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This is a guest post by Kid Strangelove. Kid originally published this article at his own blog, but he deleted the site a while ago so he could focus on other projects. He asked me if I’d be willing to re-post some of his articles on my blog and I said yes.
“To women, you’re either the shit or you don’t exist.” – Kid Strangelove.
Yes. I just quoted myself. But let’s back up a bit.
It’s funny how a theory perfectly comes together almost out of the blue. Stuff starts to make more sense, and seemingly unrelated topics now have a common thread. Your eyes become open to a new way of seeing the world. But it all starts somewhere. And for me, that somewhere was on the phone, talking to a recently divorced friend, who was about to go on his first date since the divorce was finalized.
He was understandably nervous. After all, he was rejoining the dating scene for the first time in many years, and everything was new and strange to him. I gave him the same advice I always give to my friends going on dates:
You’re on a date, the hard part is over. If she is on this date with you, if she is sitting across the table from you, that means she is attracted to you. You don’t have to worry about attracting her, because that part is over. She likes you. Enjoy yourself, have fun, and see if you like her and where you want to take it.
There are men in the game world that would disagree with that statement, that the game is on even during dates, and that you need to watch what you say and do. Fuck that! Would she have gone out with you if she wasn’t already attracted to you in some way? Of course not. So relax and enjoy yourself. Besides, I did not want to cloud my recently divorced friend’s head with various schools of thought on dating.
However, there was one other voice guiding my friend: his sister. And not the “You’re my brother, I love you, so I’m gonna tell you some real shit” type of sister, but the “I’m on Team Woman first, Team Brother second” type of sister. She was clouding his thoughts. She told him to behave like a gentleman, to watch what he says and does, and to pay for everything so he could “stand out from a sea of liars, cheaters, players and scumbags,” because that’s just what “all girls think guys are, and its up to you to prove otherwise.”
Oh, hell naw. She did not just try to send her own brother down the path of expensive celibacy, especially right after a divorce. I had to shut this down.
Here’s the thing. Listen to these girls, they all say the same thing: “all guys are liars, all guys are cheats, all guys are douchebags, all guys are this that and the third.” But simple math shows us that this is not true. I’m not a liar, a cheat, or a douchebag, and neither are you. Neither are our mutual friends Shaun, Steven and Ricardo. That’s five people already. Hell, how many people do you know who are actually liars, cheaters or douchebags? Maybe one at most. Maybe. Most of our friends are great people with good manners. So we just took a big shit on her numbers.
He listened carefully, and that’s when the entire theory rushed in, and I started to articulate it for the first time:
Most women can’t imagine a world where guys aren’t douchebags, because if all guys are douchebags, that means they (the women) are the good guys, the innocent victims in these stories, the oppressed. By openly saying that all men are pigs, it absolves them from their responsibilities as the other half of the dating equation. So to maintain this, they apply the qualities of the attractive men who hurt them to all men, and simply ignore the ones who don’t fit into their preconceived notions.
Have you ever read any of those articles popping up once every two months or so about how “nice guys aren’t really nice?” They simply can’t fathom a world where men are good people and where men court women, the same strategy used by our parents and our parents’ parents, the same strategy passed on to us by our families and the media. No, they simply make all of these “nice” men fit their criteria that “all men are douchebags.” They will do anything to absolve themselves of any responsibility. And when men try to break the code, to make themselves more attractive, to stop being invisible and start playing by different rules, women suddenly become aware of these roles and desperately try to stop the invisible men from becoming visible.
He was hooked. I was on a roll.
To women, you’re either the shit, or you don’t exist. And you see that everywhere.
Example: a supermodel or famous actress mentioning in an interview about how it’s so hard to find anyone to date and that guys are intimidated by her. Bullshit. You know me: I will always hit on the hottest girl at the bar, no matter what. And I know there is a legion of guys out there just like me who would do the same.
But these models and actresses are in a world filled with millionaires and moguls, celebrities and tastemakers, the elite of the elite. Their barrier to a guy being the shit is way higher than anyone else’s. So of course they get hit on everywhere they go. It’s just that they don’t get hit on by guys who they think are the shit, but since those guys are invisible, they will say that nobody hits on them. And they genuinely believe it! Those guys that hit on her are nobodies!
I was speaking to educate and empower my friend, but also to get a lot of stuff off my chest, because I finally had that eureka light bulb above the head moment. Sorry buddy, but at this point, it was as as much for me as it was for you:
Look at the actions of feminists, especially in the United States. They say we live in a country where men have all the power. But what do they define as power? They define it as institutional control. They are upset that only 20 percent of the House and Senate are women and there has never been a female president of the United States. They are upset that most CEOs of big companies are male.
