I said I’d be away until after May 1st, but I lied because Athol Kay has a post up that made my heart sing, and I wanted to share it with you. Are Women Like Exotic Pets?
One of the strangest things I’ve encountered as a blogger overlapping with the manosphere is a view of women as rapacious man-eating vixens, cold-blooded fiends who suck the life out of men and should be caged during ovulation. According to this view, we’re devoid of moral character and lacking a cerebral cortex, guided instead by something called the “hindbrain.” We’re sexual Terminators, ruthlessly and relentlessly searching for the more dominant male, the bigger asshole, the man most likely to leave us brokenhearted (if we had a heart).
If we’ve been “lucky” enough to have such a thug in our past, a man must be on guard at all times for signs of “alpha relapse.” Preventing us from having such errant thoughts is critical, and this can only be accomplished by acting like a bigger asshole. The thinking is that if men can keep us sad, threatened, anxious, worried, suspicious and jealous we won’t have the time or mental energy to find another man attractive, much less cheat.
We’re also programmed to reject any man who reveals his humanity, vulnerability, or need as a runt who can’t survive the rough and tumble world long enough to mate and care for his family.
I’ve debated this view of female nature more times than I care to admit here at HUS, and more than once I’ve wracked my brain to come up with a single example of a woman who fits this description. I believe they do exist, but only because I’ve seen them on TV.
The worst thing about this view is that it destroys the ability of men and women to relate to one another in any meaningful way. A relationship with such a woman would be doomed, or so entirely self-destructive it would make no sense to try. Athol Kay, a rational male blogger whose method of saving and improving marriages has won him well-deserved accolades and success, relies on science and actual results rather than hyperbole and hucksterism.
Athol received the following letter from a Reader who shares my horror at the dystopian vision (excerpted):
The Manosphere paints women in a pretty ugly light (by my standards), and I can’t help but think if it is really that bad, why bother at all? If my SO’s true nature is like that, what is the purpose of being with her? …What I’m being told is that no woman will ever understand me, understand my concerns or issues, and doesn’t really want to know what makes me tick. The impression I get from them is that women are like kids at Disneyland: They love the rides, but don’t want to know how they work, and would be disappointed to find out.
…I get the feeling that what is described is much more like owning an exotic pet than having a mate…How can I emotionally bond with someone if I can’t tell her how I really think and feel? How can we support each other if we don’t understand each other? Can I ever expect her to understand on any level the dedication and work I’m putting in? How can I keep her from taking me for granted if she has NO idea what I’m doing to make things work?
Athol’s response (also excerpted):
Most of the Game websites view women exactly as you say, as “exotic pets” and they give advice as such. Frankly though, if women really are exotic pets, you shouldn’t mess with one at all. Eventually every animal has a bad day, and a 400 pound tiger having a bad day isn’t the same as a 10 pound cat having a bad day. Likewise, if women are essentially dangerous wild animals, divorce and cheating are essentially assured unless you relentlessly manage their behavior. If that were truly the case, my advice would be to buy a Fleshlight, a ten-foot-pole and the highest quality streaming porn money can buy.
He goes on to desribe the reality:
- Both men and women have biological drives toward a primary pair bond and opportunistic sex.
- Both men and women have modern socialization, education and intellect.
- Both men and women have access to technology that can gain some degree of control over sexual outcomes.
- Both men and women have rationalization hamsters.
And then he describes what separates man from all other animals:
Most importantly, both men and women can have either an unconscious relationship, or a conscious relationship. By unconscious relationship, I mean they simply go along through life believing that all their feelings and thoughts are something that they have no control over or ever hope to understand.
The conscious relationship, however, acknowledges that we have a ton of hormones and neurotransmitters following ancient programming telling us how to think and feel…Because we are conscious of these things, we can also exert some conscious control over them by our actions. We can actually adapt and outwit our own biology to some extent. We can understand that we’re designed for a primary pair bond and also opportunistic sex, and be able to pull off monogamy by having regular sex together, and also some highly irregular high intensity sex together. One hits the oxytocin response, the other hits the dopamine one. Thus fooled, our bodies relax and tell us we’re happy.
…What most of the Manosphere advises assumes that the male is conscious (“Takes the Red Pill”) and the female is unconscious.
…If your SO is conscious and self-aware, I think there’s plenty of hope for a genuinely deep friendship along with the nuts and bolts of having to keep up the basic opposite sex attractiveness. Wife selection is absolutely critical though. Some women believe they are exotic animals, and they should be avoided. You can’t make a tiger into a house cat.
Perhaps the Red Pill should be a controlled substance, as overdoses seem common and casualties are mounting. You don’t have to take my word for it, you can get the truth from your Uncle Athol.
{ 1050 comments… read them below or add one }
« 1 … 4 5 6 7 8 »
@OTC, @SayWhaat
I think there are a couple of things going on here. One is a full generation between you. The SMP has changed a lot in 20 years. The sex ratio in college has definitely worked in favor of college guys in general – more guys are going to get action than previously because the demand exceeds the supply.
I’ve said this before – I personally know a couple of dozen beta guys who have ONSs, choose when to get into a relationship, etc. even as they struggle with inevitable oneitis. I recall saying that most of them have a count over 10 and OTC said that means they’re alpha, not beta. But that is not the case. They’re nowhere near players, and they have a lot of beta traits. They’re routinely described as “nice” and “sweet.” I’m not saying it’s easy for beta guys to be manwhores – the young players I know have been with 50-100 girls. But they’re not in the sexual desert, by any means.
Heh, I wasn’t kidding.
Anyway, I think you and the folks you know, are an in elite sexual conclave, where even the losers are winners. Remember those CDC charts, they are not 20 years old. You simply haven’t met the low-count people for whatever reason. It appears nearly everyone you know is in that top quintile.
And now I see I’ve cross posted with Emily as well.
I agree that a lot of the frustration people have in debate here comes from the age range. It’s not a bad thing to have a variety of perspectives, in fact I think it’s really useful to observe how things change over time.
I do think we all need to keep an open mind. I went off the market in the early 80s, and the difference between then and now is absolutely staggering. The 90s is when hookup culture really took hold, as more and more dorms went coed and schools drifted further from in loco parentis type attitudes. That was a period of transition, so people had a wider variety of experiences.
I don’t know if it’s true or not, but perhaps the estimated 20% of women who are giving sex-on-demand to alphas are mostly made up of girls in the, idk, 6-8 range, or 5-7, or whatever. So that if guys are focusing their efforts on 6-8 gals, their perception of hook up norms are not going to match the stats.
@Jesus
Of course we don’t know how good looking the 20% of women is. Studies of hookup behavior do suggest that women trade casual sex for temporary access to a “top male,” and also that the most attractive women are reluctant to make that deal. My guess is that a lot of those women are 6-7. That’s where Karen Owen fits in, certainly. My guess is that the freshmen targets who get burned by a player are probably much better looking than the girls still being passed around senior year. Buy you have said your ex was very pretty, so I’m sure there’s a lot of variation, with self-esteem being the key factor there.
Sorry, not sure what you mean here.
*enclave. Thank you ipad.
Maybe, IDK. If that’s true then the top quintile is comprised of a lot more than players. Most players would claim 50+ partners – obviously that’s just a sliver of the male population.
We’re also back to the problem of how to define alpha. If I know a sweet boy who turns sluts down for Round 2 and wants nothing more than a serious gf, is he alpha because he says yes to Round 1? I don’t think so. I think in terms of alpha traits and beta traits as aspects of a person’s demeanor and presentation, not in terms of lays. I can think of one guy with hundreds of notches, but his narcissism is off the charts and he has no real intimacy with another human being. He’s obviously miserable. How could that possibly be alpha, something other men should or would even want to aspire to?
Re: Ron Perlman’s Beauty and the Beast
Vincent not Alpha? C’mon, he kicks everybody else’s ass, all the other men pee their pants at the sight of him. On top of that, he has practically the entire Western poetic canon memorized. His “sewer” looks like Norma Desmond’s mansion.
Ron Perlman’s a shaved ape, but he’s always been a panty-soaker. Look at Sons Of Anarchy In fact, my daughter calls SOA the “hot boy cafeteria”. She’s had major crushes on Jax, Opie, Juice, Half-Sack, and even Tig.
LIza207:
“This brings me to another male rationalization, I want to add: being in denial and clueless about their own SMV. I believe this affects males way more than it does women.”
The first part is right but it’s not male rationalization. It’s men not understanding how attraction works. Many men think that women approach attraction the same way men do — some are just more attractive than others, but they wrongly think that most men are attractive to most women. That’s not true at all, as all of us here know (or should know).
The second part is completely wrong, in my opinion. Any woman above a 4 in attractiveness can get sex anytime she wants. I think most women in today’s SMP think they are much more attractive than they really are. Most women have an incredibly inflated view of their own SMVs.
I agree with deti on this. It’s true that women are force fed all kinds of unrealistic body images their entire lives. The truth is, 99.9% of women don’t come close to resembling Barbie. Yet female narcissism has climbed dramatically in the last 20 years – that’s clinical diagnoses of NPD.
I believe that women are capable of great self-deception wrt looks. Just as an anorexic woman can look in the mirror and see a fat girl, I think a lot of women layer on the makeup, put on slutty clothing, bleach their hair to straw, and see Barbie in the mirror.
I’ve personally witnessed many average looking women describe themselves as being smoking hot. In fairness, I’ve also seen those women describe their average looking partners as being smoking hot.
Dogsquat:
“Yeah, this one reason so many men get angry and sad when they’re Red Pilled [because game works and gets men laid] – I couldn’t have said it better myself. Damned if they don’t, but accused of low morals if they do.”
I added that parenthetical statement because it’s what I read into it from the context. One of the things I considered in my head when stumbling onto the manosphere was “how can this work? Game isn’t NICE. It’s manipulation. It’s Jedi mind tricks. It’s the exact OPPOSITE of what every single person told me growing up about how this mess works. If I tried this on my wife she’d dry up like a sack of potatoes.”
Nope.
I got myself into a situation with my wife where I’m backed up against the wall and have no choice but to run some game. And to my astonishment, it worked. Like a charm.
That’s why a lot of men get angry and sad when that red pill goes down. And you realize you have only just now learned the truth. And you realize that some will accuse you of douchebaggery and being “NOT NICE”.
It’s entirely possible to run Game without lying to anyone or manipulating their emotions. You can control someone’s perception of you without harming them in any way. Witholding admiration is not lying. Failing to vomit your emotions onto someone else is not lying. Telling them you’re the boss and not putting up with their BS isn’t lying. Working to create an impression of emotional investment – pretending to care, “I’m so happy you aren’t with anyone else, I like you so much!” – that’s just pure douchebaggery and unacceptable.
We’re not talking about niceness, we’re talking about integrity. Big difference. Tucker Max isn’t nice, but he did have integrity, as far as we know. He never engaged in “courting” behaviors, he was clear on wanting casual only. Pretending you want casual when you want more, or pretending you want more when you only want casual is morally wrong. I honestly can’t even see where the wiggle room is here.
Deti – “That’s why a lot of men get angry and sad when that red pill goes down. And you realize you have only just now learned the truth. And you realize that some will accuse you of douchebaggery and being “NOT NICE”.”
This. But for me, it was myself making accusations of douchebaggery. I felt like scum after the realization hit me, and I fought accepting the truth for months because of it.
@Susan
True integrity vs. nice but thats not what deti meant.
Nice is currently defined as being submissive, deferntial and a loser. Actually for a guy to be nice he pretty much has to be a woman.
As we all know it doesn’t work.
So guess what, as you described having integrity. People will still label men as “not nice” for that behaviour.
Sucks when either your an ass who gets laid or the moral superior who dies alone.
It is not possible to be labelled both nice/good and be successful with women. And its not the fault of the women but the way we define nice which is totally of the fuckin rocker.
