From Time:
Whatever started it, Gavrilets notes, humans’ transition to monogamy was much more radical than the sexual revolution of the 1960s — even though it went in the opposite direction. “Not many people realize that the most important sexual revolution for our species probably happened several million years ago,” Gavrilets says. “This revolution was accomplished by the masses of lower-ranked males, along with females, directly against the elite of alphas, so the term revolution is even more appropriate.”
So, maybe when the 2001 monolith arrived in the Olduvai Gorge, what it really did was not inspire the proto-human apes to bash each other's heads in with tools (that was already pretty obvious), but to take that special girl ape out for a nice steak.
“This revolution was accomplished by the masses of lower-ranked males, along with females…”
ReplyDeleteThis is obviously fallacious. The lower–ranked males did not have power in the mating game to exercise in the creation of monogamy; the advantage (as we are learning through negative example) of monogamy for women is fairly clear; the monogamous revolution, such as it is, was an exercise of female power.
Part of the whole "game" universe that is really twisted is that, while unintelligent and propagandized women may want to settle for "a share of an Alpha", this is still not the norm in the upper–middle, educated classes. We may be all for destroying everyone else's culture, but we keep up the Old Ways.
"So, maybe when the 2001 monolith arrived in the Olduvai Gorge, what it really did was not inspire the proto-human apes to bash each other's heads in with tools, but to take that special girl ape out for a nice steak."
ReplyDeleteBETA LOSER!!!
If you want to get laid, then NEVER PAY FOR DINNER!!!
And here we are regressing....
ReplyDelete...take that special girl ape out for a nice steak.
ReplyDeleteRaquel Welch in '1 Million Years BC'
Table for two, please.
Further, the ev–psych argument about human nature defaulting to polygamy may not be applicable for all persons. Formal concubinage or polygamy has rarely been a factor in Indo–European societies (except for those who converted to Islam), especially in Europe. There is perhaps a similar effect in East Asia, but I'm not versed enough in its history. Obviously the rich and powerful had ways to have access to other women, but they were not legitimized in the same fashion as polygamy has been in many other cultures.
ReplyDeleteWhile I've never seen statistical work on this in particular, anecdotal evidence suggests to me that the de facto true polygamy (where simultaneous childbearing partners occurs with regularity) sometimes seen in the black underclass is far, far rarer in the white underclass. Serial monogamy, of course, is common to both. I do not find the ev–psych argument for polygamy very convincing in regards to Europeans. What happened in the sexual revolution was the end of the mechanisms by which eros was re–channeled for the unmarried and within marriages; some peoples may be monogamous for childrearing, but they will certainly get some "on the side". (The commonness of cuckolding, often assumed by game bloggers, has far more basis in their misogyny than reality.)
Yeah, Raquel might be Top-5 All Time.
ReplyDeleteI've always had Grace Kelly at #1, and usually Ingrid Bergman at #2, but boy, I tell ya what, the more I see of her, the more I'm wondering whether Charlize Theron is making a hard charge for a position in the top 3 or 4 [I'll probably always have Princess Grace at #1].
Anyway, Raquel definitely plays in the same league as Kelly, Bergman, and Theron.
While I've never seen statistical work on this in particular, anecdotal evidence suggests to me that the de facto true polygamy (where simultaneous childbearing partners occurs with regularity) sometimes seen in the black underclass is far, far rarer in the white underclass.
ReplyDeleteGood luck finding funding for that research project.
The lower–ranked males did not have power in the mating game to exercise in the creation of monogamy
ReplyDeleteOf course they had (and still have) the power. All power ultimately resides with the majority of men, who can make the social arrangements be whatever they like if they put their minds to it. Women and so-called "alphas" have very little say in the matter.
Serial monogamy, of course, is common to both.
ReplyDeleteSerial monogamy is de facto polygyny.
