Articles from March 2012

Rationalism in the Matrix

It would appear that I mixed up the proverbial shit pot with last week’s The Gift of Anxiety post, which was itself a response to another post on another blog’s response to yet another post made by your humble author here. If it sounds like a tangled mess, just know that it’s happened before. For my readers, I feel apologies are due, because I think this blog’s purpose deserves more than to be dragged down by the petty machinations of fem-centric Matrix-speak; and particularly the variety that censors any rational challenges to its venerable vulnerable ideologies.

If you find fault in my having even entertained a response to this, well, I can’t say as I blame you. If I’m guilty of anything it was in attempting to logically reddress what amounts to a brick wall of socially reinforced fem-centric ideology that by definition has no margin for any critical analysis of it.

Reader BJ’s comment:

RT, you’re engaging with an emotionally charged being in an analytical argument, a battle whose W.O.M.D are the very tools which make you a man, logic and reasoning, for which there are no comparable counter measures.

However it was reader Höllenhund who really brought this home for me:

By the way, older, experienced MRAs have stated that it’s completely pointless to try to have a rational debate with women about these issues. They’ll always get angry or react in some other irrational way, and you can bet white knights will immediately come to their defense. It’s a waste of time. As Alte said, “if you have a rational argument, take it to the men”.

Guilty as charged, but if there was any benefit to this clusterfuck of idealism vs. censorship it brought to light the necessity to protect the social system that is the feminine Matrix.

Censoring for Affirmation

Reader Umslopogaas wrote an interesting post in reference to just this dynamic that inspired an awareness in me. The feminine social Matrix is a system that was built upon, and depended upon an older social paradigm that never accounted for a globalized connectivity. If men becoming aware of their true SMV was a primary Threat to that system, then the rise of social media and global connectivity was its facilitator. For men, the Meta Game and true unplugging began as a result of meta-connectivity and the free exchange of observations and ideas that followed.

Although I think it’s a bit of a dramatic stretch to compare Aunt Giggles’ censorship with the Gestapo, I do think there’s another, more apt comparison – that of religious figures’ censorship.

The rise of social media has inspired a more open means of discourse in previously closed social arenas. Nowhere is that more obvious than in religious / theological debate. Where in previous times a religious leader’s ‘inspired insight’ was closed to interpretation or discussion, now they must be prepared to defend their position online to the global consortium of the internet.

This globalized marketplace of ideas doesn’t make for a comfortable environment for people with an absolutist mindset used to receiving constant praise, if not acquiescent silence. Now, courtesy of blogs, social media, and the general connectivity of the internet people can voice their criticisms of ideas that, in a ‘real time’ social setting, they would never dream of initiating out of repressed courtesy or fear of ostracization.

For those unaccustomed to a contrary position in their ego-invested beliefs, this proves a to be a challenge. To remain effective in their message they must stay contemporary and use the ‘voice of the age’ – in this case social media – however they also must entertain the risk that some dissenting voice will call them to the carpet on their perspectives. The inherent problem with this is that it necessitates a critical insight that may conflict with that ego-invested belief.

For religious leaders this is a very tough trade off: Posting your sermon on your blog to reach the massess is simply good marketing, and implies certainty in the relevance of that message and/or idea. However the strength of that message must stand up to public scrutiny for it to be considered a strong theory, assertion or  perspective. The same holds true for the religion of the fem-centric society.

Since the apex of feminization in the 90’s, fem-centrism has taken its social positions as articles of faith. It just is because it always has been, and no one questions its purpose or validity. Old ideologies die hard, but are the ones most tenaciously clung to by those whose livelihoods depend on the old paradigms to endure. To preserve this system in the face of a building volume of social critique, a degree of dissociation has to be instituted. Thus we have the professors and pastors of previously unchallenged ideologies selectively filter out conflicting ideas, thus recreating the echo chambers they were accustomed to under the old paradigm, or take the lazy way out and simply brook no audience for any feedback by turning off anyone’s ability to comment on their ideas.

People who have questions don’t frighten me. People who have no questions scare the shit out of me.

Letters from the Pedestal

Background

The following is an instant message transcript detailing the soon-to-be break up of an 8 month live-in relationship. Our heroine in this classic tale of dutiful Beta vs. memorable Alpha had recently moved in with the Beta subject after a tumultuous two year Alpha relationship with “Chris” (names changed). From almost the moment she agreed to living with our Beta she began pining for her former Alpha lover. Chris was a musician who’d moved to a large metropolitan area to “make it big”. He was the perfect brooding, inflective, creative archetype, but suffered from the usual maladies, alcohol, drug abuse, overly self important – basically the perfect recipe for the artistic Alpha. Needless to say this was what led to the first breakup.

For the want of a more stable relationship, and a place to stay, she takes up with our Beta. They’d been ‘friends’ for so long, and he’d been so supportive in her time with Chris it seemed the natural fit for her. No more chaos, just the down-to-earth comfort of a relationship with a “familiar friend.” Needless to say thing don’t go as planned, and the secret phone calls to and trips to vist the former Alpha lover commence.

Before you read this analysis, I want to express that my focus in this is the Beta guy and to detail some of the more common misconceptions men have whilst plugged-in to the Matrix. Yes, our heroine’s behaviors are cruel, but only serve to illustrate the machinations of the Beta mind in this study. Is she blameless? Absolutely not. Is she following her hypergamic imperative? Absolutely so.

