Would you still answer the same way if the poll showed 42.1% blue and 57.9% red? Like, are you actually willing to commit suicide to not live in such a world?
Because I'm not. If that's the way the world goes then that's the way the world goes, I'll still choose to be here until I die.
Also 40% isn't too far off from the Black Death's estimated toll of 30% to 60% of Europe's population. Is modern society too much of a fucking pussy to survive what Europe survived a few centuries ago? I doubt it. We're going to bounce back fine in the long-run. The intervening years will suck, but that's no excuse to give up on civilization rebuilding. (And maybe they won't even suck! The cost of labor went way up after the Black Death, so surviving craftsmen did pretty well.)
mdurak
3d ago
This was an excellent comment thread that expanded my perspective. This is exactly what I hope for when I visit the Motte. Thanks to both you and urquan.
I think the only way you wouldn’t enjoy the idea is if there’s a little Andrew Tate on your shoulder constantly whispering “land whale, 3/10, now you’re a loser.”
But it seems like urquan is talking about all factors that goes into making a partner attractive:
The value of this goes beyond the purely puerile: any feature that makes a person of the opposite sex highly desirable to a large number of people, like being really sweet, or very caring, or having a great job or a home owned outright or a kind smile, increases demand, and increased demand means the competition for that person's hand is harder
which would make this person way higher than a 3/10 once you took into account her funny and outgoing nature, and all "that vivacity, that confidence, those bountiful breasts and the things you could do with them, all that soft flesh".
But what you're saying is that the very act of adopting this mental model will cause someone to overindex on market sentiment instead of continuing to listen to their own value judgments. Is that correct?
mdurak
6d ago
And why the ick? It's not obvious that your "desirability in matchmaking" would correlate with the "desirability in matchmaking" of the partners you are able to attract, whereas if you use the term SMV it's immediately obvious how the two might correlated.
It feels like urquan and omw_68 represent my own position on the matter pretty well in this subthread. Perhaps it'd be good to consolidate the discussion there.
edit: but actually, what you're saying is what I'm signaling merely by bringing up such a topic, yes? as in there are healthy ways to engage with Wehrmacht gear and Nazi-adjacent ways to engage with it, and it's fair for someone to be suspicious based simply on this information
so they don’t like discussions and framing that imply a relationship to be transactional.
This is exactly what I mean. In what ways were a relationship implied to be transactional?
Maybe relevant as a discussion in this other subthread.
But also, even if this were resolved in favor of "it's possible to discuss this without having a transactional attitude towards human relationships," the interesting question is why did you read that implication into the topic in the first place? Is it mere "guilt by association" with the redpilled dudes who also talk about these topics?
mdurak
7d ago
Now that's interesting. Why the correlation between sexual mores and economic hardship?
mdurak
7d ago
I don't think Chad strategizes much. He just feels sexually confident, playful, and relaxed.
Maybe the difference is in the definition of the word "strategize." You seem to be using "strategy" to mean "thinking," whereas I (and presumably The_Nybbler too) think of "strategy" as "which move to make." For example, complimenting vs negging a girl would be two different strategies. Chad very naturally makes strategic moves. Non-Chad must learn these strategic moves until they too are naturals.
Once the interaction starts, I don't think he's thinking much about what he's doing at all.
Yes. If you're still actively thinking, you haven't internalized strategy deeply enough yet.
But discussing gender issues in mixed-sex company is like discussing feces at the dinner table.
That is an absolutely hilarious metaphor, kudos
it couldn’t affect your behavior much because you’re already doing what you can to be attractive
I'd disagree. If you understand what gives SMV you can optimize for that instead. If you refuse to acknowledge the existence of SMV altogether -- which is what a lot of women seem to do IME -- good luck optimizing for anything as a guy.
and your standards aren’t a matter of choice so it doesn’t give you any new information
I'd disagree. If you have an accurate view on what kind of partner you can realistically get, you'd make a more optimal partner choice.
mdurak
7d ago
So this right here feels very illuminating. I said one thing and you appear to have heard something completely different. Why is that? Perhaps the answer lies somewhere here.
mdurak
7d ago
Yes, ivory tower-type reasoning about female attraction isn't going to help your game very much. But "adjust your posture this way for a more dominant look" definitely helps, and likewise understanding that "women are attracted to dominance" is very useful as a guiding principle that points you in the right direction. And if anyone disagrees with points like these, then an interesting discussion can be had over why they think that way, and how else they would explain field-tested results.
But no, that doesn't answer my question at all.
mdurak
8d ago
Ok, so then the question is, why is this what the average woman hears when it's not actually what is being said?
mdurak
8d ago
How would men appreciate it if women started discussing frankly "Look, you'll be 35 in two years. That's way too old if I'm thinking of having kids with good prospects. You better set your sights lower, some 40+ woman done with childbearing will probably take you if you smarten up, get rid of those awful clothes, and hit the gym" 😂
Well, except for "some 40+ woman done with childbearing will probably take you", men do in fact listen to and take all that other advice you mention!
mdurak
8d ago
What you're actually complaining about is that you can't talk to women the same way you talk to men.
