Where did the ‘nice guy phenomenon come from?

psuedoscientist500 · 2022-10-02T18:24:47+00:00

From what I've experienced, there's a rather sizable gap in communication between men and women in the "nice guy" trope. I also think that both men and women should take some ownership in creating the monster that is the nice guy syndrome.

Hopefully this might shed some light on the missing pieces of the conversation that I think both genders are missing.

Growing up as a man that is attracted to women there is a wide chasm between what some, but not all women say they're attracted to, and what they actually go for. The impression we get is that if being respectful, kind, and hard working are desirable traits to women. However what we see is that there are rather substantial groups of women that desire men with the exact opposite traits, and what's worse is that men with those toxic traits don't have to put in nearly the ammount of effort into attracting women. Not all women do this mind you, but enough do this for men to question what they were taught growing up in terms of a healthy relationship dynamic between men and women. I have been told by many women over the years that they want someone hard working, emotionally stable, that is kind and considerate. What I've experienced in many cases is the exact opposite. It's extremely confusing for men who are taught to work hard on ourselves to be desirable to women, only to turn around and see large numbers of women go after men who exhibit extremely toxic traits when we're told to be the exact opposite. Again not all women do this, but it's extremely common. So it isn't just "incel rage" or "male entitlement; many women often say one thing about attraction and relationships, then go off and do another.

Some women can also be extremely emotionally manipulative, cruel, and hurtful towards men with low self esteem. The way some women bully and manipulate is often times glossed over, or worse they blame it on some outside force such as society, or the patriarchy. I'm not saying this is the case every situatuon, but many many women can be absolute monsters at worse, or extremely condescending at best to men who may lack a sense of self confidence. That absolutely does not warrant lashing out at women as a whole, but let's not act like there aren't many toxic women out there that get a pass for their behavior because they're women. As i said though this does not warrant lashing out at the entire female gender, and of course there are times when women are labeled as being a difficult, or a bitch when that isn't the case at all.

The other missing piece of communication is that men are never taught the difference between being a good guy, and a nice guy by other men. Part of the nice guy syndrome is that sense of entitlement that they get because they're not toxic that women should desire them more. The reality of it is, is that dating is much more complicated than that. A nice guy can think of himself as more desirable, but he may lack in many other areas. Having a stable job, being a person with a decent moral compass or at least not being an asshole, and having your life together are kind of bare minimums in todays world. None of those traits make a man interesting or desirable. If your most interesting charactetistic is not being a piece of shit than you're missing the bigger picture. This is the difference between a good guy and a nice guy; a good guy will have the bare minimum requirements of being a decent person with his life together, and also still work hard on his own hobbies, goals, or passions. Good guys won't be toxic, but they also don't build their identities around womens appproval, where as a nice guy definitely has.

I hope this sheds some light on the whole "nice guy" trope.

throaway-user · 2022-10-02T17:18:55+00:00

I used to be a Nice Guy. I was very much making a semi-conscious effort to be the opposite of what my dad was. I saw the pain that he caused my mom, and all of his subsequent girlfriends. He didn't beat them, or anything like that, but he was absolutely untrustworthy and unfaithful. But he was also extremely charming.

So I would see him with women, with girls who were sometimes my age or even younger, chatting them up and captivating them. And I knew for a fact that he was bullshitting them to get them into bed. And I didn't see how they couldn't see it, it was so obvious. So from an early age I went after girls with honesty and straightforwardness.

But what I saw as Disney prince behavior, they of course saw as boring. I didn't want to hook up, I wanted a serious relationship, I didn't want casual sex, I didn't want to play truth or dare because that might require me to kiss a girl without being in a relationship and that was very much a thing my asshole dad would do.

I have this very clear memory of being a freshman in high school and being in a group where they were talking about drinking and smoking and me just gawking at the impropriety and refusing to give in to the peer pressure that would have made me a normal kid.

So many missed opportunities in life because I was trying to be correct, to be a "good man," and it took until I was 27ish, and seeing my dad with a new girlfriend every two or three months while I was still a virgin, for the lightbulb to go off and I realized that the reason he was so successful was because he was attractive. Here was this man who could cajole almost anyone he met into bed, and I spent my entire life trying to be the opposite of him.

