Ok, i'll start with the dating stuff here because it's something you're particularly interested in. As an older trans lesbian who came out late, i have plenty of experience dating both straight and queer women, and i've found that a lot of straight women are in this paradoxical situation where they know that they absolutely do not want to live with an opressive, threatening partner, but will at the same time struggle massively with a partner who does not (or, in my case, never could) convincingly perform some type of patriarchal masculinity with consistency. I know it shouldn't be that way, but i've found over and over again that showing vulnerability, having a soft side, not taking the lead in every situation, even completely minor stuff such as not being the big spoon when cuddling are potential causes of conflict when you take on the male role in a straight relationship. Straight girls struggle to handle that kind of behavior. But the showing vulnerability part in particular is something that i've found to be crucial in forming menaningful relationships, not just romantic ones, with other people. If you're not allowed to do that, you can never fully open up to somebody because people just have weaknesses, all of us. Men are forced to project this image of total self-reliance and permanent stoicism and while that creates a person who is very efficient at confrontational social interactions, at defending and protecting others, it will also lead to them being a person that intuitively puts people on guard. After i came out as trans, women very quickly started to treat me differently. They were suddenly much more open, much less distanced, and much friendlier towards me. And the longer i lived as a woman, the more i understood why we do that: Straight men are usually fucking scary when you're a woman. And the way straight women who have internalized patriarchal norms and do not question them interact with men in relationships keeps it that way.

That's not even getting into the actual dating part. Hitting on people in a way that is not potentially threatening and intrusive is hard. It's another thing i've only started learning after coming out, and i don't know if i could have learned that before because heteronormativity makes such a weird, counterintuitive dance out of flirting. This is already getting quite long because there's so much implicit assumptions to unpack around gender and sexuality, but a lot of guys have a hard time establishing and respecting consent when they're flirting, and that absolutely contributes to the self-preserving fear thing. We have to maintain a certain amount of distance to men we do not know very well simply to protect ourselves from advances we do not want. The "she was nice to me, that must mean she's DTF" mindset is fairly prevalent and the reaction to that is that we are afraid to be nice to men.