However, if you define power as an individual’s control over their own life, they have that in spades. They get better healthcare and female only causes, as well as preferential treatment in the courtroom and in the hiring process for companies. More women than men go to college and they actually have reproductive rights, where we have none. And the mythical wage gap? It’s been debunked so often that believing in it is like arguing that the world is flat.
Now, I don’t know about you, but how many men out there really have the drive and connections to get to the top of the political or business world. One percent? But how many women get to enjoy the advantages I described? All of them. But tell women that they have these advantages and you get called a sexist. They ignore the stuff you say. And you know why?
“Because men are either the shit or they don’t exist,” my friend chimed in. He was getting it.
“You’re right. They worship the top, they covet it so much that anyone who is not there is simply ignored. Remember the row over ‘Cellular Solutions?'”
My friend did not hear about the story, so I sent him the article and told him to look at the accompanying picture.
“What does this article say?”
“That a hard working all female company is still controlled by sexist patriarchal men at the top, creating a glass ceiling that no one can break.”
“What does it miss?”
“That except for the four senior positions, everyone in the company is a woman. As a man trying to find work in this company, you probably won’t have a chance. Especially in this shitty economy.”
“What does it imply?”
“You’re either the shit, or you don’t exist.”
Now, all this sounded like some doom and gloom, life sucks so kill yourself-type stuff that I was trying to say. Let’s see if my friend got the point.
“So what are you gonna do?”
“Be the shit.”
He got it, and I hope you get it too. That’s why I decided to tell this story in the way that I did: because after meeting quite a few members of the manosphere, we all felt like old friends. And that’s how I want to treat my readers: like friends.
Look, I know it’s not all peaches and cream for women in the world, even in the United States. I can definitely say that there are some areas where men have the advantage and some where women have the advantage. I know that as people, we are quick to exaggerate and maximize the effects of the supposed disadvantages we’re dealt in life and minimize our advantages. That’s normal. But I can sit here and talk about my advantages and disadvantages and not pretend that I am some poor eternal victim underdog trying to struggle with every aspect of my existence.
But in my experience, in the myriad of interactions I’ve had with women from all walks of life, I have met so few people that possessed that quality—that ability to empathize with people who have it worse than you—that it shook me to my core. So many women are simply incapable of understanding male suffering, because in their eyes, men are the leaders, the seducers, the producers, and ultimately power itself, and that women are eternally enslaved to men and have to fight through the system: a belief that is reinforced through parenting and educational indoctrination. It’s simultaneously sad and funny that the only way a woman can break this lifetime belief is to have a son.
Read that article—this post can wait—and come back here. What did you think of the writer’s tone and her message? In this case—and only in this case—men are no longer the living, breathing symbol of power, but boys who need guidance, patience and understanding from a parent. Read the article. It describes my theory perfectly.
I can talk about this subject forever, and I will probably revisit it at some point. But for now I will leave you with this: make the same conclusion that my friend made. If the world shows you a clear cut path to victory, take it. Be the shit. Be that walking, talking representation of male power and ego, and you are bound to be worshipped. After all, if you give me the choice of being the shit or being invisible, I’d choose the former.
By the way, this theory has a name (and thanks to Dagonet for pointing it out). It’s called the Apex Fallacy. I Googled it, but found nothing but a deleted Wikipedia article and angry feminist rants about how this theory is nothing more than bullshit, without any explanations to back it up. I don’t know about you, but if something makes angry feminists froth at the mouth, it’s at least worth a look.
If you don’t believe anything I’ve said so far…
It took me roughly ten minutes of distracted searching to come up with the following examples.
Australian media outlet points out that more women over 55 are facing homelessness, while statistics point out that 64 percent of Australia’s older homeless population consists of men. The message is clear: homeless women are more important than homeless men.
While the gender pay gap has been disproven more times than I can count—and young women are now shown to out-earn young men, earn way more university degrees, and have special incentives provided only to them—we are still subjected to the claim that women make 77 cents on the dollar as a big giant issue that needs to be fixed from both the government and media. The message is also clear: as far as everyone is concerned, men run the world, no matter what the actual facts and statistics show.
Read Next: On Male Friendships: Part One
The post The Number One Rule of Male/Female Interaction appeared first on Matt Forney.