FWIW, Dalrymple's Life at the Bottom paint a fairly consistent picture of White Underclass defacto polygamy, a few men getting most of the women pregnant, often simultaneously ala the Black underclass. I don't have the stats handy but seem to recall some incendiary study out of the UK suggesting a large amount of White births of multiple fathers for the same woman.
ReplyDeleteSocial organization where survival of offspring require a constant male commitment would favor monogamy. That means tight resources, large differences in outcomes (survival or death) based on paternal care, which in turn suggests a "weak" form of social organization, not large troops of say, baboons, but small groups where its a male providing and defending or nothing. This seems to be suggestive in the fossil record of hominids, that groups were dispersed fairly widely and small in number at each site.
IMHO, this is consistent with older monogamy and later polygamy, studies showing that 80% of all women gave birth but only 40% of all men who ever existed fathered children. Larger groups, greater resources, less threats, pencil out to greater desire for "sexy" characteristics such as dominance, social posturing, dangerousness, etc. The equivalent to male peacock feathers in behavior.
Thus good times and low risk produce female preference for bad boys who are dangerous but don't stick around; hard times put a premium on a guy who will stick around, women give up sexual options to earn the sticking around.
Evolution of course depends on size of population as well as time, evolutionary effects can be the result of one or the other factor accordingly.
Serial monogamy isn't polygamy. Children born into polygamous marriages are considered legitimate. Children born to serial monogamists are not. Polygamy usually has some element of permanence; at the very least you have to get divorced to end it. Serial monogamous relationships simply break up. Even if the husband has other wives a woman in a polygamous marriage is expected to be faithful, at least to some degree (even if a certain amount of cheating is tolerated it won't be if it is blatant and publicly embarrasses the legal husband). Cheating is generally preffered in SM relationships but it's not as serious as cheating within a marriage. The serial monogamy practiced in Western urban areas are not marriages and thus they are not equivalents to polygamy.
ReplyDeleteGloria
The problem with Gloria's comment is that all children are now legitimate and can demand paternal resources/inheritance. So, while serial monogamy is not de–facto polygamy, having multiple women you've impregnating bearing at the same time is, especially if none has a greater claim to you by virtue of marriage (but that's really just a distinction that highlights the lack of real distinction).
ReplyDeleteSeems like mind-reading of those lower-status males. A plausible, but completely unsubstantiated interpretation of events.
ReplyDeleteFWIW, Heartiste wrote about a study of digit ratios that showed that Poles (among the groups in the study) had the lowest ratio, which would imply that male Poles were the most beta. Does that illuminate the topic of this post?
ReplyDeleteOn the other hand the highest ratios (among the groups in the study) were from Jamaicans and Finns. What does that suggest? I dunno.
...but to take that special girl ape out for a nice steak
ReplyDeleteSalad.
Humans can think, it's not just a case of brute force like among animals. You might be the biggest, baddest male around but it really wouldn't be all that much trouble for me to put a spear through your back. That fact helps to encourage compromise. So does the fact that the clan down the ridge could put spears through all our backs if we don't co-operate.
ReplyDeleteAnd yet by historic times, somehow Indo-Europeans were the only people to remember this revolutionary idea from millions of years ago?
ReplyDeleteBy and large, monogamy seems to be a practice of Europeans and North Asians. For the rest, it might be a recent aberration.
ReplyDelete"Formal concubinage or polygamy has rarely been a factor in Indo–European societies (except for those who converted to Islam), especially in Europe."
ReplyDeleteMedieval Irish law (most definitely Indo-European, bearing a lot of relationship to both Germanic and Hindu customary law) actually did recognize limited polygyny. That said, it is also clear from the legal documents that this was never the normal arrangement for most people. It was apparently meant as a way of giving some legal protections to the children of men's mistresses (because guys will be guys), and was probably only ever exercised by the very wealthiest and most powerful warlords in society. Irish law even recognized the legal right of a first wife to physically beat and abuse a second wife upon her introduction to the household- hardly, one would imagine, what would be expected of an obedient wife in the Islamic world (though I am not an expert on this point).
