Another OKCupid study: Preselection rears its ugly head, again

I’m not innately a misogynist, but I think most American women are seriously defective, for probably cultural reasons. I’m going to establish one of the reasons why in this post. Let’s look at an OkCupid study that has recieved a lot of attention: Your Looks and Your Inbox. Not surprisingly, it shows that women are focused as strongly on appearance as men are. Surprise? Not really. Cause for moral outrage? No. Everyone knows that looks are a substantial component of the dating process, and most of us accept this. Thankfully, not everyone’s appraisal of attractiveness is the same. A few of us are attractive to most people; most of us are attractive to some people. Given enough tries, we find one that likes us; life goes on. The real shocker is this: women on OkCupid have rated 80% of the men as unattractive, including four demonstrably average-looking men (OkCupid staff). It’s quite possible that this reflects only on the women who chose to give ratings– e.g. that bitchy women rate men, the rest don’t. However, although it is far from a scientific analysis, this publication contradicts much of what society prefers to believe about women: that they are kind, less shallow than men, and relatively accepting of the average man’s appearance.

The average man, based on the histogram, appears to have been rated at about 1.4 stars (out of 5) by women. That’s a D, on an A-F scale. Let me explain just how bad that is. A general rule in survey design is that ratings of anything will be inflated compared to the respondent’s actual opinion. If 100 viewers watch a television show and their ratings of it average 3.7 stars, on a 1-to-5 scale, that’s not a “good” rating. The show sucked! The same goes for performance reviews. A ubiquitious constant in such surveys is the “real average” of 4.3– a product rated below this by the public, on a 1-5 scale, is generally below-average. (Expert raters and critics are more conservative in their grading; a 3-star film, according to Ebert, is not being rated as mediocre.) And what is the average GPA at Ivy League colleges (where there are few poor students who must be given failing grades)? It’s about 3.3. It’s the same principle.

People seem to be much more candid when rating the physical attractiveness of strangers, so this rating inflation may not apply, but I’d still contend that a luke-warm rating– say, 3 stars– is not a good sign. In any case, the graph of male ratings of women shows absolutely no inflation. The distribution of attractiveness ratings seems to show a symmetric, bell-shaped curve. This is what we’d expect, and I posted on this matter in October. An average woman is sexually attractive to about 45% of men; an 85th-percentile woman is physically acceptable for about 71%, and a 15th-percentile woman is acceptable to about 23 percent. It’s fairly close to a normal distribution. For men, the story is different, and for those who lack the skills to project sociosexual confidence (e.g. “Game”), quite dismal.

Now consider the distribution of attractiveness ratings given by women to men on OkCupid, which exhibits severe skew in the fugly direction. Of seven categories, a quarter of men fall into the “least attractive” category, while almost none fall into the “most attractive” category. The median male is generally given terrible ratings, with only a few men in the thin rightward tail rated well. This occurred, one should note, in an environment of passive rating, where “Game” is almost certainly not a major factor. It’s likely, then, that these men were rated under the assumption that they have average (e.g. almost none) game.

Men on online dating sites are assumed to have poor game, and to be single, two severe attraction killers. As defined in my October analysis, a man with “7” looks (84th percentile) and “4” game (43rd percentile) is sexually attractive to only 2.7% of women. Of course, posting to an online dating site is suggestive of weak game, to the extent that this trait is tacitly assumed by most women. This, in my opinion, explains why the men were rated so badly– and, yes, 1.4 stars is not merely below-average, but abysmal, keeping in mind what I said about rating inflation. I would argue that the cutoff for a “good” average is probably in the mid-3 range (this is someone who is substantially attractive to a few women). Yet less than 10% of men are rated so highly.

What is “game”, again? I defined it as sociosexual confidence, but its root is preselection. Men with “game” are those who adopt the mannerisms of the sexually experienced and somewhat callous. They’ve adopting a set of behaviors to suggest preselection. Registering on an online dating site has the opposite effect– it indicates that a man is single, and eager enough in his search for a partner to invest time in an online profile.

