Don’t Be Externally Judgmental

[adarkheart]

A usual hiccup for a man considering a relationship is a tendency to see everything as a major red flag and to advise his brothers in arms to ‘next’ her on account of a questionable past. While this does have merit, it’s often detrimental to acquisition of both knowledge and valuable life experience. Furthermore, appearing to be outwardly judgmental will cause the object of your affection to clam up, keeping her less-than-ideal past to herself, only to have it come out at the most inopportune moment down the road. Do you really want that?

 

Imagine the following scenario: you meet a girl, sparks fly, you go at it like rabbits, and begin hanging out with some regularity. As feelings develop bidirectionally and a few months elapse, you inevitably have conversations about past relationships and she’s comfortable enough to confide in you that she was raped as a minor, her father abused her, she did drugs, had an ex who beat her, had X sexual partners (where X > your number of partners), and was generally betrayed in a number of ways.

 

Did that make your stomach turn? If so, you haven’t experienced enough. You may be saying ‘what an idiot, stop going for all these damaged girls and find yourself a good woman’, but what men fail to see is that while certain combinations of the above don’t always go hand in hand, the overall tale is quite common. A shockingly high percentage of women have gone through this but simply haven’t told you. These same ‘broken’ women have done a fantastic job keeping it to themselves and have married, had kids with, sometimes left men who were none the wiser. The point is this: you don’t know. Your virtuous wife could have been doing lines of coke while simultaneously polishing a couple knobs. You just met her at a point where nature necessitated a change in behavior and a tight packing up of the skeletons.

 

An even worse fate than merely writing a girl off for some minor indiscretion (she had 10 partners while you only had 5) is getting seriously involved without finding out as much of the truth about her past as possible. But it has to be done from the onset, not later. This is accomplished by not being externally judgmental, by verbally projecting this, and by subduing any naturally gut wrenching response you’ll probably feel. You do want to know the truth, don’t you?

 

I prefer to meet the gorilla as soon as possible, on the first date if she’s up to it. A good way to do this is to lead the conversation to past experiences. It can come naturally. If it’s a first date, you can ask ‘so, you do this a lot?’ The answer is irrelevant, but it takes you in the right direction. Somewhere in the midst of what follows, drop the golden line:

 

You can tell me anything, I’m one of the most non-judgmental people you’ll ever meet.

 

And leave it at that. If compelled, you can follow it up with ‘we all have issues and I like to learn about people and want to know more about you’ or similar. If you do this with sincerity, she’ll open up shortly thereafter. People love to talk about themselves, particularly about topics on the taboo side because there’s rarely an ear that will listen and ‘accept’ them without repercussions. They yearn for it. Sometimes you’ll be surprised at the vivid details and the enthusiasm with which they recall the dirty past.

 

Just like too much ice cream will make all ice cream seem common, a plethora of experiences with women will desensitize you to some of their tendencies. I remember when I used to have the partner talk with girlfriends. In the earlier years, she almost always had more than me and it made me sick. Not due to some moral conviction, but – as it came to light later – simply because I had less and as a result labeled her a slut. It’s an interesting dynamic because if you had 5 and she had 10, she must be loose. But if you had 10 and she had 5, she’s legit. Or if she had 10 and you had 20, and so on.

 

The same goes for other experiences. Let’s briefly look at rape. Quite often it’s not really rape, at least not the attacked-in-a-dark-alley kind. The story goes like this, with some deviation in details: I was at a party or went out with some friends, we all got really drunk, I needed a ride so some guy took me home, we ****ed, and I regretted it the next morning. Raaaaaape! Other times it’s closer to the sober variety, but regardless if it’s your first time hearing it, you’ll have a very specific internal response: it’s going to bother you.

 

But like other realizations about women (flakiness, the Hamster, obsessions with the mundane – ahem – shoes), the more of it you see, the more commonplace it becomes and the less discomfort it causes. Typical doesn’t mean good. It means typical. The benefit of getting women to open up to you, besides wisdom, should be obvious: it allows you to see the forest for the trees and gives you the initiative to do as you please.

 

Take mental notes, but keep it to yourself.

 

Internally, we’re always judging. It’s human nature. And while some parts of the past don’t have lasting consequences or can be, for all intents and purposes, erased through sheer willpower (like a man’s lack of confidence due to a self-reinforcing negative feedback loop in childhood), others will have lingering effects. It’s a sad truth that mere days of particular experiences can have a negative lifelong impact, and it’s up to you to discover what they are, which have been dealt with, and which are still smoldering.

 

Furthermore, if you prematurely next girls on some past pretense, you’ll miss out on quite a few opportunities not only for great sex and surprisingly enjoyable companionship, but you won’t learn much in the process. You still have to screen ruthlessly and hold true to your own set of principles, especially for long term commitment, but immediately labeling girls as sluts, damaged goods, too much baggage, and any other shaming language handicaps you before you start.

