One could consider this tantamount to "e-mailing him first," which is against Rule #1 of The Rules for Online Dating.
But is it really? If I do not include a personal message, it is really more like simply publicizing my event in general, is it not? I wouldn't think these guys would assume I had singled them out among my friends.
However, if we want to analogize facebook to a "dance," the Rule is pretty clear:
Don't even stand next to someone you like, hoping he'll ask you, as many women do. You have to wait for someone to notice you. --Rule #2: Don't Talk to a Man First (and Don't Ask Him to Dance)
At best, by sending the invitation to guys I might be interested, it seems I fell into the trap of "many women" by "standing next" to these men in a virtual sense. I put myself in their inbox. Even though I was also standing equally close to all of my other facebook friends. Here the dance analogy falls short. If I am including all of a certain category of people in something, how can I artificially exclude people within that category just because I like them more? This does not make sense. The Rules do not contain a chapter on throwing parties or publicizing events - do Rules girls never do this?
In the end, I decided to include everyone, mostly because of the rudeness factor. I did not think it was breaking the Rules so flagrantly at the time, but now I sort of see that it was. In the future, I guess I will go ahead and exclude the people I'm interested in, even if it might create awkwardness. If they ask me about it I can then say "oh, I'm so sorry, I meant to put you on the list." Note to self: make future post on "white lies," which appear to be completely unavoidable under the Rules.
I am no expert, but I would think if somebody is already your facebook friend, and hasn't progressed past that point, then there isn't any hope for him anyways. As I understand it, the Rules are designed to get guys to chase you, so somebody who is just hanging around your facebook page without actually asking you out isn't really chasing at all.
ReplyDeleteI see why you'd say that, but I'm not sure I agree. Various circumstances come up like that someone was in a relationship and no longer is... for example, currently, that "someone" is probably me. I was in a relationship until recently so facebook friends I gathered during that time knew I was off limits. If they haven't actively checked my profile since then, they might not know otherwise. Plus, these days some people add people they barely know or don't know because of activities or friends in common. I generally add people back even if I don't know them, if we have a number of mutual friends.
ReplyDeleteThe Rules's official position on things like this is that if I was the one to add the guy, it is Doomed as you suggest. If he was the one to add, there is technically hope regardless of timing. I no longer add men, so anyone recent fits this pattern.
In my case, two specific guys I am talking about here (neither of whom I initiated the add for) have special circumstances. Guy #1 is someone I was supposed to go on a fixup date with right before I got back together with my boyfriend 1.5 years ago and had to cancel. Before the fixup he had been good about initiating contact with me. However, I tend to think he probably should have asked me out by now if he was still interested, as I have seen him once since then albeit before I started the Rules (he approached me and we talked, but he did not follow up).
Guy #2 is someone who actually added me on facebook without even knowing me, presumably because he was possibly interested in me. He told me he had seen my name on RSVPs and noticed we had mutual friends. The last message I got from him was sort of a mild request to go out (maybe we can plan to meet up at an event or get a drink sometime). Arguably he is in the process of "chasing" me.
I should also note that Guy #1 did message me in response to the facebook invite I was unsure about sending! Ironically, this makes me wonder even more if I Rulebroke here.
ReplyDeleteI wrote him back, he wrote me back. Now he has 2 more messages to suggest we meet or I have to next him.
There's another Rules analogy. The Rules suggest that YOU'RE the one to put out a personal ad. Therefore, if you send out an invite and you make it clear that it's to a number of people - maybe start the personal message with "Hey everyone - " then that's closer to a personal ad than a specific pursuit aimed at a specific man. Just make it crystal-clear that it's a general invite and it's being sent to potentially dozens of people. He's not being made to feel there's a spotlight on him. Then it's up to him to respond or not - as in the personal ads.
ReplyDeleteI don't know. I think you have to suss out each individual situation.
Ooh, excellent suggestion, and you're quite right about the personal ads part. Will do this in the future!
ReplyDeleteYep, just make it general - like a smile at the universe. ;) I think you'll be fine!
