It’s been less than two years since I was first introduced to the concept of female hypergamy – the desire for a woman to be with a mate of the highest possible status. This desire will drive women to “trade up” when given the opportunity. For that reason, it profits men to maintain as high a level of status as possible. Though prestige and affluence clearly play a role, women often prioritize a man’s level of social dominance as the most telling predictor of mate fitness.
For obvious reasons, this “instinct” often malfunctions in contemporary terms. The thug who may provide strong physical genes that will enable your offspring to survive infancy is also an unpleasant individual, lacking partnership skills. Yet the thug, and the many variations on that “bad boy,” will often attract more women than stable, attractive, productive men without the dangerous edge.
The Sexual Revolution, ushered in by the Pill and the Women’s Movement, unleashed female sexuality in an unprecedented way. The result has been a hypergamous free-for-all, with women demanding increasingly long checklists of features from men as qualifications for dating. No one wants to “settle,” so we’ve created a sociosexual environment where a brilliant and attractive professional may go without a date if he isn’t the male that all other males turn to for guidance on what’s cool. Never mind that he’s doing brilliant research – it will count for less than the ability to walk off a rugby field battered and bloody but still smiling.
I believe that this sorry state of affairs is worst in the U.S., since feminism is more entrenched here than anywhere else, and most contemporary cultural trends (including hookup culture), originate here. This weekend, though, I encountered thought-provoking examples demonstrating that hypergamy is thriving around the world.
My husband and I watched the film Leaving (Partir) starring Kristin Scott Thomas, who seems to have made something of a career of acting bilingually in French films. She plays a wife and mother living a gracious and comfortable life. Her husband, a successful doctor, is guilty of having fallen into the routine of taking her for granted, but so has she – they’re a typical affluent couple approaching middle age, and their marriage is boring.
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1BO3ddnTgF8
As you can see, she throws it all away for an ex-con who roams from short-term gig to gig, and she destroys numerous lives in the process, including her own. My husband was surprised (and reassured) by the strength of my reaction to the total selfishness of Scott Thomas’ character. My impression was that the female director sympathized with her more than I did. The film received critical praise, and I recommend it highly. No effort required – we streamed it from Netflix.
I then spent much of Sunday with my nose buried in a book I simply can’t put down: To the End of the Land, by David Grossman. From Amazon:
To the End of the Land is a book of mourning for those not dead, a mother’s lament for life during a wartime that has no end in sight. At the same time, it’s joyously and almost painfully alive, full to the point of rupture with the emotions and the endless quotidian details of a few deeply imagined lives. Ora, the Israeli mother in Grossman’s story, is surrounded by men: Ilan and Avram, friends and lovers who form with her a love triangle whose intimacies and alliances fit no familiar shape, and their sons Adam and Ofer, one for each father, from whom Ora feels her separation like a wound. When Ofer, freshly released from his army service, volunteers for an action in the West Bank instead of going on a planned hike with his mother in the north of Israel, she goes instead with Avram, who fathered Ofer but has never met him and has lived in near-seclusion since being tortured as a prisoner in the Yom Kippur war three decades before. As they walk and carefully reveal themselves to each other again, Grossman builds an overwhelming portrait of, as one character says, the “thousands of moments and hours and days” that make “one person in the world,” and of the power of war to destroy such a person, even–or especially–when they survive its cruel demands.
Grossman, whose own son was killed during the 2006 Israel-Lebanon conflict, writes directly from the heart in this scorching antiwar novel.
Ora, Ilan and Avram meet in a hospital in 1967 when all three are recovering from serious hepatitis, and forge a lifelong bond. Ilan is emotionally distant, but intimidating, and on one occasion he kisses Ora in a feverish state that makes her weak in the knees. In contrast, Avram is smart and funny and incredibly present emotionally. Here is the text of a telegram he later sent Ora, after they’d been released:
“It was not love at first sight because I loved you long before that stop before I met you stop I love you backwards too stop even before I existed stop because I only became me when I met you stop.”
I guess you know who got the girl.
Avram, a prolific writer, continues to share his thoughts in letters to Ora, who pulls back after receiving his telegram. He shows amazing insight, and no resentment whatsoever, in this excerpt:
“Last night I was at a jazz show with Ilan (who keeps trying to peek over my arm at what I’m writing, even though he continues to insist that he’s not interested in you!). Anyway…I was able to pull together some of the opinions I’ve been gathering about girls lately, and I came up with some well-founded and interesting theories about them, and mainly about you. I believe that, ultimately, you will not tie your fate with mine but with some other dude, Ilan or someone of his ilk, the point is, a guy who will definitely not tickle your navel with giggles like I do, and won’t drive your mind wild with sharp obsrevations like I do, and make every organ of your body tremble with pleasure like I do. But the thing is, he’ll be hunkier, much hunkier, and calmer and more solid, and mainly more understandable to you than I am. Yes: that in the end you’ll mate for life with some gorgeous, grave-looking, silver-haired alpha male.
…For I suspect, my duplicitous Ora, that deep in the depths of your light-filled and beautiful soul (which, I do not need to tell you, I love very much) lies a minuscule recess (like the ones in some corner stores, where they keep the old preserves?) that is, forgive me, slightly narrow-minded in matters of love. Of true love, I mean.
..I can only eat my heart out over the fact that it didn’t happen to you with me, that revelation of love (because love is a revelation!!), because I was so close (fuckit, hissed the defeated Avram as he poured out his wrath), and that’s also something I feel quite a lot in my life, the almost-happened, and I only hope it won’t be the guiding principle of my life, the main tenet of all the guiding principles of my life.”
“Yours, Dispirited by Torments.”
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Well, it’s a given that hypergamy exists everywhere. Whiskey just had a great post about the implications of unrestrained hypergamy:
http://whiskeys-place.blogspot.com/2011/03/why-women-hate-nice-guys-and.html
This recent comment from Novaseeker is also good:
http://whiskeys-place.blogspot.com/2011/03/rich-lowry-alpha-girls-and-child-men.html?showComment=1299697935434#c5720129891060180138
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Amen.
Mark Richardson posted about a great example of that:
http://ozconservative.blogspot.com/2011/03/why-would-someone-like-sami-lukis-need.html
Partir isn’t much different from Eat, Pray Love apart from the sad ending. Most French men have at least one tolerated mistress, though. Doesn’t sound like hubby has one in the film. If so, his wife would not have left him. Preselection and all that ya know……. Must say that for her age, KST still has it in spades. Mmmm.
Hipergamy is not the enemy, neither is unrestrained Hipergamy. Is when the bad features are glorified that Hipergamy causes problem, IMO.
Look at Asian cultures where girls throw themselves at the stable Beta serious hard working and nerdy man. Because on their culture that is what is desirable, the problem with western world is that the player, the alpha, the bully are the ones glorified, the ones that get jobs and hand outs and friends and status and celebrity deals. That is why Kirk is the captain of the Enterprise and no Spock or why Tiger Woods was all over the place instead of Mark Zuckerberg.
Really I think aside from Bill Gates there is no such a thing as the nerd is successful and has high status, if anything only comic books depict nerdy types as the heroes and jerks as the villains but mainstream western culture sells the image of the bad boy as the hero, the one that is protector and that “the one” will turn him monogamous and supportive.
That is the real problem there that Hipergamy has been herded to the worst possible type of guy. Why do you think feminism sells self sacrifice, morality and niceness as weak? and that is why they prefer the angry female to the easy going one? Is because they are also identifying rudeness and selfishness as the traits of the winners, no wonder a guy that demonstrate that is so attractive, YMMV.
Hipergamy is not the enemy, neither is unrestrained Hipergamy. Is when the bad features are glorified that Hipergamy causes problem, IMO.
Most definitely.
I know I might be a bit late on this one, but can someone (Susan?) articulate what is meant by the concept of social dominance and how it may differ from something such as social prestige? Still trying to get my head around it.
@blogster:
Prestige is a subset of — a way of dispalying — dominance. Think of the lead singer of Coldplay. “Dominance” isn’t the first word to spring to mind when a generic pouty Englishman walks by. But because of his social prestige / celebrity, he marries Gwyneth Paltrow.
Other forms of social dominance are more commonplace. E.g., the leader of the pack, the wealthy guy, the boss, etc.
By the way: Eric Barker at Barking Up The Wrong Tree has a great study showing that some measures of attraction are indeed universal.
Here’s some real practical advice for men who want an “edge” but don’t want to be a criminal thug — be a gun owner. It’s perfectly legal, a good way to defend yourself, and it is incredibly manly. Knowing how to safely handle a gun, fire one and store one is a good life skill to have for anyone, much like driving a car.
My husband is a STEM nerd who plays video games and models advanced math stuff. But he is a hell of a manly man, partially because of this. He would not brag about it or play with a gun, but he knows what to do and has been around them since he was a boy (his stepdad is a Vietnam vet). That’s quite sexy.
When the law-abiding men have lost all their masculine edge, the only thing for women left is to turn to criminals. Back in the day men would have swords and knives, and they gained this access when they passed into manhood. These days there is no similar rite of passage. But good men should and can reclaim their masculinity.
@Hollenhund
Excellent piece by Mark Richardson there – it’s almost becoming a stock post in the blogosphere, as more and more celebrities go the sperm bank route, and other women who rode the carousel for a decade or two get book deals to share their tragic, entirely preventable histories.
@MW
I disagree – the main character in Partir, Suzanne, is not on any mission of self-actualization, or even simple self-indulgence, i.e. good food, good yoga, good sex. She runs headlong into the arms of a complete and total loser, sacrificing everything in her path, including others and even the thug himself! She seems possessed by a kind of insanity – she keeps claiming she was “hit by it.” This is just abdication of personal responsibility, but it’s more extreme than Elizabeth Gilbert, who mostly was just an opportunist and narcissist.
I do agree that KST looks incredible. She’s a very beautiful woman, and is aging gracefully. She also does a great job acting in this role.
“I was first introduced to the concept of female hypergamy — the desire for a woman to be with a mate of the highest possible status. ”
I’m not sure this does it justice, and it also seems to conflate two concepts.
1. The first concept is that status and social dominance play heavily into female attraction – more so than man. I don’t consider this a function of hypergamy, it’s just one of the traits women (consciously or subconsciously) weigh heavily when getting the tingle.
