For part 1, go here.
September 22, 2009, and beyond: Mr. Aaron Wright is shocked by Sarah’s revelation. Nine partners, three one-nighters. Shit. For him, sex only made sense in the context of a committed relationship. Sarah does not share such values. He, nonetheless, is too nice to dump Sarah over her “number”. He doesn’t want to think of himself as a judgmental person or a “misogynist”. It’s 2009 and, if men can have casual sex, so can women. At least she wasn’t a total slut, and she came clean about her past in its entirety, right? She just had a “wild oats” phase. No big deal. The past is the past, mistakes were made, move on and we will work this out. This is what Mr. Wright tells himself, every time his creeping resentment of Sarah’s past enters his conscious mind. Mr. Wright and Sarah never discuss their sexual histories again.
A week later, they have sex. Mr. Wright turns out, despite his “inexperience”, to be a natural in bed. He’s the best lover Sarah has ever had. Despite one very uncomfortable conversation, the relationship seems to have promise from this point forward. Unfortunately, Sarah’s shame and Aaron’s resentment, neither acknowledged due to their armistice regarding “history” talk, fester over the winter. Over the next six months, the couple begins having increasingly heated arguments over trifling matters, proxies for the underlying issue. In February, Sarah shows up 15 minutes late for an engagement and Aaron berates her for her “total lack of self-control”. Sarah mutters something under her breath to the effect of: “at least I didn’t let my youth pass me by”. Aaron: What? Sarah: “Nothing.”
Fast-forward to the first warm day of 2010– a Sunday in late March. Sarah and Mr. Wright have a huge fight, and Sarah makes an unflattering comparison of Aaron’s bedroom prowess against that of an ex-boyfriend. She doesn’t mean it, it’s not true, but she can’t unsay it. Aaron calls her a slut, a bitch, a whore, a cunt. They break up and agree never to speak again.
Sarah, now 29, has a couple one-night stands in the months after the breakup, bringing her “number” to 12. Her sexual history has already made evident her lack of self-control, so the reader can probably intuit what happens next, but I’ll spell it out: ice cream. Lots and lots of ice cream. She gains 30 pounds and feels so bad about herself that she’s unsuitable for dating. Regarding any man who would date her in such a state– and, of course, there still are some– she’d be too turned off by his low standards (Mr. Wright wouldn’t date a fat slut) to make anything of the situation. Eventually, she decides to slim down and wait for an age when a double-digit number might be less of a big deal.
2013. Sarah’s 32. She’s still beautiful, but it’s harder than it used to be to get male attention, and very old men have been approaching her with more confidence, as if they might actually have a chance. Gross. She begins dating the less impressive “beta” males she spurned when she was younger– men who have mediocre jobs, bland personalities, and will be moving out to the suburbs in a few years, but at least they’re “sweet”. Some are more awkward than others. Once, on a fourth date, she admitted to having had 14 previous sex partners. Her date’s response, with a wide grin: “Hot!” (He didn’t get a fifth date.) Eventually, she meets John, a nondescript but reasonably handsome 40-year-old. He’s smart but has never been terribly ambitious, has a nondescript office job, and watches significantly more television than Sarah is used to. They date, get along well, and have a surprising lack of fights. Overwhelming “sparks” of passionate love never occur, but Sarah experiences flashes of contentment. Moving out to the suburbs, getting a big dog, having kids and a plastic slide in the yard… that might not be so bad, after all.
2016. Sarah’s 35. John and Sarah have been together for three years. She has accepted his marriage proposal, but is having second thoughts. The wedding’s in two months. He doesn’t make her feel sexy the way Mr. Aaron Wright (now married) did. They’re not even husband-and-wife yet, and John already seems more like a brother than a lover to Sarah. Sarah decides that she has to see Mr. Wright once, just for closure. She may invite him to her wedding. She asks him out for lunch, and he accepts. The “chemsitry” she once felt with Mr. Wright returns as soon as he walks into the diner. She tries to kiss him; he rejects her advance. After feeling a raw lust she thought inaccessible at her age, she wonders how she could have ever thought to settle for mere contentment. She knows she must break off her engagement with John. She does. John throws her out of the house. Later, Sarah calls John, on his 44th birthday, hoping he’ll forgive her. No response. They never speak again.
October 5, 2019. Sarah’s 38th birthday. Her closest friends are all married. She’s single. Her supporters all tell her that “you’ll find someone”, but they have no single men in their social networks. If she wants to get married, she’ll have to seriously consider 45- and 50-year-old men, and not the rich and handsome ones either. Her “number” is 22. She’s averaged exactly one sexual partner per year since losing her virginity at 16– certainly not a true “slut”, but she’s got a very high number on account of her relational instability. When she tells the truth about her history to a prospective boyfriend, he gets “sticker shock”. Not even the beta nerds want her. Worse yet, she knows it’s her fault. If she had laid off the strange cock in college and her 20s, she’d be married to Mr. Wright.
On this October night, Sarah reaches an epiphany: fuck it. No kids or marriage are in her future, so she might as well have whatever “fun” she can until she drops dead. She pulls out the sluttiest clothes she owns. She hasn’t worn them in eight years, and they fit her body poorly, but she squeezes into them through Herculean force. She doesn’t smoke, but she buys a pack of cigarettes; by lighting up, she can accentuate the “easy” look. She heads off to a dive bar near NYU, hoping to score a sufficiently drunk and desperate college student. She’s now a full-fledged cougar.
These 20-year-old men are absolutely awful in bed but… hey, at least they have fresh faces and nice abs. She never calls them afterward, knowing her calls won’t be returned. She doesn’t see a point in getting emotionally invested in them, knowing that they’ll never take her seriously. Given her casual sex history, men her age don’t exactly take her seriously either. At least with the college studs, she can blame it on their age and immaturity.
