by Sasha Brown-Worsham

 If a man can’t talk about current events and has no idea what is going on in the world, he isn’t the man for me.

Going out on a date with anyone is a leap of faith. We trust that they aren’t an ax murderer or a weirdo or someone bent on worldwide destruction. Most of the time, dates go bad for any number of reasons, both big and small — he picks his teeth or talks about himself too much. You find there is no chemistry or he is simply not that interesting to you.

Sometimes, however, it’s harder to tell. Sometimes a guy seems perfectly nice and there is some chemistry, but you still can’t really tell.

For those situations, there are some obvious ways to help yourself know if he deserves a second date. Here are 10 dating red flags that should either send you running or make you proceed with extreme caution. Here they are:

1. He tips badly: Bad tippers are often selfish people. He doesn’t have to be the king of all tippers, but less than 15 percent tells me he will be cheap and ungenerous in other ways, too.

2. He calls his mom and dad “mommy” and “daddy”: My husband totally does this and maybe it’s a Southern thing, but this is super weird to me.

3. He is disrespectful about ex-girlfriends/ex-wives: Every person has an ex who hurt them in some way and every person has baggage left from old relationships. But smart people learn from those relationships and find ways to respect what they learned. Someone who didn’t wouldn’t be great to date.

4. He is rude to waiters: Anyone who is rude to wait staff or people in retail stores will eventually be rude to you as well. Watch this one.

5. He doesn’t read books: This could be just me. But when I dated a man, I wanted to know what books he read, and if he hadn’t read any recently, that said something to me. Even if they were books I wouldn’t have read (my husband reads science textbooks), I wanted a man who read SOMETHING for pleasure. I was looking for a well-read man who was intellectually curious. To me, this said he wasn’t.

6. He smokes: In this day and age, smoking is just gross. No matter how cool he is, a guy who doesn’t take care of his health isn’t a guy I would want to be with.

7. He doesn’t work out: This is really not a red flag for everyone, but for me, it’s very important that a guy appreciates taking care of his body and working out as much as I do. My family is very outdoorsy and active and I always knew I wanted it to be that way.

8. He disparages women: A friend went on a date with a guy who laughed about some other woman’s “fat ass.” My skinny friend didn’t take it personally, but she did realize that this wasn’t a man who respected women.

9. He is not interested in the news: If a man can’t talk about current events and has no idea what is going on in the world, he isn’t the man for me.

10. He hasn’t traveled or has no desire: To me, travel is one of the key markers of intellectual curiosity. A man who hasn’t traveled or who doesn’t desire to do so isn’t a man I could see building a life with since it’s something I couldn’t live without.

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Read this article in The Stir

 

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