[xdahliax]

As feelings develop bidirectionally and a few months elapse, you inevitably have conversations about past relationships and she’s comfortable enough to confide in you that she was raped as a minor, her father abused her, she did drugs, had an ex who beat her, had X sexual partners (where X > your number of partners), and was generally betrayed in a number of ways.

 

Why would a girl's past of sexual and physical abuse make you uncomfortable? These are not first date topics, you are not entitled to this information at the onset of a relationship. You are given this information when trust is established. Furthermore, these women have nothing to be ashamed of because they are victims. Telling someone like you about their past would victimize them once again. From what you've written, you'd somehow manage to make their trials about yourself and then give yourself a slap on your back for being "non-judgmental". In reality, you think that most cases of rape are just girls crying wolf.

[Janesays]

I was abused as a child. I am not ashamed of it. Why should I be? It wasn't my fault. I was a CHILD. I don't care who knows. If someone doesn't want to date me because of this, then they are not worth knowing.

[adarkheart]

Why would a girl's past of sexual and physical abuse make you uncomfortable? These are not first date topics, you are not entitled to this information at the onset of a relationship. You are given this information when trust is established. Furthermore, these women have nothing to be ashamed of because they are victims. Telling someone like you about their past would victimize them once again. From what you've written, you'd somehow manage to make their trials about yourself and then give yourself a slap on your back for being "non-judgmental". In reality, you think that most cases of rape are just girls crying wolf.

 

It does for guys. Different wiring. As for 'these are not first date topics', anything can be a first date topic. Of course you're not obligated to discuss it if you don't want to, but it's a free for all.

 

I was abused as a child. I am not ashamed of it. Why should I be? It wasn't my fault. I was a CHILD. I don't care who knows. If someone doesn't want to date me because of this, then they are not worth knowing.

 

The point isn't about shame, but rather how our past experiences shape our present. Some can get over being abused as a child and it doesn't have lasting effects. Others can't. It's up to you to figure out which is which with the person next to you.

 

Lovely story but reality is you should never, ever date damaged goods. They're fantastic for having casual sex with but they're not relationship material.

 

It's a matter of degree. Nearly everyone is 'damaged' to some degree (and on the flipside, virgins from a great home almost always have an adolescent social skillset, which makes them 'damaged' as well, due to arrested development).

[SmileFace]

Lovely story but reality is you should never, ever date damaged goods. They're fantastic for having casual sex with but they're not relationship material.

Well I guess I better start buying some cats now...foreveralone.

[GorillaTheater]

This is not going to be a popular post.

 

I've told my older kids that they'd be wise to give consideration to past abuse suffered by their SOs. How have the wounds healed? How have those wounds impacted their current outlook and personality characteristics? How have they processed what happened to them? They need to know this stuff to have a clear idea on how to relate to their SO, and maybe whether or not they should try. To that extent then, yes, past abuse is a "red flag".

 

Long ago I was engaged to a young woman who I'm reasonably sure was sexually abused by her father. She was frankly a mess, and I was too young and inexperienced to see what I was in for. I guess I was too sheltered from that sort of thing as a kid, and didn't even have a frame of reference by which to even begin to process things for myself. Needless to say the relationship ended, and it ended much more painfully for both of us than it had to.

 

"Eyes wide open", that's all.

[adarkheart]

This is not going to be a popular post.

 

....

 

"Eyes wide open", that's all.

 

You will find that most of my posts won't be 'popular'. I have very polarized writing. Things I've learned in my own life and through the lives of others, that are not all sunshine. I offer a practical look, not necessarily a feel-good one.

 

Eyes wide open is correct.

 

@ adarkheart

 

I agree with you to a degree. I'm always up for giving someone a shot. However, I have dated two women with some of the above "bagage" and I must say they were pretty bad relationships. My first girl friend was molested by her father when she was a young child. That kind of weirded me out, but I learned it after I already fell for her, so I brushed it out of mind. However, because of having that horrible experiance our sex life was very odd... one day she would be kinky and then the next be closed off for months at a time (when I had done nothing wrong). She was also very paranoid, insecure and clingy. Eventually she cheated on me and left me. I was hurt, and it took me a while to get over her because she was my first love. A few GFs later, and I was dating a girl who was a sex addict, a raging alcoholic, and was also date raped. This girl's drama and alcohol abuse was constant. Yet, the sex was great, and I thought she would change. She never changed. She ended up wrecking my car (without me knowing about it), getting arested, trying to drag me to court to lie on her behalf... then she ran off one day with half of belongings and my dog! she gave the dog away and threw my stuff out! then she dumped me for her stalker ex! It was a country song relationship, and not the Taylor Swift kind. I got over her really quick though after doing a week of looking back on all of her drama throughout the relationship. My current GF is very shy, insecure, and can be very clingy. Her parents did not allow her to have friends growing up and didn't show her much love. However, besides those faults she is a great girl friend and has no other real issues. However, on the off chance we break up, I highly doubt I will date a girl with baggage like the two exes I mentioned. No way! Sure a girl with more sexual partners than myself is fine. Sure a girl who has some issues is fine. We all have them. However, I will not date any drugies, alcoholics, any past rape victims (unless they have truly mentally heeled) etc... both those relationships drove me close to ruin!

