The reason many women vanish without a trace is not because they’re heartless sadists or gutless cowards or gold diggers or because you’ve mortally offended or creeped them but because they’ve been verbally abused, physically intimidated, assaulted, stalked and/or harassed by a guy - or guys - who cannot handle rejection. Absolutely pathetic but not uncommon.

Most women I’ve asked, including two cousins, have been in such a situation - often with guys who seem like gentlemen until they hear what they don’t like and then the dam beaks. Sadly but understandably one such experience of having a man not necessarily go berserk but just make her seriously uncomfortable can leave them feeling paranoid of history repeating for a very long time, in the same sense that one traumatic sexual encounter can blacken their enjoyment of sex for years or decades to come.

As the analogy goes, contending that most men are well meaning is akin to arguing that only a few snakes in the pit are venomous…is that really supposed to be of some great consolation?

If hypothetically everyone could conduct themselves with grace and restraint all the time, especially when bitterly disappointed, the dating landscape, rife with all its pitfalls and hidden snares and lurking anxieties, would improve unrecognisably. Even the dreaded cold approaches would soon become - still slightly invidious due to the public embarrassment - but a lot less dreaded. Maybe in some distant future when human nature has evolved along with our monkey brains this will become a reality.

Unfortunately as with sexual assault awareness messages the worst perpetrators aren’t likely to give a shit for such advice and clearly they have more issues than TIME magazine that they need to address pronto (and almost certainly won’t) but nonetheless this is worth bearing in mind when torturing yourself wondering why you were ghosted by the lovely lass you were seeing, and to check your own reaction to rejection.

Besides from being an enormous waste of precious time and energy, If you do wish to hold on to any glimmer of hope of reuniting with the one who’s rejected you, the only possible way of keeping that flame flickering is by proving how mature and courteous and high valued you are by taking it in your stride and wishing them well; reacting with ire will only burn the bridge romantically and confirm that they have made the right decision.

Arguably more damaging is to burn a bridge platonically; perhaps you could have built a lifelong friendship, perhaps she could have introduced you to a friend who you’re more romantically compatible with, or perhaps you wind up sitting next to her at your new workplace, perhaps you end up dating her best friend (until she finds out), perhaps her brother is a Muay Thai champion and beats the living shit out of you. It’s a small world with a penchant for irony and these things can happen. Burning as few bridges as possible seems like a good philosophy to me, and if you do, make sure they’re deadwood so you can explain your reason for doing so.

Similarly, if you’re rejecting them, do so in a way that’s polite and respectful - don’t disappear on them unless you feel too unsafe to maintain contact, but don’t explicate every reason why you disliked their face and their laugh and their political views, just keep it brief and amicable - how they react to it is their problem.