Like some of the rest of us I’ve been up to my neck in other stuff. But over at my blog I recently posted about three items that in retrospect are pretty related. Here’s the first.
One was about the semi-moronic but quite popular “Hot Chicks With Douchebags” website, which is basically just a compendium of pictures of women the (male) author and (almost all male) contributors think look attractive next to men the author and contributors think look ugly, stupid, undeserving, unworthy, or otherwise not to their liking.
Photo HotChicksWithDouchebags.com.
Doesn’t it seem like the website Hot Chicks with Douchebags is both a refutation of huge chunks of the “hypergamy” meme and a pretty big hint as to whether the (mostly male) notion is descriptive or prescriptive.
Photo HotChicksWithDouchebags.com.
Because who, exactly, is registering disapproval of the gentlemen depicted? More to the point, who’s registering disapproval of the choice of the women who seem attracted to the gentlemen in question?
Tool through some random pages on Hot Chicks with Douchebags for more examples.
Sort of by-definition it isn’t the women themselves.
Chances are at least above average that it’s not other women.
The website’s author is a man, as are virtually all commenters.
Photo HotChicksWithDouchebags.com.
You know what’s really interesting about the comments from women over at my place?
It’s mostly “um, the men all look pretty normal to me.”
From the pictures here, and looking at another handful from the sight, I’m really confused about this guy’s definition of “douchebag.” It seems to mean “Man I don’t particularly like the look of who’s standing with a girl I do like the look of.” I see attractive guys, unattractive guys (though not actually that many… most are average-to-cute), rich-looking guys, poor-looking guys, geeky-looking guys, jocky-looking guys… I’m wondering if there are any men not personal friends of the site’s owner who wouldn’t automatically become “douchebags” when paired with a hot girl.
I think that’s about right. Why, exactly, are we leaving it up to straight men to arbitrate what, exactly, should constitute male attractiveness for women? Especially when it looks like, you know, our objections to the looks of straight men we’re not attracted to doesn’t really seem to be a problem for straight women. Who, presumably, we’d all like to be attracted to us.
Personally I’d just be relieved I wouldn’t have to dress like Mystery after all. 🙂
So… where’s the reductio ad absurdum? Not sure if you’re just kidding… maybe I’m just tired right now. So I was trying to say that when taken too far in our society, hypergamy leads to lower reproductive success. That is reductio ad absurdum. At least it disproves the “awesome mate” rationalization Ozy brought up, which to me is premise that if selecting a show-offy guy is good, then selecting someone even more show-offy is even better. At a certain point you might give birth to a kid who kills himself in a motorcycle stunt (that’s tongue in cheek – I… Read more »
@dungone, Hypergamy is a valid pursuit up to a point. It makes sense for a woman in a pre-agrarian society where it gives her real reproductive advantages. It stops making sense in a post-industrial society because it no longer has any impact on reproductive success. Well, lots of things stop making sense. Modern medicine makes men’s preferences for health and fertility make less sense. Yet those preferences are still mostly hardwired, just like women’s preferences for culturally successful men. Hypergamy sets a precedent that causes men to pursue attention-seeking endeavors that don’t benefit anyone just because it’s a choice between… Read more »
Hypergamy is a valid pursuit up to a point. It makes sense for a woman in a pre-agrarian society where it gives her real reproductive advantages. It stops making sense in a post-industrial society because it no longer has any impact on reproductive success. Successful men don’t have too many qualms about reaching down the social hierarchy to find a worthy mate. The future queen of England is the daughter of some flight attendants. Throughout history there have been great emperors who married prostitutes and regarded them as equals even though it went against the social norms in their cultures.… Read more »
@BlackHumor, I’ve never said that only women are doing good genes mating. Of course both men and women are. Yet at least in a short-term mating context, good genes are a lot more important to women than to men (when the woman is carrying the baby, she needs to make sure that the father is awesome, whereas a man doesn’t need to ensure that a woman is genetically awesome if he isn’t sticking around to raise the child… these appraisals aren’t necessarily conscious, of course). Furthermore, a man can get a lot of his information about a woman’s genes and… Read more »
@figleaf, I still don’t get why it has to be women “choosing” more successful men. For instance, even inside of sociobiology/ev-psych ideology if I wasn’t “sure” of the women-getting-the-best-sperm-spreaders hypothesis That’s the sexy son hypothesis. I’m thinking more of the good genes hypothesis. I might pause to wonder whether more robust and successful men are more comfortable just asking women if they want to have sex. As I mentioned, the exact route is unclear. It could be any of the following: cultural success -> confidence asking -> attractiveness confidence -> cultural success -> attractiveness cultural success -> status -> attractiveness… Read more »
@Hugh Tipping: What you’re arguing for seems to be pretty normal selection and very far from the concept of “hypergamy”. I could’ve guessed that better hunters get more sex. But that’s quite different from “women (and only women) prefer high status sex partners”, which is itself more broad than the conventional MRA definition of hypergamy. It’s not surprising that men with good genes or high skills get selected as sex partners. I’m not arguing that males OF ANY SPECIES with good genes don’t get selected as sex partners, because that’s arguing against evolution itself. But that’s because women unconsciously want… Read more »
I still don’t get why it has to be women “choosing” more successful men. For instance, even inside of sociobiology/ev-psych ideology if I wasn’t “sure” of the women-getting-the-best-sperm-spreaders hypothesis I might pause to wonder whether more robust and successful men are more comfortable just asking women if they want to have sex. Because I’ve got this feeling that male policing and male self-policing have got to have some role in the process. I mean, if nothing else, considering how bloodthirsty humans tend to be, and how (as Jared Diamond has documented) in many non-Eurasian societies the leading cause of death… Read more »
Comment stuck in mod due to links. Would you guys consider raising the allowed links from 1 to 3 before a post gets auto-moderated? WordPress default setting is rather punishing of anyone trying to do real linkage, making research posts tough.
