Where do they hide the normal men?

[Ihaveroyallyscrewedup]

Is there some island they all live on, some secret place only a few know of?
The most recent seemed like a safe bet, known each other for many years, well enough to know a fair amount of detail about each other’s lives. In that time he’s always seemed stable, good job, own house, two children he has three days a week, wise enough to have asked my advice before he has taken action because he has recognised he may be unreasonable and being a dick. For reasons which are irrelevant we have never dated but there has always been chemistry so we found ourselves in a place where we think ok let’s date and suddenly he’s turned in to this unreliable, non communicative man who treats a suggestion of lunch as if you had just proposed marriage, buying a house and having triplets all at the same time!
So time to throw this one back which is a shame as we have been friends a long time.

Tbh and this is an unpopular view. But I'm nearly 50 and been around the block.

The older I get the more I realise -and I have always had loads of friends of both sexes - have been drinking buddies mates close friends with oodles of men over the years.

I realise that in the end most are not great one way or the other.

Sorry.

Thread the other day if your OH left etc would you have another bloke.. Most posters said no. 3/4!!!

I would date but it would take something really amazing to live with one again.

In the end I think the internet thing is shit.

I'm sorry your friend did that OP that's properly upsetting. Doing that to s long term friend is just crappy.

The old ways- pubs gigs etc is the way I would go if on the lookout :)

Also the happily married couples.. I don't know s single women whose OH is not an utter dick in some way, or worse.

Nearly 50 so divorcing stage of life...

The rich good looking men are all arseholes thing is... A bit odd.

Rich good looking men are people same as anyone else. Different personalities. Insecurities. The sort of people they like to go out with. What they want from s relationship

And obviously the female population are not all dead set on rich handsome etc.

Whoever said that if that's you experience across everyone you know that's a bit weird.

Most women are looking for someone they get on with, and you fancy each other, and they're not a twat.

If that's a big ask then there really is a problem and it's not women!

Can you just imagine if en masse women started ogling ‘barely legal teens’ and refusing to do a fair share of housework or childrearing

I can't decide whether to laugh or cry thinking about it

@TossaCointoYerWitcher, best advice is to take your time to heal. If you can't trust (I know that feeling!) then you are still not ready but it will come.

@Fireflygal

I think men don't deal with their issues in the same way women do. Lots of reasons for it but in my experience it's ego and entitlement .There is no doubt a similar amount of women with issues but the power imbalance in society means we tend to look inside for solutions.

Good men stay in relationships as they have the skills to make it work.

Good men stay in relationships? Blimey.

Firstly, sometimes the ‘normal’ man isn’t at fault, has been cheated on, and is single because of that. This thread seems to say that any single bloke must be “faulty”

And secondly, would you tell a woman in a failing relationship she’d be “normal” if she stayed and made it work. Splitting means she didn’t have the skills??

@BillMasen, women generally work harder at relationships, especially if they have children. They often won't leave when issues arise, maybe to their detriment. That's not usually the case for men who are more likely to check out when a relationship becomes difficult, maybe due to children coming on the scene. I work in a male dominated environment and have seen hundreds of examples, over the years. No doubt there are complex reasons behind this and perhaps when women have equal power in society the stats will become more equal.

@Fireflygal I just think your statement that good men stay, therefore any not staying must not be good, is fundamentally wrong

All I can say is- observe how a man treats his mother. Thats an indicator of how he is going to treat his wife.

I do think its difficult to meet people esp if you have a full time job and commute. I think people are much less social on the whole as they used to be- our parents met at BBQs and other 'community events'. I met my DH at university and made a decision to quit my first job in my home country and immigrate to be with him- was a pretty big decision at 22 and not for everyone cos it was a nerve wracking time! But if I didnt make that decision, I am pretty sure I would be single today at the age of 29 and due to coronavirus, I might be entering my 30s single. Nothing wrong with that but I would probably have wondered if I would ever meet anyone...

