This post is part of the How Much Do You Love Me? series. Normal posting resumes in April.

Ah, the Nice Guy. This myopic douchebag believes that women should automatically give them sex because they’re sooooooo nice and kiiiiiiiiiind and def. not like other guys. They harass women on the street, have very difficult cognitive skills that borderline “absolute idiot” when it comes to understanding phrases like “No, stop talking to me and leave me alone,” and they believe any woman that is outside their house or visible on the internet is fair game, regardless whether she is busy, tired or plain not social. Women aren’t people to them, just a trophy to win and get sex from.

Here’s the thing about the Nice Guy. He’s not that nice. If anything, he attempts to be manipulative and when the manipulation fails, goes full on salty douchebag. Here’s a great video by the1janitor about why being a Nice Guy, isn’t really being a nice guy.

Wasn’t that vid all informative and fun? This dude hits the nail right on the head. See, women, given that we are people, like to be treated as people, not as damsels in distress or as if we’re open pickings simply because we exist. That’s why I made fun of that dude several Ask Black Witches ago because that’s exactly what he was doing and I, like any other girl, do not appreciate that. No girl or woman appreciates some random person walking up to them going, “You wanna start a relationship [with me, a total stranger]?” It’s creepy as hell, rude and any guy who does that fully deserves to get their every emotion obliterated because they don’t know how to talk to people. Look, if a girl walked up to a dude and acted just as desperate, I have a strong feeling that she would be treated as, well, desperate. Guys shouldn’t be excluded from such treatment because society told them that they are to be the actors and the women to be the acted upon. Nope, act like a jerk, get treated like a jerk, it’s that simple.

Now, if anyone is confused about how girls (and guys) should be chatted up, try the “like a human” route. Y’know, say hi, start small talk, learn to read and acknowledge the girl (or guy) not wanting to talk if it occurs. All you need are regular social skills you should have learned in grade school.

If you’re reading this and still feeling that, “Hey, women should learn how to be more receptive”, congrats, you are the human embodiment of rape culture, your “Proud to be a Douche” trophy will be in the mail with one (1) free coupon to the nearest castration and assisted suicide clinic. Thank you for your unwanted participation.

What is rape culture, everyone? It’s everywhere, from the Nice Guy syndrome to street harassment, to slut shaming to domestic violence to rape itself. It’s the fancy little ball of wtf that makes life pretty hard to live, especially if you’re a girl. It’s the societal assumption that of both genders, women, regardless of whether they’re grown or little girls, are supposed to be acted upon at all times. That, regardless what happens, they should be the victim and it will always be their fault because the onus is supposed to be on the woman to protect her modesty and chastity, especially if they are a minority. And that brings us to this side bit about guys calling women “females”.

See, the term “female” instead of “woman” is degrading. Simple as that. It steals away the human identity because we’re not scientific specimens, we’re people (if I sound like a broken record with this whole “women are people” thing, you won’t believe how many people are not actively aware of this fact). If we can’t even have the basic decency of being regarded as a person, just don’t talk to us. Rudimentary gender description should only be reserved for forms and to describe a group of people where age is not accounted for situation, never in informal talk or chatter. Either you were talking to a girl or a woman, not simply a female so choose one. Demetria of Ask Demetria was very on point when she said that when guys say “female” instead of “woman or girl”, it simply is another word for “b*tch”. So if any guy wants to be successful with women, take it out your vocabulary. It just tags you with “I’m probably a wife beater and/or rapist, please be rude to me.” This is also ditto with “shorty” and “ma”. Use of “Queen” means you’re the Afriboo edition of the degrading douchebag with a side of Nice Guy. Please avoid it.

On that note, I wanna bring up rape. If you think a rapist is a creepy guy in the bushes, hate to say it but you’re wrong. Almost 80% of rapes are done by guys that the girl* knew, which is part of why the number of reported rapes are so low. The “creepy guy in the bushes” is about 9%. (Lying about rape is about 2-4%.) Rape, as defined by the FBI, is “The penetration, no matter how slight, of the vagina or anus with any body part or object, or oral penetration by a sex organ of another person, without the consent of the victim,” which basically mean if there isn’t consenting, it. Is. Rape. End of story. Forcing the girl to have sex? Rape. Is she sleep and wants to stay that way but you don’t? Rape. Is she drunk beyond comprehension? Rape. She says no or something along those lines and you won’t listen? Rape. Rape is rape. Between straight couples, gay couples, guy forcing himself on girl, girl forcing himself on guy, so on and so forth, it doesn’t matter, rape is rape. If the dude refuses to acknowledge non-consent in any way, shape or form, it rape/sexual assault.

I’m sure some folks don’t know how rape and sexual assault are different so here’s a basic cheat sheet:

  • if it is unwelcomed touching in an inappropriate area such as breasts or derriere or crotch, it’s sexual assault
  • if it is unwelcomed touching anywhere else on the body or making inappropriate sexual comments, it’s sexual harassment (which is what street harassment falls under, we’ll be talking about that later)
  • if it is forced sex (oral, vaginal or anal), it’s rape.

And there you go, your cheat sheet for life, now you can talk to people without risking interaction with the healthcare system, judicial system or mace. Still confused? Read and read again. Don’t wait for a “no” but aim for an enthusiastic “yes”. A rapist isn’t the creepy dude in the shadows but the guy who decided to not understand dissent.