It's also clear from a historical analysis that the Church worked hard to stamp out the practice, with varying degrees of success at different periods in history, until they appear to have had almost complete success in the early modern period. It does lend a different light to the song "The Limerick Rake", though.
"Medieval Irish law (most definitely Indo-European, bearing a lot of relationship to both Germanic and Hindu customary law) actually did recognize limited polygyny. That said, it is also clear from the legal documents that this was never the normal arrangement for most people."
ReplyDeleteIn fairness, it doesn't seem to have been the normal practice in a lot, if not most, polygamous societies.
"By and large, monogamy seems to be a practice of Europeans and North Asians. For the rest, it might be a recent aberration."
ReplyDeleteEuropeans seem to have become truly monogamous only after becoming Christian. Northern Slavs (Kiev Empire) were christened en mass in the late 10th century. Before that, it wasn't unheard of for a powerful, wealthy man to have 2 or 3 wives at the same time.
As for North Asians, I believe that polygamy was practiced among them a very short time ago still. In joy Luck Club, An Mei's mother is raped by a powerful man who needs a young, healthy wife to bear him a son. The rape is arranged by the man's second wife (not the first one she arranged, just the first one with positive results), and she ends up claiming the the baby as her own. The man's first wife is an opium addict and doesn't participate in the drama, and his third wife is busy raising 2 ugly daughters. An Mei's pregnant mother has nowhere to go, so she becomes the 4th wife.
Also, I've read that it is and always has been pretty easy to arrange a ghost marriage for a young daughter who passed away. The living husband would marry the ghost wife, have her name written on his tablet so his progeny would honor her, and then he'd just marry a living girl because men could have as many wives as they wanted on their tablet. On the other hand, a woman who agreed to marry a ghost husband couldn't marry anyone else afterwords, so only girls from very poor families and with very poor prospects agreed to such an arrangement.
Of course, it seems as though European and North Asian were very invested in their children, so they didn't have more wives and more children than they could afford, usually. So, perhaps, even in the absence of true monogamy as law, a lot more of the young men in these regions ended up married and anchored than elsewhere in the world.
Also, I don't think that the societal move towards a limited number of wives ( making one wife per man the most common scenario up north) was driven by women's choice. The vast majority of the world's cultures have been purely patriarchal.
ReplyDeleteIn Africa, daughters have been (and in some areas still are) more valuable than sons because the father could (can) get payment for them from a wealthy man and use them to create family ties to a powerful man. In a mild, fertile environment food was plentiful, and even elderly wives could produce enough in their gardens to feed their husbands. Besides, many elderly men who were worthy enough to have wives, possessed a few who weren't all that elderly by the husband's twilight years.
Something about harsh, cold climates made young men a lot more valuable TO THEIR FATHERS. It's hard to plow cold soil. It takes muscle to chop wood in preparation for the winter and to build the type of a house that could protect a family from the cold. Fathers need at least one son to survive into old age and several sons as insurance and to grow in wealth. But sons need motivation in order to stay away from foolish, dangerous sports like bear wrestling and good reasons to work hard. If in mild climates fathers gained wealth by exchanging their daughters for goods from that one successful man, fathers in cold climates insured their households by cooperating with each other and exchanging daughters to provide ALL their sons with wives and children which would anchor them to the productive activities of the household.
This is a joke.
ReplyDeleteWhite Beta males are the biggest LOSERS of the last 50 years social revolutions (Diversity, Feminism, Multiculturalism,...) and this is obvious when you see the demographics.
"So, maybe when the 2001 monolith arrived in the Olduvai Gorge, what it really did was not inspire the proto-human apes to bash each other's heads in with tools (that was already pretty obvious), but to take that special girl ape out for a nice steak."
ReplyDeleteMore like someone might have arrived to teach a prehistoric cave hunter how to be extra gentle with his favorite little sister...