Susan – “Pretending you want casual when you want more, or pretending you want more when you only want casual is morally wrong. I honestly can’t even see where the wiggle room is here.”
Your statement above is too restrictive. I would wager that many if not most women in general would be upset if not outright pissed off to find out they had been “gamed”, regardless if it was a ONS or a 10 year marriage. I understand that YOU are interested in integrity here, but what Deti is pointing out is that for many women, integrity doesn’t even come into play. It is simply the fact that they were manipulated in some “game” way to behave as a man wanted that will send her through the roof. To most women, the concept of game is completely unacceptable. But, they are more than willing to play the part as long as they can claim they didn’t know. Plausible deniability in action.
I’d love to completely remove that dynamic from play. The easiest way I know how? Take game mainstream. Once women can no longer claim they didn’t know, they can’t make excuses for bad behavior and blame men for simply following their “path of least resistance”.
In your example, if Jane had full knowledge of game and still fell for it, would you feel like she was taken advantage of?
I’ve personally witnessed many average looking women describe themselves as being smoking hot. In fairness, I’ve also seen those women describe their average looking partners as being smoking hot.
That’s the same term most of the married men in the ‘sphere use to describe their wives and most of the PUAs use to describe their gfs.
Sue: “How could that possibly be alpha, something other men should or would even want to aspire to?”
He truly sounds miserable, I bet he cries himself to sleep every night.
Simple, a guy like him has physical needs met (maybe exceeded), but no “real intimacy” as you say. A man who is alone has neither his needs met, nor “real intimacy”.
Something is better than nothing. Thus, the player wins.
“I get the impressino these dudes really want a world where women to jump at the chance to date or hook up with a guy solely because he-wants-her.”
—-
Courtley,
This the impression I have always gotten from most men as well. They want you therefore, you should just make yourself available–pure entitlement. Men seem to want to be the only ones who have the right to choose the partners they desire. They don’t want women to have standards of any kind when it comes to choosing them.
@Lokland
I hear you. In fact, more than ever I feel like we just don’t have the right words to say what we mean.
Courtley and Liza, you do awesome Amanda Marcotte impressions!
Can I hire you for parties?
Biggest losers: The most attractive women, whose “natural, assortative” mates are now preoccupied with banging 7s. And of course the least attractive members of both sexes, unless they get with each other.
The happiest marriage I know of is between two people in the 2-3 range. At approx 5’4″, he looks likes a minature version of Lenin. She is 5’2″ x 5’2″ and has a gummy smile. They are both extraordinarly nice people and are so happy and grateful to have each other. Most people would envy their relationship.
What I mean is, if promiscuity is in fact more common in the 6-8 or 5-7 range, then the experience of guys who are, for the most part, targeting girls in this range are not going to match the statistics that say only 20% of girls are promiscuous.
I feel like there’s underlying resentment against very attractive women for wanting very attractive men because those men are–in the Manosphere contruct–less deserving of female attention because they are assholes.
I’m not as bothered by the guys lusting after 9-10 girls (because that’s normal) as I am by the disdain some have for the girls that they would normally wind up due to assortative mating. IOW, it doesn’t bother me than an HB 5-equivalent guy would want Megan Fox; it bothers me that he turns up his nose at an HB 5 gal or thinks that Game will get him an HB 8.
If what Tom did is Game, I wouldn’t endorse it. There is nothing in Game that condones Tom’s behavior, AFAIK. Once again, we’re on the cusp of light and dark. If you need to covertly manipulate, deceive and instill dread to keep your relationship alive, your relationship sucks. Maybe it’s better than splitting, IDK, but I’ll never condone it.
Saying “I have to be this way to get women” does not fly with me. Find some different women. At the very least, find a woman who’s as douchey as you are. That’s not what Tom did. He targeted a girl for sex knowing she liked him so much she hadn’t even kissed another guy from August to February.
As I’ve said before, history and literature both are filled with tales of cads sexually corrupting women. They are generally loathed by all, including other men. It’s one thing to play a woman who’s hopping onto the carousel, it’s something altogether different to target a woman minding her own business and talk her into riding by pretending to care for her.
I don’t want to go down this rabbit hole again, so I’ll stop here. Like I said, women aren’t going to be able to make informed choices until we equip them with portable polygraph machines.
@OTC
Right, but if you’re going to learn Game, why not go for both?
” Like I said, women aren’t going to be able to make informed choices until we equip them with portable polygraph machines.”
Damn that would make the first or second date VERY interesting.
The same could be said about men as well Susan. But even that might not help,them, since it seems most women are completely oblivious to their own triggers. I wonder how many would pass a polygraph when asked if they find “nice” men attractive?
Good point! You’re right – if the market is segmented, and a guy targets one specific niche, his experience and perceptions will vary according to the characteristics of women in that niche. It’s the same thing that happens with guys – most women will say that “all guys are jerks” and “no guys want relationships” because they are only aware of that 20% of promiscuous guys.
Pluralistic ignorance also plays a role here – the promiscuous people are just more visible in the crowd, for obvious reasons.
@Jackie
There were so many strange things that she did, that in retrospect make perfect sense when filtered through an NPD.
That’s why it’s such a relief to know. When my mom was diagnosed, her shrink commented that I almost looked happy. And I was! Things now made sense.
But my mom had perpetually low self-esteem and mine isn’t especially high either.
Yeah, I find that LSE lingers. I still fight that battle. I have a lot of unearned shame about I don’t even know what. I have a lingering sense that “something is wrong,” but I couldn’t rationally say what it is.
PS: The hilarious thing was, she still saw herself as a 9 or a 10– the beauty standard. Still the belle of the ball– at 70+ years old! Have you ever seen “Sunset Boulevard”? I’m ready for my close-up, Mr. DeMille!
OMG, I’m LMAO.
Susan – “Right, but if you’re going to learn Game, why not go for both?”
1. Learning game gets a guy lots of female attention. He may simply be thrilled at the action.
2. Learning game tends to paint women in a negative light for many guys, so they become less inclined to even want a LTR or marriage.
3. The legal setup we have in the West is strongly sided in women’s favor. Many men may simply feel it is best to sex it up and remain unattached to protect their legal assets.
I can keep going…
“Something is better than nothing. Thus, the player wins.”
I once held this naive belief. It is interesting that men’s needs are boiled down to sex, and nothing else. Lonely guys want companionship as much as anything else. Players aren’t interested in that kind of thing. What a false dilemma indeed.
@SaayWhat–Absolutely welcome to the club!
@Jacke re 16 & PG/Teen Moms
I actually make my sons watch these shows with me. We have a ritual. At the end of the show, I say, “And the moral of the story is…..” and they reply, “Be careful where you put your dick!”
Today, the average person spends 17 years between puberty and marriage. 17 years! . . It’s hardly surprising that premarital sex is the norm. . . It would perhaps be better if people married earlier, say in the 22-25 age range. I do believe the pendulum will swing back to that at some point, but at present it’s not feasible, as men are struggling financially and women are still being groomed for career superstardom.
Very incisive post. I cosiign 90% of it, but I do think though there is one issue that you aren’t considering–the extention of adolsecence into the 30s, especially for men. One thing is see among my friends’ college age kids is that the young women ARE thinking of marriage by 23 or 24, but the guys aren’t until they’re 30 or so–mostly because sex without commitment and responsibility is so available to them. A male friend recently took his son to task for not settling down in front of me. The upshot was the kid likes to work sporadically, travel, and screw a variety of girls. (Yes, I know, duh!)
Therefore, a full third of American women with a college degree will not have the opportunity to marry a man with a college degree.
OTOH, college has become high school with ashtrays over the past 20 years. Who’s to say that a plumber is not a good match for a gal with a communications degree and a job as a bank teller?
J: “One thing is see among my friends’ college age kids is that the young women ARE thinking of marriage by 23 or 24, but the guys aren’t until they’re 30 or so–mostly because sex without commitment and responsibility is so available to them.”
Well, this is to be expected. If women are free to maximize attraction, then men are free to minimize investment. We should cheer them both.
“A male friend recently took his son to task for not settling down in front of me. The upshot was the kid likes to work sporadically, travel, and screw a variety of girls. (Yes, I know, duh!)”
Let me guess, he needs to “man up” right? Invest more in women, just like the papers say? Does he also insist that women minimize their attaction? Or is it just a one way street?
“I’ve personally witnessed many average looking women describe themselves as being smoking hot. In fairness, I’ve also seen those women describe their average looking partners as being smoking hot.”
—
This is very true. I have witnessed this myself. And I have also witnessed men referring to average looking women as being smoking hot as well. So, don’t totally blame those women for that–men play a role in this.
I have always believed that for the most part women determine their own SMV based mostly on how attractive men find them or don’t. Or what men are expressing to them about their attractiveness.
In the end, men are the ones who determine which women are the most desirable, unless that has changed and no one told me.
I believe that women are capable of great self-deception wrt looks. Just as an anorexic woman can look in the mirror and see a fat girl, I think a lot of women layer on the makeup, put on slutty clothing, bleach their hair to straw, and see Barbie in the mirror.
There is the “If I dress like pretty women I’m going to look like them” effect in female psyche. Had you seen a really overweight woman wearing a clothing style for someone three times smaller? That is what she is thinking of.
They are both extraordinarly nice people and are so happy and grateful to have each other.
That is a key ingredient on a successful relationship I think being grateful for being in each other lives but then entitlement and gratefulness are diametric opposites, YMMV.
@Susan
Would you say the same for men or will you claim women don’t lie?
@Susan/J
On guys going for HB-10.
Few reasons,
1. opportunity cost- there isn’t one
2. Looks are not ALL encompassing (important no doubt but not everything)
So when you combine the two above it means that there is atleast a chance of getting sex out of HB-10 at literally no cost.
Sounds like a win-neutral situation.
And just to point out it does work. My fiance is by far the hottest women I’ve ever had the pleasure of inserting bit P into slot V with. She probably tops me by a couple points physically (if not more) whereas I have way more points in other areas that generate attraction in her. Some of that is due to game, some is innate and some I picked up totally by accident on this wonderful little adventure.
@J
Any man who loves his wife will delusioned into thinking she is smoking hot. Is it true, yes. She isn’t every going to be the hottest but thats not a requirement for men. Women are on the best program, men prefer good enough.
On another note, bragging rights are very important to men. HB-10 is worth bragging rights.
Much like chasing down a wild wildabeast and bringing back food for the tribe.
We live to compete. And after we’re down we like to flex and say how awesome we are. Of course there are different styles of bragging. Not all of them involve being a caveman.
Well, OTC, I think what my friend is looking for is grandchilren, not necessarily to have his son “man up” in the media sense of investing in a woman. From my perspective, there are both advantages and disadvantages to parenthood in your 30s. It’s physically harder, but you do gain in knowledge and maturity that does help the kids. But what my friend said to his son was “When I was your age, I had both you and my business going.” As a parent, I can understand his anxiety about seeing his son being a “playboy” when in the dad’s mind he should be “building a life.” His concerns go beyond the media debate.
On another note, bragging rights are very important to men. HB-10 is worth bragging rights.
Much like chasing down a wild wildabeast and bringing back food for the tribe.
We live to compete. And after we’re down we like to flex and say how awesome we are. Of course there are different styles of bragging. Not all of them involve being a caveman.
There was a Dominican joke about this: A HB10 approaches a guy and tells her that she is really horny and wants to have sex with him but she has a reputation to take care off and that he needs to agree no to say anything to anyone and he will get one million dollars for his silence. Well he agrees does the deed a week later…he finds her and hands her the check back “Have your money I can’t take anymore”
Not sure if is translate well just sharing.
@Megaman
I think Ted D’s point 2 is why it’s not a false dilemma for a lot of men who learn Game. The way Game is taught in a lot of places is pretty caustic to women and most men who learn it formally are already anger or bitter. One reason I looked at the whole Game world and rejected it is the assumptions about women it makes. I’ll even go so far as to say if it’s true I’d rather not give up my illusions.