2. But as to wanting the most attractive possible partner, that could be said of men too. Men by and large are more attracted to the hottest woman than a plainer woman. What seems different in women is the degree of separation. In other words, take a male who is judged a 6 (weighing all the relevant factors, including looks, social dominance, status, etc., as the average woman weighs them), on the one hand, and take a female 6 (weighing all the relevant factors – mostly looks – as males judge them), on the other hand. The male 6 is much more likely to get a boner for the female 6 than the female 6 is likely to get the tingle for him. But as these 6s start to look at 8s, 9s and 10s of the opposite sex, their attraction levels start to equalize, and hers might even exceed his at the upper end. Think of a graph, where you plot the attraction of a the male 6 to women of different attraction levels ranging from, say, 3 to 10. He would have some tepid attraction to the 3, and the curve would gradually rise as it the number moved from 3 to 10. But the difference between his attraction to the 8 and 10 would not be all that huge. Now lay on top of that the attraction curve for the female 6. She would likely show almost zero attraction for levels up through 5, then some tepid attraction for her own level (6), but still far below his, then her curve would jump up drastically as we approach 8, 9 and 10 (probably even exceeding his as we get to 10). Her curve is much more heavily weighted on (i.e., almost exclusive to) the high end.
3. I think there is a 3rd factor at play in post in that, putting hypergamy aside completely, some of the characterics that women find attractive (the dark triad qualities) are often affirmatively negative social/mate characteristics in the modern world (i.e., the bad boy thing). But, again, I don’t consider that a hypergamy thing.
So, Stephane is correct that it might be worse in the west because of the greater attraction to the dark triad types, but hypergamy is still an issue regardless of what characteristics women in any culture happen to weigh.
@Stephenie
Good point there about cultures. In the west we romanticize traits that are in fact bad, or at least unproductive, for society. I’m no expert on Asian culture, but I wonder – how do drug lords and other bad characters fare in Southeast Asia? Certainly speaking historically, alpha males/warriors enjoyed very high status in China and Japan. If it’s true that Asian women can’t get enough of the nerdy astrophysicist, I’d be interested to know what has caused this shift. I also suspect that the explanations would differ dramatically between China (post-Mao) and Japan (post WWII).
@Susan
This plot actually reminds me of The Turkish Passion a stupid crazy selfish woman if I ever seen one: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Turkish_Passion
I mean I had seen men abandoning their family over a new lover one too many times and I don’t see any reason to sympathize with them on anyway. I wonder what would happen if this type of movies were done the other way around with men leaving their wives for younger and prettier women. I doubt they will be getting any Oscars over them that is for sure.
@Blogster
The guys will be better at defining this than I am, but I’ll give you my sense of it.
Prestige is status that generally reflects wealth or position in society, either via birth or career success. An ugly man with zero alpha traits can get whoever he wants if he has enough of these. We might question the qualities of the women most susceptible to his “charms,” but that’s another discussion.
Social dominance is displayed by the guy with leadership, who serves as the alpha male of the group (AMOG). Those in his inner circle will benefit from his dominance, and get some of their own via association. The outcast or brooding loner may also have enormous social dominance if he is good looking. Generally, most women find these guys hot because they don’t defer to anyone. Being handsome helps, but it not necessary for social dominance. Women often are drawn to men they call “sexy ugly.”
@Susan
One of the things that few Game proposals acknowledge that the women they are falling themselves over assholes are more often than not assholes themselves. You surely can’t find attractive nice traits if you goal in life is to be mean and bitchy and earn tons of money, right?
I believe Asian women (and Hope or any other correct me if I’m wrong) didn’t had the feminism trend of glorifying negative traits to the extent western world did, so even if you had some of them falling for their warriors their warriors also had good traits like loyalty and integrity thus when the warrior’s way was not longer useful it was easy for them to make the transference to loyalty and smartness because that was what men did to make their country prosper. Which I believe is another part of the issue, Asian know that they are part of larger purpose and they can think on long term consequences of their actions, most Americans live on the moment and consider themselves island no part of a society so whatever they do is meaningless whether for good or bad. Is the same situation that makes many people no to vote: it won’t change anything.
The problem and the virtue of American way (as off now) is that people don’t grasp the concept that we are all society and that our individual actions matter, so is some sort of pseudo anarchy that gives them free reign over making mistakes because after all is all about ME. I’m the only one that get hurt if my selection of mate is wrong, when in reality is another stone on the grave of the society.
Asian cultures culturally are pressured to see the world as the sum of the individual actions, thus their attraction to bad traits never developed independently of the attraction to good traits, add a culture that actually thinks that nice good and considerate men (and at least on Japan their religion is one of the few ones that has a goddess so feminine traditional traits are not considered a weakness) and chances are that nerdy types will do very well with women, in fact more than well.
@Passer By
I think your second point comparing the attraction curves of each sex is right on. That’s my sense of it as well, from observation. I do want to clarify a couple of points. I refer in the original quote to women wanting to be with someone of the highest possible status. This implies a willingness to jump ship for a man with more status. I’m not sure whether women are more inclined to do this than men are, but the fact that 2/3 of divorces are initiated by women suggests that they might be.
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Second, there’s the effect of hypergamy being unrestrained that we often discuss here. A female 6, as you point out, will very likely want to take her shot at the male 8-10. She can’t get a commitment from him, but she can get short-term sex from him. Many women in this range of attractiveness consider themselves “the hottest,” because they bang hot guys. This is hypergamy at its most efficient, which is why the SMP has rewarded it. A female 8-10, meanwhile, demands more than the ONS, so she prices herself out of the market.
Never mind that he’s doing brilliant research — it will count for less than the ability to walk off a rugby field battered and bloody but still smiling.
Are we conflating athletes with “bad boy” behaviour here?
@Hope
That’s a great idea. Legal, possibly beneficial to the family’s safety and most definitely manly.
So, Stephane is correct that it might be worse in the west because of the greater attraction to the dark triad types, but hypergamy is still an issue regardless of what characteristics women in any culture happen to weigh.
True I never denied Hypergamy that would be silly, but in here things are worse for the Nice Guy because the “status” traits are the dark triad. My guess is a combination, the feminist movement needed women to be angry at men at some point to fuel itself so painting all of you as selfish bastards was what worked and then decided to pick this traits as the reasons you oppressed poor women and copy cat them because that is how you won the supremacy, why they didn’t picked Ghandi strategy is beyond me, and I usually say that if feminism was a bit more honest it will call itself masculinism and the other part is because you are a warrior nation and you need to make sure the men that can defend it (or make excuses to attack other nations :p) are the ones that reproduce on majority. Of course I would like to know how many bad boys (and their offspring) are actually brave and patriotic and will go and fight. I would believe few bullies are really willing to go and fight a bigger and meaner enemy and the nice guys are the ones that will actually love their country enough to die for it if needed it too. But that is just me.
@Chico
Who are the big men on campus? Athletes reign, and the rougher the sport the better. Football trumps tennis, lacrosse trumps fencing. As far as I can tell, the qualities that women consider dominant amount to at least the potential for physical domination – of other men, and possibly of themselves. Of course, not all athletes are bad boys, and Mike C is a very manly looking guy who considers himself “beta” inside (or did, before Game).
I think what social dominance really boils down to is the potential to lead other men – and that rewards supreme confidence, even cockiness, physical strength and size, and other high testosterone features. Not all dominant men will have all of these, but those who are small in stature, for example, will make up for it with extremely high amounts of the other dominant characteristics.
Of course, these men may not exhibit any of the traits necessary for long-term bonding, like ability to collaborate, willingness to demonstrate affection, loyalty, strong work ethic, etc. In fact, few very dominant men do have these other necessary and attractive qualities in large amounts. Our current SMP rewards short-term gratification, however, so extremely dominant men are never disqualified based on traits that are not immediately apparent. And the inverse is also true – men who are naturally less dominant never get to the plate to demonstrate their long-term strengths.
Anther thing we need to talk about in terms of hypergamy that people dont really speak on is a lot of guys keep settling below their rungs just to get laid. The fact that there are so many men who would sleep with anything(see Duke F list) just to get laid is crazy. If guys would raise their behavioral and physical standards for sticking it in a woman, maybe women would have more realistic standards. Look I watch Jersey Shore, the fact that a girl like Snooki or the Duke Chick who are at best 5s had to beat dudes who wanted to have sex with them with a stick, thats a big problem.
@ Susan, confudence, thanks for detailing it – pretty close to what i imagined and interesting to learn the distinction that sometimes occurs between prestige and dominance.
Here’s an economist’s take on hypergamy:
http://econlog.econlib.org/archives/2009/07/the_lens_of_hyp.html#
He wrote this in response to Tyler Cowen, who linked to an essay by F. Roger Devlin, whom he called evil.
I have to agree with this. I just can’t imagine that throughout all of history women as a group consistently picked sexy men over reliable men. If they had, then how did civilization ever get built?
To put it another way, imagine we were living in ancient times. Imagine you had two tribes of men, Team Alpha and Team Beta. Team Alpha is composed of men who are wild, un-tamable, take what they want, dark triad types. Team beta is composed of men who are civilized, agreeable, team players who work for the common good of the city.
Team Alpha is doing their wild “woo hoo” thing through the countryside. Team Beta sees this and does not approve. So the two tribes go to war. Team Beta, being cooperative and civilized, have built a small city where they can smelt metal for weapons and have trained as a team for warfare. Team Alpha takes what it finds and learns by experience. When Team Alpha and Team Beta meet up on the battlefield, Team Beta will be armed with superior weapons because of their city activities and have trained as a team for warfare.
On the ancient battlefield it wasn’t the wild barbarians who mostly won the day, rather it was the hoplite citizen-soldier of the ancient Greek city-states who fought as a united phalanx that steam rolled across the ancient world.
Sure, my portrayal of the two groups may be a bit extreme but I’m hoping you can see my point here. In the long run it just doesn’t make sense for women to not pick cooperative responsible men.
Do we really need groups of nice guy-hoplites roaming the American wasteland and cracking skulls before women buy a clue?
This doesn’t make sense to me. Why doesn’t boxing dominate? A big football player may be good at playing a child’s game where he moves a ball around a field, but that doesn’t translate into anything when it comes to a dangerous physical encounter.
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Take a footballer who trained for some years in his sport and a boxer who also trained for same number of years, do you honestly think the footballer stands a chance? Here’s a clue: he doesn’t.
