I scored in the top fraction of 1% on the SATs, so I don't think I've ever met a woman who "scored a noticeable margin better" than me, but I have dated several women I consider my intellectual equals, and I am currently married to one of them (a successful lawyer who went to one of the best law schools in the US). I have broken up with women who I felt weren't able to keep up with me intellectually because I found them boring.
But you raise an interesting alternative hypothesis, which is that maybe women are the ones selecting "intellectually superior" men to date, and that's why they perceive all the men they date as "needing to feel intellectually superior," because they actually are.
"Men need to feel intellectually superior to women and I got sick of playing dumb a long time ago."
A bit off topic, but I've heard this sentiment from a number of women, yet I've never seen it in real life. I strongly prefer smart women, and no male friend or relative has ever told me (or acted like) they prefer dumb women. Where do women get this idea? It must be rooted in real experiences to some extent, but it's completely alien to me.
My candidate hypotheses:
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Most men like to discuss niche topics of particular interest to them, and women interpret this as a need to feel intellectually superior.
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Most men dislike argumentative or combative women, and such women interpret this as men disliking their intellect rather than their attitude.
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Most men would choose a hot, dumb woman over a smart, ugly woman, and women interpret this as men needing to feel intellectually superior.
I agree with you completely, and I take it a step further by not voting at all. Whatever marginal benefit my blank ballot would have on voter turnout statistics is negligible compared to the inconvenience of voting.
guajalote
1d ago
Yeah, even if it were indisputably true that the US economy is in decline, it's declining from the highest heights in human history. Even if Gen Z ends up being a bit worse off than Millennials, they're still better off than the vast majority of people who have ever lived.
guajalote
1d ago
Is this actually true, though? Millennials felt the same way 15 years ago, that's what all the Occupy and "I am the 99%" stuff was about. People understandably feel poor when they're starting their careers. They often have a bunch of debt and relatively little income. But that situation generally corrects itself over the course of a person's working life. Life is a struggle but this stuff is not insurmountable.
Things are, simply, not that bad in the US. Unemployment is close to the lowest it's ever been. Real (i.e. inflation adjusted) wages are close to the highest they've ever been. Cost disease has hit certain sectors like housing and healthcare, but there are still plenty of places where housing is affordable, and young people generally don't need a ton of healthcare. I'm not claiming everything is perfect or couldn't be improved, but I can't see how economic doomerism is warranted under the circumstances.
I said "no male friend or relative has ever told me (or acted like) they prefer dumb women," i.e. neither their stated nor revealed preferences seem to indicate an aversion to smart women. In my experience there's no trend of men seeking out dumber women.
I don't see what this has to do with intelligence. I know smart men who I'd call "blowhards" and I know dumb men who I'd call "blowhards." And I've never observed a trend of such men preferring dumber women.
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