Happy Fourth of July from Seattlest
Seattlest Day Trips to Mount Rainier (in Photos)
Can't Miss It: Weekend Edition July 3-5
Weekend Theatre: July 3-5
Quarter-Life Crisis is, as personal blogs by 24-year-olds go, not particularly self-involved.
By which, of course, we mean that it is incredibly self-involved.
But that is the way of the 24-year-old personal blogger, it is part of their charm, it is why, when we are being self-involved, we think, "if only there was a 24-year-old personal blogger here--she would steer the conversation away from our problems and toward hers before we could say 'you were born when?'"
Last week, Quarter-Life Crisis, the 24-year-old in question (that is her with some guy at right), opined that "Seattle is the worst place to be a single woman in the western hemisphere."
Why?
Because the Seattle man sucks. He is shy and nerdy, says Quarter-Life Crisis.
He stares at you from a distance and when you glance back he quickly takes a sip of whatever he's drinking and either looks around the room nervously at anywhere but into your eyes, or he desperately begins a conversation about proxy servers with the buddy standing next to him.Fair enough. Seattle men suck, it's their fault, case closed, let's move our US Magazine subscriptions to San Diego.
Ah, but wait! Quarter-Life Crisis receives a letter from a reader that places the blame squarely on the Double-X'ed among us.
I have lived all over the world and never (ever) had trouble getting dates, meeting women, beginning relationships, or making female friends... until I moved to Seattle. The vast majority of women here are closed off, stuck up, insecure, unfriendly, snobs. Not all at once mind you. But it only takes one of these traits to blow up a potential date. I work with a lot of single young men and they have all complained that meeting women here is extremely difficult due to the boorish behavior of the women in the area.Well now we are confused. Are we single because Seattle men are cowards, or because Seattle women are bitches? Or maybe it's our parents' fault?
Seattlest reader, what do you think?
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A friend and I were talking about this the other day actually, how we have such shit luck with guys in the northwest, and Seattle in particular.
Of course, we just thought they were total dicks.
We decided it was likely because there are so many gay men and/or homebody techies that the only guys who talk to you are huge fucking assholes because they know they can get away with it - we ladies are desperate.
Can we agree that Seattleites, whether male or female, are overly passive?
That alone makes dating in this town an arduous endeavor.
Hrm. Stepping out of my editorial cape and into my personal one (*I actually don't own a cape), I have to say that, having lived in both New York and Seattle, both purportedly places where it's impossible to meet people, it's never as bad as the hype makes it out to be.
To take the guy's point, obviously, some girls will be standoffish if you start a conversation with them (hell, this happened to me last night), but that's probably because they have a boyfriend, or they think you look like a fish. Instead of ascribing this trait to a city-wide disease, keep trying.
As for the girl's point, if you are going places where all the guys are shy tech dorks, you need to go to different places. "Trendy" bars in any city tend to get overrun rather quickly by the wealthy, and while in New York that might mean Wall Street guys, who are certainly not shy, in Seattle it means tech dorks, who often are. The best bars to meet people in aren't the Barcas and Havanas of the world, but the Bill's Off Broadways's and the Shortys's, where people are laid back and not trying to convert their newfound wealth into a hot girlfriend.
Same's true in New York, where if--back when it was trendy--you spent your Friday night at Pharmacy Bar you'd have a 100% chance of your shirt getting scoffed at, and a 0% chance of meeting someone cool. Different story at, say, the Blue and Gold or McSorley's.
I think it's that people in Seattle (men and women) are really, really into themselves...in a good way).
It's always struck me that everyone here is strongly passionate about their own very diverse interests. We proudly like to do our own thing.
Combine that with the naturally independent nature of this city and you've got a community poorly designed for one-on-one relationships.
We're not really desperate for a relationships (we're happy hanging out with a variety of similar interest friends) and we care alot more about our own unique, individual interests and passions than trying to fit them to those of the people around us.
I'm cool with that...
Seth makes some good points, cape or not -- people are always picking up on people at the Hopvine, for instance. They just come in, sit at the bar, start chatting.
Another thing is, people aren't sure how to act interested in someone these days. What QLC mentions sounds like guys worried about getting busted for checking a woman out. For whatever reason, in Seattle looking at someone and smiling is uncommon (at all times, not just when trying to pick up on someone).
You know what works for the shy often is a prop. Books are fantastic. A friend of mine claims that while he was walking around with a copy of Let's Go: Paris, he couldn't lose. It was an automatic conversation starter.
