Alpha

The Contextual Alpha

Well, as is Roissy’s wont to do, he’s once again (most likely intentionally) put his foot in it and and flung the proverbial shit from his shoe into the great online fan of the manosphere. What am I referring to? Oh, you know, the ageless debate on what constitutes the most elusive of men’s aspirations – an Alpha state of being. If you haven’t already, you can catch up on the action here where the Chateau boldly nominates James Hooker as Alpha of the Month.

As expected the post’s comments get heated, but that’s not the end of it. The SoSuave discussion thread created by the (sometimes overly) passionate Naughty Ninja in response really gets down to the meat of the matter:

How “Alpha” will Mr. Hooker be seen by the general public?

How “Alpha” does the 18 Y.O.’s friends think he is? (If she has or had any at this point.)

What about new employment for the infamous Mr. Hooker? Will he take his ‘soulmate’ to work functions he may be required to attend?

There are probably loads of weird situations they will find themselves in. Or will they become a pair of social recluses?

Think about it. That dude isn’t Alpha he’s more of the Little Rascal’s Alphalpha. Pathetic nerd.

Before I launch into my take on this situation I feel it’s incumbent upon me to throw out this disclaimer; I do not condone Hooker’s actions. I have a daughter who will turn 14 in April and if there is any better indictment of the delusions of empowered single mothers and the inherent necessity of a strong, positive, masculine influence in a child’s upbringing, of either sex, I can’t think of it. Kids need the resolute, protective Fathers that far too many ‘strong, independent women’ emphatically resist, run off or covertly despise – only to further shame them for a lack of presence when an incident such as this occurs.

That said, I agree with the Chateau’s assessment – Hooker is an Alpha, but only contextually so.

From the 16 Commandments of Poon (emphasis mine):

XII.  Maximize your strengths, minimize your weaknesses

In the betterment of ourselves as men we attract women into our orbit. To accomplish this gravitational pull as painlessly and efficiently as possible, you must identify your natural talents and shortcomings and parcel your efforts accordingly. If you are a gifted jokester, don’t waste time and energy trying to raise your status in philosophical debate. If you write well but dance poorly, don’t kill yourself trying to expand your manly influence on the dancefloor. Your goal should be to attract women effortlessly, so play to your strengths no matter what they are; there is a groupie for every male endeavor. Except World of Warcraft.

As a teacher, James Hooker is afforded a default status authority. To students in a classroom, being the teacher confers a contextual presumption of mastery and thus a de facto social proof is conferred upon that person. In that theater, in that environment, the teacher is Alpha. A uniformed police officer is perceived Alpha in his given role, despite his personally being a chump when off duty.

As Roissy illustrates, Hooker was playing to his strengths. In virtually any other social setting he’d be perceived as a beta. Naughty Ninja and damn near every other casual observer peg this guy for the Beta-Symp he undoubtedly is, but in that classroom, to a 14 year old girl who gradually matures into an 18 year old woman, Hooker is Alpha, and probably the only Alpha she’d ever experienced.

How “Alpha” will Mr. Hooker be seen by the general public?

In all likelihood, he’ll be more publicly reviled than legitimate sexual predators when the genders are reversed. The great unwashed masses in the pop culture narrative don’t recognize the legitimacy of Alpha influence as it is. To them it’s psychological manipulation, and to a calculated extent it is, but the real question that nags them is WHY that manipulation is effective. They’ll blame it on the naivete of the girl, and her seeking a father figure, as well as the lasciviousness of Hooker, but what’s really uncomfortable is WHY the Alpha influence works.

What about new employment for the infamous Mr. Hooker? Will he take his ‘soulmate’ to work functions he may be required to attend?

It’s precisely because of Hooker’s subscription to the soul-mate myth that he reeks of beta. I have no doubt that he fluidly convinced himself of his noble intent narrative, casting himself as the savior for his adoring princess. White Knights are very prone to using their delusions of chivalry to rationalize good intent into the same behaviors they’d condemn in Players, PUAs or typical ‘other guys’ in general. To venture a guess I’d expect that Hooker buys his own bullshit, and because of this he hasn’t given an afterthought to how it will affect his career, his relationship with his family, his kids or any future social circle. As an extension to this, along with his teaching job, Hooker has lost his contextual Alpha cred. As his young chippy matures more, she’ll begin to see that contextual Alpha status erode with every progressive shit test he fails. And removed from the environment that made him Alpha, fail he will.

