Was classified as a Jerk... LOL. Read up
Notes on Alpha Males, NiceGuys(TM), and Jerks
This document is composed of various postings to alt.support.shyness on the subjects of Alpha Males, NiceGuys(TM), and Jerks. Shy guys tend to fit the description of NiceGuy(TM), which is explained below, and they therefore have little luck with women.
From: csbruce@ccnga.uwaterloo.ca (Craig Bruce)
Subject: Alpha Males, NiceGuys(TM), and Jerks
Date: Tue, 29 Oct 1996 23:50:19 GMT
Message-ID:
Organization: University of Waterloo, Canada (eh!)
Someone wrote the following to me in a private message in response to a posting I made. I won't say who so as not to betray their anonymity, but I have more to say on the subject of Alpha Males/Jerks/NiceGuys(TM).
>So what is it about these "shallow psychotic wasteoids" [Jerks] that attract
>women in the first place? I have seen in my years that they usually
>attract the younger, more minsunderstanding or "rebel-stage" women.
This is very true; I have seen it myself.
>But, ya have to admit, there's something that makes them darn attractive
>or they'd never have g/f's.
Yes, there is something that makes them attractive.
I am currently taking a Social Psychology course locally, and in the lecture earlier today, the subject was styles of intimate relationships. What way discussed was generalized theory, so there are no hard-and-fast rules and many exceptions, but the following material just hit the nail right on the head for me. It has to do with "Attachment Styles" in adult relationships. To learn your attachment style, select the one of the following paragraphs that best describes your feelings. Don't read the descriptions of the types until you have picked one.
A. I find it relatively easy to get close to others and am comfortable
depending on them and having them depend on me. I don't often worry
about being abandoned or about someone getting close to me.
B. I am somewhat uncomfortable being close to others; I find it difficult
to trust them completely, difficult to allow myself to depend on them.
I am nervous when anyone gets too close, and often, love partners want
me to be more intimate than I feel comfortable being.
C. I find that others are reluctant to get as close as I would like. I
often worry that my partner doesn't really love me or won't want to stay
with me. I want to merge completely with another person, and this desire
sometimes scares people away.
Which one did you pick? I am guessing that a lot of people in this newsgroup will pick "C", including myself. The names for these attachment styles are: A. "Secure", B. "Avoidant", and C. "Anxious/Ambivalent" (which I'll just call "Anxious" below). The people of the Secure style report more satisfying relationships than people of the Insecure types (either Avoidant or Anxious). "Secure subjects describe highly positive interactions, characterized by happiness, friendship, and trust. Avoidant subjects indicate a fear of closeness. And Anxious subjects report a love life full of emotional extremes, obsessive preoccupation, sexual attraction, desire for union with the partner, and love at first sight. Thus, there are striking parallels between the Secure attachment style and companionate love [(having your mate be your lover and your best friend... Rod Stewart stuff)], as well as between the Anxious style and passionate love [(Romeo and Juliet type stuff)]."
"Looking back, adults with different attachment styles report different childhood experiences. In research conducted in Australia and the United States, secure subjects describe positive family relationships, while avoidant subjects spoke of difficulties with their mother and anxious/ ambivalent subjects mentioned difficulties with their father. ... Among U.S. undergraduate women, an insecure attachment style is correlated with depression." I also think that these tendancies affect all relationships that you have, to some degree.
If we correlate this Social Psychology theory to the NiceGuy(TM) stuff, we get the following classification scheme for male socio-psychology Back to the classification I posted earlier:
TERM STYLE DESCRIPTION
------------ -------- -----------
Alpha Males Secure Outgoing, friendly, intelligent, (socially) powerful,
confident, and fun social-group leaders, "have
their shit together"
Regular Guys Secure Much of the stuff above, but not necessarily leaders,
maybe slight NiceGuy(TM) or Jerk qualities
NiceGuys(TM) Anxious Shy, anxious, low social status, maybe many
friendships with women but few real relationships,
a push-over, walked upon by others, "needy",
"clingy", dependent, self-esteem problems,
desperate, tries to move relationships too quickly
Jerks Avoidant Exciting, arrogant, psychotic scum
I'm using a very specific, negative definition of "NiceGuy(TM)" here. Any of the first three types can be "nice" people, in the dictionary sense of the word. And, well, I would guess that there are parallel female equivalents. It is my contention that most human social groups have a male domination hierarchy of some sort, with the more self-confident males near the top and the less self-confident nearer the bottom. Mind you, they don't butt heads or beat each other up; the more dominant ones lead the group, guide the conversation, are the ones that others look up to, etc. The less dominant ones are followers, and in pathological situations, are ridiculed and taken advantage of. There's probably a female domination hierarchy and a "person" hierarchy. To the naysayers and non-believers, I say to take an analytical look around you. It may be subtle and it may be more or less important in different types of groups, but it's there.