Single men are really in a sandtrap– assumed, because they are unattached, to be awkward, unattractive, and undesirable. It’s inconsistent with the norms of the rest of society; for example, an unemployed man is expected to look for work– that’s normal, and people worry about him if he doesn’t– and yet a single man has absolutely no way of maintaining face while looking, even very casually, for a girlfriend. Simply put, he shouldn’t search. No paying for a stranger to have a nice dinner, no online profiles, no face lighting up when introduced to a pretty girl at a party– none of these can do a man any good.

This all comes down to preselection– women want what is not available to them. Fuck it. I agree with others who’ve called it “the root of all evil”, and it’s a trait that I advocate forcing out of the human species through any means possible– even eugenics, re-education, and aggressive social engineering.

On that note, my guess is that the OkCupid developers, rated as unattractive by their site’s women, posted pictures of themselves next to attractive women, they’d get ratings in the 3-4 range, not the abysmal scores that these average-plus men were given.

Ok. I’m done getting riled up and angry. I need a drink. Over-and-out.

‘Fuck happened here?

Defcon 4: “W.T.F.?”

Defcon 3: “What the fuck?”

Defcon 2.5 “What in the fuck?” (The “in” adds gravity.)

Defcon 2: “Tha’ fuck?”

Defcon 1: “Fuck?”

I mean, really. Fuck, man? i’-ta’ fuck?

I go away for a month, come back, and shit’s all fucked up. What happened here? Either Hope is being slandered horribly, or call me shocked and blindsided. She always seemed like a great person. I just can’t imagine her cheating on her husband. I will have another epistemic crisis, a collapse of confidence what little sanity the world seems to have, if this seemingly heroic woman turns out to have bitten faildirt in such a primal, unambiguously nefarious way.

Please clue me in, because I’m shocked. ‘Fuck happened here, people?

Epistemic seizures

I had to take a break, for work reasons. I’m 6 weeks from a major deadline and have been running on all cylinders. The blogging has been put on the back burner, and my mind is mostly elsewhere right now.

Sometimes I find myself in a state of utter doubt and agnosticism. I’m not talking about religion, but life in general– beliefs, values, ideals. I step back from cocksure arrogance to deep introspection and questioning. It’s not a problem– it’s a good thing– but it makes it difficult to write with authority.

This difficulty provides an interesting insight into our society. We overvalue confidence, not just from writers and opinion people, but in general. Confidence is usually a good thing, but sometimes it isn’t, and when it’s not, it fails us badly. The 2007-08 stock market crash was brought about my overconfident traders, rating agencies, and investors. It wasn’t a shock to anyone who knew much about financial markets. Yet people were surprised when the market tanked, having bought into the lies of overconfident bullshit artists in finance and real estate.

Look at the popularity of characters like Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, and Bill O’Reilly. Although their views match those held by many within their target demographic, it’s not their ideology and opinions that make them cultural “forces to be reckoned with”. It’s the confidence with which they say, not what they say. The same is true of large-company CEOs. For the most part, it’s not their executive vision or managerial skill that makes or breaks their careers. It’s the confidence that they project.

Of course, no discussion of overconfident bullshit peddlers is complete without discussing the phenomenon of “game”. Roissy defines game as “psychosocial dominance”. That’s a reasonable working definition, but I’d call it, instead, “sociosexual confidence”. Game is the ability to project confidence in a sexualized social environment. Confidence in other areas of life is neither necessary nor especially relevant. Most “nerds”, for example, exhibit strong cerebral confidence, reasonable social confidence in general, but a lack of sociosexual confidence. This, more than “social ineptitude”, as most nerds are socially normal, prevents them from getting women.