Alpha is as Alpha does

In context, James Hooker parlayed enough Alpha mojo to land a solitary 18 year old girl; one he had to invest in for at least 4 consecutive years to consolidate on. In fact, I sincerely doubt he had any idea that he was situationally an Alpha to the point that he thought he could intentionally manipulate this girl with it. There is a vast difference between the contextual Alphaness of Hooker and the subconscious Zen mastery of it in Corey Worthington – the Alpha Buddah. Both of these guys are an affront to the sensibilities of the “Alpha = Leader-of-Men” faction of Alpha definers, but both tap into a common root of Alpha energy that women naturally respond to. It’s discomforting to think that the brave Marine fighting in Mogadishu, commanding the noble respect from his country and peers taps into the same Alpha energy that makes a guy like James Hooker attractive to women. Same Alpha, different context. Hypergamy is a cruel mistress.

Jerry Seinfeld dated and married his wife when she was 18. And while it caused a brief stir in the press, Jerry’s wider Alpha appeal pushed this story out of the headlines. Elvis Presley, Jerry Lee Lewis, both were banging and/or marrying underage girls, but were given an Alpha pass then and now. As I stated, I’m not condoning it, in fact I find it deplorable, but I do understand why it occurs.

Defining Alpha

Many apologies for my recent absence from blogging. Concurrently launching two new liquor brands in Q2 is proving very time consuming, but it has allowed me to step back briefly enough to review some of my more ‘influential’ posts. Amongst those, none generated more dialog than my essay on Alpha, so I thought it prudent to come back to this very contentious topic.

I understand why guys, both of the red and blue pill variety have a problem with using the terms Alpha and/or Beta; depending on the perspective, terms that are definitive about what someone has an investment in make us uncomfortable. It’s much more comfortable to put those issues into more subjective understandings because when we’re objective about them we can’t help the wondering or the doubt of our own status within that definition. Objective terms are very close to absolutes depending upon who’s doing the defining.

From a generalized perspective, I feel that the terms Alpha and Beta are good reference points in assessing the characteristics that women find arousing in men for both short and long term mating strategies. However, I think that beyond these convenient terms, men need to be more realistic about how they apply to their own self-impressions in contrast with how women are interpreting the Alpha and Beta cues that they exhibit. For the record, at points in my life I’ve personally been the worst, bottom scraping Beta, the douchebag Alpha stud in the foam cannon party in Cancun, and the strong (but lesser) Alpha father and husband. So it’s with this in mind that I think guys shouldn’t believe that their ‘stars are set’ and they’ll never live up to the manosphere standard of Alpha.

Living Up

The reason that so many guys get so bent about what defines an Alpha is usually because they don’t fit that general definition very well. So it’s a logical ego defense to make necessity a virtue (once again) and redefine it to better suit their own conditions. It’s exactly the same dynamic as the debate over Looks vs. Game. Game takes priority for those without Looks and vice versa. A personal definition of “what’s Alpha?” becomes whatever plays to an individual guy’s strengths, and women who can’t appreciate them (i.e. all of them) are relegated to being less-than quality women. Sour grapes are sour, but deductively it makes sense; we want to be the embodiment of what we ‘know’ is attractive to women and others. The worst beta schlub you know thinks he’s Alpha, because every woman he’s ever known has defined for him that being beta is what women want.

Ethics of Alpha

The problem then is looking at the definition objectively. In an objective light it’s difficult to look at ourselves as not measuring up to an Alpha ideal. So it becomes the first recourse to cast suspicion on the whole idea of being Alpha at all. It’s a pissing contest between immature men then. Or is it? There is a LOT of observable, provable evidence that many so-called Alpha traits do in fact elicit very predictable, desired, favorable behaviors (usually breeding precursors) in women. From an evo-psych perspective Alpha is just as unprincipled, just as efficiently ruthless and uncaring as it’s female counterpart – feminine Hypergamy.