Fin.
Sounds more like the two had poor relationship skills and could not communicate properly, which is essential to root out resentments and prevent future conflicts. Many couples cannot really talk to each other openly and honestly.
I’m not condoning casual sex, because I’ve never been with a man who has not told me with heartfelt sincerity that he loved me. But if this woman had not been judgmental but more accepting of Mr. Wright, and if she had not tried to lie about her past but been more self-aware and analyzed her own motivations, things might have gone differently.
As well, they could have been both more open with their feelings, and not blamed each other for their own insecurities and shortcomings but supported each other as they worked on these. If they had been able to truly work on their mutual sharing of feelings, fostering lots of love and friendship, they would be able to overcome a lot of difficulties. The trials of a long-term relationship are far more intense than the little things like “you slept with a few more people than I did!” If they could not work through such trifling matters as that, then when the real trials come like childbirth, child rearing, illnesses, deaths, and so on, they would have snapped.
If a woman has not been a bona fide slut and wants a long-term relationship, and if she has real maturity and not stuck in emotional adolescence, she still can find a good man at 38, but yes she probably will be finding a lot of divorced men. NYC might be a different story, because of its emphasis on fashion, money, superficiality, etc. Coastal major cities are not good places for long-term relationships. But many women in the smaller cities and towns find fulfilling long-term relationships in their late 30s and early 40s. My fiance’s mother has been with her 2nd husband for 20+ years, and they met when she was almost 40.
When I wrote this, I thought people would pounce on Mr. Wright for being judgmental, but yeah… both protagonists come off as judgmental and not right for each other.
Yes, definitely. It’s often repeated in the Roissy-sphere that a woman’s stock plummets after 30, but I don’t see this. I don’t think it’s true. I think that, after 25, the glut of male attention that shallow women depend on for their confidence begins to recede, but this has very little to do with their desirability in relationships. Most of the best guys in their 30s and 40s want women close to their age– 3 to 5 years younger, not 15 to 20. If a woman is fit, beautiful, interesting, and has a reasonable history, she’s still very desirable in her 30s and 40s to men of her own age. My dad (late 50s) told me that women in their 20s never stop being attractive, but that the difference between 25 and 55 shrinks dramatically as you get older.
When I wrote this, I thought people would pounce on Mr. Wright for being judgmental,
In point of fact my instinct is to pounce on him for not being more judgmental. Nine that she admits to – OK, what is the real number? Cross her off the “potential wife” list and put her on the “pump and dump” list right then and there.
It’s often repeated in the Roissy-sphere that a woman’s stock plummets after 30, but I don’t see this. I don’t think it’s true.
I do.
If you are thinking of a potential woman as a mother, she’s going to hit the fertility wall in her late 30s. If you want to have two kids spaced two years apart about five years after you meet her, then the math is simple: back up seven years from age 40 and she can’t be older than 33 when you first meet her, and even that is kinda pushing it (30 is better). Perhaps if you’re willing to gamble on having kids with someone you just met who is 37, but that is a risky strategy, since you have just put yourself in a high-stress situation (having a brand new baby) with someone you hardly even know.
Solid point, but I don’t think everyone wants kids. Also, relationships tend to move faster as people get older. For people who met as college sophomores to marry as juniors is unheard-of, but it’s not that unusual for people over 30 to get married a year and a half after meeting.
The “fertility wall” is an issue, but it’s minor in comparison to the importance of marrying the right woman. If you’re a 30-year-old guy, a great 32-year-old beats a mediocre 25-year-old.
I don’t think everyone wants kids.
The vast majority of men and women do want kids, and thus it is correct to say that the “stock” of women whose fertility is rapidly declining – women over 30 – is correspondingly rapidly declining. The occasional exception does not disprove the general rule.
it’s not that unusual for people over 30 to get married a year and a half after meeting.
Allright, and how long after that does he knock her up? The clock is ticking, tick tock tick tock tick tock. Her “stock” (SMV) is lower than it was when she was in her 20s, and getting lower by the minute.
The “fertility wall” is an issue, but it’s minor in comparison to the importance of marrying the right woman.
It’s not a minor issue at all if you want to have kids, it’s a show stopper! If you do, then the “right woman” who is over 40 and infertile is not the right woman, period. If you’re a 30 year old guy, you can afford to keep looking until you find the “right woman” who is under 30.
The minor nature of the fertility issue explains why so many careerist women over the age of 35 are frantically trying to find a man to reproduce with, and spending thousands and thousands on fertility treatments.
For people who met as college sophomores to marry as juniors is unheard-of, but it’s not that unusual for people over 30 to get married a year and a half after meeting.
~~> It’s worth noting also that this is a new trend (wait-and-date before marriage, that is). Just two generations back, this was not the case. For example, when I told my grandmother about my boyfriend’s and my 2 year (non-wedded) anniversary, she remarked that she had only been courted by her husband for less than a year. To the best of my knowledge they were happily married until he passed when my dad was a teenager. Certainly they weren’t divorced.
Part of this may be due to the fact that more people stayed in the community they grew up in, so the weren’t likely to meet and marry a complete stranger. There’s also (on both males and females) a commit-phobia – because men have so much to lose, and women have been told they should have their own lives first. It’s shit that this is so, but it is.
The “fertility wall” is an issue, but it’s minor in comparison to the importance of marrying the right woman.
It’s not a minor issue at all if you want to have kids, it’s a show stopper! If you do, then the “right woman” who is over 40 and infertile is not the right woman, period. If you’re a 30 year old guy, you can afford to keep looking until you find the “right woman” who is under 30.
