Thank you everyone for your considered responses. I'm getting enough comments on this now that I'm not sure I've caught every one.

One thing I would like to address in general. Many people, mostly women it seems though I don't know everyone's identity, have been telling me that I am in part denying the collective experience and wisdom of women by blanketly claiming their interpretation of these situations is flat out wrong. How can I be so arrogant as to deny the experiences of so many women?

To answer that, I'd like to offer the following hypothetical situation.

What if a woman wrote an article that started out by saying, "So many men have the idea that women say they have a boyfriend even when they don't, because they think women are immature and can never be direct. That's just wrong. It's so completely wrong. I thought it might just be a few men who think this, but I was shocked when I asked around, and I found out that many of my male friends agree."

That's not an attitude I completely made up, by the way. Many men do, in fact, believe something like that about why women use the "I have a boyfriend" deflection. Those men think that women, by nature, are indirect and play games to test men for their suitability.

So, the article then goes on to say, "The real reason women say they "have a boyfriend," is because they want to deflect the man in such a way as to avoid confrontation. They do it for safety, because men may become dangerous when told "no" directly."

Then dozens of men comment on the article saying, "you're wrong because me and all my male friends have had countless interactions with women, and based on our experience, women do in fact play games. And that's our experience as men, and if you disagree, you're discounting the collective wisdom of an entire gender."

If I read that article, nothing about the number of men or their claims of collective experience in interacting with women would convince me that the woman writing the article was wrong. Would it convince you?

Any human can put forth a theory on human behavior, and this is mine. It's not a defense of men, or a strategy guide for women. It was not written *for* anyone, it was just written, because I believe to be true. It's something to consider, and I hope it helps in some way.