Another option is workplace romances but those seem to be frowned upon these days. I believe that online dating can give the illusion of 'choice' so people are less likely to settle down and keep searching for the optimal candidate.

Most of the normal men I know are gay or asexual.
Oh and one of the normal ones who isn't gay is a Catholic priest so that's a non-starter!

I just can't be bothered with it any more. My single life is great and I am way happier than I ever was in a relationship. I am also more content since I gave up searching for a man all the time and have more time to do things I want and also more time for friends.
I've always felt in relationships that my friendships have ended up taking a bit of a backseat.

There are very few 'normal' men actually if you are talking about decent, kind, faithful, reliable, solvent, not overweight, not ugly or reasonable looking, comes from a stable background, heterosexual and has a good/stable job and doesn't come with a stack of emotional baggage or past trauma.

It's not even as simple as saying 'normal men are happily married'. You only have to read threads on here to realise that many many women in marriages that look 'happy' externally are not happy. You only have to spend time in the workplace to realise that many men whose wives/friends/families believe that man is decent and faithful are not because he's been having affairs at work for x amount of years.

Many women have really low standards - only the other day there was a thread on here about write nice things about your DP and someone had put he never calls me a fat bitch or a whore or something like that!

Don't forget two important things

statistically the happiest people are single women followed by (What a shock) married men. Married women come down that list.

men (people generally) treat people differently depending on their relationship. An absolute c*nt of a man to women he dates in his life or his wife may still treat his daughter perfectly. A man may be a reliable friend to his male mates but be a flaky partner in sexual relationships. A man may be kind to his mother but beat his wife.

A 'normal' man (depending on exactly what you are looking for) is a rare thing to start within even if you were taking the whole pool of notionally happily married men. There really aren't that many.
Add in 'single' to that and you are even in a smaller pool. It's not that they are hidden, it's just there aren't many to start with at all.

@NoviceNewMN I do have a single male friend in his early 30s who really wants a relationship- slightly overweight but is ok looking, kind, decent, family orientated, comes from a stable family, owns his own 2 bed house in London, solvent, solicitor, no emotional baggage/trauma that I know of (DH has known him since he was in his teens), intelligent. He does have a hearing disability but hearing aids means that there is no problems regarding communication and they are quite discreet; in any case, does not prevent him having his own career/doing sport or anything I can think of. I think he would prefer a Jewish girlfriend which narrows his pool but he probably would settle for a nice girl who respects him not eating pork or seafood. Doesn't tick everything off on your list, but is close. I know very few people as I didn't grow up in this country and don't socialize much, but I do know 1 decent single man in his 30s, so they must exist.

DH ticks everything off on that list in addition to being a higher rate taxpayer and being a very good cook who does more than his fair share of the housework but he is taken :)

There’s normal, and then there’s perfect. There’s plenty of normal men around where I am, in a variety of situations and with varying degrees of desire, inclination or ability to maintain a relationship with equally flawed women.

Some behave badly but so do the women … I’m old enough that none of us have children at home so maintaining family life is no longer a consideration.

I’m certainly not perfect myself and couldn’t quite tick all the boxes Novice mentions. I’d be rather unnerved to meet a perfect man, and they would dump me fairly fast!

@NoviceNewMN

There are very few 'normal' men actually if you are talking about decent, kind, faithful, reliable, solvent, not overweight, not ugly or reasonable looking, comes from a stable background, heterosexual and has a good/stable job and doesn't come with a stack of emotional baggage or past trauma.

It's not even as simple as saying 'normal men are happily married'. You only have to read threads on here to realise that many many women in marriages that look 'happy' externally are not happy. You only have to spend time in the workplace to realise that many men whose wives/friends/families believe that man is decent and faithful are not because he's been having affairs at work for x amount of years.

Many women have really low standards - only the other day there was a thread on here about write nice things about your DP and someone had put he never calls me a fat bitch or a whore or something like that!

