"You'll be pissing someone else's blood before we're through! We're gonna bring the party to you!"

-Jimmy Pop

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It comes up all the time here: "This girl I'm interested in is making me wait for sex. I'd be cool with it, but I found out that she used to hook up with random strangers. This isn't fair!" "Dude, this is a classic case of AF/BB. She's just using you and/or cheating on you." Yeah, no. I don't buy it. I can see how people think AF/BB fits this situation, but with a little more scrutiny I don't think it holds up. Instead, I think most cases are actually men dealing with post-crash women. What is the crash?

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First, we need to talk about addiction. Most addicts, with luck, will eventually crash. The crash is the point where they finally become aware that they have a big problem and decide to take action to try to solve it. It might be a soft crash; like friends staging an intervention, or watching Trainspotting. It could also be a hard crash, perhaps vehicular manslaughter. Regardless, the victim of addiction resolves to recover and beat their addiction. Maybe they do and maybe they don't. Here's the thing: beating addiction is really just stalemating it. Completely beating alcoholism means being able to drink as desired without it becoming a problem or risking a loss of control. This is not feasible for most addicts. Instead, they will stalemate their addiction, which means they'll achieve sobriety but they won't touch a drink ever again. If they do, it will be accompanied with fear of relapsing, and it won't be enjoyed as it would for a normal person. As a result, the recovered addict is changed by the experience. They won't return to the person they were before. They'll be developed, for better or worse.

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What does that have to do with AF/BB and PPD? Well, most young adults develop a mild addiction to hedonism, not to any particular vice so much but rather to the entire concept of vice. High schoolers and college kids typically seek to party, get high, and get laid. The important part is how they transition from this era into greater adulthood. Some will simply grow out of it and party less as other priorities take hold, like holding down a decent job or raising a child, but will still be able to have a good time when the occasion is right. For others though, they will crash (whether because they hit "the wall" or ran out of cash or woke up with the worst hangover ever), and like a more stereotypical case of addiction, they will end up with an aversion to the lifestyle they previously enjoyed. This can be subtle (a commitment to healthier behaviors) or drastic (joining a church/cult). Nonetheless, the result is adults that have distanced themselves from hedonism.

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The thing is, when men undergo this shift, it's typically considered "maturity" but for women "hypocrisy" is declared. That's not to say that AF/BB doesn't exist; I'm sure there are some awful manipulative women that make a habit of harvesting simps, but I don't think it's common at all. Instead, I think what usually happens is that women party hard in their 20's, crash, and then end up dating someone who becomes frustrated with the aversion they've developed. I empathize with both sides here; I understand how frustrating it is for men who feel like they missed out on all the fun that their new partner had without them and won't repeat. I also understand how frustrating it is for the women who are trying to work on themselves and being told that their progress is undesirable. Additionally, this also contributes to people judging each other for n-count; inevitably a man/woman with a higher n-count is more likely to have burned out his/her pleasure principle) previously.

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So no, I don't think women switching from slut to prude has anything to do with alphas/betas or dual mating strategy in most cases. I think men tend to tell themselves and each other that because it's easier than admitting they missed out/were barred from a key developmental stage that they can't get back; that being a "late bloomer" is actually awful and there isn't really any catching up for the vast majority. It's just doom. Additionally, I think there's some systemic factors that come into play with men being more likely to miss out on early adulthood hedonism, but I'll save that for my next post: "Shouldn't TRP embrace communism?"