He's fun and outgoing and a good conversationalist and I intentionally made myself none of those things because I saw that as being deceptive. Dad was clearly making that woman laugh and smile to fuck her a couple of times, so I was always very serious. Dad teased and I was always courteous and formal. Dad pulled them close and I kept my hands to myself. Dad gave empty praises and I was honest about disliking her hair or something.

All in an effort to show that I was a good, dependable, nice guy who wouldn't disappoint them in the next coming weeks.

Philip8000 · 2022-10-03T00:03:29+00:00

Unfortunately, anyone who dares to express unhappiness at never having any luck with woman will be labeled an entitled, misogynistic man-baby. Sure, there are those who fit the description but I don't think the claim of: "Women don't like you because you're an entitled misogynist!" is any more true than: "Poor people are poor because they're lazy!"

Even for genuinely kind people, there are moments it can get frustrating. I've seen genuinely worthless people with no ambition, nothing to offer who spend their time drinking and using drugs have no trouble attracting women. It's why I don't buy the whole: "women only want Chad!" since these guys usually aren't good looking and about as far from that description as you can get.

It's the lack of social ability that's the true death sentence for attracting women.

Pacman124 · 2022-10-02T15:21:07+00:00

Bluepill upbringing mostly by women. They pretty much create what they hate. Since you're a kid, you're being told that women like nice guys, and that all it takes to be desirable is this (indirectly assumed, since the only topic being discussed was niceness).

I used to discuss this with some of my friends and arguably the entirety of their female role models never went in depth about how you have to max out your looks, etc.

In more traditional households, the importance of status and financial stability was at least taught about, so credit is to be given for that

I suppose it's because those attributes sound "superficial", so it would take a female role model to have a very low ego in order to be completely honest about it, even at the expense of the boy's future opportunities

tired_hillbilly · 2022-10-02T19:27:49+00:00

I think you should read "Radicalizing the Romanceless".

When I was younger – and I mean from teenager hood all the way until about three years ago – I was a ‘nice guy’. And I said the same thing as every other nice guy, which is “I am a nice guy, how come girls don’t like me?”

There seems to be some confusion about this, so let me explain what it means, to everyone, for all time.

It does not mean “I am nice in some important cosmic sense, therefore I am entitled to sex with whomever I want.”

It means: “I am a nicer guy than Henry.”

Or to spell it out very carefully, Henry clearly has no trouble attracting partners. He’s been married five times and had multiple extra-marital affairs and pre-marital partners, many of whom were well aware of his past domestic violence convictions and knew exactly what they were getting into. Meanwhile, here I was, twenty-five years old, never been on a date in my life, every time I ask someone out I get laughed at, I’m constantly teased and mocked for being a virgin and a nerd whom no one could ever love, starting to develop a serious neurosis about it.

And here I was, tried my best never to be mean to anyone, pursued a productive career, worked hard to help all of my friends. I didn’t think I deserved to have the prettiest girl in school prostrate herself at my feet. But I did think I deserved to not be doing worse than Henry.

No, I didn’t know Henry at the time. But everyone knows a Henry. Most people know several. Even three years ago, I knew there were Henry-like people – your abusers, your rapists, your bullies – and it wasn’t hard to notice that none of them seemed to be having the crushing loneliness problem I was suffering from.

Freelovehighway · 2022-10-02T17:23:01+00:00

Probably reflection of their parents values or something.

My dad by his account anyway was a ladies man in his 20's and I always feel had a desire to experience the thrill of being with the opposite sex.However as he got older he was ashamed of some of the stuff he'd done which I gather wasn't all that bad tbh but he probably wasn't as loyal as he could be. The problem was he took it one step too far with me and over the years conditioned me to think that being nice was what you need to be. That was good advice to give a son to make him a good citizen but bad for his dating life. Other factors combined as well though so it wasn't just that. So maybe parents projecting values and bad self-esteem. My dad could have made it funny but he took it very seriously, maybe having a daughter changed him?

But also as a teenager if you're not the guy getting girls(which is a lot of them) you're told that your time will come when these girls mature when girls want respectful and kind guys.

