Serious? Do men know the slightest about women

[Gothamgirl1970]

Posting here for traffic and opinions.

As it’s 3 am and I am posting it’s because I simply am perplexed and need the hive mind.
Dating apps: presumably a person joins up because they would like to meet someone for company, to find love, just a shag or probably 100 other reasons I can’t contemplate this late.
I’m not sure if this holds true for all age groups but what I’ve observed is in men 46-58. In the profile area you can post some photos if you wish. A lot of men do but write no bio which tells me nothing and essentially they are just a body.
Here’s my serious question. Approximately 60% of men with photos lead the opening photo of themselves In Lycra gear with a helmet and sunglasses on, a bit of mud displaying their bicycle with pride. In many cases all 3 photos will be man and bike. Mid flight, crossing some finish line etc.
I know lots of women who are also befuddled by why a man would think bike photos would interest any woman in him at all. Shouldn’t they put a photo that shows the face, and is in a friendly happy pose?
What is it these cycle mad men are trying to convey? I cycle most of the time so I won’t have any time to spend with you? I want a woman who will cycle with me ? Look at my bike it’s impressive? I look decent in Lycra?
Please help. My friends and I are dying to know why they do this and what they are trying to communicate and further who are they thinking they can attract with this?

AIBU to not have to look at literally hundreds of cycling photos?

@Cam77

One take on it: A lot of shy boys get passed over by girls at schools in favor of the athletic, assertive, confident, types. A generalization perhaps, but you can usually pick out the boys who will have had a girlfriend (or multiple) pre-university and those who won’t. At least that was the case in the 80s/90s perhaps it’s changed now.

Of course those 3/4 teenage years are small fry in context of a 60+ year adult life, but it does make a psychological mark. So when those boys grow up and they do have an alright car/bike and they are making decent money and they do get some more confidence they decide to start playing the part they couldn’t in their formative years. “Hey look at me now”.

Piffle.

As are the replies and follow-ups.

More like, the shy boys grow up to value the relationships they can get, and 25 years down the track, have no reason to be on dating websites.

Tom Pinch - I dated a shy guy, on and off, for years. I adored him. All our mutual friends told me he was shy, and I agreed with them that he needed time to find himself.

He wasn't shy, he was self absorbed and secretive. He had a secret girlfriend or two for much of that time, dumped me horribly twice, dated other women, dumped them and blocked them, blocked me, cut off all the former mutual friends (including men who were genuinely hurt by it), etc, etc. Strangely, he wasn't too shy to cheat on me!

I'm now very wary of supposedly shy men!

@Cam77

I love your post and couldn’t agree more but I’d like to add a few thoughts. I’m a U.K. citizen but not by birth and a citizen of my birth country and another country. The prisoner/ cause-effect of lack of therapeutic intervention before the offending occurs is statistically more significant in the U.K. than any other developed/1rst world country due to the negative perception of therapy by the British population. Therefore it is not offered or if offered declined more than 40% of the time. This cognitive bias must be addressed not only to reduce the criminal population of known offenders but to retard any child teen or vulnerable person who has unresolved issues that could lead to that person becoming an offender. Preventative therapeutic intervention is nearly non existent.

I have written two books and several publications on toxic masculinity. Please PM me.

Men over 45 are facing ageing, loss of strength, loss of masculinity and hence the bike photos. I guess it’s similar to women wanting to look youthful and photos with make up.

So I think we should give Lycra guy a break! It’s tough out there. Trying to date 2020.

Agree re middle aged men! My DH is not perfect by any means ,but stories on here and in R/L show me he is a long way from the bottom!So many men seem to feel "entitled" to a 1) blonde slim 20 something /2 failing this a slim brunette in their 30s and so on .However they are often accompanied by a beer belly with its own postcode , a set of teeth that dont look like they have seen a dentist in recent history ,and an attitude that seems to belong to an immature 15 year old who has just discovered boobs!

@TomPinch

Excessive shyness in young adults and lack of social contact is a maladaptive behaviour and requires therapy. They don’t grow into healthy adult males and wonderful husbands

There are women who like a cycle shot for various reasons from it being a shared hobby to the more primal and shallow how hot is his body

I would disagree that it’s “shallow”. You described your former husband as a 10. How can it be shallow for other women to want their own 10?

@Balibabe1 PM me I think we can support each other

@IncandescentSilver

Tom Pinch - I dated a shy guy, on and off, for years. I adored him. All our mutual friends told me he was shy, and I agreed with them that he needed time to find himself.

He wasn't shy, he was self absorbed and secretive. He had a secret girlfriend or two for much of that time, dumped me horribly twice, dated other women, dumped them and blocked them, blocked me, cut off all the former mutual friends (including men who were genuinely hurt by it), etc, etc. Strangely, he wasn't too shy to cheat on me!

I'm now very wary of supposedly shy men!

Ha ha! Yes I had a child with my shy guy... typical intelligent nerd who needed his own space quite a bit. Adored him too. He really was shy too, very awkward in company. I totally understood, why he wouldn’t come on family trips, why he wouldn’t accompany me to many things as a couple.

Turns out he was cheating all along with several sexy women! Not so shy then...

So don’t just ignore warning signs just because they are ‘shy’!