 

Sadly this is one of the great tragedies of life - that hot, sexually adventurous women who will also give you phenomenal emotional highs are typically not the best for long term commitments. You've found out why firsthand. You can still have relationships with them, but it requires a higher degree of management, if you're up to the task. Unfortunately, a lot of wounds DON'T heal.

[Janesays]

Lovely story but reality is you should never, ever date damaged goods. They're fantastic for having casual sex with but they're not relationship material.

 

...Says the single guy to the engaged girl.

 

Not a single man I have ever dated (including my ex husband) has had anything seriously bad to say about me. Not a single one would say I come across as 'damaged' or dysfunctional, either. I don't smoke, do drugs, or drink more than socially. I've never cheated on anyone. I have a solid high paying career. I treat my friends, clients, and SO's with respect and I'm fairly even tempered. The worst anyone can say about me is I can be somewhat forgetful and I never match my socks.

 

What my Mother did to me is on HER. NOT ME.

 

Some of you guys lack empathy, big time, which to me is a bigger red flag than past abuse. I mean, what kind of Father would a man like this make? What happens if one of her friend's Dad molests her at a sleep over one day? Will you sit your daughter down on your knee and say, "Welp, guess your life is ruined. You'll never find love and no one will ever date you because you're damaged goods. Sorry darling."

 

Yeah. Father of the year right there. TOTALLY not the kind of man I'D want to marry.

Edited November 1, 2012 by Janesays

[2sunny]

EXTERNALLY judgmental?

 

Never heard of that term - what YOU need to do is to look deep within! It's there if you look hard.

 

It takes honesty - courage and strength too.

[yongyong]

You should be non-judgmental because you belong to the bottom of the barrel.

 

Let's say you go to this trash place and talk about some past crimes, drug use, bad friends etc. Those people will be so 'open minded' and won't judge you based on these.

 

Now go to the place where upper class people hangout. These people will look at you like a scum once you talk about the same thing. are they retarded judgmental *******s?

 

Usually people with dirty qualities complain about being judged.

If you think that's unfair, don't have these kind of qualities.

[dasein]

Doesn't apply to the stock market, but with people, the best indicator of future behavior is past behavior. A "shocking" number of women lead these kinds of dissipated lifestyles (and true rape and parental abuse are so infrequent as to be red herrings) today because men discriminate too little, not too much.

 

People, male or female, are shaped by their past choices. Some few could have a genuine come to jesus, but I wouldn't take the bet in Vegas, and won't take it in my personal life ever again. Every time I have, it's been a bad bet.

 

Guys, if a woman is all about her victim or reformed party girl status in her past when she chooses to "open up," walk away from her and towards better options. Doing otherwise shortchanges yourself. Life is too short to make bad bets.

Edited November 1, 2012 by dasein

[todreaminblue]

A usual hiccup for a man considering a relationship is a tendency to see everything as a major red flag and to advise his brothers in arms to ‘next’ her on account of a questionable past. While this does have merit, it’s often detrimental to acquisition of both knowledge and valuable life experience. Furthermore, appearing to be outwardly judgmental will cause the object of your affection to clam up, keeping her less-than-ideal past to herself, only to have it come out at the most inopportune moment down the road. Do you really want that?

 

Imagine the following scenario: you meet a girl, sparks fly, you go at it like rabbits, and begin hanging out with some regularity. As feelings develop bidirectionally and a few months elapse, you inevitably have conversations about past relationships and she’s comfortable enough to confide in you that she was raped as a minor, her father abused her, she did drugs, had an ex who beat her, had X sexual partners (where X > your number of partners), and was generally betrayed in a number of ways.

 

Did that make your stomach turn? If so, you haven’t experienced enough. You may be saying ‘what an idiot, stop going for all these damaged girls and find yourself a good woman’, but what men fail to see is that while certain combinations of the above don’t always go hand in hand, the overall tale is quite common. A shockingly high percentage of women have gone through this but simply haven’t told you. These same ‘broken’ women have done a fantastic job keeping it to themselves and have married, had kids with, sometimes left men who were none the wiser. The point is this: you don’t know. Your virtuous wife could have been doing lines of coke while simultaneously polishing a couple knobs. You just met her at a point where nature necessitated a change in behavior and a tight packing up of the skeletons.