Actual zoological 'beta' male mating strategy is to seduce, love and leave the female, while avoiding confrontation with the dominant alpha males. This is how other primates behave, and remains common in Africa - it's how men who are not 'Big Man' alphas behave.
ReplyDeleteIn high latitudes, beta males stopped being betas and started being mini-alphas, mating monogamously with a single female. Dominant alphas also became more monogamous, but slower and less decisively - in much of the world it seems common for most men to have one wife, but a small number of men to have lots of wives and/or mistresses, harem girls, etc.
My impression is that monogamy had major survival benefits in high latitudes, so it became common. The modern welfare state terminated this, so we are seeing a tendency away from monogamy.
"masses of lower-ranked males, along with females, directly against the elite of alphas"
ReplyDeleteKind of a mish mash of Marxist babble especially the part about the masses. More likely 2 males discovered that they could beat one male that was stronger than either of the two. Then four took on two. Then eventually you get the biblical battle of Meggido with a mob of males formed into a line armed with sharp sticks. This was they system for most of human history. I doubt the scrum at Meggido had a class consciousness of being part of the masses. The job of the alpha male was now to keep the sticks sharp and the line populated and straight. To the extent that there was class consciousness it was that of the alpha male that understood the masses. In the same way that today the neo-cons know exactly how manipulate the American masses.
"sexual revolution occurred, led by low-ranked males and faithful females."
Wow talk about politically incorrect, men have class consciousness, but women have sexual desires. I think he confuses faithful with monogamous.
"My impression is that monogamy had major survival benefits in high latitudes, so it became common. The modern welfare state terminated this, so we are seeing a tendency away from monogamy."
ReplyDeleteThe modern welfare state is running out of money so we should see a tendency toward it again. It used to be that people who had children they couldn't afford would see their children starve to death. After the industrial revolution created huge amounts of new wealth, we decided at a societal level to use some of that excess wealth to keep that from happening. We never dealt with the issue, though, of the underclass producing increasing numbers of children and then offloading the responsibility for them on to the welfare state. If we want a policy of not letting children starve to death, eventually we'll need a policy of not letting more be born than can be fed. It's going to be that simple We won't be able to afford to do anything else.
The commonness of cuckolding, often assumed by game bloggers, has far more basis in their misogyny than reality.
ReplyDeleteThe commenters absolutely destroyed that study's conclusion.
The lower–ranked males did not have power in the mating game to exercise in the creation of monogamy.
ReplyDeleteHunter-gatherers generally had a reverse dominance hierarchy whereby the betas combined to keep the alpha in check. Read Christopher Boehm's Hierarchy in the Forest.
"Actual zoological 'beta' male mating strategy is to seduce, love and leave the female, while avoiding confrontation with the dominant alpha males. This is how other primates behave, and remains common in Africa - it's how men who are not 'Big Man' alphas behave."
ReplyDeleteIt's fine that you boys are using terms from real science for your internet game thing, but it's silly to pretend that you're using them in the same sense as the real scientists. My younger siblings used to call large, fast flying snowballs "asteroids", but even being little kids, they knew it was just snow... Please, open your introductory textbook. I believe mammal mating hierarchies were covered in 9th grade Honors Bio.
... while unintelligent and propagandized women may want to settle for "a share of an Alpha", this is still not the norm in the upper–middle, educated classes.
ReplyDeleteUh, I hope you realize that the upper-middle, educated classes are a minority. Most people are in the lower ranks of the SES. So, by your argument, game does work on most women.
"Uh, I hope you realize that the upper-middle, educated classes are a minority. Most people are in the lower ranks of the SES. So, by your argument, game does work on most women."