This is both true and not true. If you’re dead set on having your own biological children, well, probably so. However, if you can consider alternatives (surrogacy, adoption, etc) it is to your benefit to have a spouse who is equally mature and of the same mind as you, rather than risk it with a ditzy twennie-something who may well take advantage of the system to leave you paying for children you wanted, but aren’t allowed to go near because of a messy divorce.
Besides that, when we come at this honestly, I would expect that any men or women who are in their thirties, and certainly by their forties, to either already have kids if they want them… or not want kids. This may be less true of men (given legal barriers) but since women have most reproductive rights, then it should be largely true of women. The issue then is are you willing to be a father to a child someone else sired, or not. But if they don’t have children at that age, the woman probably won’t… or else they will want to get to it QUICKLY!
You’ve just revealed, perhaps accidentally, why you’ve had bad luck with relationships: all of this stewing over other people’s sexual histories. That this would be an underlying issue months into a relationship is laughable.
Judgmentally picking over a partner’s sexual history with a fine-toothed comb is the sign of a sociopath, not the beginning of a healthy partnership. What happens with normal people in new relationships is this: They get tested for STIs.
For some people it is, though. Right or wrong, it’s not easy for some people to accept their partner’s past. A person who’s only had 1 or 2 partners would usually not want to be with someone who’s had 9.
Well, this was a fictional example in which I got to create all the details. I was using omniscient third-person narration. It’s unlikely that a man would be able to flesh out so much detail about his girlfriend. For this allegory, I needed a relatively average example of a “modern”, badly-behaved American woman– not an outright slut, but not what most men would consider marriage material either.
This is only true if you think the number of sex partners has no influence on how they behave with each subsequent sex partner.
Picking over sexual history is a sign of simple prudence. If she has slept with a ton of guys, obviously this increases the chance that she’s going to dump you and move on.
Yes. It’s not the number that matters, so much as her behavior and intentions. At 28, four long-term boyfriends she loved (but is now over) is much better than 3 one-night stands, even though the number’s higher.
A woman with a low number can have good or bad moral character– not every virgin is a good person, obviously– but if the number’s sufficiently high (20+) there is only one way to read it.
The number matters because it indicates her behavior and intentions once it gets over a certain level.
A woman who has had only a few one-night stands and no LTRs might hypothetically exist, but one suspects that typically a woman who has had any one-night stands has had quite a few of them. A woman who has had even one should give you cause for pause if you’re interested in her as relationship material. (That was my rule, anyway.)
I agree with you completely on this.
How do you ensure that she never had a single one-nighter? Do you employ the pretend non-judgmentalism tactic?
You can’t ensure it, and when I was dating I never bothered to inquire into “her number”. I found that often enough, women who had had one-nighters in the past (or who had slept with married men or done something else immoral) volunteered that information without any prompting from me.
Do you think it’s counterproductive, then, to explicitly ask early in the relationship?
I like to know early on, because if the girl has done something immoral, then I can get out quickly. It’d be much more complicated and hurtful to find out a girlfriend of 3 years, whom I had plans to marry, had one-night stands. I’d still dump her, but it’d be emotionally more difficult.
I think you can usually tell without explicitly asking. These are some warning signs. You may not agree with all of them, but his two maxims are generally correct:
Roissy Maxim #41: The more experience you have with women, the more you’ll know which women have experience with men.
Corollary to #41: It is the inexperienced beta male who is most often in the dark about a woman’s sexual history and liable to be victimized by the cheating slut.
As for finding out after three years, at that point you should have a lot of evidence about her character that might well outweigh this new information.
Well it depends. Did the partner have one-night stands? If so, that is a red flag. It does speak to lower impulse control and sometimes a lack of class. Combined with other personality differences, this can become a fundamental character incompatibility between two people.
If all the partners were within the context of either long-term relationships or potentially budding long-term relationships, then the numbers do not have much importance. But if the person is old enough to know better and sleeps around for the pleasure of it alone, then the person’s future orientation value is very low. The ability to get physical without the emotional component means the person is more likely to cheat on a whim. Not good long-term material, be it a man or woman.
In the fictional character’s case, a one night stand at 16 is very young. She should not be held too responsible for that, as she was an easy target. At that age I remember also that I was easily manipulated and too eager to please. Good thing I had the Internet to keep me occupied.
Once in college for Sarah is excusable if she learned from it and didn’t do it again. The ONS at 26 is the real killer. She could have recovered if she was sorry for it and admitted her mistake. In the story she implies that she enjoyed it and did not regret it, which paints her as someone who is more interested in the fleshly pleasures than higher values.
“Number” itself isn’t a big deal, except for what it signifies. If we’re talking about a 28-year-old woman, it’s better than she have (a) 4 boyfriends than (b) 3 one-night-stands. Even though her “number” is higher in the former, the former is a normal sex life and the latter is a bad sign.
The problem with a high number is that it signifies either one-night stands or relational instability, which is why there’s an upper limit (scaled by age) on what an acceptable number is. A person could get a high number while never having casual sex, if she had a new “relationship” every 4 months and did “boyfriend-to-boyfriend”, but that would still be really bad.
Exactly. If a woman sleeps with a man after 6 or 7 dates because she thinks he’s going to make a romantic commitment, and the man never does, that’s not “casual sex”. It’s a mistake, but everyone makes those and they’re forgivable. Intentionally having unattached sex (or trying to do so) is a sign of someone not suited to long-term relationships. At least, this holds for all but those who believe polyamory can work. I don’t think it can; people can be affectionate for multiple people, but once love crashes in, they want to make their relationship exclusive and permanent. A lot of people are able to make casual sex and open relationships “work” because they never fall in love, but I don’t want that kind of “relationship”.