Back to attachment style, here is how people with different styles tend to see themselves and other people. Where one sees positively, when there are problems one will think that they are situational and where there good things one will think that they are more typical. Where one sees negatively, one tends to think that bad things are typical and good things are transient, caused by external forces.
STYLE SEES SELF SEES OTHERS
-------- ---------- -----------
Secure Positively Positively
Anxious Negatively Positively
Avoidant Positively Negatively
Self-esteem theory says that we always want to maximize our self-esteem and that we derive self-esteem from two sources: achievement and affiliations (friends, groups, lovers). Of course, it takes self-esteem in the first place to get these things, so it is circular feedback loop, which can spiral both upwards and downwards. Secure types have this whole system working in a healthy fashion. Anxious types tend to have a lack of affiliations (or at least close affiliations) and so they draw more of their self-esteem from achievement (things like 4.22 CGPAs). When both sources are cut off, self-esteem plummets. Avoidant types either don't like to be close to other people or they tend to see affiliations as being achievements... in a pathological way. The way for them to achieve in this area is being able to dominate and control people. Avoidants don't care about other people's feelings and are always looking out for #1. They see people as things to conquer.
The types of intimate relationships that people with different attachment styles tend to have is summarized here:
PERSON1 PERSON2 RELATIONSHIP
-------- -------- ------------
Secure Secure Smooth, harmonious
Secure Anxious Smooth -- the Secure person is nurturing to the Anxious
Secure Avoidant Conflict -- Secure loses patience, Avoidant is bad
Anxious Anxious Roller Coaster -- highs and lows, intense emotions
Avoidant Anxious Power -- the Avoidant dominates or abuses the Anxious
Avoidant Avoidant No intimate relationship possible
Women tend to look for security in relationships with men and men tend to look for youth and beauty in a female partner. Consequently, women tend to marry socially upwards and men tend to marry socially downwards. Women tend to marry older men and men, younger women. So, women tend to be naturally drawn toward Secure qualities in men, and tend to be turned off by NiceGuy(TM) qualities. Expressed simply, if a woman can walk all over you, she is not going to respect you. If she doesn't respect you, then she's not likely to want a relationship with you.
Now, about Jerks. Jerks tend to see themselves positively and other people negatively, so they tend to have high levels of self-confidence and little respect for other people. It is the high self-confidence that attracts women to them, as it causes them to be rambunctions, energetic risk takers. They think they're God's gift to women. They tend to be spontaneous without really thinking about consequences. They tend to be impulsive, and so give off an air of danger and adventure. If we look at the chart above, we see that Avoidant types (jerks) don't tend to have relationships with each other and relationships with Secure people tend to be filled with conflict since a Secure person is not going to take the Avoidant's "shit". And so, it tends to be the Insecure, Anxious type of women who falls for the Jerk. These are the women who may be called NiceGirls(TM), parallel to NiceGuys(TM), except that instead of being turned off by the type as women tend to be, the Jerks see these women as easy marks, easy to dominate and thereby increase their self-esteem, and, whatever else a man might want to do with a woman.
Think about it... there's this woman who has a low social status, is anxious and insecure, and there is this exciting guy who wants her. How can she resist? And so she falls in love with him, while he is relatively unmoved emotionally (since his self-esteem is derived from social conquest). The relationship is guided by the Principle of Least Interst: the person who is the least interested in the relationship gets to dictate the terms of the relationship. Result: he treats her like shit. He takes advantage of her, dominates and controls her. He sees problems in the relationship as being her fault, and she is inclined to agree since she sees herself negatively, and if she's very lucky, she even gets to be physically abused.
Another thing: A number of people have either said that Alpha Males are defined as the most physically attractive males or that Alpha Males and Jerks are the same thing. I don't think that that is the way things are at all. Alpha Males are the benevolent socially dominant males of a group that tend to be leaders, care about people, and that everyone in the group tends to look up to, including the females, and Jerks are abusive headcases who socialize in order to conquer people. Physical attractiveness is a different issue, although people who are attractive have an extra card in their hand when it comes to self-esteem and how other people perceive them, but this is only a benefit and not a determinant.
Anyway, this is the stuff that I have to say on the subject. But one more thing: human socializing and mating is a very complicated subject, and the stuff I've said is only a component of it; there are many other factors at work, too.
Comments?
-Craig
"If you tied buttered toast to the back of a cat and dropped it from a
height, what would happen?" --unknown
From: Marc Meunier
Subject: Re: Alpha Males, NiceGuys(TM), and Jerks
Date: Wed, 30 Oct 1996 08:08:22 GMT
Message-ID: <32770CF6.6BAC@ionline.net>
Organization: University of Waterloo
[snip]
> TERM STYLE DESCRIPTION
> ------------ -------- -----------
> Alpha Males Secure Outgoing, friendly, intelligent, (socially) powerful,
> confident, and fun social-group leaders, "have
> their shit together"
>[...]