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If women were really into rough dominant men then Army Rangers, Navy SEALS, or military men in general would have cheerleaders and a train of tail following them around instead of following the NFL around.
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What this tells us is that women are actually selecting for entertainers. Women are not picking the men who do the serious business of civilization.
What this tells us is that women are actually selecting for entertainers. Women are not picking the men who do the serious business of civilization.
I think you are both right and wrong.
Even if traditional manly sports are more admired this sports are also displayed on places were all welcome to attend and watch and select, if you remember the Romans didn’t allowed married women to watch the gladiators but single women were one of their biggest audiences, they know very well that women get turn off by men competing in groups on places they can see and have other women admiring and selecting, the problem with many Nice Guys activities is that the places they have to display become boys clubs (or are men’s clubs by definition like the army). I will say that for example warhammer games are a very good displaying manly traits but there is no way women see men doing this, I went to the store with my husband and the guys stared at me on disbelief being probably the only female that had entered the store on a while. If there were big championships on places where female audience was invited and welcomed it I wouldn’t be surprise if they could pick a couple of groupies that will be turn on by their displays of competence and confidence, but again is the football, baseball,basketball players and lately golf that get the perks of this competitive trait, YMMV.
Susan,
While I accept your point about athletic positions of leadership, wouldn’t that only qualify the quarterback?
As someone alluded to earlier, NFL players have more status than professional boxers. My assumption is that this is true because of how popular football is in the states, and this blog has a primarily American commenter base. Up here in Canada, the same can be said about professional hockey players.
I used to speed skate at quite the competitive level. But I often have to explain to people what speed skating actually is, so it’s an awkward sort of DHV. You definitely have to be strong and in amazing shape to excel in that. Aggression is also more of a pre-requisite than you’d think, especially in short track. But… we wear tights, so I guess that’s a loss of man points.
Sport value is culturally relative. Soccer (the “real” football in other countries) is absolutely HUGE throughout most of the world. But it’s tiny in America, ranking behind football, baseball and basketball by a long shot. On the other hand, David Beckham, a famous British soccer star, is a household name in the US thanks to popular mass media.
Here’s anther example that will turn your world view of sport status upside down. In South Korea video game leagues have huge prestige, with players getting corporate sponsors, tournaments that are nationally televised, and female groupies who swoon over skilled video game players. They are famous celebrities and appear in commercials. If you want to bring race into it, there are enough white girls who do the groupie thing in video games to debunk the idea that only Asian girls would go for this.
So the definition of female “hypergamy” is culturally relative, although the phenomenon itself is universal. It’s all a fitness test of complete and utter… nothingness. We are such status-influenced creatures, and actions that are completely devoid of actual genetic value (like feathers on a hat) can impress us, as long as they seem “high status.”
I just can’t imagine that throughout all of history women as a group consistently picked sexy men over reliable men. If they had, then how did civilization ever get built?
In many cultures women did not do the picking – rather their parents did.
Moreover, in just about all cultures “decent” women would not sleep with men they were not married to, and the pool of potential marriage partners in a particular place and socioeconomic grouping would be small. Not much waiting for Prince Charming in such circumstances.
A sad poem but a tad self serving perhaps. Most humans experience rejection in life on some level.
One has to resist feeling sorry for oneself in such situations.
this guy is suggesting that that deep down she doesn’t get turned on by him an dis secretly lusting after some stud.
He may be bang on the money perhaps but if you use susans market place scoring system we all have to compromise. Somewhere down the line. I have always had a genuine attraction to people i have had gone to bed with but I would imagine if I was less conventionally attractive i would have to alter my expectations to some extent.
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In terms of the unchecked female sexuality- I think that’s true. A lot of USA commentators like Fisher, Langley, Dobson and Townsend are now talking about this rise. financically independent women are now following their genuine sexual interests rather than doing things to impress their parents or society.
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some will recall the Karen Owen expose from last year. that’s your unchecked female sexuality for you. Not always so dignified i guess.
@Stephenie Rowling
Re: Asian culture & betas
I think you’ve got it a bit backwards. It’s not that Asian cultures don’t glorify asshole traits, it’s that Asian cultures still have massive amounts of shame reserved for sluts so betas still have good standing. It’s not that hypergamy doesn’t exist over there, it’s that any girl caught slutting around is in for a big dose of “get the hell outta my house” by her father. It used to be that way in the U.S., too. Hypergamy will always exist, women will always tingle for the bad boys. It’s what society does about hypergamy that makes a difference.
@Walenty, there is something to what you are saying. Sometimes a lot of what makes civilization seem “civilized” such as art, music, cinema, literature, and fine dining are basically aspects of entertainment. None of these things has ever been essential to basic human survival. But somehow we do “select” for these traits, because creativity has been passed down successfully.
All animals live just fine without needing such extras as clothing, bedsheets, or furnishings. Yet we find that for as long as humans have lived we have used tools and fashioned objects of one form or anothers. There are ancient potteries, statues and ancient drawings in caves. One could argue that dwellings such as houses are more of a basic human necessity, but we never really truly “needed” to create electronic devices such as computers in order to survive.
It may be that women are just simple creatures who want men to entertain them, but how many women actually watch sports and enjoy the sport for the sport? The actual selection mechanism is more subtle than mere entertainment or rough dominance. It’s a mixed bag. A talented musician, playwright, athlete and five-star general can each receive a lot of female attention, and it can certainly be argued that these have different raw survival values, but in the end, the common root is more or less the female’s propensity to adore that which is superior to herself. That’s hypergamy in a nutshell.
Men also adore women who are skilled — only as a bonus to looks. Female dancers, singers and artists get plenty of attention, but raw skills are not worth much if she’s not physically attractive. Women are not rewarded in the evolutionary scheme of things for excellence, but for their looks. It’s men who stand to gain more by doing and succeeding. The female entertainers’ primary job is to be outstandingly attractive. Male entertainers? Be outstanding.
Men forced monogamy on women.
The link is dead, but here’s another one to it:
http://dontmarry.files.wordpress.com/2009/03/sexualutopia.pdf
It explains hypergamy very well.
@hollendhund
“Men forced monogamy on women.”
Not to mention that reliable birth control was not available, and single mothers faced a miserable life (as did their children).
@Susan
True, but more importantly, the more popular the sport, the more “alpha” the athletes. For example, at my school, UGA, football is the sport that reigns supreme above all others. I wrote a post addressing the the “Alpha Male College Athlete” and his status above all other lesser alphas.
http://raliv.wordpress.com/2011/03/23/the-alpha-male-college-athlete/
Females on campus are more than willing to be part of athlete harems in college in an attempt to snatch up an Alpha Athlete. The fact that the Athlete Alphas are on TV and worshiped by the entire state and the students gives the football teams their status here. It is for this reason that I advocate removing NCAA scholarships as it creates an unnatural social hierarchy.
I have little to no respect for Athletes who run harems rather than other alphas who use social dominance and build up their personality and popularity to attract friends and women.
These are book reviews by Devlin also addressing the consequences of hypergamy:
http://dontmarry.files.wordpress.com/2009/03/rotating.pdf
http://dontmarry.files.wordpress.com/2009/03/fscr.pdf
So then for me to picture a functional civilization with most men enfranchised to the sexual marketplace I should imagine a boot stamping on a woman’s face— forever?
Walenty…on the question of why more women aren’t chasing Rangers, SEALs, attack pilots, etc….the dominant culture of the upper-middle-class and above, especially among the highly educated, has become pretty isolated from the military (viz, ROTC thrown off campus) and has also been extensively inculcated with anti-military prejudices. I think it’s fair to say that in most previous societies, including the US until fairly recently, elite military service *was* attractive to most women. But today, a woman would in many cases have to get beyond the reactions of her friends and possibly also her parents.
@Walenty Lisek
If you want to argue reducto ad absurdum, then try to imagine our dysfunctional hypergamy driven society as a boot stamping on the beta male’s face.
How did civilization get built? A lot of it was forced slave labor. See: the great pyramids, the great wall of China, etc. Not everything should be seen through the lens of females oppressing the poor men.
I have little to no respect for Athletes who run harems rather than other alphas who use social dominance and build up their personality and popularity to attract friends and women.
Why not? Both take a great deal of work and dedication to achieve the same result.
David Foster, are you kidding me? Women LOVE the military guys.
Walenty,
basically, yes – although I should point out that monogamy suppressed both male and female sexuality and I imagine most women wouldn’t consciously want to give up the benefits of monogamous civilization, like running toilets, heating etc. But the evidence indeed seems to suggest that lifelong monogamy – NOT serial monogamy, which was standard human behavior in the Stone Age – was a system that was forced by men, on the command of their male leaders, onto all women at the dawn of civilization (after the invention of agriculture) as an attempt to maximize male cooperation.
The accumulation of wealth makes civilization possible, and that’s only possible if men cooperate, and they cooperate only if they don’t have to continuously fight over access to women. Secured paternity is the greatest incentive a man can be given to work. Only monogamy facilitates that, which constitutes a strict limitation on female sexual choices.
At the end of the day, male and female reproductive strategies are at odds, and social peace is only possible if the two are reconciled and both men and women make concessions. Monogamy is an attempt at that.
Hope said: Here’s some real practical advice for men who want an “edge” but don’t want to be a criminal thug…
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There’s been a lot of advice out there, especially in the manosphere, that seems to urge “nice guys” to be a little less nice and a little more thuggish. But I’m not sure you can have it both ways.
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My self-image is and always has been the nice-guy beta. And hey, I’m short too. What goes with that is being seen routinely as a doormat, relatively weak and even cowardly. “Nice” is often the cowards way out of a conflict, right?
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Well, I’m also a 2nd dan black belt and (former) rock-band member. Married two beautiful women in my life and got rather involved with a knockout between marriages. Never cheated, never hit (even when tempted) and steadily employed. So am I a doormat?
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What I’ve come to understand is that I am not a good bad-guy. I don’t like that persona and it’s not me. There was never a point in my life where I could pull it off.
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I may very well have been that doormat as I was commonly perceived back then. But it nothing to do with a lack of aggressiveness or social dominance or anything like that. It was youth. It was immaturity.
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I could not ever pull off being a bad guy. But there came a point when I didn’t have to.
