Five Minutes Of Alpha Syndrome

A reader generously offers a glimpse into the mind of a woman stricken with “five minutes of alpha syndrome”.

CH,

Having been a regular reader of your blog for a while now, I couldn’t quite join-the-dots in the general ‘5-Minutes-Of-Alpha-Beats-5-Years-Of-Beta’ (or variations thereof)
I couldn’t quite see it working in the ‘Real World’.
Until last night.
I contacted a woman from a well-known online-dating site that requires a strong rod and large net.
The woman: 44, 5’8″, Mom-of-one, blonde, pretty, maybe a solid ‘7’ with her war-paint on, separated from nice guy husband of 12 years, recently split from relationship with BF of 7 months.
The Boyfriend: 45, 5’7″, fire-fighter…really average-looking but with serious ‘issues’.

I was initially pulled-in by her looks and IQ (she’s a smart woman, a buyer, by trade) and a comment she made struck me: “I’m scared I’ll never find the level of intensity I had with my Ex”
Me: “What, with your husband?”
Her: “No! My Bf”
(husband, apparently was a tall, handsome guy, 6’3″, but had two things not going for him: ‘Nice Guy’ and liked to crush a 6-pack each night)

Anyway, we met.
For a drink, at 20:00pm, a bar not far from where either of us live.
We left at 22:45pm, after each having a single drink each, mainly because of her life-story of the last ‘X’ months with Fire-fighter Bf.
I could wax-lyrical about it, but it’s best set out in list form:
* upon first meeting, she said “the sort of man I wouldn’t look twice at – he’s 5’7″ for God’s sake”
* didn’t even date him for at least 3 months after 1st meeting, and he pestered me daily for a date
* finally met and things took-off (in her words, “sexually, emotionally and mentally…it was intense, daily”)

Then things start to slide:
* he breaks her left-cheekbone with a straight-right
* deletes names of male co-workers and friends from her iPhone
* secretly hacks into her FB account and sends ‘Don’t contact me again’ messages to male contacts
* constantly, calls, queries and questions her about where she is and who’s she’s out with
* rips her off for 86,000
* finally after 7 months she dumps him and throws him out.

Cue:
* paint poured over her Audi A3
* hate mail sent daily
* threatening phonecalls made multiple times daily
* bogus online-dating-agency profiles created and setup to monitor her on website
* fellow friends recruited to keep tabs on her
* drives by her home multiple times a day, checking up on her

Finally, the police are involved.
They urge her to press charges, a) for the physical assault and b) threatening behaviours

What does she do?
Protects the fuck out him, claims she doesn’t want him to lose his job or get into any trouble.

And the clincher? She spent the whole 2.45 hr date talking about him (liked to call him ‘Twat-Face’, and this whole sorry episode to me, her supposed date.
No matter what I did, no matter how blasé or cool I was about it….she just looked like she’d rather be anywhere else but on a date with me….
Why?
Because I wasn’t him.

Thoughts, opinions, rants?

Yeah…

Chicks dig jerks. And Ross Douthat handwaved.

Less glibly, yet another reason to avoid a long-term relationship with a woman who has amassed an above-average number of sexual partners in her life is that the odds increase that she has dated, fucked, and fallen deeply in love with an asshole. And though she was able to extricate herself from his intoxicating grip to one day go on a half-hearted date with you, his memory continues to scour her dreamscape. What man who isn’t a desperate loser needs the extra headache?

The girl with a lot of past lovers is never alone. You aren’t sitting across from her at a bar; you’re sitting across from her and all the cockas that rocked her.

My advice:

Date virgins.

Ok, that’s a tall order nowadays.

Your next best options, should an execrable date of this nature ever occur again, are to fight asshole with asshole.

Flirt with another woman in front of her.
Text while she’s talking about her ex.
Keep changing the subject. But make it obvious that’s what you’re doing. Humor helps. “You ever wonder what it’s like to piss in a moving elevator?”
Lay down the man law, in so many words. “If you want a shoulder to cry on about your ex, there’s a gay guy I know who’s much better at this. Don’t worry, he won’t judge.”
Get up and leave without warning. This is your last card, and it’s an Ace. Don’t be afraid to play it. You shouldn’t be spending three minutes, let alone three hours, of your valuable time listening to a woman bitch about her ex, anyhow. That’s beta male scarcity mentality.