Craig, this is some really important material you've brought to light here... One thing I've often noticed about shy people is that we seem to believe, "talking to that cute blonde over there = proposing marriage" and we forget about all the intermediate steps, and that fits in EXACTLY with your Anxious concept. If we attach so much importance to minor things, then of course we'll also worry intensely about those things!
> Anyway, this is the stuff that I have to say on the subject. But one more
> thing: human socializing and mating is a very complicated subject, and the
> stuff I've said is only a component of it; there are many other factors at
> work, too.
>
> Comments?
All in all, excellent stuff. You should save that in case a shyness FAQ ever gets off the ground :)
One thing - I tend to be wary about slapping labels on things, it's often very destructive. Once you give a name to something, that tends to solidify it in your thinking. People are already all worked up about being "shy", "introverted", "non-Alpha", and now they'll be upset about being "Anxious" and a "NiceGuy (TM)". I think it's important that we define this whole thing as a dynamic - that an Anxious type can, over time, become Secure through learning and experience.
From: arandia@bway.net (arandia)
Subject: Re: Alpha females
Date: 31 Oct 1996 02:49:36 GMT
Message-ID: <559440$bts@betty.bway.net>
Organization: bway.net, part of Outernet, Inc. in New York City
Rogerio Yick Kwong Fung (u1001353@isc.sjsu.edu) wrote:
: Why is it that we only see posts about alpha males? I guess alpha females
: are also out there, but I hear so little about them? Or..does this have
: anything to do with the fact that we are more guys in here than gals? :)
: Obviously, it seems that shyness affects women less than men, since there
: are so few of them (but those who are in here are the best ;) ) in here.
: And if we also consider that women are more emotional(its a fact) I guess
: shy women get caught by all the non shy guys of the world. Am I right?
Well, the reason that there are no alpha females is because female modes of social contact are egalitarian instead of hierarchical like men prefer. In a society of "equals", there is no clear leader.
In male groups, it's very easy to spot the alpha male. He's the guy giving orders. Everybody follows him.
In female groups, the dynamic is one of suggestion and validation. While one person might propose an action, ideally one would want the group to reach a consensus before acting.
Good books to read on the subject are:
* "You Just Don't Understand!" by Deborah Tannen.
* "Brain Sex" by Anne Moir.
--
joel
watch me on tv! Tell Yianni that you're my fan!
"Diary" Sundays at 6:30pm on Time Warner Cable of Manhattan's Ch. 35.
email Yianni: yianni@panix.com URL: http://www.yiannimovie.com
From: arandia@bway.net (arandia)
Subject: Re: show of hands
Date: 31 Oct 1996 02:44:13 GMT
Message-ID: <5593pt$bts@betty.bway.net>
Organization: bway.net, part of Outernet, Inc. in New York City
Scott Ramnarine (breadro@ix.netcom.com) wrote:
: How many people out there are dependant on the opposite sex for
: validation? I am currently struggling with this. Any theories as to
: why this exists? Please reply to me personally as I do not have
: newsgroup access very often.
I used to think that I needed a girlfriend to validate me. That once somebody actually said to me how great my life is then my life would be great.
It wasn't until I decided that *I* make my life great that I attracted my girlfriend. And well, my life validates itself.
--
joel
watch me on tv! Tell Yianni that you're my fan!
"Diary" Sundays at 6:30pm on Time Warner Cable of Manhattan's Ch. 35.
email Yianni: yianni@panix.com URL: http://www.yiannimovie.com
From: Daeron
Subject: Re: Alpha females
Date: Wed, 30 Oct 1996 16:53:55 -0500
Message-ID: <3277CE73.24DC@ix.netcom.com>
Organization: Netcom
Rogerio Yick Kwong Fung wrote:
> Why is it that we only see posts about alpha males? I guess alpha females
> are also out there, but I hear so little about them? Or..does this have
> anything to do with the fact that we are more guys in here than gals?
There is no such thing as an "alpha" male or female. These are imaginary constructs invented by half-baked sociologists - who probably flunked physics in college! (Which is why they ended up peddling 'theories' about "alpha males" or whatever.)
From: pepke@scri.fsu.edu (Eric Pepke)
Subject: Re: I like you shy people!
Date: Tue, 12 Nov 1996 14:13:10 -0600
Message-ID:
Organization: Florida State University, but I don't speak for them
> jlee (jenny.hill@mail.utexas.edu) wrote:
> : Hey, I don't even believe in alpha females, much less want to be one--
> : in my mind I'd have to be a she-wolf to do that. Ok, so maybe you're just
> : implying that I'm a bitch! (another joke! or perhaps just a bad pun;
> : at any rate not meant to be inflammatory, ok?)
