The Asking People Out Manifesto

Ask! People! Out

If you’re single, and you don’t want to be single, you should ask people out on dates. If you are already convinced of this claim, feel free to skip the rest of this post.

In this post, I’m assuming that you’re a complete nerd, and that the people you’re interested in are also complete nerds. I think this is a pretty safe assumption given the demographics of my readership! But if you’re interested in football bros or former sorority girls or hot Instagram models of any gender, maybe this isn’t good advice.

Asking People Out Gets You More Dates

There are approximately four ways of getting more dates:

1. Become a generally more attractive person.

2. Learn how to flirt.

3. Be less picky.

4. Meet more people; ask more of them out.

You can make up for a deficiency in one, to some extent, by improving on the others. If you’re ugly and charmless, you can get a partner by settling hard. If you have high standards, you can become a stunningly attractive badass yourself. Like Voltaire probably didn’t say, give me ten minutes to talk away my ugly face and I can bed the Queen of France. Et cetera.

#3 and #4 are powerful because your results are approximately linear with regards to how much effort you put in. The more you drop your standards,¹ the more dates you’ll get. The more people you meet, and the more of them you ask out, the more dates you’ll get.

What’s more, they’re nearly impossible to fuck up. Many people try to learn to flirt and wind up sleazy or awkward. Many people try to become generally more attractive, and end up coming off as fake, exactly the same as everyone else, somehow uglier than they started out, and so on. But it is extremely obvious if you’re succeeding at meeting more people, being willing to date more of them, and asking more of them out.

Being less picky is a mixed bag. If you’re not picky at all, you wind up with a boring, annoying, lazy partner who treats you like shit. But asking more people out has no such adverse effects. It is all upside.

Asking People Out Gets You Better Partners

Let’s take a visit to beautiful Examplelandia, where everyone is bisexual and all the cows are spherical. In Examplelandia:

• There are 100 people.

• People’s preferences aren’t correlated with each other (i.e. there are no universal 10s and being attracted to someone doesn’t mean they’re more likely to be attracted to you).

• People ask out the top 10% of other Examplelandians according to their own preferences.

• …except half the time they get scared and don’t.

• People say ‘yes’ to any date that’s in the top 50%.

Alice, an Examplelandian, has high standards! She only wants to date the top 10% of other Examplelandians, according to her unique standards.

Let’s say Alice doesn’t ask anyone out. She’ll get asked out by five people. Unfortunately, she only has a 41% chance of getting even one 10. :(

But Alice decides that she’s going to take matters into her own hands. Unlike other Examplelandians, she won’t get nervous! She’ll ask out all ten 10s. Five of them say yes, and Alice gets to choose between five 10s. :)

Okay. Back to the real world. We have two dynamics:

• In general, people are far more likely to say “yes” when they’re asked out (they want to give the person that asked them out a chance) than they are to ask someone out (terrifying!).

• Even if two people are both interested in each other, they often fail to pair up because they were both too nervous to ask the other one out.

Therefore, if you ask more people out, you will tend to have partners that are more suited to your own preferences, partially because you’re causing matches to happen that otherwise wouldn’t, and partially because your partner selection method weights your preferences somewhat more than your partner’s.

Does my argument always hold true? No. For one thing, if you strongly prefer bold and sexually aggressive partners, waiting to be asked out will filter for bold and sexually aggressive people.

Many people legitimately prefer a partner selection process that weights their partner’s preferences somewhat more than their own preferences. Most commonly, people have this preference because they want to feel special and desired and unique. If your partner asks you out, you know that they chose you, out of everyone else they could have asked. You know they didn’t only go out with you because it was easy.

The decision of whom to ask out is usually made based on relatively visible factors: physical appearance, coolness, shared interests, popularity, friendliness, etc. So to the extent you care about relatively visible factors, and to the extent your best traits are something people only find out about after spending one-on-one time with you, you should ask people out. If you’re really hot, or if you’re mystified by how anyone could tell which of their forty acquaintances they might want to date, maybe wait to be asked out.