Susan, did you get my missive through the contact section?
collegeslacker
Is the other way around, IME. Women don’t go for assholes if assholes are depicted as a low status undesirable trait. The reason why Beta men are sought after on cultures where there is a ton of Alpha males is because those traits are undesirable and is the reliable Beta man that is the luxury that few women can get. I really think that many Beta men thing they are low status just because is mostly the culture that places the assholes traits as the traits of a leader that make Betas look low status. Read Hope comments about video games superstars to use an example. Those women are willing to slut it up for a man that women here won’t piss on to get them out of fire is all a matter of context.
Here is the key to all this mess. In cultures that celebrate Beta traits snagging a Beta is what gives women the hipergamy fix, what is wrong here is that Betas are mocked, ridiculed and seen as boring. While assholes get all the attention heck look at the coverage of megamurderers and serial killers compared to doctors that go to serve on poor countries and tell me what this cultures encourage on women to look as better.
Men forced monogamy on women.
Wrong again. First monogamy was beneficial to women, that have to make sure someone is there for them when they are 9 months pregnant and can;t run from predators or gather their own food (for men here woman’s changes make them picky on things they eat when they are pregnant so they need help to gather the nutrients) so an Alpha that won’t have any pressure to commit will be too busy impregnating women after women to provide for all of them when they need it. Thus securing a man is beneficial for her.
Second you are falling into the feminist trap that women didn’t had any agency on the past. Nothing further from the truth many women earned a lot of power if they wanted to, we have had women priestesses, powerful queens, Egyptian women could inherit land and have their own business and divorce men (in fact many ancient cultures had ways for the wife to get out of a bad marriage) and the expression the power behind the throne wasn’t born out of men. Heck even the bible specify things as a man only taking a second wife or a slave if the wife allowed him and in Islamic cultures women could demand things like their husband not taking another wife if they were the first. So really women might not be stronger than men but we had been clever long before feminism was invented.
And third why Alphas will force women to be monogamous? They would be having an endless supply of pussy and the few Betas won’t have any. Why they will short their own supply of poliginy? Out of the goodness of their hearts? I think the Mormons that still practice poliginy and make sure to get rid of the boys as soon as posible show me that Alphas don’t want competition not even from their own offspring.
So for your model of forced monogamy to work there should be more Betas than Alphas to be able to overcome the Alphas attractiveness and strength and if that were the case how unforced women gave birth to so many Betas on the first place? So unless you tell me that there was a meteor rock that mutated half the male population into Betas a million years ago and they had to fix this by inventing monogamy that models makes no sense at all.
How did civilization get built? A lot of it was forced slave labor. See: the great pyramids
Actually the pyramids were built by Egiptian paid workers. The other ones I agree.
@Stephanie – Just to clarify, the Mormons do NOT practice polygamy (plural marriage). That is a few nutjobs in very rural south Utah who get a disproportionate amount of attention. Yes, they do force boys out and are generally quite noxious – there is not much love for those kind in Utah. They are no more Mormon than Lutherans are still Catholics. Just so you know.
@Zen
Oh I know that. I have a couple of friends that are Mormons and hate those guys I was referring to that group specifically for the purpose of the argument.
Women in some cultures favor betas because they require a man to survive and a beta is a much better bet than an alpha. Those women are more pragmatic about marrying a provider because they have to be. Bring them to the city, let them earn their own money and they aren’t so different.
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I don’t think women are any different than men in wanting the best possible mate they can get. (The qualities of “best” might differ a bit between the genders, but for LTRs, the differences are not as much as people might think.) The real danger of “hypergamy” is when it causes women to believe that because a significantly more attractive man will fuck them, that he will also want a relationship with them.
@walenty
“I should imagine a boot stamping on a woman’s face— forever?”
Sounds like someone visits too many fetish sites.
Bring them to the city, let them earn their own money and they aren’t so different.
Disagree with this but so much. If that were true rich women wouldn’t be attracted to Betas at all. I think Hope mentioned not being poor when she meet her now husband and I must say that even though I was not rich I earned eight times the minimum wage on my country and I was at the top of my career. And one of the many married older men that usually chase me offered me a car and an apartment plus showed me his house that was six times the size of mine, with maid room included, again no interested at all, in fact I felt that he called me a whore (a expensive one) but trust me if I before was no attracted I was completely repelled by this display of resources. So I really don’t think money makes the women rejects Betas, YMMV.
Chico…”women LOVE the military guys”…I was responding to Walenty’s comment of 4:29, asking why women more often prefer athletes to soldiers.
Obviously, it depends on the woman and her social milieu…but I’d bet if she’s a Harvard Law student, or even a Duke Law student, any natural attraction is likely to get suppressed, especially for LTR/marriage.
@Walenty
I like your portrayal of Teams Alpha and Beta. You have hit upon the negative, undesirable traits of alphas and the civilizing, cooperative traits of betas that I have so often “peddled” on this blog. I agree with you that women’s choosing alpha types does not make sense in the long run, but it may be an effective short-term strategy. We are living in a time where the SMP rewards short-term, self-indulgence over the building of relationships, families, or communities.
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Quite simply, I think military men are bad bets for LTR/marriage. Their profession requires that they spend months away from family, leaving the woman to fend for herself and the kids while he’s gone. She’s in only a slightly better position than a single mother – a decidedly unenviable role. Furthermore, my impression is that military salaries and benefits are a pittance and therefore unsuitable to raise a family in the comfortable upper-middle class lifestyle we’ve been raised in.
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Facing the prospect of singlehandedly raising children while constantly worrying for my husband’s life while he’s deployed, trying to make ends meet on his meager salary (since it’s damn near impossible to be the primary caretaker and sole breadwinner of the household), being forcibly uprooted from every town we get accustomed to every time he gets posted to a new assignment….all of that is enough to make me feel absolutely nothing every time I see a man in uniform. He is a poor prospect, and one that would force me to give up on my own success, to boot.
@Chico, @Walenty, @Hope
There’s no question that culture plays a huge role in determining the popularity of a sport, and therefore its ability to crown its best athletes with dominance. There was a time when boxing was a popular American pastime, and boxers got all the women they could handle. Today NFL and NBA players rule. Speed skaters in countries that promote it (Scandinavia?) are no doubt considered total jocks. I have to say, Chico, I’ve never seen more amazing quads than on speed skaters, though I’ve only ever seen them in the Olympics. They are incredibly strong and fit athletes.
The men with the most dominance in just about any society will be the top athletes in the sport that society deems most valuable. In the U.S. that’s Tom Brady, the Mannings, etc. And the NBA and MLB stars do fine too.
@Hope
“Sometimes a lot of what makes civilization seem “civilized” such as art, music, cinema, literature, and fine dining are basically aspects of entertainment. None of these things has ever been essential to basic human survival. But somehow we do “select” for these traits, because creativity has been passed down successfully.”
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Those are all things humans do that sub-human animals don’t. So, doing them is not mere “entertainment” – in the sense of distraction from humdrum life; by doing them, a man demonstrates that he is more HUMAN than someone who cannot do them. (Which can actually be a trap. E.g., a pretty robot person who is really good at ACTING human, like Tom Cruise.)
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Because we have consciousness, culture became part of the environment that naturally selects inherited qualities in the human species a long time ago.
Re the attraction of Asian women toward nerdy guys…perhaps when a country has not yet become wealthy, occupations that have obvious direct economic value tend to get higher prestige, while in an already-wealthy country, non-economic occupations rise in status. (I’ve been told that traditional types of engineers–civil engineers, power EEs, etc, have high status in Hispanic countries–any comments on this from the resident Latinas?)
In the specific case of Chinese culture, my understanding is that the legacy of mandarinism has led to high respect for scholarly activities, somewhat in the same manner that study of Torah and Talmud led to high respect for scholarship among Jews. So if you combine these factors: economic value plus scholarly orientation–maybe high prestige for nerdy occupations isn’t surprising??
Well said, Hope! This is why I encourage women to look beyond the surface impression. Of the two men in the novel I’m reading, the greater human being is the man with less “dominance” – and the man with dominance has little else to show for his life.
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If women want to partner for life – we’re talking 50+ years, doesn’t it make sense to select a person who has the constitution for the long haul? Why are women so shortsighted as to think only about today? I knew better than that, and I can’t believe I was all that unusual. I think many women still have a strong future time orientation (though fewer than a generation ago), but the logistics of dating, of “getting together” have gotten less user-friendly.
@Sorer Bveito
Good point. Until recently, marriage was an economic partnership, a strategic alliance. We’ll never go back to that, of course, but it does seem that there was real value in de-emphasizing romantic love in matchmaking.
@Hope
There’s been a lot of work done on the nature of creativity, which might make an interesting post. We do highly value the creative spirit. You’re right that women view it as sexy in men, while many of history’s most creative women have been considered anything but sexy.
@Stephenie Rowling
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For us, chasing alphas (or not) is a choice. But for most women in non-western countries, it’s a luxury they simply cannot afford. It’s one thing for a western woman to make a mistake (or 20) chasing alphas, it’s another for an uneducated woman in a developing nation where her family approval or a good marriage is the only thing between her and real poverty.
@Passer By
It’s hard to overestimate the effect the Pill has had on society. It’s very un-PC to suggest that it’s not “all good,” but removing the threat of pregnancy (though not STDs) changed the SMP in ways that we’re just coming to grips with. We’re also learning that preventing ovulation in women may affect not only their sex drives, but who they choose to mate with. And there are quite a few doctors who question its long-term effects on health.
@raliv
Welcome, nice job on the blog. It’s good to see another POV, another voice from the college scene. I see you’ve caught the attention of Ferdinand Bardamu, the benefactor who brings much good traffic…congrats.
I was making an allusion to 1984. Being clever didn’t work out for me this time.
@david foster
There’s no question that the military has taken a beating in terms of status in the U.S. Whenever I encounter someone in the military, I make a point of thanking them for their service, in part because I feel they get very little love. Did this originate with the Vietnam War, do you think? After the shameful treatment that returning vets received, it seems that the military has never really recovered. Of course, we haven’t been involved in any popular wars since then.
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That said, a guy in dress blues looks hot. I think that men in uniform convey something that gets the tingles going – authority = dominance?
@Stephenie Rowling
I think we are in agreement about a lot of this but we are getting caught up in using slightly different definitions. I think you’re getting too hung up on assholeness as status in the U.S. and not thinking enough about status on its own, regardless of culture. If asshole behavior is shamed in a culture, then for the sake of argument its a low status trait. But in that culture, regardless of how relevant video gaming is or being a dick is to acquiring status, the Alpha will still be the high status dude- whatever the status comes from- who can get most any girl he wants. Traditional cultures, in great acknowledgment of hypergamy, have always attempted to shame women away from leaving their lesser status mates for higher status mates.