From the top, Beta’s commentary is in blue:

They say absence makes the heart grow fonder, you have proved that with getting back with chris.
I never stopped loving you less or caring for you less when we were together. You say, I gave up, stopped trying, after I won you.

This statement here is a textbook illustration of what I call a “scarcity mentality.” As if the initial cliché weren’t bad enough, he refers to getting together with her as “winning you.” This puts her attention/desire into a reward status – classic AFC preconditioning. SHE is the PRIZE to be won rather than making himself the PRIZE who is to be sought after. This mentality is an instant confirmation of a lack of confidence. It’s she who should be appreciative of his own self-worth and identity, and desire to be associated with it, but from the outset he puts her on the pedestal and confirms for her that he is of lesser value. Off to a very bad start. Also, his hammy referencing of an old cliché is only one more glaring illustration of his lack of depth in experience; this just screams “I’m a beta.”

Thats not true in the least. I never stopped trying, it was the first time I had ever been in a relationship with you and the first time we had lived together, and over the first 4 months we were together we had only been in each other’s company like 12 days. I was trying to get comfortable with us. It was still kinda weird at first since I hadn’t talked to you in so long and we were together. So awesome and so sudden but that made it interesting. I never stopped doing for you, I never stopped being spontaneous with us.

Here, and in the previous comment, he interprets her telling him that “he gave up” as an accusation that he gave up on the relationship – not the real message, which is, he gave up on himself and his own identity to better identify with and accomodate her in order to secure and maintain her intimacy. As I’ve discussed before, he’ll “do anything” to make her happy and this is precisely why she has no respect for the guy. I think this is where the main point of conflict is rooted. He has a fundamental misunderstanding of what she meant by saying “he’d given up.” He thinks he didn’t identify enough or didn’t figure out the secret combination of sappy romantic gestures that would make her desire him because it’s been so mentally ingrained into him that a woman should always be considered a prize to be ‘won’. This is the root of his own frustration because her words and behaviors contradict his ego-invested expectations of himself and how relationships ought to be. So consequently he falls back on victimhood as a defense – according to his mental schema he’s done everything by the book and it’s she who’s been disingenuous.

“Yep, I won her heart finally, its time to sit back and relax.”

Again with the ‘Sleepless in Seattle’ romantic comedy banter; but also, again, he restates his position of supplication by making her ‘heart’ a PRIZE to be won.

Never would I think that. Nothing was set in stone, you could leave me at any point and for any reason. I knew you were still an independent person.

I was just trying to get on a comfortable grounds with us. God, we only lived together 5 months, in that 5 months, from June to Oct, is when you formed your opinion, cause it was all over in November when you decided you loved Chris more than me.

More melodrama, but rather than find fault in his own actions for even considering the fallout from living with a woman he’s involved with (much less, one in need of a home and fresh out of an intense relationship) he’d rather apply for victimhood again and make a plea for circumstance. In all likelihood her opinion of both he and Chris were already set, but he finds fault with her because it more easily fits his romanticized (and feminized) ideals. I swear, the guy should get into daytime dramas when he gets out of college, he’d be brilliant at it. But I can’t let her off the hook entirely here – she knew your own set of conditions and this guy WAS a convenient out for her. It’s just now she’s paying for that misjudgment.

Before you decided that everything you had done was a mistake and that you regretted coming here, and dating me.

You even said that. You did say that to me, so whats that say about you and our whole relationship. You think I quit trying and just wished you’d never have come here and/or dated me.

See my other comments, I think I addressed this fairly well. He misunderstands that ‘trying’ has nothing to do with the relationship, but rather establishing himself as his own person. He then finds it easier to accommodate his own idealized fantasy relationships against her indiscretions. She’s the flawed one now (and rightfully), whereas before she was his ideal, because it conflicts with his romantic mental narrative.

So which one is more fucked up, I think yours was much worse. Regretting me, having feelings in your heart for Chris that started pushing me out 5 months after getting here and for good 7 months later. So yeah, when you think and say to yourself  I wasnt a good boyfriend, cause his faults were just too great. He cared too much, would do too much for me and quit trying after I gave him a couple of months before I totally pushed him out of my heart and decided that Chris wass my main objective.

Our hapless Beta is in the right, but for the wrong reasons.

Restating the obvious here, but it does show that he enjoys the time he spends concocting ways to confront her on the righteousness of his efforts in order to change her mind. He falls into the same binary thinking trap that most AFCs do – “If I can just plead my case well enough and logically enough while applying a good amount of indignation, guilt and conviction she’ll see I’m the perfect boyfriend and desire me again.” This logic is great when you’re an attorney or arguing on a debate team, but he hasn’t come to the realization yet that desire and attraction cannot be negotiated. He only consolidates her estimate of his Beta status by lamely employing shame in an effort to engender the guilt he thinks will make her come to her sense and love him.

This is a very important lesson that beta chumps MUST transition past; shame will NEVER make a woman hot for you. You can be 100% justified in your judging of a woman’s behaviors and character, but in jarring her into self-awareness you will only generate her resentment of you – and especially when you’re unquestionably correct in your estimations.

You were much worse in the relationship than I was. Your total basis is pretty much irrelevant. Cause givin just a bit of time and you voicing any concerns it would have been different. Relationships are about change for both parties involved. You never came to me with the problems you had. You didnt care enough about me to do that, like you were looking for an excuse.