The problem is once you internalize a view of women that caustic and then start getting successes that reinforce it (instead of thinking things working have an alternative explanation) I suspect you’ll start rejecting the idea of women fulfilling the need for companionship. Many more traditional cultures certainly expect people to find companionship with members of the same sex. Companionship marriage as the expectation, at least this iteration, is relatively recent and western (that isn’t to say it hasn’t happened before or elsewhere, just the the idea that marriage’s first goal is companionship is).
I suspect a not insignificant part of MGTOW is this a reflection of this. In my personal experience I know for years now I’ve more and more sorted women into two boxes: sexless people who are friends and more likely to be intimates and sexual who I might want to date but I to whom I worry about opening up.
I think Athol’s correspondent whose letter sparked this whole thread is more representative than we’d like. That’s much more bothersome than a lot of other SMP issues.
@Ana
It translates.
But to give you a different perspective one of my favorites:
Geeky guy rides up to the engineering building on a brand new Harley. His buddy sees him and asks where he got it.
“I was walking into work and this 6 ft blonde rode up on it, stopped, threw off her clothes, and said, ‘ Take whatever you want’”, the guy explains.
“Good choice,” his buddy says, “The clothes probably wouldn’t fit.”
I think a big part of the 80%’s problems is encapsulated right there.
@J
Unfinished work of feminism: building the cultural perception that men can “build a life” without a woman (ie, making it mainstream that the bicycle doesn’t need a fish either).
So it is the whole manning up thing, just in a parental concern guise. Because at the root that’s what manning up says, a man isn’t complete without a woman.
@Lokland
1. opportunity cost- there isn’t one
It think it depends on how long the search goes on. I know a 41 year old lawyer–tall, handsome, intelligent–who loved to pursue the young HB9/10s. Last year, he decided it was time to get married to a young HB 9/10, preferably religious. These girls view him as too old for more than a date or two, and he won’t even look at a 32 year old because he wants a big family. In the meantime, the clock is ticking. Sure he could go the foreign bride route, but he won’t find someone of his background (which he wants) if he does.
On another note, bragging rights are very important to men. HB-10 is worth bragging rights.
Huh. Who knew?
Because at the root that’s what manning up says, a man isn’t complete without a woman.
I see your point regarding MSM, but I think it’s really more about grandchildren in this case, especially coming from a family man of my generation to his son. The discussion took place BTW when the young man’s kid sister became engaged to a man a year or two younger than he was.
So it is the whole manning up thing, just in a parental concern guise. Because at the root that’s what manning up says, a man isn’t complete without a woman.
I think you have a point here. My husband and her brother were shamed a lot into marriage and children by their parents (as I was by mine even though it was not needed) but all single, childfree women over 30 that I know have no pressure at all for marriage and children from their parents so there is a double standard in which a single male gets more speeches about settling down than women do at least in this culture, YMMV.
“In the end, men are the ones who determine which women are the most desirable,”
.
Of course, “desirable” includes more than physical features. ONLY men get to make this determination and anyone who denigrates men for their specific desire-criteria is a jackass at best
but all single, childfree women over 30 that I know have no pressure at all for marriage and children from their parents so there is a double standard in which a single male gets more speeches about settling down than women do at least in this culture
I see people push women over 30 to marry all the time, usually adding in biological clock comments as well. I also recall receiving those comments as well.
“most women will say that “all guys are jerks” and “no guys want relationships” because they are only aware of that 20% of promiscuous guys.”
.
Then we have a majority of women [in certain locations] who will be struggling to de-harem themselves when its time to pick over the 80% of men who, if these women are lucky, would consider them for a LTR. But really, why even give these gals a shot, aside from some sort of twisted benevolent mercy-marriage?
I see people push women over 30 to marry all the time, usually adding in biological clock comments as well. I also recall receiving those comments as well.
I see the articles popping once in a while but in my circle of friends is the thing no one talks about to women in fact when I mentioned I was getting desperate at 34 most of this women were like “You are too young why the despair?” but men do get a lot of it, different circles maybe but I do notice it because in my culture both genders get the same shaming after finishing college usually.
@Herb
I don’t think lying is any more common in one sex than the other. Here we’re talking about men lying to get sex. Women can lie to get commitment, obviously, so I’d make polygraphs available to everyone. A woman who lies about her number is as guilty as Tom, in my view, for what it’s worth.
J, that’s funnily the opposite with my father-in-law. At 24-25, my husband wasn’t sleeping around or bringing a new girl home all the time, so his dad was pressuring him to play around a bit and be a “playboy” like he was when younger. Instead my husband played video games while living in his dad’s basement, and then he met me. Apparently when his dad saw my picture he approved, but my husband was looking for way more than just looks.
@Ana
Funny story. Very true.
@J
Thats a good point. The length of said screw around time does effect men just not as quickly as women.
Its not some cultural thing though. Its just biology, guys tend to have more time to dick around and pull out a good deal than woman do. (Plus the men don’t like sluts.)
So the opportunity cost is not nonexistent but just way lower for men than woman.
On another note, what dipshit waits till 41 to decide to marry. If he had kids he’d watch them graduate from a wheelchair.
@Susan
So no one can make informed choices about sex (women) or commitment (men) (after all you said women can’t make informed choices without it) and thus men are right to complain about ELPing being so common?
See, I’d like to give women credit about being able to make informed choices because they can evaluate risk and what they don’t know. The can do it even without the polygraph.
They might evaluate wrong, we all do about somethings, but this “they can’t make informed choices without a polygraph” is rationalizing that is beneath you and what you’re trying to do.
CNN has an opinion piece up titled Are Men Stupid?:
http://www.cnn.com/2012/04/23/opinion/ghitis-men-stupid/index.html
This is coming from a mainstream media source. Roissy’s blog is really nothing to get wadded up about.
I do think we all need to keep an open mind. I went off the market in the early 80s, and the difference between then and now is absolutely staggering. The 90s is when hookup culture really took hold, as more and more dorms went coed and schools drifted further from in loco parentis type attitudes. That was a period of transition, so people had a wider variety of experiences.
Yeah, when I was in college in the late 1980s in California it was already like that — I lived in coed dorms (with coed showers even) for my three upperclassmen years, and there were plenty of coed frosh dorms, too (the one I was in was segregated by floor at the time … no longer the case). There was plenty of hooking up going on (we didn’t call it that, however — mostly we called it “hanging out” or “getting together”), and there was virtually no dating at all. Our ratio was about 50/50 (it still is, because the school has a huge number of applicants and skews it in various ways to get the ratios they want in terms of sex, race, nationality and so on), but most of the guys were not getting any sex (except the guys who were “good with women” — what we called sexual alphas at the time). I will say that most of the girls were not involved in *much* sex either — there was a kind of avoidance/seriousness issue going on for many, I think (this was a serious academic school) — a lot of people were functionally celibate in college, despite living in coed dorms and so on. This was before the “hookup culture” became a hop topic, but I suspect California was just at the leading edge of the trend at the time, and we had, de facto, the hookup culture, but didn’t focus on it as such because it had yet to be named and identified as such.
So I’m not sure how much really has changed. I suppose it depends on what one’s college experience was in the 80s. My own wasn’t that different to what I see the 20s describing, although we didn’t have the sex ratio issue (and my school still doesn’t, as I note above).
@PJay
Bigoted much? Can you imagine if someone asked if women or were stupid? For CNN to print something like that and still post the disclaimer that “the views in this article are not representative of CNN’s views” is what’s really stupid.
My last post was supposed to read “Can you imagine if someone asked if women or (insert minority here) were stupid?”
Apparently brackets get sucked up as HTML on this site.
I’m only saying that if we go beyond “don’t ask, don’t tell” to “ask, but don’t tell” or even “when asked, change the subject” then what is truth?
You either intend to be honest or you intend to deceive. The gray area is always about adding in a bit of deceit. We all do it – tell white lies, deliberately create a false impression, e.g. not texting back for three hours to give the impression you’re too busy having fun or don’t care enough to respond.
All these mind games, the competition toward the Principle of Least Interest – it’s a race to the bottom. There is no winner.
We can only make good informed choices when we have the facts. Deliberately massaging or witholding facts robs the other person of information, increasing the likelihood that they will make an uninformed choice. That’s the problem – if the person is bound to regret the choice later, as Jane did, “If I’d known he had a gf, I never would have done that.” – then you’re deliberately harming that person.
Tom knew that he was keeping a secret that would have sent Jane packing. His friends were also required to keep his secret at the formal, obviously. He led Jane into a conversation that he knew would give a false impression, and he made a bet that Jane wouldn’t ask. That does not excuse Jane’s failure to grill him, but neither does it change the fact that Tom is a liar and set out to deceive Jane in order to have sex with someone new while his gf was away.
SayWhaat said:
“You shouldn’t mollycoddle us, certainly, but you can’t expect us to make zero mistakes from the get-go, either. ”
___________________
SayWhaat, I agree with you. Mistakes are a part of life.
Part of not mollycoddling is not blaming people who don’t deserve it.
Women are responsible for who (whom?) they sleep with. No one else.
SayWhaat said:
“The difference between your situation and Tom’s, Dogsquat, is that your situation did not lead to an outcome where you won at the expense of the girl. ”
_________________________________
Not always true.
I’ve left girls who really wanted to be with me after finding out things they tried to hide. I’ve manipulated them to find those things, too.
I am very happy. At least one of those gals is not, even now.
It just so happens that my goal was not merely sex, so it’s easier for some here to swallow.
Susan said:
“Manipulating another individual for personal gain at their expense is immoral. ”
_______________________________
Aha! Susan, we have ridden the merry-go-round one full revolution, and are back at our point of contention.
You are again saying (indirectly) that it’s possible to manipulate a woman into sex.
Again, I disagree.
Women are fully autonomous human beings. PUAs are not capable of forcing them to perform actions against their own best interests.
Again, I’m asking you to consider the implications of your viewpoint. If women are able to be so easily manipulated, then yes, PUAs should be blamed for the woman’s actions. The PUA is in a position of power and responsibility.
The woman is as a child, and helpless before tight Game. We don’t hold children or people with diminished mental capacity accountable for their actions – it’s not fair to do so.
To blame a PUA for getting laid is to assume the woman has no agency. That is perilously close to the Dark Game view.
I assure you I am not being intentionally obtuse. You know I support what you’re doing here, and I respect you as an agent of good, a teacher, and a fellow human being. I help where I can. This is one of those times. You have got to understand this. You’re unintentionally validating a viewpoint I know you find repulsive.
I feel like I’m pushing the North side of two magnets together. They’re repelling each other more strongly the closer they get. Eventually, when they get too close to touching, one shoots off on a tangent.
Please, please ask until you understand. I’m not arguing to prove a point. I view it as a critical moral building block, a cornerstone supporting your mission.
Dogsquat, here’s Wikipedia on manipulation:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychological_manipulation
With good enough tactics, alibis and lies, just about anyone can be manipulated, including smart, experienced, astute and even cynical folks. Just because someone got manipulated does not mean that person has no “agency” or is “a child.” That’s excusing the immoral behavior of the manipulators.
Notice, lying by omission is clearly listed there in the Wiki entry.
Any further defense of the manipulator?
@Hope
Again, the magnet flies off on a tangent. I am not defending anything. I am encouraging Susan (and now you) to examine the second and third order effects of blaming PUAs for banging women.
THINK ABOUT WHAT THAT IMPLIES ABOUT WOMEN.
Hope, is it possible for a PUA to cause a woman to have sex with him against her will? Not rape, of course, but for a PUA to meet a moral, commitment minded, stereotypical good girl – run a little Game on her and P and D her against her will.
No morality or blame or anything implied here.
The question boils down to “Are women autonomous human beings, or are they at the mercy of tight enough Game?”