Yes, two one-nighters is really bad. I think the kind of one-nighter she had (frat boy) in college is also fatal. If a girl has a one-nigther with a shy, awkward boy on her floor, that’s a forgivable “mistake”. If she gets split open by a frat boy, that’s a sign that she likes imposing alpha males, which means that she’s not cultured.
That brings the discussion around to one of the problems with being “alpha”. It attracts women in large numbers, but exclusively the uncultured ones.
Yes, two one-nighters is really bad.
Wow, quite the cynical one, aren’t you! I won’t say my number (at least not in a post, maybe in email), but I’ve had significantly more than two in the last year. Although, if I had a steady girlfriend, I wouldn’t be out cruising the bars, and then my number would be a lot lower. The bizarre thing is that I’ve had fairly good luck getting myself ONSs/SNLs, and yet I believe I’ve only found a single girl who was interested in sticking around for an LTR over a year now.
I ultimately rejected that girl — she was significantly overweight, she lived too far away, she wanted more attention from me than I could give her, and she was pretty boring to be around. We never actually did the deed, although I’m sure I could have had I pushed things.
I’ve had a decent number of dates with higher-quality girls, but the usual outcome is that after 1 date, they disappear and are never heard from again. Occasionally 2 or 3 dates. But in the end they all stop returning my calls/texts. I guess they weren’t interested or found someone else.
It’s so bizarre. It’s the exact opposite of what you’d expect, when a guy like me can get a one-night stand but can’t get a relationship.
I know plenty of guys who’ve had a lot more girls than I have, so I can only assume that a lot of these bar girls have gotten around the block in a major way.
This is the problem with the contemporary dating market. Getting one-night-stands is easy. I know average-looking people who get 2-3 per month. I might have an obvious opportunity or two per year, and I don’t look for (or accept) those at all. Finding long-term relationships, on the other hand, is extremely difficult.
Meh. If they were really “high quality”, they’d return your calls. If they lack the courage to properly reject someone, imagine the passive-aggressive shit that they’d pull in relationships. Also, if you’re a decent guy, the fact that they’d blow you off so crudely indicates an utter lack of class.
I actually address the importance of proper rejection in this morning’s post : https://alvanista.wordpress.com/2009/09/23/opposite-sex-friendship-can-happen-heres-how/ . “Game” is an effective short-term, instant-gratification strategy for both sexes, but long-term romantic success usually relies on having a strong social network, which most people in their 20s don’t have. That these girls don’t even value (at least) the potential for your friendship enough to behave decently is, I would argue, idiotic on their part.
Getting one-night-stands is easy. I know average-looking people who get 2-3 per month.
OK, I’m not anywhere close to that. But somewhere in between that number and the number that you decline. There’s also a question about how far you’re willing to “slum it” — you can massively raise your number if you massively lower your standard on looks.
If they were really “high quality”, they’d return your calls. If they lack the courage to properly reject someone, imagine the passive-aggressive shit that they’d pull in relationships. Also, if you’re a decent guy, the fact that they’d blow you off so crudely indicates an utter lack of class.
In that case, when have you ever had a girl “properly reject” you? Thinking back, this has happened to me less than 5% of the time. The passive-aggressive “I’m-not-returning-your-calls-or-texts” is the norm, including with girls I’ve met online. And there’s another good percentage who will string me along and then never follow through with anything, which is worse.
I don’t think there’s anything wrong with your standards, Cless. They are admirably high. I once had standards that resembled them myself, and for a sufficiently serious LTR, I’d have similar standards. But is it even possible to meet a girl who comes even close to them? At least from my experience, the girl you’re looking for lives in the far, far off country of Fantasy Land. Maybe I’m wrong. I hope I am.
But in the meantime, I’d be happy with a girl who merely (1) isn’t obese, (2) is at least a little cute (maybe a 6), (3) is vaguely interesting to talk to (could be witty, or well-read, or an interesting job or hobbies, or whatever), and (4) isn’t batshit crazy. If I found a girl like that, I’d be willing to at least try dating her. But every girl who seems to meet those criteria ignores me when it comes to dating. That may not reflect well on point (4), but I’m not sure it does — not returning calls is a “standard”, if obnoxious, way for women to reject guys. As for my hookups, I’m fairly certain all of them fail on at least one of these four items, and some of them were from out of town anyway.
That’s what a lot of those men do. Alpha is a misused term in the Roissy-sphere. It’s not a good thing to be, and a true alpha has such a strong desire to be promiscuous that he’ll sleep with a string of unattractive women in order to have “variety”.
In college, this is more uncommon because a woman knows she’ll see you again, and because people have to worry about their reputations. If a woman leads a man on or stops returning his calls, she’s going to get her reputation ruined very quickly. People will just make shit up about her, and she’ll have a slutty reputation within a week. The problem with urban dating is that this check on misbehavior doesn’t exist. We need to solve this. Twittering phone numbers of girls who don’t return calls, maybe? It’s a start. Involving 4chan is also a good idea.
By the way, most girls you meet online will worse. than average. They tend to enjoy the electronic attention but are terrified of doing anything in real life. You might get a phone call or even a date once, but they have enough aversion to the big, scary world out there that only the excitement of meeting a new person will draw them out. They have ridiculous Prince Charming fantasies about how a first date should play out, and if you deviate from their expectations once, you’ll never hear from them again. Those girls are window-shoppers, not fit for serious dating. I’m told, though, that some of them are easy if played right.
