I present to you the anthem of the Beta male:
Song starts at 00:30.
“Pretty women out walking with gorillas down my street
From my window I’m staring while my coffee grows cold
Look over there! (Where?)
There’s a lady that I used to know
She’s married now, or engaged, or something, so I am told
Is she really going out with him?
Is she really gonna take him home tonight?
Is she really going out with him?
Cause if my eyes don’t deceive me,
There’s something going wrong around here ”
“Is she really going out with him” is another way of saying, “Why not me?” The age old question of awkward teenage boys throughout history, myself included.
Picture for a moment me at 16 years old sitting at the top of the amphitheatre of my high school. My friend Chad and I are looking at one of the most devastatingly attractive girls at our school holding hands with a neanderthal. What was it? Why was she with him?
20 some years later I still can't claim 100% what makes one person attracted to another. We are complex creatures. I do think that nowadays I'm armed with information I could have used at 16 when my similarly toad-like friend and I were asking each other what Joe Jackson was asking.
We were smart. We were nice guys. We thought we were funny. We knew plenty of movie quotes and listened to cool music.
What nobody told us was that those traits were invalid currency to certain types of girls. The equivalent to having 100,000 Chuck E. Cheese tokens at Disneyland.
What we lacked, the “weird trick” was the evident ability to KILL THE SNAKE.
The Serpent
Let's put a snake into a chimp enclosure and see what happens.
Snakes were hell on our early primate ancestors, constantly killing babies and the weaker members of the tribe. Snakes are a major bummer if you’re a chimp.
Part of the reason that humans attained such highly developed eyesight as compared to other mammals was for snake detection. The lower half of our field of vision in particular is designed to detect the difference between sticks on the ground and snakes in the grass.
Evolution has a clever built-in mechanism for species survival. The bravest members, or alpha males are tasked with protecting the group from outside threats. If a snake is amongst the group, the alpha and a few contenders to the crown are tasked with eliminating the threat.
This ingroup develops a dominance hierarchy based on their members attributes and skills. Inevitably, an alpha will appear with a wider opportunity for mate selection. This ensures that the next generation will carry on the genetics of members near the top of the dominance hierarchy.
Unlike chimpanzees, female homosapiens are selective about their partners. Alpha male chimps just happen to receive the widest ability to mate with any female he chooses, but the low male chimp on the totem pole doesn't have to worry about dying a virgin.
We are not chimps though. So if you are a human male trying to catch a date with someone out of your league, the chances are high that you'll be rejected. When a woman rejects a man, she is essentially saying;
“You’re not too bad for a friend, but there’s no reason that your genetic material should propigate into the next generation.”
Ouch.
Homosapien women tend to select men who are able to protect the group. A selective female would want a dominant male to handle protecting herself, her offspring and the group as a whole. These dominant traits will pass on the next generation so that only the strongest and the bravest get their genes passed on.
Football quarterbacks, military, firemen and police tend to exhibit alpha traits of "snake killer" in spades and are therefore more attractive to female partners attuned to such attributes.
How Romantic!
The story of Adam and Eve is VERY old. Perhaps over 10,000 years old, predating the Bible. There's a big reason the father of lies is considered a serpent and not a giraffe.
The ability to protect is essential to a tribes survival. Naturally, a selective female would want a dominant male to handle protecting herself, her offspring and the group as a whole.
It ain't exactly romance, but it's a part of how the world works. The dominance hierarchy has been in existence in for 350 million years, our earliest ancestors only arrived 40 million years ago.
The question I would pose to my younger self is, “Why would she pay you any attention? What do you bring to the table that’s crucial, necessary and even the least bit attractive?”
My answer would probably be some derivative of;
…”But muh FEELINGS!”
Screw your feelings. This is important stuff, this is the survival of the human species. Your feelings don’t matter.
Read this article by David Wong.
It was very helpful for me and every young person should read it.
Women might feel personally attacked by the claims presented. People don’t like to feel like their choices are dictated by any other factors than their own free will. I’ve come to question the very existence of free will in and of itself. I think that our behavior and choices are generally dictated by forces far outside our control. Your genetics, upbring, social placement are things decided long ago and they weren’t put into place by you. You are just the end result of the terrible thrust of humanity. What makes you think you’re making your own choices about anything?
What Can You Do About It?
Nothing but add value to yourself in some form so as to stand out in some other manner. Humans are complex and different traits attract different people at different junctures in life. A young woman might be OBVIOUSLY attracted to the football star, theatre lead or water polo champ. Later on, however their interests may change.
Here’s the cool thing about us humans, there are different dominance hierarchies.
Say for instance that you know more about Battlestar Galactica than anyone else in your tristate area. Utterly useless information in most high schools but in college some weirdo will think that’s super hot. You might be a chess superstar, utterly alone in Instagram world. Just wait though, somewhere out there is a chess groupie.
They’re here for Justin Tan- Chess Ace
Exhibit A
The stunner on the left actually married the hairy oaf on the right. It wasn’t because he was an okay bass player (why would anyone be attracted to that?) Perhaps she saw some potential, a dry sense of humor and an appreciation for knowing he had a catch on his hands.
I’m still trying to figure it out.
The point is, there are many choices I could have made which would have put me out of the running to marry her. I did some things right, a lot of things wrong and just enough in the former category to compensate for the later. She would not tolerate a drug abuser, a violent dude or someone with no job prospects/earning potential whatsoever. Maybe she saw some basic character and said, “He’s a fixer upper but he shows promise.”
We have some kids together and it’s working out.
On Valentines Day I will post part 2 where I will unpack the severity of the problem. In the meantime let me know your thoughts on the topic. Is there anything we can do to help low status, useless men? Is the dominance hierarchy just a sham? Thanks for reading.