Confidence is a good thing, usually, but why is it a requirement for certain interactions? Answer: many, if not most, people are very weak. They get their opinions from the loudest and most authoritative-sounding source. Unsure and confused about sex, they sleep with those who are able to convince them that others find them desirable. Unaware of what’s worth doing and what’s not, they would rather have 9-to-5 jobs that are an extension of the school-driven “here’s work, now do it” model than accept that they’re out on their own, left to figure things out for themselves. (Note: you’re on your own even if you work for a large company and have a boss; you also have a boss even if you work for yourself.) We all need motivation, but weak people tend to lack the ability to generate it intrinsically; they get it from the confidence of others.

As for strong people; are they always confident? The answer, perhaps surprisingly, is no. Strong people tend to be confident, but not uniformly, and not naively. For example, those who are highly intelligent (intellectually strong) tend to have cerebral confidence, but are not always completely sure of their knowledge. Some of the smartest people I’ve known have been the most humble. I would say, in general, that strong people tend often to be self-aware, which makes them often confident in their ability but without assumption of superiority, dominance, or infallibility. Thankfully, most of life admits a middle ground. For example, it’s possible to believe that one is capable of fulfilling a job without assuming that it will be easy and require no effort. It’s also possible to believe that one is generally intelligent without assuming that one is always “the smartest guy in the room”.

However, with sociosexual confidence, I’m not convinced that most people perceive a middle ground, which we’d consider “high beta”. To be seen as “alpha” requires the overreaching, aggressive, and unrealistic style of confidence. It requires an unfounded sense of superiority, which the more sensitive and introspective people can’t feign.

Back soon

I’m a bit slower to come back into the blogging fold than I expected I’d be. Don’t worry. I’m fine, I’m not “burned out”.

I’m working 50-70 hours per week, and will be for the next 3-4 months, so I’ll be sporadic in my posting. Aiming for 3-4 posts per week.

Gotta take a break. Back on 11/9.

Work is heating up– a very good thing– and there’s a lot going on in my personal life. I’m going to put my blogging life on hiatus until Monday, November 9.

Cless Alvein vs. a casual sexer

I’m slammed this week. No time to write a serious essay. My “80th anniversary” post, on the October 29, 1929 stock market crash, will have to wait a couple days. To lighten the mood, here’s a video of Cless Alvein kicking the shit out of a serial casual sexer.

I’m impressed that this guy did it with less than 7000 HP. I was over 9000 when I got to the Wyvern for the first time. The Colosseum was a bitch.

Quick thoughts on the “bitch shield”

I’m frankly sick of the phrase “bitch shield”. Let me offer an analogy. A man of inherited wealth and privilege is exceedingly arrogant and rude to other people. He treats waiters and doormen like garbage, calls people of less means “plebs”, “proles”, and “poors”, and he holds and expresses the attitude that those of less means are subhuman, lazy, and cowardly. He is either blind to the fact that he has had an atypical and easy life, or justifies the fact on the grounds that he is simply better.

It’s not difficult to imagine a person like this. There are a lot of rich assholes like him out there. Let’s go ahead and further assume that he can “flip the switch” on his obnoxiousness. Around his father (who has the power to “cut him off” from his trust fund) he’s polite and seems outright submissive. When trying to impress a girl, he’s charming. Around the three or four friends he has, people he’s known since prep school of similar backgrounds, he’s fairly down-to-earth.

Let’s go further and assume that you’re of average means, and that this guy has just treated you like dirt. Understandably, you dislike him. One of his friends excuses his behavior. “He’s not really such a bad guy. The obnoxiousness is just an act. That’s just his rich shield. If you can prove your status to him, he’s actually a decent guy.” How would you respond?

If you’re like me, your response would be something like the following: “What? I have to prove my status to this prick? No thanks. ‘Rich shield’ or none, he’s shown himself to be an unlikeable asshole.”

The same goes for the bitch shield. A woman with a “bitch shield” is not a nice person who happens to carry a miserable demeanor around, as if it were some sort of tactical accessory. She’s a contemptible bitch, plain and simple, and she deserves to be called such, to her face and behind her back. No excuses. So let’s retire the concept and excuse of the “bitch shield” right now.