ReplyDeleteYou know - Ellen & Sherrie REALLY need to write a few articles about what to do with Facebook!!
An additional thought: What I get from The Rules is that men in romantic relationships with women have a lot of similarities to dogs. That's by no means a putdown of men - I love dogs and I actually think they're intelligent animals - but it does remind me of a funny story. My family had a Landseer Newfoundland dog who loved to chase seagulls. Now, in Canada about 20 years ago, the rest of the provinces used to tell "Newfie jokes" - jokes aimed at people from Newfoundland - because people from Newfoundland were seen as kind of backward and as never having quite grown out of the world of 19th-century Ireland. And we thought they had funny accents. One of the jokes was, and I apologize to any Newfoundlanders who may be reading this: "Two Newfies are walking along the beach. One says to the other, 'Aye, there's a dead bird.' The other says, 'Where?'" (At that point, the joke teller looks up into the sky as if looking for the dead bird.)
ReplyDeleteWell, we taught this Newfie - the dog - to bark at the sky whenever any of us said, "Dead bird!" And one day, a seagull flew low within about two feet of the dog, taunting him, and then flew upward while the dog pursued him in vain.
Wouldn't a Facebook invite - or showing up where he might be and looking fabulous, but looking away - kind of be doing the same thing that the seagull did?
I think the main point of The Rules is this: If a man is interested and you're interested in him, keep him guessing as to whether you like him or not. Keep him mystified. Sending him a Facebook invite that's not specifically addressed to him would be more like flying low above him and letting him run muzzle-first into your feathers as you swoop away.
Like I said - Ellen and Sherrie REALLY need to cover Facebook, because I don't really know WTF I'm doing with it either...just figuring it out along the way. But I am pretty sure the main point of Rules-like behaviour is to keep him mystified and thus keep making it fun for him. If your Facebook invite does that, great - if not, don't send it. Same with everything else Ellen & Sherrie have not yet covered.
That's my best guess, anyway.
Wow, excellent thoughts, Nay.
ReplyDeleteI agree, they need to cover facebook, but I sort of wonder if they're qualified to do it. I doubt they use it, and if they tried to do so just to write a book or an article, I doubt they'd understand it well enough.
That said, I said the same thing about their take on "texting" at first. But after reflecting on it and being put in the position of having to apply it recently (more on that later), I think they friggin nailed it. No texting until he has asked for a Saturday night date. Period. Even if it's rude as hell.
If anything, I think the facebook anecdotes are probably the biggest "value added" of my blog. Hopefully at the end of this Rules Girls can find my blog and click on the "facebook" tag and get a reasonable interpretation/extrapolation. I very much appreciate your contribution to that interpretation :)
Thanks! :) Part of it stems from my anxiety over having recently sent CC an invite to my play (he lives in another city in my province) - so I'll update on how that works out, too, if it has any impact either way. Glad to contribute!
ReplyDeleteOk, I just looked back at the facebook invitation and realized that I had either forgotten to invite one of the guys I was pseudo-interested in, or had not invited him out of spite. I ran into him the other day and he actually expressed interest in coming. I ALMOST invited him, but DID NOT, because it would be obvious that I did so in response to our conversation.
ReplyDeleteI think you should not exclude people from invites if it's solely becauase you might be interested in them. That defeats the purpose because it's reverse discrimination which shows that something is up if they find out you invited, essentially, everyone else you know.
ReplyDeleteJust do a group invite and include everyone. No special privileges or exceptions for anyone. By not inviting, you are drawing attention to yourself if they find out--like the guy you ran into and he asked about it.
After reading the comments above I'm not sure I'm adding anything new here, but it seems like the Rules should not apply if you are acting in a capacity other than your personal self. You don't say what this event is, but if it's a public event you are helping organize or promote, I don't think it matters who you invite, as long as you are clearly inviting "the public" and not a select group of people. You're supposed to be mysterious about your feelings; a public invite gives no information away.
ReplyDeleteOn the other hand, if you're throwing a party at your house, then being on the guest list says something about your personal feelings.