One of my complaints is sending what I consider very obvious "I'm not interested" signals - like putting in earbuds - still doesn't stop them. There's something that stops me from just saying "I'm not interested"; for one thing it labels what they're doing as hitting on me and they might argue back with me ("Hey, I'm just giving you a compliment!") and/or get upset. It's usually easier to just nod, mumble, and act much more interested in my phone than them and hope they get the hint.

What do you mean about the dating world being dangerous?

I'm a lesbian anyway, but I think regardless of gender or identity it's tough because people (including myself) are very emotionally guarded. Whether you have trouble finding dates or not, every relationship is at arms length, every plan can be dropped when a better one comes along, you "don't want to catch feelings", etc. Nobody wants to firmly commit to a time for lunch, let alone a relationship (even without monogamy).

That kind of sucks, but in terms of it being dangerous, it usually only feels physically so if you get involved with men. Emotionally though, it does feel dangerous... it sort of feels like a race to the bottom where whoever cares the least wins. I kind of miss really caring about the people I date; but they usually don't care about me, and if I do care about them, often as not that scares them off.

It's certainly a weird dating world these days.