So then the definition moves into an ambiguous moral ground; is it ethical to be / act Alpha? To be Alpha implies that you necessarily rise above a certain degree of common mediocrity depending upon the context – whether you do so like a guy from hotchickswithdouchebags.com or like a perfect “honorable” gentlemen is irrelevant, you still position yourself above “other guys”. To some extent this is selfishness or implies a self-importance that questions moral tenets.

At this point I should also add here that women NEVER doubt themselves on moral grounds for outshining their own competition in the sexual market place – they just do so covertly and with a polite smile, unburdened by ethical doubts. Hypergamy is its own excuse.

Alpha Selectivity

And that brings us to the subjectively deductive end of defining Alpha. Every sexual competitor seeks to disqualify their rivals from breeding opportunities. Most animals fight for territory or harem rights. Humans generally (though certainly not exclusively) do the same combat in the psychological. We seek to disqualify sexual competitors by calling into doubt the sexual credibility of a rival. “Yeah, he’s really good looking, but that means he’s probably gay” from a man, or “You think that blonde with the big boobs is hot? Girls who dress like that are usually sluts” from a woman are both psychological, sexually disqualifying forms of combat.

This also applies to the observably, provably, sexually successful male capable of OVERTLY flaunting his high sexual value with two (or more) concurrent women. He must be of low moral character to so flagrantly manipulate his multiple girlfriends, right? His observable success, as a sexual competitor, conflicts with what a beta believes should constitute a beta-defined definition of Alpha-ness as it characterizes him personally. Ergo, the polygamist either must be disqualified as a sexual competitor based on subjective (moral) grounds, or a guy is forced to alter his own definition of Alphaness and therefore his own self-estimate.

Every guy has a Game. Everyone thinks they are Alpha in their own way. Even the worst doormat Nice Guy, hammered flat by women for a lifetime, thinks his supplications or Capn’ Save-a-Ho mindset is the best way to win a woman’s intimacy. He’s invested in thinking he’s unique in his understanding of how best to arrive at sex with a woman. Likewise, Alpha-ness is a moving target that’s conveniently applied or disparaged based on personal circumstances.

Personally I believe Alpha-ness can, and does, have a concrete, objective definition. The problem arises when anyone asserts that they can definitively outline Alpha traits when it conflicts with the subjectiveness and ego-investments of those who define it personally for themselves. So we get a wide variety of what makes a man Alpha – he’s the guy of high moral character, princely ambition and integrity, as well as the self-important cad banging his wife and “their” girlfriend. They are BOTH Alpha. Thus I would propose that while certainly contextual, objective Alpha-ness is NOT exclusive to social status or personal integrity, but rather an attitude of expressly manifested traits. These can be innate or learned, but the definition is not dependent on moral grounds (or a lack of). A scoundrel and a champion can be equally Alpha or Beta in their own psyche’s.

Five Minutes of Alpha

Back in September of 2010 the inimitable Roissy (aka Heartiste) graced the manosphere with an insightful post about Katy Perry and an intriguing meltdown she had whilst spotting an old high school crush she had in the audience at one of her shows. My how time changes the landscape of our realities in so few years.

As is Roissy’s gift for prophecy, he accurately summed up the whole affair thusly:

Five minutes of alpha — even worse, five minutes of alpha rejection — can fuck with the heads of even the most desirable women. And continue fucking with them years later. In comparison — if the reports are to be believed — women who divorce beta schlubs after years of marriage pretty much forget them before the ink is dry on the papers.

Flash forward to January of 2012 and we find our previously boastful, pre-marriage Katy Perry in divorce proceedings with a situationally famous Russel Brand. But,…wait you say, isn’t this the same Katy Hudson Perry who so publicly shamed her first Alpha love Shane Lopes?

Perry dedicated her next song, a kiss-off anthem from her double-platinum 2008 disc “One of the Boys,” to her former crush and even tweaked a lyric in the middle of the song for the occasion, singing, “I can’t believe I fell in love with Shane Lopes.”

At the end of the tune, she looked directly at Lopes, held up her hand — which prominently displays her engagement ring [ed. Russel’s dowery investment] — and said, “That’s cool, I got mine,” and mockingly blew him a kiss.