Whatever you do, don’t sound jealous or butthurt. This is a game, treat it like one.

The advantage will be yours because a clear and present asshole trumps an invisible asshole. And given her history, you may be the new asshole who helps her get over her last asshole.

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Eye Gaze Experiments Demonstrate Holistic Female Attraction Triggers

A slew of eye-tracking heatmaps reveal some very interesting sex differences in subconscious desire, (as well as revealing optimum product positioning, which come to think of it is related to the former).

In the above map we see that men’s gazes focused on the woman’s face and body (and less so on the surrounding details). Women were more interested in the photo’s context, but they didn’t gaze any less at the model’s face and body. (It even looks like women spent *more* time checking out their competition.) Conclusion: Women objectify women as much as men do.

Similar results here. Women aren’t blind to other women’s beauty. Or their shoes. (Men, as per cultural stereotype, don’t give a shit about a hot babe’s choice of footwear.)

Here are two online dating profiles. The left profile is female, the right male. Eye tracking shows that men and women viewers gaze for a long time at the female profile’s face. The male profile photo, in contrast, hardly gets any attention, from either sex! More attention is paid to his background information, aka his story and his identity.

Eye gaze experiments provide strong evidence that a woman’s sexual market value is primarily a function of her looks, while a man’s SMV is multivariate. Women’s attraction triggers are holistic. Women will subconsciously measure and judge a host of personality, psychological, and contextual characteristics of a man before their arousal has solidified into conscious desire.

Because I know it drives certain spergalicious Rainmen crazy, once more with the slash of the shiv:

Maxim #5:  A man’s looks don’t matter as much to women as a woman’s looks matter to men.

Men who grasp the innate truth of the above maxim will do better with women than men who give up all hope because they are sad their jawlines are 0.1 micrometers too narrow.

***

Taking bets now on how many bitter quasimodos and Tinder sluts with poor reading comprehension show up here to ragefroth after ignoring the part that says “as much”.

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Overconfidence Is The Heart Of Game: ❤Science❤ Edition

Yer ‘ginal aerator has not sifted through virgin forests of montes pubis without noticing a thing or two about the rhythmic ecological tickings of women. One of those tickings is the unmistakable sound of the cogwheel shift that occurs in women who have the good fortune to fall under the admiring gaze of an overconfident man.

“Over-” being the key prefix here.

As always, social science plays catch-up to the keen Heartiste eye.

A study from 2012 concluded that even when overconfidence produces subpar results, its charm still wins the day. We might expect someone with more confidence than ability to underperform when pressed. The study tested that expectation and found it more or less accurate – but also found that it really doesn’t matter. Overconfidence may not shine when objectively tested, but it has a knack for seducing people to such a degree that they ignore the results in favor of keeping the golden child on a pedestal.

Sounds suspiciously like women ignoring the red flags of relationship threat when they’re in love with jerkboys.

If you had to isolate why, it seems to come down to a matter of status—a commodity that overconfidence is expert at creating and nurturing. When managed well, the social status conferred by overconfidence has an aura just shy of magical, capable of keeping our attention diverted from measurable results.

Chicks dig men with social status, i.e., leaders of men and women. They dig that male character trait more than looks, money, or dependability.

That’s a jarringly paradoxical conclusion when you consider the average person’s gut reaction to “that overconfident jerk.”  How can we be both repulsed and seduced by the same thing? The question gets stranger in light of another study that showed how even rudeness gets a pass if its bearer’s overconfidence has alchemized sufficient status.

In one of the study’s experiments, participants watched a video of a man at a sidewalk café put his feet on another chair, tap cigarette ashes on the ground and rudely order a meal.  Participants rated the man as more likely to “get to make decisions” and able to “get people to listen to what he says” than participants who saw a video of the same man behaving politely. Through a few other experiments the same results prevailed – people tended to rate the rule breakers as more in control and powerful compared to people who toed the line.