It’s important to remember here that this was the first “real relationship” this guy had ever engaged in. Would he know that “Relationships are about change” due to his many past, successful relationships? No, but his life long Matrix conditioning has taught him that this is ‘what’s expected of people in a relationship’. Here, he is qualifying her against his own preconceptions and trying to make himself the martyr rather than realizing that he’s just as culpable as her for even allowing the ‘relationship’ (such as it was) to happen. When women’s real-world behaviors conflict with beta men’s fem-centric life conditioning, worlds collide.

You came to Chris, you told him what needed to be changed, gave him an ultimatum basicly. You gave him lots of chances over the 2 years. For the last 8 months when you were getting any dick from him you told him.

You loved him enough to do that, you wanted him in your life enough to do that.

2nd, 3rd and 4th (and more) chances are for Alphas. Betas must be bulletproof from the start until they attain, perceptively, Alpha status in a woman’s estimation. Alpha can fail far more shit tests than any Beta would ever be given leniency for.

Our Beta can’t see past his own drama to ask why she allowed Chris more leeway and how this applies to himself. Even when she left, Chris was still his own person, he was the PRIZE, not her. In standard Beta fashion, he will interpret Chris as indifferent or uncaring towards her and try to play this as a card in his favor, but the subtext of it is she had respect and tingles for the Chris well after she broke it off (5 Minutes of Alpha) and his sense of identity is what planted the seed of doubt in her head. Betas will never come to accept this until they re-evaluate their own preconditioning. In the meantime he’ll conveniently use her returning to Chris to reinforce his own estimation of her, use Chris’ indifference as leverage in pleading his case (shame) for being a logically better boyfriend choice, and affirm his own Beta-Game beliefs. It might be interesting to compare how she feels about leaving the Beta to how she felt when she left Chris.

You didnt do that for me, not at all. You made your decision within 6 months of being down here together. Chris was in your heart the entire time. I never had you.

I was in love with you and you only thought you were in love with me. So dont ever think that you had it bad and that I was the one at fault. My faults were nothing, and you know that in your heart, they were nothing that couldnt have been easily changed with a little time. They werent deal breakers.

Im not saying I feel this way, im saying this is what I think and i believe it is absolutely true. at least most of it.

Here, he’s looking for absolution of his efforts at this point and using the only psychological skillset he’s ever developed – an adolescent one. He’s feeding his emotionality by concocting rhetorical scenarios about her that he’d like to be true in order to reaffirm his self-righteous, AFC idealisms, when in fact this whole experience is essentially a challenge to his ego-investment in moon-eyed romanticism. When something attacks this investment it also attacks his personality because he’s internalized it so fully. So in order to protect it (and because it’s easier than self-analysis) he transfers the blame to her for not playing the role of his fantasy girlfriend. She becomes the flawed one for not affirming his idealism. ‘Quality Woman’ becomes ‘Damaged Goods’.

Epilogue

It was not long after this that our heroine left our subject and temporarily got back with her former Alpha lover. It didn’t last long. For all his brooding and pensive Alpha-ness he was still the same loser she left. Not long after she eventually married another Alpha with the same self-confidence, but much better long term prospects. Her now-husband was, and still is, the prize for her, and that’s what she wanted, a prize.

The Gift of Anxiety

 

Well since Aunt Sue’s decided to click on the ‘echo chamber’ setting on her blog’s comment filters I thought I’d take the opportunity to retype my deleted response to her (once again) on my unmoderated blog. Aunt Sue has a big problem with competition anxiety, and since she secretly loves me, she can’t make it too obvious that she reads my blog posts regularly for inspiration. Hell, it’s almost a Friday tradition now! It’s OK dear, I’ll entertain you for the weekend. Roissy, Roosh and Dalrock send you their unrequited regards too,…

Dear Sue, you know instead of paraphrasing my perspective on this you could simply quote the bit in my post that set you off (again):

Women don’t want a Man to cheat, but they love a Man who could cheat. Naturally you don’t want to appear to be seeking the flirtation – that would be OVERT – but rather playing along with it. I have encouraged or played along with casual flirtations with my wife present that leave her with the impression that other women find me desirable. When you’ve been together long enough and a strong emotional bond has formed, you will be surprised at how many shit tests and hypergamous evaluations you can avoid just by her perception of you being a commodity that other women are attracted to. Mrs. Tomassi has told me on at least a dozen occasions that she finds it flattering that other women would find me attractive. Always remember that your attractiveness to other women is an associative reflection on your spouse’s attractiveness to hold your sexual interest in the long term.

The trick to this is how you follow up after flirting. She has to be made to feel as though she’s still the one you choose to be with even though you have obvious, provable options. Women are always unconsciously evaluating the men they are with. Her self-worth is associated with his value. This is exactly why women in the stablest of relationships will still shit test. There are precious few ways for a Man in a long standing LTR to establish social proof and demonstrate higher value better than reciprocating a flirt with other women. Nothing stimulates a tired LTR like suspicion and jealousy. Her Imagination is the most important tool in your Game tool box. The hamster doesn’t stop spinning after marriage, but it’s incumbent upon you to make sure it keeps up the pace.

The problem you have with my take on this is that you see it in an absolutist, all-or-nothing in-your-face disrespectful frame. As if every aspect of an LTR would be overshadowed by a malevolent ‘dread’ of loss bordering on emotional blackmail. You might be surprised to know I don’t actually agree with the idea of using the impending doom of ‘dread‘ per se.

If you could get past your taste for the melodramatic you’d realize that returning casual flirtations is actually a compliment to the woman a Man is with. It satisfies that internal, hypergamous doubt as to whether the guy a woman committed herself to years ago is still the Man other men want to be and other women want to fuck.