I think you've hit the nail on the head. And I suppose this would be because women are more inclined towards bonding than problem-solving.
mdurak
8d ago
Hahaha I think you have hit on something here. The spergouts are themselves a vibe, but perhaps as someone else mentioned, they're the vibe of "instrumentalising", "dehumanising", and "commoditising".
mdurak
8d ago
Well yeah, did I imply that this is a topic I talk to random strangers about?
mdurak
8d ago
I also know of such an anecdotal story. She did express a wish at some point that he would make more money eventually, so it's not like she didn't feel this at all. But she seems to have made peace with that by the time they got married.
mdurak
8d ago
This would seem to imply that the era before mixed gender schooling was common produced a lot of socially maladjusted men and women. It doesn't seem to me that the Victorian era had that reputation.
mdurak
8d ago
I feel like I saw life as a male 2/10 all the way to a 7/10 which was pretty illuminating.
Wow. Care to elaborate on the differences in life at the different tiers?
mdurak
8d ago
Haha like I said, "not in those specific terms," but
How do you feel about dating older women, Johnny?
Not over 30 man, not for me. I want little Johnnies running around, and women over 30 ain't gonna be giving me that. Have you seen those charts?
Well okay, but most women still have a half-decent shot at it even at 35. Why write off a girl who's just a little over 30?
That right there is a discussion about "mate selection strategy," mate ;)
you’re probably giving off an overly analytical, clinical, impersonal vibe that most people don’t like to see applied to human relationships.
But that's fair. And so the autist in me asks, why? What is wrong with applying abstract reasoning to human relationships?
mdurak
8d ago
assuming – based on the experience of their mothers and grandmothers – that marriage and children is something that just happens anyway, will have the same consequence.
That's fair. That's what I had assumed when I first started dating as well.
mdurak
8d ago
One key aspect of dating is illegibility. It starts with flirting, where (I have read that) a key goal is to maintain plausible deniability
Where did you read this? This completely tracks, I would like to know more.
So it is reasonable to enter a mode of cognitive dissonance where you don't notice that common trait and instead focus on how you like men for being funny or whatever.
Men still have the same preferences, some prefer smaller tits, some larger ones, but few prefer flat-chested women. But admitting to that would mark them as some kind of perverts. So their brain protects them from themselves and becomes really good at not noticing how they like boobs, and will invent all sorts of other proxies or unrelated variables to explain whom they find hot.
This is also in line with how jealous people will not admit that they are jealous of someone else, but will invent all sorts of excuses for why they dislike that other person. Is there a word for this proxy-variable phenomenon?
mdurak
8d ago
You won't get guys to be any more honest about their sexual experience than you will get women to be honest about female sex appeal.
This has not been my experience with men. Male virgins will admit when asked that they've never been with a girl.
To your larger question, all the stuff you're talking about is male-oriented models of the dating scene.
What are female-oriented models like?
If the model produces useful results for you in real life, who cares if women acknowledge it?
Well, it's not about getting recognition from women. But if the topic of dating comes up ("So and so got back together with that guy again", "Ah heck, why doesn't she move on from him already?", "It's hard, dating in this town sucks"), this is exactly the sort of thing that might be relevant to the conversation.
mdurak
8d ago
Let's be realistic, a husband who's initially obsessed with looks, SMV and biological clock is somebody who gets bored after a couple of years of sex, is mad about inevitable body changes with pregnancy, won't coparent kids or co-maintain the home, then runs off with the now-higher-SMV secretary 15 years in, leaving his wife permanently companionless with decimated career prospects and the burden of coaching the kids through the trust issues he created.
Ummm... no? That's like, seriously a lot of assumptions. A neckbeard who doesn't think at all about how to make himself look more attractive to girls by getting in shape and dressing better, and finally gets with a woman in her 40's who runs into fertility issues is simply not going to be a father or even a husband at all.
Or maybe you're purposefully hyperbolizing "obsessed." Okay, but I'm not talking about being obsessed with superficial things. I'm talking about merely talking about these things.
#1 and #2 are directly about modeling dating as a short-term transaction.
I don't see how optimizing for the long-term does not involve solving for the short-term. If you cannot even get dates, how are any of your long-term goals ever going to come to fruition?
#3 is indirectly the same: ime, professing deep interest in women's biological clocks covers a strictly penile preference for youthful bodies.
And it would seem there's an obvious reason men evolved to have such a penile preference.
Okay now that's interesting. Compare and contrast with this:
Or girls calling their boyfriend "daddy".
Why the parallels to the opposite-sex parent? Freud went too far with his literal interpretation of the Oedipus complex, but was he seeing some sort of pattern there?
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