Jerks are rule breakers. Rule breaking is perceived as high status. High male status is attractive to women.

And what’s the all-essential ingredient in believing oneself above the rules? Why yes, overconfidence, of course. (This may also help explain why rude sales associates outsell others at luxury stores.)

Fake it till you make it. And then, once you’ve made it, fake it even more.

Those studies circle the question of why we’re prone to falling for the chutzpah of overconfidence, but say little of why the overconfident are so good at pulling it off. The most recent study on the subject has an answer that’s not likely to lessen our irritation about this whole thing, but irritatingly makes decent sense.

It can be summarized like this: Belief sells, whether it’s true or not. In the case of overconfidence, the belief in one’s ability—however out of proportion to reality—generates its own infectious energy. Self-deception is a potent means of convincing the world to see things your way.

Inner game. You won’t succeed with women until you first internalize the belief that you CAN succeed with women. And are DESTINED to succeed with women. Another term for this is ABUNDANCE MENTALITY. When you start to believe that there’s a new woman around every corner excited to meet you, that no one woman has a monopoly on specialness, then WOMEN THEMSELVES will begin to believe that about you, too. It’s as if your self-enlarging belief system is carried aloft on an ether of sexy vibes that women can sniff out from the dispiriting miasma of beta male self-doubt that permeates their existence.

While we may not like that conclusion, it’s difficult to argue that it isn’t in evidence around us every day. People who don’t believe in themselves—whether that belief is well-grounded or not—aren’t likely to convince others to buy in.

A better description of the beta male mindset you would be hard-pressed to find.

What the latest study and elements of the others are telling us is that self-deception is an especially potent brand of status fertilizer. When packaged with personality, it makes others want to believe even when the results would counsel otherwise.

Game is applied charisma. Charisma is status + a charming personality. These characteristics will lift an ugly man to a desirable man in the hearts of women. A false belief in your allure as a womanizer will become a true belief in time, and you can thank women’s loving assistance for the evolution.

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Science Continues Vindicating Heartistian Worldview

In big and small ways, social science studies have a habit of confirming many CH precepts. The latest finds that expensive diamond engagement rings and expensive wedding ceremonies are inversely associated with marriage duration.

This study was done by professors from Emory University. They found that U.S. adults who spent large amounts of money on engagement rings and/or their weddings were more likely to end up divorced!

According to the research, men who spent $2,000 to $4,000 were 1.3 times more likely to end up divorced than men who spent $500 to $2,000.

And when it comes to weddings, if you have a wedding that costs more than $20,000, you’re more likely to end up in “Splitsville!”

The average cost of a wedding in the U.S. is $30,000, according to “The Knot.”

Expensive rings and weddings are classic provider beta male game. And, as science is showing and the Chateau has warned, beta male game is ultimately self-defeating. Women don’t fall in love with a wallet; they fall in love with a man. They don’t desire a mate guarder who has to pay fidelity money; they desire a self-assured jerkboy who expects love free of charge.

And if you’re dating a princess who demands a big ring or ostentatious wedding, my advice is simple: Run. Don’t look back. The next day, you can admire the bulge of your full bank account and your spared dignity. I just saved you from hitching yourself to a woman who couldn’t really love you without a large gift bag included in the deal.

What studies like this one uncover is a bidirectional sexual market feedback loop: On one vector, you have a weak man who feels it necessary to pay for love and supplicate to his fiancee’s gaudy selfishness. On the other vector, you have an unenthusiastic woman who knows she is settling for a less desirable man in a trade-off between exciting sexiness and boring security, and who therefore feels empowered to make her sloppy second beta pay tribute to her in Damegeld. Where these two vectors meet, relationship exactness and complementarity trump love, and subcurrents of divorce are never far from cresting the polished dinner party surface.

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Science Proves Asshole Game Works

One day, CH will achieve the perfect post title that captures the spirit of the cosmic shiv. You will read it and the gleaming knife will metamorphose from the words right before your eyes. Perhaps this one is it…

A reader forwards a study and adds this promising promo:

Powerful people lack empathy.

