No, I will weep no more. In such a night
To shut me out? Pour on; I will endure.
In such a night as this? O Regan, Goneril!
Your old kind father, whose frank heart gave all—
O, that way madness lies; let me shun that;
No more of that.–King Lear
An unnamed reader made a first and last comment on this site a while back to express his extreme disagreement at my stance that a man shouldn’t hold himself accountable for his wife’s decision to cheat or walk out on the marriage:
I spent two weeks delving into your blog. I unilaterally agreed with almost every post/point/blog entry that you made… until I saw this.
Never fail a shit test. Never bow down to it.
You fall into the mass of beta… “Don’t marry a whore…”
“My marriage is better than your marriage”
“My girl is better than your girl”
Thanks for the nice articles, I’ll not be reading again. You’ve fallen into the clever p**** trap, “NOT MY P****,” so deal with it.
I know you won’t care, but my god, such a horrid intellectual position? And you defend it?
The assertion of mine which upset him so much was an excerpt from my original post on Gaming your wife:
The foundation for her commitment to your marriage shouldn’t be your game. If she is only one, or a few, or even 50 failed shit tests away from walking away from her sacred vow and/or whoring around, then she isn’t a wife, she is a whore. Don’t marry a whore*. Game should be about making you and your wife happier with your marriage, not about putting the sole onus for the success of the marriage on you.
Presumably a game purist, the reader appears to believe that women are mere puppets to be controlled by the gamer. Any failures from this perspective are of course attributable to the puppet master, since it would be irrational to blame the puppet. I can see where a pickup artist could benefit from adopting this frame for hookups and LTRs. It certainly would be an effective way to perfect one’s game in such scenarios.
However, marriage isn’t a hookup or a LTR. It is something else entirely. Hard core gamers want to apply the rules of hookup/LTR to marriage, and it isn’t appropriate. Many have already pointed out that there are virtually no benefits in marriage for a man. The law, family courts, the church, and society are all stacked against him. A man actually loses protection from cuckolding and is placed at a disadvantage regarding custody if he marries. The only potential benefit a man gains by marrying is the moral force the marriage vows hold on his wife.
Many hard core gamers want you to cede this last benefit as well, out of a sense of purity of game. This is absolutely insane. If you aren’t clear on whether it is morally wrong for your wife to frivolously divorce you or cheat on you, how is she supposed to be clear on this? If you aren’t comfortable making such a judgment, don’t marry; there is absolutely no benefit in marriage for you, and a world of downside.
Commenter Looking Glass makes a more thoughtful but still ultimately very troubling argument relating to his Grind Theory of relationships:
Except in the case of serial affairs (which means a bad marriage choice), cheating only happens in relationships that have been brought to the point where needs are met outside the relationship. This takes actions by *both* parties. No one is blameless in this situation. Choices have consequences, and not minding your marriage and grinding it to dust is just one of those choices.
While I absolutely agree that neither husband nor wife should neglect the needs of the other, this kind of thinking is extremely dangerous. If you open the door for her to blame you for her breaking her vows, you are inviting her rationalization hamster to do the rest. Even good marriages tend to run into periods where there is temptation to stray or to give up. Having perfect game or perfect communication doesn’t change this fact. Successful marriages make it past these periods often out of sheer will.
“The foundation for her commitment to your marriage shouldn’t be your game… Game should be about making you and your wife happier with your marriage, not about putting the sole onus for the success of the marriage on you.”
This is where I break with the Taken In Hand philosophy. TIH appears to tell couples that the woman should be as “strong” as she wants, but if the man doesn’t constantly recalibrate to be “stronger” than her then he’s failing in his duty. It sounds like one side has all the freedom and the other all the moral responsibility for the marriage.
In that sense, TIH sounds suspiciously like feminism – “I’m empowered but it’s your job to stay ahead of me.”
I will never be considered a PUA for that reason, I actually believe a woman can be a human being and follow logic once in awhile. an animal only follows instinct.
“Many have already pointed out that there are virtually no benefits in marriage for a man.”
Rather cynical view, I think.
Of course there are benefits in marriage for a man.The love of a good and loyal woman. Regular sex, with no worry about contracting an s.t.d.. A lifelong companion.. Children…
Choose wisely.. Life is full of risks.. Nothing is guaranteed..
I loved and trusted my husband enough to give up a well paying job to stay home and look after the kids while he supported us all. This is what he wanted, and I agreed..
He holds all the cards.. I have been out of the paid workforce for fifteen years now..
Am I bothered? Am I insecure?
Nope.. Never crosses my mind.
We’re tight. We’re committed for life.
“The only potential benefit a man gains by marrying is the moral force the marriage vows hold on his wife.”
I think this is too limiting, marriage also confers a marginally more durable connection to one’s children that cohabitation or being a sperm donor simply does not do.
But otherwise your so-called cynical outlook on marriage rings just about right, Kathy’s sunny take on the institution not withstanding.
“But otherwise your so-called cynical outlook on marriage rings just about right, Kathy’s sunny take on the institution not withstanding.”
Well, if that is the case why are you guys married then? 😉
@Elusive Wapiti
Only if your wife takes it seriously. If not, as Oak has pointed out you stand a better chance staying connected to your children if you have them out of wedlock.
@Kathy
I’m not tearing down marriage. I’m just pointing out the painfully obvious. Nothing holds a woman to her vows aside from her own commitment to them. Men can and do get sex, love, and children now outside of marriage. Legally men only lose when they marry. So the wife’s commitment to the marriage and her clarity on the importance of her vows is all a man gains from marrying a woman vs shacking up. All I’m saying is it is outright insane for men to argue to give this up as well. It makes no sense whatsoever. If they aren’t clear on the morality of marriage vows, they have no business getting married. Do you really disagree?
“Many have already pointed out that there are virtually no benefits in marriage for a man.”
To assuage Kathy, I read this sentence as “virtually no ENFORCEABLE benefits.” No court is going to order a divorcee to sex up her ex-husband in the manner to which he had become accustomed, and even if it wanted to no court can enforce the companionship and psychological security. So it would be more correct to say that the benefits for men are intangible, while the benefits for women are tangible.
I’m happy for Kathy she has a rocking marriage, but I wager to say that’s due a lot more to the people involved than to the institution.
Game is about appearing to be something or someone other than yourself that attracts a woman and manipulates them into giving you what you want. It is inherently dishonest. This is not a issue if you are looking for a hookup, pump and dump, or are into some level of serial dating. It is an issue within a marriage or, for those of us who expect not to be married, a committed LTR.
Since I often seem to tell you stories that illustrate my point, I have a recent one to share.
I’m in a monogamous relationship, of several months. We are proceeding toward a committed LTR and have a long way to go. Over the weekend I was with her at one of her competitive events. She was done for the day and changing out of her uniform. The hanger broke and she asked me if I would please hold the garment bag for a second. I told sure I’ll even hold it for 2 seconds. She laughed and replied “How about 5 minutes?” So she is struggling to both change and mange the hanger problem and I am standing there holding her bag. Her trainer comes over and they begin to discuss her performance. When the five minutes are up, I hand her back her bag saying “Times up.” Still talking to her trainer she gets the uniform situation sorted out and hangs the bag on the wall. The trainer finishes and walks away. My lady removes her over shirt and has no place to put it. So I take the very sweaty shirt from her while she finishes. She realizes that she forgot to tell the trainer something and starts to walk after her, leaving me hold her shirt.
I stop her. “Wait. This is yours,” and hand her the shirt. She says, without thinking, “Oh. I’m sorry.”
I respond without inflection “Good. You should be.”
She stops cold. Holding her shirt. Not knowing what to say. Because she knew that she should have been sorry, and she should have meant it, and she had completely taken my assistance for granted. I say “well if you have to talk to you trainer some more we better catch her,” and turn and head after the trainer. She follows along side. As we walk after the trainer she tries to apologize again and I cut her off and say “Don’t worry about it. I’m sure you won’t do it again.”
As I’m helping her pack up her gear, she tells me that she doesn’t have me confused with a coat rack. I respond that’s good, because I not about to become one. She tells me she knows. We go on to have a great time for the rest of the weekend.
I was reminding her that a central part of our relationship is mutual respect. Crossing that line has immediate consequences, which can ultimately end the relationship. Now some might construe that entire episode as some aspect of game. It was not, because I was not pretending to be someone else, I was reminding her who she has chosen to be with, and the consequences of forgetting. I also want to say that this cuts both ways, I treat her with the same respect and consideration that I demand.
As for fidelity in our relationship. Since we have chosen to be monogamous, I am responsible for my actions, she is responsible for hers. Period.
“Game is about appearing to be something or someone other than yourself that attracts a woman and manipulates them into giving you what you want. It is inherently dishonest.”
This is total BS. The story you just told us is classic game.
fred et al, on the topic of not being a sap:
http://badgerhut.wordpress.com/2011/07/08/one-tip-for-each-gender/
http://www.marriedmansexlife.com/2010/12/dont-be-white-knight-be-horny-knight.html
“Men can and do get sex, love, and children now outside of marriage.”
The group of women willing to provide all of these things indefinitely without any prospect of marriage is, as a whole, very different than the group of women who require marriage in order to provide one or more of the three. I’m not just talking about moral or ideological differences either.
“Nothing holds a woman to her vows aside from her own commitment to them. ”
Or a man ..Like I said nothing in life is guaranteed.
[D: Of course it works both ways.]
Shacking up is a sin, for either a man or a woman. It provides no security for the children as either party can call it quits at any time. Of course I disagree with that from a moral and religious perspective.
[D: I meant practical advantage. God’s judgment doesn’t help a husband whose wife got unhappy and went EPL. It would be different if the Church took it seriously. I’m still waiting for someone to point one out that does.]
The REAL test of love is through a lifelong commitment, ie marriage.
Now, I agree the cards are stacked against a man should his wife divorce him.
But if a man and a woman truly love one another and want to have a family, then they should marry.
The trouble in this world today is that divorce is too easy.. Irreconcialable differences?
What a load of rubbish!
And, no one should marry if they have NO real intention of making a lifelong commitment.
“If they aren’t clear on the morality of marriage vows, they have no business getting married”
Yes, I would agree with your statement, above, Dal.
[D: Agreed on all points. Thanks Kathy!]
“It provides no security for the children as either party can call it quits at any time.”
Are you talking about modern American legal marriage? Because that’s exactly what you have described – either party can walk out by filing a form. The institution doesn’t provide the protections you are talking about.
“If you open the door for her to blame you for her breaking her vows, you are inviting her rationalization hamster to do the rest. ”
This.
It’s one thing to say that a man (or woman) cheated because the other simply denied them sex or affection. That denial is a clear breach of the marriage compact. But something like that will almost never be the cause of women cheating. So her hamster will come up with all sorts of reasons as to why the husband was deficient. He doesn’t do this, he doesn’t do that. The reality is, it wouldn’t matter if he did all those things, she would find some other thing about him that upsets her or makes him appear repulsive, because her hamster wants to do so.
Kathy–
It’s the severance contract that she, but now very often he, can get from marriage called divorce 2.0 administered by VERY one sided family courts that are the problem for men with marriage 2.0, of course.
I have all that in my four year plus living together relationship with my wonderful girlfriend/partner. Except children which I haven’t wanted. As well I have no financial sword of Damocles hanging over my head. She has to strive to keep me interested, as I do with her.
As for children, Matthew MacConahey has two kids with his live together Brazilian model and US TV presenter partner. Gene Simmons, lead singer of the mostly 80s band Kiss, has two late teen kids with his former Playboy centerfold and B movie actress partner Shannon Tweed.
I think with modern appliances and conveniences that remaining a stay at home mom for 15 years long after all the kids are all in school is pretty lazy. Alimony should be abolished and splitting wealth theoretically 50/50 but almost always the divorcing wife really gets more is thoroughly unfair. It’s also a recent invention that only came in starting in the 70s.
No, because I am Australian, Badge..But I guess I was really looking at it from a moral perspective in relation to the children…. If a couple have taken wedding vows and have children, then it’s more likely (but not always) that they will work harder on their relationship, when the going gets tough. Children themselves would obviously feel more secure if their Mom and Dad were married.
*but not very often he
When women are a lot wealthier than the men they marry they almost always require prenuptial agreements.
“When women are a lot wealthier than the men they marry they almost always require prenuptial agreements.”
And newspapers will write glowing articles about how female-demanded prenups are a sign of women’s growing power and making sure they get a fair shake. The same publication will say that a man asking for a prenup is unromantic.
This is one of the more infuriating quirks of the cultural pressure to marry – women are supposed to “protect themselves,” but men are supposed to be “romantic” and hope for the best.
“It’s also a recent invention that only came in starting in the 70s.”
Curious…can you elaborate on the history lesson here?
Kathy,
“No, because I am Australian, Badge..But I guess I was really looking at it from a moral perspective in relation to the children…. If a couple have taken wedding vows and have children, then it’s more likely (but not always) that they will work harder on their relationship, when the going gets tough. Children themselves would obviously feel more secure if their Mom and Dad were married.”