@MrsBobDylan you almost told the end of my story which I will share shortly

Crap you can’t edit. And that’s not my only advanced degree

IceCreamSummer pretty much the same then! Ooh, some of his behaviour was horrible, but everyone would always encourage me to make allowances for him, because he was "shy". In the end, your boundaries become so stretched, because the "shyness" becomes an excuse for everything. When in reality, it was a mostly cruel individual who had realised the shy act worked very well for him, who could pick up and drop people at will without any conscience.

I always assume that the ones taken at 'events' (cycling, triathloning(?), marathons etc) are the only pictures that a man has of himself that aren't obviously taken in a mirror.

It's usually an indication of a man who either doesn't have friends to take a picture for him, or who doesn't want to ask a friend to take some pics because he doesn't want to have to answer 'why do you want me to take pictures of you?'

At least the 'sweaty, passing the finish line' pictures don't have an enormous reflection of the guy holding up his phone to the mirror with an incredibly untidy room in the background (see the 'cock shots' thread for an example of this, where a man has sent a cock shot with a large bottle of tomato ketchup on the floor behind him).

This so so funny and sad! I've been in a relationship for 16 years so I'm not familiar with this. Unfortunately I'm not surprised! I don't have any answers but would also like to echo the why are men question!

What is it these cycle mad men are trying to convey?

That they are fit and healthy; in the case of finishing lines, that they are "acheivers".

As to why they wouldn't put a clear face photo up - anonymity or they don't think their face is anything to write home about or they don't realise face would be important to a woman.

(It sometimes isn't important to men, they rate it below body and as long as there's nothing exceptionally unattractive about a woman's face, they don't really care.

This is not to say some men are not very into faces; there are some who rate face v highly but the slimness or boobs or ass fixated men often don't).

Whereas the men seem to care mostly about keeping all the bits of being single they love + sex. Sadly, and without tarring all men, I have found this to be true. Which is why, although I love sex, I will not be having Friends with Benefits etc with men online sites. It just makes it way too easy to be single and have sex, when I ultimately want LOVE and a PARTNER.

So I am waiting on the sex (even though it is killing me!) - and getting to know men, and not having sex until there is some kind of partner commitment.

I have to say, it’s not looking great!

This thread is so interesting. The shy guy stories also chime with my own experience, although, obvs, NASGALT.

Also, as I realise I haven't said it up until now, sorry for your loss OP.

@DancingCatGif

Men have no interest in pandering to women because most of them think they should be accepted just as they are.

Women feel they need to improve themselves, market themselves, lose weight, put on makeup, remove every hair from eyebrows down because they feel like they aren't enough.

Most men just go tada, here I am, fat, useless, ugly, sweaty, self obsessed, bike obsessed or whatever they are and some poor deluded woman will take them on anyway.

Best post I have ever read.

*as long as there's nothing exceptionally unattractive about a woman's face, they don't really care.

I should amend that to "as long as there's nothing they perceive as exceptionally unattractive about a woman's face, they don't really care".

But you can tell so much about a man by his bike!

Rusty bike = lazy, no good at maintenance / DIY. avoid.
S-Works carbon fibre dream machine = he's fucking loaded, go for it OR he's having a mid-life crisis, avoid
Mountain bike = likes the great outdoors, go for it if you like getting rained on, camping and all that shit
Halfords bike = he's skint and clueless, avoid
B-Twin = likes value for money options. Meals out will be when he has a voucher for Pizza Express
Ridgeback hybrid = boring, crap in bed. avoid
Fat tyre bike = it's his teenage son's. avoid
Steel frame hand-build by a bloke in Carlisle called Nigel = you'll have your weekends to yourself as he'll be out on100-mile rides. Go for it
Brompton folding bike = embarrassingly practical, cagoules all round. whatever
Vintage Bianchi = shag him so you can admire the bike

Wears cycling shorts = inspect carefully.

beer belly with its own postcode

Wears cycling shorts = wink inspect carefully

That's another point - maybe they think they're well hung and want to hint at it without sending dick pics.

@Lovemusic33 spot on. Let's add

Man topless on a bed 'look how sexy I am don't you want to get in here with me because I just want to get laid'

Man in gym with moody look and guns hanging out a vest 'look how ripped I am, I could pick you up and everything, well I could if I ever got out of the gym where I just take photos in the mirror'

@IncandescentSilver my heart absolutely goes out to you! I’m so sorry you had that experience with a shy man. It must bring out the nuturing in us maybe? I stupidly felt really happy that no one else could see how affection, sexy, kind and interesting my ‘shy’ guy was, but that I could.

I reasoned that I didn’t need a man to be my social prop or charismatic person I reasoned, it was OK not to always go out as couple or for him to ‘reject’ my friends, as I was perfectly capable of having my own friends...

I didn’t realize that he was perfectly capable of being assertive and talking to people, but only if there was something in it for him, hence loads of female friends and men who looked up to him (very high achiever).

I sometimes wonder if he had built so much resentment from his earlier life, where he really couldn’t even approach women, and had now found that being ‘sensitive’ and shy was a way in, he learnt to manipulate and not bond. Bonding is different, there is trust and loyalty, companionship and letting your guard down. He didn’t do that, which is a shame as there is a child involved with me, who now has me as a single parent!