You see the problem with your perspective Sue is that you view intergender relations from a ‘security first’ priority. This is mostly due to your fem-centric conditioning, but also because you’re in a phase of life now where security means more to you than it did when you were in your 20’s or 30’s. It’s difficult to see the value of adding measured degrees of insecurity into an LTR when your long-term security becomes your paramount concern. After the Wall, women dread the idea of having to start over in a sexual market place in which they are grossly outmatched, so even the slightest deviation from the ‘security forever’ script becomes a major ego threat.

An LTR based on dread, a threat, or an implied ultimatum isn’t one based on genuine desire, and you know enough about my philosophy to understand how important real desire is to me. I think of it more as an ambient understanding that a Man is still desired by other women and this manifests in flirtatious behavior. Obviously if a guy is overtly seeking out opportunities to flaunt his flirtations with his LTR, that’d be indicative of him having other issues to resolve for himself. Guy’s thoroughly underestimate women’s sensitivity to nuance and subcommunication; it doesn’t take much to trigger her imaginings, but most guys think they need to beat her over the head with what he wants her to get; and that of course defeats his purpose – he’s too obvious.

Pure Evil

Presently I have two new brands of liquor I’m launching concurrently. In an average year I may introduce one or possibly two, but these are progressive releases and really don’t hit the consumer market until Q3. So with that and my upcoming travel schedule I’m finding it a challenge to do daily updates on RationalMale. Forgive me, but I don’t blog for a living.

Even so, I’m still managing to put ideas to page, but every so often I get stopped in my tracks by something that interrupts my thought train so significantly it demands an immediate post. The lead ‘secret’ from PostSecret (today’s pic) this week was one such article.

In Bitter Misogynists I outline the facility with which our fem-centric socialization will label men as ‘burned’, or presume to ridicule the length of a man’s cock, if he should so much as offer a passing critical thought about women’s motives. I understand why plugged-in men (and women) read the ideas of the manosphere and think that it’s anti-women, misogynistic, cynical and plaintive. With critical thought comes the attendant risk of becoming iconoclastic, and iconoclasts don’t play very well with ego-investments in a system of belief.

Before I go any further, and for the benefit of those unfamiliar with my writing, I unequivocally do not hate women. Got that? I love women; and in fact I sincerely doubt that, but for a negligible few, you could find a Man in the community who genuinely ‘hates’ women. True misogynists are just as rare as true misandrists – the grey area in between the two extremes is where we have to live. However, that said, under the fem-centric social pretexts we live in today, and due to the innate, subconscious hypergamy that motivates it, women are generally unaware of their own misandrist social conventions. As I’ve stated in many a prior post, anything can become normal.

I realize that explaining the latent motivations and core concepts behind feminized social norms to women (and plugged-in men) doesn’t sink in when, on some level of consciousness, they understand that their functioning in society depends upon them NOT thinking too much about them – and discouraging you from doing so either.

Pure Evil

There was a time I thought that the ultimate female-centric lie a woman could tell a man was, “It’s your baby” – I stand corrected, this is it:

“I killed our baby and it’s your fault I did.”

No verification necessary, just pure, wracking, potentially life enduring psychological and emotional distress based entirely on her ability to sell it convincingly. Why go the Carrie Underwood route and smash his car when you can do THIS kind of psyche-damage to him? This is the nuclear option of covert, psychological revenge. As I’ve stated in countless posts, men fight in the overt and physical, women fight in the covert and psychological; and here it is writ large and bold.

I mean really, what an absolutely brilliant tactic this is. She knows you’ll be amenable to her coming back to you a few months later, what better time to drop a bomb like this? In fact I wouldn’t be surprised if this “Your Fault Abortion” revenge isn’t covered on a few websites or forums devoted to getting back at him.

This psychological combat is what gave me pause to write this. I’m sure there’s a contingent of men who will think it’s no big deal, or that a guy would come up with his own rationalizations to cope with any guilt of having a woman purport to be pregnant and then, allegedly, abort the child. He dodged a bullet, right? I would think so too only that, in all the manosphere discussions about the overwhelming male risks associated with marriage, the single most common (only) upside was that marriage is the best environment in which to raise kids. Theoretically, marriage is worth the marriage risk for men who want children of their own. Furthermore this presupposes a motivation in men to want children at some point in life. My assertion is that on some level this registers for women and the opportunism it represents is something viewed as a bargaining token.

NAWALT

Not all women are like this, I know, and I’m not trying to conflate this particular instance to the whole. I love women, remember? What I am illustrating is women’s psychological gender combat skills and how the hypergamic imperative hones them – even when they’re unaware of it doing so. This is an extreme example of a greater dynamic. Irrespective of whether a woman actually is pregnant, or even if the paternity doesn’t belong to you, the fact is that in pregnancy women assume a much more powerful role. If women are socially respected by default, mothers are veritably deified. In a fem-centric world, the life-givers are absolved of any circumstantial indiscretions that led to their pregnancies.

There’s an assumption that men would prefer abortion; to further his wanton sexual strategy of scattershot sexuality, men necessarily would rather avoid the entangling responsibility of parental investment. Yet we have men contemplating entering into an institution that is knowingly stacked against his own best interests in order to “raise a child in the best environment”. That upside must really be important to men to involve themselves in such risk.

On this blog, in my analysis I always try to remain as objective as circumstances permit. By definition I make my best attempts to leave issues of morality out of the discourse (unless the topic IS morality), however in this case it’s unavoidable. This is deliberate evil.