 

An even worse fate than merely writing a girl off for some minor indiscretion (she had 10 partners while you only had 5) is getting seriously involved without finding out as much of the truth about her past as possible. But it has to be done from the onset, not later. This is accomplished by not being externally judgmental, by verbally projecting this, and by subduing any naturally gut wrenching response you’ll probably feel. You do want to know the truth, don’t you?

 

I prefer to meet the gorilla as soon as possible, on the first date if she’s up to it. A good way to do this is to lead the conversation to past experiences. It can come naturally. If it’s a first date, you can ask ‘so, you do this a lot?’ The answer is irrelevant, but it takes you in the right direction. Somewhere in the midst of what follows, drop the golden line:

 

You can tell me anything, I’m one of the most non-judgmental people you’ll ever meet.

 

And leave it at that. If compelled, you can follow it up with ‘we all have issues and I like to learn about people and want to know more about you’ or similar. If you do this with sincerity, she’ll open up shortly thereafter. People love to talk about themselves, particularly about topics on the taboo side because there’s rarely an ear that will listen and ‘accept’ them without repercussions. They yearn for it. Sometimes you’ll be surprised at the vivid details and the enthusiasm with which they recall the dirty past.

 

Just like too much ice cream will make all ice cream seem common, a plethora of experiences with women will desensitize you to some of their tendencies. I remember when I used to have the partner talk with girlfriends. In the earlier years, she almost always had more than me and it made me sick. Not due to some moral conviction, but – as it came to light later – simply because I had less and as a result labeled her a slut. It’s an interesting dynamic because if you had 5 and she had 10, she must be loose. But if you had 10 and she had 5, she’s legit. Or if she had 10 and you had 20, and so on.

 

The same goes for other experiences. Let’s briefly look at rape. Quite often it’s not really rape, at least not the attacked-in-a-dark-alley kind. The story goes like this, with some deviation in details: I was at a party or went out with some friends, we all got really drunk, I needed a ride so some guy took me home, we ****ed, and I regretted it the next morning. Raaaaaape! Other times it’s closer to the sober variety, but regardless if it’s your first time hearing it, you’ll have a very specific internal response: it’s going to bother you.

 

But like other realizations about women (flakiness, the Hamster, obsessions with the mundane – ahem – shoes), the more of it you see, the more commonplace it becomes and the less discomfort it causes. Typical doesn’t mean good. It means typical. The benefit of getting women to open up to you, besides wisdom, should be obvious: it allows you to see the forest for the trees and gives you the initiative to do as you please.

 

Take mental notes, but keep it to yourself.

 

Internally, we’re always judging. It’s human nature. And while some parts of the past don’t have lasting consequences or can be, for all intents and purposes, erased through sheer willpower (like a man’s lack of confidence due to a self-reinforcing negative feedback loop in childhood), others will have lingering effects. It’s a sad truth that mere days of particular experiences can have a negative lifelong impact, and it’s up to you to discover what they are, which have been dealt with, and which are still smoldering.

 

Furthermore, if you prematurely next girls on some past pretense, you’ll miss out on quite a few opportunities not only for great sex and surprisingly enjoyable companionship, but you won’t learn much in the process. You still have to screen ruthlessly and hold true to your own set of principles, especially for long term commitment, but immediately labeling girls as sluts, damaged goods, too much baggage, and any other shaming language handicaps you before you start.

 

 

 

for starters if a woman has been abused an issue of trust and dropping golden lines is nto a good idea....a line is a line if you dont mean it dont say it.....if you are using it as a way to get a girl to open up its manipulation....

 

 

its like this girls who have suffered abuse and do open up have to be able to trust that person I myself dont go into relationships lightly......I try to get to know someone before i make a move i made an error of judgement recently and made a first move i followed my heart but this guy i trust...he is a wonderful person he wouldn't need to line me....i would already know i could tell him and if he had to line me.....that isnt trust...i would naturally open up you shouldn't have to convince women to say anything about their past they should want to especially in regards to sexual history......it is a given that a new partner should know sexual history it helps know the person.....i have turned away nice guys mainly through fear of being misunderstood and judged i don't let it go anywhere....i am getting some spiritual counselling tonight actually to see if i can decipher who i am who i deserve to be with and be a part of so who knows ....maybe i fit somewhere

 

 

i think by feeding women lines you are exasperating the issues......say what you mean and mean what you say....no one liners and not golden ones either.......I have heard so many one liners.......not one of them have worked....deb