On your 5% statistic, this sounds about right. Then again, the other 95% aren’t worth having in one’s life in any context– unsuitable as romantic partners, and they’d make shitty friends. They don’t return calls because they frame every interaction as a sexual contest, for the same reason they have so much casual sex, which is that sex is the only thing they have to offer.
She can be found, but good women are alarmingly rare in this country, and they usually pair off early. I don’t think the downside of having high standards is that you’re likely to fail in the long term– I turn 26 next month, and I imagine I’ll be happily married by 40– so much as it’s the immediate likelihood of grueling dry spells. If you (a) never have sex outside of committed relationships, and (b) only have sexual relationships with people of marriage quality, you can easily rack up 3 or 4 consecutive years without sex, during the phase of life when people are naturally inclined to be most sexual. This is even true for very attractive people, and for women (it’s not like quality men are very common, either). Most people can’t tolerate such long periods of celibacy.
I won’t say my number (at least not in a post, maybe in email), but I’ve had significantly more than two in the last year.
Yeah, and you’re a guy, right? Men and women are different (duh). A girl need not be too concerned about a guy who’s had a bunch of one-nighters. As a guy, if you meet a girl who’s had a bunch of one-nighters, that should be a big red flag to you – i.e. she is not LTR material, she is pump and dump material. I’ve had tremendous sex with “highly experienced” women – wouldn’t date ’em or marry ’em, though.
I know plenty of guys who’ve had a lot more girls than I have, so I can only assume that a lot of these bar girls have gotten around the block in a major way.
Yeah, and as a guy, you want to avoid those skanks like the plague from a LTR standpoint.
Why doesn’t a girl need to be concerned about a guy with one-nighters?
I think this one is pretty symmetric. In either gender, it’s a sign of poor moral character.
I would be pretty bummed if a girl took one-night-stands on my part as evidence of poor character.
I stand by my contention that I wouldn’t be out doing that if I had a steady girlfriend.
Why doesn’t a girl need to be concerned about a guy with one-nighters?
I think this one is pretty symmetric. In either gender, it’s a sign of poor moral character.
It is not symmetric at all, and shouldn’t be. Men are not woman (duh). A woman with a lot of one-night stands is damaged goods, a man with a lot of one-night stands isn’t.
I think a lot of women would consider a man with a string of one-nighters to be “damaged goods”.
It’s bad either way. Losing the ability to pair bond is not a good way to set oneself up for future relationships.
Yes. A string is damaged goods territory. Though it does depend on how many one-nighters and under what circumstances.
If the man went out to bars specifically looking to get laid, got drunk and had a bunch of one-nighters with strangers he’d never met before, that’s really, really trashy.
I would say the man has poor impulse control, lack of foresight, probably also lower class and comes from a poorer background. Maybe a bad relationship with his mother. Likely feels very self-entitled and thinks he’s “hot stuff” for being able to get laid so much. In reality has a low self-esteem and low confidence, and needs constant external validation to feel good. Yes I am generalizing big time here.
If the man knew the girl beforehand, duration of a few weeks to many months, and she is not some crazy cokefiend or partygirl who goes out to clubs, not a fish in a barrel waiting to be “picked up,” but more of a normal kind of girl, and he sleeps with her for a night and then regrets it, then it’s somewhat different.
If he does this once or twice, that’s forgivable. If he makes a pattern of this and continuously leads girls on, pumps them and dumps them, that’s just as bad as constantly going out to bars and clubs looking for easy girls. Might be even worse because this guy would have no conscience about hurting others’ feelings.
Porn and masturbation exist for both men and women with sex drives. I don’t buy into the whole “men are evolutionarily programmed to sleep around and make lots of babies with as many women as possible” line.
“Evolutionary success is not about having the most sex, it’s about producing the most fertile offspring. I’ll say that again: the idea isn’t to spread the most baby batter around, it’s to raise the most children who themselves grow up to produce children. That’s why your parents won’t leave you the hell alone about making them grandparents; they aren’t done until you do.”
How is a man randomly sleeping around in the caveman days going to do this? How is it a good idea to alienate and screw over fellow male hunters and farmers whom he has to rely on for survival? Not to mention the small village factor of complete lack of privacy and thatched roofs where everybody knows everybody’s business? And jealous men whose whole family will come cut off the head of that “player” and put a stop right quick to any flings?
That line just men an excuse to do a lot of unexamined sleeping around. Your evolutionary “programming” makes you a robot now?
Right. That’s different from what I consider “casual sex”. They were friends; they thought they had sexual potential, and it didn’t work. It’s forgivable. Sleazy one-nighters aren’t.
It’s not robotic, but it’s there. Impulses are what they are — whether you act on them or not is a personal decision, but you don’t *create* the impulses yourself. Men *do* have an impulse to sleep around, but since the species is a pair bonding one, this impulse has always been balanced with the risk that poses to the pair bond which, for most men, is still the safest bet for having fertile offspring because he gets to invest in the offspring and steer them to some degree, unlike the offspring of his pump and dump partners.
Both men and women alike are programmed to (1) pair bond and (2) cheat the pair bond under certain circumstances where the individual benefit to them justifies the risk of threatening the established pair bond that is associated with such cheating. For men, those circumstances are more common than for women, because men get more reproductive chances than women do. But the circumstances exist for women, too, as is evidenced by the non-trivial cuckolding rate.
Different people have different impulses based on various environmental and sometimes genetic feedback.
I have the natural desire to eat rice, because this is food that I grew up with, but I never have the desire to eat fish at all. If I had grown up eating a lot more fish, it might be a stronger desire. Cultural messages for specific types of food intermingle with innate drives for food.
