Stories of stingiest first dates

[frtedsbed]

Just comparing experiences here at a friends ... jaw dropping stuff!

Mine asked me to transfer money for a coffee and cake after our first date which was a walk and feeding the ducks.
I thought we were going for lunch ... that was the original invite.
Another asked me to transfer money to r a takeaway having offered to pay for my child and I , as he stayed at mine every weekend. Both ended there and then !

Getting back to stories....I went on a first date with a guy at lunchtime at a coffee shop we awkwardly ended up staring at the rows of sandwiches until finally he asked if I fancied one, I declined purely because I felt it was offered be grudgingly. He ate his sandwich in front of me and didn't offer any...I thought he could be shy or just a bit nervous so I accepted a second date, he picked a restaurant and sent me details. I had nothing to drink other than mineral water which he shared, and he had two glasses of wine and an expensive main course. He kept on saying how it was his favourite restaurant and he had wanted to go back for ages. When the bill came he stared at it silently and for a long time and I offered to pay he literally without a word took my card and asked the waitress to split the bill. My share would have easily been half of his. Basically he had wanted to go out for dinner and needed a random female to go with. Now if there's a hint of meaness on a first date I won't go on a second...

Me too! Having to skip a long way to get to them!

Thought this was going to be a 'lighthearted' thread!

Basically he had wanted to go out for dinner and needed a random female to go with.

Why? I've had plenty of meals out by myself.

I've stayed out of this particular bunfight but it's not ok for a man to come on here and call women names like this. You need to go and find yourself another site if you can't play nicely on this one.

It's always men with nothing who complain about freeloaders.

What do you mean when you say worth spending money on? Do you mean attractive enough to take on a proper date?

Yes.

How lovely, struggling to imagine in what circumstances I would begrudge a £5 drink. I mean I buy my collegues a coffee or a glass of wine fairly regularly they don't need to pass some arbitrary test to be worth it. How extremely odd.

Absolutely. My EXDP refused for us to get joint accounts because he was "scared I'd steal all his money hahaha"...yet I earned almost 3 times his salary 🙄🙄🙄 He was the stingiest person I've ever met, though hid it well at the start by presenting himself as a saver.

It's not at all odd and you know it. Buying your friends a drink is a completely different dynamic to buying a romantic date a drink. There have been a few posters doing the "but I do this with friends" thing and I'm sorry, but I don't believe any of you don't actually know the difference. Yes, even when taking into account that romantic partners should also be friends. A first date is a different dynamic. A sexual and romantic relationship is a different dynamic.

And while that was a slightly crass way for the poster to put it, it aligns with what I've been saying. A man who's properly interested in a woman won't begrudge the cost of an inexpensive drink. Men aren't morally obliged to buy anything for a woman they've just met, but if they are actually into her, then they won't be sulking and arguing over a Coke.

Why would you begrudge anyone the cost of an inexpensive drink, unless you are absolutely on the poverty line, in which case why are you going on a date anyway ?

I just don’t think the onus should be on a man from the outset to buy drinks and meals for the woman. Both parties agree to go on a date. If a man had asked the woman on a date that changes the dynamics a bit. If it’s OLD it’s an experience where two people agree to an arrangement for their mutual benefit. Neither of them know each other before apart from online messaging. If one buys the other drinks and meals that sets up a dynamic straight away that the man is in charge. Who wants that?
The stories on here though do seem to be about particularly mean and unpleasant men.

The point I was making was that, in the examples here, the men didn't even think it worthwhile spending money on their own drink or meal.

Which is very strange indeed. I mean it's a coffee/ coke fgs. I wonder how they cope with the rest of their lives frankly. Even if 5 dates a week ( which seems like a lot to me) that is a total outlay of £25, I mean that is the price of an off-peak day return from London to Brighton, by any normal measure not a huge amount of money.

The man is ‘in charge’ if he treats a woman to a meal?? How bizarre.

BTW I haven't dated for 25 years, but would never do dinner as a first date, surely it's a drink or the cinema ( then at least you got to see the film).

If someone is paying for you, it’s not an equal power balance. Of course it isn’t.

If they said from the outset; I'm stony broke, I can only afford to go for a walk/picnic, that would be fair enough. It's the deciding once they have 'valued' the woman's appearance that crosses the line between genuinely impoverished, and stingy.

I earn more than my chap and knew this from the outset, though I have more outgoings. On our first date he made sure to arrive at the bar way ahead of me and when I arrived he jumped straight up to buy me a drink. From there we took turns and always have.

That’s a healthy relationship

I can think of loads of people I wouldn't buy even a cheap drink because I don't know them, don't like them, don't want to see them again and don't care about impressing them!

But if a man's personal wet dream is sitting opposite him, he'll pay for the chance to see her again. As before, it's symbolic. If a man didn't buy my drink, I wouldn't complain that he shouldn't begrudge it. If he begrudges it, he's not into me. That's it.

I think it's just politness frankly. Someone has bother to make time to meet you, yes you owe them a drink ( your own) and 40 minutes of your life, really very low stakes.

Hasn’t the man had to get ready and give up his time too though? I’m genuinely perplexed at this way of seeing a date as if a woman is doing a man a favour. It’s quite different if it’s not OLD and someone has asked you out when you don’t really know them.

Not really. Not unless you see yourself as somehow ‘less than’ and ‘owing’ something because someone bought you dinner, in which case it might be worth looking at your self esteem and the strength of your boundaries.

And yes women are doing a ‘men a favour’ as you put it, by going out with them because they’re the sexual selectors. Or at least, they used to be and they should be.