Yeah, that same one. Yet the plot still thickens with the billboard chart topping hit/video released by Hudson Perry aptly entitled “The ONE that got away” (*apologies for subjecting my readership to this audio mayonaise), wherein we find a visibly aged Katy retrospectively pining away for her post high school Alpha artist lover of a bygone decade in the luxurious home of whom we presume is her aging beta providership for the duration of her soon to be ending life.

For all the internal conflicts and psychology that caffeinates the rationalization hamster in women, I’ll admit that it occasionally makes for some convincing artistic statements. I was almost feeling sorry for the young Katy, that is until her past lover comically swerves to avoid a Laurel Canyon rockslide and dives off a cliff in his 70’s Mustang. The premise that the guy plummets to his death then absolves our heroine of the liability of her next most significant life choice; settling for the unexciting beta provider responsible for what we presume is the duration of her lavish, yet empty, life. He’s not the One that got away due to any reason she implicitly enacted, he’s the one who was blamelessly taken from her by fate. Tragic reality replaced by fairytale .

Poor, poor Katy. Her Alpha love is forever denied to her. I wonder how Russel Brand feels after watching this? Like maybe a (situationally) Alpha  high school QB with little more than a GED can still upstage a Hollywood actor if his impact is significant enough on a woman? I can’t help but imagine that Katy is oblivious to the irony of all this. That’s the real tragedy; that women would be  convinced of this soul-mate pornography, while still subject to the War Brides dynamic. Still more ironic is Katy Perry’s story as a parallel to contemporary western women’s. Party and dance, settle in with the provider before the inevitable Wall impact and pine for the One that got away.

Taking things Slow

Sex is the glue that holds relationships together.

“Taking things slow” is covert communication for “I have other irons in the fire, and you’re not the first best option.”

This is the law of diminishing returns; at what point is the yield out-valued by the effort needed to produce it? If you allow yourself to be put into a holding pattern with a “take it slow” woman you will ALWAYS expend more effort than the reward yield, if for no other reason than that you are ignoring other, potentially better, opportunities in exchange for your attention and effort.

The “take it slow” methodology capitalizes on a guy’s insecurity in that it automatically places him into a constant position of qualifying himself to the woman at the risk of his reputation. In other words, if he doesn’t take it slow (i.e forces the issue, pleads his case too emphatically) OR he ejects altogether, he risks becoming who she, conveniently, “fears he really is”, a Player only interested in getting in her panties. It’s a self-fulfilling social convention that protects a woman’s ego no matter what the outcome. However the converse of this is that he wastes his own resources (time, opportunity, attention, money) indefinitely while trying to negotiate terms for what he thinks is her genuine desire. Ultimately, assuming there is one, the reward (which initially is always sex) will never out-value the cost of the investment.

In most instances, a guy getting this response is one of multiple options she’s entertaining at the time and will conveniently be dismissed if a higher value guy becomes viable for her (i.e. the hot guy in Cancun). In a way this “take it slow” contrivance is a similar, but more manipulative version of the LJBF rejection. In the TIS method there is an implied presumption that a guy “may” qualify for her intimacy IF he can prove himself to be patient and match her set of prerequisites. There is no presumption in an LJBF and the guy simply takes it upon himself that he can qualify if he can only plead his case well enough.

the SEX might not be worth the wait, but the relationship might.

Beware of this rationale, sex is the glue that holds an LTR together. Sex is an integral part of an LTR and if it is established from the outset that a woman’s sexuality is a conditional reward for desired behavior from a man rather than a mutual experience based on mutually passionate desire, this LTR becomes fundamentally compromised. It is her frame, her world, that the waiting guy is entering from the very inception of what later may turn into an LTR. His first act of that LTR is capitulating to her terms for sex.

You can dress this up in esoteric reasonings as to how, later, she’ll appreciate him more for respecting her wishes to move slowly, but it doesn’t negate the fact that the Alpha traits women find the most attractive, and the most sexually arousing, have nothing to do with patience and everything to do with impulsivity. Women want to be pushed for sex. Women constantly complain that they need to feel sexy to want to have sex, and so long as it’s ‘the right guy’, nothing makes them feel sexier than knowing he’s hot for her to the point that he’s acting on impulse. The token resistance might seem cute or it’s used as some ASD ego preserving buffer, but it’s really a another way women prolong that feeling sexy dynamic which can be more rewarding than sex itself.