 

The Hypergamy Conspiracy

Rollo Tomassi:

“Hypergamy is a selected-for survival mechanism.”

Aunt Sue:

“Hypergamy states that a woman seeks a man of higher status than herself for marriage. Nothing less, nothing more.”

Escoffier:

“I don’t think that’s right.

The theory is more like this, from what I have read. Hypergamy is a woman’s natural (which is to say, genetically wired) preference for a higher status male–that is, higher status than herself and also higher status than the other men in her field of vision and also perhaps higher status than men she has known in the past and even (at the extremes) higher status than most men she can personally imagine meeting. That cuts across a range of possible relationships, all the way from a ONS to marriage. In all cases, women naturally prefer the highest status man they can get. And sometimes they want so much status that they won’t settle on ANY man they could actually get.

“Status” has a varied meaning in this definition. Certain things correllate with high status, for intance money, prestige, social standing, etc. However a man can have all of that and still be low status because of low status intrapersonal behavior (i.e., needy schlumpitude). The highest possible status male would be rich, good looking, fit, well dressed, high social cache, high prestige job (preferably one which involves risk, physical risk being better than mere monetary risk), and also extroverted, dominant, the leader of his group of friends, able to command any social situation, and so on. However, women are wired to be turned on more by the latter BEHAVORIAL traits than by be the former SUBSTANTIVE traits. So, if you have have to choose one or the other, to get women, be socially dominant and a broke societal loser rather than socially awkward and a rich societal winner. But best to be both, if possible.

As to marriage, sure women want to marry up. But this does not exhaust the effects of hypergamy. Women can marry up–both intrinsically and in their own mind–and still ditch their catch because someone “better” comes along. That is hypergamy at work.

Also, when women are pursuing short and medium term mating, hypergamy has no less force. They always prefer the most socially dominant male they can get. This is often relative (A&B are both a little dweeby but A is more alpha than B and since I want someone NOW I choose A) but sometimes it is more intrinsic (A&B are both a little dweeby and even though A is a little more alpha, since I don’t have to have someone NOW, I am going to hold out for the Real Deal).

It’s not all about marriage. It’s about mate selection accross the range of circumstances.

That, at any rate, is how I believe the manosphere understands “hypergamy.”

Aunt Sue:

“Yes, because they made it up. Researchers do not recognize that definition. It’s pure Game.”

The main reason I only sporadically participate in the comment threads at Aunt Sue’s echo chamber Blog is because conversational gems like this have a marked tendency to get buried under, sometimes, thousands of other comments. I think it’s a shame really. I wanted to draw particular attention to the difference in interpretation of terms with regards to the dynamic of Hypergamy here.

Escoffier makes an astute analysis of Hypergamy in a much broader perspective than Susan’s definition-approved “researchers” are willing to recognize. On the fem-centric side we have Sue casually dismiss “Hypergamy” (twice) in this context as some fabrication of the Game-set and therefor not a legitimate analysis. A rose is a rose, and as I’ve stated in prior threads, Hypergamy is a term that should have a much broader definition when considered in context with the feminine imperative and the eminently observable feminine behaviors that manifest as a result of Hypergamy’s influence.

That the term Hypergamy should be so wantonly limited in its definition, and in such a way that it serves to deliberately confuse a better understanding of it as an evolutionary impulse on the feminine psyche, speaks volumes about the importance of maintaining its misunderstanding to the feminine imperative.

It’s almost ironic that the collective feminine ego should even need to deign to recognize Hypergamy in the terms that it is cast as in Susan’s default response. “Hypergamy states that a woman seeks a man of higher status than herself for marriage. Nothing less, nothing more.” forces the feminine to at least begrudgingly accept that women are in fact basing their long-term commitment prospects on status (as defined by researchers), and not some ephemeral soul-mate, emotional precept. God forbid men (PhDs or otherwise) should have the temerity to extrapolate any further social, psychological or evolutionary implications that could’ve influenced that Hypergamy dynamic into existence.

While I wont argue the credentials of the researchers Sue will undoubtedly quote – I often acknowledge all of the same in other posts and comments – I will however make the point that her interpretation (as is everyone’s) is subject to bias. And in this case, that bias serves the feminine imperative in keeping the definition of Hypergamy in as closed a way as possible to benefit the feminine. In the evolving understanding of the motivators that influence intergender relations there are going to be terms that describe concepts.

AFC’s, Alpha, Beta, Hypergamy, etc. are all defined by the concepts they represent.

‘Hypergamy’ serves well in a much broader capacity, but should the feminine imperative find that broader definition threatening to its purpose it will casually dismiss it as illegitimate. The real question then is, why would that concept be threatening to the feminine? You can delegitimize the term, but the concept is still the operative issue. Why is the concept of that larger scope of the term so offensive to a fem-centric society?

The Conspiracy that Wasn’t

One issue many of my critics have is that in exposing these inconsistencies, these operative social conventions and the latent purposes behind them, my writing (really most of the manosphere) seems to take on a conspiratorial tone. I can fully appreciate this, and it might shock a few readers to know that I  reject much of the popularized MRA perspective in this respect. I agree with an MRA perspective in a rational analysis to a certain degree, but there is no grand conspiracy, no secret mysterious cabal pushing a negative perception of masculinity – and this is exactly why what I outline on this blog is so pervasive. There doesn’t need to be a unitary group of ‘anti-men’ bent on some melodramatic goal of world domination; because this feminized ideal is already embedded in our socialization. Fem-centrism IS our collective social consciousness.

