I'm convinced that men's fear of rejection by women is caused by a psychological operation that was made to convince generations of men in western that a "no" is a catastrophic event instead of⦠a normal human interaction.
Rejection on the english speaking Internet gets framed as humiliation, emasculation, social death or even a life ruining event.
Somewhere along the way, men have been convinced that asking a woman out became this high stakes referendum on your worth as a man.
I wouldn't be surprised if this was caused by some kind of demoralizing campaign by a foreign power to try to decrease the population of western countries honestly.