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Ok, considering the main audience of Well Cultured, back when Anonymous was in the title, this may have been more important.

Regardless, I find myself needing some pointers on how to not be a creepy son of a bitch, and I’m sure many anon could use this information as well.

The guide is good, but doesn’t much help here. Neither does asking the girls that say I’m creepy.

Well, this is a toughie.

“Creepy” is best defined in the social sense as being odd enough to fall into predisposed stereotypes of what can be creepy. Translation? Most of the time, being “creepy” is falling into the stereotype of being “creepy”. The best way to address the topic then is to get an idea of what kind of actions and affects make people feel odd.

First off, the most common mistake for our readers is presuming standoffish-ness is being “cool”. Thanks to bad Japanese Anime and Video Games, a lot of geeks presume that being “mysterious” is being “cool”, and thus something girls will attach to. This is incorrect. Trust me, despite your beliefs on the subject, most people are actually afraid of unsociable people- it is connotative of “creepy serial killer” for most people. This is a lesson I’m still learning to this day.

This leads into a very important point, though- a lot about being creepy is in your body language and affect, not so much your speech. Trust me, no matter how worried you are about sounding stupid, most people sound stupid- that’s only about 1% of your total appearance- the other 99% is really related to your body language- how you stand, how you handle people, etc.

First off, try to become conscious of your body language. Are you needlessly submissive (as in, avoiding eye contact, staring at the wall, sitting far away from people)? Are you being excessively dominant (staring people in the eye, getting too close to people, etc)? Do you look angry all the time (as in scowling, crossing your arms)? All of those things tend to put people off- and do that enough and most will find you “creepy”.

One of the best combatants for the above issues is to simply be more fun. Smile more. Talk to people more. Start up conversations. With the right attitude, you can literally sit down at someone’s table at a restaurant and talk to them- with the wrong attitude, you’ll scare them shitless. Be willing to laugh at yourself and you’ll come across as much more fun- even if you’re “creepy” now, you can easily combat that by socially realizing you’re creepy and having fun with it.

The second part to not being creepy is to avoid publicizing antisocial hobbies. Hide your “power level”- how geeky you are. No matter how much you may like games or anime or whatever, don’t run around with a Shugo Chara t-shirt on (which is the worst thing I can think of at the moment). Geek is trendy right now, but don’t abuse it- trust me, you’ll creep people out quickly. You can get pretty clever at making yourself seem tame- I ran around with a 5 Centimeters Per Second wallpaper on my laptop for a year and no-one was the wiser. Similarly, there’s always an advantage to having cool gaming equipment (Guitar Hero is the new in-vogue thing now), but having a full gaming center with imported Japanese titles where you molest witches is not the way to make (female) friends.

The third part of not being creepy is the hardest- learn to read people well. When you learn to read people, you can get a fair idea of when you’re being creepy or not. Most of the “really creepy” guys I’ve known in my life simply had the problem of not knowing how to properly read people and determine proper dialogue- for example, talking to girls about MP5s their effectiveness in a future zombie plague. Try to get an idea of what proper discussion is for people- determine what’s an appropriate topic and go for it. In general, most people like to talk about themselves, so long as you don’t ask too much/too many personal questions.

While I’d love to give an easy answer, there really isn’t one. Still, keep it up- think of social culture like an RPG, and grind your way to skill. Most people don’t realize that everyone is as awkward as everyone else- some just learn how to handle it better- so have fun and work at it.