Herb said:
“At 21 I was responsible for reactor and submarine safety affecting over 100 lives (over 10,000 in port with the reactor).
I’m a piker for responsibility compared to Dogsquat.”
______________________________
Nah, you’ve got me there. At 21 I was an infantry squad leader. Me and my boys could have messed up 10,000 people, but it would have taken us a week, maybe a week-and-a-half.
Plus, the State Department could have easily smoothed over whatever I did with a rifle and some judiciously applied high explosives.
No ambassador could possibly explain away the glowing pit where a harbor once was.
You Navy dudes have some scary gear.
Iggles said:
“I’m not defending carousel riders, but I don’t think kids of either gender should be judged so harshly for rookie mistakes in dating. (There’s a learning curve)”
______________________________
No disagreement from me here. Everybody does dumb shit, especially when they’re young.
My beef is with people who blame PUAs. It’s not because I identify closely with PUAs, either. It’s because blaming PUAs for getting laid implies they are controlling women, making them dance like puppets.
Women make their own choices these days. It’s not 13th Century Europe anymore. If a chick fucks a guy, it’s because she wanted to. She certainly wasn’t compelled to hop on his johnson.
To hold a man accountable for the choices a woman makes is wrong. When one advocates for this blame-shifting, they’re at least implying that the woman has less control over herself than the man does, and the man should have looked out for her best interests.
Ana said:
“There is the “If I dress like pretty women I’m going to look like them” effect in female psyche. Had you seen a really overweight woman wearing a clothing style for someone three times smaller? That is what she is thinking of. ”
_____________________________
And her nails will be done with the care of individual Sistine Chapels atop each pudgy, bejeweled finger.
@Hope re your FIL
I guess it is the job of parents to nag kids into doing the opposite of whatever they are doing.
On a more serious note, I think we want our kids to follow societally prescribed paths. In the basement playing video games in one extreme and traveling the world in search of exotic sex is another. Parents want kids to take a middle ground that leads towards marriage and family.
@Ana re single shaming
Yes, different circles no doubt.
Dogsquat, you’re going off-topic. I was talking about the Tom vs. Jane situation.
Now you want to talk about the PUA. Okay, which one? Susan already said, and I would agree, that a guy like Tucker Max might be repellant, but not a liar.
Imagine a guy is HIV positive. Let’s say he hides that fact from the women who sleep with him. He’s good looking and charming, so they’re sleeping with him willingly. If they found out he was HIV positive? They likely wouldn’t. They’re not given all information. But they’re still acting with full agency — but not full knowledge. Should they have asked, or used more protection, or simply not had sex?
Let’s change the genders up a bit and see if you still think it’s cool. A woman who’s HIV positive sleeps with a bunch of guys unprotected. They don’t ask, and she doesn’t tell. What say you? What if it was one of your ex-girlfriends? Someone you had slept with without protection? Your own girlfriend? How does it look now?
@Hope, Dogsquat
Hope, your examples stated my viewpoint so well, that there’s nothing left to say.
Maybe we are at cross-purposes, because it’s not about some PUA or some naive girl. *It’s about ethics.* Is deliberate omission of crucial information in relationships ethical? I say, NO. Doesn’t matter if you’re a guy, girl or a martian.
If the situation was reversed, and the girl was stringing some other guy along and cheating on her boyfriend, somehow I doubt there would be this level of support. (See Senior Beta’s remarks of “not fair” to Susan and myself.)
PS– Dogsquat, did you miss my response to you @ 663, with clarification @687?
The thing is, Lokland, he encounterd the same issues that female carousel riders encounter. When he decided to go with young, somewhat sheltered, religious girls, they wondered what he’d been doing between 22 and 41. And even to a 22 year old, an older guy who’d been chasing young puss for nearly 20 years seemed like a bad bet–good looks and high income notwithstanding. Plus, he was 10 years older than their upper age limit in most cases.
Full disclosure, a number of middle-aged women, myself included, ended up “pimping” for him. We rounded up a bunch of women in their early thirties who wanted to marry and have kids. They weren’t virgins, but I wouldn’t call them carouselers either. Even they wondered what was up with being 41 and never married. They’d been burned in the past by guys who couldn’t commit and weren’t happy to repeat the experience. Handsome as he was–and he was handsome–he had entered manwhore territory. He may have been go to go from a biological perspective, but culture caught up with him.
Hope, I have asked the same question and brought the same point up at least four times on this thread.
I am not going off (my) topic. If Susan wants me to knock it off, she has only to say so and I will comply.
So far, the only response to my query has been to do what you have done, which is to say,”Oh yeah, but what about this situation?” You (or anyone else) have not yet addressed the issue I brought up, which is autonomy.
Because you asked me some direct questions, I will answer. I certainly hope I will be done the same courtesy in return.
You asked:
“Imagine a guy is HIV positive. Let’s say he hides that fact from the women who sleep with him. He’s good looking and charming, so they’re sleeping with him willingly. If they found out he was HIV positive? They likely wouldn’t. They’re not given all information. But they’re still acting with full agency — but not full knowledge. Should they have asked, or used more protection, or simply not had sex?”
Yes, they should have asked, then had a series of mutual tests done three to six months apart (depending on test methodology), and adjusted the level/type of protection as more info was revealed s/p testing.
Interestingly enough, you’re scratching around the edges of my question with this statement:
“He’s good looking and charming, so they’re sleeping with him willingly.”
Is that it? Be good looking and charming enough, and their higher cognitive functions become so diminished that they won’t care if you have The Hiv?
Do you see how much in line with Roissy and Rollo that puts you?
You asked me directly, and I’m following with a direct answer (hint hint):
“Let’s change the genders up a bit and see if you still think it’s cool. A woman who’s HIV positive sleeps with a bunch of guys unprotected. They don’t ask, and she doesn’t tell. What say you? What if it was one of your ex-girlfriends? Someone you had slept with without protection? Your own girlfriend? How does it look now?”
____________________________
First, I never said it was “cool”. It’s reprehensible.
I’d also tell those guys they got what was coming to them. I volunteer once a month or so at a free/low cost clinic, and there really is no excuse to forgo testing. It’s often free, and it’s always cheaper than retro-viral.. therapy.
I also understand that those men are autonomous human beings, responsible for their own actions, and liable for any consequences they bring upon themselves. To view them otherwise (in the scenario you’ve painted) is a cop-out of the highest order. I hold women to the same standard, and I’m having a difficult time understanding why it’s so hard for others to do so. If you are able, please enlighten me on that point.
One of my ex-girlfriends doing that doesn’t change my view on the matter.
Where you and I may have some common ground is when a verbalized (or written, in the case of marriage) agreement to monogamy is violated. In that instance, the person who was cheated on is the victim.
Word of caution –
Don’t take the easy way out and seize upon my last statement. I challenge you to answer the questions I posed without again distorting the context.
Also, I’ve never been at the “mercy” of tight game. I’ve never even made out with a guy who wasn’t emotionally invested in me (in other words told me sincerely he loved me). However, I’ve been subjected to some crazy lies (not about the emotional investment part, but other things), and that is absolutely not cool.
Deti can tell you that I’m at least consistent on this. I think what his wife did, withholding information for years, was despicable. I’ve never lied to any past partner about my count, and I’ve always been upfront about it before things got serious enough to reach a kiss. So it is the lying and bad intentions, not the sex, that I take great issue with.
Jackie said:
“PS– Dogsquat, did you miss my response to you @ 663, with clarification @687?”
_________________________
Indeed I did. Apologies, Sweet Jackie!
I have been reading this thread on my phone in the back of my ambulance between calls, then posting when I get off shift. I have failed to be as diligent as I’d like to be. Thank you for the gentle reminder.
I have a class shortly, but I will rectify my lapse as soon as I am able.
Dogsquat, I have already said that any given person has agency and autonomy. However, if person A goes into the interaction intending to cause a bad outcome for person B, then the following hold true: 1) person A and B both have agency and free will, 2) person A has intentionally committed an immoral action, 3) person B’s agency was not violated, but his/her right to not be harmed was.
In my example, the woman who was HIV positive was absolutely immoral if her intention was to deliberately and maliciously give HIV to others. If she was unaware that she had HIV and did not intend to harm anyone else, and felt bad for giving HIV to others, then she did not have bad intentions.
If you really don’t see the difference between these two scenarios, I just don’t know what else to say.
@Doqsquat
Your apology is most definitely accepted and appreciated.
See you later!
@Hope
Hope, I think we are on the same page: To me this is about ethics and character.
I really wonder what the response would be if the genders had initially been reversed.
I just can’t see supporting the ethics of lying through omission if the liar is a woman. Maybe I’m wrong: Are there any women supporting Tom’s actions? I
Jackie, I’m glad you see the point I’m trying to make.
However, I think most men are psychologically inclined to think of sex as never having the possibility of causing actual harm when it is consensual. It’s a fundamentally different view. Men as a whole tend to have a practical, instrumentalist perspective on sex, procuring sex and doing whatever it takes so that sex happens.
That is in part why Senor Beta, Dogsquat, and all these guys are saying it’s fine, it’s just sex, no big deal, she wanted it, and all’s fair. If the situation was reversed, they’d probably pat Tom on the back for getting in her pants, even if she cheated on another guy to do it. Lying to get sex is the oldest trick in the male repertoir, and they figure any girl who falls for it is just an idiot, and lucky for the guy who got sex out of her. As they say in video game parlance, “good game!”
Also, in this day and age, women are supposed to be “free agents” capable of self-determination and responsibility. If women didn’t want the trouble, just say no and don’t have sex. If she went for it, it’s on her and her alone. This line of thought is common, and a great number of guys subscribe to it. If the idea of “harm” is brought up, they would say, “too bad, she already gave her consent,” because to say she didn’t would be taking away her “agency” and capacity to act as an “adult.”
I think it is valuable for every young woman to read this carefully and remember that most men don’t give a fancy flying mousetrap’s spring about you. The only reason why you should have sex with a man is if he truly, really, deeply cares about you, as a person, not merely as a sex object, instrument of pleasure, a hole into which to ejaculate. Unless a man is actually in love with you, the average guy will likely think nothing of lying, withholding information, and all sorts of other tactics to get sex from you.
I guess with that, we’re back to “Just say no.”
@Hope
I’d modify this a bit. The “average” guy doesn’t have the balls nor the cunning to successfully lie his way into a girl’s pants who doesn’t already want some. Instead of saying the equivalent of “nobody gives a flying fuck about you”, which encourages women to see all men as dangerous and deceitful vibrators set to stun (lol), I’d say this: “If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.”
I agree with your sentiments about “only sleep with a guy who loves you” in theory, but in practice it just doesn’t work that way. What about the (many, many) women who need to get their needs met and don’t need or want a relationship or to get married just to do so? Just saying, this is a LARGE group of people, lol. There’s a purpose for birth control and protection, and everybody’s not going to just stay celibate until “the one” comes along. Most people’s path through life is rarely so straight. I would say BE VERY CAREFUL and accept the risks of whatever choices you make.
@Dogsquat
Let’s boil this down to the essential question. Forget having sex for a moment.
If agency is the ability to make independent and free choices (social science definition), then clearly the gathering of accurate information is essential as a basis for decision-making. The agent is responsible for that gathering process, often relying on personal knowledge, observation and intuition. It is also common to rely on trusted sources to supplement the facts. Trust is the critical word here. Tom had created trust in his relationship with Jane. He ultimately proved himself unworthy of that trust. We may judge Jane for having been foolish, though not immoral – she harmed no one but herself. We should judge Tom for having been deceitful, which was immoral as he harmed Jane deliberately so that he could benefit.
Here’s an example that follows the same logic:
A married couple welcomes their first child. They are ecstatic. Seven years later, their little boy is diagnosed with leukemia. A DNA test is run on all family members, at which point is becomes clear that the first child does not have the same father as his two siblings. Further testing reveals that the husband is the father of kids 2 and 3, but not the firstborn son.
