There's a lot of confusion over the term hypergamy, so this is an attempt to bridge some gaps in understanding.

The standard definition given by wiki as well as the most popular dictionaries online has to do with the act/practice of marrying up socioeconomically. A sociological phenom.

The manosphere one refers to the [often instinctual] urges women have towards "alpha males" especially during ovulation. If we're being honest, it's something that gets talked about often enough outside the manosphere even in the most liberal media. An evo psych phenom.

For different reasons, it's difficult for me to care for either. This post doesn't do my apathy justice.

I care so little about the standard hypergamy that my apathy wrapped around, overflowed the buffer, and I must have went right back to caring... because I'm generally positive about it.

It's a natural way to spread wealth without pointing a gun at anyone. Also, while it might not be as obvious in wealthy nations, around the world it's often not a choice on the part of the woman. It sucks balls being poor, and often it's a conscious but difficult choice... not an instinctive gold-digging urge.

...

The problem with the manospherean concept of hypergamy is that it is so broad and ambiguous, and used whimsically to account for almost every case where a woman leaves a guy for "a higher SMV man". It could be for any reason. "The other guy was wealthier. Hypergamous gold-digger!" / "The other guy was more dominant! Hypergamous bitch!" / "The one she left me for had a bigger dick! That hypergamous slut!"

Bpers are not free from this either, as they conflate this with other concepts such as serial monogamy to make the point that it happens less often than people think.

So it's not a very useful term for unambiguous communication.

It reminds me of "Patriarchy" in the way it is an abstract and corrupted concept often used to make excuses for bitterness/failure and often used to promote an agenda.

A positive spin exists. One is used to encourage men to keep working at everything (anything that comes under Sexual/Social Market Value), because "women are hypergamous and will leave you for any reason". The other is used to encourage women to keep fighting together as a collective for equality because the Patriarchy is always there and gives advantages to men.

But clearly the concepts are tools for inspiration/propaganda rather than unambiguous communication.