I’m not sure if you’re missing our point or you just don’t think it has a lot of value. The “moral perspective” doesn’t make any sense under a system that allows either side to walk right out, and a culture that tells women to celebrate doing it. The American divorce rate is somewhere around 30% – clearly LOTS of couples who have “taken wedding vows and had children” are dropping off when the going gets tough. If a couple has infrastructural issues in their relationship, getting married is not going to help. And a serious committed couple is not going to get more “committed” by getting married, it’s just the legal imprimatur of an already-fused spiritual commitment. I’m long past taking marriage as a sign that a couple is really all in for the relationship, especially when many people are still getting married for non-personal reasons like family pressure or ticking ovaries.
“I think with modern appliances and conveniences that remaining a stay at home mom for 15 years long after all the kids are all in school is pretty lazy.”
It depends on the situation, Doug. For myself, I am a partner in my husbands business and I do some of the bookwork .( from home.) Also place orders, arrange quotes, etc..
My two kids are indeed at school, but my youngest boy who is ten, is autistic and very hyperactive, so keeps both hubby and me on our toes. Love him to bits, but he needs to be constantly supervised, when at home so it can be quite draining and restricting, especially on weekends. One weekend a month he goes to a respite facility. He loves it and it gives us a break.
In any event my husband prefers that I stay at home. He is making a six figure salary so there is no need for me to be in the paid work force.
Dal, I find your position inconsistent with your previous views on justifiable divorce. “If you open the door for her to blame you for her breaking her vows, you are inviting her rationalization hamster to do the rest.” This sums up what I consider to be the key point of this post, that the behavior of the man does not justify the actions of the women (divorce). And yet you consider adultery an ok reason for divorce, in other words the actions of one party gives justification for the other to divorce, i.e. you can blame her actions for breaking your vows.
The problem as I see it is once you open the pandora’s box of “this means it’s ok to divorce” it’s pretty hard to shut. Adultery ok, what about if it was only cybersex? Cybersex ok, what if it was only flirting? Flirting ok, what if it was a lack of affection? You can travel down the same slippery slope for abuse, irresponsibility, or just being unattractive.
That’s what this country has done in general, going from there being pretty much zero justification for divorce, to ok, abuse, to ok, adultery, to ok, mutual consent, to ok, no fault. You simply cannot stop the logical implications of the next step justification for divorce. To me, separation is only justified if there is physical abuse, and even that does not justify initiating divorce.
Badger-
Feminists campaigned in the late sixties and early 70s for the notion that marriage is an equal partnership, including economically.
Traditionally men who were deemed to be at fault in the marriage had to pay alimony unless the wife could comfortable support herself “in the style to which she’d been accustomed”, more or less. Before the 70s a lot fewer women were able to earn comparably to men even if they wanted to. However if she was at fault, especially if she cheated or she was the one wanting out of the marriage without his fault, she often had no right to alimony or only a small and transitional amount of it.
He also had to pay child support but at much lower levels that really was only child support, than today’s child support=also stealth alimony if the man make good money.
Actually until first wave feminism, solid respectable, successful men were assumed to get custody of children, at least once they were beyond their “tender years” of infancy and young pre school childhood. This was especially true if she was unfaithful or if she just wanted to end the marriage.
He did not however have to pay her half or any of his accumulated investments, retirement accounts and so on, even if it was all earned during the marriage. Assets were divided according to who had title to them. If the house was in both spouses names, then yes it was evenly divided, along with the mortgage. If it was only in his name, then no she had no right to it.
Dan —
Adultery has been a permitted ground for divorce since 1787. It was also commonly a ground of divorce in many places outside North America before then, from the time of the Protestant Reformation — in fact, in many places, the only ground for divorce for a long time (based on the Bible).
*in New York since 1787
Maybe Dan wants to go back pre 1787. On the other hand, if you go back that far, I think adultery was grounds for a defense of “provocation” in the case of homicide. You probably don’t even need to go back that far.
Dalrock—
I completely agree with your position on this and disagree with that of Roissy and Dave from Hawaii, etc.
I can understand why they take the position they do including in LTR’s and marriages, and understand that it can be useful for the husband to have their mindset about turning the marriage around through game and being more alpha.
However in essence I think it’s important for WIVES to not have that view, but rather yours.
I’ll go beyond that. I think wives should work to help guys be more alpha, more leading, and so on. It used to be part of American culture that wives should build up their husband’s self confidence and feelings of masculinity and leadership, rather than challenge it at every turn, which is clearly the real feminist message despite their cover story, 10,000 feet high, claims of equal partnership.
Adultery was the principal or only biblical grounds for divorce yes. However adultery was defined in the Old Testament as a married woman having sex with a man other than her husband. A man married or not would be guilty of adultery if he has sex with another man’s wife, but that did not give his own wife grounds for divorce; it made him liable for sanctions from the husband of the wife he slept with, and from the society.
Then why have a marriage contract at all? Why have any contract?
Perhaps this master gamer should dismiss the use of contracts and contractual expectation altogether.
Who needs an express written warranty on that new car when you can rely on your ability to “game” the service manager at the dealer into fixing your car for free?
So what happens when his wife meets a guy with even better game than him and decides to cheat? What if his wife cheated with Tiger Woods?
Using game in this sense is not all that different than suggesting locking the wife up your room.
Either way, you are implying that a woman cannot be trusted, is not a free moral agent, and is also not capable of being held responsible for doing wrong. As though she were a young child or something.
@Badger
“And a serious committed couple is not going to get more “committed” by getting married, it’s just the legal imprimatur of an already-fused spiritual commitment. ”
While it’s true that they are not going to get “more committed”, for members of some generations, at least mine, there is something about standing up before close friends and family, and God if you so believe, and publicly stating the commitment.
If my lady and I are successful in blending our lives, I admit that I have an emotional attachment to that ideal. So for some the ceremony can be more than just a “legal imprimatur”. Given the reality of modern divorce, I am torn about indulging that emotional attachment. I fear the potential downside is far too great. Fortunately, for a number of practical reasons, that decision is at least a couple of years away, if indeed we get there at all.
Badger–
The American divorce rate is almost 50%.
I do agree with the idea that a man cannot be hold responsible for a woman’s moral choice in any case, in the same vein that a woman cannot be responsible for a man’s moral choices. All marriages are made out for humans and we are not perfect, but the vows you take are clear in the idea that just because your marriage suck you shouldn’t leave it, unless it reaches a point where is beyond vows. I believe pretty much everyone agrees that physical abuse is one of those, Cheating is probably the most controversial one with people claiming that is not as harmful as popular culture says it is, and other consider it a grave sin and totally justified cause for divorce. I think we all could benefit for having personalized vows in which the couple actually discuss this before getting married, unlikely because no one wants to give their partner the option of cheating, but maybe some honesty before signing up would work better than assuming is part of the deal regardless of the state of the relationship.
In my second wedding here actually my hubby say during the vows the other part we didn’t said in our original wedding: “In boringness and routine, whether I remember to take out the trash or not for as long as we live”…the crowd laughed at that but I had been mentioned the idiots from shouldidivorce.com so he considered appropriated and I of course said I do. 🙂
Anyway one of my critiques in game is that is designed to attract women unfit for marriage anyway if you being a cocky asshole is the reason she decides to be with you then her system of partner selection is faulty at best. Given that Game is not designed to change women’s attraction triggers with time it only takes a man with higher game for her to rationalize cheating and divorcing you is the same principle of the guy that sleeps with a married/committed woman, he can’t be outraged if she ends up cheating on him. That is exactly how he meet her.
So I think maybe Game scientist could complete their observations and try to locate women that actually are not ruled by their ginas it would be a better tool for gender relationships overall…of course I also know that manosphere doubts this women actually exist so is a vicious cycle. So I don’t think Game being the solution to social problems but the solution for temporary lack of company, YMMV.
I completely agree with your position on this and disagree with that of Roissy and Dave from Hawaii, etc.
Come now Doug, where have I ever written anything contrary to what Dalrock has written here?
I agree 100% as well.
Cheating is always grounds for dissolving a marriage. The term cheating means that one party clandestinely broke the trust of the other. Whether you agreed that threesomes were ok, swinging was part of the deal, or one night stands on the road at least X miles from home were allowed, or you both promised complete fidelity, when one person cheated they broke the other persons trust.
No marriage, no relationship of any kind, can survive when there is no trust. Maybe the partners can find a way to restore that trust, maybe not, but it matters not how harmful we may decide cheating is, if trust is lost the relationship is doomed.
Dave from Hawaii has written about how LTR Game greatly improved his marriage. That does not mean it is the foundation of his marriage, the basis of keeping her committed to her marriage or the sole reason for the continuing existence of their marriage.
“Dave from Hawaii has written about how LTR Game greatly improved his marriage. That does not mean it is the foundation of his marriage, the basis of keeping her committed to her marriage or the sole reason for the continuing existence of their marriage.”
He described his marriage as essentially intolerable prior to game, and that his wife was a non-stop raving shrew. So, yes, it is fair to say that it’s the sole reason for the continuing existence of their marriage.
His writings have also been infused with a fair amount of “blame the pathetic beta husband for outlandish behavior by the wife” mentality, including when discussing his own relationship.
@Passer By
I actually considered linking to the Dave from Hawaii post on Roissy as proof of my point. Yes he describes their relationship as extremely difficult during his more beta period. But their marriage survived because she was committed to keeping her vows. A lesser woman might have bailed. Game made their marriage much more enjoyable for both of them, but what saved their marriage was her clear sense of commitment.
This is common in a lot of game writings. I think the point is to get the men reading in a frame of mind to stop the bad habits they have been convinced by feminism to adopt. It is a sort of brutal self assessment, and done for a specific purpose. But it doesn’t necessarily follow that a wife is justified in cheating or otherwise breaking her marriage vows. Dave’s comment above clarifies his stance here.
@dalrock:
“This is common in a lot of game writings. I think the point is to get the men reading in a frame of mind to stop the bad habits they have been convinced by feminism to adopt. It is a sort of brutal self assessment, and done for a specific purpose.”
I get that it can be taken as a sort of a form of “tough love” therapy, and there can be value in that since it’s best to control what you can (i.e., yourself) rather than whining about facts that can’t be changed. But I think Dave and other similar commentators can go overboard in blaming the men. Perhaps he doesn’t absolve the woman of blame for cheating, but he seems to excuse a lot – maybe because he has to in order to continue to love his wife, given her prior behavior. Dunno.
But I also think I’m being fair in saying that your prior point was that if, a guy has to non-stop Game a woman to make the relationship even tolerable, then maybe it was a poor choice in the first place. Game should be a way of enhancing an already functional relationship. I get that you don’t want to offend Dave here, but isn’t that a fair characterization of what you were saying? So, my point is that the original commenter above was agreeing with this stance.
Dalrock,
“The only benefit man has from marriage is the moral force that the marriage vows have on his wife”
Which, as we’ve all seen from US women, they hold no force whatsoever. In fact, their feminist upbringing has hard-wired Anglobitches against restraints, moral or otherwise; and this is exacerbated by the same teachings that men are inferior to women. Game won’t work on these Amazons, however it’s played.
Contrary to what the NAWALT Orchestra preaches here (many of them ‘trad women’ on their 2nd and 3rd marriages themselves); women far exceed men in ending marriages. As I pointed out in a previous post, the ‘selling of divorce to women’ which you’ve been exposing isn’t being ‘sold’ to an unreceptive audience. Where are all the divorce salesmen pitching their commodity to men? Nowhere, because men aren’t buying—women are.
As to Game, the idea that women are attracted to strong, intelligent, confident, respectable ‘Alpha’ types is absurd on the face of it— it’s disprovable by simple empirical observation. It’s the thugs, louts, bums and losers who have stables of willing women and scores of children by different moms—not any ‘Alpha’ types. Women, in our culture, feel no love for men; and I’m tempted to suspect this whole ‘alpha’ stuff was invented by the Game Theorists as a rationalization itself: Men, with Game, can pretend that women desire them because of their supposed sexual alpha-appeal. The Anglobitches lose quite a bit of their own sexual appeal once men realize that the opposite is actually true.
Game is a diversion (at best); not a solution to anything. The solution is to realize that Anglo-American women—who’ve been claiming that they don’t need men anyway—are useless as part of any solution. We can work with men in our culture, the women are better left to the degenerate males they prefer. Teaching men that we don’t need them at all is the first step to saving our culture.
Lordy.
The point seems to be this: If you have to game your wife that hard, she doesn’t have the right frame or perspective to be a wife. The relationship is more adversarial than mutually beneficial.
In a marriage, because that’s what we’re talking about, there has to be more than just a strong alpha pimp hand holding her there. Eventually I think a wife will start resenting that pimp hand and besides, I don’t think a husband can keep that hand up forever. A boyfriend or LTR “significant other” with tight game can. A husband cannot. Athol Kay has written extensively on this. An all alpha husband is a jerk. An all beta husband is a loser wimp. A husband has to be somewhere in between.