The father had every right to demand a paternity test when his son was born, but it never occurred to him to do so. He had no reason to doubt his wife, as far as he knew. Certainly, many in the manosphere would declare him a fool. What would they say about his wife?
Should we judge his wife for cuckolding him?
@Dogsquat
Wait – this has nothing to do with PUAs. Tom was a college sophomore at the time. As far as I know, he never studied Game. When Jane met him the previous summer, he had been single for a few months after breaking up with his high school gf. We’re not talking about Svengali here, we’re talking about a 19 year old kid who lied to get sex. He lied to at least two women, and recruited others to maintain the subterfuge.
Dogsquat, this isn’t about Game. I think you’re waaaaayy out in left field on this one.
Sure, but her wanting to hop on may be strongly affected by her perception of him as trustworthy and genuinely caring for her. That’s why guys lie to get into girls’ pants! They say they care when they don’t care. She’s making a decision with bad info. That’s like you performing a medical procedure on someone after checking out their allergies, and then watching them die from an allergic reaction. How awful if it was an error, but can you imagine if someone deliberately planted false information in a record?
I don’t think the guys here are celebrating what Tom did at all… they’re just sick in general of women playing the victim card for the choices they knowingly make. Not saying that’s necessarily the case here, but it happens so much that a lot of guys are just sick of it and short on sympathy.
Exactly. Dogsquat’s argument only makes sense to me if he believes that lying is an amoral act. If it is an immoral act, then it is an offense against the party who was lied to. In this case, that includes both Jane and also Tom’s gf. It doesn’t really matter if Jane had sex or not. Tom committed the immoral act when he lied, and would be just as guilty if Jane had declined sex anyway. Jane’s choice does not lessen or increase Tom’s wrongdoing.
NO SEX BEFORE MONOGAMY
@Jimmy Hendricks
I get that, and I have always maintained that “don’t ask, don’t tell” is a terrible and foolish approach for women. It is their responsibility to ask the awkward, tough questions, because a guy who cares and is not playing them will appreciate their caution. When women don’t ask, there is an element of not wanting to rock the boat, of hoping for the best, of delaying potentially disappointing news until later. That’s on them – they are knowingly taking a risk.
I do think this situation is a bit more complicated than that but even then I’d say, “Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.” Of course, that still doesn’t let the deceiver off the hook for wrongdoing. It’s just that women need to assume the worst about the men they’re seeing, and verify emotional investment before having sex.
Hope said:
“That is in part why Senor Beta, Dogsquat, and all these guys are saying it’s fine, it’s just sex, no big deal, she wanted it, and all’s fair.”
______________________
I’m so, so disappointed you missed the part where I offered to help drown Tom in bloody diarrhea. I thought that was good invective on my part, and I was inordinately proud of that particular turn-of-phrase. Back to the ol’ drawing board.
I guess the meaning wasn’t clear.
I greatly disapprove of Tom’s actions in the example as originally given by Susan.
I repeat myself:
WHAT TOM DID WAS NOT OK. HE CHEATED ON HIS GIRLFRIEND.
At no point did I say it was “no big deal”, or any of the other words you metaphorically shoved into my piehole.
Tom is dishonorable. Jane (or whatever her name was) was dumb.
Alrighty, then..
You said:
“Also, in this day and age, women are supposed to be “free agents” capable of self-determination and responsibility. If women didn’t want the trouble, just say no and don’t have sex. If she went for it, it’s on her and her alone. This line of thought is common, and a great number of guys subscribe to it. If the idea of “harm” is brought up, they would say, “too bad, she already gave her consent,” because to say she didn’t would be taking away her “agency” and capacity to act as an “adult.””
__________________________
Indeed, I am saying this WRT consensual sex. Possibly it’s not for the reasons you think, though. I am saying this because I view women as human beings just as fully developed as I am.
I don’t understand why you have such distaste for this view. I invite you to explain it. Indeed, I hope you do. I’m shocked and dismayed at the revulsion shown in this thread for this simple, fair idea. I do not like the implications.
In my opinion, it’s the only practical, non-sexist view.
Here’s another direct question:
Do women need men to look out for them? Stated another way – If you were Goddess Emperor of The Universe, would you punish men who had short-term sexual relationships with women if the women wanted more but the men did not?
You said:
“I think it is valuable for every young woman to read this carefully and remember that most men don’t give a fancy flying mousetrap’s spring about you.”
_______________________
If you correct this to say “most people don’t”, I will sign on whole-heartedly. The world can be a nasty place, and humans are dangerous animals. Women are certainly no better than men in this regard. We are all well advised to insulate ourselves from these facts through hard work, judicious selection of people we invite into our lives, and maintaining situational awareness. There are no fairy tales, and the last Prince Charming died putting down a populist revolt sometime in the early 19th Century.
Just because it’s not nice and pretty doesn’t mean it’s not true.
@Dogsquat
I think you know that no one is debating that. We are saying what Tom did to Jane was not OK either. He misrepresented himself as being single and available. This was not a first date – they had been communicating and seeing one another for six months. All of that is clear in the original post. When he said he needed to talk, then asked for reassurance that she hadn’t hooked up with anyone else, and threw his arms around her, she foolishly interpreted that as a wish to be exclusive. IOW, she was a fool and he got away with it. Doesn’t make his actions OK, as they relate to Jane.
@Jackie:
I went back through and saw where I got fired up at you.
You said:
“DS, I think your answer was revealed already in the question: Someone who exploits people by “using the Rationalization Hamster to his full advantage” is just that– a user. A user can be male or female. Lack of integrity and manipulation knows no gender.”
and
“Just like there are “slut tells” for promiscuity, there are “character tells” as well. The guy doing this is pretty weak, character-wise, in my opinion. To me, his actions are telling the universe, “Who I am is not enough. I have to ‘use her hamster to the fullest’ to get what I want.””
____________________________
This is damaging advice for many (most?) men, including me.
I was raised and indoctrinated with a bunch of faulty information. Because I was acting on bad intelligence, I conducted my operations in a way that was extremely harmful to me (belying Hope’s point that men can’t be harmed by sex).
Because I am lucky and stubborn, I lasted long enough to gather better information about How The World Works. Included in that information is Game, Hamsters, and a plethora of fiddlybits that are nowhere near as flattering to women as the crap I was force-fed in my youth.
I use that new knowledge to my great benefit now, and I’m pretty sure the girls I’ve dated like the “smart” me better than the “dumb” me. They benefit, too.
My character and integrity aren’t really a factor in this, and honestly I don’t believe they’ve changed much. At my core, I’m still the same dingdong I always was, but I am much better with women.
As to the Golden Rule –
I try not to harm people – including myself. It’s impossible to be entirely open and honest at all times without causing harm, so there are limits on that principle.
Susan said:
“I have always maintained that “don’t ask, don’t tell” is a terrible and foolish approach for women. It is their responsibility to ask the awkward, tough questions, because a guy who cares and is not playing them will appreciate their caution. When women don’t ask, there is an element of not wanting to rock the boat, of hoping for the best, of delaying potentially disappointing news until later. That’s on them – they are knowingly taking a risk. ”
______________________________
THIS RIGHT HERE!
What we were talking about got discombobulated in all of the examplifying.
I started talking about a guy who didn’t lie to get laid, but didn’t tell the girl everything she needed to know even before she asked. Then there were examples posited, and I foolishly waded in without constantly re-stating my starting point.
There are a few gals on this thread who forget the point you made. They hustle to castigate the player, and proclaim the “played” as an innocent bystander. That’s super-bad for a lot of reasons.
BLearg. Off to study.
Dogsquat, you only said Tom was “an asshole for cheating.” But you never said the fact that he lied by omission was an issue, and implied that Jane was the only one to blame for not asking cross-examining questions. Perhaps I have the wrong reading on this, but if you place culpability and wrongdoing on Tom for the lie of omission, I’ll take back what I said about you saying it’s fair.
On your next point, with regard to consensual sex, everybody has responsibility, and nobody is omniscient. At any given moment, we rely on the other person to provide some information. So no, I don’t believe it’s “on her and her alone.” It was his intention to deceive that makes it not on her alone. The idea that person A who lied to person B is not at fault whatsoever, but person B is wholly at fault, is not a “simple” or “fair” idea in my world. If this is what you consider naive or idealistic, then so be it.
I know the world isn’t fair. I saw a lot of suffering when I was younger, suffered a lot, and our firstborn son is not with us. I don’t live in some Disneyfied lala land. I will never have the power to rectify all the wrongs that happen in the world, but that doesn’t stop me from judging things as wrong, sad, painful, and awful. I can’t help most other people directly, but I want to help them anyway.
Does anybody “need” anyone else to look after him or her? Well, human beings are social animals, and we do need other humans. That is biological and fundamental. The founding fathers of most modern societies believed in a basic social contract. As for me, I do not see this world as some kind of horrible, dark, negative, separatist, not worth living in, and every man for himself/every woman for herself hell-hole. Yes I acknowledge that many people are choosing the bad ways, but I have a spiritual foundation that allows me to forgive them and understand them, and ultimately I believe we are all capable of so much more.
I seek out those who prefer the light, the positive, the kind, the unifying, the loving, and those who want to come together, see our commonalities and the ways in which we are connected. Even those on the other path will eventually meet us.
Conversely to what you said last, just because it’s not ugly and horrible doesn’t mean it’s not true.
“I think it is valuable for every young woman to read this carefully and remember that most men don’t give a fancy flying mousetrap’s spring about you. The only reason why you should have sex with a man is if he truly, really, deeply cares about you, as a person, not merely as a sex object, instrument of pleasure, a hole into which to ejaculate. Unless a man is actually in love with you, the average guy will likely think nothing of lying, withholding information, and all sorts of other tactics to get sex from you.”
Uhhh…..yes? This is a revelation?
If you aren’t in a relationship, you are locker room talk.
“I don’t think the guys here are celebrating what Tom did at all… they’re just sick in general of women playing the victim card for the choices they knowingly make. Not saying that’s necessarily the case here, but it happens so much that a lot of guys are just sick of it and short on sympathy.”
And I’ll second this.
A Definite Beta Guy, as I said earlier in the conversation, that was drilled into me before I hit puberty. It’s not news to me, but might be to someone who bought into the current sexual culture that is supposed to be “empowering” for women.
Sure, pluralistic ignorance definitely plays a role. But you’d have to figure that if the most promiscuous guys are the 9′s and 10′s for the most part, then the most promiscuous women must fall just beneath. 10′s are not hooking up with anything 1-4. Promiscuity at those levels is probably fairly low. My guess is that the highest rate of promiscuity would happen between women who are 6-7′s, with some 5′s and 8′s.
I think we should change the subject from sex to another thing to see the whole being mislead by an interested party outside of the gender war. It Tom’s goal would had been something different like stealing an expensive watch, collect some money from her or any other thing wouldn’t this be considered a fraud or a scam? Just saying taking the sex out almost everything else is a fraud or a scam or a con job just because his goal was getting laid doesn’t make it different IMO
He wasn’t collecting money or stealing an expensive watch. He was engaging in a sexual act and she got sex out of the act.
She WANTED to have sex with him.
That’s the point.
I don’t think Tom’s actions regarding Jane are very important. He is not the sexual gatekeeper. Jane is. Her role as sexual gatekeeper is paramount, 10 times more important than anything Tom is. It is HER DAMN RESPONSIBILITY to keep guys like Tom at bay.
And like Hendricks said, we don’t even really think Tom in this case is a good guy. It’s just…trivial compared to Jane. Guys like Tom will exist. Some guys like Tom will ALWAYS exist. It is the responsibility of the Janes of the world to see that the Toms are not rewarded for their behavior.
