I think that looking at flirtation in isolation is a mistake. Flirtation is a behavior attached to some motivation. That motivation might be coercive (“I want to sleep with that hot person, let me flirt with them and maybe it will happen”) or it might be a genuine express of interest (“I really like that person, I’m going to go talk to them and not hide how I feel”, which comes across as flirting) or it might be something else (“The person in the lab coat told me I have to flirt with a person for 10 minutes as part of a study to get extra credit in Psych 101”).
So I don’t exactly know how to answer your question, but I read this feeling like it’s leaving out the most important questions:
Do you have a romantic interest in a person?
Do you want to sleep with them?
Would you be open to romance/sex with them?
How safe do I feel letting the other person know how I feel?
Have you tried expanding out of Anglo-Saxon culture? Here in France, flirting is a more common and comfortable mode of interaction, a form of adult politeness, without the underlying cultural codes that make it awkward in the US.
Painting with a coarse brush: Americans value childhood over adulthood, equate sex with violence, and polarize gender roles. The French value adulthood, see sex as a refined pleasure, and tolerate emotion in men.
A lot of this might be very cultural.
Sources:
Clotaire Raspail, “Culture Codes”
Personal experience: 23 years in the US, 23 years in France.
Like, we can imagine that I (in the UK) might flirt with someone by telling her “you’re very pretty”, and she’d likely receive subtext like “philh is possibly interested in going on a date with me, or kissing me, or having sex with me”. (Or something. I don’t claim to be an expert in flirting.)
Is it that in France, it’s common for a man to tell a woman “you’re very pretty” (or “tu es très jolie” according to Google translate), and it would still have that subtext? And maybe additional stuff like “in the UK there’s a higher bar for expressing that subtext than in France; in the UK you’re not supposed to express that subtext if you’re in a relationship with someone else, where in France it’s fine”?
I’m confused by what is meant by “flirting” as an activity if its separated from the romantic context? How is that distinguished from friendly conversation?
I think that looking at flirtation in isolation is a mistake. Flirtation is a behavior attached to some motivation. That motivation might be coercive (“I want to sleep with that hot person, let me flirt with them and maybe it will happen”) or it might be a genuine express of interest (“I really like that person, I’m going to go talk to them and not hide how I feel”, which comes across as flirting) or it might be something else (“The person in the lab coat told me I have to flirt with a person for 10 minutes as part of a study to get extra credit in Psych 101”).
So I don’t exactly know how to answer your question, but I read this feeling like it’s leaving out the most important questions:
Do you have a romantic interest in a person?
Do you want to sleep with them?
Would you be open to romance/sex with them?
How safe do I feel letting the other person know how I feel?
Have you tried expanding out of Anglo-Saxon culture? Here in France, flirting is a more common and comfortable mode of interaction, a form of adult politeness, without the underlying cultural codes that make it awkward in the US.
Painting with a coarse brush: Americans value childhood over adulthood, equate sex with violence, and polarize gender roles. The French value adulthood, see sex as a refined pleasure, and tolerate emotion in men.
A lot of this might be very cultural.
Sources:
Clotaire Raspail, “Culture Codes”
Personal experience: 23 years in the US, 23 years in France.
Hm, to clarify...
Like, we can imagine that I (in the UK) might flirt with someone by telling her “you’re very pretty”, and she’d likely receive subtext like “philh is possibly interested in going on a date with me, or kissing me, or having sex with me”. (Or something. I don’t claim to be an expert in flirting.)
Is it that in France, it’s common for a man to tell a woman “you’re very pretty” (or “tu es très jolie” according to Google translate), and it would still have that subtext? And maybe additional stuff like “in the UK there’s a higher bar for expressing that subtext than in France; in the UK you’re not supposed to express that subtext if you’re in a relationship with someone else, where in France it’s fine”?
I’m confused by what is meant by “flirting” as an activity if its separated from the romantic context? How is that distinguished from friendly conversation?
Yes, this is exactly what I’m getting at, and why motivations for flirting matter.