The Game, Pt. 1I am going to elaborate on what I call "The Game" that occurs in many
churches and fellowships with a sizable singles population. In
my last post, I described "The Game" is that a) the men want to talk to
the women, and b) the women want to talk to the men, but c) neither the
men nor the women can make their desire obvious to the other side.
This is Part 1, where I describe in detail how the game is played, and
some of the various intricacies and the various challenges that The
Game poses.
In Part 2, I will discuss some of the elementary strategies of The Game.
If this resembles your church or fellowship, or not at all, I'd like to
know. Also, if you have some strategies of your own, I'm sure
many other readers would benefit.
The Field of Battle
At the end of a given worship service, you have various groups of
people in conversation, but rarely in mixed company. As described
in point b), the women want to talk to the men, but for a woman to
approach a man for conversation is thought too aggressive and
unfeminine. So, she waits, talking with her female friends, and
every once in a while (or perhaps more) talk about how the guys never
talk to them.
Little do they know that by their own words, they are contributing to
the difficulty of "The Game." For while the woman has resigned
herself to merely being a pawn, hoping to be pushed forward by some
cosmic hand until she gets promoted to Queen, the man shoulders the burden of forming a
strategic approach to meeting women, and as is usually the case, forming a strategy to meet a specific attractive woman. And
the outlook is not good, for the woman he has in mind has undoubtedly surrounded
herself with other women, which makes the approach very difficult
indeed.
Thus, more often than not, the women will only talk to the women, the
men will only talk to the men, and although they will occasionally
sneak a glance at the other side, ne'er shall the two ever meet,
although they both want to and know they ought to.
This has also been described as the "Junior High / Middle School Dance in the Gym" phenomena.
The following is a typical conversation among single men regarding single women after any given church service.
Mayday! Mayday!
"Captain, the subject has been spotted and identified. Target locked. Wow, check out the armaments on that one."
"Approach with caution, Commander. Give me visual."
"Captain, she is flanked by two escorts, both heavily armed and dangerous. They have been alerted to my presence."
"Cripes! You won't be be able to take them alone, Commander. Pull
back and re-group. Meet me at the rendezvous point at 1200 hours."
For a man cannot approach and meet a single woman in the midst of other
women -- this would violate point c) above. Surely to do so would
make him thought to be desperate, just interested in looks, or even
"sketchy."
| 