I remember being blue pilled but I was so blue pilled that I was always going to turn once the reality of life and dating became apparent. My other firends were less so, they just accepted that popular guys get the girls and you're fighting for the scraps. You were either a Chad(Rugby guy)/badboy(good looking football chavs)) and that's who the girls went for. I obviously had an understanding of this too but I sociaised less in my teens so it wasn't in my face as much.

NationalistGoy · 2022-10-03T04:24:48+00:00

I’ve kinda dabbled in Madonna-whore theory but I wanna know all of y’all thoughts on ‘nice guys’ and where this thought process exists.

I just wanted to say that the MWC is real, but here's the thing. I see women throw around MWC label on men who say they don't want to wife up women with a high body count. They basically try to gaslight the guy "if you don't accept women with a colorful past it means there is something wrong with you" while in reality men have avoided marrying women with a colorful past for millenia.

Men saying "if you don't date/marry broke men without goals, then you are insecure", that would not fly.

fdswasamistake · 2022-10-02T16:32:34+00:00

Nice guy just means you're not seeping charisma out of every pore of your body and don't give women the tingles.

wtknight · 2022-10-02T19:04:06+00:00

but would harass other women in private to be promiscuous for them?

That's not what "promiscuous" means. Of course men want chaste or fairly chaste women to be sexually hot for them. They just resent it when she has been that way for many other men in the past (which is what "promiscuous" actually means), and especially when it is perceived that she did hotter things with those men in the past than she will do for them.

As for where the phenomenon comes from, I think that it's mostly men seeing themselves as just as attractive as the men who are able to have sex with many different women these days, when actually these men are not as attractive. It's difficult for people to be objective about themselves and their shortcomings, and when they do become "objective" they tend to go overboard and think that no woman will ever be attracted to them just because a few Stacies rejected them.

Ok_Razzmatazz_1751 · 2022-10-02T23:08:02+00:00

Nice guy , the man who calls himself the nice guy literally in his messages, then explodes emotionally when he doesn't get his desired feedback.
Most are not attractive men, but think they are attractive , I've seen some really ugly neck beards that think they are super hot when reality they are super unattractive physically. It's not exclusive to women to have the inflated ego about themselves look wise. Personally I think it's the trophy participation syndrome. Everyone gets everything without hard work etc. Which snowballs into adult hood

Men will always be 2 sides of the coin (Madonna whore complex) from my observation in life , What's allowed in public and private. Two different personalities in one man.

Laytheblameonluck · 2022-10-03T00:01:26+00:00

What are you on about?!?

It comes from the book "No more Mr Nice guy" by Robert Glover.

Your post is just plain weird.

SolidPuzzleheaded984 · 2022-10-02T16:13:59+00:00

Nice guy just means guys that not sexually attractive

Barneysparky · 2022-10-02T15:13:23+00:00

Most of those guys know they don't stand a chance at breaking into the casual sex culture and are just there to insult those that are in the culture they wish they could be a part of.

I've only known one guy who acts like that in real life, and he was insufferable. The only reason people tolerated his behaviour was because he was an excellent frontman, but they didn't hang out with him.

GuyIsAdoptus · 2022-10-02T19:25:51+00:00

wtf is "promiscuous for them", people always say this shit. It's not promiscuous if it's not with more than one person. Why do people act like people can't control themselves and have an active sex life with 1 person they are devoted to unless they have a subterranean level libido or something??? It's called sex control and monogamy, y'all freak me tf out.

ameminator · 2022-10-02T23:51:58+00:00

For too much on a topic too old: https://slatestarcodex.com/2014/08/31/radicalizing-the-romanceless/

2022-10-03T01:03:15+00:00

There's no phenomena, just exposition.

Something always happens but now with exposition you have this idea that it exploded, it don't. It's, in fact, so smaller of a sample that mostly are not worthy to discuss because every time someone make some sort of argument using a small% as core this results in peoples throwing shit around.

They have losely right ideas but don't factor for much more, using it as veiled excuses; Yes women quality dropped like a lot, but so does men quality; it's just this, guy try to hit a girl, gets rejected and throws a fit, girl screencap it for upvotes.