She must subscribe to the notion that she is in the marriage and that the promises she made have real moral force, she submits to that force and she allows that force to hold her in place. Not just for her, but for her husband and any children produced from the marriage.
“Anyway one of my critiques in game is that is designed to attract women unfit for marriage anyway if you being a cocky asshole is the reason she decides to be with you then her system of partner selection is faulty at best. Given that Game is not designed to change women’s attraction triggers with time it only takes a man with higher game for her to rationalize cheating and divorcing you is the same principle of the guy that sleeps with a married/committed woman, he can’t be outraged if she ends up cheating on him. That is exactly how he meet her.”
Completely agree.
Game isn’t guaranteed to keep the woman there. She still has to respond. She might not respond. It might not work.
What keeps a woman in her marriage is her commitment to her promises. If she doesn’t have that, the tightest game won’t keep her in.
“Contrary to what the NAWALT Orchestra preaches here (many of them ‘trad women’ on their 2nd and 3rd marriages themselves); women far exceed men in ending marriages. ”
Does anybody have reliable statistics on divorce initiation prior to the steady changes in family law that shifted incentives to divorce to women? I suspect if men could walk off with the kids, house and a good chunk of the marital property, you’d see more men than women “chasing the divorce dream.” Not to mention the societal shaming of men who do that as compared to the celebration of women who divorce to “find themselves.”
[D: Page 3 of this document has some stats you might find helpful.]
Passer_By
Does anybody have reliable statistics on divorce initiation prior to the steady changes in family law that shifted incentives to divorce to women? I suspect if men could walk off with the kids, house and a good chunk of the marital property, you’d see more men than women “chasing the divorce dream.”
That was the norm in the US prior to the 1850’s, and quite common up until about 100 years
ago. There was no epidemic of divorce such as we see now. So history tells me that the answer
to your question is “no”.
Not to mention the societal shaming of men who do that as compared to the celebration of women who divorce to “find themselves.”
Decades of “men bad women good” has an effect, clearly.
@AR
You may be right. I suspect the difference lies in the fact that the male fantasy is for variety rather than replacement, whereas, as Dalrock has noted, the female fantasy is a “re-choose” type fantasy. In other words, a male with family law power might be more apt to simply get some on the side rather than replace the wife. It is probably also the case that, not being hypergamous, men tend to be more content with the quality of their mates (if not the quantity), even as they age. Maybe that’s another way of saying the same thing. I guess to round out the picture, I think men with family law power would be less apt to want to separate their children from the children’s mother than vice versa.
@Passer_By
You might also add that women were their husband’s property if he abandoned her she will have no means of survival on her own or their children and almost no chance of remarry, so only the heartless cruelest of men will ever try to do that no matter how unhappy he was with the woman. Society might gave a lot of power over men but also make sure to shame and control this men to make sure their women were protected. Is true she might not be able to leave for a lover, but neither could he. The wife needed to commit a great crime (like adultery) for the community to allow the man to leave her in poverty and unprotected and even so a repentant wife could go to a nunnery if she showed repent or the husband could just confine her at home. So again for a man to divorce was even harder in patriarchy than many people believe, YMMV.
@Passer_By
Yes, that is an accurate characterization of my point. All I would add is that most men don’t become too beta because they naturally want to be that way. They are told that it will make their wife happy, so they comply. So unless the couple is fundamentally mismatched as you said, the amount of game he will need shouldn’t be “work” in the way that so many people think of it. He will have to work some upfront to undo bad habits, but it won’t be a constant battle to stay alpha enough after that. I don’t think Dave’s story contradicts this. He listened to the bad advice we give men and made himself and his wife miserable for 7 years. Once he figured it out, he knocked it off and went back to the way he was in the beginning, except now he knew what he was doing. Now they are both extremely happy.
I read the stats in the article referred to in Dalrock’s previous post.
I find it fascinating that the rates of women filing before and after the overhaul of divorce laws has remained relatively constant. At no point in American history have men been the majority of divorce initiators or filers. It would seem to me that women, not men, are the ones wanting out of marriages — and that it has always been so.
Looking at Dalrock’s link, I can only say, “Don’t move your family to Polk County, Iowa!”
Dave from Hawaii–
Ok, I guess I misunderstood you.
I strongly recommend that every guy read the Dave from Hawaii post on Roissy that Dalrock links above in a comment. It’s a great introduction to game and is not nearly as off putting as some other game posts and concepts are to newbies.
Actually read the whole Relationship Game Week series of posts, of which the Dave from Hawaii one is the last.
Shacking up is a sin, for either a man or a woman. It provides no security for the children as either party can call it quits at any time.
Uh, how is that different from marriage with the no-fault divorce escape clause?
Reading the paper that Dalrock linked to. It’s not No Fault Divorce that’s the problem. It seems to be the combination of No Fault and the presumption of maternal custody. Interesting.
Dalrock, have you read Daniel Amneus “Case for Father Custody” ? If not, I could probably dig up a link to a PDF of it.
I get that it can be taken as a sort of a form of “tough love” therapy, and there can be value in that since it’s best to control what you can (i.e., yourself) rather than whining about facts that can’t be changed. But I think Dave and other similar commentators can go overboard in blaming the men. Perhaps he doesn’t absolve the woman of blame for cheating, but he seems to excuse a lot – maybe because he has to in order to continue to love his wife, given her prior behavior. Dunno.
So many folks get obsessed with “assigning blame.” Look, when it comes to “blame” my focus has always been on society and feminism and the way in which mass media indoctrination encourages we males to “beta-ize.”
I could care less about “blame,” I only seek to point out that for many men, they need to be AWARE of how their own behavior, actions, attitude and demeanor affects their relationship.
MOST relationship breakdowns are not 100% one or the others faults. Both have SOME role to play in it when things go bad.
I’m not “Excusing” nor seeking to “blame” one side or the other.
In the end, there is only one person you can change – yourself.
That has been my main point all along.
A lot of people have read that Roissy thread and jumped to all sorts of conclusions regarding my wife and the kind of person that she is. As I’ve said many times prior, I recognized that much of the reason she acted in those ways was because of MY OWN behavior. When I acted like a beta chump, she would become contemptuous. That’s because she’s a fairly normal female (alll womynz be crazy to some extent…). If my wife did NOT have a strong commitment to marriage, she would have left me long, long ago. Long before I even had a chance to read about this shit called “game.” Which is why I agree with Dalrock’s point here.
The only thing “Game” did for me, was make me realize I had allowed conventional wisdom to influence my attitude and behavior, in pedestalizing my wife and emasculating myself in some kind of attempt to “make her happy” and “be a rational, understanding, reasonable man” who was “caring, and emotionally available.” It was all a load of bullshit I had internalized from pop culture and reading about “game” made me realize it.
Absolutely WONDERFUL post, Dalrock. Excellently clear and truthful about both women’s and men’s responsibility, not to mention marriage.
I’ve seen even some patriarchal men act like women are puppets, claiming that a man, in return for his wife’s obedience, is responsible for ANYTHING she does; he also claimed men invented feminism to shirk responsibility. Two of the most patriarchal girls there are, who believe women exist to follow men’s dreams, said that a man is the prophet, priest and king of his home. A double-edge sword, isn’t it?
That women are infinitely malleable as long as you have enough game is quite off base. At best that’s what we tell ourselves in order to keep inner game at its sharpest, but it’s never intended to reach female ears!!
Learning game won’t do any harm to any man even if it doesn’t have the godly powers that some fans claim. One of my gripes with the married minded manosphere is that some of them want a paper or contract to make up for their lack of manliness and to spare them from “having to” learn learn to get along with the girls. I remember a paragraph from Ferdinand Bardamu despising the learning of game:
“the singles market is so screwed up that guys have to read a book by a freak wearing a stupid hat in order to figure out how to even get laid.”
…all of which is incredibly misguided, quite insulting for the decent ladies and most important, a crime against children.
What Dave made the case for was not that his wife’s intransigence was his “fault” but that there are measures a man can take to dramatically improve his domestic situation.
I see two schools of game. The “inner game” of which “Dave” and Yohami are key proponents says that you should be a strong, centered, self-respecting man, and that this social identity will attract people in general and women in particular. The PUA school says that a man should be validated by female attention and sex, and thus should carry out a variety of behaviors to get him those things.
I think many guys using game are somewhere in between – often they “fake it” with the PUA game until they lift the frustration and wear out the betatude, at which point they can carry forward with inner game. Much like you might use a personal trainer until you feel competent to run your own workout regimen. Even Athol Kay is a mix of “be your own man” and “here are things you can do to be sexy for your wife.”
Tyler Durden said in a talk “it’s amazing how many life problems disappear when a guy gets laid a bit,” and the converse is also true – it’s amazing how available sex is to a man whose frame suggests he doesn’t have any problems.
“One of my gripes with the married minded manosphere is that some of them want a paper or contract to make up for their lack of manliness and to spare them from “having to” learn learn to get along with the girls.”
I’ll admit that at one point part of my desire to find a marrigeable mate was to check out of the SMP. This is a classic beta-male fallacy, “if I find someone who likes me for me, my general lack of skill with women won’t be a problem.” In reality I was just pedestalizing one (imaginary) woman instead of pedestalizing them all. It also produced some massive one-itis; when you think you need that one unique woman, the loss aversion is all-consuming.
All this talk about blame. You’re responsible for what you have control over or should have control over. Not more. Not less.
To be clear:
As Dalrock wrote:
“If she is only one, or a few, or even 50 failed shit tests away from walking away”
Much of the things I wrote about in that Roissy thread occurred after 7 YEARS of failing shit tests and being a supplicating, pedestalizing Beta.
I had a number of things in my favor that contribute to the fact that she didn’t leave me before I figured things out: 1) I was her first and only (as far as I know…she could have cheated on me and lied. I don’t think so, but no one can be 100% certain. If she has, she’s kept the secret well) 2) she comes from an intact home with happily married parents (still) and; 3) we dated for years before marriage. We had a lot of good times and great memories of happiness before things got bad.
“Tyler Durden said in a talk “it’s amazing how many life problems disappear when a guy gets laid a bit,” I think this is also true for many women.
To be frank, if I have had a good “seeing too” from hubby, the roof could cave in afterwards for all I care.. 😀
A few days missing out.. kids driving me nuts.. hubby really, really busy.. planets not aligning.. well then every little problem seems kinda magnified, until hubby sorts me out..
This is another good reason why hubby wants me home when the kids are at school. He can often drop by during the day. 😉
@Kathy
Heh this is so true. In my country often times coworkers usually comment when I woman is grumpy and angry all the time that she needs to get “married” and more often than not there was a change for the better in the first year of marriage…of course till the husband started to cheat that is, then grumpy lady came back with a vengeance or tears…that bit was unpredictable.
Dave from you know where:
Much of the things I wrote about in that Roissy thread occurred after 7 YEARS of failing shit tests and being a supplicating, pedestalizing Beta.
Could you point to that thread with a URL? I’d like to read about your turnaround, if you please.
AR,
Prepare to have your mind blown.
http://roissy.wordpress.com/2009/08/14/relationship-game-week-a-readers-journey/
This is the post that opened up an entirely new avenue in the Manosphere, linking PUAs and married guys together. I still think it’s possibly the most important Roissy post ever.
@ Kathy’s first comment
“Regular sex” LOLOLOLOLOLOLOL
Maybe if “Regular” is defined as “a regularly optional monthly encounter” . There is a reason so many men complain that the quality and frequency of their sexual relationship declined after marriage. Because it does!
Speaking in broad generalities, modern married women expect to have sex when THEY feel the desire. They know that their husband feels the desire almost every day of the week, so they are fairly secure knowing that when the planets and stars align, and her biochemistry starts to work, and the hot Federal Agent on her favorite TV show gets her worked up, and dear husband has done the appropriate amount of house work, and if she got flowers in the past week, then voila! Regular Sex!!!!
I am a Christian man who waited until marriage to have sex, and so having sex was a strong drive in my decision to marry. Not the only drive, but a major one. If I had known that “regular sex” was going to be this awesome I’d have waited until I was 45. I would have built a career, traveled, restored an old challenger or camaro, bought a motorcycle, joined the navy, finished a college degree without loads of debt, snowboarded in Alaska, fished for marlin, had my knee repaired, trained in MMA, owned a gun collection instead of a gun, etc. etc. etc. Some married guys are going to be able to do all that, but they are the excepti0n (and they probably come from money) and not the rule. The financial and time commitments that marriage requires just won’t allow most men to follow more than a couple of their dreams.
I just think young Christian men ought to know going in that the awesomeness of “regular sex” is likely going to be a good bit shy of what they are probably expecting. They should also step back and recognize two other things: 1) what they are trading away when they make the marriage commitment, and 2) that they can still have a family at 40 or 45.
That I also have that bookmarked and we are discussing it 2 years later is quite telling on how important and insightful that post was. Damn, if so many people remember something I write 2 years from now, I will know I have made my mark on the world.
