Your good buddies may not want you to have a girlfriend, for reasons of envy or simple fear that you may leave them behind. Blind dates must surely be the greatest boon to humankind since the invention of the guillotine. A singles bar can be a chamber of horrors for a shy person. At the narrow pass, there is no brother, no friend. Male predators abound here, too, at times even masquerading as women.
Cynicism is the rule.
Shyness and sensitivity attract ridicule and gratuitous nastiness. Sneering vitriol is the coin of the realm here. These are the preferred haunts of emotional amputees and losers. Even worse, it that is possible, is the alt.seduction.fast newsgroup. It evokes unpleasant memories of a high school locker room, complete with bragging, lies, and insults.