

Are Geeks The New Alpha Male? - roblewis
http://www.techvibes.com/blog/are-geeks-the-new-alpha-male

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jcl
_To feel safe, secure and taken care of, girls are now turning to men with
brains. These women see a direct correlation between brains and dollah-dollah
bills y’all and geeks have brains for days._

It's a weak correlation; there are plenty of poor geniuses. Displays of wealth
probably work better than displays of smarts.

~~~
orangecat
_Displays of wealth probably work better than displays of smarts._

And displays of social status are better than both.

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dkarl
_The alpha male has long been achieved by means of physical prowess (meow)._

First, not after high school, no. Second, being the alpha male has more to do
with how other men think of you than about how women seek mates. Third, women
have always found intelligence inherently attractive, and smart people who
have a hard time with the ladies have always avoided acknowledging that
because it would mean acknowledging they have other defects that hold them
back.

~~~
alexgartrell
Being physically larger and stronger makes people look to you for leadership.
It's hardwired biological behavior. Maybe in a million years this'll change.

~~~
dkarl
Height matters. So does general health. That's not the same as "prowess." Now,
I don't deny that prowess is helpful. Julius Caesar was known as an excellent
horseman and a brave leader in battle, Vladimir Putin milks his judo black
belt, etc. But the claim that athleticism has traditionally been the key to
power is clearly overblown. Bill Bradley, Jack Kemp, and how many others?
"[T]he leader of the pack has long been achieved by sweat and blood" is simply
untrue.

Being a good athlete may make other kids look instinctively to you, but that's
just an opportunity to learn leadership skills. Other kids have different
opportunities, and after high school, those opportunities multiply and
diversify. Prowess doesn't guarantee that you'll develop alpha male skills,
and even in high school, there are star players who don't have much influence
over their peers. Likewise, on any high school football team, you'll find one
or two starters who aren't the best performers at their position but provide
valuable leadership for the other players.

People really need to sort out two distinct concepts: social rank and
masculinity. Geeks talk a lot about "alpha males," but they're also jealous of
the beefy guy down the street who washes his Corvette shirtless and always has
a girl hanging around. It doesn't matter whether that guy gets ordered around
by a short bald guy _and would have been in the Paleolithic, too._ The dude is
masculine. And he gets chicks (which I suspect is the common factor that
creates geeky interest in both social rank and masculinity.)

While social rank and masculinity are not entirely unrelated, geeks conflate
them way too much, and I think this article is a prime example. Rough, tough,
strong, assertive guys can end up as leaders _or_ followers, socially climbing
_or_ falling relative to their origins, and that's been true in every complex
society, meaning the phenomenon has been around for thousands of years. Geeks
are interested in both social rank and masculinity and would benefit from
treating them as distinct ideas, but they prefer to lump them both under the
label of "alpha male" because it sounds more intellectual (and probably less
homoerotic, to boot.)

[Sorry for the huuuuuge edit after I was already modded up once....]

~~~
byrneseyeview
When did we last elect a fat President? When did we last elect an ugly one?

Since the invention of television and the dawn of universal suffrage,
politicians have gotten taller, fitter, and more attractive. There's a reason.

~~~
dkarl
Bill Clinton was fat, even when he was elected. As for the general trend in
favor of tall, attractive presidents, the top dog out of a field of millions
is going to have most of the major helpful assets. There's no disputing that
height and attractiveness are helpful.

~~~
byrneseyeview
He was 6'2" and weighed around 225 pounds. So he was chubby, but I have never
met a woman who would admit to finding him ugly.

"Helpful assets" is one way to put it. But I'm advocating a stronger
hypothesis: when lots of people can vote, and they can watch candidates on TV,
we will not have an ugly President. We'll have very charismatic average-
looking presidents, or really stupid great-looking presidents. But we won't
have ugly, brilliant ones.

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orangecat
No, our genes aren't that smart. For the same reason that sex doesn't stop
being enjoyable when using birth control, women won't stop being attracted to
socially dominant men because the shy geeks have better earning potential.

~~~
camccann
Well, given enough time, women will prefer men who provide more advantages to
her children.

Of course, "earning potential" actually doesn't matter much either, in a
wealthy society where death from poverty is rare. Instead, look at the people
who are having lots of kids vs. few or none. Don't underestimate the power of
vertical memetic transmission, either--breeding rapidly is more viable today
than ever before as a means of promoting ideas.

Genetic engineering will probably throw everything out the window long before
selection pressures could do much anyhow.

------
brandnewlow
<http://roissy.wordpress.com>

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mburney
If we accept this writer's theory, it would be more plausible to say that
women desire to get impregnated by jocks (w/ physical strength and social
intelligence) but then have their kids raised by geeks (w/ money and abstract
intelligence).

I've read a stat somewhere that claimed at least 10% of fathers are not
raising their actual sons (and they are unaware of it). Unfortunately I can't
find the study.

