Hi friends. Is it fucked up to flirt with someone with no intention of taking it further? I’m in a long-term monogamous relationship. Sometimes I crave a little validation from strangers. I’m not going to cheat on my partner, but I do have a need to feel desirable to others. I don’t feel like a bit of flirting is a betrayal of my relationship, but I’m less confident about how other people feel. Like, I don’t want to waste someone else’s time, but I guess maybe I am leading people on a bit if I chat with them without mentioning my partner.
OP described doing it for external validation and the original question is about their desire for that validation against the feelings of the people they would be interacting with and potentially “leading people on a bit” in OP’s words.
OP is married to a woman and hasn’t specified their own gender that i’ve seen. They mention they’d be flirting with women in a hotel bar or the like. I don’t know if you picked up on that, you’re arguing against things I haven’t said or positions i’ve explicitly not taken, and the gender dynamic you’re attacking me over probably isn’t even the one at play.
you’re also convinced i’m trying to get laid when i’m not.
yeah fuck me for not being a social butterfly i guess. If somebody wants to act exactly like they might be interested in me when they aren’t, that’s some highschool bully shit. I’ve literally been harassed in that manner, and i don’t think being used for a quick dopamine hit is all that different. I have no way to tell the difference between fake interest and genuine interest, and if OP is going to flirt with me and then go “lol nope i have a wife and we’re monogamous” then that’s a really shitty experience they’ve put me through intentionally. As opposed to it organically not working out, which is sad but isn’t malicious.
you’re really muddying the water here, an exchange of compliments isn’t flirting on their own. There’s a back and forth escalation to flirting and the issue is the intent of the person considering climbing that ladder for purely selfish aims rather than a collaborative goal.
and that’s like, analogy to a physical ladder not a videogame thing.
e: the shitty neurotypical dance is a shitty neurotypical invention regardless of the rest of us maybe learning to navigate it sometimes, that wasn’t me diagnosing anyone other than the indeterminant majority of people who developed shitty cultural practices over time.
Pretending to like somebody to bully them is an entirely different thing than casually flirting with somebody for validation. You cannot treat everybody who does not follow your excruciating script that they cannot possibly know about as your schoolyard bully. This is automatically misjudging them. Grown up people do not usually act like teenagers and when you pretend we do, you will keep having interactions like this one because you misjudge everybody around you.
they’re both using another person to feel better about yourself. again, literally as OP describes.
all i’m asking is people don’t act completely indistinguishably from somebody who might be interested when they aren’t.
Incredibly uncharitable reading, given that you equate a simple misunderstanding about the most trivial bs with deliberate intent of hurting and traumatizing somebody.
did you read OP’s other comments? what they describe wanting is an ego boost gained by initiating flirting only interested in that boost. it’s not targeted abuse but it is using someone.
Removed by mod