The nature of the Alpha guy that women crave pushes him to have sex, not wait for it. In fact that sexual insistence is a prime indicator that a woman is dealing with an Alpha. The man who’d agree to ‘taking it slow’ telegraphs Beta to her. Sexual impulsivity is an Alpha indicator that translates into a Man who insists on getting what he wants in other aspects of life – which benefits HER and her future offspring’s long term provisioning. In the long term, women want Men who other men want to be and other women want to bang. The man agreeing to the patience and effort needed to “take it slow” is indicating that he’s not accustomed to insisting on, and getting what he wants. If he can sublimate his most powerful biological imperative to get sex, what else is he willing to sublimate?

Sex is the deal breaker, but in my pointing it out I run the risk of coming across as “shallow” or “superficial.” It’s important, but it shouldn’t be that important, right?

Wrong. It is THAT important. Sex is the glue that holds relationships together.

If you encountered a woman who fit every ideal you ever had for a relationship – best friend, loving, 100% loyal, excellent mother, came from a great family, perfect HB 10, healthy both mentally and physically, emotionally available, intellectually stimulating, shared all your beliefs – who loved you unconditionally and wanted to marry you, but with one caveat; he/she would NEVER have sex with you under any circumstances, would you marry this person? You could have children together through insemination and they would always be platonically affectionate with you; knowing full well before you did, and pledging to be completely faithful yourself, would you spend the rest of your life in a completely sexless marriage with an otherwise ideal person?

Remember this sexless state doesn’t come after having had sex before (due to an injury or disability), it’s a pre-condition for the relationship. That’s the underlying message of  “taking it slow” – all the benefits and emotional perks of a relationship with no expectation of sex. It’s like men having a fuck buddy, all the sex he wants with no expectation of emotional investment.

This is how important sex is. People tend to think of love as coming in different varieties and colors – platonic, fraternal, familial, erotic, agape, etc. All of this is nonsense. Love is love, it’s how it’s expressed that’s different. I love my Mom, my brother, my best friend and my daughter, but I only fuck my wife – that’s what makes us husband and wife, not brother and sister. Sex can be an expression of love or it can be an act of recreation, but it is always a prerequisite for an intersexual relationship. It’s time we all stopped deemphasizing the importance of sex and accept it for what it is. Every time we think we’re taking some moral high-road by saying it’s superficial or shallow to place such importance on sex, we only do a disservice to ourselves and our lovers. We’re only screwing ourselves by thinking that we’re in some way above sexuality in some lame self-delusion that in stating so will make us more desirable and set us apart from the rest of the herd (who are also claiming to be above sex anyway). It IS that important, so start giving it the respect it deserves. You do yourself no favors by desexualizing yourself.

Alpha

The Alpha Buddah, Corey Worthington.

What I’m about to type here is not going to make me any new friends. I know because any discussion of what constitutes Alpha characteristics in a Man always becomes clouded by the self-perceptions of how well we think we align with them. As I’ve covered in prior postings, the ‘community’, the ‘manosphere’, the new understanding of gender relations that’s picked up momentum for the last 12 years has always generated it’s own terminologies for more abstract concepts. The danger in this is that these terms lack real, universal definition. For purposes of illustrating a concept these terms are usually serviceable – we have a general understanding of what makes for a ‘Beta’ or a Herb, or a man who falls into a ‘provider’ mentality. Even ‘Alpha’ in a specific context is useful as an illustrative tool, when the subject isn’t directly about ‘Alpha-ness’. It’s when we try to universally define what constitutes Alpha that the sparks start to fly. So before you continue on reading further, think about what you believe makes a guy Alpha. Got it in your head now? Good, now put all of that aside, purge that from your head, and read the next few paragraphs from the perspective that you don’t know anything about Alpha.

I was first introduced to the Alpha Buddah courtesy of Roissy and this post “Umm, sorry?” You can go ahead and read this from the Chateau’s perspective, and I think the analysis is pretty good. I call Corey the Alpha Buddah not in the hopes that men will aspire to his almost Zen like ‘being’ in Alpha, but rather to provide an example of Alpha in it’s most pure form. He literally IS Alpha, unclouded by pretense, afterthought, or conscious awareness of any influence that could have a hope of prompting introspection about his state.

