True or false "If you’re smart, don’t drink much, stay out of fights, display a friendly personality, and have no criminal history – then you are the population most at risk of being miserable and alone."

WestsideMoonWalker · 2019-09-17T02:44:11+00:00

The issue isn't that someone is smart or doesn't drink much, or is friendly. It's that those people are passive. Passive guys won't have much success because passiveness is an unattractive trait (imo for women it's super unattractive too, but apparently that makes me an outlier). Being high inhibition mean you talk yourself out of something before it even has a chance of happening.

oneprettycoolcat · 2019-09-17T04:31:00+00:00

It's ridiculous how much better my life has gotten since I became a giant tyrannical asshole to everyone. It really makes me question whether humanity deserves to be wiped out by a gamma ray burst or something.

LotBuilder · 2019-09-17T04:50:12+00:00

Rule 1: Don’t be boring

You don’t have to be a flamboyant asshole or a drunk or a thug to not be boring.

Futureman999 · 2019-09-17T05:00:20+00:00

My father grew up poor. He has always been a violent bully. Generally he has had at least one wife and/or girlfriend(s), though nobody I would be attracted to.

I'm fairly smart, drink moderately, have been in some fights but rarely won and eventually trained for several years, and I'm somewhat friendly.

I'll say though, I think I may have inherited some of my father's zero fucks given ways. I keep catching myself wanting to break the law all the time, like I don't even notice I'm doing something illegal. I just do it without thinking. *victimless crimes

But not giving a fuck and doing what you want is how you end up in jail. What's wrong with me? Am I less dog and more wolf than most men, like my father?

Ofourkind · 2019-09-17T03:34:49+00:00

Risk takers take risks. Duh.

Someone who is brave enough to approach every woman he's interested in is unlikely to focus his bravery in only one direction. He probably does a lot of other risky and reckless things. He'll probably have a few too many and do some outrageous stunt, go for the high paying job, make friends more easily, have interesting hobbies, have a few misadventures, etc.

09f911029d7 · 2019-09-17T02:32:01+00:00

The link between those things is risk-taking behaviour.

Men who are prone to risk taking behaviour are going to be more likely to ask women out. That alone will give them a huge advantage. They'll also be more likely to ask for raises, etc...

Then you need to take into account whether women are attracted to that. The answer, I'd have to guess, is yes but with limits and less so as she gets older and stability starts to matter more than upward mobility.

strickyicky · 2019-09-17T07:16:15+00:00

Self control is overrated regardless of how smart you are. Look at all the greats this planet has seen... did they have self control?

Fuck self control and let loooose. Who cares if you fail, if you fail you were always going to anyway. Might as well take a good swing at it

exit_sandman · 2019-09-17T07:59:57+00:00

Is it causation? (People choosing these behaviors LEADS to loneliness).

Is it correlation?

Generally correlation, though a case can be made that drinking would help passive men getting out of their shell, and thus refusing to do so directly contributes to their continued misery.

flamingoinghome · 2019-09-17T12:34:58+00:00

For a little context: the author of this piece is actually a friend-of-a-friend, and I think I see where he's off. (admittedly part of it is that the author lived for some time in Ireland, where it's true that being averse to drinking will leave one somewhat socially isolated--but that's not the main issue)

A "friendly personality" is not simply the opposite of "an angry personality." Friendliness is actually a fairly aggressive trait, and friendly guys generally do very well with women. But a lot of men who are simply polite and nonaggressive think they're friendly; they're not. It is almost impossible to be both shy and friendly.

Also, contrary to what certain subcultures say, being "smart" is not a personality trait. I have a cousin who graduated from top schools with a BA and then an MBA, and is clearly quite intelligent. He's also a Boring-Ass Basic Bro who was a literal Frat Guy and refuses to live in a certain city because he hates their football team. He's now married to his female couterpart and they do a lot of Lifestyle Posting on Instagram.

Edit: Quick note--"being friendly" and "having friends" are very different things. Both will help you in life, but you don't need to be friendly to have friends.

Second note: in The Story of Henry? I'm willing to bet that if any of the women involved with Henry physically chased down the lonely guys referenced, while wearing nothing but a thong and pasties, those guys would still turn them down.

reluctantly_red · 2019-09-17T05:03:24+00:00

If your're boring AF involuntary celibacy shouldn't be a surprise.

TheBookOfSeil · 2019-09-17T06:20:23+00:00

Is it causation? (People choosing these behaviors LEADS to loneliness).

