Meme: Board Room Suggestion, 4 panels
1st panel: Supervisor demands from his team, "How do we get them to think of us romantically?"
2nd: Three people in the team respond.
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First man: Disingenuously laugh at their joke.
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Woman: Hit on someone else to make them jealous.
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Second man that is relaxed: Explicitly tell them you want that.
3rd: Supervisor looks angrily at relaxed second man.
4th: Outside view of office building with relaxed man thrown out of a window
I'm sure there are very good reasons for why people flirt and communicate romantic interests implicitly. However, to me and my concrete literal thinking style, the whole thing is confusing. Sometimes I pick up on it, but I'm sure I miss most of it since when I was younger and used to go to places, friends would have to tell me if a girl was interested in me. When I would get home, I would recap the night with my friends to see what they thought. In general, it leaves me feeling lots of self-doubt in these situations, so I end up playing it extra safe to avoid making others uncomfortable. However, it would be nice if people were more explicit with me in general.
Maybe I can make a checklist of flirting signs that I can keep on a phone app. When I start getting confused, I go through the list to make a thought-out assessment.
Bonus: Casually Explained video providing tips for noticing romantic interest
I wonder if that doesn't work because it's not about them knowing that we like them, but about us doing or being things they like. It just comes off too strong or too soon.
I explain explicitly, and it works great.
After hearing my neurovanilla friends complain about how complicated and such the weird hinting/guessing thing they do do is... I still think their ways are just dumb