The fit is just labeled

DXBrigade · 2022-10-03T13:54:15+00:00

In my experience, "nice guys" are just sore losers. People who can't take rejection properly and need to blame the other gender.

prizefighterstudent · 2022-10-02T15:18:13+00:00

It all comes down to handling rejection. You can attribute it to loads of reasons -- childhood trauma, high school drama, genetics -- but if a dude handles rejection poorly, he falls into the "nice guy" category.

A dude who hits up girls and merely tries to "earn" attraction or attention is just a simp, not a nice guy. If he gets laid out of it, more power to him (not counting on it though lol).

freespirit1963TJ · 2022-10-02T16:58:05+00:00

People in general aren't very honest with themselves. Guys (I'm a guy) are notoriously the very worst. I read this sub often, because some of the questions, thoughts and ideas are very comical. I'm going to make an educated guess that a huge faction of this sub are very young. I understand that there is a philosophy (and it probably has some merit in truth) that there is a method to assist guys in bagging sexual encounters. However, it's glaringly apparent, there are guys who are naive enough to believe if you follow a certain set of directions or pattern, that you're going to be wildly successful with chicks. There are many that maximize their belief that women are mean/evil and minimize their own shortcomings. On a different sub, about dating there was a dude who couldn't believe he wasn't getting dates, he said how evil girl's/women are, the guy was at least 70 pounds overweight and still lived with his parents. My point is that people should stop using excuses like, I'm not successful at dating because I'm a nice guy. That dynamic does exist, but hardly at a rate that people claim. I would suggest doing a honest self assessment and move forward from there. Blaming someone else for everything is following the path of least resistance and that path leads nowhere good.

caption291 · 2022-10-02T18:05:32+00:00

how do you explain the cognitive dissonance of DMing people in private to be sexually open, but publicly shame them because of being sexually open?

"I want the rarest thing" and "I don't want other people to have the rarest thing"

Are not mutually exclusive statements... You get that right?

"I want you to be promiscuous with me" and "I want you to not be promiscuous with other people".

Are also not mutually exclusive statements.

ConvolutedMaze · 2022-10-02T15:16:01+00:00

A long long time ago one of our kind (homosapien) learned that being good and honorable lead to a higher likelihood to the survival of our species and ever since then more and more of our types took it upon ourselves to also take up this strategy.

gofigure62 · 2022-10-02T15:53:28+00:00

It's behavior that's always existed. The internet just gave you a window into what women have always dealt with.

"Nice guys" are just neurodivergent narcissists who only view women as sex objects. They try to manipulate sex out of women by pretending to be nice and think after x amount of nice words and x amount of favors the woman that he wants will have sex with him.

These men don't respect or like women. They're just sexually attracted to women and don't know how to get the sex that they want and think that they deserve from women that they're attracted to. The rage out and throw tantrums because they don't believe the woman as the right to reject them.

NorthernTaste · 2022-10-02T15:49:59+00:00

Guys thinking basic human decency is sex currency

Hoopy223 · 2022-10-02T15:48:13+00:00

Three things:

1) the Internet is huge and allows tiny groups of people you would never meet in Real Life to congregate together

2) Western Society is changing in regards to dating, family, children etc

3) some brands of “ugly” speech are politically acceptable in our society and some aren’t.

Silver_Switch_3109 · 2022-10-02T16:42:58+00:00

Nice guys exist because they were told they just need to be nice for girls to like them.

hungry_frenchy · 2022-10-03T09:21:54+00:00

I think you didn't get the definition right. Not all nice guys are entitled, calling women sluts for being rejected or looking for a virgin woman. Some are just good guys, respectful, but thinking that they have to be nice in social situations and with women. They are not assertive or flirty, not pushy and can't enforce their boundaries.

I guess being a nice guy comes from education. Boys growing up in an environment where dating, sex, superficiality are shameful and where mariage was the sole morally good goal. Strict education asking for kids to be behaving perfectly and punishing them severely everytime they misbehave. Kids which didn't get the feelings they were loved for who they were but that they were loved for behaving well. And many of these kids don't have a male model which could teach them how to flirt and attract women, or how looks and being playful are important.