I don't think anyone "chooses" these behaviors. These are character traits that people naturally exhibit. It's essentially who they are.

Is it correlation?

Probably. People (especially men) who are more risk averse than others tend to be perceived as "less manly," not as open to certain activities, and otherwise BORING. Not a good candidate for a fun, fulfilling, adventurous relationship to fill up the pages in the storybook of both people's lives.

Is that correlation caused by ...gasp....natural selection?

Probably not. People change throughout the course of their life. It's somewhat natural to not be as adventurous when you're 40 as opposed to when you're 20. It's also habitual. People who get used to a slow-paced, non-adventurous life tend to continue with that trend. Not many people who have lived the same monotonous routine for the last five years are going to wake up one day and say to themselves "I want to go skydiving/rocky moutain climbing/2.7 seconds on a bull named Fumanchu." They're going to continue sitting on the couch after a long day of work and turn on Netflix. Not much to do with natural selection and more to do with habitual behaviors and endulging in the luxuries that the US/first world countries offer.

(I.e., only the weakest men are: smart, don't drink much, stay out of fights, display a friendly personality, and have no criminal history)

I wouldn't say this. Smart =/= weak. Definitely a tendency for laziness, but not weakness. The rest could also be taken into context differently. They have good social skills and don't cause fights or cause people to want to fight them, and they have no need to commit any crimes because they have a successful career and are financially well off. These types of guys can and still do get married. There's more to look at here in context than these simple characteristics. They're not guaranteed to be an X for everyone.

Bekiala · 2019-09-17T13:52:03+00:00

The characteristics you listed means the individual is better tribal material but unless the individual has the looks and pheromones that appeal to someone they may well never be in a romance.

CursedLemon · 2019-09-17T14:08:26+00:00

True - if you believe that all people everywhere are shallow, flash-in-the-pan personalities who are attracted to such death-drive behavior and you enjoy the idea of burning out by 35.

Or, maybe there are interesting, decently attractive people out there who are actually that well-adjusted, and for whom you have to actually have healthy social skills and a sense of where to look in order to find.

Talkytalktalk · 2019-09-17T15:38:17+00:00

society is fucked up and fallen. that's the intelligent surmisation.

mandoa_sky · 2019-09-17T05:07:23+00:00

my dad is all of those things. he's also a high ranking department head at a university.

what you're thinking is "passive", and "avoidant personality" - neither of which my dad happens to be.

MisterJose · 2019-09-17T10:41:57+00:00

I think this blog post is fantastic, and I've linked to it several times in the past. He's based that statement on statistics, so yes, it's a correlation, not necessarily a causation. It doesn't mean if you go out and commit a crime you're going to all of a sudden get laid more.

Unusual_Table · 2019-09-17T13:01:58+00:00

I guess it depends on your environment. My childhood friends always had a good head on their shoulders. One had a high school boyfriend that didn't work out and the other had two college boyfriends who didn't work out but after that they had a pretty solid idea of what they wanted, entered into relationships with decent men who shared their interests and values, and got married. Never heard a peep of drama from either of them.

My college... close acquaintances... were a hot mess and their relationships were always a hot mess. Very entertaining to observe but also... yikes. I'd get play by plays of all the drama whether it be people they were actually dating or the varying quality of their hookups when they got the idea that sex with multiple people would make them feel powerful (which is true for some people, but definitely not for them). I'm sure all the unresolved body image and anxiety issues didn't help with their clarity in selection.

Zero9194 · 2019-09-17T13:32:15+00:00

You clearly don’t live near a large homeless population.

life-space · 2019-09-17T13:51:23+00:00

Ha! I'd say it's true. I'm like this. My good impulse control and generally reflective demeanor alienated me from my peers for much of my adolescence and 20s. Interestingly, in an effort to diminish those qualities, I started drinking heavily in my late 20s. It didn't work, but I figured out other ways to be happy and develop friendships and relationships that weren't as self-destructive. Therapy helped.

starfox863 · 2019-09-17T16:27:03+00:00

I liked this article , thanks.

CaptDeadlift · 2019-09-17T23:06:56+00:00

Agree somewhat

Dumb people don't think much of the future and are on auto pilot most of their lives with predictable reactions to problems risen during their life.

No wonder people say that the dumbest people are the happiest.

From an outside perspective I've got my life as together as it can be byt in reality sometimes depression hits me hard.

I work a lot , run a small company , have an amazing GF , no DB with sex almost every day , fit , almost finished uni and so on but sometimes I get these episodes where I am just thinking of ending it all (rare but had it happen few times).