2 years is an eternity in internet time.
“They know that their husband feels the desire almost every day of the week, so they are fairly secure knowing that when the planets and stars align, and her biochemistry starts to work, and the hot Federal Agent on her favorite TV show gets her worked up, and dear husband has done the appropriate amount of house work, and if she got flowers in the past week, then voila! Regular Sex!!!!”
Lol. Foo. There is however some truth in what you say. I know of women who are not that interested in sex. Of course when THEY do want it they have no trouble getting it from hubby… Poor hubby on the other hand can whistle dixie or stand on his head naked..if she is not in the mood nothing he does will make a difference..These women are selfish uncaring and are not satisfying their husbands needs.
Other women (like myself) really enjoy sex with their husbands, often initiate and never knock them back.. My husband has never knocked me back, even when I have woken him in the middle of the night. And, I would never knock him back either..
He does not bring me flowers and is too busy for housework. He has me to do that stuff. 😉
Seriously, though, it must be terribly frustrating for you Foo if your wife won’t come across.. She should be reminded of her wedding vows..
The more a woman has sex the more she will want it. It’s a pity more women don’t understand this..
Why don’t you go into the kitchen when she is doing the dishes bend her over the sink and….voila! 😀
lol
Let me tell you guys…to this very day, I still get an occasional email from someone because of that post. Nowdays, I just refer em to Athol’s website and book.
I find it hilarious, because I know I still get traffic from it to my blog…but people check it my blog and they’re like “WTF?!?!?”
For some reason, people expect my blog to be like Athol’s. That post at Roissy’s was actually the compilation of a lot of different comments I had made at his blog over the course of several months. Most don’t know what to make of the “conspiracy theory” and paleo diet topics I regularly blog about.
I began my blog in the “MRA” blogosphere back in 07. I was just a newcomer in a blogosphere in which most of the big timers were primarily focused on the injustices of feminism. The Eternal Bachelor, Rob Fedder’s “No Ma’am,” Outcast Superstar, Kumogakure School, Captain Zarmband, Field Marshall Watkins, Angry Harry, ….these were the forerunners of today’s manosphere. When I stumbled across Roissy’s blog back in those days, the “MRA” side and the “PUA” side had not yet really converged like they have today. They were two seperate niches on teh interwebz. I had come across several “game” blogs and forums back then, and had begun writing blog pieces and linking to them as a regular MRA blogger. Than I came across Roissy in DC.
2 years ago, Roissy’s blog was instrumental in bringing it all together MRA/PUA/MGTOW.
Some of the old timer MRA bloggers were very skeptical and standoffish with regards to “Game, ” but over time, they recognized the underlying principles of it and how they applied to all the MRA issues we were all so concerned with.
Turns out that “Game” and the recognition of the principle of female sexuality – hypergamy – was just another piece of the puzzle in deconstructing the present day Gynocracy/Fematrix.
@Foo
First Kathy is totally right (oh sweet memories :)) and second READ ATHOL’S BLOG! He has a lot of good advices for men that want more sex in the marriage. You need to read his blog! PRONTO! Like now: http://www.marriedmansexlife.com/
Why don’t I go bend her… ah yeah baby… oooh that’s niiice… oh wait… oh noes… ahhhh get me outta here…that won’t do at all.
Bending her over the kitchen sink would likely get me a nickel in the state pen where even my nice white coveralls will not keep me from getting more sex than I ever wanted.
very intersting post. this is why i keep stopping by. very good insight sir.
Ah ha! Yes, been there and have been reading. I’m open minded to the ideas and will be making changes in my behavior and attitude. If I could come up with a catchy blog name I’d share my experience with teh int3rtub3s.
Personally I think Dave’ experience would be more beneficial for Foo, Steph. I guess it depends on what kind of a woman his wife is.. I find a lot of Athol’s stuff sickening and contrived, myself. The 10 second kiss for instance. Taking her on a shopping spree is another that just Wouldn,t work for me. I prefer to cut to the chase: Flowers and chocolates or Hubby doing housework just don’t do it for me. I much rather it when he just comes into the kitchen and.. Gives me one. Sorry but I just don’t like a lot of beating around the bush. Lol
Speaking in broad generalities, modern married women expect to have sex when THEY feel the desire.
This is based on the feminist idea about sex and rape. The idea is that if you want to have sex with someone, even though she might not want to have sex with you (as here), you have the attitude of a rapist. There is no idea in feminism that spouses have an obligation to be there, sexually, for each other — rather, sex in marriage is like sex between unmarried people in that it’s all based on mutual desire at the time in order to avoid being rape. For a feminist, the traditional Christian idea that people (in the feminist view, typically the wife) should have sex even if she doesn’t feel like having sex is a “rape mentality” that is a part of a “rape culture” whereby men feel “entitled” to sex from their wives just because they are their wives — i.e., it’s all about rape.
Foo’s Folly
Foo for Thought
I am a Foo
What the Foo
The Foo-strated Man
Foo-ster
fe fi Foo fum
sorry for spelling and grammar errors Dal. Posting from my phone,
Ha ha Ha… CSPB. You are certainly no Foo…
Ha ha Ha. You are certainly no foo CSPB.
@Badger: that Dave from Hawaii post at Roissy really is considered to be the manosphere’s origin of game for the married man. It is still good reading, and still brilliant. But, its actual origin is probably somwhere in the Apostle Paul’s epistles.
@ Foo: Whoa. You need to read up. Go to marriedmansexlife.com. Athol Kay has lots and lots of great suggestions. Get Athol’s book. Go read that Roissy post by Dave from Hawaii. Remember: game won’t make a woman turn around. If she’s determined not to, you have to make a choice: stay with her the way she is, or find a woman who will give you what you want and need.
Kathy, what part of the wedding vows are you suggesting I remind her of? Is there something in them about sex? I don’t remember anything in the vows that mentioned an obligation to have marital sex. I think it is implied in the nature of marriage, but for some sexually repressed/dysfunctional people the implied obligation is very easy to ignore. It would be harder to ignore actual vows to that effect.
CSPB, thanks for the blog titles.
This is fun…. here are some more.
Foo’s Ball
Shoe on the other Foo
The Foo-deration
One Foo in front of the other
I give an inch, she takes a Foo
Standing on one Foo
No Foo to stand on
Learning to put my Foo down
Hard to be the Head when you’re a Foo
OK, now Foo should have no excuse to not have a blog and keep us informed on his journey. We can offer advice and the numerous other anonymous men in the same situation can follow along and hopefully improve their marriages too. Christian men need help with their masculinity and the manosphere is often more edgy than they can initially tolerate.
What I eventually found works best is to keep your wife generally interested in you by using married game (see the sites mentioned, but the basic principles are simple.) This will mean that the Little Woman will have respect for you and want affection. When you want sex, simply tell her that affection will come after sex. This really works. Simply initiating when she is cold on you because she feels no respect for you is unlikely to work.
Hi Kathy. Alte has a new blog (Traditional Christianity) and all bets are off. You would be welcome and I would like another Australian there.
@CSPB
This is a good idea. If he creates one I’ll put up a post letting people know where it is. My favorite of your title suggestions is The Foo-strated Man.
Your comment on the manosphere being too edgy fits with my take on the discussion above about game resources. I first learned about game from Roissy’s site. I probably would have been turned away from the site had I not had a PUA roommate 20 years ago in college. His game was strictly natural, so he didn’t understand it well enough to explain it to anyone else. I was able to think about what the roommate did, or picture how he would say a phrase being discussed on Roissy, and it all made sense. I would say if a Christian man can stand it, reading Roissy and the comments will be very insightful. I don’t think it is going to turn a good Christian beta into a monster. Another choice would be Solomon’s blog. He was/is also a PUA type, but not as harsh as Roissy. These guys ruthlessly ferret out any hint of pedistalization and destroy it. You don’t have to (and I would say won’t want to) become like these guys. But I think it helps to see this in its purest form. When we pedistalize women we don’t even know we are doing it. I would say Christian married men are probably the worst at this. If the church wasn’t so thoroughly feminized you wouldn’t need to learn this from PUAs. Keep in mind that your wife doesn’t want you to pedistalize her. Not only is it a tingle killer, but it comes across as condescension. Men don’t mean it this way but it does. The sooner you stop doing it the happier both of you will be.
My only advice would be to go there to learn, not to teach or lecture them on their life choices. They are actually pretty tolerant of married confirmed betas like myself so long as you don’t come off like you think you know more than they do or make the standard idiotic statements like “this can’t possibly work on a real woman, don’t you want a real woman?” or “but don’t you want them to love you for yourself?”. If you accept that in their world you are the greenest of novice, they will generally be pretty welcoming and helpful (all things considered). After a while you will find you got what you came for. I rarely visit Roissy’s site anymore.
But if the ultra concentrated formula is too much for you, as was already mentioned Athol’s site and book are outstanding. Badger also talks about game and he doesn’t have the PUA edge. Private Man might be another good choice for the same reason. Also, check out the Game Resources For Marriage thread linked under Resources at the top of the blog.
One more point. Roissy has confirmed my assertion that married game doesn’t have to be “work” in the pickup artist sense. The man who was was kind enough to quote a segment of my post on gaming your wife, and Roissy agreed:
There is another aspect to learning Game that some may find disturbing. Many married men reek of desperation, of oneitis: “If she were to leave me, what would I do?”. A Game truth is that such desperation lowers a man’s value in women’s eyes.
A married man does not have to engage in an affair to know that with good Game he can attract other women. He can see it via all sorts of interactions; the extra smile from the barrista, the lingering attention from the female store manager, etc. This in time will lead to the realization that if his wife left him, he could find another woman in a year or less. Possibly much less time, in fact.
And this knowledge can only give a married man confidence, because his relationship with his wife shifts from “need” to “want”. “I don’t need you around, but I do want you around”, i.e. Keoni Galt’s “invitation”. That mindset, or frame as Game calls it, is more attractive to women in general and ought to be more attractive to a wife or LTR.
Thus, by learning Game, a married man finds that he does not need to cling to his wife; if she leaves, he can get another one, and likely quicker than she will find another man. This leads to confidence in his interactions with her, which she finds more appealing. Win-win all around.
(Win-win, with the sure knowledge of a “Plan B” if she ever ejects…)
I had a couple of natural PUA buddies in college. They could never explain it either. All they could tell me was something like, “I don’t know. I just talk to lots of girls. If they like me, that’s great.. If not, that’s OK too. Doesn’t really matter to me. If she gets tired of me, that’s cool. If I get tired of her, whatever.” At age 19, I just couldn’t make sense of that for a lot of reasons, mainly because it didn’t seem very “nice” and when I tried it, it came off as unnatural and mechanical.
@Badger,
This is the post that opened up an entirely new avenue in the Manosphere, linking PUAs and married guys together. I still think it’s possibly the most important Roissy post ever.
Take out the “possibly,” man. This is ALWAYS the first link I send men who are frustrated, and for some reason I have had that opportunity too often. I don’t know if they follow up; I recall most of all the student, male, 40s, who called me and begged to drop my class because he was emotionally distraught that his wife had had an affair while he was in Afghan, or something. He was going to grovel to get her back (this was before Dalrock), but I sent him first to that post. I think there was a suicide or murder/suicide possible in a few months if that man did not change course. Dave has talked about friends lost to suicide, but I think he might have saved someone else’s friend from that sad fate.
It woke me up because I too ran the script about the restaurants with my own wife. “But I’m just trying to be equalitarian” is no defense: decision and leadership work much better than groveling. As others in this thread have pointed out, it works best with a woman from an intact, patriarchal family, but it will work with ALL of them.
Foo
Kathy, what part of the wedding vows are you suggesting I remind her of? Is there something in them about sex?
Don’t know about modern vows, but the old ones included “love, honor and obey” for the woman. Obviously “obey” doesn’t include carrying out a bank robbery or other illegal things. But “obey” certainly ought to include sex. Others can address specific parts of the Bible that teach what husbands owe to wives, and what wives owe to husbands, not my area of knowledge. Those teachings might not be what churchianity is teaching / has taught your wife, though.
“I still think it’s possibly the most important Roissy post ever”
Some points were good, others were disgustingly as*hole and unChristian. It’s basically pandering to the idea that alpha-men are always right and must never admit otherwise; most say that men must have alpha and beta qualities (in less simplified terms, men who are strong and good), but I’ve rarely if ever heard this from Roissy. That post shows what asses men of that ilk are.
“I find a lot of Athol’s stuff sickening and contrived, myself”
Some of his stuff can be irritating, but he’s not sick and contrived like the Roissy-type. I recommend Deansdale, Athol and Badger; the Roissy-type slides into pedestalizing the male self, simplifying women and sliding into manipulation/dark game.
“I’ve had to learn the hard way that most church girls who like you will deal with you in a relatively straightforward manner and that using all sorts of elaborate technique will often backfire”
BINGO.