Most of these are a matter of personal preference. But I’m selfish and kind of shallow, and I personally have enjoyed the extremely hot people I get to date because I asked them out. Maybe you will too!

Straight men should ignore all these considerations and just ask people out. Straight women never ask anyone out. If you wait for them all to read and be convinced by the Asking People Out Manifesto, you’ll die a virgin.

Asking People Out Is Doing Them A Favor

There exist people who are bothered by all the people constantly asking them out. “Ugh,” they say to themselves, “another loser who thinks they are worthy of a modicum of my time and attention… begone! I can’t believe that people dare to ask me out when they don’t even earn $500,000 a year and have been scouted for less than three modeling jobs.”

If you’re reading this blog, probably you are not asking those people out.

Imagine how you’d feel if someone you liked asked you out. They’d be doing you a favor, right? They screwed up their courage and did this horrible, vulnerable, embarrassing thing, and now you don’t have to. And, if you really like them, probably you feel amazing. I feel kind of hesitant to share this anecdote because I’m worried that it will fill the comment section up with sentiments that asking people out only works for Chadly bloggers and not mere mortals without a dime of subscription revenue to their name. But one time I asked a girl out and she couldn’t sleep all night because of how excited she was that I’d asked her out. It happens! You can certainly think of people who could ask you out and give you acute insomnia.

Now, imagine how you’d feel if someone you didn’t like asked you out (in a normal, non-pressure-y way). Are you mad at them? Do you feel creeped out? Are you even annoyed? Probably not! Probably you feel a bit awkward: turning people down can be a delicate social situation. Maybe you feel worried about disappointing them or about accidentally causing social drama. And, quite often, you feel flattered. It makes you happy that someone was interested in you. You feel hot!

Consider the possibility that people you’re asking out feel the same way.

I’m going to talk to straight men here. A lot of straight men assume that straight women are constantly turning down suitors. This isn’t true. The kind of women you’re interested in have a dating pool of men like you, which is to say a dating pool of shy, anxious men who need to read a long blog post urging them to ask people out. You would be shocked by the number of perfectly unobjectionable women who have gone years without someone asking them out. You can make a woman’s day by asking her out—in the exact same way it would make your day if someone asked you out. Even if you’re not that attractive yourself! Even if she says no!

You Should Be Less Scared Of Sexually Harassing People Than You Are

To be clear: you shouldn’t sexually harass people. Sexually harassing people is bad. But not sexually harassing people is also not very hard. Sexual harassment is mostly not a problem of well-intentioned but socially awkward people making genuine mistakes. It’s mostly a problem of people who want to make others uncomfortable and/or coerce other people into dating them.

I have three tips that, together, will keep you from sexually harassing anyone.

First: don’t hit on people who are obviously not going to be interested in you. Don’t hit on thirteen-year-olds when you’re thirty-five. Don’t hit on people in monogamous relationships. (If someone is wearing a wedding ring, assume they’re monogamous unless you have some reason to think otherwise.) Don’t hit on lesbians if you’re a straight man. If a stranger is clearly busy—she has headphones on, he’s on the phone, he’s wrangling three screaming toddlers, she’s waiting for her cancer biopsy results—don’t hit on them. If a reasonable person would make five minutes of small talk with a person in this situation because she’s bored waiting for the bus, it’s okay to flirt.

Now, I know some of you are going “but I’m ugly and weird, no one would ever be interested in me, all my attentions are unwanted, this rule means I can’t ask anyone out.” Reread my examples. If the situation is remotely ambiguous, this rule doesn’t apply.

Second: don’t hit on people in an offensive or sexual way. Don’t say “nice tits” or “nice ass.” Don’t open with an offer to eat them out. Don’t invite a stranger to your hotel room at 3 am. Don’t make jokes about wanting to rape them. Don’t call them ugly. Refrain from any comments whatsoever about their race.