October 27, 2009 — Cless Alvein calls the nadir

7:09 am: it’s overcast, rainy, and dark. The weak morning light is barely indistinct from the ashen pink of an overcast night sky. Streetlights are on. Mornings like this don’t recommend the day. It’s tough to get out of bed. My apartment’s 5 degrees too cold, and I’m hungry but have nothing to eat.

My post was eaten by a Firefox bug. Or maybe a WordPress bug. I blame it on Firefox because it’s written in C++, an utterly awful language that should have died out a decade ago. The essay was nearly complete, and I hit the “Save Draft” button, and was told it had been saved. It wasn’t. It’s gone. Maybe I’ll write it this evening, if I have time, and put it out on Wednesday or Thursday.

On this cold, rainy morning, we move into the grand finale of autumn– early November’s display of brilliant color. Let’s just hope it doesn’t get rained out, weighed down, like so many falls. Then we enter winter, the season of spice, snow, love and intimacy– or sometimes of cold, rain, mist and desolation.

I love October, but the 27th is not one of my favorite days– I associate it with a number of deaths, breakups, numerous manifestations of bad news that have transpired on this day in years past. I realize that it’s all coincidental, and that bad things happen on every day of the year. So do good things. Approximately 1/365.2425 of all good things that have happened have occurred on this day. The same holds of bad things. Anyway, this is just prattle. I’m quickly losing my point. Did I even have one? Not so sure.

I feel raw, poorly slept, and confused. At the same time, I’m optimistic about the future, and grateful to be alive. I keep pushing forward, believing that, as damaged as the world is, it will get better. The collapse of American culture that began in the 1970s, was sped along by the Reaganoid mouth-breathers in the 1980s, and swerved into a nose dive in the 2000s, will end. Either we die utterly and finally, or we turn around. I have reason to believe the latter is more likely.

I’m going to call the nadir. It happened today at 2:30 am, the midpoint of the traditional “hour of death”. Over the past year or two, I’ve sensed a backlash. The destructive forces of casual sex, crass commercialism, female indulgence, anti-masculism, heartless conservatism, conspicuous but insincere liberalism, “game”, sociosexual obsession, combat dating, human self-mortification, et cetera, have begun to wear themselves out. We’re now on the upswing, as of 2:31 this morning. This world of ruin is reeling, badly aching, but ready to be repaired.

Why do I think an upswing is imminent? I observe. I talk to people. I ask prying questions. I enter philosophical debate with random strangers. People and news come to me, as well. An 18-year-old Somali immigrant, a beautiful college sophomore, responded to one of my essays with an account of her experiences. Casual sex seems remarkably less common in her observation of college life than it was in ours. Young people seem to be moving away from it. She only presents one data point, but I have others, and it seems that college is becoming a less crass experience by the year. It’s true that some young people are irreparably damaged, casual-sexed-out emtional zombies, but many others are turning rapidly away from filth.

The shrill cries of those in our generation who have had casual sex, as their lot in life turns sour due to their nonexistent marital value, will be bitter, stark, and petrifying. I’m talking mostly about Sex and the City harpies. They fear competition from foreign, Asian, and black women– this is why they spread nasty rumors about white, American men who date them. But this is just a “trickle” of competition compared to the next wave: a rising cohort of cultured young women, of all races and nationalities, who eschew casual sex and combat dating entirely, rendering useless and unwanted the “never return his calls” wraiths who currently own the urban dating scene.

I can’t see it for the clouds, but my clock tells me the sun has risen. Good morning, world.

Ochlogamy

I’m going to introduce a new word, and motion that we retire the less appropriate uses of old ones. That word is ochlogamy. As awkward-sounding as the word may be, it’s the perfect word to describe the modern sexual marketplace, more appropriate than “soft polygamy” and “hypergamy”, terms that are commonplace today.