It doesn’t need a centralized directorship because the mindset is already so installed and perpetuated by society at large it’s now normalized, taken for granted and self-perpetuating. AFCs raising AFCs leads to still more AFCs. This generation doesn’t realize their own bias because it’s been standardized, encouraged and reinforced in them, and society, over the course of several generations now.

What’s to question, especially when calling attention to the feminization dynamic leads to ridicule and ostricization?

So to answer the conspiracy question; no, there is no illuminati shadow conspiracy and that’s exactly what makes feminization the normalized and overlooked default.

“You’re such a nice guy,..”

I was once included in an interesting conversation about a certain group of women’s inability to find a “nice guy”. The 6 women were all very concerned with the state of contemporary men and the dearth of guys available to them now that felt they’d matured and needed to be appreciated for their readiness to settle down and start a family (see, post-wall, 35+ demographic).

“What is it with men these days? It’s like they’re all self-absorbed jerks now.”

“I know, but I think it’s just another indicator of how messed up society is now.”

“Yeah, why can’t I find a Nice guy? Is that too much to ask for?”

“Rollo, what happened to men? Where are all the Nice guys?”

 

“Back in your 20’s where you left them.”

 

The Nice Guy Space-Time Continuum

Girl age 16: “You’re such a nice guy.”

Translation: ” I don’t want to hurt your feelings, or come off as a bitch to my friends, but I’m really much more attracted to Bad Boys – outlaw bikers, the football team’s quarterback, basically any guy who appears dangerous and exciting. You’re Nice, nice and mundane”

Girl age 22: “You’re such a nice guy.”

Translation: “Thanks for listening on the phone to me cry, fall into verbal hysterics and drone on for hours about my Jerk BF (oh, and my little dog too). You’re really sweet, and deserve a girl  (which isn’t me) who can appreciate how nice (i.e. mundane) you are.”

Girl age 28: “You’re such a nice guy.”

Translation: “I know you’ve always been (an) my emotional tampon, and thanks for sticking with it – any sane guy would’ve found a far better prospect by now. And while I’m beginning to see that guys like you are stable, dependable and tend to make a lot more money than the Jerks I’ve dated, I think I’m gonna hold out for a hotter guy than you while my looks still hold up”

Woman age 32: “Why can’t I just find a nice guy?”

Woman age 35+: “You’re such a nice guy.”

Translation: “Oh, you’re a Nice Guy,..here, let me suck that for you. See? Being a Nice Guy does get you laid!,..thanks for being there for me when I needed you; my fatherless kids appreciate your generosity too. How chivalrous of you to forgive my past indiscretion and take us in, I wish there were more guys like you. I really pity the women who can’t appreciate your kind of dedication – you are so different from “other guys””.

Relationship Game – A Primer

I had a request from a comment thread to breakdown the function of Game within the confines of a marriage or LTR so at the risk of coming off as Athol on Married Man Sex I thought I’d elaborate a bit on maintaining a Game mindset into an LTR today.

Going Alpha

Before I dig in here I think it’s important to bear in mind that the principles of Game do not change in an LTR, only the context does. Every behavior set, every frame control tenet, every aspect of amused mastery and even PUAs skills like Cocky & Funny are all vitally necessary, if not more necessary in an LTR. One of the greatest failings married men begin their nuptials with is starting from a position of Betaness. I’ve encountered, and counseled, far too many men with the same story; they entered into their LTR or marriage from a default position of being the “supportive” submissive partner only to discover Game later in their relationship and then fight the very uphill battle of convincing their spouse that they’ve ‘genuinely’ experienced a radical shift in their outlook and personalities.

If all she’s ever known is the Beta you, convincing her you’ve gone Alpha is a tough road to hoe. An Alpha shift in an LTR is threatening to a woman who’s built a lifestyle around the predictability of the Beta guy she committed to. It stirs up the competition anxiety she’s been numbed to for a long time, and while that’s beneficial in prompting her genuine desire for you, it also upsets her sense of security. It’s for this reason that Beta men are reluctant to experiment with being more dominant; they carry over from their singlehood the same mistaken belief that women require comfort, familiarity and security in order to become intimate or “feel sexy”. They still fail to grasp, even in marriage, that sex by definition requires anxiety to be grounded in genuine desire. Sexual tension requires urgency.

So from the outset it’s important to acknowledge that going Alpha from a Beta default is going to require a measured, practiced effort. The ideal position is to begin an LTR from an incorrigible, irrationally self-confident, Alpha frame and encourage the belief in your partner that it was she who ‘mellowed’ you. It’s ingratiating and ego-flattering for a woman to believe that she has the capacity to charm the savage beast with her feminine wiles.

The Outline

If you are presently in an LTR, considering one or believe that you might be spinning a particular plate that may have that potential, I urge you to read through the Chateau’s 16 Commandments of Poon. This is one of Roissy’s seminal posts and should be required reading for every 18 year old young man upon graduating high school. This may seem like an odd place to begin relationship Game, but these tenets are not only the basis for good Game, but the foundations of a good, masculine primary LTR.