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No reason Alpha’s can have male babies that are Beta. Just like two genius parents can have dumbass kids.
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Mental note, try to pick up Jewish women.
@Joe
I thoroughly respect your decision to stay “nice” rather than “bad.” You obviously found the sweet spot of being a good man with a strong dose of dominance, regardless of physical size. This is what I was getting at when I ended the post by observing that Game can turn “Avrams into Ilans” – but (and this may not make sense if you haven’t read the book) – I want a world with more Avrams and fewer Ilans. I strongly encourage men who learn Game to hang on to their humanity, and the traits they have perhaps found disadvantageous while young.
@Benjamin Fox
No! I didn’t get it! Sorry about that. Can you resend? I’m at walsh.susan1@gmail.com. You’re the second person to ask me this – sounds like the contact from plugin is not working.
With Passover approaching, I must point out that Jewish slaves helped build the pyramids.
@Aldonza
Well put. Cities like Shanghai are seeing an explosion in cads and sluts because these young people are free from the poverty of their forefathers, while those in rural China still practice the social shaming of hypergamous behavior due to the economic benefits of marriage and unmarketability of a slut. As has been said by many before me, prosperity + women’s equality aka no shaming slut behavior= the reemergence of hypergamy. Not that I’m arguing against women’s equality at all, this is just what happens afterwards.
@david foster
This is true, no question. If the guy is educated, especially at one of the military academies, a family will be delighted. As a parent, I would also be totally cool with a ROTC guy. I am speaking about status here. Parents are wary of military men for their daughters because of the built-in absences and dangers. My sense is that guys who go into the military without a college degree will have little interaction with educated women – their socioeconomic status is different.
Susan:
Another religious lie.
Good point. Women are not as free to move about as they were when they didn’t have careers of their own.
For us, chasing alphas (or not) is a choice. But for most women in non-western countries, it’s a luxury they simply cannot afford. It’s one thing for a western woman to make a mistake (or 20) chasing alphas, it’s another for an uneducated woman in a developing nation where her family approval or a good marriage is the only thing between her and real poverty.
It doesn’t work like that at all.
For some reason Americans sell the idea that other cultures women have no choices at all. We all do, always do, I never met a woman that didn’t had choices, the thing is that some choices are harder than others.
The choices in my country were: chasing after Alphas consequences be damned (25% of women are like this they will get pregnant from every single loser and they will whether rely on their relatives or just live on poverty as hard is that to believe poverty is a way of life for many people so no everyone cringes at the horror of having just one meal at day or a daily beating or cheating with your own mother I think this is what is called here White Trash)
Trying to pick the best possible out of the Alphas I would say 65% of women try to discriminate and pick the ones that will cheat on them but as long as they don’t beat them and they keep the mistresses away they try to make a life with them hoping that if they hold long enough their penises will stop working when they reach old age and they could finally have a normal family life, of course this strategy is faulty because the man can leave for a new hotter mistress, he can father kids outside the marriage that will cut his supply of affection and money and sometimes you have to raise them to make sure the other woman doesn’t have power to lure him with a younger kid and you need to be on constant vigilance of female relatives and friends never trusting anyone because a more or less decent Alpha is an step up from the other ones)
And the rest are divided between women that decide no to marry at all and pursue other things: careers, convent and the ones like me that decide to outsource and find a good husband outside, but again this is probably the hardest choice. So no they have a choice but some women do so even to their own demise I seen poor women becoming prostitutes to keep their man with them,its amazing to see it happen, but then a very poor but pretty girl got killed by a rich baseball player because she didn’t wanted to have anything to do with him.
That is one of the reasons I highly doubt there is no a biological component to both tendencies. Most of single friends have had the chance to be with an Alpha that promises that they are reformed (and it might be truth) it just doesn’t happen, they can’t bring themselves to feel anything for them. So yeah there is a mix of choice and social pressure but also there are women that won’t be attracted to an asshole no matter how many tricks or social dominance he exudes. They are just not wired that way, YMMV.
“It’s what society does about hypergamy that makes a difference.”
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At this time, few societies are not keeping hypergamy in check. The other wifely societies offer American men enticing options.
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“The real danger of “hypergamy” is when it causes women to believe that because a significantly more attractive man will fuck them, that he will also want a relationship with them.”
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…and that real danger kicks in upon realization that equally attractive men will also reject her for a relationship due to such behavior.
@collegeslacker
Just spend about half an hour on your blog, with a note to return tomorrow and comb through your archives. Great stuff there, and a male voice from the college trenches is always a great addition.
@GudEnuf
What???? This is a key part of the seder – bad pharaoh. 12 plagues and all. Are you saying none of that is true, or that enslaved Jews came after the pyramids were built?
Traditional cultures, in great acknowledgment of hypergamy, have always attempted to shame women away from leaving their lesser status mates for higher status mates.
I will say traditional cultures promoted character and good traits as the marks of Alphas. That is the opposite of what is happening as of now where selfishness and materialism are the marks of high status. And this is the point we disagree.
No reason Alpha’s can have male babies that are Beta. Just like two genius parents can have dumbass kids.
But to what rate? I mean it had to be a fairly top rate for them to be able to need monogamy to assure the Betas could get laid and father kids as well, and if Alphas genes can be beaten by Beta genes then the point still stand, there is no reason to prefer them if there is a big enough chance Betas are going to be born anyway and supposedly the Betas are no desirable. So still doesn’t make a lot of sense.
Mrs. Walsh, Some post back I left a comment regarding the knowledge of hyper gamy in the western classics, (the cartoon one I think). In summary, It was known about then, but suppressed by the philosophers and the church. Madame Bovary, Anna Karenina.
What???? This is a key part of the seder – bad pharaoh. 12 plagues and all. Are you saying none of that is true, or that enslaved Jews came after the pyramids were built?
I think the new studies say that the Hebrews (or first Cananites, depends on the scholar) were a small group that probably helped other constructions before they “left” Egypt. I don’t think it denies the biblical accounting just that from the slaves POV things looked a lot different and were recorded as such.
Dealing with Hyper-gamy, requires cultural solutions.
In my recent stammtich, this is difficult to articulate so bare with me I have a point, I noted that women tend to authenticate themselves existentially differently than men. As a general observation women don’t do philosophy, its sort of an inside joke. I don’t doubt their are female philosophers, its just a rarity and appears to be a very male discipline. The point that I’m getting at is that I believe women are doing something through their sexuality to make themselves feel more alive more so than men. Men assert their existence by other means i.e. philosophy, religion. In generally, a transcendent Idea that is their guiding goal. With little religion or culture for women these days, they are making there experience/existence authenticate by chasing the tingle, by their passion trampling everything underfoot. It’s Kierkegaard’s passion applied to female sexuality.
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In sum, for women at least when it comes to these situational relationships you have described above and that we all know come to know. Its, to change the phrase slightly, “I feel There for I am”
It’s the Drama that is the pinch to see if she really is alive in this sterile modern world
With little religion or culture for women these days, they are making there experience/existence authenticate by chasing the tingle, by their passion trampling everything underfoot. It’s Kierkegaard’s passion applied to female sexuality.
You need to take in account that Feminism is a religion/philosophy as off now. Part of the feminist efforts had been to undermine all religions as patriarchal and oppressive and I must say organized religions had been failing to people on modern times by preaching morality and then you find things like priests abusing kids and is easy for the media to run with it and paint all religious people as hateful hypocrites, I know is not the truth (my father is a very devout catholic and my aunt is a very devout evangelical plus some of my friends are mormons, muslims…) but must religions don’t try and mend this image so feminism looks like answer to humanities owes. So women are indeed following a philosophy is just a destructive one.
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Alpha genes don’t beat Beta genes when the Betas outnumber the Alphas 3 to 1 or more. Add to that the force multiplier that military training can bring and even a 1 to 1 match of Betas vs Alphas and the Alphas will lose because the Betas will work as a team.
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Did you see the move 300? The Spartans were Team Beta. How did the Spartans act? They worked as a team, listened to orders, and put group above self. Leonidas the Spartan king commanded the respect of his men. That’s not what Alpha’s do. Persian king Xerxes was the Alpha because because of his size, status, disagreeableness, and rule of his people through fear.
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Another Team Alpha society would be the one Alexander the Great built. Once he was dead there was no cooperation between his subordinates and they fell into civil war on each other. A society run by Team Beta would have been agreeable enough to stay together.
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Team Alpha v Team Beta is the Tortoise and the Hare writ large.
Alpha genes don’t beat Beta genes when the Betas outnumber the Alphas 3 to 1 or more. Add to that the force multiplier that military training can bring and even a 1 to 1 match of Betas vs Alphas and the Alphas will lose because the Betas will work as a team.
I get this on human terms but the Betas genes should had been born from someone before we started to think on civilization terms. The argument here is that women unleash will never pick the Beta guys and that the only reason Beta reproduced was because women were forced to mate with them.
But before civilization existed there shouldn’t had been enough Betas for women to pass their genes so how is possible that no woman willingly mated with Betas at enough rate to create them on the first time? That is the problem. For Betas to benefit from monogamy there should had been enough Betas to need monogamy.
How that happened if women have all the Alphas they could to have sex with?
@Susan
Thanks. Good to see you’re open to new voices at HUS, I like what you got going on here. Enjoy!
DF, Stephenie, & others re philosophy, religion, and sex….Arthur Koestler wrote a very interesting novel titled “The Age of Longing” (published in 1950) about a young American woman living in France–a previously-devout Catholic who has lost her faith–who falls *hard* for a very committed Russian Communist. In a broader sense, the novel is about the loss of religious faith and civilizational self-confidence in the West, and is both disturbing and thought-provoking. My review is here: sleeping with the enemy.
@Susan
True, but that is only a consideration for the ladies. For guys, there’s only one takeaway in all this: Do Not Be Avram!
I concur with SayWhaat in that an educated woman who wants to forge a career is poorly matched with a serviceman. (Chuck Pelto coming in here to tell us how the Airborne made a man out of him in 3…2…1…)
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For a woman without a lot of earning potential, who lacks the egoistic ambition to “own” her own achievement, and who would take a lot of pride in an alpha-headed family arrangement, a military marriage is a much better bet.