“I stop her. “Wait. This is yours,” and hand her the shirt. She says, without thinking, “Oh. I’m sorry.” I respond without inflection “Good. You should be.” She stops cold. Holding her shirt. Not knowing what to say. Because she knew that she should have been sorry, and she should have meant it, and she had completely taken my assistance for granted. I say “well if you have to talk to you trainer some more we better catch her,” and turn and head after the trainer. She follows along side. As we walk after the trainer she tries to apologize again and I cut her off and say “Don’t worry about it. I’m sure you won’t do it again.”
If your relationship is really about mutual respect, I hope you wouldn’t complain if you ever treated her like a coat rack and she responded in the same way.
Right-on, Jack. Doing game should always be a manifestation of who you are as a confident man, not trying manipulation to get your way.
“A lesser woman might have bailed. Game made their marriage much more enjoyable for both of them, but what saved their marriage was her clear sense of commitment”
Hmm, good and honorable points.
“In a marriage, because that’s what we’re talking about, there has to be more than just a strong alpha pimp hand holding her there. Eventually I think a wife will start resenting that pimp hand and besides, I don’t think a husband can keep that hand up forever”
Also good points; unless both people are universally shallow, there has to be more than role-playing.
“I don’t need you around, but I do want you around”, i.e. Keoni Galt’s “invitation”. That mindset, or frame as Game calls it, is more attractive to women in general and ought to be more attractive to a wife or LTR”
Um, wrong. Marriage is nothing if you find your spouse replaceable. All these lower rungs of game would reduce me to feeling like a replaceable fuck toy engineered to boost his cock-ego.
@Jennifer
I think the saving factor here is that men act too beta because they want to please their wives. When they find out their wives hate this (even though the wife often can’t articulate it), they want to change… in order to please their wives. Ordinary (hopefully greater) Beta husbands aren’t going to turn into Rossyite assholes. This isn’t who they are. It is like worrying that if you push a boulder down a 100 yard hill that it won’t stop until it is on the top of a nearby mountain.
If you read much of the really game focused blogs you will find that even most of the PUA types struggle with not slipping back into a mentality of pleasing/pedastalizing women. Unless the guy is secretly a natural alpha asshole who somehow lost his mojo, he won’t be able to turn himself into an alpha asshole without a huge amount of effort, practice, and reinforcement. This is work he doesn’t want to do. Coincidentally this is the part of game which you see so many men rejecting when they say “why marry only to have to game your wife”. They truly don’t want to do this. Women don’t understand this because 1) they aren’t men and therefore don’t understand how most men (Beta men) really think (not an indictment, it just is). and 2) the Apex Fallacy causes them to mistake natural alpha traits as representing the common man.
Some points were good, others were disgustingly as*hole and unChristian. You mean like when I yelled at my wife because she was being hysterical? LOL in 13 years of marriage, that was like one of 3 times total in which I’ve raised my voice. I guess that just makes me a total asshole! Oh, and “UnChristian!” I’m sure Christ was all reasonable and calm and nice when he threw the moneychangers from the temple…
It’s basically pandering to the idea that alpha-men are always right and must never admit otherwise;
You missed my main point. Jennifer, what you fail to understand is this – the reason why that post has been so popular is because my experiences are all too common for so many men. When the wife gets angry and upset…many, many men think that constant apologizing and begging for forgiveness is what they are “supposed” to do. This leads to her contempt that her man is groveling. She also figures out that her man is simply apologizing half the time to avoid upsetting her and to avoid conflict. In other words, he’s acting like a big pussy. If your so afraid of her anger that you would apologize profusely, surely she begins to question if you’d be man enough to defend her when the shit hits the fan.
As I said, as the man, if you KNOW you are in the wrong, and she DESERVES a legitimate apology, than give her one…once. Acknowledge the wrongdoing, say you’re sorry and that’s it.
What many married men don’t understand is that continually apologizing and begging her to not be angry anymore.
Prior to understanding this, we would often have little disagreements turn into 3 day, passive aggressive wars of silent treatment. In trying to avoid conflict, or always apologizing in the mistaken hopes of neutralizing her anger, I was just making it worse. Now…if we have a disagreement or argument, it’s OVER in a matter of hours, if not minutes.
That’s because I no longer apologize profusely just to avoid conflict. If I feel I’m in the right, I don’t back down.
most say that men must have alpha and beta qualities (in less simplified terms, men who are strong and good), but I’ve rarely if ever heard this from Roissy.
And what you fail to understand, Jennifer, is that my problem is very similar to most men’s problems nowdays: ALL beta qualities, almost zero Alpha. My post was basically about the discovery that I in fact did have to develop some alpha qualities to restore balance in the relationship…and yes, that did involve acting like an asshole sometimes. But that’s what it takes when you spend years as a spineless doormat afraid of her emotional state.
I see you constantly talking about “Game” in the negative around here and at Alte’s. You simply have NO CLUE just how pussywhipped and cowed by their wive’s emotional state many men are nowadays. I see it all the time with co-workers, acquaintances, friends and family members. Far too many Men fall into a “she’s my Mommy and I need to ask her permission and I better not make her angry” mentality. Most of them are not in happy marriages…and their wives aren’t either.
“You mean like when I yelled at my wife because she was being hysterical? LOL in 13 years of marriage, that was like one of 3 times total in which I’ve raised my voice. I guess that just makes me a total asshole”
Don’t bother twisting my words, keoni. No that’s not what I mean by “asshole”; an asshole would be a guy who’s incredibly careful not to sound sorry when he did wrong.
“When the wife gets angry and upset…many, many men think that constant apologizing and begging for forgiveness is what they are “supposed” to do. This leads to her contempt that her man is groveling. She also figures out that her man is simply apologizing half the time to avoid upsetting her and to avoid conflict. In other words, he’s acting like a big pussy. If your so afraid of her anger that you would apologize profusely, surely she begins to question if you’d be man enough to defend her when the shit hits the fan”
I agree with this; it’s the far opposite of the spectrum that I hate.
“As I said, as the man, if you KNOW you are in the wrong, and she DESERVES a legitimate apology, than give her one…once. Acknowledge the wrongdoing, say you’re sorry and that’s it.
What many married men don’t understand is that continually apologizing and begging her to not be angry anymore”
There’s a difference, you know, between groveling and acting as though her forgiveness is no big deal if you, say, kept her waiting for six hours and thinking God-knows-what while you’re gone.
“I see you constantly talking about “Game” in the negative around here and at Alte’s. You simply have NO CLUE just how pussywhipped and cowed by their wive’s emotional state many men are nowadays”
Oh but I do. You haven’t seen my most recent comments; I’m fine with basic game, which is what I’ve told the three bloggers I recommended.
“Ordinary (hopefully greater) Beta husbands aren’t going to turn into Rossyite assholes. This isn’t who they are”
I agree. This is also why I’m ok with basic game; it’s the best kind and will help a man use his natural mascuilinity/assetiveness without becoming a twisted ass-version of himself.
“That’s because I no longer apologize profusely just to avoid conflict. If I feel I’m in the right, I don’t back down”
That’s perfectly legitimate, and something I’m working on. LOL So you’re Dave from Hawaii, don’t know why I didn’t note that before.
“I in fact did have to develop some alpha qualities to restore balance in the relationship…and yes, that did involve acting like an asshole sometimes. But that’s what it takes when you spend years as a spineless doormat afraid of her emotional state”
If you had to up the assertive game to as*hole once in a while to restore balance, as a way of saying, “Look, I’m no longer cowed by your unnecessary anger anymore”, I can understand that; sometimes extra assertiveness has to make up for past uber-submission. I just wouldn’t recommend the as*hole thing in general, or as a reflex constant behavior.
“Some points were good, others were disgustingly as*hole and unChristian”
I was referring to some of Roissy’s general comments as well.
an asshole would be a guy who’s incredibly careful not to sound sorry when he did wrong.
My point was even if the man IS sorry, he should not “act” sorry. He should apologize, because she deserves it…but he shouldn’t beg and grovel and literally ACT sorry.
In the old days, my wife’s typical response was: “Yeah, you’re sorry alright! You’re ALWAYS sorry!”
So much for being a nice guy.
Sometimes being a man means being an asshole…and that has nothing to do with being Christian.
I’m sure the money changers thought Christ was an asshole for throwing them out of the temple.
So you’re Dave from Hawaii, don’t know why I didn’t note that before.
lol – Back then, I made the name up because when I first started commenting there, I did not want the regular invasion of femtard trolls that appeared regularly at Roissy’s to come invade my blog. Dave is not my real name.
Off-topic, but on the topic of emotional porn and unrealistic expectations…
“Mills & Boon Blamed for Sexual Health Problems,” The Guardian (UK), 7 Jul 2011
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2011/jul/07/mills-and-boon-sexual-health-problems
Subtitled: Psychologist says that “a huge number of the issues that we see in our clinics and therapy rooms are influenced by romantic fiction”
Says the article (and it didn’t even mention Eat, Pray, Love): “A ‘huge number of the issues that we see in our clinics and therapy rooms are influenced by romantic fiction’, according to Quilliam, who believes romance readers are inclined to suspend rationality in favour of romanticism. This could, she says, lead to a reader not using contraception because she wants ‘to be swept up by the moment as a heroine would’, to the termination of a pregnancy ‘against all her moral codes because that same man asks her to.’, to panic if sexual desire ‘takes a nose dive … after all, such failure never happens to a heroine’, and from there to the end of the relationship.”
“I’m sure the money changers thought Christ was an asshole for throwing them out of the temple”
Difference: They were wrong and He was right. What I define as an as*hole is a guy who acts like a self-confident cock even when he’s dead-wrong, not a guy who’s firm and non-groveling. If I was left waiting six hours for my husband, I’d need a sincere apology; I wouldn’t expect him to go, “Oh God, I’m SO sorry, I fell asleep and I don’t know what I was thinking. It was stupid, I know, let me make it up to you..” But rather a “Hey honey, I’m really sorry if I kept you waiting, but I was conkered out and just fell asleep. Be home soon” over the phone. Sometimes true “sorriness” is needed from either spouse; this doesn’t mean groveling.
“Sometimes being a man means being an asshole…and that has nothing to do with being Christian”
Again, I don’t see assertiveness or even necessary aggression as being as*hole; on the contrary, I’d have loved to see Ray Barone once in a while say to Deborah, “Would you be QUIET already! And I’m sleeping in my bed tonight!” It was nice to see him, in the PMS episode, respond to her “You’re crazy” with “No, YOU are!” I love the PMS episodes of both Raymond and Roseanne.
I think I assumed your real name might actually be Keoni; I wasn’t sure if you were a native Hawaiin, lol.
“Says the article (and it didn’t even mention Eat, Pray, Love): “A ‘huge number of the issues that we see in our clinics and therapy rooms are influenced by romantic fiction’, according to Quilliam, who believes romance readers are inclined to suspend rationality in favour of romanticism. This could, she says, lead to a reader not using contraception because she wants ‘to be swept up by the moment as a heroine would’, to the termination of a pregnancy ‘against all her moral codes because that same man asks her to.’, to panic if sexual desire ‘takes a nose dive … after all, such failure never happens to a heroine’, and from there to the end of the relationship.”
Yeah, fiction can really suck.
lol – I am native hawaiian…and Keoni is also not my real name. 🙂 “Keoni” is Hawaiian for “John.”
If you don’t know who John Galt is…
Oh, kewl; Hawaiin for John. I haven’t read Ayn Rand’s works yet, but they sound awesome. Clever choice of name.
Mills and Boon blamed for sexual health problems? Doesn’t surprise me in the least. These silly romance novels create unrealistic expectations in the minds of many women. Perpetuating the myth of the knight in shining armour sweeping the girl off her feet and riding off into the sunset to live happily ever after.
So glad that I was hooked on sci-fi novels as a teenager, and was never once tempted to read any of those trashy romantic fiction books. Lol.
Jennifer
“I don’t need you around, but I do want you around”, i.e. Keoni Galt’s “invitation”. That mindset, or frame as Game calls it, is more attractive to women in general and ought to be more attractive to a wife or LTR”
Um, wrong. Marriage is nothing if you find your spouse replaceable.
That’s not what “I don’t need you around, but I do want you around” means. As I pointed out, a man who desperately, clingingly, needs his wife to be around is not going to be attractive to her. A man who wants his wife to be around, in a healthy way, will be attractive. Maybe you should include more context when you disagree, if you are truly interested in communicating ideas.
It appears that you do not like Game. That is interesting, but not really new or relevant. Game works, and helps solve interpersonal relationship problems. Pedestalizing women, crawling before them, submitting to their whims, etc. not only doesn’t work or solve problems, it creates problems. So Game is here to stay.
David Collard: “Hi Kathy. Alte has a new blog (Traditional Christianity) and all bets are off. You would be welcome and I would like another Australian there.”