The cultural message for the modern West is both to engage in casual sex and then later have monogamy. This encouragement of casualness makes more people feel like it’s morally fine to sleep around. For men, it is even seen as a necessity, driven by Darwinistic evolutionary impulses that are “impossible” to rid of — yes, it is a primal urge, but like all other urges, it can be moderated. Witness the obesity rates of modern times compared to 50 years ago, when food was similarly abundant.
There are lots of men who often have “dry spells” and loathe this state. They would have sex with every opportunity that comes their way, because they buy into the cultural message that having sex is proof of a man’s masculinity and that not getting laid makes you a “loser.”
Some them also repeat the message that “all” men are predisposed to sleeping around. This is similar to spreading the message that people are predisposed to eating sugary and fatty foods, and that they should eat as much as they can, as every opportunity arises, because it’s a biological drive.
However, some men do not have the impulse to sleep around. They are able to withstand years of celibacy and would rather be single than have sex with every “opportunity” that arises. They counter the mainstream cultural message perhaps because of their particular upbringing, religion or personal beliefs. They are outliers, but their existence means that men are not slaves to their “sleep around” instincts.
Men have a higher level of testosterone than women do, and therefore a higher libido. That’s all. They do masturbate more frequently in the absence of sex, but that this is deemed shameful is a cultural message rather than a biological imperative.
Circumstances for cheating are not more “common” for men than for women, because women who want to have lots of sex in their fertile years have no lack of opportunities. On average, most women can rack up the numbers far higher than most men, if they were so inclined.
The more accurate statement is that for men, there is very low opportunity cost for spreading their sperm around, so although there are fewer opportunities in general to have sex for men, the few opportunities that do arise can be taken advantage of without much “consequence.”
The idea of humans as purely evolution and genetically-driven automatons is false, but so is the idea of humans existing as blank-slated clay able to be molded into anything. The truth is that the two — nature and nurture — interact in a myriad of complex ways and give rise to the result that we currently observe.
Yes, and people ate a lot more food (measured in volume and variety) 50 years ago than they do now. It’s junk food and additives that are creating the obesity. Come to think of it, casual sex as emotional junk food is a good metaphor. I’ll use that.
You sound like a great person, Hope, so I’m sure you’re an exception to this, but I think women are the problem here.
I don’t know how much sex most of my male friends are having, and I don’t care. No sex for 3 years? We all get laid off, get sick, have dry spells, and will die one day. Misfortune’s not something to be embarrassed about.
Women, on the other hand, are quick to judge a man who has had too little sex, or too long a dry spell.
I’m glad I’m not the only person who thinks this way.
However, some men do not have the impulse to sleep around. They are able to withstand years of celibacy and would rather be single than have sex with every “opportunity” that arises. They counter the mainstream cultural message perhaps because of their particular upbringing, religion or personal beliefs. They are outliers, but their existence means that men are not slaves to their “sleep around” instincts
Again, as I said above, all men have the impulse, but not all act on it. The guys who don’t sleep around (and who otherwise would be able to do so if they wished) still have the impulse, but they also have impulse control. It’s just like the analogy you use with food: everyone has the impulse to like sugary foods, but some people modulate that impulse better than others do. The impulse, though, is still there.
The more accurate statement is that for men, there is very low opportunity cost for spreading their sperm around, so although there are fewer opportunities in general to have sex for men, the few opportunities that do arise can be taken advantage of without much “consequence.”
Actually, I was referring to the simple numbers game: men can have more children than women can over the course of a lifetime, given equal sexual opportunity. That’s why men have more “chances” for fecund cheating, again given equal sexual access (assume a very sexually attractive man). A woman who cheats can still only give birth roughly once a year, while a sexually successful man could sire multiple children in that timeframe — hence more circumstances, just in terms of numbers, than women have where opportunities for reproductively advantageous cheating of the pair bond may arise.
Coming back to the food analogy — everyone has a food desire just as everyone has a sex drive. The cravings depend on a person’s particular modulation and cultural input. Someone may be actively repulsed by certain types of food (too greasy junk food or even gourmet food like sushi with raw fish) just as they may be repulsed by certain types of sexual acts.
Casual sex falls under the category of “desirable” for some men, but not for others. To categorically say all men have the impulse to sleep around would be folly. True, all men have the biological impulse for sex, just like all men have the innate desire for food. The particulars of this desire are different based on a variety of factors.
In hunter and gatherer societies, this can only be the case due to cuckoldry. Most men were not able to feed hundreds of children even if theoretically they could sire that many in a lifetime by many women. If a man sires children that he cannot himself support, then those children would be reproductive dead ends. If a man sires children that he expects another man will support, then he has increased his reproductive success.
Morally speaking, the vast majority of men would be against other men taking advantage of such “opportunity.” Though a man might have some small impulse to spread their seed, there is also a great impulse to not let this same thing happen to him. Hence ancient prohibitions against adultery, “thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s wife,” etc. There were also great inhibitions placed on female sexuality, because it was understood that this behavior is not desirable or conducive to stable societies.
Modern times have taken away these rules or converted them into “men should sleep around because they can sire multiple offsprings.” The idea of “ought” has changed completely into the idea of “this is what evolution has given us, therefore this is what we shall do.” Hence rampantly engaging in casual sex and gorging on junk foods are not looked down upon but even encouraged.
The seven deadly sins are not so deadly nowadays. They are fashionable.
I think most alphas’ children were raised by the harem.
Unflinching realism is necessary if a society is going to have science. The problem is that when realism mixes with postmodern nihilism, we reach a state where negative aspects of what “is” are glorified. Often those aspects are only present in a limited sense, e.g. X was one of many contributors to our evolutionary progress, which does not lead, logically, to “we should do X”.
Well said. I like the way you think. Do you know anyone in NYC who sees the world how you do?