Might be due to the PEDs I take that mess with my hormones a little but all my life I've been a person with depression attacks I guess.

[deleted] · 2019-09-17T05:12:09+00:00

If you’re smart, don’t drink much, stay out of fights, display a friendly personality, and have no criminal history

you could have friends and relationships if you were fun to be around .

but sadly you aren't. didn't even put being fun to be around on the list

this character you created also sounds pretty fucking boring

Anopey · 2019-09-17T07:41:30+00:00

False in regards to "smart."

It doesn't have to do with being smart but rather with our perception thereof.

Though many people from all spectrums are smart, and often active people in business etc even more so, we associate, for some reason, smartness with passivity. This is partly because of how people who ARE passive tend to portray themselves as intelligent to gain at least some social standing, and partly because of us reinforcing this idea after the internet became a thing.

A guy memorizing encyclopedias or browsing the net all day doesn't have to be smart, but he could, for example, be using all of his time to do these things because he is scared/cannot do anything else. Then, he just uses the information he learned to seem smart, whereas the information is useless in his life for anything other than social validation.

Of course, people who dedicate themselves to anti-social activities are NOT always passive. Writing a book or being an academic is not a passive activity. (neither is browsing the net technically but we colloquially measure whether someone is active or passive based on our preconceptions in regards to usefulness.)

We tend to associate passivity with anti-social activity, not because of these active introverts, but because of all the people who shut themselves in, maybe despite having extraverted personalities. We then say that these "weak" people are smart, whereas it was the former active introverts that were smart. Of course, mixes of both exist but I am talking generally.

It's a matter of association and culture.

Intelligence does not have to be anti-social. We just associate it to introversion, perhaps because of the rise of anti-social occupations that DO require high intelligence, for example in front of the monitor.

wtknight · 2019-09-17T14:29:54+00:00

False. Bitter, unconfident people are the least likely to find someone. If you’re being friendly and confident to people, then somebody will eventually end up liking you even if you’re just average looking.

Littleknownfacts · 2019-09-17T02:22:22+00:00

(I.e., only the weakest men are: smart, don't drink much, stay out of fights, display a friendly personality, and have no criminal history)

Why are you combining all these unassociated traits? Some of the smartest and friendliest people I know are also decent drinkers. They don't fight, but that doesn't mean they are weak, they go to the gym or play some team sports. They don't have criminal history but that doesn't mean they are fun averse. Of course if you describe someone that is so anxious as to be boring they aren't going to do well, but it's not because they are too smart, it's because they are boring.

oneprettycoolcat · 2019-09-17T04:31:17+00:00

It's ridiculous how much better my life has gotten since I became a giant tyrannical asshole to everyone. It really makes me question whether humanity deserves to be wiped out by a gamma ray burst or something.

couldbemage · 2019-09-17T07:07:56+00:00

It's pretty clear that in this context smart doesn't mean intelligent, it means cowardly.

Or to more completely translate, the op is referring to guys that are:

Cowardly, killjoys, cowardly some more, lacking personality, follow all the rules and insist everyone else do so as well.

This is the description of a guy that if you remember him at all, it's a memory of mild annoyance.

Mountain_Fever · 2019-09-17T11:29:04+00:00

False. I check all of your boxes and I am neither miserable nor alone. I know a lot of other single people who also check all the boxes who are neither miserable nor alone.

Being miserable and alone has nothing to do with being these things. It has to do with your own desires to participate in the different facets of life and your attitude when you do.

Bad attitude? No one will want to be around you. Bad attitudes only reap negativity. No one is happy around a negative person. It's a terrible cycle that breeds miserable people.

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k0unitX · 2019-09-17T02:23:20+00:00

I understand the argument they're trying to make but they make a very poor job making it.

https://youtu.be/bWYrAU5mmXE

Tl;dr to be a virtuous man you need to stand up for yourself, but apparently according to this book, if I'm smart enough to not get caught breaking laws, don't drink but do other drugs, stay out of fights but maybe burn down houses and cars of my enemies, and put on a friendly persona apparently that means I'll be miserable and alone. Yeah ok.

TrueReligionGenes · 2019-09-17T17:27:10+00:00

The thing is, the only males who have the option of being aggressive and project their masculine will are the ones who can hold their own against the other aggressive dominant males. If you are not within this realm of male physically, then attempting to be aggressive and dominant will fail miserably.

It's like a 150 lb guy trying to act tough to a bigger 190 lb guy and and steal his girl, its gonna look pathetic.