Hi David. Hope all is well with you. Thanks for the invitation, but with exception of two female bloggers (one an Australian woman, the other Thag Jones) I mostly DO prefer to read(and much more enjoy) male blogging sites. Less drama.. 😉 more consistency.. and of greater interest (to me)
” Kathy, what part of the wedding vows are you suggesting I remind her of? Is there something in them about sex?”
Christopher West(faculty member of the Theology of The Body Institute) explains this much better than I can Foo.
“The free exchange of consent properly witnessed by the Church establishes the marriage bond. Sexual union consummates it – seals it, completes it, perfects it. Sexual union, then, is where the words of the wedding vows become flesh. The very “language” that God has inscribed in sexual intercourse is the language of the marriage covenant: the free commitment to a union of love that is indissoluble, faithful, and open to children.
If spouses willfully contradict any of these goods of marriage in their sexual expressions, marital intimacy becomes less than God intended it to be. In turn, spouses, rather than renewing their vows through intercourse, contradict them. In practical terms, how healthy would a marriage be if spouses were regularly unfaithful to their vows? On the other hand, how healthy would a marriage be if spouses regularly renewed their vows, expressing an ever-increasing commitment to them?”
Oh, David. I have also of late been reading Susan Walsh’s blog HUS. Thought provoking stuff. She is a very perceptive and switched on lady.
I recently heard from a client that a mutual acquaintance of ours recently passed away at the age of 39 years, from a heart attack induced by a cocaine overdose. He was married three times. Unlike most cases, though, he actually divorced his first two wives because they complained that his drug habit was impacting his health.
It didn’t matter so much to any of his three wives—all successful career women—that they worked 50+ to support this chronically unemployed guy; or that he spent most of his free time sleeping with their ‘best friends’ and co-workers. It didn’t matter that he stole from them to support his drug habit or was in and out of jail continually. No, they were concerned with his health. He wasn’t very good-looking to start with, but his habits prematurely aged and emaciated him considerably. He was quite an intellect, too; he used to tell interesting stories about how the government used satellite TV dishes to control his mind and that the CIA was spraying chemicals on him, because ‘he knew too much’.
Obviously an Alpha, right? Apparently so, since he had 3 kids by his first wife; 2 by his second; and his third was so distraught at never having borne a child to him that she went to a sperm bank and got a donor that matched him right down to his astrological natal chart. No one knows how many kids he fathered by his numerous mistresses.
So, if any of us who knew him had bothered to learn Game, I suppose, all these women in his life would have abandoned him straightwith and turned to us because we offered them so much more… not that they could have seen it for themselves without Game.
Why does anyone take this absurd theory seriously? Is anyone going to argue with a straight face that his was a unique circumstance? I could point to dozens of losers just like him—all with a seraglio of willing women at their disposal.
“As I pointed out, a man who desperately, clingingly, needs his wife to be around is not going to be attractive to her”
No, but nor is the attitude that he can get someone else easily. I would have liked more context too. As for whether I like Game, I’ve already explained the kinds I like and don’t like. It’s nice to see some admit that it doesn’t always work.
“Why does anyone take this absurd theory seriously? Is anyone going to argue with a straight face that his was a unique circumstance? I could point to dozens of losers just like him—all with a seraglio of willing women at their disposal”
That explains in a nutshell how not to treat women, and especially the pathetic way that women shouldn’t act; the nature we’ve gained after the fall from Eden can be downright pathetic.
Whoops, didn’t mean to say “pathetic” twice so closely, though it does bear repeating.
Jennifer:
It’s true that men shouldn’t treat women like that guy did; but notice—he acted that way because it worked!
The reason thugs, punks, and other so-called ‘bad boys’ behave like they do is because they are rewarded for doing it. I’ll bet this guy got sex twice a day—he had at least 5 kids, too. But strong, responsible guys who really want to be husbands and fathers? They get to stay single or drug through divorce.
In fact I happen to know that his 3rd wife met this creep on Match.com. She was engaged to a successful entreprenuer at the time (yes, Gamers, she dumped an Alpha for this other guy. Maybe Game’s not infallible, after all?)
“he acted that way because it worked!”
I know he did, hence my words that pitiful women need to get their act together. Maybe he wasn’t even satisfied with his first or second wives because they were pushovers. But that doesn’t make it right; plenty of guys have demonstrated much less extreme and much more moral ways of attracting women with non-dark game. It also doesn’t justify what he put his children through.
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“plenty of guys have demonstrated much less extreme and much more moral ways of attracting women with non-dark game”
But who knows; maybe those foolish women were masochists anyway, who he either loved using or was attracted to; I wouldn’t be surprised if it was one vicious cycle with bad behavior on both sides. One Christian author recommends doing whatever your husband says, even if it’s sinning, and being nice no matter what he does ; she says this won her own hubby back after he temporarily left her for another woman. Well, even men don’t like a chump; he eventually left her AGAIN for another woman. And he ain’t coming back.
“Well, even men don’t like a chump; ” Ha ha .. very true Jen.
@Eric
Game predicts counter-intuitively that women will find men attractive whom no one would expect them to be attracted to (without knowing game). You see women being attracted to men who they have no business being attracted to, and present this as evidence that game doesn’t work. Roissy talks all the time about how women are attracted to bad boy thugs. These guys are often losers by men’s standards. Likewise, men we respect are cast off by women and treated with contempt. Again, game explains this.
Thanks Kathy, and good to see you! 🙂 Will miss you around Alte’s new blog, though I’m not a constant visiter.
Me
“As I pointed out, a man who desperately, clingingly, needs his wife to be around is not going to be attractive to her”
Jennifer
No, but nor is the attitude that he can get someone else easily.
Pardon me, but you do not know what you are talking about.
I would have liked more context too.
Then try asking for it, rather than creating a strawman to bash.
As for whether I like Game, I’ve already explained the kinds I like and don’t like.
And I’m supposed to care about that? Why?
It’s nice to see some admit that it doesn’t always work.
Who said that? I certainly didn’t.
“These guys are often losers by men’s standards. Likewise, men we respect are cast off by women and treated with contempt”
Boy are women confused. Game explains how confident and assertive men attract women sometimes regardless of their jobs, but not why some women are idiots. Plus, generally guys with big jobs have confidence, hence the double alpha aspect (they’re actual alphas of society, not just alphas by attitude).
You don’t need to care, anon, just go on talking like an ass.
Jennifer,
Game does explain why some women are idiots. Game even predicts the amount of women that will (sometimes or usually) act like idiots and allows for the not infrequent condition of Bat Shit Crazy.
Jennifer, this is the manophere, talking like an ass is welcome but shaming is laughed at.
I’d like to modify a quote by Bertram Chandler,
Come on in. This is the manosphere: you can spit on the mat and call the cat a bastard.
Which means; Speak as you wish because here there will be no floggings (cat-o-nine) for insolence.
Not completely for me, CS;. I think the only thing that totally explains it is in Genesis. Plus there’s no code to explain each and every spat or why it occurs. The very idea that some women choose losers over men with jobs..ugh. The sexual revolution and man-hating era turned everything on its head; as one article put it, it’s tragic that the picture of an alpha male used to be a soldier, and now it’s a slimy “mystery” guy with makeup and a pimp’s hat.
If I wanted to shame, CS, I would have cared more.
But, noted anyway.
“Subtitled: Psychologist says that “a huge number of the issues that we see in our clinics and therapy rooms are influenced by romantic fiction””
And Comic Book turn kids into murderers, Porn turn men into rapists, and Marilyn Manson is the leading cause for teenage suicide… /sarcasm.
Well, the point is that visual and fictional stuff can influence others.
Jennifer, there are things you do not know. And apparently, you do not know that you do not know them. If you are going to be arrogant, you have to be consistently right, and you have failed at that. If you wish to discuss things like an adult, then I suggest you start acting like one.
If you wish to be yet another female who trolls for flames, then start your own blog. Then you can post whatever you want, and the rest of us don’t have to read it. Win-win all around.
The problem is most people are absolutely spineless to anyone they imagine is in a “socially higher tier”. This gives the women and the other higher ranked people the opinion that all they have to do is up the ante till you crack. Cause you gotta be nice. I had one person, a guy actually, from a “protected” group, go through a whole manipulative sequence on me cause I had the audacity to point out he was being an ass. I’m doing him a favor, and at this point I don’t even know why. He went from stunt to stunt. The upset phase, then the “walk off” phase, then the “You gotta know whatever” phase, then the “You gotta let me tell you whatever phase”…. I think it was two or three phases later when he started whining.
Now, I’m not saying it took any guts at all for me to do this. It didn’t. He had nothing he could credibly do to me, and I’m doing the favor. He isn’t in my normal social group. He has nothing, no way, to retaliate. I’m even bigger than him.
So why the near-instantaneous transformation into attack mode? Cause I gotta be nice. Cause I’m a nice guy, right? So might as well come out swinging and howling in my face, eh? On a side note, he has seen me get mad before. He was aware of my volatile temper. So really, WTF? WTF? WTF?
That’s pretty much what most women are like. Even when you have a credible threat, and you fully intend to do it, WITH PLEASURE, they really don’t take you seriously. Cause, ya know, he acts nice, right?
That’s one of the big advantages of the “bad boy”. Women know better than to fly at him screaming like a nut. For example, does anyone believe that Richard Dawkins is going to get loony Rebecca Watson kicked off some conference panels? Or have a chat with her ex-husband and then a chat with a journalist who owes him a favor? Why shouldn’t he? She declared war, fangs bared and screaming insanely at a grossly stronger opponent. If she were a man, then she would be crushed. So why shouldn’t he crush Ms. Equal-Rights girl?
See, that’s what she is counting on, and why she would NEVER do that to an Alpha Bad Boy.
Ah, come on anon reader, Jen is not a troll. She is just a young woman who has strong opinions about stuff.
I like reading what she has to say. Differing opinions are good, and stimulate debate. Hey Jen and I don’t always agree, either.
Btw when Jen made this statement:
“It’s nice to see some admit that it doesn’t always work” (game)
And you said:
“Who said that? I certainly didn’t.”
She was referring to this statement from Eric: 😉
“So, if any of us who knew him had bothered to learn Game, I suppose, all these women in his life would have abandoned him straightwith and turned to us because we offered them so much more… not that they could have seen it for themselves without Game.
Why does anyone take this absurd theory seriously? Is anyone going to argue with a straight face that his was a unique circumstance? I could point to dozens of losers just like him—all with a seraglio of willing women at their disposal.”
Steph, Jen does have a point. Visual and fictional stuff can influence others.
I have a cousin who read loads of those trashy romance novels. Sure, they influenced her. Her expectations of men were not realistic.Because she was waiting for the kind of man she had read about to come in and sweep her off her feet she never married until in her thirties. And then only because she was desperate to have a family. She had two boys who are now in their teens. Her marriage is on the rocks. She and her husband have nothing in common.. She wants to find a “soul mate”
Everytime I hear a woman mention such nonsense about a soul mate I want to run out of the room screaming!
[D: She married a man she wasn’t attracted to or in love with. Now it is just a matter of finishing the countdown to when she discovers “she doesn’t love him anymore”. It’s all over but the crying.]
@Eric
Game isn’t fallible or infallible. It doesn’t exist. I know men who have been on both sides of the loser who got women and the successful man who can’t get a woman to save his life. These men have told me how when they were marginal and were lucky to make $10,000 a year and were barely employed if not unemployed, women were all over them. Now that they cleaned up their act and got high paying jobs (anywhere from $80K – $140K and in a few cases more) women want nothing to do with them. The response to this will be that they lost game. The fact is nothing changed other than their jobs and a few related things really. They remember what they did that got them women, and it no longer works.
They were no longer bad boys so women didn’t want them anymore. Nothing else happened. They prove that there wasn’t some “game” to lose.
“you have to be consistently right, and you have failed at that. If you wish to discuss things like an adult, then I suggest you start acting like one”
LOL Look who’s talking. And I thought this was a no-shame zone. If you wanted to be clear, you should have phrased your original statement about a man not needing his wife better.
“Steph, Jen does have a point. Visual and fictional stuff can influence others.”
I read trashy romance novels since I was six, watched Telenovelas and all that, so did my mother and she still married 34 years after the fact.
So I don’t like the implication that this is an universal phenomenon there are not studies in deep about this neither statistics proving that a huge portion of people are going to take this seriously. Were there kids that jumped of highs thinking they could fly like Superman? Sure. That meant that this minority of kids had issues that needed to be treated not that Superman comics should be burned and discontinued.
I mean does your relative was raised in an intact home by parents that gave her good lessons about love and marriage?
I really think this is a lazy way to blame the media instead of fixing families and couples, if real life is stable and concrete I doubt fantasy world can seduce a healthy woman,YMMV.
Thanks for the defense, Kathy; I became irate because Anon seemed to take my second response to him personally, brushing off my words and/or thinking they were arrogant, when they were not intended to be. I do listen and I do understand the basic problem, which is why I don’t fear game or damn it entirely anymore; I’ve left approving comments on the blogs of the men I mentioned earlier. And it wasn’t just Eric’s statement I responded to; Keoni (or Dalrock) pointed out that Keoni’s wife could have left or chosen not to respond to game, and I’ve seen men elsewhere tell guys to approach with confidence and not fear rejection, because it WILL happen and they need to accept that.