ReplyDeleteThat which you call "game" works on most people without a real sense of self and with no strong personal values. "Girls like jerks" is as much of a cliche as "boys like bitches", and both are true when it comes to the shallow, pathetic dimwits who make up the majority of the human race. That's why fraternities and sororities haze their pledges. It's not that people enjoy being humiliated. It's that those without a mind of their own figure that any organization (or any person) that believes that being in its presence is worth suffering must be right. It's why gangs beat the shit out of new recruits. Oh, and evolution didn't predispose either gender to enjoy being treated like shit. The pathetic weakling IS suffering as it's being tortured, physically or mentally. He or she simply wants something great for him/herself, and since the dimwit isn't sure what exactly is this "something great", the shallow drone is looking for clues from someone around him or her. Dominant sociopath behavior is often mistaken for such a clue.
as much of a cliche as "boys like bitches"
ReplyDeleteUh, boys don't like bitches. Boys like sluts (although not to marry). There's a big difference.
"The lower–ranked males did not have power in the mating game to exercise in the creation of monogamy"
ReplyDeleteyup, it's having the power in the muscles and numbers game.
"the monogamous revolution, such as it is, was an exercise of female power."
or mere expediency. refer to Briffault's Law.
"while unintelligent and propagandized women may want to settle for "a share of an Alpha", this is still not the norm in the upper–middle, educated classes."
Because they already have more than their share of the top-notch males?
"The commonness of cuckolding, often assumed by game bloggers, has far more basis in their misogyny than reality."
It's the fact that it goes unpunished(and even covered up for women) that's really grating.
It's the much more easily assumed commonness of rape by the feminist-addled society that has far more basis in misandry and general suspicion of men.
It takes some getting used to that women hate men more than vice versa but I hope you do.
btw this is from roissy's blog much before razib's posts on the topic:
If a man suspects his wife has cuckolded him, the odds of his child not being his rise to 30%. The general nonpaternity rate is around 4%.
razib uses the term 'urban myth', perhaps in the same way that people think 25% people are homos, or that promiscuous women are judged more harshly than their male counterparts, or that game bloggers are misogynists par excellence.
-------
"That which you call "game" works on most people without a real sense of self and with no strong personal values. "
It certainly doesn't make men wanna get in bed with other men. (homo lurkers will disagree)
"Oh, and evolution didn't predispose either gender to enjoy being treated like shit."
The sales of 50 shades of grey would like to differ.
How about it makes women want to have sex, and thus it's not 'being treated like shit' per se that is enjoyable.
Would that stop ruffling your feathers?
""Girls like jerks" is as much of a cliche as "boys like bitches""
it's not, certainly not 'as much'.
Sistas before playas is certainly not as much of a cliche like bros before hos.
"It certainly doesn't make men wanna get in bed with other men."
ReplyDeleteAnd it doesn't make straight women go to bed with lesbians. (Although, extreme examples of emotional neediness coupled with an off the charts weak sense of self might make even this possible.) What's your point? Insecure dimwits who kinda know that they want a man or a woman or to be a part of a group, but aren't sure how to pick a good one fall prey to misleading, sociopathological cues that I described above, but you chose to ignore. There are plenty of such pathetic men out there who get into relationships and stay with women who berate them, emasculate them and treat them like dirt. No, they don't enjoy it. It's usually hell for them. But because they don't have strong personal values in which they are confident, these men see being mistreated by a woman as a clue that they are with a woman who is worth suffering for- a high quality woman. That's the essence of game.
"The sales of 50 shades of grey would like to differ. How about it makes women want to have sex, and thus it's not 'being treated like shit' per se that is enjoyable."
Correct me if I'm wrong, but from my (admittedly quick since it seemed to be the same idea repeated over and over again) ivestigation of the "game"-sphere, I gathered that a successful PUA is advised to make a woman feel less rather than more desirable, give the desired target less rather than more attention and make the object of desire insecure and unsure of the PUA's affections. Tearing a person down like that and spitting on their dignity while compromising your own is equivalent with treating that person like shit. Again, women most definitely don't enjoy it. Dogs don't enjoy it. Nobody enjoys it. But confused, shallow, weak people who want something of great value, but have no sense of what is valuable take being treated like shit as a sign that the person spitting on her (or him) must be very valuable indeed to presume the right to do so.