Maybe that is part of your issue. The large coastal cities like NYC and LA have a different culture from heartland America. I grew up in Ohio and lived in suburbs for most of my life. Right now in Utah.
I was always around people who have been in long-term monogamous relationships from college age onward. Even in high school I recall classmates being in relationships of 2 or 3 years. All of my coworkers at my previous and current jobs were either married or in a LTR. Virtually nobody I knew did the dating thing.
Most guys I knew were focused more on their hobbies and work than on women and male-female relationship dynamics. They just didn’t have any issues with women, and 90% of them were in LTRs or married (read: not usually to Hot Babes).
It was somewhat of an Internet version of cultural shock at first when I stumbled upon all these people who made dating, picking up girls and casually sleeping around a priority. These kinds of people were made fun of where I grew up, and girls were warned to stay away from them.
They complain vociferously about women having unreasonably high expectations, but I wonder if it’s related to the fact that these men also want the “hottest” girls. They would probably laugh derisively at the guys in LTRs I knew who are with 5s and 6s.
I think this is a bit of a self-selected group, partly due to geographic location, partly due to being high IQ, and partly due to cultural factors that gave them unrealistic expectations just like for women.
Many in the PUA community constantly reiterate that looks are the most important asset for women, because they are bombarded by images of thousands of beautiful women in the media. They talk about Gisele Bündchen’s dating habits and believe that they, too, deserve a supermodel and would get one if their “game” is tight (whereas my fiance says supermodels are icky). They would look down on the women I knew in the suburbs, homely women who are good mothers and caregivers, and many of whom have 2+ children.
If you want to find women who aren’t into combat dating, you should first get out of those ultra-competitive urban environments. Stereotype time: most women in NYC are probably waiting for a rich, big-shot investment banker or corporate executive husband. You might be able to find a nice girl in NYC, but chances are, she’s already off the market.
It’s true that there are regional differences here, and some places are harder than others. But I don’t think it’s a solution to move to flyover country. The best jobs and careers and so on are not located there, generally speaking, and many of us guys like living on the coasts. I think you’re right that the dating market here is different from in flyover land, but I suspect that Cless’s idea of seeking out women from outside the US will be more appealing than moving to Utah.
It’s not really a “solution” to move to flyover country, but culture and upbringing have a lot to do with people’s attitudes. There are probably girls in urban NYC who are the “next door” type, but unless they are very shy and religious or conservative, they would soon become corrupted by the mainstream culture. I think even immigrant girls are not immune unless their family keeps a close watch on them.
I moved to Utah from Chicago, 3rd largest city in the nation, though not a coastal city. There is a sort of corn-country, midwestern “feel” to Chicago, but it is also somewhat influenced by the bar and club culture. People do tend to get married here in mid-late 20s and early 30s. It was rare to meet an unmarried 30-something — at least the people I hung out with, which may have just been its own social niche.
Utah is not really my cup of tea either, but it’s where my fiance lives — interestingly, part of the reason he could not find a girl is because he is among the small non-Mormon and non-religious minority. He is also not a party person and at least two standard deviations above the average intelligence here. So no, a 150+ IQ guy is not advised to move to Utah if he wants to meet relatively smart women.
In hunter and gatherer societies, this can only be the case due to cuckoldry.
Yes, of course — that’s the point. It is cheating, after all. Cheating the pair bond always entails risks, but due to the numbers game men simply have a different risk/benefit curve than women do when it comes to cheating the pair bond.
Casual sex falls under the category of “desirable” for some men, but not for others. To categorically say all men have the impulse to sleep around would be folly.
I don’t think that’s really the case. The men for whom casual sex is “undesirable” are generally either (1) incapable of pulling it off even if they wanted to do so or (2) morally impeded from doing so due to religion, cultural upbringing and so on (such that this programming acts to override or constrain the impulse). Men who don’t have (2) and who are truly capable of pulling off sleeping around yet who refrain from doing so are not common.
In hunter and gatherer societies, this can only be the case due to cuckoldry.
Yes, of course — that’s the point. It is cheating, after all. Cheating the pair bond always entails risks, but due to the numbers game men simply have a different risk/benefit curve than women do when it comes to cheating the pair bond.
Misplaced my command it would appear.
Casual sex is not desirable to social stability and so cultural and religious messages once made it very clear this is wrong and made it very unpalatable to men.
You are still spreading the message that casual sex is desirable, which happens to be your indoctrination. To those men (and women) with proper upbringings, casual sex is extremely undesirable to the point of being repulsive.
Hope, you are great. I wish you an amazing life, full of love and joy.
You are still spreading the message that casual sex is desirable, which happens to be your indoctrination. To those men (and women) with proper upbringings, casual sex is extremely undesirable to the point of being repulsive.
Not so much spreading the message as explaining that without contra programming, it will be what men who are capable of pulling it off will do.
This has been “rigorously, empirically and scientifically” tested and proven in the species homo sapiens?
For much of history men have explored with other men, hunted with other men, went to war with other men — in groups. The story of brotherhood and propensity to form male alliances is an extremely strong “programming” as well. Yet in the modern era this has become much more subdued as individualism takes hold over group-oriented activities.
Culture accounts for a great deal of the selection pressures. There is no period of time in human history where culture did not exist. Humans have always lived in social groups, and so when discussing “programming” you must put culture into the genetic/natural equation as well, or you essentially have thrown away half the formula.
Cless,
The 2019 scenario (or sooner) is what I would call Sarah’s ‘Wile E. Coyote moment’. She realized that she was about to plunge only after it was too late.
