Ive made a list of some things I’ve witnessed men do that give away that they’re interested in you but are LV behaviours. I’ve seen these things from male coworkers and mutual friends. Feel free to add more.

  1. Ask you to describe your perfect man. I have never seen this work out well. This is usually how it goes - Him: “What’s your perfect man?” Me: Describes qualities I want Him: “Well I’m like positive quality I mentioned and another positive quality and I am NOT like negative quality I mentioned”. They think they’re getting dating cheat codes from you with this one. Sometimes they can be more subtle than this example, sometimes not. (Think Groundhog Day when Phil gets an idea of Rita’s perfect man over time and pretends to be that).

  2. Put down other men to you and around you. This can take many different forms. Maybe they put down another man’s hobbies and say he’s bad at whatever it is and that knows nothing to make him look stupid. They will try hard to embarrass him in front of you. They’re trying to make other men look less desirable to you, and boost themselves in the process. Again, this can be sneaky, ranging from stuff like “You’re too good for your ex” to telling a male coworker how badly he does his job in your presence.

  3. Talk about past acts of aggression towards men. This is to make him look “alpha”. Maybe he will tell you about all the fights he’s been in (and won 🙄) in his life, or about how he stood up to his boss and shut him down, or some variant of this to make himself look strong and intimidating. He wants you to feel like he’s tough and brave enough to protect you. It’s all talk of course.

  4. Act like they know you better than they do. That’s how relationships with LVM can happen so quickly, they try to convince you they know you and know what’s best for you. What they’re actually doing is making a series of their own assumptions about you and trying to trick you into feeling familiar with them before you really are. Maybe they listen and remember a few key words to recite later to ‘prove’ that they know you. This goes hand in hand with them pretending to align with you on your interests and beliefs, which is why you should be wary of openly telling them what you want in a partner.

  5. Put down other women TO you. They will likely never do this when the woman they are putting down is present because they don’t want to hurt their chances with her - she’s just another potential bangmaid if you don’t want to date him, after all. He will put down other women when you both are in private and tell you how he doesn’t find an obviously pretty women attractive, or how she’s too loud or too boring. He’s trying to trigger pickme behaviour in you, so you can prove to him how you’re so much better than her. 😒

  6. Trying to prematurely make you feel like his saviour. Some men try to incite sympathy in women and will overshare and unload emotional baggage onto you even before he’s explicitly expressed interest in you. This is probably to make you want to help him and fill the role of his mother or saviour, so you’re already committed to helping. It will trap your emotions in a relationship with him even before there’s any relationship with him. Look out for “I could never have done it without you” type of compliments after something mundane, like you gave him a pep talk before a work meeting.