The Roissy-sphere uses “soft polygamy” to describe the nightmarish opposite-sex scene, as if a reversion to pre-monogamous norms were in motion. This is partially correct. Polygynous “alpha” males are becoming more imposing every year, increasing the scope of their damage, while “beta” and “gamma” males are being squeezed out. However, polygamy has a certain officiality that is not present on the modern casual-sex market. Moreover, it’s more appropriate to call it polygyny, as the sexual market is only weakly polyandrous, hence the large number of men it leaves with nothing. Yet if this market were traditionally polygynous, each woman involved would be sleeping with a single alpha exclusively, which is not the case. No secret harems exist, and slutty women definitely double-dip. Women who participate in the casual-sex market are not even serially monogamous, but are permitted, due to the anonymity of large urban communities, to offer themselves to the entire set of “alpha” males of their acquaintance. It’s much like “dating the football team”, but with the “teammates” often not knowing each other.

So, what do we call this shit? One might consider invoking the impractical concept known as polyamory, but this makes an outright absurd assumption that love (amour) is involved in the modern sexual marketplace, when it’s clearly not. The sexual marketplace is about social status, not love or even sex as an end in itself.

Probably the most accurate word used to describe the sexual marketplace is hypergamy, asserting that women offer themselves to the men who hold the highest status. According to a certain notion of hypergamy, we’d expect a similar configuration to what we observe: a few alpha males in (possibly nonexclusive) sexual possession of a large number of women, and a large number of men with little or no sexual access. However, the problem with the word hypergamy is that it’s too vague and morally neutral. There’s good hypergamy and bad hypergamy. If women were most strongly attracted to men of integrity, intelligence, and compassion, that would be a good form of “hypergamy”. When women are attracted to men based on an empty and pestilent notion of social dominance, as seen in the world of “game”, that’s a very bad form of hypergamy. The nefarious existing variety of hypergamy– whereby men are encouraged to be boorish, aggressive, and borderline criminal “alphas” and “badboys”– on the modern sexual market is a symptom of the underlying problem, but not this subculture’s defining characteristic.

Now I’m going to discuss ochlocracy, a style of “government” that often emerges in a lawless state. Literally meaning “rule by the mob”, it describes an undesirable political arrangement in which power is held by those who, in a society with enforced laws, would be called “organized crime”. In an ochlocratic society, might makes right. Not surprisingly, the criminal underworld has a distinct ochlocratic flavor, with disputes being resolved by private agents of brutality (hit men) rather than in the court system. The social collapse observed in post-Soviet Russia illustrates the dangers of ochlocracy, which leads to diminished life expectancy, increased crime, declining standards of living, and wide disparities of economic and social fortune.

Monogamy is the sexual counterpart of democracy. It’s designed to enfranchise nearly everyone, so that no one has a stake in upsetting or destroying the common peace. By contrast, traditional polygamy is the counterpart of aristocracy– a few “entitled” people are allowed to have disproportionate sexual access; there is also a small yeoman (“beta”) class with some access, freedom, and enfranchisement; and most people are peasants who have none. Now consider the modern state of opposite-sex relations in large cities, where loving relationships are falling out of favor while “arrangements” become more common. The destruction of sexual mores during the Sexual Revolution, coupled with the rise of malignant, empty elitism, has brought about a sexual regime that is certainly not monogamous or democratic, but it’s not aristocratic either, since the “alpha” class is fluid and determined according to a man’s boorishness– in other words, his willingness to break social norms. This is the essence of an ochlocratic environment. The “alpha” males are the ones who figured out that (1) the sociosexual marketplace is relatively lawless, and (2) that they can profit immensely by behaving in ways that would be criminalized by a more lawful society (e.g. one in which casual sex were properly shamed).