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I tried to find divorce stats for military marriages and came up empty. Lots of married enlistees marry young because they can live off base and get a big pay raise (~10%), but obviously that plus young age are going to make those marriages poorly formed. I do know that the successful military couples really have it together, especially the officers, because the stresses are enormous.
Sorry above should be “Pinch”
@Mrs. Rowling
Sorry, I should have made my self more clear. Feminism is really a type of Gnosticism, an outer layer of philosophy and systems but at it’s core, feminism is an impulse of what women want it to be at any one time. That was the cleverness of Devlin, he was able to see it for what is actually was, not what it said it was. This is also why I refuse to play feminist word shell games, empowerment is whatever she wants it to be.
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Women benefit enormously from feminism but very few women could articulate it or care less. Most women don’t pour over feminist theories or deconstructing patriarchy etc. Except for a demented few, feminism is not what women live for. However they do live for, wage their lives on, priorities for, suffer for – the tingle. The tingle( I actually dislike this word), the hypergamous impulse, redeems them of the boring existential dilemma of modern life.
@david foster
Great book. I will totally add it to my pile of books. Very insightful I believe the 50′s generation probably saw a lot of this coming. I will recommend you Doris Lessing the golden notebook. Is also another book about disappointment just a lot subtle and using the term “free women” in a very clever way.
I think half the issue is what kind of people the girl hangs around. Just as in certain social groups guys tend toward certain kinds of girls (i.e. you won’t see a born again christian guy actually hit on a party girl, even if she is a 10), I think who she goes for is heavily influenced by her peers. Girls who fall all over “alpha assholes” are, as Stephanie said, likely to be bitches themselves.
This seems locked up in the “excitement” issue. One possible answer is to find women with a rather low desire for excitement in their lives (i.e. satisfied with their thrill level the way it is). That pretty much leaves out the charismatic personalities, as addicted as they are to excitement. Fortunately, it’s fairly easy to pick those girls out, so that’ll make the job a lot easier for guys. In fact, I’d make this, along with my “no alcohol-oriented scenes” rule, another prime rule to go by: Never go for a girl with a strong love of excitement. In fact, the more intelligent, sober-minded women are likely to see excitement as more style than substance; just as guys see women too flashy in their dress, persona, looks, etc as more style than substance. If serious-minded, excitement-eschewing beta can find venues his female counterparts are likely to frequent, then that could do a lot to solve the problem.
This may or may not be realistic, but even if it is, it still helps to go for women who have a low desire for thrills and excitement, even better, a rather strong disdain of the same.
filrabat….I think it depends *what kind* of excitement. Some people seek excitement (drama, chaos) in their relationships because they are too uncreative or too unmotivated to find it elsewhere in life.
@The Deuce
That is what you think. I never mentioned why I think friendships with my male friends were usually long and stable with other women they were not attracted to. Most players know that no matter how much game one has women get tired of it, get tired of the neglect the cheating the abuse and leave the relationship bitter and hating them forever, their kids see what they did to their mothers and hate them too, they can’t make male friends for a long time because they know sooner or later they will want to game the same woman to see who wins. They know in the long run that they are not doing anything but seeding pain but they can’t stop, so having a couple of female friends that are not going to sleep with you so you can destroy them is the only real human connection they can get. Dark Game is addictive once the punani stars to fall there is nothing to stop you and you end up lonely because all you have to offer is Game or doing something really stupid I remember one that ended up fired because he started to Game his boss’s wife almost unconsciously and that is not the worst I seen on Dark Game. So yeah Dark Game ends up becoming your boss. Roissy and their group might have had all the sex they want now, but nothing in this life is free. They will be rethinking all this when their dicks stop working. I seen it happen before and it will happen again, is just a matter of time.
@David
A+ right there!
When I spoke of excitement, I meant in the conventional common everyday sense of the term (i.e. what would look good on TV, YouTube, or even a cell phone camera). IOW excitement coming from adrenaline rushes, rushes from (oxycotin?) or ….whatever “natural drug” gives the ‘gina tingle.
Which adds another trait to look for in women – women who get their thrills from mental activity rather than photo(video)genic ones. They’re more likely to be interesting conversationalists anyway (what smart and serious guy really wants to listen to gossip, drama, etc. anyway?)
filrabat….I think it depends *what kind* of excitement. Some people seek excitement (drama, chaos) in their relationships because they are too uncreative or too unmotivated to find it elsewhere in life.
Or just plain dumb. Most of my chasing Alpha friends are so dumb, they don’t grasp the concept of actions lead to consequences or obvious lies men they just meet tell them and some of them are educated and all that, it doesn’t seem to help. And they don’t have a rich inner life, don’t read, don’t have hobbies can’t even make a decent conversation over a movie they just watched is amazing. They live on the here and now, nothing beyond that.
@Stephenie
But that’s not important!!! It FEEEELLLLLS good. Natural mind-altering drugs that inhibit your judgment legally IS the most important thing in life.
But that’s not important!!! It FEEEELLLLLS good. Natural mind-altering drugs that inhibit your judgment legally IS the most important thing in life.
Heh you know very well that I don’t believe on denying the lizard brain their tingle, but letting the big brain to choose what the lizard brain gets that is beneficial on the long run, moderating it to achieve maximum efficiency. I don’t believe is impossible feminism convinced women of many crappy ideas on mere decades, deprogramming should take about the same, of course we will need an intense effort and possibly enough respected people to go behind it, and critical conditions which is probably what the manosphere is betting on with Game.
hypergamy isnt new. men are hungry for status, women are hungry for high status men. thats how it works in nature too.
feminism unleashed the women from their beta hubbys and lower-status-men-dependence so they are go ride the alpha cock. and no problem with that
the thug isnt the only one who can be manly. a lot of men would develop manly attributes, along with the funny emotionally present and other qualities, if media stopped selling the beta model and started selling the alpha male role
being a man is natural – the pressure to stop being a man is whats hurting most men, its not the liberated women
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“Most of my chasing Alpha friends are so dumb, they don’t grasp the concept of actions lead to consequences or obvious lies men they just meet tell them and some of them are educated and all that, it doesn’t seem to help. And they don’t have a rich inner life, don’t read, don’t have hobbies can’t even make a decent conversation over a movie they just watched is amazing.”
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If I may ask, why are you friends with these folks? It doesn’t sound like they bring much to your life in your own words.
If I may ask, why are you friends with these folks? It doesn’t sound like they bring much to your life in your own words
I always do everything for many reasons so in no particular order… Many of them are good on other things (you need to remember that intelligences are different for everyone) so they are more like romantically dumb I try to accept friends the way they are, discriminating people just because they are dumb is elitist IMO no one asked to be born dumb some people are luckier than others and no one is so dumb that you cannot learn something from them, for example one of my dumb friends taught me mix drinks (something I sucked at) or how to drink without getting completely wasted with just one glass like I used to do and another one taught me Crochet, cooking tricks and how to curl my hair… so there is no such a thing as an useless human being everyone has a part (except you know assholes or serial killers). Also some of my dumb friends that actually accept there are things they are just no good at seek my help so I also help them (like I learned English practically on my own, reading comics and watching Dawson’s creek so I showed them more natural ways to learn a new language to some of them in cheap ways instead of spending money on schools that teach little of practical English) and finally I used to be a writer and part of the passion is observing people and see what makes them tick and what consequences of their actions are best or worst on the long run that help you write but also helps you to guide other people when they enter a route that you had seen many times other people take and end up badly, it helps to create characters but also I must say most of the time people don’t listen to advices that are against what they want to believe (regardless if their method is working or not), but once in a while some one will say ” Oh yeah I see that if I keep seeing that guy I will end up in a bad relationship like the last 2 ones” so for that one everything else is worth it .. as rare as this instances are.
Re the sociosexual market place/value, getting a better understanding of…
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For the purpose of game – it’s important for us (men) to discard our own understanding/perceptions of status and try to see it how women see it.
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Women have their own collective perception of the SMP and the men within it who possess value at any given time. Fame, popularity, cool, trendiness – whatever type of guy seems to be socially desirable to other women – seems to be what most of the women flock to. Women are not directly attracted to the actual man (as men see themselves) but to his persona and it’s perceived social value.
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Although the archetypical high-T alpha male who is obviously “dominant” is what we tend to focus on – social status as women perceive it is determined by many factors. There are countless ways for a male persona in any given society to achieve value – not simply via overt and physical displays of dominance. Remember that even the “sensitive” low-T artist/musician types often have as many women chasing them as do the archetypical high-T guy does.
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This doesn’t mean that women are attracted to betas – it simply means that there are various ways for a male persona to attain alpha-level SMV – even if he has a softer or less dominating personality. This is why I tend to separate personality from persona in my analysis of SMP. Ultimately women flock to high status male personas – even if the man has a submissive personality. The two (personality and persona) are different things, even though they are often conflated in these discussions.
Two words: Josh Camacho
It’s the whole minimalist versus maximalist scholarly arguments. I side with the maximalists myself. However the Hebrews weren’t involved with the building of the pyramids, they were building with mud bricks, not limestone. The city they were working on was probably mistranslated as Rameses, leading to people thinking that Rameses 2 was Pharaoh during the Exodus.
The fact that men do the vast majority of approaching helps enable female hypergamy. Even a female 5 gets hit on far more than a male 9.
A girl thinks that because all these men hit on her, she must be hot stuff. She’s probably not. Men with game are hitting on chicks ALL THE TIME. All it means is that they want to bang her, nothing else. And just because they want to bang her, that doesn’t mean they consider her to be on the same level as them. A man will bang a chick far below him in quality. The counterpart to female hypergamy is male polygamy, and for those two things to coexist, men have to get most of their notches from girls who are not good enough for their commitment.
@Yohami
Dude, I gotta tell you, I just spent about two hours reading stuff you’ve written, courtesy of Rivelino, mostly. It’s pure gold, and I’m going to put together a post of highlights. I’ve clipped like crazy, but let me know if there’s anything in particular you’d like me to link to, e.g. Yohami.com? I think I may have to lead with the beta poetry…
@DF
Yup, found it:
It’s funny you should mention Madame Bovary and Anna K. As my husband and I were watching the film, we wondered whether it was a remake of one of those stories. We’d settled on Mdm Bovary, actually, until the last scene, which has a twist. Salon called the film a cross between MB and Lady Chatterley’s Lover.