Asshole game proven by science.

Nice guys do finish last.

The paper is called Social Class, Contextualism, and Empathic Accuracy. The abstract:

Recent research suggests that lower-class individuals favor explanations of personal and political outcomes that are oriented to features of the external environment. We extended this work by testing the hypothesis that, as a result, individuals of a lower social class are more empathically accurate in judging the emotions of other people. In three studies, lower-class individuals (compared with upper-class individuals) received higher scores on a test of empathic accuracy (Study 1), judged the emotions of an interaction partner more accurately (Study 2), and made more accurate inferences about emotion from static images of muscle movements in the eyes (Study 3). Moreover, the association between social class and empathic accuracy was explained by the tendency for lower-class individuals to explain social events in terms of features of the external environment. The implications of class-based patterns in empathic accuracy for well-being and relationship outcomes are discussed.

I bet you’re wondering where this is going. The suspense is delicious!

http://socrates.berkeley.edu/~keltner/publications/kraus.socialclass.2010.pdf

FYI, before delving into the paper, “empathic accuracy” simply means the ability to read another person. Someone with high empathic accuracy is very good at discerning how other people feel, based on social and visual cues.

It’ll seem counter-intuitive* to some, but lower class people in this study were more empathic. When you have fewer resources, the external environment exerts more influence on your life outcome. A well-off person can insulate himself from trouble (hi, Cheap Chalupas!) in ways that a poorer person can’t. So the poorer person needs to be more aware of potential dangers (and benefits), and that means being better at reading people to determine if they will hurt or help him.

*It’s fairly well-known that most criminals are less empathic**, dumber and poorer than the general population, so a study which purports to find that lower SES people have higher empathic accuracy than higher SES people would seem to fly in the face of the typical criminal profile. However, certain aspects of criminal psychology are better thought of as sharing more traits across SES than within; that is, high SES criminals may be just as anti-empathic (sociopathic) as low SES criminals, even when there are far fewer criminals as a proportion of the high SES group.

**Also worth noting: Empathic accuracy — precision at reading others’ emotions — doesn’t necessarily mean identification with those emotions. A person with robust Dark Triad traits would be very good at knowing what people are feeling and using that knowledge to manipulate them, but he wouldn’t feel much guilt from exploiting others.

Our central prediction was that participants with manipulated lower-class rank would discern the emotions of other people better than participants with manipulated upper-class rank. Initial analyses revealed that participants in the lower-class-rank condition (M = 27.08) showed greater empathic accuracy than participants in the upper-class-rank condition (M = 25.23), F (1, 77) = 4.64, p < .05. To further test our hypothesis, we conducted an ANCOVA with our social-class manipulation as a between-participants factor, gender and agreeableness as covariates, and empathic accuracy as the dependent variable. As Figure 3 shows, participants experimentally induced to experience lower-class rank were better able than their upper-class-rank counterparts to discern emotions from subtle expressions in the eyes.

This is additional evidence that social priming works, at least temporarily. (Social priming is the presumed foundation for a lot of inner game concepts, as well as “alpha maximizing” and testosterone-raising power position body language techniques.) Subjects who were made to think they were lower rank experienced improved empathic accuracy.

One prediction that follows from these tendencies is that lower-class individuals should be more accurate judges of the emotions of others than upper-class individuals are. In three studies that tested this hypothesis using measures of both objective and subjective SES, lower-class individuals, relative to their upper-class counterparts, scored higher on a measure of empathic accuracy (Study 1), judged the emotions of a stranger more accurately (Study 2), and inferred emotions more accurately from subtle expressions in the eyes (Study 3).

So what does this have to do with game and assholery?