So these kids grow up and lack sometimes some self-love or self-esteem. If they were good kids and not rebels, they will become good but passive citizen. They respect the law and other people, behave well and politely but will never become charismatic leaders. As well, they try to behave well with women to be loved for it. For some of them, it doesn't result in dating or relationship (and they are not helped by the fact that they view being superficial, flirty, sexual or assertive as shameful)

Since these guys want to be good and are not dangerous (they behave well, they are not pushy, they are not violent), some of them are being used by women.

With time, if they are still unlucky, desperation and frustration start to come in. Some will get angry at women, but most guys I know in these situations were just angry at themselves, starting to believe they have issues, they are not good enough. Some started a depression due to it (as I did). None of this is making these guys more attractive, so they risk to get in a vicious circle.

SuperBodybuilder7405 · 2022-10-03T20:04:54+00:00

Online, Reddit in particular I think.. before the niceguys subreddit became a thing, I think nice guy opinion used to be like the meta.

The idea itself - probably TRP? Somehow spread to Reddit and other online places. As far as why they go apeshit, I think reading about how women dont like nice guys you start having some resentment towards women for not liking you, it's not your fault, it's because women are whores etc..

Like most dudes get called "nice", it's the default quality for a guy so it's easy enough to convince a lot of guys that their failures have something to do with their niceness.

fizeekfriday · 2022-10-04T18:58:20+00:00

Unironically? I was born in a single parent household and my mother literally beat and berated into me not to stare at girls too long, not to look at them, don't touch them because they will think you're "weird" and whatnot. She basically handicapped me when it came into relationships. Add on the fact that she's got 4 kids from 4 different men and you'll see why I've got such a poor example for relationships.

I was never 100% a nice guy in any meaningful way. I was nice in middle school cause girls would ignore me and then only pay attention to me when I had money, the richest/most popular boys got all the girls.

I started boxing and got a little bit of an edge to me but literally the only time I got a lot of female attention was when I was on the verge of or basically a bully. I was that guy that thought they were the main character. I find that honestly SUPER cringy coming from anyone else and I hate guys who act like that, but girls LOVEEE that shit so much.

freespirit1963TJ · 2022-10-07T16:32:50+00:00

No, every situation is different. There is a segment of women that absolutely are exactly how you characterized them. I will tell you, from experience, after women begin to age, that dynamic changes. Some never learn that being with the nice guy, is much better long term. The one's that don't, live a drama filled, tumultuous life with many regrets.

_revelationary · 2022-10-02T16:53:45+00:00

Even as a dude, other dudes perplexed me. l'm pretty certain some of these dudes want a prude virgin as a gf and shame other women in general for promiscuity, but would harass other women in private to be promiscuous for them?

This is one of my biggest problems with men around here. I am on the older side now, but before I met my husband I dated some men and there was this insane pressure to have sex quickly. This was 10-15 years ago so I imagine it’s worse now. I never had casual sex and I never had sex with any of those men. I got mocked and dumped. I don’t regret it, but I can see how women cave.

Some of those men were self-described “nice guys.”

Then there are men who want to marry their low n-count ideal woman, not realizing that men’s own behavior makes it less likely they’ll find this type of partner.

I agree with the nice guy stereotype that men complain about, though. If the only thing a guy has going for him is that he’s nice, for some women that might be a great quality. But it’s not going to make him a desirable partner unless there is something else there to attract them. And that sucks but it’s reality.

xzpw · 2022-10-02T15:36:07+00:00

I can’t say your definition of wanting sex in private and shaming in public for sex fits any “nice guy” narrative I’ve heard…

You seem to be creating a straw man about what a “nice guy” is. Nice guy was just someone who thought being overly nice to women would get them laid - plain and simple. Some would get bitter when it didn’t work and others would realize the advice they were given was bullshit. Sometimes both would happen. Rarely does it turn into slut shaming and other such shit. You’re basically taking the worst takes out of a 1000 comment thread on reddit and acting as if that is the norm when it’s just representing the small amount of deranged men that exist. (Deranged women exist too)

In neither case does the guy call women whores or do any of this other shit. You guys seem to be terminally online where you think less than 1% of the population is slut shaming women constantly. In real life - I don’t know if I’ve met a single man who would openly slut shame any woman in the last 5+ years. If anything, I can only recall women who slut shaming each other out of pure envy. All the dudes were fine with it. (After all - more for us men! Why hate on a girl who is providing for so many?)