But you should have added a technological angle here too, in order to make the story even more prophetic. By 2019, there will be sex technologies that will keep even a 50 year old man from going out of his way to bother with a 38 year old woman. The artificial woman will be too addictive for a man to tear himself away to go through the motions with a 38-year-old has been.
Sex technologies will lead to substantial male addiction, and thus a world where real 8s are treated like 5s, and 7s are treated like 4s (i.e., not worth interacting with at all). Thus, the post-30 falloff that women experience, will be even more pronounced.
For much of history men have explored with other men, hunted with other men, went to war with other men — in groups. The story of brotherhood and propensity to form male alliances is an extremely strong “programming” as well. Yet in the modern era this has become much more subdued as individualism takes hold over group-oriented activities.
Actually what has happened is that male trust has broken down, largely because of what the elite men did when second wave feminism happened — namely dismantling enforced monogamy. The resulting marketplace is characterized by low inter-male trust, which means men will put the knife in each other’s backs more readily. There were always cads and cheats, but in the current context of low male cooperation, these are much more prominent.
When you get rid of enforced monogamy, male cooperation craters, because there is no inherent stability in their relationships. It quickly becomes a scenario of “each man for himself and God for us all”.
The resulting marketplace is characterized by low inter-male trust, which means men will put the knife in each other’s backs more readily.
A lot of this is because SocialCons have decided to align with femininsts in the goal of swindling the average man.
SocialCons have betrayed the average man, making the nefarious activities of feminists more easy. This is the root of the problem. Welmer has written about this.
I don’t think it’s advisable to discuss past sexual conquests with current partners. Don’t ask don’t tell is the best policy unless both partners are really able to hear the answer.
I would prefer a man who has had no one before me, but that is rare outside of traditional Asian cultures. So I’m happy if he’s just had a few. But I don’t want to be disappointed and disturbed thinking about it, so I don’t breach the subject.
I can understand the concern about contracting an STD and therefore such a topic most likely should be breached, in the opinion of healthcare professionals. But I’m sure the opinion of psychologists and therapists differ with that.
Don’t ask.
Don’t tell.
Be happy.
I’m sorry but this entire story is ridiculous. There are so many little things that are very wrong but I want to focus on this one point: Is the morale of the story really “If she had laid off the strange cock in college and her 20s, she’d be married to Mr. Wright.”
Really? REALLY?!
I was going to rant but I’m honestly speechless.
I’m a guy btw, and some some prude Mr. Wright who’s had sex twice by the age of 32. I would honestly be much much more concerned about having sex with a virgin or a girl who’s only had 1 or 2 sexual partners than a girl who’s had 9.
LOL this is a little silly.
Why do you assume that people would be completely honest?
Sarah’s best bet is to lie about the # of sexual partners.
Awful and immoral? Oh blah blah blah. The fact is that women do it and men fall for it so rant all you like but myeh 😀
Wow.
Either this exact series of events has happened to you, or more likely…
These are the wishful musings of a person who disapproves of his or her peer’s “loose morals”. I would guess you are a woman anyway. Sorry to say, “not slutty but badly behaved” girls like your protagonist usually don’t fall into a life of romantic purgatory–being sent there by your sexless God.
You build up Sarah to play like some sympathetic, doomed heroine, but it is clear to me (as it should be to others) that she is nothing but an imagined scapegoat . A metaphysical target for you to rage against. Perhaps it is you who has lived the life of Mr. Wright, abstaining and refraining. And for what? For whom? For deified, perfect partners out there who lived lives of passion outside of your little sandbox. “Perfect” people who don’t exist, and who never will.
As I write this, I feel as if maybe, just maybe you have slyly written this as satire. Perhaps you write in such a dichotomous way to point out the horribly flawed and juvenile beliefs of Mr. Wright and Sarah. But on closer inspection, I see that you are Mr. Wright. Or even Sarah. But someone having lived Sarah’s life is unlikely to have written a story such as this.
If I could retitle this silly cautionary tale I would call it: Lust: watch out kids, it will get you.
I can’t believe I just spent 5 minutes typing this.
“If she’d laid off the strange cock in college and her early 20’s, she’d be married to Mr. Wright”.
So…?
Think of all the damned miserable marriages out there. Millions of them.
Sarah HAD a relationship, and good sex, with Mr. Wright. She f*cked it up by a lousy remark (her bad), and he f*cked it up with a lousy remark (his bad). Oh well.
Can neither of these walking cliches’ start over?
Jesus Iced Christ, Nelson Mandela was in prison for 27 years (and got a divorce after 6 months of being released). Is this the horror story of our time, that people aren’t getting married?
Alvanista.
Your story is a true one. I would not have anything to do with a woman, with a history such as hers …
“Jesus Iced Christ, Nelson Mandela was in prison for 27 years (and got a divorce after 6 months of being released). Is this the horror story of our time, that people aren’t getting married?”
When the families disappear and all the world is burning, you will feel the silliness of such a remark.
About this story not sounding realistic, isn’t this precisely the type of story recently published in the Atlantic. A woman just refused to marry a great guy because “something was missing” in her 20’s. Now she is pushing 40, an obvious pump and dump, and talking about being single for the remainder of her life. And, somewhat regretful. But hey, she has a nice high number.
Many modern woman expect to marry Mr. Perfect. Ladies, Mr. Perfect is a rare bird, and what would he be doing marrying you? And, you sure haven’t been saving yourself for Mr. Perfect, either.
Were men to be as fussy as women in mate selection, NOBODY would get married. Man “settle” all the time. To the ladies “settle” is a dirty word.
[…] We conclude with a link to a story (from Alvanista), in two parts, to illustrate what happens to a slut when she finally does catch a good man: part 1, part 2. […]