Again, many people are going to carry this too far, and I want to emphasize that I’m not setting some new, original rules here. Use your common-sense understanding of offensiveness that you have developed as a minimally functional adult living in a society.

Exception: hitting on people in an explicitly sexual way is all right if you’re a man hitting on a man whom you know to be queer, or if you’re at a play party or sex party.²

Third: don’t hit on people in a way that makes them expect something bad to happen if they turn you down. This is really the central issue, the thing that sexual harassment is.

A lot of rules that people find confusing are because of this rule:

• Why shouldn’t you ask people out if you have meaningful power over them (you’re their teacher, boss, mentor, or client)? Because asking those people out unavoidably implies a threat to harm their schooling or career if you’re turned down.

• Why shouldn’t you ask your coworker out? Because it might come off as a threat to harm their career if you’re turned down.

• Why shouldn’t you ask your waiter out? Because it might come off as a threat to not tip them or to complain to their manager.

• Why is it okay if so-and-so asks out their coworker or their waitress? Because they’re good enough at navigating social situations that they can avoid threatening people.

• Why is it bad to hit on someone you don’t know well if they’re staying at your house? Because it might come off as a threat to kick them out on the street.

• Why is it bad to hit on women you don’t know at night on a deserted street? Because it implies a threat to attack them if they refuse.

Notice that very few of these threats are threats of violence. Asking someone out risks coming off as sexual harassment if the person reasonably expects any kind of negative consequence from refusing you.

The easiest way to avoid sexually harassing people is to make rejecting you as painless as possible. If you’re committed to not making being rejected the other person’s problem, then you’ll naturally communicate through subtext that it’s safe to turn you down, and people generally won’t feel pressured. Try to really believe “I don’t want to date someone who doesn’t want to date me.”

If the person you’re asking out says “no,” drop the subject entirely. Don’t argue with them. Don’t try to change their mind. Don’t try to seduce them. Don’t try to guilt people into dating you: “I’m so lonely and depressed, you’re my only chance at love.” Don’t imply any sort of negative consequence for refusing you: “if you don’t go out with me, I’ll kill myself.” Don’t talk behind people’s backs about how they’re stuck-up bitches for refusing you. In most cases, never bring up the subject of the two of you dating again. Move on emotionally and find someone else.

If you follow these three simple rules,³ you will almost certainly not harass anyone. Now, can I promise you that there is literally zero percent chance that you’re going to creep someone out if you follow these rules? I can’t.

Miscommunications sometimes happen: someone might think you were trying to guilt them into dating you when you actually misspoke. Sometimes you might accidentally do something that reminds the person you’re asking out of their abusive father or creepy ex, and they’re responding more to their memories than you.

And some people are batshit. Some people are prejudiced against autistic people, or trans people, or black people. Some people don’t believe they would ever experience transient awkwardness unless it was someone else’s fault. Some people believe they have the God-given right only to be hit on by people they find attractive.

I think a lot of people would benefit from clarifying in their minds whether they’re primarily concerned about:

1. Genuinely making people feel uncomfortable or unsafe.

2. Facing social consequences because of unreasonable people.

I see a lot of slipperiness on the topic. When I say “it isn’t that hard to avoid sexually harassing people,” people say “but batshit people on X say that it’s sexual harassment to hit on a woman while wearing a My Little Pony shirt.” When I say “you should ignore batshit people,” people say “but what if I accidentally hurt someone?”

Here’s where I think it’s important to distinguish “I might hurt someone” and “people might be mad at me.”

You might ask someone out in a way that makes them feel uncomfortable. Unless you’re doing some Harvey Weinstein shit, some “let me flash my penis at my teenage employee” shit, some shit that absolutely no one does by accident—and as long as you’re steering clear of professional contexts and not hitting on teenagers while an adult—it doesn’t cause serious harm. I realize I am letting down the feminist team here. But women can stand an unpleasant conversation, I promise. No one is permanently traumatized by transient awkwardness.

