HC: When we’re alone he is awesome, but when we’re in a large group he is super awkward. He can’t even look at me sometimes. It’s not a secret that we hang out. Why does he act like this?
Bro: These are red flags, but I’ll be optimistic for you. If he’s not a generally shy person, it might be that he just doesn’t know how you might like him to act in public. What I mean is that he might not know that you want him to flirt with you and be playful like he is when you’re alone when you’re in front of other people. This could easily be addressed by talking it out. Now, the bad news would be that he doesn’t really want to be public at all and that even if a lot of your friends know you hang out, he may not others to know. I’m just saying there’s no scenario where I or any guy I know would genuinely like a girl then fail to even look at her sometimes.
HC: It’s date event season. How do guys decide who they’re taking to their formals? Is it based on the kind of time they want to have, or the girl?
Bro: When you take a girl to formal, you’re basically betting 200+ dollars on whether or not she’s going to be a good time, so the decision process can get pretty messy. It comes down to really a couple options: the reach, the settle and the last ditch.
The reach option is when a guy asks a girl that is clearly out of his league and who he probably has a crush on but never really took the initiative before. She will probably say yes because, well, who doesn’t want to go to formal? The settle is when a guy just takes a girl he’s been seeing for a while that he’s comfortable with and doesn’t want to have to deal with possibly getting turned down by someone else. Finally we have the last ditch. One of my roommates took a girl to formal that he met at Red Lion the night before. That’s an extreme scenario, but when girls have to bail or already are going to another formal, guys start looking through their contacts in a hurry. So, it’s really more about the situation the guy is in.
HC: There is this guy who always texts me and lets on that he likes me. How do I make it obvious that I only like him as a friend, short of flat out saying that?
Bro: The first thing I want to say is: don’t address this situation by repetitively blowing him off and hoping he gets the picture. When you do that, it typically takes a while, and he’s not going to be too happy with you. It doesn’t always work, too, because he might just actually believe you always “have a big day tomorrow” or that “it’s just a bad week for you.”
What you should do is talk to him in a way that should let him know that he’s not in the running for anything more than friendship. By that, I mean talk to him about guys that you DO like. If he’s your friend, try to set him up. If I liked a girl and she was trying to set me up with her friend or always talked about this hot Aussie dude in her class, I would know it’s not in the cards for me.
HC: Do guys gossip about girls? If so, in what way is it different than how girls gossip?
Bro: In general, guys do gossip about girls. It’s distinctly different from the way girls talk about guys, though, or even the way girls gossip about other girls. Guys gossip way less in general, and when they do, it’s less mean-spirited or speculative. It’s more of a passing of information. However, when guys gossip about girls, it’s not debating whether or not she ran track and field in high school or where she shops. A common thing guys do is debate (sometimes heatedly) about a girl’s attractiveness. Other topics include her, uhm, relationship history, whether or not she sucks or if she’s crazy or not. Also whereas girls might describe a hook-up in a few words, guys who do gossip about girls they’ve been with or girls they know, their descriptions are often broken down into play-by-plays (blame ESPN), sparing very little details. Don’t let your imagination run wild though, like I said, many guys keep it hush hush and aren’t sitting around saying terribly mean things as soon as you leave the room.