And the Jane’s of the world, in our experience, try to weasel out of this scenario by blaming Tom. And yes, us guys do respond by not liking Tom. But we’re done with the misdirection, we think Jane bears 90% of the responsibility in that transaction.
Where we think Tom is a MASSIVE dick is cheating on his girlfriend.
Imagine Jane was in possession of, I dunno, nuclear launch codes or whatever. She was hired specifically to protect those damn launch codes. And then she was seduced by some guy and she gave the codes over and then the Russians killed us all. Wouldn’t you freakin hate Jane for NOT DOING HER JOB?
Just throwing in my lot with Dogsquat on this one.
Jane just didn’t fall on this guys dick. She made a concious decision.
Let me switch the example.
Lets say we have Mary, shes a former hoe with a count that dwarfs the population of small countries.
Then there is Bob, he is a good Christian boy saving himself for marriage.
They meet, get married, have a few kids, divorce, kids aren’t his etc.
Now when they first started dating Bob never bothered to ask her number and Mary never disclosed it. No lying occured.
Getting into the marriage. Totally Bobs fault for not doing his homework.
Some of the later bits were Marys fault. Bobs problems could have been avoided by asking the proper questions.
Lets say he had asked.
If she told the truth and he did it anyway, its more murky.
If she lied then its totally Marys fault.
People are responsible for what happens to them. Including deception by others, hell, that should be an expected part of life.
@Hope (#827)
Hope, thank you for this viewpoint. It’s really hard for me to step outside my head and understand this from a possible male perspective.
It just seems like the genders operate in different worlds WRT sex. There just seems to be *so* many more risks for the girl:
*Pregnancy– the guy can walk out
*STI– women more at risk, potential damage to child-bearing
*as the # climbs higher, her mating pool shrinks (Wasn’t there a poster here who had 40+ partners who DQ’ed a girl who had 15 partners? That just blew my mind.)
*potential of being called a slut, bad reputation
*she loses a lot of leverage
For secular guys it seems like, sex = win, and that is that. Totally different perspectives…
@Jesus
Agreed, that fits with hypergamy and also with men relaxing standards a bit for casual sex. Just thinking about some woman who’s an 8 going the casual route for a male 10 – I don’t get that. Although I imagine that guys at her level of SMV are also focusing on casual. It would also be interesting to see who initiates. My guess is that the 8 gets hit on by players, while the 6s and 7s get sexually aggressive to make it happen. They probably have their best luck at closing time. :-/
@BroHamlet
“I would say BE VERY CAREFUL and accept the risks of whatever choices you make.”
—-
Hi BroHamlet,
That is a good rule of thumb for more than just sex. (I.e. posting on FB, financial matters, etc). I definitely agree about ownership of actions. If everyone followed your rule, drama around the world would decrease by at least 2098%
@Lokland, @DBG
Simple question:
Is the act of deception moral, immoral or amoral?
@Lokland, @DBG, @Dogsquat
I do know people that consider people that get tricked by others stupid and deserving of whatever luck this “naivety” gives them.
I will say that I sometimes I do , if Jane falls for this trick again I wouldn’t had any sympathy for her or if she indeed had a boyfriend, but the first time I’m usually more lenient people learn from experience after all.
In the case of the husband tricked by the clever slut I wouldn’t blame the husband either. People with pure intentions usually don’t assume the worst of others unless they had a bad experience already that taught them better, YMMV.
The rationalization for male bad behavior on this thread is extremely disappointing, but very enlightening.
Once again, it’s just confirming that guys who have drank the pickup-artist Kool-aid are selling themselves short morally. Deception is never an amoral act, regardless of extenuating circumstances.
End of.
@Susan
Immoral.
But your switching out two seperate concepts.
It is IMMORAL that Tom decieved Jane via omission but that does not put him at FAULT.
Jane is at fault for what happens to her even though Tom used an immoral action.
Now if Tom had outright lied, then yes it is his fault.
Theres no grey area here. Either Jane is responsible for objects inserted into her body or she is not. If she thinks those objects are made of unicorn leather just because someone didn’t mention it was actually cowhide… thats still on her.
@DS (#838)
Dog, thanks for clarifying your position! I think we are talking about two different things:
You: Applying Game to have your relationship, old methods were not successful
Me: Tom’s character is crap because he is exploitative: He is lying and cheating, via Game.
This is a poor analogy, but….
“Game” is the vehicle. You are using your vehicle to get to your goal destination. That’s awesome! Tom is using the vehicle to run over this girl, then putting it in reverse to run over his girlfriend as well. NOT GOOD. The girl is standing in the road, oblivious to the red light and “DON’T WALK” signs. *EPIC SIGH*
Does this make any sense?
J in response to some other comments…
“but all single, childfree women over 30 that I know have no pressure at all for marriage and children from their parents so there is a double standard in which a single male gets more speeches about settling down than women do at least in this culture
I see people push women over 30 to marry all the time, usually adding in biological clock comments as well. I also recall receiving those comments as well.”
My reply:
I know of this as well, and have always been baffled by it. Men are the ones who control commitment, make the offer, etc., not women. So unless a woman is turning down perfectly good offers, how can they be encouraged/shamed/guilted into marrying? If there are no offers, nothing is happening. So if there is going to be any encouragement/shame/guilt/etc., I can understand it being directed towards men, as some have already mentioned in their own criticism–why aren’t they “manning up,” etc.
I agree with Lok, immoral, but responsibility here is buyer-beware.
At Ana:
Yeah, I’ll grant her a very tiny little bit of lee-way, but from where I am coming from, she screwed up. She will get a lot more lee-way if she admitted she screwed up, and that she also screwed up the SMV by failing her role in sexual gate-keeper.
I’m all about forgiveness, but for people who, you know, repent.
@ADBG
“Imagine Jane was in possession of, I dunno, nuclear launch codes or whatever. She was hired specifically to protect those damn launch codes. And then she was seduced by some guy and she gave the codes over and then the Russians killed us all. Wouldn’t you freakin hate Jane for NOT DOING HER JOB?”
———
Y’know, guys here say they women to be loving, nurturing and soft creatures. It’s really hard to cultivate that attitude in face of this analogy.
Do you really want us to start regarding you as potential hazards that manipulate us in order to cause massive destruction (i.e. nuclear launch codes)? Because what you are asking for is going to require EPIC “witch shields.”
Isn’t it possible there is a better way? (hint hint, golden rule)
Susan, random thought here, I know I have seen some posts about determing smv, in your blog, but definitely in others, but it seems to me that it is really subjective, and that is something I find troublesome. How do people really know where their smv lies, when, if as you are suggesting, there is much narcissm, and as we know, there is a skewed media interpretation of female beauty. In addition, the standards are affected not only by personal preferences, but other factors as well, perhaps race/class/ethnicity, “ladder theories,” etc, etc.
@Ana
“People with pure intentions usually don’t assume the worst of others unless they had a bad experience already that taught them better.”
Very well said, Ana! It’s a lot harder to fool someone who is a liar and has bad character. They already know all the angles and, being deceitful, probably think everyone is the same as them. They’re already half-suspecting how people are do dirt to them, as that’s the bad character’s M.O.
It’s much easier to fool someone who has good character, who wants to believe the best about people. Sadly
@Courtley
“The rationalization for male bad behavior on this thread is extremely disappointing, but very enlightening.”
I made the point earlier than young women apparently have zero margin for error in the current SMP. Rejection usually comes after sex. For guys, it’s the opposite, which may explain why some use deception to get sex in the first place. When two singles like each other, sex might occur before exclusivity, but this very well could lead to exclusivity. Young people don’t usually presume their object of affection is an elaborate con artist.
When I was young, and thought a girl liked me by the way she acted, the last thing on my mind was whether she had a boyfriend already. Call me old-fashioned, but is honest dating completely dead? Does a young person have to presume that the person he or she likes already has a SO, or an STD, or children with someone else, or a criminal record, until proven otherwise? That kind of checklist is a good idea in general, if not overly thorough. But it kind of intrudes on the romantic and spontaneous moments of a relationship in progress.
I don’t know, this story is illuminating in a way. In my experience, people honestly looking for a meaningful relationship tend to assume the person who’s showing interest is also honest. Hence the cynicism about the SMP. Now that Jane’s been burned once, will she assume every guy going forward is a potential philanderer?
@Lokland
“Including deception by others, hell, that should be an expected part of life.”
—-
I am not disagreeing with you, but this makes me incredibly sad.
Whatever happened to being an example to others? Are we here just to exploit each other all the way down to dregs of humanity?
This makes me want to listen to Winston Churchill speeches and dream of a better world.
What we really want you to do is not put out for jerks and only put out for guys if you are in a committed relationship with. That’s it. We are not asking you to solve world hunger anything.
If you are in a committed relationship and you end up getting played, most men are going to have an extreme amount of sympathy for you. You notice that no one is yelling at Tom’s girlfriend for being dumb. We feel worse for her than anyone else.
We do not, however, feel any sympathy for Jane. She was misled, yes, but she is in a grave of her own making.
Lokland April 25, 2012 at 9:21 pm
Just throwing in my lot with Dogsquat on this one.
Jane just didn’t fall on this guys dick. She made a concious decision
—————————————————————
EXACTLY!!!
put me on the squatter bench too
Theres no grey area here. Either Jane is responsible for objects inserted into her body or she is not. If she thinks those objects are made of unicorn leather just because someone didn’t mention it was actually cowhide… thats still on her.
.=========================================
Lokland
you are on fiyah!!
@Courtly
“Once again, it’s just confirming that guys who have drank the pickup-artist Kool-aid are selling themselves short morally.”
———–
Co-signed, 100%.
I don’t expect anyone to agree with my view, but I’m saying it anyway: Tom and those supporting deceit are hurting themselves, at the end of the day. Each deliberate lie of omission, every exploitation, each bit of “collateral damage” chips away at their character and integrity.
Haven’t you ever been around someone who is scummy? Where it almost feels like the darkness is radiating off of them in waves? That’s what these Toms are doing to themselves. They are degrading themselves, far worse than any “slut” ever could.
Thomas Jefferson said, I tremble for my country, when I reflect God is just. I’ve just seen so much of this in action that even when I’m tempted to deceive, I don’t do it because it’s not worth the inevitable karmic return.
@MegaMan
Those are the $64,000 questions.
I’m a professed cynic, but I suspect yes. I think it’s a byproduct of two things. The extended non-married period, which leads to more experience and probably more bad experiences. Second, is the general lack of a script.
One other point, is these same issues seem to be occurring more and more in all arenas. How many companies use mice type to include clauses that amount to we can screw you? How many companies work to get everything out of employees and screw them in the end?
How long can you be in a culture were work and business have reached the point where you have to assume everyone will screw you every way you let them before people start to do the same?
How long can that culture exist in business and work before it spills over to mating and dating?
@Courtley
I haven’t followed all of it, but I don’t really like a lot of the pick up artist mentality (as far as the sole focus of actively “seducing” people), because it basically implies that men have no value in and of themselves without dancing on cue, and some of it is too ambiguous on the deception part that we are discussing here.
It could be that what some of the guys are saying here is that there are two issues (or maybe I’m wrong). The morality is one issue- which I agree with you on because deception is immoral (and it looks like they do too). The other issue is reality. The reality that once you’ve been fleeced, there’s often nothing you can do about it and you are responsible by default for the result of what happened because the other party can’t always be brought to justice to pay for what they’ve done and no contract of honor was established.
Now, don’t think I’m condoning anything immoral because I’m not, I just notice that this is a difference between the male and female perspective on these types of issues. Women always seem to emphasize the moral and how someone needs to take responsibility for any trickery, and men focus on not letting the situation where you get tricked happen at all because men seem more likely to accept that there are situations where no code of honor can be strictly enforced and sometimes the villain doesn’t get punished (so buyer beware). This is just my experience when watching the genders debate this type of situation, and it seems like the two sides might be talking past each other a little bit here as well.