Corey Worthington is a piss poor example of a human being, but he’s a textbook example of Alpha. I could use a lot of adjectives to describe this kid, but “beta” wouldn’t be one of them. What’s funny, and a bit ironic, is this kid has probably never come across Mystery Method or “the community” or even heard of ‘peacocking’ and he gets naturally what millions of guys pay small fortunes at PUA seminars to acquire over the course of a lifetime. He’s a selfish little prick, but what makes him insulting to ‘normal’ men is his having the natural, internalized Alpha bravado so many AFCs wish they had. If you could bottle and sell this Alpha essence, you’d be rich beyond imagine.

Right about now all of those self-affirming preconceptions you had about Alpha-ness (that I told you to stow away before reading this) are probably yelling to be let out of the mental box you put them in. “,..but, but Rollo, how can you possibly think this arrogant douchebag kid could ever be an example of anything remotely Alpha?!” You’ll be pleased to know I fully empathize your outrage. You work hard to be a “better man”, you put in the self analysis, you paid your dues coming to terms with unplugging and reinventing yourself. You’re a success, Corey is fuck-up. Corey’s not a better Man than you are, however, he understands Alpha better than you do.

Alpha is mindset, not a demographic.

Alpha is as Alpha does, it isn’t what we say it is. There are noble Alphas and there are scoundrel Alphas, the difference is all in how they apply themselves. There’s a tendency to approach every “Alpha” argument from what a guy thinks is righteousness; ergo, his personal definition of Alpha is what appeals best to his sense of virtue. He earned his Alpha cred, played by the rules, and by God people (women) should respect that. However, the sad truth is that prisons are full of Alpha males who simply channeled their drive toward destructive and anti-social endeavors. There are plenty of examples of indifferent Asshole Alphas who you wouldn’t say are upstanding moral leaders at all, yet women will literally kill each other (or themselves) in order to bang them because they exude a natural Alpha-ness. Just as Corey does here. There are Alpha drug dealing gang leaders, and there are Alpha husbands, fathers and leaders of industry. It’s all in the application. Genghis Khan was Alpha as fuck, and a leader-of-men, but probably would be on most people’s douchebag list for that era. Here’s an illustration:

 

Guy’s like Corey infuriate men who have invested their self-worth in the accomplishments of what they think ought to be universally appreciated and rewarded. So when they’re confronted with a natural Alpha being undeservedly rewarded for brazenly acting out of accord with what they think the rules ought to be, they seethe with resentment. The natural response in the face of such an inconsistency is to redefine the term ‘Alpha’ to cater to themselves and their accomplishments as “real men” and exclude the perpetrator. The conflict then comes from seeing his new definition of Alpha not being rewarded or even appreciated as well as a natural Alpha attitude and the cycle continues. Your respect (or anyone else’s) for an Alpha has nothing to do with whether or not he possess an Alpha mindset. 3 failed marriages and 100+ lays has nothing to do with his having or not having an Alpha mindset. There are many well respected betas who’ve never had a passing thought of infidelity, or may have 300 lays either with prostitutes or because they possess fame or stunning good looks and women come to him by matter of course.

The take home message here is that you are not Alpha because of your achievements, you have your achievements because you are Alpha. You possess a mindset you either had to develop or it came naturally to you. I constantly field questions from young men asking me whether some action or behavior they displayed to a woman was Alpha, or Alpha enough. The real answer is that Alpha behaviors are manifestations of an Alpha mindset. And just like Corey the Alpha Buddah, the introspect required to wonder if something was or wasn’t Alpha wouldn’t ever be a consideration enough to ask. You almost need to have a childlike understanding to really appreciate what Alpha really is. Kids get Alpha. Even the picked on, introverted, beta-to-be kid has a better understanding of Alpha than most adult men do because he lacks the abstract thinking required to rationalize Alpha for himself. Most men, by our socialization, and to varying degrees, lose this in-born Alpha mindset over time. The naturals, the Corey’s of the world, have a better grasp on it’s usefulness and repurpose it; either to their adulthood advantage or their detriment.