Hence we have ochlogamy, a fluid sociosexual configuration in which stable relationships are uncommon, and sexual access is mediated by a fluctuating notion of social status that correlates most highly to a person’s willingness to behave in a way that a more proper arrangement would consider shameful and criminal. It’s the world of “game”, and unless we can bring back or reinvent sexual mores, it’s not going away.

Cless Alvein’s ideal woman, part 1 of ε_0

For the edification of the Cless Alvein-reading public, I’m going to describe my ideal woman, from least important to most important criteria.

Race/skin color: Although I blog often about racial issues as they pertain to the gender situation, this is the least important category by far. I’m only listing it as an item here because the topic gets so much discussion. There are women of all races I’d consider myself immensely privileged to date and marry. That said, I’m slightly more attracted to dark skin than light, and find dark-skinned Asians and blacks especially attractive. I’d say that my ideal woman is half-black, half-Irish, an “island girl” who split her formative years between Ireland and the Caribbean. Sanaa Lathan with Dolores O’Riordan‘s accent. Wow… Of course, combining Sanaa and Dolores in any fashion would break the universe in Large Hardo Hadron Collider fashion, since the world wouldn’t be able to handle that much beauty.

Appearance: I’m a major fan of the “girl-next-door” look— a pony tail, T-shirt, jeans and sandals are fine by me. No need to wear makeup. I like wavy, raven-black hair and large pupils. I prefer small-to-medium, high and perky breasts. There’s no need, in my mind, for women to be super-thin. Strong but not visible abs are ideal. A little bit of belly fat is beautiful (her stomach should be flat when she stands but soft when she sits). Ideal height is 5’8 and ideal weight is 140-145 pounds, with substantial musculature. My preferred age is 23-24, but my desired “age gap” will probably increase as I get older. (I’m 26.)

Politics: Bush Republicans are out. Rand-ite objectivists are out. Racists and homophobes are out. For libertarians and conservative-leaning independents, I tend to take them on a case-by-case basis. However, I’d prefer a woman whose politics are generally liberal, but more pragmatic, somewhat more centrist, and less hopelessly idealistic than mine.

Intelligence: This is obviously extremely important, but the kind of intelligence is more crucial than the amount of it. My IQ’s 152, but 125 is enough for me. Ideal is probably 135-140, but creativity, curiosity, and drive are substantially more important than raw intelligence. Since I’m looking for a complement rather than a twin, I’d rather marry a literature or philosophy major than another math/science person.

Ambition: She should have hobbies or interests about which she is passionate– sports, political activism, spirituality, musical instruments– and she should constantly be striving to improve herself. She should have an existence that is independent of mine. Her level of career ambition can be anywhere from very modest– if she wants to be a housewife, it’s not a dealbreaker as long as she’s an active housewife– to extremely dedicated, but selfish yuppies (e.g. investment bankers and “biglaw” lawyers) are out. If she’s going to be working more than 40 hours per week, it should be for something worth believing in– fighting poverty, social justice, the arts, education– and not for status or money as an end in itself.

Past experience: This is an area where I’m somewhat unforgiving. Any one-night stands are a deal-breaker, as is anything that smells of sex with an “alpha”. I really dislike such men and view it as disloyalty for a woman to sleep with one. I’d prefer a woman to have had 2-4 loving relationships before me, with no sex outside of those, and for all of those relationships to be conclusively over.

Religion/spirituality: This is crucial. I will only marry a woman of faith. I’ve actually turned down an almost-ideal woman (“off-by-one”) because she was an atheist. I could date, sleep with, and even raise children with an atheist. But I don’t want to face aging and death (mine, or hers) with one and, in my mind, there needs to be a damn good reason for marriage to be anything less than “unto death”. Her specific religion (Christian, Jewish, Buddhist) is not nearly as important as the depth of her spirituality. I want someone who will force me to explore new aspects of life, myself, and her. So spirituality is a major turn-on. On the other hand, theological intolerance and conservative politics are dealbreakers. A Buddhist or a Friend (Quaker) would probably be best.