White, that’s an interesting point; it does show that game is no guarantee, though a guy with confidence will always have a better chance.
“Apex Fallacy causes them to mistake natural alpha traits as representing the common man.”
Very insightful, so as women climb the totem pole the only guys remaining attractive are apex men. So in effect game is mimicking apex behaviour, the corollary being that in the past beta behaviour used to be an attraction key.
So in effect the social fabric is screwed and game is just a maladaption to the new reality?
[D: I think (R)Evolutionary said it best when he described game as “feminism’s bastard child”. Feminism did two things. 1) It made men more cowed.htmwimpy, and 2) It made women need more alpha.]
Stephanie, even if someone doesn’t go crazy lusting after vampires or serial killers because they’re reminded of Edward Cullen, fiction can still be influential in a very subtle fashion. Porn’s a lot more harmful than Superman.
“Porn’s a lot more harmful than Superman.”
I also watched A LOT of porn when I was a teen and I still managed to keep myself virgin till I meet my now hubby. So what was porn supposedly do to me?
Yes, Steph, my cousin’s parents are still happily married after nearly fifty years of marriage.
Look, there is no doubt that some people are INDEED influenced by what they read. I also know a kid who jumped off a kitchen bench trying to fly like superman..
I read lots of sci-fi novels but I knew that it was fantasy.. There were no three headed aliens in Spaceships coming to conquer the Earth.. Dead set mate!
Romance novels are another kettle of fish, however.. My cousin was not the only woman I saw that was influenced by these romance novels.. Romance novels write unrealistically about men.. Women who have not had much to do with “real” men can and are subtlley influenced by these stories. It is much harder for them to separate fact from fiction.
Just as a constant stream of porn can influence a man, to have unrealistic expectations about women, too.
Would you say that a man who likes to watch his woman sitting naked on a chair smoking a cigarette whilst he is wanking off, is normal?
This young man 25 was heavily into watching porn.. Normal sex just wasn’t doing it for him.
His partner(who I had known for a few years-she was my hairdresser) left him a few months ago. She told me that she couldn’t handle his weird behaviour anymore. He never wanted to come inside of her…She blamed it on his constant consumption of porn on the net.
Just because you or your mother were not influenced by romance novels, does not mean that others have not been, Steph. 😉
Great response, Dalrock. I agree.
@Stephanie Rowling
Romantic literature (in the case of the study) shouldn’t be limited to Rosemary Rogers novels or big-budget Hollywood movies. It’s a cumulative effect. IOW, girl beta writers alpha attractors romantic movies pseudo-porn romantic novels sexy songs (from The Dream to old-school Prince, there’s no shortage of musicians getting paid to seduce for dollars) mothers telling them about “the one who got away (there’s a Roissy blogpost about a woman who dissolved a working marriage based on her 20 years prior one night stand with a DJ) sex neutral to positive feminists blather about only getting “married married” to your “soul mate” (while allowing yourself to be pumped and dumped by cute guys and ignoring non-cute guys)=romantic fiction. Porn movies (in which near-impossibly endowed men smash the cervices of”pretty girls”) just act as the cherry on a rotten sundae because they give sexually inexperienced women lofty/scary expectations (there’s no end to the cavalcade of nascent size queens in major cities.)
Tl;dr
Way too many women are looking for handsome, charming, intelligent, successful, telepathic/empathic men with nine-inch cock due to a culture which tells them from cradle to grave that the(ir) “perfect man” needs to have all of those things to be worthy of them (not better or even equal to them, literally worthy of giving them a ring and earning their obeisance/respect). From Twilight to EPL, women’s ideals in connubial endeavors are shaped by “the best is barely good enough, not the best isnt a consideration” when making a connection with a middle-class American girl.
Unless, of course, she meets a bad boy with the right combination of talent/power/influence and disdain to catch her eye.
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@ Foo:
You had asked about marital vows involving sex.
I submit that sex, and an obligation for regular sex, is implied in marriage. The marital relationship is a sexual relationship. In theory (and usually in practice) the one thing that differentiates your marriage from a man’s other relationships is that his wife is the only person he has sex with. IOW, sex is the one thing that differentiates a marriage from all other relationships.
So a man and his wife have sexual obligations to each other. Each are required to provide sex at reasonable intervals and only with each other.
@ Jennifer:
“pitiful women need to get their act together. Maybe he wasn’t even satisfied with his first or second wives because they were pushovers. But that doesn’t make it right; plenty of guys have demonstrated much less extreme and much more moral ways of attracting women with non-dark game. It also doesn’t justify what he put his children through.”
A couple of things:
1. Women don’t need to get their act together. Feminism has told them how super-awesome they are just because they have vaginas. And so women think they can say and do anything they want, anywhere they want, anytime they want. They need to be told no. Game does that.
2. I agree that non-dark game is the way to go. The way you game a wife is that you simply push back against her whims and ridiculous emotional manipulations. You tell her no when she’s being silly or unreasonable or frivolous. You ignore the fitness/shit testing. You never allow yourself to be manipulated by her emotional displays. When she withholds sex, you call her out on it. You tell her you know what she’s doing, and you tell her it’s not acceptable.
When push really comes to shove, and she starts saying things like “I’m just not physically attracted to you” or “I love you but I’m not in love with you”, you push back hard. You make it clear you won’t stay in such a marriage and that things need to change and that right soon. You make it clear that you aren’t the entire problem and that she needs to examine herself. You also make it clear that while you want her, you don’t need her. Because a husband does not need a wife who won’t submit to him, does not love him and does not respect him.
I disagree with this notion that a husband should not act as though he does not need his wife. If she is fitness testing him by saying things like the above, she already has one foot out the door of the marriage. So him gaming and pushing back hard essentially says “you’re either staying with me and things will be different; or don’t let the door hit you on the way out”. And that’s the right way to go because it forces her to make a clear choice one way or the other. And women sometimes need to be forced into that decisionmaking because it pushes them off the pedestal.
I want you becasue I NEED you. = unhealthy, codependant
I need you because I want you. = healthy
With the first statement, the need is for the other to fulfill some emptiness. No other can do this and so when failure happens, even in some small way, the codependant person sees the other cannot meet the need so is no longer wanted either.
Ah, FOO-EY CSPB.. Just because ya want something, doesn’t mean ya NEED it! 😉
@MaMu1977
To a point I agree with the accumulative effect that if certain thing is repeated over and over again it might affect people without a strong structure or/and morals.
WhatI think probably the issue is what kind of romance is being sold and the culture. As Latina I grew up reading Corin Tellado and watching Telenovelas and wfich is true a handsome rich guy was the leading man, but the heroine was usually a virginal modest hard working girl that surprise everyone by wining the leading man’s heart. The villains was usually the slutty,vain, selfish and entitled one so it might be that modern Romance shows the slut winning all the good stuff and having no consequences of their bad choices and actions. I had yet to read or watch a telenovela were the leading lady is pumped and dumped and ignores the cute guys. Now if that is the type of romance that Mills and Boon are selling then your problem is not the fantasy but what the fantasy is showing as “winning behavior”
I think you mistook the link to porn, most women don’t watch porn, when people complain about porn they talk about men having unrealistic expectations about women that are always horny with impossible hot bodies, also men are obsessed with penis size, another thing that most women don’t even think about it but men do think size is something basical of the “real man” so I really think you should check this out more.
And finally I would never compare Twilight with EPL. In EPL the fantasy and happiness in the woman is linked to she getting a divorce and traveling to the exotic world of second single-hood. In Twilight the fantasy is getting married to ONE guy and having a child. The Marriage is the exotic world. In fact none of my Twimom friends had read or watched EPL and very few of them are SATC fans, as many issues manosphere has with Twilight adding then to the “selling divorce” group shouldn’t not one of them. Every single character that is considered good and happy has been married for decades, even the bad vampires are completely monogamous and the only character that got a divorce is depicted as a childlike hare brained immature woman that emotionally abandoned her daughter for a young dick to ride, YMMV.
No, I disagree detinn. Women need to get their act together because they’re not even choosing the right men to begin with, and perhaps men aren’t either if they need step-by-step rules to avoid a long road of manipulation. If you’re in a good marriage of mutual love and respect, your spouse should be someone you’re completely linked to and love; you may be able to survive without them, but simply “wanting” them is not marriage, it’s a pleasure relationship like dating. But then, we’re not talking of faithful marriages and non-manipulative spouses; all the more depressing, that people see it as a survival game.
Jennifer–
Tight game expertly calibrated to the woman’s particular personality type and degree of hotness does always work in the sense of greatly increasing the guy’s chances, but it certainly doesn’t work equally well for every game practitioner, no matter how much they theoretically understand game.
As well for the vast majority of guys who don’t possess consummate acting skills, game must also be adapted for their own personalities and strengths and weaknesses to be most effective.
Also let’s remember game isn’t everything. In the casual sex that MIGHT lead to serious LTRs market, a guy’s status, game, looks (mostly height, fitness and appearance of masculine dominance), and money or money potential matter in that order. In the marriage market, status, money or the potential for money, loyalty/steadiness/faithfulness, game and looks matter in that order for most women, especially more good girl types.
So no learning game to the nth degree isn’t gonna give a low status nerdy lab tech, short guy the ability to pull 9’s of for that matter 7’s. Might get him a cute 6 though instead of a 4 or 5.
Sounds about right, David.
Jen: I was being facetious. Of course women need to get their acts together. Feminism has done women a terrible disservice by telling them they are awesome just the way they are. And many women are making poor choices in their men.
detinennui32
“When she withholds sex, you call her out on it. You tell her you know what she’s doing, and you tell her it’s not acceptable.”
Right in premise – but not quite on point. You need to begin the relationship so that she NEVER actually withholds sex to start with.
On the day that she accepts your proposal of marriage (or I suppose you accept hers), when you establish the rules for marrying, you both agree that sex is an integral part of marriage. You both commit that baring unusual circumstances (injury, illness, other obvious situations), physical and emotional intimacy, is freely available. You both commit that sex will neither be used as a reward, currency, or a weapon. You agree that failing to honor this commitment ENDS THE MARRIAGE.
Before I enter into a LTR this commitment (requirement) is unambiguously established. Openly and formally. At that point in the relationship, generally, women are willing and happy to do this. I hear a lot of “I’m not like that.” “I’d never use sex to get my way.” “You must have had a bad experience. Why would this be a problem? When I love someone it goes without saying.” “I feel exactly the same. I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t.” Then eventually she find’s a situation where she really wants to use sex as a lever. Because of your “mutual” agreement, they never start out by actually withholding sex. They always test the waters to see the cost of so doing. They test the water either through jokes or complaints.
Usually, before you get complaints you’ll get “jokes.” Jokes are things like “I guess I’d better be nice to you or I’m out the door. RIght?” This gets a “joking” reply like “Well sure, I’m too old to hang around where I’m not wanted. Usually said with a smile and a pat on her ass.” Jokes are usually pretty harmless.
Complaints are more serious and reflect a situation that must be addressed and nipped in the bud before it festers. Complaints sound like this: “You are only with me for sex, otherwise you wouldn’t have that stupid rule.” Or “I don’t feel like I have a choice, you aren’t being fair.”
To complaints, I have one response. “Words don’t show you love me, actions do. People who love each other don’t use intimacy as a weapon. If you don’t love me, then it shouldn’t bother you if you end the relationship. Using intimacy as a weapon ends it, exactly as if you used words to tell me it’s over. What are you trying to tell me?” Then they decide if they want to continue or not.
There is a lot of discussion here about how to screen if a woman is marriage material. This particular arrangement is a pretty good one. If she starts to complain about this part of the relationship, she is NOT marriage material, at least not for you. I was in a very intense and enjoyable LTR for several years. She started complaining about this rule less than a year into the relationship, but never actually withheld sex or otherwise broke the deal. It was a sort of “shit test” I suppose, but she always folded at the gate. Usually, her folding was shortly thereafter followed by her initiating an episode of incredible sex where she demonstrated that she badly wanted to stay with me.
Of course you have to be 100% willing to walk away from the LTR/marriage if she pulls the pin on the grenade and she has to believe to her core that you will do so.
@jennifer:
“Um, wrong. Marriage is nothing if you find your spouse replaceable.”
You’ve got this wrong. Marriage is nothing if a spouse makes themselves replaceable.
I don’t think that game as such provides much value in a marriage. But the most of the examples as applied to marriage is not so much about gaming a wife as about communicating and relating to the wife so that she understands that she has a great deal to lose by failing to handle her end of the marriage.
Either spouse can make themselves replaceable. Feminism teaches women that men are replaceable by definition. The legal system is weighted in a way that makes divorce, on average, much more costly for a man. The divorce industry, reenforces this at every opportunity. If the woman buys into this, she creates a “marriage” where she is not only replaceable, but probably must be replaced or at least ejected from the marriage if the man is to survive.