Actually, I was quite serious. The major purpose of postings like the original here and the "Hi" and "Hello" postings is to divide alt.support.shyness into two groups: a "liked" group and a "disliked" group. This is pure dominance game-playing, and it's a classic splitting maneuver, commonly used by alpha wannabees to start a takeover.
It's one thing to say "I don't think you're right." It's quite another to say "What you are saying puts you in a special category, that of disliked or unaccepted people." The former is a disagreement; the latter is a dominance game.
--
Eric Pepke
Supercomputer Computations Research Institute
Florida State University
pepke@scri.fsu.edu
From: "Hugo Drax"
Subject: an intresting quote. (experiment)
Date: Tue, 11 Nov 2003 12:32:10 -0500
Newsgroups: alt.support.shyness
I first noticed that American women are fucked up when I attended Purdue University in the mid-1980's. No man could open a door for a woman without her screaching "I can open the door myself!!!" at the top of her lungs. Purdue, being a internationally-renowned university draws students from across the country....and those ingrate women screaming at anyone who DARED to show them simple basic courtesy, were, likewise, a cross-section of American females from coast to coast.
I've dated close to a dozen American women....from ALL over the country, all but one was college educated. Not one of them was ever worth the effort of keeping the relationship going for more than a couple of months.
Then, about 5 years ago, I happened to start dating a girl I met down at the pool at my grandmother's apartment. Completely different. Not once did she "misunderstand" anything I said resulting in an argument. When I did something for her, she truly appreciated it. Unlike the previous girls, when she did something for me, there was NOT an underlying motive that I owed here something in return. With the previous girls...every favor done for me....was with the expectation that I would have to do something several orders of magnitude more significant. She has a bachelor's degree in economics, and a master's in business, and speaks FIVE languages.
And yet, she *_NEVER_* belittled me, or otherwise made snotty remarks.
Unfortunately, she was only here on a tourist visa, and had to return to St. Petersburg, Russia. After several months, I said to myself, "well, there's at least ONE girl who is capable of holding up her end of the relationship. I wonder if it was because of how her parents raised her, or what?"
So...I started doing research. Magazines, books, AND personal interviews via Internet Relay Chat [I interviewed both American women, and girls from Russia in various cities....and asked them the same sorts of questions]. To each interviewee, I introduced myself as someone doing a study on various cultures, and asked if I could ask them a few questions.
I used a sexually neutral name (Pat), so that responses would not be based on me being a man.
The feedback from these interviews was....absolutely startling.
I interviewed several dozen girls of each nationality, and, using the logging feature of mIRC, recorded each interview in it's own text file.
The American girls, were, to the very last one...of the opinion that a man's problems were HIS to solve, and that she would not exert any real effort to help him...but if she has a problem, he better damn well get her out of it, or she'll be the most pissed off fucking bitch on the planet. Basically, the attitude is one of -- If I marry a guy, that gives me free license to steal his money, resources and time, and, in return, I owe him nothing.
Apparently, the anonymity allowed these women to express views which would NEVER be openly talked about....especially with a man.
The Russian girls, in contrast, expressed opinions that indicate that they view relationships as a partnership. That marrying a man is commitment to a mutually suppportive partnership. Out of several dozen, there was only one that I would not characterize this way.
In some ways, I was truly shocked. On the other hand, I was EXTREMELY gladdened to discover that Maria was not a "needle in a haystack"....but instead, to realize that, per the analogy of looking for a woman, American culture produces hay, but Russian culture produces the MUCH more valuable needles...in MASS QUANTITIES!
In general, Russian women PRIDE themselves on being feminine, AND on how well they fulfill the female half of the division of labor within any halfway-organized family--AND they truly appreciate that men are able (and willing) to do many things which they just are NOT well suited for (either psychologically, sociologically, or physically). In other words...Russian women are aware of their limitations...and are quite thankful for men who help them when faced with a problem which brings such limitations into view.
At the same time...my personal experience is....that the character of your typical Russian woman is MUCH more of a true "Can do" spirit than American women. When an American woman sees a problem, her first response is to call a man (husband to move the couch, police to get her out of her poorly-chosen relationship, etc.)....all the while claiming that she's "independant" and "doesn't need men" to get through life. In contrast...the many Russian women who I have met over the years, have never played "incapable woman-child" when faced with a problem well within their own ability to resolve. Nor do they go around badgering
FURTHER research leads me to believe that the qualities I discovered in Maria...and the Russian girls I interviewed...are not limited to just Russian culture...but are fairly common THROUGHOUT the slavic countries (Poland, Ukraine, etc.)...at least the Northern slavic countries...I don't yet have enough data from Czech Republic, Slovak Republic, and former Yugoslavia(*) to make any well-founded statement about women from those areas.
(*) In slavic languages, Yugo = south thus, lit "South-slav-land.