@Lokland
I’ve said repeatedly that I do not absolve Jane from responsibility. However, Tom did more than omit relevant information. He produced misleading information with a clear intent to deceive. Again, Jane was the gatekeeper and she blew it, I’m not arguing otherwise. But people can and do use immoral tactics to gain what they want from others, and that needs to be called out for what it is as well. Of the two of them, only one harmed another person. Jane harmed only herself.
Tom’s deception mislead Jane into making a decision she would otherwise not have made. He is not entirely to blame, but he is at fault.
@pvw
This also happens at the level of dating and relationships among young people. Men observe that there are plenty of guys who would love a relationship if girls would just give them a shot. I think that girls would give a lot of them a shot, but they’re traditional in their outlook and unlikely to initiate or be the aggressor.
I see this as the biggest challenge in the SMP – getting the 80% to meet halfway.
Courtley said:
The rationalization for male bad behavior on this thread is extremely disappointing, but very enlightening.
Once again, it’s just confirming that guys who have drank the pickup-artist Kool-aid are selling themselves short morally. Deception is never an amoral act, regardless of extenuating circumstances.
End of.
_________________________________
I find your comment quite illuminating as well.
Which guys have made excuses for Tom’s behavior?
What do you mean by “selling one’s self short morally?”
And deception never being an amoral act? What exactly does that mean?
@ADBG
“What we really want you to do is not put out for jerks and only put out for guys if you are in a committed relationship with. That’s it.”
Given that ~40% of guys in one survey Susan’s point to admitted they’d lie to get sex, and presumably lie about going steady or being exclusive, is it fair to expect women to have perfect judgement? Particularly if they actually are looking for a boyfriend, instead of Mr. Right Now?
Jane didn’t do her homework, clearly. It’s very possible that what she’s gone through with this putz will colour her future interactions with men. I wonder how often guys like Tom consider the “indirect” consequences of their actions.
@PVW
Good question, I think that can be difficult to figure out. A lot of guys say that it’s simply the same as the SMV of a guy that will commit to you. But even that is tricky, because his SMV is subjective!
I always had friends more attractive than I was. I was the perky sidekick to the perfect California blondes in high school. I can recall feeling so flattered when their bf’s said I was cute. (I never had a bf in high school.) So I had a sense of where I stood – perhaps that is why I’ve never had a taste for the pretty boys. Having said that, I did well for myself in general, and my husband has always found me attractive
As I’ve written about before here, I always had a certain joie de vivre that allowed me to punch above my weight, particularly after guys knew me for a while. (This is in opposition to male claims that it’s entirely visual, but that’s been my experience.) Anyway, I think the trick is to err on the side of humility, take a genuine interest in others, and see what happens.
Narcissists who have an inflated view of their own appeal are bound to be perpetually disappointed, it seems to me.
“Jane harmed only herself.”
Jane harmed the entire SMV by not exercising her duty as gatekeeper. Jane should own up to this.
For the record:
Jane failed because she was rewarding bad behavior. This would not have happened had she been exercising due diligence.
The key word there is “bad behavior.” We all know Tom is acting poorly.
Now on the flipside, Jane damaged the market. She has helped foster a market where bad behavior is rewarded. We can fault guys for acting badly in this market to some extent, but bad behavior is reinforced, and Jane is reinforcing it.
I know you have a micro focus, but there is a macro element to this. Jane has helped, in a very small way, to create a society where men are literally pushed into behaving like sociopaths to accomplish their objectives.
@Jackie
Which is why freshmen girls are considered “fresh meat” on college campuses. Many get burned once, maybe twice by players. Not having sex, necessarily, but just being led on. If a girl doesn’t learn by then, she’s likely to become a habitual hooker-upper.
@Megaman
Like I said, though, we don’t expect women to have perfect judgement. Just implement some reasonable safeguards. If women do that, most men are a-0kay with them, and will perfectly accept the men who lie as moral monsters of the highest order.
@Megaman
It sure does. And that’s also part of why women are loath to bring out the checklist. They want the romantic scene at the park bench, with the hug and the pickup and twirl. They can either enter the rom com, or burn a hole in the film right then and there. Of course, they should be practical, but many are not.
@Susan
I’d actually like to take one step back. I think we’re actually seeing a broader problem here:
People want to take greater risks but only engage in the care of lesser risks.
To take it out of the directly sexual realm but leave it in the dating realm let’s look at meeting people and ask questions about two strategies. Strategy one is online dating and the second is meeting people in person at a board games club. In both cases we’ll assume a man asks a woman on a date. In the first case it’s after a few emails. In the second case it’s after several months of seeing him weekly with people who know him outside of the group.
Do we all agree the woman one needs to ask more questions and take more precautions than woman two to assure the same level of safety? The first has no real information about the man and should meet him instead of getting picked up, have a safety call including duress words, request a copy of his idea, do a google, and so on.
Hell, a man should do that. I do.
The second woman could probably let the man pick her up (although I might recommend against it) and accept in front of their common social circle. I’d recommend she left a friend know and what time she’ll be back, but not recommend a during the date safe call.
Now, back to Jane and Tom. Jane has decided to engage in sex prior to some establishment of monogamy, by public declaration to people who know them both and some symbolic act that indicates to others their status. If Jane had chosen a strategy of requiring both then I would say the level of due diligence she showed was appropriate. However, having chosen to engage in sex prior to proof she needs to screen harder in real time because the commitment process isn’t in place.
Now, you can say all you want the modern SMP makes commitment harder and that’s all fine and good, but women still choose giving up sex prior to commitment as a strategy. If they are going to do so and want sympathy from me, they need to man up and do due diligence. If they do and get counterfeit evidence (including lies) then I’ll believe they were used.
If they don’t, they’re telling me they want sex and want an out from being judged for giving it up easy.
I know I’ve been held to that standard plenty (does anyone really know what they’re signing up for at enlistment?) and I don’t find it unreasonable.
Tom’s a dick and guys like him piss me off because not only are they immoral but at least some of the bullshit other men have to put with women are created by guys like him. However, I can’t give the women he hurts a pass, especially when they won’t own their mistakes of not asking but just want to be victims.
@ADBG
I don’t believe Jane had a sense that Tom was acting poorly. He hid his poor behavior, that’s the point. Jane was happy that Tom wanted to take their relationship to the next level by indicating that he didn’t want her seeing other guys. For most girls, a guy’s saying he doesn’t want you to see anyone else is a milestone.
@Herb
I cosign this, we’re now on the same page.
@Susan
(This is kind of off-topic and feel free to delete.)
Over Lent, when I was not feeling well– it turned out it was pneumonia. Yikes! Things got pretty bad– I had a low-grade fever than ran 11 days.
I am usually super-active and could not even walk down the stairs. Completely humbling.
Anyway, in the middle of all this, people — some of who I barely knew– completely stepped up and took care of everything for me. And some of was not for the faint of heart.
I mean, someone cleaned my bathroom (the sight of which should them into a pillar of salt!). Another person cleaned me up after vomiting and stayed with me until it passed. I remember writing in my journal how much goodness there is in people.
I also had been thinking about a trip to visit my sister in NYC in college. I screwed up the subway schedule and forgot to charge my phone (oops), so I ended up riding all alone, quite late (1am) on a Saturday night. There were cops walking through all the time, as there were a lot of gang members (or so they appeared to me) in my particular car.
I was starting to get scared and upset, tears were coming close. I asked one of the cops for directions as to which stop I should get off at. He gave me a long, rambling explanation that only made me more confused. Tears were eminent now.
After the cop left, one of the hugest and scariest looking of the men came up to me. I was thinking the worst, when he said to me, in this soft and extremely kind voice, Miss, you need to get off three stop from now. Then he went back to his enclave, dutifully leaving me in peace to recollect myself.
People seem to be going the extra mile all the time for others. Why does this seem to go completely out the window when it comes to potential romantic relationships?
@ADBG
The gatekeeper notion I understand and endorse, for the most part. Women ruin the marketplace by giving it up too soon (however that’s measured). Men ruin the marketplace by lying or cheating. But by reducing women to suppliers of sex, and men to demanders of sex, deception becomes just one more (unethical) strategy employed by the demand side of things. Don’t the ends justify the means when it comes to sex? I don’t personally believe that, but apparently plenty of guys do. I mean, that’s where “buyer beware” get us, doesn’t it?
The sad part of this is, it has a ripple effect. Women have ever more reasons to reject decent guys, because they’re judged to be potential bad actors. And men have more women to reject, because they’re judged to have put out too soon. Admittedly, I’m thinking off the top of my head here.
Just an addendum to my long post that addresses MegaMan’s worry that we need to kill the romance with the checklist.
This is what happens in a Wild West situation. Romance is something that needs safety, some walls. The pre-sexual revolution dating world had those walls. They weren’t always pretty (1) and were often honored in the breach, but they created expectations. We talk about needing slut shaming, but unless I completely misunderstand history the Toms of the era were shamed as well. In fact, slut shaming and player shaming are two sides of the same coin.
I think what a lot of women here want is shaming of Tom more than excusing Jane. I also think those women are willing to slut shame so that’s reasonable.
The men, however, think there isn’t any slut shaming so why should women get to be the victim and shame men for being players. I think that’s reasonable too.
In destroying those walls we destroyed the safe space. Now romance without all the prelims, which kind of ruin it, isn’t really possible. Although I think people can build it on a small scale in their social circle.
(1) Thinking about this had me imaging Susan explaining this in a court yelling “You can’t handle the truth.”
Curt: “Deception is never an amoral act, regardless of extenuating circumstances.”
I agree. Unless it is a shit test or last-minute flake, or otherwise done by a female, in which case it is totally fine.
@ Jackie:
“It’s a lot harder to fool someone who is a liar and has bad character. They already know all the angles and, being deceitful, probably think everyone is the same as them. They’re already half-suspecting how people are do dirt to them, as that’s the bad character’s M.O.
It’s much easier to fool someone who has good character, who wants to believe the best about people. Sadly”
———
I disagree that people of poor character are more astute than those with good character.
What makes a person more susceptible to falling prey to scams is being sheltered.
When a person of good character is trained to be cautious and less trusting, they’ll fare better than a person of bad character.
People with bad character get scammed all.of.the.time. I’ve seen it too many times to count. Even when you try to point out pitfalls to them, they don’t see it.
So, try not to get discouraged- just realize that there are lots of people who will take advantage of you if given the chance. Even in the discussion you’ve all been having here, lies the opportunity to let that point sink in.
You don’t have to walk around being bitter.
Think of it like defensive driving; putting on a seatbelt, driving slowly into the intersection, not tailgating– it can keep you from lots of heartaches.
I know of this as well, and have always been baffled by it. Men are the ones who control commitment, make the offer, etc., not women. So unless a woman is turning down perfectly good offers, how can they be encouraged/shamed/guilted into marrying? If there are no offers, nothing is happening. So if there is going to be any encouragement/shame/guilt/etc., I can understand it being directed towards men, as some have already mentioned in their own criticism–why aren’t they “manning up,” etc.
But this women are not claiming powerlessness they date around and live the single life they don’t seem to be interested on settling down this is not a case of women saying “I’m dying to get married but there are non takers” is more “I don’t need a man to be happy” How many men do you hear in your regular life saying that? Most of the time the single men just get random “Why don’t you find a nice girl to marry and have children?” they usually can’t respond with anything but a shrug the only single male I know that is beyond this is a guy that is an Omega no one thinks he can be attractive to any woman so no one question his singleness “normal” guys get the shame all the time, at least in my very feminist liberal circle, YMMV. I mean had you ever tell anyone that you are looking for a man to marry? Women in this culture don’t do that. In my country it was not uncommon for a woman that had already more than three boyfriends saying that she hopes the next one is the good one and they can marry because dating is exhausting and starting all over again with a new guy is horrible and I agree, dating sucks.