I think you might be onto something here. The only contemporary female philosopher worth reading, IMO, is Camille Paglia:
“There is no female Mozart because there is no female Jack the Ripper.”
…and even she is all about sexuality.
@david foster
I believe you may have mentioned Age of Longing before, but I let that slip through the cracks. I’m requesting it right now – will report back once I’ve read it. It really does sound very compelling.
@The Deuce
Haha, seriously. It’s funny – I came across an online debate about whether David D”Angelo (who writes for men) and Christian Carter (who writes for women) might be the same person. They’re not, although DD may be writing stuff for CC – they’re in the same company. In any case, lots of people objected to the idea that one person could write advice to both women and men. I understand where this comes from – how can one write for two opposing mating strategies? And yet it seems to me that both sexes benefit if both sexes get better at mating. That means knowing one’s own sexuality, and also knowing something about the sexuality of the opposite sex. Increasingly, I’m straddling that fence, but so far have had no crises of conscience on this score.
Women don’t want Avrams, they want Ilans. The reason I am pro-Game is because an Avram who becomes an Ilan is a better catch than a natural Ilan (channeling Athol Kay).
One more comment on the Koestler book I mentioned earlier–in addition to its perspective on overall socio-political trends, the book is interesting in terms of SMP theory. Fedya, the Communist who beds the heroine, is an Alpha in that he is self-confident, aggressive, dominating, and attractive to women although not good-looking. (He is the only man who has ever satisfied Hydie sexually despite his complete lack of interest in foreplay.) OTOH, he is Beta in that he is a completely obedient member of the Party, to the point of being willing to return to Russia as a prisoner in a labor camp, if that is what the Party requires of him.
Julien, who wants Hydie but has been relegated to the friend zone, is also pretty self-confident, plus he has demonstrated his courage as a member of the Resistance and is a successful poet. What appears to turn Hydie off is his lack of hope about the future and his self-pity (“what I most dislike about you is your attitude of arrogant broken-heartedness”)
@filrabat
I don’t know if I agree with never, but I do believe this is largely true wrt both sexes. A strong love of excitement means that the person has a highly developed (perhaps too highly developed) dopamine reward system and prizes novelty and risk-seeking. This is directly opposed to long-term relationship success.
@VI
Excellent observation. And yet women willingly signing up for harem membership deny this reality.
@Joe,
You can’t have nice and thuggish, but you CAN have nice and manly. There’s a big difference. I’m not saying for men to be thugs, but for men to be men. Men want to protect their families, to fight for honorable causes, and to play with weapons (like little boys play with fake guns, swords and lasers?). What’s wrong with that?
Hope…”Men want to protect their families, to fight for honorable causes, and to play with weapons (like little boys play with fake guns, swords and lasers?). What’s wrong with that?”
There is presently an anti-toy-gun movement which has reached genuinely insane levels.
I hope you’re just ignorant about contemporary philosophy because the alternative would be too much for me to bear.
Although most philosophers are male, women do make significant contributions to contemporary philosophy. Here is a list of great female philosophers written by the very woman you claim to respect. IMHO, no list of contemporary female philosophers is incomplete without Martha Nussbaum, who deserves half the credit for reviving contemporary virtue ethics.
If you’d prefer some lighter reading in philosophy, you might want to check out Ask Philosophers. It’s a great site, I’ve asked them 100 questions and I always get intelligent responses. Do you see any difference in quality between the answers written by female panelists rather than male? Isn’t amazing how a woman can write quality philosophical literature?
@Susan, sure, link to yohami.com what did you read?
Here’s what’s wrong with women; when they dissolve an engagement to a man because their “highly” attractive boss makes a move, proceed to have sex then get dumped because said boss meets someone else, then where do you put faith in one? On top of it, when the rationalization that the ex-fiancee is a boring, dependable guy and not what’s wanted, even though she went through the process of agreeing to marry him, at 23 but will be someone to latch onto at 33. I told her point blank good luck and let me know how that turns out for you.
It’s not hypergamy gals that’s enabling you to live like complete dumbasses dear ladies. It’s the un-natural outcome of using birth control that is. There is noting inherently natural happening in today’s society with its use.
First I read everything that Rivelino has linked to or quoted. Then I found your conversation with White and Nerdy – which I thought you handled very well. He can be difficult to communicate with. Finally, googled your name, checked out your blog, twitter, fb page etc.
The bottom line is that you are not only a model of successful self-development, but are also a gifted communicator and teacher. And your laid-back demeanor helps in keeping the tone even and rational. All of this is much needed in our corner of the web, IMO.
@demirogue
That’s harsh – and your disgust with women is understandable. I’ll stand by my claim that unrestrained hypergamy is problematic, but I won’t quibble about your claim that the Pill is screwing with the SMP as well – it undoubtedly is. Though it’s generally thought to make more feminized men attractive to women, because it suppresses ovulation/monthly testosterone surge.
@Susan, awesome
@GudEnuf
Rest assured, it’s entirely a matter of ignorance on my part. Which means that I shouldn’t have made a statement about no one else being worth reading. Sorry.
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Philosophy is a real hole in my education. I have heard of Martha Nussbaum – in fact, I think CP has written about her. Will check out the links you provided.
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Thank you for putting up with my shortcomings
(like little boys play with fake guns, swords and lasers?). What’s wrong with that?
Nope they don’t there is a lot of anti-violence movement for kids that is taking away that part as well. So yeah the lack of male manliness is taking over a whole new generation
@david foster, that’s sad. It’s partially female ignorance of violence that leads to this sad state. We do great violence to the world in being alive, our bodies destroy countless bacteria, our food including eating of plants destroy living beings, and our lifestyles trample upon nature. That is not to say we should all be ruthless and tyrannical, but these same women who want to keep men tamed are also losing attraction to men who are no longer men.
Even in countries without citizen rights to own guns, little boys play with toy guns and play rough with each other. This is another reason why boys and girls do not play together in more traditional countries. The genders are not the same. In the positive light, women use their emotions to nurture and men use their strength to protect. In the negative sense, women use their emotions to manipulate and men use their strength to brutalize.
@Joe, my husband also took years of martial arts, and again those skills can be used in different ways. Little boys from a young age choose a side, and most of them choose to side with the good guys. Unfortunately when women de-masculinize all the violence out of men, they have to break the rules and be bad guys in order to be manly at all. You see this sad state of affairs where guys call those being on the good side in video games “pansies,” “softies” and “goodie two shoes.”
The evil / bad / dark side is more powerful today thanks to feminizing the rule-following boys. That is a grave blow and a danger to civilization, which was built on the concept of order triumphing over chaos, rules and regulations being superior to lawlessness, and the good guys who are brave heroes and protectors banding together to overpower the bad guys who are villains and thugs.
Being capable of violence is a fundamentally manly thing. It is NOT evil in and of itself. Don’t succumb to the popular lies, and reclaim your masculinity without needing to be “bad.” That is an essential part of what makes my husband so sexy and manly. He is strongly polarized toward the good, and he can and will fight for the good, the righteous and the just.
this for me raises an interesting issue when you consider the relatively rare breed of society alpha females. Look at Madonna for example. I imagine there is a huge internal conflict for her. A high level of social dominance, sexual attractiveness (at least 15 years ago, although not everyone’s taste), social prestige and financial resources.
You get the impression no man has ever been quite ‘man’ enough – how could you compete with her clout? I imagine a huge conflict between her need to dominate and be in control (witness loads of toy boys) and an internal desire to be dominated?
Pop quiz: Who is more likely to break up because the relationship lacks “magic”?
@GudEnuf
Good catch! I can’t find a copy of the whole study online – surprising, because it dates to 1986. Very interesting – I want to know more!
VI hit it on the head. Many women get an inflated sense of value since men do virtually all the approaching.
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Susan, I appreciate how often you bring up the female causality in the current SMP. Here’s a great example of how women cause their own problems with men: The net result of female hypergamy is a large pool of reasonably attractive yet celibate males. Keenly aware of their lower value and celibacy, some of these men realize (correctly) that for them to get laid, they have to cast their net wide. So they start hitting on every woman who looks even remotely single. Every once in a while, one of them is in just the right mood and puts out.
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What does this mean for women? It means that male approaches give them no useful information. In order for a male’s approach to convey value information, the guy can’t be desperate for sex. At the very least, he needs to believe that he can get laid if he wants to. (Is this an argument for legalized prostitution? It might be…).
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So it’s a catch-22 for women. For them to know anything about their value, most men around them need to be NOT DESPERATE for sex. But women are only interested in sex with the highest possible males, so most males remain celibate. And desperate.
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I don’t know if there’s an easy solution. You can’t very well tell women to begin implementing sympathy screws so they’ll get a better idea of which guys are genuinely on their level. But it appears that you can’t talk them out of hypergamy, either. It’s a self-perpetuating cycle of ignorance (of “real” sex rank) and male frustration.
Judging each other by our own gender’s standards, men and women will disgust each other. It’s a natural reaction. A women doesn’t want to think of her man’s polyamorous thoughts, and a man doesn’t want to think of his girl as a hypergamous id monster.
We can accept the reality, but whether we do so or not, it will continue to be true. If a man can’t overcome the disgust, he will either be celibate or a player for life. If he can, he might be able to become monogamous, if that’s what he wants.
@hambydammit, I think most women know the ballpark of their physical attractiveness. Most non-fat women with no obvious deformations in their 20s are at a minimum rated 6 in the overall market.
The big (no pun intended) issue affecting female hypergamy is that an otherwise average female some years ago is now much rarer due to the epidemic of weight gain. There are lots of men who would have gone for the average girl years ago, but now something like half the female population is overweight, so the pool of women who meet the “minimal attractive threshold” has decreased for the same pool of men.
The single, non-fat 6 is now as scarce as a 7 or 8 when it comes to the overall market. Some have ventured as far to say any skinny woman is an automatic 7 (!). Scarcity increases the value and price. That’s why you now see so many men hitting on the same group of women. Even “chubby” girls are getting more attention as there are women who are obviously obese.
Incidentally, a smart, educated woman of higher socioeconomic status is more likely to keep in shape, hence a double choosiness. The twin influences of obesity rising in women and feminized traits in men keep the market conditions rather terrible.