Who cares if a certain book sold a certain number of copies? "The Rules" which teaches girls to play boys by pretending to be more busy, valuable, desired and aloof than they really are has been selling like crazy for decades. Unfortunately, since so many people of both genders do lack a strong sense of self that stuff really does work fairly often. However, i don't suppose boys enjoyed having their calls not returned, being turned down for dates when those dates aren't made within a proper time frame or being treated with cool detachment at random intervals, even if it did fool them into thinking that their girl was more desirable than she actually was and made them more eager to marry.
My feathers aren't ruffled, but I'm sad for all the young people who fall for stories that are meant as entertainment and mistake them for real life advise. I'm a teacher, so being worried about kids and about their future is in my nature. As for myself, I can honestly say that I haven't attempted to tear someone else down in order to build myself up since preschool. What a rotten start for... anything (even if it's just a short adventure or a making of a pleasant memory). All the men in my life (starting with daddy and ending with my husband) have always given me a lot of attention and affection, and I always did the same for them. That's the whole point of any rewarding relationship. Make yourself as worthy as possible, pick a person worthy of your affection and shower them with it. "Game" and "Rules" are about picking someone you don't really like and pretending to be someone you're not for them. Makes for funny reads, but doesn't translate well into a good life.
"Beta males" ensured the survival of their offspring by being there to provide for them. Quite the revolution - a revolution of evolution, not of revolution "betas" rising up against their "alpha" masters.
ReplyDeleteLots of factors at work there, including probably an evolutionary payoff for impulse control - if you keep your pants on your children can survive to adulthood.
This would especially have been the case with the agricultural revolution, which demanded impulse control and restraint to a degree that hunting and gathering did not.
Today, of course, we make sure that even the children of those with no impulse control survive to multiply and overrun us.
Who cares if a certain book sold a certain number of copies? "The Rules" which teaches girls to play boys by pretending to be more busy, valuable, desired and aloof than they really are has been selling like crazy for decades.
ReplyDeleteUh, both The Rules and 50 Shades were big hits with women, not with men. In the first case, it's simply projection: women think that what works on them must work on men. They couldn't be more mistaken. In the second case, it's a submission fantasy that appeals to women, not to men (barring a few weird fetishists).
"Who cares if a certain book sold a certain number of copies? "
ReplyDeleteTo be more clearer think of the 'cliche' point before.
""The Rules" which teaches girls to play boys by pretending to be more busy, valuable, desired and aloof than they really are has been selling like crazy for decades."
Does the Rules involve the gender- inversion of the storyline in 50 shades?
Have men used it to call women misandrist?
"these men see being mistreated by a woman as a clue that they are with a woman who is worth suffering for- a high quality woman. That's the essence of game."
Are you sure you are not projecting your own worldview onto these men? How about an alternative one that goes something like this "if women didn't have vaginas, Men would hunt them for food"?
If the whole charade doesn't end up in sexual intercourse then there is no essence of game.
"There are plenty of such pathetic men out there who get into relationships and stay with women who berate them, emasculate them and treat them like dirt."
Your use of 'plenty of men' is again the same wordplay "as much of a cliche as boys like bitches."
They don't seek out such relationships because it makes them have more sex with these women.
The relationships turn into that. That's a big difference.
"This would especially have been the case with the agricultural revolution, which demanded impulse control and restraint to a degree that hunting and gathering did not."
ReplyDeleteProducing surplus isn't a good way to increase impulse control and restraint.
me:
ReplyDelete"Actual zoological 'beta' male mating strategy is to seduce, love and leave the female, while avoiding confrontation with the dominant alpha males. This is how other primates behave, and remains common in Africa - it's how men who are not 'Big Man' alphas behave."
Maya:
>>It's fine that you boys are using terms from real science for your internet game thing, but it's silly to pretend that you're using them in the same sense as the real scientists. My younger siblings used to call large, fast flying snowballs "asteroids", but even being little kids, they knew it was just snow... Please, open your introductory textbook. I believe mammal mating hierarchies were covered in 9th grade Honors Bio.<<
Feel free to explain my mistake, if any.