I’ll have been married for 16 years in July and in that time I can honestly say I’ve practiced every one of these tenets to varying degrees. However, I’ll focus on a few of the more contentious articles and explain the premises behind them:

II. Make her jealous
Flirt with other women in front of her.
Women don’t want a Man to cheat, but they love a Man who could cheat. Naturally you don’t want to appear to be seeking the flirtation – that would be OVERT – but rather playing along with it. I have encouraged or played along with casual flirtations with my wife present that leave her with the impression that other women find me desirable. When you’ve been together long enough and a strong emotional bond has formed, you will be surprised at how many shit tests and hypergamous evaluations you can avoid just by her perception of you being a commodity that other women are attracted to. Mrs. Tomassi has told me on at least a dozen occasions that she finds it flattering that other women would find me attractive. Always remember that your attractiveness to other women is an associative reflection on your spouse’s attractiveness to hold your sexual interest in the long term.

The trick to this is how you follow up after flirting. She has to be made to feel as though she’s still the one you choose to be with even though you have obvious, provable options. Women are always unconsciously evaluating the men they are with. Her self-worth is associated with his value. This is exactly why women in the stablest of relationships will still shit test. There are precious few ways for a Man in a long standing LTR to establish social proof and demonstrate higher value better than flirting, or reciprocating a flirt with other women. Nothing stimulates a tired LTR like suspicion and jealousy. Her Imagination is the most important tool in your DJ tool box. The hamster doesn’t stop spinning after marriage, but it’s incumbent upon you to make sure it keeps up the pace.

Far too many guys are too fearful to even attempt this because they subscribe to a scarcity mentality (see Rule 16)

This then dovetails nicely into,…

VII. Always keep two in the kitty
Never allow yourself to be a “kept man”. A man with options is a man without need.

I understand this may be a very tall order for most men, particularly those with scarcity mentalities. However, I would interpret this less as spinning plates while in an LTR and instead replace it with keeping your options open. One reason to flirt in front of your LTR is to establish the suspicion that you have those options, and then allay those fears. Again this goes back to being a man who could cheat, but chooses not to. Men think that their dependability and steadfastness makes for a sexualized woman – it doesn’t.

Particular to relationship Game is this idea: Never allow yourself to be a “kept man.” Don’t make the mistake that I’m promoting infidelity by this, but rather think of it as maintaining an ambient, unspoken cognisance that, while she is a compliment to your life, she is not the focus of it.

I’ll be very clear, I’ve never cheated on Mrs. Tomassi, but I do know I could be balls deep in pussy if we ever did split. I know this because I experience the receptiveness of women to whom I do flirt with. I realize this sounds like conceit, but even if I were completely in error about that receptiveness I do know I’m in better shape, have more Game and possess higher status and value than 90% of the men in my peer group. So keeping two in the kitty for me is knowing that I CAN generate options if necessary. This may or may not be your particular reality, but it needs to be your mental state.

V. Adhere to the golden ratio
Give your woman 2/3 of everything she gives you.

This isn’t hard once you internalize it. Too many guys think Game is a waste of time because it means a constant memorization of scripts and gestures that they can never hope to master in every situation for every eventuality. And they’d be right – if all they did was try to commit everything to rote memorization. But as any good teacher will tell you, that’s not learning. Once the golden ratio becomes part of who you are it’s effortless and becomes your default response. Remember this is an outline. I don’t think aloud to myself “hmmm, well Mrs. Tomassi gave me 3 kisses this morning, I must remember to give her only 2 when I get home from work.” It’s an outline for a principle that you need to get the ‘feel’ for. The point isn’t trying to keep some scorecard of tit for tat exchanges. The effect you’re establishing is,..

it establishes your greater value by making her chase you, and it demonstrates that you have the self-restraint to avoid getting swept up in her personal dramas. Refraining from reciprocating everything she does for you in equal measure instills in her the proper attitude of belief in your higher status.

All the bleating sounds popularized by the post-Wall demographic of women about how there are precious few available men with the capacity to Man-Up and be the high status Men they’re entitled to find their root in this principle. For all the ramblings of the equalists they still betray their true desires in their own complaints – women DEMAND a man of higher status than themselves.

I add this at the end of this primer to address the criticism that will inevitably follow; “So, a wife should just be your doting slave then Rollo?” No, and neither should a man be his wife’s self-convinced slave. If you get anything from my blog it should be this – I am always focused on the Desire Dynamic. A slave might behave in ways that please you, but you cannot negotiate genuine desire, nor can you extort genuine desire. Freewill is an interesting topic, especially in terms of intergender relations, but understanding the dynamics that promote genuine, unobligated desire is paramount to a good relationship.

The Burden of Control

One of the primary ideas I’ve offered since starting this blog is that of the socially insaturating influence of the feminine imperative. I’ve even dedicated a particular category for it on my sidebar. It’s a recurring theme for my outlook on gender relations because I believe it’s the environment we subconsciously accept as the default. Women of course have little reason to question the primacy of their own imperative when it serves them, and men are less willing to analyze the social fabric they exist in if it intuitively means they might be rejected for intimacy, sex and social affirmation. Unplugging from the feminine Matrix takes an act of will.

I euphemise this environment at times when I refer to the details and social conventions of the imperative as “girl-world“, and often I think that readers may interpret the rise of fem-centrism as something unique to the late 20th century up to the present. And while it’s certain that 3rd wave feminism was the catalyst for the present day “girl-world” society we find ourselves in, I don’t think that it adequately accounts for the prime, directive motive that the feminine imperative demands, and has demanded since before our present feminization.

That prime motivation is control.