How long can you be in a culture were work and business have reached the point where you have to assume everyone will screw you every way you let them before people start to do the same?
Funny I have this same discussion with one of my friends who was a business owner very brilliant when he was arguing with me for the eleventh time that cheating was not bad, the bad was that women wouldn’t put up with it without a fight. I told him that if he will sign a contract with a partner in which he will be stealing money from him and he was supposed to look the other way. He got speechless I don’t think he brought it up ever again not that he stopped cheating of course but I guess his hamster died that day or at least entered in comma.
Now, don’t think I’m condoning anything immoral because I’m not, I just notice that this is a difference between the male and female perspective on these types of issues. Women always seem to emphasize the moral and how someone needs to take responsibility for any trickery, and men focus on not letting the situation where you get tricked happen at all because men seem more likely to accept that there are situations where no code of honor can be strictly enforced and sometimes the villain doesn’t get punished (so buyer beware). This is just my experience when watching the genders debate this type of situation, and it seems like the two sides might be talking past each other a little bit here as well.
I do agree with this.Men seem to want people to learn with “though love” you screwed up you clean it up regardless what the other part did. I guess because no matter what Jane is always at the risk of finding Tom’s so excusing her might mean that she will just fall for the next one. Not that is our intention I’m sure anyone wants Jane to learn from this lesson but not shaming Tom only means that he will just use his “con” artist’s skill to find other Jane’s to screw. This should be something women learn to avoid and men help to minimize too. You cannot have every single woman new in the market being trained by the Tom’s of the world. Tom’s are also part of the problem, YMMV.
What makes a person more susceptible to falling prey to scams is being sheltered.
When a person of good character is trained to be cautious and less trusting, they’ll fare better than a person of bad character.
I agree but again this training is not available anymore to younger generations due to PC culture and other changes in society heck sometimes is not even available a corner from Jane’s house.
I had a friend that started working in this place and this executive asked her out and took her to public places holding hands and being completely open about they dating it was not till a few months later when his secretary made the mistake of saying that “Your wife is on line number 2″ in front of her that she knew he was married. She is from a better class than me were there is still some old dating rules and she was baffled that no one in the office said anything or that he never acted strange around her, thank goodness upper classes also have the rule of no sex before monogamy but still she was tricked for months and as I mentioned before some men that know how to make women fall in love and then when they see her “deep in” is when the reveal of the wife happens knowing that is very unlikely she can cut him out of his life, heck some even wait till she is pregnant to make sure she will be available. Men can be really good at this trick thing as good as a slut cuckolding a man, shame for both is needed, YMMV.
@Susan
Okay lets hypothetically say Janes a fluffy bunny who can’t make mistakes and Tom is a bad, bad man who should be sent to prison.
So what?
Theres not a thing on this entire frickin planet that can change what happened. Tom got off with no real trouble. Jane now has an N+1 and a damaged ego.
Even if we were to blame Tom (which I don’t) you literally can’t even give him a slap on the wrist. There is absolutely ,no/zero/nada punishment that he can recieve.
Jane lives with all the consequences.
We can say Tom is a bad, bad little boy who decieved poor little Jane till we’re blue in the face.
Guess what.
Janes next boyfriend/husband/SO isn’t going to give a fuck. Her N is still +1.
Its not about whats right or wrong but defending yourself against harm. That is no one elses responsibility. If people want to be free from harm they must protect themeselves.
Even if we were to blame Tom (which I don’t) you literally can’t even give him a slap on the wrist. There is absolutely ,no/zero/nada punishment that he can recieve.
Why not? I mean you admit he did something harmful to propel his agenda (another notch on his post) at the expense of giving Jane another notch in her post so why can’t we at least shame him for his harmful behaviour?
Is interesting that for all the unfair shame to men “man up”, “creep” when there is a legitimate reason men seem to react as strong as a poor Beta guy being called creep for no other reason than he smiled at the wrong girl. I’m all for stopping the unfair one but I don’t think you can do it if you put every shaming of men on the same boat as “unfair”, YMMV.
@Ana
As I said above, slut shaming and player shaming are two sides of the same coin. If one is prohibited it is impossible to really do the other.
That’s pretty much what is going on in the Tom/Jane situation. Jane wants to have sex without obtaining commitment (the most generous definition of slut and one that arguably existed in the slut shaming era) but wants Tom shamed for pretending to offer commitment (in the loosest definition as even the women agree she didn’t ask obvious questions) in order to escape the slut slime for giving it up without commitment.
If you want to shame Tom for lying about commitment even when he was never asked directly you need to be willing to shame Jane for giving it up without insuring there was commitment.
I think that’s what’s a lot of men are saying. The typical HUS woman is open to shaming Jane or at least calling her on being stupid. The typical HUS men know the larger world will give her a “poor baby, men are assholes” so see no reason to call him to the carpet either.
I think that’s what’s a lot of men are saying. The typical HUS woman is open to shaming Jane or at least calling her on being stupid. The typical HUS men know the larger world will give her a “poor baby, men are assholes” so see no reason to call him to the carpet either.
I get that I totally think Jane is an idiot (and Tom’s girlfriend is major idiot for putting up with his cheating) and she better ask the right questions next time or she will get “Oh Jane you ignorant slut” from me at least.
But can we agree that HUS is some sort of gender neutral zone for using people (male and female) as disposable cups for a while? And not amount of hornyness justify trying to look legit to get laid or opening your legs with no info.
I mean I think this argument has been used before when talking about “how much a guy can get away to get laid” and it seems that for many men getting laid justifies every possible behaviour short of rape and murder because many men here are like “he might not know what he was doing, he is young his dick is too powerful to say no to a good chance to bang more than one woman” which sounds a lot like the “poor women can’t help it if a guy is too attractive and pushes the tight buttons” so there shouldn’t be justification for actively getting laid with ulterior dark motives neither for opening your legs at the first sign of Alpha or with ulterior dark motives like getting a relationship, YMMV.
Anacaona:
But this women are not claiming powerlessness they date around and live the single life they don’t seem to be interested on settling down this is not a case of women saying “I’m dying to get married but there are non takers” is more “I don’t need a man to be happy”
My reply:
The single women I have known (younger relatives) fit primarily in the category of wanting to be married who were then “put on the spot,” shamed and humiliated by our other overbearing relatives for their single status that there must be something wrong with them as they were not married. Of course, these were relatives who married in a much earlier time and in a different place; they had no idea of current dating realities. Returning to the broader issue, might the “I’m single and liking it” for some of the women you speak of have been a defense mechanism against the shame?
Megaman:
But by reducing women to suppliers of sex, and men to demanders of sex, deception becomes just one more (unethical) strategy employed by the demand side of things. Don’t the ends justify the means when it comes to sex? I don’t personally believe that, but apparently plenty of guys do. I mean, that’s where “buyer beware” get us, doesn’t it?
The sad part of this is, it has a ripple effect. Women have ever more reasons to reject decent guys, because they’re judged to be potential bad actors. And men have more women to reject, because they’re judged to have put out too soon. Admittedly, I’m thinking off the top of my head here.
Herb:
Tom’s a dick and guys like him piss me off because not only are they immoral but at least some of the bullshit other men have to put with women are created by guys like him. However, I can’t give the women he hurts a pass, especially when they won’t own their mistakes of not asking but just want to be victims.
My reply:
I was raised similar to those who mentioned that they had parents, mothers, and sometimes fathers, who raised them to believe “all men are no good, they only want one thing, be careful, etc.”
So when I was of high school and college age, I was very suspicious of men and not trusting. I didn’t trust male attraction, my first thought in response to what seemed to be “IOIs,” was, as I look back, almost like a deer in the headlights: “what does he want from me, is he a user, go away, wolf!” Perhaps I missed some opportunities as a result? Who knows and who cares now? I protected myself, kept my number low and avoided being pumped and dumped.
It seems to me that this notion of losing the spontaneity of romance is a very “feeling” type thing, which for me as an INTJ, means there is more reason to distrust it. I trust cold, hard logic far more; it certainly saved my butt as I eventually matured into dating. If a man was not willing to talk “old school” about his intentions, nothing happened.
@Jackie
There are many people who are giving and generous, even to strangers. Maybe they are even the majority. But there are also many people out there who do harm, even in small ways. They practice a kind of emotional petty theft. I’ve had female friends like this, btw. Some veer into behavior that is devoid of empathy – I would put Tom in that category. He knew he was lying, and he didn’t feel badly about it. In the end, when Jane and his gf confronted him separately, he didn’t apologize to either and claimed he had done nothing wrong. And then some are openly antagonistic and vengeful – men who seek to redress some previous hurt by women, whether mother, girlfriend, or even someone who friend zoned them.
In all of these cases, it helps to be carefully attuned for red flags – there are certain to be some. But the truth is that it’s just terrible luck to wind up in the crosshairs of someone like this. Emotionally manipulative people wreak great damage on others.
@Ana
“Why not? I mean you admit he did something harmful to propel his agenda (another notch on his post) at the expense of giving Jane another notch in her post so why can’t we at least shame him for his harmful behaviour?”
Shaming only works if its done en masse. If you and me try and slut shaming everyone will think your crazy and I’m a hypocrite.
I think this might be a chick thing.
Like DS said above.
Sometimes there can’t be justice or a way to make it right or fix it or put unicorns shitting skittles into the world again. Theres nothing that can be done to him.
She lives with all the consequences. That makes it her problem and her fault.
Jackie (881),
I really like that story.
I think it’s very important to remember the good side of humanity. I’ve found that even homeless guys can be chivalrous if you treat them with respect.
Even in the dating world, I believe that most people have good intentions. It’s a shame that there’s a small percentage of baddies that go around ruining it for everybody else.
@Herb
That’s a great insight. You’re right – no one has attempted to remove blame from Jane for being stupid, delusional, imprudent. She was all of those things to some extent.
I do think we’re focusing on Tom as a cad rather than a player though- the line separating the two being deceit. If Tom had just been a player – if he and Jane had been having sex already or he had never attempted to stop and have a talk about their relationship in the park, he would have been guiltless. By pretending to be single and actively suppressing his relationship status throughout the weekend, he became more than just promiscuous. And the problem with that is that Jane may have been willing to sleep with a player, IDK – but she wasn’t willing to sleep with a cheater. That’s where the lie is.
@OTC
Talk to the women here, not the women “out there.” Do you see women here advocating a double standard?
@Lokland
You’re right, it would make no sense for Jane to dwell on the injustice of it. Shit happens, we make bad decisions, more shit happens, and hopefully we learn something. None of us goes through life unscathed, and that includes being used and disposed of.
When we say “So what?” or “Who cares?” about the Toms of the world, we create a default code of conduct in the SMP that is corrosive at best. I don’t think Tom is unusual in the least – he clearly had all his buddies on board to cover for him. And of course, there are women who will eagerly forgive the Toms – as his gf did. That’s bad for the SMP too. Women giving guys like Tom a pass.
Ultimately, it pits men and women against one another – enemies on a battle field, a fight to the death in which few are left standing, and all are wounded. Even Tom. Because Tom will either be nagged by this for the rest of his life – that’s the best case scenario. Or go through life with minimal emotional capacity, which is probably more likely.
@ Abbot
If they live in a place or culture surrounded by people who have had more. It is purely culturally driven. If you do not want to be with such a person, switch cultures [shop elsewhere]. You see, all are happy and there is someone for everyone after all. Happy happy
___________
While I agree with what you said about culturally based. I disagree where you say to find it. I posted stats about latin americans sky rocketing divorce rates, they must have been deleted.
@ Susan,
I just saw a video with Helen Fisher, the world’s foremost authority on the brain in love, and she says some interesting things about both men and women falling in love as a direct result of having sex together. Maybe I’ll slap it up as a post this morning.
_____________
Dont have to be a genius to know that. It isn`t called making love for nothing…lol
« 1 … 4 5 6 7 »
{ 2 trackbacks }