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Notes -
Competence and self-direction are virtues in men, so we expect men to get attainably competent at things that are important to them.
Our hero might not start as an amazing shoe-salesmen. But, I'd expect him to get good enough to hold down a retail job at a shoe store, especially with a few years of trying.
Applying that to dating: The background belief is that it's not that hard for an otherwise healthy guy to get into a relationship, or at least go on some dates.
So, if a guy isn't dating, then the assumption is that he has a lack-of-ambition issue (he's not asking anyone out), a lack-of-skill issue (every woman rejects him), or a lack-of-interest-in-adult-women issue (... what is he interested in?). None of those are especially flattering.
There are plenty of people here that could not do this: not even if they were as dedicated to their craft as say Paul Ekman was dedicated to the study of facial expressions. It would - I shit you not - be easier for some of the people here to become literal rocket scientists (or at least aerospace engineers). I am not joking.
This seems silly and self-aggrandizing.
I don't believe that otherwise healthy people are putting engineering-degree levels of effort into learning to hold down basic retail job. If someone's telling you that they spent thousands of hours, with engineer-student level focus, and can't hack it at Payless Shoes, then I think they're lying to you.
Maybe he could hack it at Payless Shoes because he's an hourly worker that just has to know a bunch about shoes and show up on time in clean clothes. But selling something like insurance or used cars? There are a fair number of engineers that wouldn't be able to do that.
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