"The lower–ranked males did not have power in the mating game to exercise in the creation of monogamy"
ReplyDeleteObviously they did.
If you have an environment where the females can provision their own offspring *easily* you have an environment that can select for gorilla type behaviour.
If part of that population then seeks to move to an environment which requires male assistance to provision their offspring then a single alpha male physically can't do it and other males aren't going to unless the children are theirs.
So the move out of Africa - or out of the tropical bit of Africa - required at least the beginnings of the evolution of monogamous traits - particularly for women.
That seems logically self-evident?
And the more neccessary it was to have a dedicated male provider the more deep-seated that evolution would be.
The new monogamous traits wouldn't neccessarily completely overwrite the earlier behaviour just suppress it so both would exist with one dominant.
If a population later moved past the level of subsistence to one where there was a surplus controlled by an elite then you have a new environment where a single male could provision multiple females and it becomes in the interest of the elite to try and go back to a more polygamous form - for themselves - but not neccessarily the majority who are still monogamous.
This last step occurred later in Europe than elsewhere because of the climate and the lack of a Nile / Euphrates / Indus and when it did occur it was successfully opposed by the Church.
So all populations except those that never moved from the tropics will contain both the monogamous and polygamous traits.
The proof is the total ubiquity of love songs - or their complete absence.
.
"Part of the whole "game" universe that is really twisted is that, while unintelligent and propagandized women may want to settle for "a share of an Alpha""
Using the welfare supported underclass or childless career women as representative of evolved female behaviour takes nonsense to unexplored new levels.
Women who want children at a socioeconomic level above welfare don't behave like that (on average) and haven't done so for millenia and for entirely logical reasons.
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"The sales of 50 shades of grey would like to differ."
Jebus wept. Dominance and being a jerk are not the same thing. Women like men who are (or at least are capable of being) physically dominant for the same reason they like men who are intelligent and healthy - it increases the chances of their sons surviving and reproducing. It's nothing to do with being a jerk or an alpha or all this stupid crap.
If you're not naturally dominant then *trying* to act like a jerk probably helps but not for the reason you think. A nerd trying to act like a jerk (but probably not very successfully) will probably come across as slightly more masculine than before.
.
"We never dealt with the issue, though, of the underclass producing increasing numbers of children and then offloading the responsibility for them on to the welfare state."
It didn't happen till offshoring and mass immigration created a mass underclass.
.
"All power ultimately resides with the majority of men, who can make the social arrangements be whatever they like if they put their minds to it."
Quite.
"Dominance and being a jerk are not the same thing."
ReplyDeleteIt's the same thing to a boy who buys into gender-equality or hasn't realized that girls are different, and then watches the stud making the moves on a girl he likes.
His angst at the girl not seeing the jerk that the stud is, has launched a thousand songs about how he could love the girl more than the stud ever will, with follow-ups of 'misogynistic' lyrics after the realization that girls do like 'jerks'.
"Women like men who are (or at least are capable of being) physically dominant"
more than half the male population?
"for the same reason they like men who are intelligent and healthy - it increases the chances of their sons surviving and reproducing. "
It makes something wet. And no, women are not pedophiles.
"It's nothing to do with being a jerk or an alpha or all this stupid crap.
If you're not naturally dominant then *trying* to act like a jerk probably helps but not for the reason you think. A nerd trying to act like a jerk (but probably not very successfully) will probably come across as slightly more masculine than before."
If you read Maya's diatribe and the responses to them more carefully, you'd realize being alpha is more about behaving in a feminine manner that women like and have themselves written of in Rules. Unless you think that obfuscation, misdirection and using words to lessen someone's self-esteem are manly traits.
