why only women mostly do these things? what do men do?

[CoursesForHorsesandMares]

Over the past years say like a decade maybe longer I have done lots of different activities including short courses. Initially (like many women who made a similar mistake!) I started out with wine tasting when I was in a dating mind set and I did it to try to meet some men and broaden my social circle. Of course as anyone who has done this will tell you, wine tasting is 99% women trying to meet men who arent there!

Since then I've done lots of different courses for things I was interested in learning - not to meet guys -but a comment on a different thread (about walking groups) made me think that actually all of these courses are just women -maybe you get one or two men but in every case it is hugely dispropotionate weighting. This covers a really wide range of subjects from lots of varied providers - art based courses, computer based courses, acting courses, language course, comedy courses, wine tasting I've mentioned, street skating, skiiing, climbing. Even the ones that are less stereotypically 'female' - same thing again - almost all women.

Doesn't matter what the subject is - it's always women and not just single women with very few men. If you have a group of say 10 or 15, usually one man maybe two. Why is this? Is it women who are just interested in learning? Or is there something else? It's really strange because the law of averages should dictate a greater male attendance. I'm not saying 50:50 but maybe even 60:40 is so far away.

Why is it so disproportionate? What are men never doing these kinds of things?

The groups that I belong to that contain the most males are

Motorbikes
Scuba diving
Music
Sports
Projects where things are built from wood

Same goes for activities after work or at the weekend so I don't think it's that.

Look up ‘male flight’, OP.

I've noticed something similar. Walking/social groups I've participated in, 75+% women (although I'd estimate none of them are interested in a man). Community allotment, mostly women. Cancer research shop volunteers, 90+% women. Sussex Green Living volunteers, mostly women. The local bridge club is more mixed but even there, newcomers learning the game are roughly 3:1 in favour of women. Only the local Rotary club is biased male but that is likely a throwback from the days when Rotary was men only. I love women so I'm not complaining at all, but I do wonder why the gender bias across such a broad spectrum of activities, many of which are not stereotypically feminine hobbies/interests? You might think me getting involved in a range of activities which are female biased might improve my chances of finding a romantic partner, well it might have done, from infinitesimally small to three fifths of bugger all 😆.

I am a man. I am a keen sailboat racer and our club has majority of men sailors (a lot of grumpy ones too!). However the newer younger sailors seem to be about 50/50. I think we men are far less social and like more competition type activities, which is possibly to our detriment.

True, men will go on YouTube or find some forum about wjat they want to learn.
They'll talk with other men in comments and mostly don't feel the need to talk talk.

A few men's shed places popping up where I am, but always empty when I walk past.

There aren't many courses these days. In the past my husband did a number of evening courses, mainly cooking. It was fortunate in that he worked locally and I was the one commuting. A problem with courses being if they started at 7 I'd not be home long before he went out. I think this can be an issue as it does tend to be men that are the main commuters so evening classes would be a pain.

Agree that sailing, golf & cycling are likely to be where you find all the men ;)

Theories on why they're not in the other groups:

1. From an evolutionary perspective, on average men use fewer words per day than women, so are less likely to notice the lack of 'company'.
2. Partly resulting from decades of 1, men are not as good at striking up conversation with a stranger or making new friends.
3. Based on a sample of 1 from my DF, men only seem interested in doing something they are already good at as a group activity. He seemed to really struggle with attending an old blokes exercise class & finding he couldn't immediately do all the things proficiently. So obviously rather than identifying these as the ones he needed time & persistence on to get stronger & look after his health, he just sacked the whole class off. I think it's an ego thing, but imagining him taking up Mandarin classes, only to have his pronunciation & vocab errors corrected every week by a 55kg female native speaker - I cannot! (or pottery with a 35 year old male instructor for that matter).

And then there's an epidemic of male loneliness & all the knock on mental health issues of not talking enough into old age (dementia as well as depression).

How you make them humble enough to try something they'll not automatically be good at I don't know 🤷🏼‍♀️

[PS yes, not ALL men]