Can we skip past commenting on this fake problem she describes and go straight to lambasting her and the P-I for the idea behind the blog in the first place? What's the difference between her blog and one of 14 million Live Journals? Or MySpace blogs? It's all the same "look at me!" tripe, no?
(Eh, for the record, Seattle women are categorically unapproachable. I thought this was a given.)
Ha i know that guy in the picture. His name is actually GUY.
And to follow that comment GUY works at a trendy Seattle club, and what better to meet people than at a trendy club... everyone is very open and friendly at a club, everyone wants to have a worthwhile discussion that is going to lead to getting to know someone on a personal level...
ah, QLC must have missed this map/graph:
http://seattle.metblogs.com/archives/2007/06/paging_dc_and_p.phtml
--josh
I was born and raised in Seattle but lived in NY for more than a decade...long enough to really get over the social passivity encouraged here. I had a terrible time dating in NY, but have been a dating MACHINE since I've been here, just because fellas respond so well to my pro-active, smile at them if they're cute, talk to them about their "props", etc. approach. I actually gave my number to a guy and he called me the next morning and said, "I had to ask you out before you became a Seattle girl and I lost my chance." Thanks, Seattle girls!
As someone who has lived else where (female, I might add) I found dating in Seattle after dating elsewhere to be like shooting fish in a barrel. I will also, however, point to the comment regarding where you go. I'm a neighborhood joint kind of girl, where people are always shooting the shit with random people, not in a gaggle of people they walked in with.
But still, I found dating as a female in Seattle to be incredibly easy.
First, I totally agree with Audrey.
I moved up here for college, so I've never really dated elsewhere either. After turning 21, I did think it was hard to meet guys, but I figured that it was probably my issue and not theirs. Then, last December, I went home to California for Christmas and made my first trip to the bars out there. WOW -- there was definitely a noticeable difference. My friend and I ended up leaving a few bars because guys were so persistent and borderline creepy. I remember thinking "I'll take passive Seattle guys over this any day." Now, I make more of an effort to approach guys here, they seem to respond better when you make the first move, and I'm comfortable doing that.
There's no doubt I'd be one of those furtive guys who won't look at the ladies (he thinks are attractive.) If they think guys look like fish, I'd be too afraid to know what they thought I looked like.
Clearly, it's time for a Seattlest cocktail hour.
This is such a tired topic. I do not think it is specific to Seattle at all! There are whiners in every major city in the USA who will tell you city x is a hard place to date/meet women *or* men. Don't blame the city.
Why does it have to be either one? Why not both?
Look, it's hard to meet people in this town. Period. More difficult than other places, but not as difficult as everyone (transplants mostly) make it sound.
It's more of a struggle to make those breezy relationships than other cities, but after several years, you wind up with a friend for decades, if not a lifetime.
This is due to the fact that Seattle has always been Seattle to it's inhabitants. Most of the "true" Satellites rage against the "Manhattans" or "San Fransiscos." We don't want our city to be at all like them, hence no light rail until 2009. We are "Seattle" for what that means.
So unless you're from here, you're considered one of them. One of those outsiders. You didn't grow up like us, you don't have the same ideals. You come in here with your money or crime and turn Seattle into a materilistic and dangerous place.
I say fuck it and talk to whomever, but this is just what I've noticed from talking with my fellow natives.
We also have a tendency to keep doing what doesn't work, hoping eventually it works. Cases in point:
Seattle football
Monorail (it'll work again)
Windows 95, 98, 2000, Me, XP and Vista
Dating
Even if you want to ignore or downplay the xenophobia, you cannot argue that we keep doing what we do, whether it works or not. We're not terribly adaptable or smart peoples. But we do have passion and pride.
Oh and, the newspaper bloggers in Seattle are annoying as fuck and I would avoid them at all cost.
They're probably all transplants ;)
I've thought about this post more than a few times in the past month, and felt this should be added. I'm not exactly an attractive man, but I'm no beast either. I try to put on an outwardly happy face and everyone who knows me says I'm one of the nicest and friendliest people they know. I will be walking down the street, and decide to shoot the oncoming female a friendly smile. Not a lecherous "hey baby baby" kind of smile, but the same one I'd give to my Grandma or my best friend. And the otherwise content or neutral face on said oncoming person immediately turns, as if my smile must be counteracted by a frown or quick glance away lest the rampant indifference in Seattle become unbalanced.
So if you ask me, the problem is, several times a day, my friendly smile is often met with a look as if I just completely ruined their day. Under those circumstances, why would I bother approaching one of these people for a conversation, let alone to hit on them?