"... or whether tempest tossed..."

I am perhaps the most oblivious man ever to embark into the realm of dating. I have had more than a dozen women lament, either to a mutual friend or to me long after the fact, that they had been throwing themselves at me and I never responded. One even went so far as to crawl into my bed naked. It took me a couple hours before I finally caught on she wanted to do more than sleep next to a warm body. I wasn't going to assume liberties.

I have been one of those guys who always got along better with women than I have with my own gender. Many have been the occasions where I had an unrequited crush upon a friend who never saw me as more than a "good friend" or "like a brother." I listened to the sins visited upon them by the boys they did date and took pains to not behave in those ways. In many cases, I was seriously shocked that they tolerated some of those behaviors.

Over the years, I have taken dramatic strides in interpersonal relations. It hasn't been pretty in some ways. I've had to pay for my new understanding in pain; mine and those around me. I still have a vast volume still to learn.

So the other day I commented on the very cool Kiss & Blog, Trouble presented a very cool question in response. She wrote in part,

There is a wide range within the term sexual. So what you are suggesting here, Lanius, is that if a woman does not have sexual intercourse with you by the second date, you'd write her off?

See, I saw this repeatedly here when I wasn't in a relationship. Every single time, I articulated to the guy that I don't have sex with strangers, and there is no possible way that you are anything BUT a stranger after only two dates. Maybe mere aquaintances who've shared a couple of meals, at the most.

That doesn't mean that I would behave like a nun, however. I'm perfectly okay with some hot kissing and/or making out, LEADING UP to sex at some later point.

But I have to say that there are actually men out there who expect a woman to have sexual intercourse with them by the 2nd date, or they're done, that just shocks the hell out of me. And, I find such men totally uninteresting.

If I am dating someone, I expect there would be a certain level of mutual attraction. If there isn't, then it becomes a social outing. It doesn't matter what form that mutual attraction is communicated, just that it is communicated. I never have an expectation of sex, but if there is no indication it is potentially on the menu at any point in the foreseeable future, I will take it off myself. I've gone out with women who really didn't evince much in the way of chemistry for me. In that case, panting after them or in any other way attempting to get something sexual going is unutterably rude. Thus, I "write off" any potential for sex with that person. We could still go on to form a wonderfully rewarding friendship, but unless/until they say anything to the contrary, I will ignore anything that would normally be interpreted as interest.

By the same token, I have also met women who for whatever reason attempt to forge healthy, adult relationships from the use of manipulation. They maintain a rigid schedule that they hold their suitor to. Kind of a variation of "the Rules". The intended results are to invest the man in them and to cultivate a desire to out-compete her expressed social life. I will never invest myself emotionally with a woman who embarks on such a path, because it is based on false information and lies. I could never trust such a woman. Thus, I write off having any sort of sexual relations with her summarily. It also tends to discourage me to maintain anything beyond a casual acquaintanceship with her.

I really don't like dating strangers. The relationships that have been healthiest and most fulfilling have been the ones that rose out of prior friendship. My SO of six years and counting was a friend a couple years before we ever got involved. If I haven't known them for a while prior to going out with them, I attempt to talk to people they do know. I want to have a basic framework to compare my impressions of them with. It also allows me a small kernel about their interests to build a conversation from.

But why would you want a woman who so values herself that she gives her body freely to virtually anyone she dates? I certainly don't want a man like that. Frankly, I want a man who thinks considerably BETTER of himself than that, and who isn't ruled at all times by his sexual whims.

In response, I am not interested in dating someone who displays no selectivity in who they go out with. If her relationships tend to average one to two years and to be overall healthy, it's not going to concern me if she is quick to jump into bed with the guys she tends to date. Nor would I find anything disturbing in a man doing the same. Your statement is at heart a value judgment. What you would consider as throwing men in and out of her vagina is not necessarily what other people would. It has to do with perspective. I am much more interested in why she has the dating habits she does and whether she behaves in what I would consider to be responsible ways. Sex is often less a problem than the foundation leading to it and the consequences arising from.