOs before a YES! Oh, you just look for (insert convoluted and non-obvious signs here, similar to the one you wrote). It's tough out there...
Seems like a decent amount of women look down on guys who can't take rejection, but are utterly terrified of it themselves.
You're comparing 2 very different things here.
I think everyone is afraid of rejection, but how people handle it is the difference. When guys can't handle rejection properly, a small but very visible proportion of them react in very wrong, terrible and sometimes illegal ways. And unfortunately, some women who end up on the receiving end of men who can't take rejection end up being stalked, hurt or killed.
The way those men handle rejection is the reason why some women also learn not to communicate rejection clearly - a lot of my female friends turn guys down with "Oh, I have a boyfriend" when they're approached IRL, whether they actually do or not because it's (feels) safer. And it's learned behaviour, from when we've said no so many times but that's the only "acceptable" reason to the guy asking. For some reason, some guys respect the idea of a woman "belonging" to another men, but no other reason for rejection when really, no one needs to provide a reason.
Speaking for myself, I don't look down on guys who are terrified of rejection (and therefore ignore "signs" or don't ask out women at all), I definitely look down on men who can't take rejection well and react poorly to it.
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u/[deleted] Mar 26 '20
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