The truth that Dalrock pursues here is that in most cases, divorce is very bad for the woman, and that she has a lot to lose.
So how does a man combat this organized assault on the institution of marriage and his family? He must be sure that his wife sees him as valuable and not worth losing. That is he must communicate and relate to her in a way that invalidates the messages of the forces out to smash the marriage. At the first sign that her hamster has begun to spin up, he must dump a bucket of cold water on the little rodent. Ideally he’d drown it, but the little things seem immortal. If you treat your husband appropriately, and handle your end of the marriage, and remember to appreciate what you have, then game will not enter your life. If, on the other hand, you let your hamster get loose, game may be in your future.
Game is not the only way to do this. It may not even be a good way. But for those men for whom it works, so be it. They are after all fighting to keep their marriages and families intact and happy. Pretty much any tool that make that effort successful is probably worth using.
Hmm, very worthwhile points, Fred. I don’t see game as a threat to avoid, but being overly-methodical would be bad.
Dalrock:
I don’t think that Game explains female behavior so much as it defines it (i.e., tells us what we already know). Personality traits are more often a combination of subconscious factors instilled in people from childhood; and perceptual concepts from the environment. For example: if I went to a singles’ event, when I enter the room women aren’t sizing me up as an ‘alpha’ or some other archetype. What they see is another male pig who’s only interested in sex; because that is how they’ve been taught to regard all men. It doesn’t matter in reality whether I fit such a description or not; I’ll be treated as though it does. Game doesn’t address issues like this; the misandryism and narcissicism that women have instilled them. It merely instructs men on coping with them.
Women are attracted to losers because of the same cultural indoctrination. They are taught that they must be superior to men; hence they can’t function in a relationship unless the male involved actually IS inferior to them. This is why when they do have relationships with normal, stable men; they fight, obstruct and try to emasculate him at every opportunity.
White and Nerdy:
Yes, you’re exactly right. Most of Game Theory, from what I’ve read of it, seems to be based some amalgamation of some now-discredited psychological theories that were in vogue during the 1950s and 60s.
Just like the guys you know, I’ve seen the same thing happen too. In fact, I didn’t mention it in the post to Jennifer, but the story I was telling has a further sequel: the ‘entrepreneur’ who was jilted in favor of the ‘Snowman’ was deeply depressed afterwards. He told me then that ‘maybe if I started acting like a jerk, I’d attract women too.’ I thought that was only his frustration speaking; but he put it into actual practice. He abuses women with a vengeance now; and has no shortage of women who are his obedient slaves.
He probably was also influenced by his brother, a guy about my age (late 30s) who still lives with his mom and spends all day playing video games. Not especially handsome, with his greying goatee, pierced nipples, and earrings; and the kilt he wears in public does throw a little suspicion onto his ‘alpha qualities’. In the dozen years I’ve known his brother, he’s never held a job longer than 6 months and never been without a girlfriend (or actually several of them) for longer than 6 weeks. Part of those 6 weeks was because he was in rehab. As far as I know, he’s had no kids; although he was trying to borrow money to pay for abortions a couple of times.
Really, I tend to believe that this whole ‘alpha’ business is a rationalization too. There has to be SOME reason to continue wanting sex with American women, after all. If these guys can convince themselves that women really desire them for their masculinity, it might make sex at least tolerable. But in the long run, it does men more harm than good.
I haven’t read the 158 comments yet, (!) but I just wanted to say: This is one of the best, insightful articles I’ve read so far here.
Honestly, even after reading Athol’s book, I had a hard time understanding how it fit into marriage. You put ‘gaming’ in proper perspective for me.
Thanks Dalrock. Now I’ll wade though the Novella of comments! Good Lord D. Your popularity is starting to strain my patience. 😉
Eric—
Sounds like you’re talking about NLP or neurolinguistic programming, which did arise out of some 60s and 70s clinical psychology theories. Only a few game gurus use it or at least use it extensively. It’s a small part of current ideas about game. Roissy had one post illustrating some techniques from it that can work.
Most game teachers essentially just observed successful seducers, observed what tended to work, and then experimented a lot themselves. That’s what Mystery did, and then developed a sort of most tiem effective steps of seduction theory.
Roissy has grounded game in evo psych theory.
Sheesh! The things a guy has to go through to get into his woman’s pants! I can understand how many guys just get fed up and can no longer be bothered. Too much hard work. Yes feminism has a lot to answer for. Killing women’s enjoyment of sex with the man that they love and replacing it with an attiitude of entitlement and, superiority … A man would not have to game his wife if she really enjoyed having sex with him.. My husband has never had to game me into having sex, with him. In fact on the odd occasion that we have had an argument , I always cave first.. He knows it too. I come crawling back, because I desperately want him him. LOLSad that women seem to be forgoing love and intimacy with a good man for…. What??? . Please excuse spelling mistakes. On the phone again. Down South spending four wonderful days alone qith Hubby. Have him all to mysself.. Kids away on camp.. 😀
“He abuses women with a vengeance now; and has no shortage of women who are his obedient slaves”
God Almighty.
Doug:
I wasn’t thinking of NLP, but that probably enters into it. The two trends Game seems to pattern most closely, at least from what I’ve seen, is some of Carl Jung’s Analytical-Archetype Theory and Eric Berne’s Transactional Analysis. In fact, Berne used to refer to his whole method as ‘Game Theory’. There are also elements of Fritz Perls’ Eslan School in it as well.
I’ve never investigated where Roissy actually may have gotten his sources; I only noted the similarities between much of his thought and some of these others. From how you described it, he was somewhat eclectic and it probably draws on many sources.
Kathy/Jennifer:
“I can understand how men would get fed up and no longer want to be bothered…killing a woman’s enjoyment of sex and replacing it with an attitude of entitlement and superiority…a man would not have to Game his wife if she really enjoyed having sex with him”
Exactly. One of the reasons why I advocate that men pursue women from non-feminist influenced cultures is because women there typically don’t have the same attitude of entitlement and superiority and see relationships as a give-and-take between equals. Men don’t need Game or any of these other ‘techniques’. They can just be themselves and be respected for it. Game is really only needed in a culture dominated by neo-feminist Amazons who treat men as rivals, enemies, and competitors.
Part of the problem with Game is, while it recognizes the cultural tendency of our women to reject worthy men and pursue losers, does nothing to change women’s fundamental attitudes. Men who follow Game fail to understand that the women they ‘conquer’ STILL despise them as males. Worse still, these men don’t realize that, in spite of their increased sexual conquests and female attention; they’ve locked themselves into a downward spiral from which they may never extricate themselves.
If men have to become more like these losers and jerks to obtain female favors, they, by necessity, have to turn from the path of self-improvement (or, in religious terms the way to moral perfection) and pursue the directly opposite course. To make it even worse, the natural (or God-given) tendency of men to possess and protect a female for procreative purposes turns from a social benefit into a societal liability. This is because these men—in order to sustain these kinds of relationships—have to sink to lower and lower levels of degeneracy since they are in constant competition with other males who are WORSE than themselves. The best course for men to follow is escaping these kinds of relationships by escaping the kinds of women who make them possible in the first place.
Brilliant commentary Eric. I have to say that I totally concur with what you say, Unfortunately the pickings are lean for many men.. Having to be on guard with sharp game in order to keep a woman in line and so, ensuring a steady supply of sex would be draining in the long term I would think. Better as you say for a man to seek out a woman who has not been brainwashed by the feminist culture.. Surely a man should be able to be himself around the woman he loves and be loved by her in return for who he is not what he can give her… Women who truly love their men will always want to have sex with him. The more they make love the deeper the bond grows, the better the sex becomes… The physical relationship between a man and his wife should take precedence over the self centered and often trivial pursuits of many women. If more women spent more time having frequent sex with their husbands they would understand this.and would never relinquish such joy and mutual pleasure ..and the connection that results…. The two really do become one flesh .. Even after 15 years of marriage sex is paramount in my relationship with my husband. . . And as corny as this may sound I Still feel like I am walking on air afterwards.
I find myself frustrated by the notion of game in a marriage. I don’t think it is helpful to the conversation to conflate game used for the purpose of hooking up with the need for two people in a committed relationship to recognize each other’s value and what they have to lose if they do not so do.
A man does not need “sharp game” to “keep a woman in line”. He needs to know himself, his worth and not allow that to be impinged by her hamster. Game is about manipulation. It is fine to get laid. Up to the point where a man decides he wants a serious relationship with a woman I have no problem with game; None what so ever. But game is not so fine in a LTR or a marriage; LTR’s and marriages require respect and honesty.
I’ve started a blog specifically to discuss this aspect of relationships. I also want to discuss the conflation of various traits ascribed to Alphas, Betas, Omegas, and Sigmas and any other greek symbols we care to assign, by posters and commenters in the manosphere. This conflation of traits is not helpful to our ongoing discussion. Not every positive trait is “alpha” nor is every negative trait “beta”. We do ourselves a grave disservice when we conflate things in this way.
I have my first post up on my blog. If you are interested your participation is welcome.
Yes a marriage requires honesty and repect from both parties . However, it appears from the many comments I have read from (American) men including male bloggers that a certain amount of game, manipulation…. Call it what you will is required to maintain the relationship and keep it on an even keel. Why should a man have to do all the work here to enhance the relationship….. The problem is as Eric points out the kind of woman that the man is dealing with ie one that has been brainwaahed by feminism… Of course game in marriage is a form of manipulation. A littke bit of game can be useful and fun for both parties… However when it has to be an ongoing thing… Not so good. Silly women who have been married several years seem to have unrealist notions of how their husbands should act.. They want to be showered with Attention .. romantic gestures and other such nonsense often employed during the dating process.. Which is natural when a man wants to attract a woman he is interested in. That he should still have to continue to woo his wife so to speak when they have married, is unfair.. Just go and read Athol Kay’s blog to see what I mean. He contrives situations to improve his chances of getting laid and is advising others to follow his example.. Give her a 10 second kiss he says!!! Foo-ey!.. Much of what Kay advises seems to be tactics that in actual fact pander to these unrealistic notions that women have… Take her on a shopping spree and then out to dinner!! Truly how many men want to do that? Why should they have to? Respect and honesty? :::a two way street. It’s looking very much like a one way street to me here.. .
@Eric
That’s pretty much the case. Game consists of nothing but ideas stolen from someplace else. Most of these ideas have been long since discredited.
It is a rationalization, but I suspect it’s as simple as being unable to break free from the idea that a man’s worth is determined by women.
And gamers lie about this fact by saying over and over again that game is self improvement when it’s the opposite of that in reality.
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Kathy, I disagree that game in a marriage must be, or should be, anything like dishonest manipulation.
“If men have to become more like these losers and jerks to obtain female favors, they, by necessity, have to turn from the path of self-improvement (or, in religious terms the way to moral perfection) and pursue the directly opposite course. To make it even worse, the natural (or God-given) tendency of men to possess and protect a female for procreative purposes turns from a social benefit into a societal liability. This is because these men—in order to sustain these kinds of relationships—have to sink to lower and lower levels of degeneracy since they are in constant competition with other males who are WORSE than themselves. The best course for men to follow is escaping these kinds of relationships by escaping the kinds of women who make them possible in the first place”
Eric, you’re a wise and deep guy. Fred, I appreciate your points too! Very refreshing clarity of mind.
I’m late to this discussion but I’ll throw this out there.
My wife is perfect in pretty much every way a wife could be expected to be. She is good looking, intelligent, nurturing, compassionate, feminine, likes sex, and is committed to the marriage. I literally have no reason to want to walk or do anything to risk the marriage. In the name of honesty, I’ve gotten offers to cheat on her from some really good looking women, and I’ve been tempted, but have stayed faithful. What is the point of this? It’s simple, I CHOSE to honor my vows and keep my word. She isn’t doing anything wrong, or slipping in her game that anyone could point to in terms of “that’s why he was tempted”. This is the lie of purist game. You can be tempted even if nothing is done wrong. What makes a person stay faithful or not is themselves. You can’t assume responsibility for their actions nor can they do it for yours. I can’t run enough game on my wife to keep her from cheating and she can’t do the same. The only person you can be responsible for is yourself.
Game has a place in meeting your partners needs, and keeping the marriage fun, but game alone does not a good marriage make.
Well said, Timitz!
Timitz, that’s gold, my friend, GOLD!
Lol Jennifer.. I happen to agree with Timitz.
He said:
“Game has a place in meeting your partners needs, and keeping the marriage fun, but game alone does not a good marriage make”
Whilst I said this in my previous comment.
“A little bit of game can be useful and fun for both parties… However when it has to be an ongoing thing… Not so good”
So we are basically in agreeance on that point..
Hey I’ve used game on my husband to get sex.. He knows that I am doing it though.. So while I am being manipulative I am not being dishonest.. Do you see the difference.
Slwerner once said that he uses game on his wife too, and that she also knows that he is doing it.
“Do you see the difference”
Most certainly 🙂
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