Don't forget two important things

statistically the happiest people are single women followed by (What a shock) married men. Married women come down that list.

men (people generally) treat people differently depending on their relationship. An absolute c*nt of a man to women he dates in his life or his wife may still treat his daughter perfectly. A man may be a reliable friend to his male mates but be a flaky partner in sexual relationships. A man may be kind to his mother but beat his wife.

A 'normal' man (depending on exactly what you are looking for) is a rare thing to start within even if you were taking the whole pool of notionally happily married men. There really aren't that many.
Add in 'single' to that and you are even in a smaller pool. It's not that they are hidden, it's just there aren't many to start with at all.

Seriously?

Being overweight makes you subnormal.

What an awful thing to say!

I find you have to seek them out more, they're less likely to come to you. They may not have the stereotypical masculine traits which most of us find attractive so go unnoticed. Unfortunately the ones who do stand out and make a move tend to have undesirable longer term characteristics.

There are barely any "normal" men out there.

@EmRata95

And finding one who is good in bed on top of all that? No chance

Yep. Zero chance.

Tbh and this is an unpopular view. But I'm nearly 50 and been around the block.

The older I get the more I realise -and I have always had loads of friends of both sexes - have been drinking buddies mates close friends with oodles of men over the years.

I realise that in the end most are not great one way or the other.

Sorry.

Thread the other day if your OH left etc would you have another bloke.. Most posters said no. 3/4!!!

I would date but it would take something really amazing to live with one again.

This. Have you got the link to this thread/which forum?

@coronaway

I find you have to seek them out more, they're less likely to come to you. They may not have the stereotypical masculine traits which most of us find attractive so go unnoticed. Unfortunately the ones who do stand out and make a move tend to have undesirable longer term characteristics.

That's interesting.

I really don't fancy those sorts of men. I hate being approached. I tend to do the approaching

I know lots of women feel differently to me.

However.

Stereotypically masculine?

Interestingly many het coupled women on the feminist board over the years, many I've met in real life.

It's really common for women like me to have massive great fellas. Rugby build types. Really tall etc.

My theory is that men who 'win' at that visible masculinity have no need to do all the dick stuff to complete on the incomprehensible pecking order thing that blokes seem to have.

DH came home once. He works in a totally male job and they're often pretty hefty fellas. And he said oh I said I wanted to embroider something on the top I've made for DD1 teddy bear. And one of thems going to lend me an embroidery machine

I think that as their build says no need to compete they are often (not always obv!) more free to behave in ways that are not generally seen as what they should be doing. For women etc.

No man will really lay into a massive bloke if he mentions he's making a dress for his DD.

However.

Everyone has a type. I can't stand alpha or showy or having drinks bought or jack the lad and all that.

I like men who are a bit quiet, shy even. And just nice kind gentle funny etc.

In the end if your bag is the blokey/ drinks buying/ showy type then I don't know how to help with them!

Thread- 80% now!

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/4354793-If-you-separated-from-your-DCs-father-would-you-stay-single

to complete on the incomprehensible pecking order thing that blokes seem to have.

Lots of men think the same about women TBH,.

I’ve also noticed (on this forum at least), that women seem to more inclined to readily kick lumps of each other (not literally of course), more so than I see on male dominated forums, but that could be down to a lot of male dominated forums being more focused towards one thing or hobby, where’s this forum is probably covers more topics so has a larger cross section of society

We just need to all agree to stop dating any of them from now one, so that they are actually forced to heal themselves rather than jump from one of us to the next. We can form an alliance and vet them over as a collective to ensure they have in fact, become normal in their abstinence.

@NiceGerbil I wasn't necessarily referring to their build but more personality - assertive, confident, extrovert etc

I'm not saying having these traits equals bad partner but these traits do seem to be more common amongst men who have narcissistic or abusive tendencies. I think it's so fair to say these traits are more attractive to women than quiet, timid, meek men.

I'm of course speaking in generalities.