They might’ve had one (or several) bad experiences and this is a trauma response, but even in that case, I don’t think it’s unreasonable to say “yeah sure they’ll pay their own way, I just feel safer if we have a second pair of eyes I trust in the restaurant/cafe/etc with us”. Like, you don’t gotta be at the table, but I kinda get it for the first date or two being “hey I trust this person, mind if they tag along and grab a drink at the bar to be my watchman or whatever”.
You dont even have to ask. Friend can just sit at the bar, or they can bring a second person and just be at a different table. If this is a trauma response, there are ways to make in nonintrusive. Plus, if the other person doesnt know you brought back up, theyre going to be more themselves, and youll see if theyre a sleeze or not sooner. Its not hard to pretend to not be a sleeze while youre being watched then turn it around immediately when youre not.
They might’ve had one (or several) bad experiences and this is a trauma response, but even in that case, I don’t think it’s unreasonable to say “yeah sure they’ll pay their own way, I just feel safer if we have a second pair of eyes I trust in the restaurant/cafe/etc with us”. Like, you don’t gotta be at the table, but I kinda get it for the first date or two being “hey I trust this person, mind if they tag along and grab a drink at the bar to be my watchman or whatever”.
You dont even have to ask. Friend can just sit at the bar, or they can bring a second person and just be at a different table. If this is a trauma response, there are ways to make in nonintrusive. Plus, if the other person doesnt know you brought back up, theyre going to be more themselves, and youll see if theyre a sleeze or not sooner. Its not hard to pretend to not be a sleeze while youre being watched then turn it around immediately when youre not.