Finally, the findings relating social class to empathic accuracy have potentially profound implications for how social inequality affects close relationships. In fact, the greater social engagement exhibited by lower-class individuals in past research (Kraus & Keltner, 2009) may spring from a similar need to perceive the external environment accurately in order to be responsive to it. Empathic accuracy may mediate influences of class on relationship quality, commitment, and satisfaction. It is also interesting to speculate about the costs of heightened empathic accuracy for overall health and well-being, particularly because lower-class individuals tend to experience chronically elevated levels of negative emotion and negative mood disorders (e.g., Gallo & Matthews, 2003). Future research should investigate whether being able to identify other people’s negative emotions contributes to relationship turmoil among lower-class individuals (Argyle, 1994; Levenson & Ruef, 1992).

Intriguingly, highly empathic people may get stressed out from constantly reading and reacting to other people’s emotional states. And this accords with experience; alpha males seem happier and also less likely to concern themselves with how others are feeling. Beta and omega males who fret about what women think of them are nervous nellies and tightly wound.

The relation of this paper with asshole game requires a connect-the-dots jog, but here it is:

Women love socially dominant men.
Socially dominant men have less empathy. They’re more self-focused and less concerned with the opinions and feelings of others.
A lack of empathy is a hallmark of assholes.
Being as asshole is attractive to women because they perceive it as the behavior of a socially dominant alpha male.
Weepy, sensitive niceguys stock up on Jergen’s and Kleenex.

Any questions?

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What An Alpha Male’s Soft Harem Looks Like

Two girls fighting over one man. This delightful menage a twat won’t be the theme of any mainstream rom-com any time soon, because the alpha male these two babycakes are fighting over is, allegedly, Arron (sic) Lewis, mystery meat marekiller currently suspected of murdering Arkansas real estate agent Beverly Carter.

“Well I guess you made up your mind cuz you are still texting him.”

Chicks dig jerks. Chicks dig taken jerks. Chicks, at least as far as we can tell by their actions, dig taken jerks who lie to them. Bonus digging points if said jerk has a rap sheet.

Indignant white knights nursing an excessively protective instinct toward women which helps themselves feel useful in the world will doubtless wail, “But he lied to her! She didn’t know he was a jerk!” This sort of thinking betrays a lack of exposure to the jungle dating market. I don’t see either of these cute-ish girls giving their sex to honest, law-abiding beta males. I see them fucking a lying, murdering sack of filth. And getting into girlfights over who will be his number one. The alpha male soft harem in action.

If you have any sort of experience with cute girls, you know that when they hook up, and stay hooked up, with lying assholes they know on some level with a quickness that these guys are lying assholes. Now of course their spinning hamsters will rationalize away their gnawing suspicions and oddly exciting discomfort, because these sexxxy bastards are just so intriguingly sexxxy and arousingly bastardly. It’s similar to how a smitten beta male, unable to think straight because his brain is awash in nutritious fresh squeezed pussy juice, will spin or ignore or sugarcoat evidence that his hot girlfriend is drifting out of love with him.

Hm, she hasn’t texted me since yesterday. Probably forgot to charge her phone.

The pricked self-preservation senses of the jerk-loving girl and the girlfriend-loving beta male tell them one thing, while their captured hearts tell them another. As love is the second most powerful emotion in the universe after jealousy, and tied with hate, the heart usually wins these contests of wills. And never really stops winning, even when it is finally denied the satisfaction of fulfillment.

***

A confused commenter avers,

The women we’re talking to each other about LEAVING him not about how much he makes their vags tingle from the power.

This is exactly the kind of misreading that one would expect from a Pollyanna pedestal polisher. Women don’t argue with each other in novella format over a man they don’t love anymore and truly wish to leave. A woman who has fallen out of love and wants to leave a man won’t turn over her decision a thousand times, nor argue about it with the man’s other lover. She’ll just leave, and her reasoning, if her spurned boyfriend demands it, will be uncharacteristically — for her sex — perfunctory. “I just don’t feel it anymore. I wish you the best.”

Only experience with women will enable a man to understand their different reactions to men they no longer love, versus men who have hurt them but whom they still love. Let’s put it this way: If two girls are fighting exhaustively over how to leave you, you’re in the gina seat.

Ya gotta read between the id-storm of lines, brethren. Or should I say sistren. *eyebrow raise*

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Social Shaming Works

It’s time to do the same with obesity.

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