Now, I’m sure I will have the random guy or girl (mainly guy) reader that goes, “But-but-but, women are aloof creatures that mean one thing but do another? How am I supposed to know when they say ‘yes’, it means ‘yes’ and when they say ‘no’ they’re not just playing ‘hard to get’? Women are so crazy, they make no sense.” Firstly, please turn off the tv, drop all your men magazine subscriptions and listen up: Women are no more complicated people than men are. Humans are, by extension, complicated creatures. If we weren’t, psychology wouldn’t exist, self-help writers would be starving in the street and advertisement would choose smarter methods to convince you to get their product rather than go down the “get the girl/all the girls” route that so strongly populates our media. Yes, you’re gonna come across some random girl who internalized the misogyny of mainstream modern culture, just like I come across guys who internalized patriarchal, hyper-masculine ideas of mainstream modern culture. They are generally nutters, poorly deluded, insecure (both genders) and – as you could probably guess – not worth bothering about with. If you think women are crazy, you’re probably the nutter I described above.

On street harassment: don’t do it. Street harassment is basically making inappropriate or sexist remarks or actions to women, using abusive language when women rebuff your random encounter. Most women hate street harassment because it is exactly that, harassment. Telling a woman to smile is harassment (if you don’t tell guys to smile, then yes, it can be seen as sexist probably because it is because like men, women have hard days and aren’t bobbing bubbles of sunshine), trying to get a woman’s number exactly .05 seconds after acknowledging her existence is harassment (and creepy), assuming that a woman needed your opinion on how short her skirt is/big her legs are/small her bust is/tight her shirt is/etc and loudly voicing that opinion is harassment. If you want to get to know a woman, try talking to her like a human being using normal social skills, it’s probably your best method. And if you’re miffed that girls put up a defense the second you talk to them, probably because you’re not the first guy to harass them and secondly, that society believe that women should be on their guard from future harassment or suffer being slut-shamed and deal with endless victim blaming because, welp, they didn’t protect their virginal ways enough.

If someone just checked their calendar throughout all this, yes, it is still 2013 but it feels so 1813, don’t it? We can call someone on the other side of the earth as if they lived in the next house over, complete with HD visuals and our phones can double as tvs, music players, cameras, calculators, PDAs, datebooks, computers and more but we still have to have this “Treat women like people because they are” discussion that folks didn’t understand back when they thought that hysteria meant the uterus was floating throughout the body and that blowing tobacco smoke up your derriere could alleviate stomach pain and save near drowning victims (I’m not making this up, check out #9). Yep. What strides in time we have made.

So, don’t be a Nice Guy. Be yourself – Oh, and the Friendzone! Let us talk about the Friendzone!

Okay, the friendzone is what the “Nice Guy” believes is the worst thing that could happen to them: to only be considered a friend and nothing more. Not a guy to screw or even a potential boyfriend, just a normal friend. Oh, the horror. All their niceness and pleasantness, wasted! I mean, if there’s no booty to be gotten, what else could possibly be there for the Nice Guy? All that is left is this girl who should now be derided as a tease and perplexing cunt who lead him on. How dare she not thank him for his kindness without removal of the panties? How mean. It’s like she saw the dude as a normal guy who had no ulterior motives they’d use conniving and manipulative methods for such as “be nicer than nice”.

The Nice Guy is only nice because they feel their only other method to get what they want lives out in a popular Sublime song: “If it wasn’t for date rape, I’d never get laid.” Using the more passive method of just pretending to be a decent human being, when it doesn’t bear the fruits of labor they prefer, here comes the whining of the friendzone because apparently being a friend to someone is a terrible thing. On the other end of all this, the girl is being “f*ckzoned”, meaning the Nice Guy doesn’t see her worth as a person or who she is, just as a walking Fleshlight. This girl could be really cool and smart but if she’s not dropping her skirt, there’s not much worth to her in the eyes of the Nice Guy. That most truly is coldhearted and degrading thinking because the girl is not seen as a whole person anymore but a sex aid, she’s objectified.

So, what if all the guy wanted was casual sex? He can’t just up and approach women on the street because that’s street harassment. Can’t be overwhelmingly nice when he’s actually not because that’s trickery. Can’t ignore dissent and rejections of sex because that’s rape. What is a guy to do? Oh woe, how difficult it is to not be the gender that doesn’t have to be on the receiving end of all this crap.

How about…having better perspectives on sex, sexuality, gender and a little bit of restraint? Women are expected to restrain themselves and their desires to the point of developing neurosis over it so it’s not like guys can’t do the same. Yeah, society won’t really give guys a hand on containing their sexual desires via oppressive laws, gender ideas and cultural backlash that can even result in death but eh, it can be done, nonetheless. Look on the bright side, dudes! No one is threatening to slit your whore throat if you decide to abstain from sex! (If that last sentence didn’t make sense, now you know how girls feel just a little bit.) Instead, just develop more sex positive ideas and interact with people who believe the same and you may get to have a better sex life. If you’re going “Omg, look at that slut over there, why does her shirt have a cowboy on it? She just wants guys to look at her boobs and then get offended when they do,” girls start to mentally strike you off their “May want to bone” list because you just slid yourself at least 200 years back in time. Misogyny is not attractive and yes, it is really hard to find women to sleep with when you keep spouting hateful ideas about them and using subversive tactics that get discovered.

So, don’t be the Nice Guy, just be yourself. Seriously! If a girl digs you, she’ll let you know. If she don’t, she’ll let you know. If she can’t, just move on without delay.

Alright, this is the second to last post of this month’s series! Next week is “The Arts” version for the How Much Do You Love Me? series! That mean:

  • books!
  • videos!
  • sites!

For everyone to use! So many that I couldn’t list them all here! And thank you everyone for bearing with the chronic late postings for this month, how embarrassing!

Oh, and there are Black Witch Meet and Greet events! Check them out here for all the details

* I know some random dude is gonna say, “Guys get raped, too” and y’all are right, but you’re only about 3% of the pie (yes, keeping in mind that rape is under-reported for both genders). As you read, switch to the appropriate gender in your head.