Neither is starting things from a place of outright suspicion.
I would understand it if they are going to someplace private, like the apartment or a dark alley at midnight, but who the hell goes to those places on a first date? I’m not freaking out about a guy asking me to a coffee date at 1000 hours in the middle of a city on a saturday.
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”.
I would understand it if they are going to someplace private, like the apartment or a dark alley at midnight, but who the hell goes to those places on a first date? I’m not freaking out about a guy asking me to a coffee date at 1000 hours in the middle of a city on a saturday.
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”.
That’s a personal issue that an individual needs to work out before dating then.
Mature people don’t need to bring a babysitter for their date.
Amen