If you aren't masculine and large enough to actually justify your aggressive behavior, then it will look cringey and pathetic. If you are, then its definitely a viable strategy to get sex and attention from women. Its no coincidence that the skinny weak guys are also passive in their behavior, growing up put them in their place.

zerofeetpersecond · 2019-09-18T21:51:29+00:00

You can’t reliably say the weakest men aren’t smart. There are Navy Seals with Mensa IQs. I know from my involvement in martial arts that there are a ton of black belts who have PHDs. I’m not talking mall karate, I’m talking UFC level guys.

Polojames123 · 2019-09-17T05:34:10+00:00

I don't know, my parents said the same thing.

I started drinking at 15. I drank all through high school (was known for it), partied,, got shit on it by people, coaches etc...(but I was good, so I played, and all the main kids drank or did harder shit). I went to JC, partied, f*cked girls, drank, played sports, got a super-high GPA, went to Cal, got into law school etc...

I think the difference was, I wasn't a f*cking pussy. I wasn't the 'bad boy' but I wouldn't take shit from pussies, I got in a few fights, was known at bars, etc... It was fun, but I lived.

I think a movie a lot of people should watch that changed my view on a lot of sh*t, is this movie called "Better Luck Tomorrow", it's a movie about rich Asian kids from Irvine, that literally got 'straight A's', met this one kid, got into dealing drugs and making money for him since he was some spoiled rich, Japanese American brat, and then he commissioned them to 'rob his parents' to get back at his dad for some 'ivy league' school bullshit. They rob him, but they hated him, and they kill him by accident. etc...

The point of the movie was 'They got straight A's, and that was their cover, and no one would suspect them'... I was always a wild kid, went to parties etc... But when I got into college, that's what I did. Made sure my grades were stellar, never talked about it, partied with friends, etc... Then got into the school I wanted and dipped as the "Golden Boy" in a lot of ways, that was never me... I just did my work, got pussy, partied, football, track, etc.. It was awesome, joined a frat too, that was fine...

Point being, the whole point of being the 'goody goody kid' is to get into a top college, and being he 'good kids' you get away with more dirt. That's why I joined the football team, and it went from "you're a piece of shit degenerate Polojames" to, "Well, boys will be boys" and I could do way more shit.

So, it's not your parent's fault, you were too pussy, or pansy to rebel at all. Or have the balls to make 'real friends' or people that would 'push your envelope'.

I go to a wedding of one of my close friends in 3 months. He was fat(looks like the fat kid from the Sandlot), didn't do shit (doesn't drink, only smokes weed, hates alcohol), played football with him. He never talked about smoking, handled his school sh*t, was a 'goody goody'(besides weed), never even talked about 'smoking weed' at practice, I found out since we became friends. I smoke with him, but we kept it 'underwraps' onlly with our little clique, no one snitched, so we were the 'golden boys, that started, coaches loved us, etc..' but were Captains, and great grades etc... he transferred to a D-1, as did I, all our group did, besides one 'whiney fat fuck, incel, woah is me, everyone owes me shit' guy, but rest of us. Gucci.

This friend I'd say, isn't that cool, he's chill, smokes, homebody,but he befriended me and our group and I'm his 'wild friend' that gets him to go out of his shell, do stupid shit, drink, or make a stupid bet, etc.. his mom, his fiance, dad, all his other friends knows me and they love me. But we're fucking 'yin and Yang" literally, but he's loyal, funny, a good friend and cares. So he still got his 'good goody' shit, but still partied, went out, find a gorgeous wife, and is beloved...

His mom said the same shit, you posted, OP... Y'all were just to pussy to 'break the rules' and it wasn't because your parents were strict, not at all, it was because you were so scared socially of the 'real world' and the rules of the hierarchy in high school, you chose to shut yourselves in, since it was easier to go 'the world isn't fair, fuck them, I'm elite, I'm smart blah blah blah" to lie to yourself, since you just weren't cool enough, or didn't have the 'honor or fortitude' to earn real friendship, friends that will go to jail with you, or protect you in their own way....

I have that with my buddy that's the "Fat kid Sandlot", and we make jokes about him and I being like "Jon Snow and Samwell Tarly"... i think all incels, should watch the metamorphouses of "Samwell Tarly' in Game of Thrones since GRRM likens him after himself, and all you fatties. That's how you take a fat pussy, and turn him into a man.

crackrocksteady7 · 2019-09-17T12:51:42+00:00

true because women make dumb decisions