Risk vs. Security

It’s easy to simply pass off this feminine need for control as a grab for power, and to an extent that may be true, but this would be interpreting that need from a male perspective. Men tend to want power; power over others, and their own lives, to affirm status, esteem, affluence, etc. From a female perspective, there may be a minority of women who crave male power, but the vast majority seek control in terms of satisfying an innate need for their security. For women, security comes in many different varieties, financial, emotional, self-worth, etc., but their need for control is rooted in minimizing the risk and uncertainty associated with achieving that security.

Through a combination of testosterone and evolved neural wiring, Men thrive and grow in risk taking endeavors – we have a propensity for behaviors that are rewarded in risk. We will go to great lengths in order to take risks. Women’s primary impulse is to avoid risk; being the primary vehicles through which the next generation will pass and be nurtured it’s logical that women’s neural software and biochemistry be evolved for risk aversion. In seeking security, women developed their own set of uniquely evolved propensities for security. Ergo, they became the sex with the better developed capacity for communication, after a need for determining the most secure decisions available to them.

With the catalyst of the sexual revolution, the power dynamic shifted to the feminine imperative in a way it never had before in society. Once freed from the old societal norms, women were encouraged by the feminine (and their new found male sympathizers) to pursue their independence as they saw fit, but what generations of women did with this new freedom was more vigorously pursue what hundreds of thousands of years of evolved psychology had designed in them – to consolidate their own security.

Every law men see as blatantly misandrist from marriage to divorce, alimony to child custody, employment to sexual harassment and more, are primarily rooted in women’s inborn need for security. Virtually every feminine social convention is designed for women to consolidate on a long term security for themselves. Security is their reason for control. If they can control for the options, control the risk management, control the preconditions of their decisions-to-be, they can more definitively consolidate on their security need. Girl-world, our modern, fem-centric society molded by the feminine imperative, was founded on making a better environment for women to exercise this control in order to better facilitate their security motive.

Every browbeaten husband who’s abdicated his frame to appease his wife does so because she doesn’t trust him with controlling for her security. Encouraged for generations to be the self-sufficient, independent woman, and combined with generation of masculine ridicule, she predetermines for herself that men cannot be trusted to provide for her security. In order to meet this need she must take the reigns as a precondition for any marriage or pairing in spite of her wanting a man to do so.

Men are shamed for not being the men women expect them to be because they seem incapable of providing for their security. In girl-world this is the preconceived norm, men wont do it so we have to.

Rewriting Evolution

However the confounding element in this push for feminine control is Men’s influence and cooperation with their imperative. I took a lot of heat for declaring that Men define what is sexy for women. In girl-world this is an affront; women need to control men’s desires in order to make them compliant to their overall security need. Hypergamy can’t function efficiently if men are allowed to define women’s value in the sexual market place. That need for control is aggravated by men’s biologically hard-wired predisposition to prefer women THEY find sexy. Solution? Rewrite the societal rules for what men are allowed to find sexy. Thus we have a fem-centric societal push to encourage men to care about “what’s on the inside” and define their physical attraction cues as “superficial” and “shallow”. It’s the height of the feminine imperative’s arrogance and solipsism to think that it can rewrite the environmental cues for men evolved over centuries.

Entitlement

Feminine entitlement is a topic of much rancor in the manosphere, but one element I think is lacking in that discourse is the role that the feminine security need plays in it. Feminine entitlement is an extension of this need for control – men should owe women the security that their provisioning affords them, and they’re mad about it. In a recent post on In Mala Fide, Ferdinand details the lastest entitlement push for this feminine control – the new ‘dating’ site,

Tawkify.

The basic premise is an overt illustration of exactly the one-sided need for security control women feel entitled to have with men. The premise?

You give the site your name, phone number and email. After getting a code from a robocall, you fill out ten questions — your age, your state, your sex etc. — and upload your photo. Then you select whether you want one match or three (the former costs $8, the latter $15), pay via PayPal, and that’s it. The site’s owners will personally match you to someone based on the info you’ve provided and you’ll get a seven-minute long phone call from them the following Monday.

The kicker is that no woman is expected to tender a picture of herself for the man’s benefit. His interest is dependent entirely on the controlling factor of the ‘matchmaker’ and her determination of his acceptability. And what was the motivation for starting this service?

THE WOMEN ARE IRATE. The women are talking about men, young men, the men they’d like to date and marry, and are they ever pissed. Here’s what they’re saying:

“All they want is sex. They don’t care about relationships.”

“They’re so lazy.”

“All they do is play video games.”

“They aren’t men. They’re boys.”

The women are a little bewildered. They’re good girls. They followed the script: did well in high school, got into college, worked hard there, got out, got jobs, started looking around for someone special to share life with, and …

“I met a guy the other night. Good-looking, smart. Twenty-eight years old. He still lives at home. With his mom.” Young men are now nearly twice as likely as young women to live with their parents; 59 percent of guys ages 18 to 24 and 19 percent of 25-to-34-year-olds live at home. Based on those Census Bureau stats, 64,000 young Philly men have returned to or never left the nest—and they all have mothers, ex-girlfriends, grandmothers, dads and other friends and relations worrying about their plight.

Essentially the site’s founder, E. Jean Carroll, has taken the Kate Bolick / Kay Hymowitz ‘Man-Up’ model of dating in the new masculine paradigm to the next level – simultaneously monetizing women’s insecurities about male ‘Kidults’, reinforcing feminine security entitlement and absolving women of the decisions they made that put them into this new dating paradigm. Bottom line, Carroll is selling hypothetical dates with “real” men with the means to provide the security that women are owed them. And once again the theme repeats itself; men can’t be trusted to provide for your security ladies, so Carroll will do it for you