"To be more clearer think of the 'cliche' point before. "
ReplyDeleteI didn't address you rejection of the existence of the "Boys like bitches" cliche before, but it really is as prevalent as the "Girls like jerks". For clarification, see almost every TV show or movie marketed to girls ever, from "Ready or Not" and "She's All That" to "Lizzy McGuire". You object to this because you, as a guy, don't like to be bitched around. Women, overwhelmingly respond that way to the notion that they like jerks. I was always scandalized when my mother would say that kids like to be punished. they don't. Nobody enjoys being treated badly. But the truth is that many kids respond to punishment in the way the parents want, and a great many people submit to the person who treats them badly.
"Are you sure you are not projecting your own worldview onto these men? How about an alternative one that goes something like this "if women didn't have vaginas, Men would hunt them for food"?
If the whole charade doesn't end up in sexual intercourse then there is no essence of game."
Game isn't simply about obtaining sexual intercourse. If it were, the teachings would be all about where the prostitutes hang out and how to make the most money to be able to afford them. No, that which you call "game" is all about getting the opposite sex to treat you in a way that validates you the most. For men, it's getting women that other men like themselves would desire to sleep with them. For women, it's getting the type of men whom other women like themselves would want to marry to marry them. And I explained my own world view already in too much of a long winded detail. Perhaps, you missed it because you are concentrating on repeating what, to you, amounts to dogma.
"They don't seek out such relationships because it makes them have more sex with these women.
The relationships turn into that. That's a big difference."
When a man marries a girl that he thought was great and she turns into a bitch, he missed the early cues. She was a bitch from the get go who made him believe she was desirable through the type of behavior described in The Rules or on PUA blogs. (Btw, many selfish assholes learn these tricks naturally, without a third party guiding them.) Similarly, a lot of women who get with obvious jerks act very surprised that these men in their lives "turn out" to be jerks.
Simon in London,
ReplyDeleteAmong the mammals, including primates, there are many different mating cultures. The case of a single male having access to and mating with all the healthy, fertile females is very rare, and mostly found among the feline species. And in that case, other males are, usually, not allowed to hang around the pride at all.
The more common case is that of an alpha male and an alpha female being the only ones allowed to mate in the whole pack/family. (Sometimes there are 2 or 3 alpha females, but all the healthy, fertile females aren't "in use".) This is often found among the canines and the primates.
The most common case is that of an alpha male as king and the beta males as his vassals. In that scenario which is the most common among the primates, almost all of the healthy females are allowed to mate and the alpha male gets the first pick (and he might impregnate more females than the betas, but not always and not by many). The beta males are also high status males who share the rest of the females. They keep order and make sure that both the alpha's rights to his females and their rights to their females are honored. When the females signal that they are being approached by a low status male, it's the betas who come running to chase him off/kill him.
" it's simply projection: women think that what works on them must work on men. They couldn't be more mistaken. In the second case, it's a submission fantasy that appeals to women, not to men (barring a few weird fetishists)."
ReplyDeleteIf this is true, if poor treatment and humiliation doesn't work to attract and earn respect of the weak minded members of BOTH genders, then why do gangs abuse their new recruits and why do fraternities haze their pledges?
Late back to this thread:
ReplyDeleteMaya:
"The most common case is that of an alpha male as king and the beta males as his vassals. In that scenario which is the most common among the primates, almost all of the healthy females are allowed to mate and the alpha male gets the first pick (and he might impregnate more females than the betas, but not always and not by many). The beta males are also high status males who share the rest of the females. They keep order and make sure that both the alpha's rights to his females and their rights to their females are honored. When the females signal that they are being approached by a low status male, it's the betas who come running to chase him off/kill him."
OK, thanks - that's a little bit different from the image I had (monkey or lemure beta seducer gains access to female behind alpha's back, often with a gift of food), which was definitely presented as typical in more than one TV documentary I've seen (in the UK there is no education in zoology at high school level, from what I can tell).
But what you describe as more typical is interesting. Alpha polygamous leader supported by high-status betas with their own 'wives' shows an easy pathway to the kind of monogamous human nuclear families we think of as typical now.