Hope wrote:
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Well, yes. Most non-fat women are at least a six. But I think most women would be shocked to know that they’re probably not much over a six. Genuine 9s and 10s are extremely rare, and there really aren’t a lot of women who are hot enough to get by on looks alone. My informal observation is that most 6s and 7s act as if they are 8s or 9s. And that’s enough to throw a gear in the works, since most of those girls want to get an 8 or 9 guy.
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Conversely, most non-fat guys are also at least a 6. (For any women reading this and disagreeing, it’s the hypergamy talking.) So… if most guys are 6s or 7s, and most girls are 6s or 7s… then most guys ought to be getting laid by most girls, right? But they’re not, which means that the females are over-valuing themselves, even if only by a little bit.
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Also true. And unfortunately, this exaggerates the over-valuation of the reasonably attractive non-fat females. Since most of the guys are passing over up to half of the single girls because they’re fat, all of the guys are hitting on half of the women. Even the ones they’d pass over if there were more options.
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I agree.
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Yep. However, and this is the crux of my position, the “genuine” 8 and 9 guys are STILL going to get the genuine 8 and 9 girls for the relationships, and they’re still going to pump and dump the automatic 7s and chubby girls. And those girls will still wonder why they keep getting used by the guys they’re choosing to have sex with. And the answer is STILL that they’re not saying yes to the 6 and 7 guys who would be likely to believe they had hit the peak of their sexual value and stay in a relationship.
@hambydammit, non-fatness in a man does not grant automatic 6 or 7 status. I have been in relationships with men who were overweight. My husband is sporting a bit of a chubby gut, but it matters not one bit to me. Men and women have different attraction triggers. You ought to know that after reading the manosphere.
I do agree that the 9-10 men would only commit to hard (not adjusted) 9-10 women, the kind that would turn heads anywhere, the kind that every woman in the room knows is hotter than her. But for us mere mortals in the 6-7 range, a 6-7 guy is still not every non-fat guy who just shows up.
5 is average. A 20-something woman who’s not fat is a 6 because she’s above average in attractiveness. A 6-7 man by definition must also be above average. He would possess above average intellect, above average strength, above average manliness and above average dominance. The “average” man who has none of these qualities is not a 6 or 7.
I may have slightly different criteria for increasing a man’s score, such as weighing raw intelligence higher. But the point remains that it might seem like the 6 and 7 girls are ignoring the 6 and 7 guys (in your eyes), yet in the girls’ eyes those guys are more like 4 and 5s.
I have been guilty of this myself, as I only wanted men who can carry on a deep conversation and have IQ at least one standard deviation above the mean. That’s less than 10% of the population. I was more than willing to compromise on wealth rank to get a “9.5″ in smarts, and I got it in my husband.
@hamby
That’s what reminded me of the final sentence of Gatsby. It’s a vicious cycle, made worse in recent decades.
I can’t imagine any reason why good looks would be distributed differently between the sexes. There has to be a roughly equal number of 1s thru 10s in the population. Obviously, when you add in social dominance, the male scale shifts, and that shift can be dramatic. However, this reliance on dominance is exaggerated due to conditions in the SMP. Plenty of girls married nice beta guys in previous eras, and they didn’t walk up the aisle saying “meh.” Actually, plenty of nice girls still marry betas, but the relationships are more likely to run into trouble.
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I have to agree with Hope that a guy is not automatically a six if he’s not overweight. Most women don’t like skinny guys either. The gangly geek is a frequent object of scorn. Only the hipsters in their skinny jeans can pull it off. It occurs to me that unless more women than men are obese, then we’ve got fat guys claiming that chubby women don’t trip their attraction triggers. Seems hypocritical.
re: Hebrews and Egypt
“Hebrew” evolved from ancient Egyptian word “Habiru”, and they were not slaves in Egypt. During the Babylonian Captivity (ca. 500 BC), their history was re-written to turn them against Egypt, and they were returned to Israel to serve as a buffer protecting Babylon from Egypt. Leaders of empires think geo-strategically. (on a related note, “Is Ra El” is three Egyptian words meaning “throne of the sun god”.)
re: female philosophers
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Let’s not forget Ayn Rand. But ignore everything everyone says ABOUT her – both supporters and detractors – until you read her yourself. The Fountainhead is greatness (and an advocacy of greatness) but it’s huge.
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I recommend starting with Introduction to Objectivist Epistomology (the study of “how do you know what the truth is”); it’s a small non-fiction work, and one of the best things I have ever read.
Have you seen this? Narcissists know they’re narcissists:
http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/beautiful-minds/201103/do-narcissists-know-they-are-narcissists
Imagine the hottest man that could theoretically exist. Don’t hold back, you’re allowed to imagine whatever you want! Now imagine the ugliest man that could possibly exist (remember, use your imagination!)
If you’re anything like me, your hottest man imaginable doesn’t look too different that the men we already see on magazine covers. Personally, I don’t think it would be possible to improve much on Katy Perry, even I had God’s paintbrush.
On the other hand, when I think of the ugliest woman imaginable, she barely looks human. Multiple heads, gigantic teeth, oozing skin—stuff that you wouldn’t ever see expect in a horror movie. She is far, far uglier than Katy Perry is hot.
Compare your hottest man theoretical man to your ugliest theoretical man. Which looks more like your average man?
My guess is that the average person is far closer the upper limit of human attractiveness than the lower limit.
@Hope:
That’s not what I said. I said most non-fat men are 6s or 7s. Yes, women view fatness in men less harshly than men do women. But fatness is still a negative for guys, and a guy who would be a 6 or 7 generally moves to a 4 or 5 if he’s fat. And I mean fat by guy standards, not girl standards. So chubbiness does not count as fat in men.
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But… (check your hypergamy meter)… assuming symmetry — that is, the distance from a 2 to a 3 is the same as the distance from an 8 to a 9 — there will be a basic bell curve for both men and women. Not many true stinkers, not many true babes, lots of folks in the middle. If you’re a woman, and you think most men are NOT at least average, you are judging men more harshly than women. And that’s hypergamy.
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Look at it another way. Again, we have to maintain symmetry or the scale is meaningless, so we’re assuming that a male 5 is equivalent to a female 5. That is, by the appropriate standards of attractiveness, a male 5 has as many desirable qualities for females as a female 5 has for males. That means that in a perfectly equal SMP, the female 5s would have to settle for male 5s.
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I’m sorry in advance for this, Hope, but…. LADIES AND GENTLEMEN: I Give you Female Hypergamy in Action.
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No. A 6 or a 7 would have above average Intellect OR strength OR manliness OR dominance. He would be A LITTLE above average. A man who has five or six above average traits is WAY above average.
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You’re presuming that the traits are distributed independently. Intelligence, looks, wealth, and personality are all positively correlated; find one of them and you’ll likely find another.
Susan wrote:
I also agree with you and Hope that being non-fat isn’t an automatic 6 or 7. And if you look back, you’ll see that isn’t what I said in the first place. I said most guys who aren’t fat are 6s or 7s. I’ll refine that and say they’re probably 6s. But one of the things women DO LIKE in men is decent proportion. As you say, over-skinny isn’t much better than over-fat. So the 1-4s are generally going to be either fat or too skinny IN ADDITION to lacking other desirable qualities. They aren’t 1-4s just because they’re fat or skinny.
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In contrast, most guys who take care of themselves to any reasonable degree are going to have decent bodies, which will — as with women — generally make them at least average IF they don’t have any hideous deformities. And if you read my comment to Hope above, you’ll see that — as with women — a man who possesses one or two “pluses” and is otherwise average is above average. Which means a 6 or 7.
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The point I’m making is that for scales to have any meaning, they must be comparable. And that means that women who are 6s have one or two features that are above average. And that’s MOST women who aren’t fat. To be an 8, a woman must have SEVERAL above average qualities.
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And this is part of the over-valuation women routinely fall victim to. It’s safe to say that all other things being equal, fat puts a girl on the <5 side of the scale. (Sorry. It's true.) So we can say that if all we know about a girl is that she's not fat, we can say she's a baseline 5. If she has one or two other good qualities — great hair and perky breasts, for instance — that means shes probably a 6. And most guys will bone a 6. But that doesn't mean they think she's equal to them. Which brings us back to hypergamy.
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Maybe this will make things clearer: Men, being prone to easier casual sex than women, will typically hook up with any girl 6 or above. Women, being prone to reticence, will NOT typically hook up with any guy just for being 6 or above. That DOES NOT mean that the guys aren't 6s. They are 6s, but the women are choosing not to have sex with them. And that's kind of the whole point, right?
I’ve never seen any scientific correlation between intelligence and looks. Half of the problem with great looking people is that they are often dickbags. Wealth can buy enhancement, so yes, wealth and good looks are somewhat correlated. But beyond that, I’m not buying it.
Bleh… sorry for comment spamming, but I just thought of a better way to explain this. In rating themselves, women think a nice rack, flat belly, and good hair make them a 7 or 8. But look around — most women have nice enough breasts, and if they’re not fat, they probably have a reasonably flat belly, and most women take care of their hair.
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That means that a nice rack, flat belly, and good hair are AVERAGE. To be a 8 or 9, you must have more than that.
I mean think about it: what does it take to look good? You’ve got to be smart to know how to dress in a way that compliments your looks. You’ve got to be rich enough to afford the good makeup and clothes. You’ve got to have the self-discipline to eat right and exercise. And you’ve got to have good genetics (due to assortative mating, good genetics in one area is correlated with good genetics in another area). So if you see someone who looks physically attractive, there’s a good chance they’ve got something else going for them too.
@hambydammit, most desirable traits in men are clustered together. That is, a man who is above average in manliness is also likely to be physically stronger and more dominant. Granted, intelligence might be unlinked from this, but out of the 4 traits I listed 3 of them are closely related, so it’s in reality only 2 traits.
Now take the female analogy. Physical attractiveness is obviously first, but niceness, agreeableness and sweetness are also closely linked. Would you say that a man who wants a woman who is slightly above average in those 4 traits is asking too much? I bet not. So why do you hate on women who are asking for above average on 4 traits?
To put it another way. Can you think of a man who is too weak to pick up a 100lb waif of a woman as masculine or dominant? Can you think of a woman who is always frowning and bitchy as also sweet? I have no issues with a female 5 getting together with a male 5, or a female 7 with a male 7, but you define my version of a male 7 as male 9 it seems. If that’s the case, then I should not have been able to get my husband, who is a male 9 according to your definition.
Beautiful people are more intelligent.
Here ya go.
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