I would note as a matter of clarification that I think they are less concerned about insulting me than they are reassuring themselves that there is no possible way they could ever be beta males, whatever their definition of ‘beta male’ is. By all indications their definition is something along the lines of “a man who sees women as something other than a mute dispensary of sandwiches and boobies” and/or “a man who does not live in fear of everyone else not continually affirming his internal assessment of personal status,” gussied up in language that allows them not to have to deal with these essential facts of their own nature. But inasmuch as insulting me is part of the mechanism of reassuring themselves, I am offered the insult.While John is a BETA by Roissy's binary sexual hierarchy, he is a delta with strong gamma tendencies in the socio-sexual hierarchy. But Rapey McRaperson shouldn't be insulted by being identified as a low delta for the obvious reason that it isn't an insult. It is merely an observation of his behavioral tendencies and an identification of his place on the normal human hierarchy. And since John isn't merely comfortable with, but proud of, his passive-aggressive snarkiness, his suppliant behavior towards women, his white knighting, his discomfort with traditional masculinity and his lack of confidence in his own right to define himself, it would be all but impossible for him to consider such an accurate identification as an insult.
I’m not insulted because, a) I consider the source, b) I don’t mind being seen as someone who does not view women through a tangled bramble of fear, ignorance and desire, c) when I step into a room, I don’t neurotically spend my time tallying up who in the room has higher status than I do, and who doesn’t. I am a grown-up, for God’s sake. Paranoid status anxiety is tiring. Also, you know. I’m pretty happy with my life and who I am, which makes me rather less vulnerable to the presumed snipings of others, particularly those who don’t have any notable participation in my life. Yes, yes, I’m a beta male, the worst of all possible males. Fine. Moving along.
John is, by his own admission, happy with his life. I think he's done very well for someone with his various handicaps. It is not at all a bad thing for anyone that the low deltas and gammas of the world can find mates, find satisfaction in their lives, and procreate. Civilization depends upon it. However, it is deeply unfortunate that John is using his success to tear down civilization and support the very forces that will render future men of his rank miserable. By constantly pushing for feminism and "equality", John is promoting a future where more men are raised in fatherless poverty like he was, only they will not get the support from the more stable elements of society to lift them out of it that he did because people like John and his readership are actively attacking those traditional elements and attempting to eliminate them, or at the very least, reduce their societal influence. Like an ungrateful dog, John is biting the hand that fed him.
Like most men with no Game, natural or otherwise, John doesn't understand any of it. The idea that any ALPHA fears and doesn't understand women is risible on its face. We don't fear women in the slightest and we understand them so well that we have to overcome the instinctive habit of making use of them whenever and wherever it pleases us. John doesn't understand that in the world he is promoting, the alphas and sigmas will maintain actual harems instead of the virtual ones we now possess, and the low deltas and gammas will be forced to go without entirely, as only omegas now do, because the elimination of the traditional strictures on female desire permits women to pursue their natural inclinations, which has never, in the entire history of Man, been to have sex with short, chubby, feminized men of low social rank.
But his biggest failure of understanding concerns the purpose of men like me and others in the androsphere. John is again projecting his own status anxiety and other-focused mindset in asserting that anyone is attempting to bolster their own Alpha credentials by insulting him. It is social and sexual dominance that makes a man ALPHA, not the metaphorical dunking of John's head in the Internet toilet. Given that John is himself, contextually speaking, a lesser alpha in the SFWA community, and considering that he could no doubt exert an amount of sexual dominance over the women of that, shall we say, differently-attractive, group if he wished, he really shouldn't have too much trouble grasping the basic group dynamics involved. Alphas need no more reassurance of their rank than to walk into a room containing women, just as John doesn't need any more reminder of his position in the SFWA than to simply show up at a science fiction convention.
Men and women alike are better off when they have an understanding of the male socio-sexual hierarchy and their current place within it, or in relation to it. John's rank, my rank, and any other individual's rank, for that matter, is wholly irrelevant except in that they happen to provide concrete and observable examples which may help people better understand the concepts involved.