You have to balance the risk of accidentally sexually harassing someone against the benefits of asking people out—to you and to the people that you’re asking out. Most of the time, the benefits are larger.

And, yes, I can’t guarantee you a life free of batshit people. Why do you want to preserve your relationships with people who are batshit? If making an honest mistake or asking people out while autistic would lose you your entire friend group, you deserve better friends.

You Don’t Need Any Complicated Strategy To Ask People Out

I will now reveal to you my secret script for asking people out. This is some real dark-magic stuff. You’d normally have to pay hundreds of dollars for pickup manuals or dating self-help books to get advice this good, and here I am giving it out for free.

“Hi! I think you’re cute. Want to go out sometime?”

Long ago, when we lived in caves and fire was still a novelty, you had to ask people out in person. Today, everyone is constantly on their phones, and you can literally just copy-paste that text and send it on your messaging platform of choice.⁴

Of course, there’s nothing wrong with asking someone out in person. When you stutter your way through the sentence, try to at least convey the important bit, i.e., that you would like to spend time with them alone in a place that is not this.

If you share friends with the person you’re interested in, you can talk to a mutual friend and feel out whether the person is potentially interested in going out with you. Yes, this is a bit middle school. Who cares? Be a middle schooler if that’s what it takes!

I think a lot of people think of dating as a very complicated video game where you have to do everything exactly right and if your timing is impeccable you’re rewarded with kisses. That’s wrong.

Most people who reject you were never going to go out with you, no matter how smooth you are. They just had a breakup and they’re too heartbroken to date. They’re swamped with work. They have a crush on your best friend. They’re exclusively attracted to people with brown eyes, and your eyes are blue. They’re looking for someone who shares their interest in hiking, and you don’t. They want kids, and they happen to know you’re childfree. They don’t like your sense of humor. And so on.

What’s more, as much as it hurts at the time, people who reject you are doing you a favor. You don’t want to date someone who secretly wishes you were their ex, or who doesn’t have time for you, or who isn’t attracted to you, or who doesn’t share your interests, or who disagrees with you about kids. You are better off if people you aren’t compatible with filter themselves out of your dating pool.

And people who are into you will generally say ‘yes’ even if you are cringey and awkward and bad at asking them out. If someone already thinks you’re hot and funny, they’ll take a charitable view of you stumbling through asking them out. “It was adorable,” they’ll say to themselves. “They were so nervous—they must like me so much! Awww!” Again, think of how you’d react to your crush asking you out. Are you going to go “ugh, they forgot what they were saying in the middle of their sentence, lame?” No! You’re going to forget that it ever happened because of the strength of your ecstasy.

Sure, if someone is on the fence, a bit of charm will swing them one way or the other. But most people already know what they think of you before you ask them out. The die is cast.

In conclusion: if you would like to get more dates, you should ASK PEOPLE OUT. It is good for you. It is good for the people you ask out. It is good for the world. I made ChatGPT draw me a picture of the utopia that would result if everyone asked out their crushes:

See! If you ask people out there will be RAINBOWS and HEART-SHAPED BALLOONS and WHATEVER THE FUCK THOSE PEOPLE IN THE BOTTOM RIGHT ARE EATING and LITERAL HUMAN FLIGHT. The robots don’t lie! Ask people out!

1. While maintaining a constant level of making your partner feel special, not being a people-pleasing doormat, etc.

2. “How many people score sex party invites while needing to read the Ask People Out Manifesto?” you would be surprised

3. I specifically left out “read people’s body language” because many of my readers struggle to read body language. If you can read body language, don’t hit on people who look uncomfortable. If you can’t, don’t worry about it—take “no” for an answer and it will be fine.

4. Do check to make sure that you didn’t accidentally copy-paste the rest of the post, which might be a bit awkward to explain.