How many men in their 20s are really doing this? Like really. Maybe they seem like the norm online but it’s really just like PPD - completely full of sock accounts. There’s posters on here who post prolifically and do not represent the average anything - not even the mentally insane.

PMmeareasontolive · 2022-10-02T15:14:07+00:00

Under "lack of socialization" I'd put lack of empathy skills. That is, if your hypothetical "nice guy" has now changed into someone who wants to lash out and hurt the person who rejected them. Lack of socialization could include inability to deal with frustration. Lots of people have that, as evidenced by how they bitch about literally everyone else on the road while driving. We all need to learn how to handle it better, some more than others.

Then there's people with full blown personality disorders.

shakeandbake8 · 2022-10-02T15:20:41+00:00

I think a lot of this is from bad or lack of socialization during developmental years that snowballs down the road causing other life problems which just makes things worse. Especially socialization around dealing with sex, love, and romance.

MAGA-Latino · 2022-10-02T15:19:40+00:00

Well you have to understand that there's a difference between a nice guy and an incel. Nice guys occasionally get laid, but it's usually exchange sex or just enough so he'll stay around because the girl wants to use him for one reason or another. Basically they get laid here and there but they have to eat a lot of shit.

Incels never get laid and they repulse girls for one reason or another so they don't even get used like the nice guys.

The nice guys would hate sluts because he wants a girl to be his serious girlfriend. The incel is more upset because he can't get anything.

darkvalleys · 2022-10-02T15:30:45+00:00

“Why does she like assholes and not nice guys like me?”

“Why won’t you date me? I’m a nice guy!”

Smitten_Squire · 2022-10-02T21:08:13+00:00

Its a bitter side effect of the bluepill in action. Basically they do everything bluepill, and when they dont end up with the fairy tale ending that the bluepill promised, even tho they followed it to a T, they get rightfully upset, confused, and mixed up.

Thats how "nice guys" are formed.

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DaoMark · 2022-10-02T18:15:59+00:00

Even as a dude, other dudes perplexed me. I’m pretty certain some of these dudes want a prude virgin as a gf and shame other women in general for promiscuity, but would harass other women in private to be promiscuous for them?

In advance, I am not defending the conduct of "nice guys", but I just want to say a few things.

This isn't perplexing at all, nor is it even a contradiction, it is just egocentric; this is not to say that you are doing this OP, but I have no idea why people are so perplexed by this as if it is evidence of some sort of contradiction within a framework - it isn't.

are variables to some of the thinking. But how do you explain the cognitive dissonance of DMing people in private to be sexually open, but publicly shame them because of being sexually open?

This isn't what cognitive dissonance is, they are shaming them for being sexually open with other people, but would like for them to be sexually open with them specifically; the principle difference being who they are open with, meaning again, its not a contradiction, its just extremely egocentric ( all the women for me basically, and they are whores if not with me )

To say it more clearly, there is no inconsistency, their beliefs and attitudes are coherent, they are just assholes.

dbz19_kai · 2022-10-04T08:57:41+00:00

Men are taught that to get a woman who have to be kind, nice, polite, respectful.

Of course this is all bullshit.

You need to be confident, assertive, masculine, successful. You have to make yourself about you. Making yourself focus on reassuring a woman’s emotions massively turns her off

mib732 · 2022-10-04T10:33:51+00:00

I think the Nice Guy Syndrome is possibly and partially an artifact of an older time: I think it’s possible to say that you could be a nice guy, get a wife and not have to worry about stuff related to dating.

Title	Where did the ‘nice guy phenomenon come from?
Author	Esterwinde
Upvotes	32
Comments	206
Date	October 2, 2022 2:51 PM UTC (3 years ago)
Subreddit	Posted in /r/PurplePillDebate
Original Link	https://old.reddit.com/r/PurplePillDebate/comments/xtqp3u/where_did_the_nice_guy_phenomenon_come_from/
Archive Link	https://theredarchive.com/r/PurplePillDebate/where-did-the-nice-guy-phenomenon-come-from.1133103 https://theredarchive.com/post/1133103

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