~~~
dkarl
Why do you assume jocks have social intelligence?

~~~
DavidCh
Because they usually have a lot of friends.

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gxs
No.

Related side note: the researcher that coined the term alpha male recently
redefined it.

According to him, the alpha male that typically comes to mind is a
misconception as alpha wolves aren't alpha wolves through some violent
usurpation. Rather, they become alpha males in much the same way that a human
Dad does. As the oldest and provider for the familiy, he is the natural
leader.

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shalmanese
No.

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flipper
From my own experience, women of above-average intelligence and education tend
to seek men who are at least as intelligent and educated as they are. Within
that pool they will still prefer men who are are socially well-adjusted, good
looking, and rich, probably in that order of importance.

So if you're a male geek looking for love, whether your IQ is 130 or 160 (the
pool of women doesn't increase much from one to the other), you need to work
on your social skills. Actually you boys in the 160+ range need to work a bit
harder as you spend so much time thinking about esoterica your 'game' is
probably quite weak.

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auston
In my short life (in miami), I've experienced the following:

Young women (18-24) seem to be trending towards males with influence of some
sort & a sense of humor - so if you're "well connected" but not well off,
"chicks can dig that" or if you're "well known" (where people stop you on the
street) & of course, if you're rich or appear to be rich.

I suppose all of them _could_ require brains, but not all of them do.

~~~
camccann
Humor and social skills _absolutely_ require brains, though. Social status
games are what our brains are _built_ for; abstract and analytic thinking may
be the intellectual power behind the march of technology, but in all
likelihood that's probably just an accident, in evolutionary terms.

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DavidCh
Wealthy men have always been the alpha males. Geek doesn't necessarily =
wealthy.

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endergen
It's good to differentiate between who girls are willing to date(ie have
companionship and sexual relations) versus who they will marry(ie. Have kids,
Pool resources, Grow old together if they are particularly romantic).

Attractiveness is so much more important when dating as the only real
advantage of a dating partner over a friend is the sex. So you tend to date
based on attraction. Where as when you are thinking long term, you look for a
larger set of attributes, such as earning power, emotional stability,
communication, etc. (Of course some people date with the intent of find a
partner. But the point is easier to make if you think of it in terms of the
extremes of dating for fun versus dating to find 'the one')

Either way, there are guys who are both highly intelligent and athletic. They
are going mop the floor of either extreme overall anyway. So in the end, yes
brains matter more now, but good luck competing with taller more attractive
and nearly intellectually equivalent guys.

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tehdik
HAHAHA. Only on sites like this and reddit.

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Luyt
ESR writes in his 'How to be sexy' essay: "Being an alpha male in some status
hierarchy changes your body language, your sex-hormone levels, and the smell
of your sweat. Women home in on men with these traits [...]".

The idea is that if you're a core developer on a project, you will gain alpha-
male status from it. It doesn't really matter what kind of project it is. So
this is a way in which hackers can become irrestibly attractive to the other
sex.

The essay is at <http://catb.org/~esr/writings/sextips/sexy.html>

~~~
quellhorst
Quantify the advice you receive. <http://lilug.org/w/images/a/a2/Esr.jpg>

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matwood
First read "How To Win Friends and Influence People." If you apply the rules
in the book and are at least an average looking guy you should not have any
problems finding dates.

Add in some gym time and some pop culture into your daily RSS feeds and you're
all set.

When you find a girl you like, slowly introduce your geek side. She'll think
it's cute. Plus, nowadays everyone uses computers in one way or another so any
geek tendencies are not going to be that big of a stretch to understand.

Really, it's not that hard.

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dkasper
Important to realize he is using the term "geeks" to refer to smart people as
a whole (not techies). After that the article makes a lot more sense.

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cmgarcia
No, I don't believe most women see a correlation between brains and money. I
believe they see a correlation of displays of wealth and money. Duh.

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thewileyone
Reminds me of a line from Revenge of the Nerds:

"Jocks only think about sports, nerds only think about sex. "

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EliRivers
No.

~~~
amock
Why is this comment at -1 while another comment with the same content posted a
few minutes later is at 18?

~~~
noonespecial
I've seen this happen a couple of times and wondered about it. This is a
particularly good example of it because there are so few comments, its likely
that both are visible to most readers. "No" should universally get 0 because
it adds as much to the discussion.

All I can offer is shalmanese is an old account with much karma and EliRivers
is a new account with none. Also the higher scoring one was posted 4-5 minutes
earlier.

~~~
nandemo
Usually "no" adds nothing to the discussion. However, in this context I read
it as "Obviously, no. The post author clearly hasn't put much thought on what
they wrote, so let's not even bother dissecting it". In a way, it is a
constructive comment in the sense that it prevents fruitless discussion.

Of course one could just flag the post but that isn't as visible.