@BlackHumor, Not that the Ache (all the Ache) aren’t attracted to high status such-as-they-have*, but the normal assumption behind hypergamy totally breaks down in societies like theirs. Why would women be particularly attracted to high status men? Nobody has any permanent wealth, refusing to share food with anyone is extremely rude, and most importantly sexual relationships aren’t tied in any way to resources. I’m glad that you are bringing up specific anthropological examples. Yet if you got your understanding of mating in pre-agricultural societies from Sex at Dawn, then throw it in the trash. You’re quite correct that there isn’t… Read more »
Big correction on my comment. The first sentence SHOULD have read:
Tamen:
Thanks. I missed that.
BlackHumor was Brian and he announced the pseudonym change quite a while back in another thread which I don’t recall the name of. I have a longer comment in moderation with some anthropolical links which refutes the view that the Ache has “equal male desirability” and which demonstrates how men compete for status (which provides sex) by hunting. It also shows that partible paternity only goes so far (2 are the number of fathers who most increase the child’s survival rate) and when too many men are considered fathers they are dissuaded to help out feeding the child since actual… Read more »
BlackHumor, you appear to be assuming that, from the women’s perspective, all of the villagers men are all either equally desirable, or that the women feel they have the right to refuse a sexual advance. Unless one of those is true, there will be sexual competition between men.
So on what basis are you assuming either ‘equal male desirability’ or ‘women must consent’?
(Also, are you Brian? Hugh seemed to think you were in an earlier comment, and I haven’t always been plugged into the threads here if you announced a pseudonym change.)
BlackHumor: Regarding Ache, you might want to look at more sources than just Sex at dawn. Sex, time, and power by Leonard Shlain provides a slightly different view of the Ache tribe: http://books.google.com/books?id=FvKyJqiX_XwC&pg=PA112&lpg=PA112&dq=ache+tribe+anthropology&source=bl&ots=-qjMeDChXQ&sig=FiyiiQaLfNapbo5ZXrLs84Q10L4&hl=en&ei=lB9GTrCIIpG8-QbbypyiBw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=7&sqi=2&ved=0CEMQ6AEwBg#v=onepage&q&f=false We find the following paragraph: Women of the Ache hunter-gatherer tribe who were interviewed by anthropologist Kim Hill preferred the best hunters for their extramarital affairs. And Hawkes tabulated that the Ache hunters with the most kills to their credit had the most children and that these children had higher survival rates because the other members of the tribe took better care of them than they did… Read more »
Remember here that infant mortality in hunter-gatherer societies is gigantic, from a Western point of view. It’s terribly unlikely the same 2 men reproduce with all the women in the village. Like I’ve already said, it’s terribly unlikely the same 10 men reproduce with all the women in the village. Though doubtless some men in the village aren’t reproducing at all, it’s unlikely to be many, because all of the men are having sex. Only the men with something actually wrong with their sperm are not going to reproduce. And the “twice as many female ancestors” thing likely comes from… Read more »
If all women have sex with at least ten men (as Wikipedia says), then unless it’s always the same ten men all the men must be having similarly high amounts of sex. They have sex with 10, but reproduce with 2. It’s pretty much the same exact thing that happens everywhere else in the world, regardless of culture. We have twice as many female ancestors as male (Ozy can back me up on this, even I didn’t believe it at first 🙂 ). The same 2 men could reproduce with all the women in the village while everyone else supports… Read more »
It’s got *a* website. D’oh.
Well, I don’t think “wrestling clubs out of mens’ hands” counts as spectating.
Also I agree the Wikipedia page is a bit spotty on information. Like I said, my main source for this is Sex at Dawn; it’s got website but I’m not sure how useful that will be. I can’t give any of the research it cites because it’s of course going to be behind paywalls.
Yeah, that’s what clued me in that they were there spectating. There’s not enough information there to answer all my questions about these people. but just enough to give me a few nightmares.
First, what’s all this about women cheering on from the sidelines? Did you miss “In all clubfights some bystanders (including women) would rush in and try to hamper or disarm men who were in combat with their father, sons or brothers”? Second, why are you assuming that’s to impress women? They can’t be bashing heads in to get sex, because sex isn’t scarce. There’s no such thing, in Ache culture, as a man that never has sex (as far as I’ve been able to tell). It wouldn’t make much sense, unless you’ve somehow come to the conclusion that all women… Read more »
Sorry, the blockquotes didn’t seem to work on the quote I took from BlackHumor
I can give you the Ache as an example of a culture that does not have any kind of permanent and exclusive romantic relationship. Not that the Ache (all the Ache) aren’t attracted to high status such-as-they-have*, but the normal assumption behind hypergamy totally breaks down in societies like theirs. Okay, let’s say the “normal” assumption about hypergamy breaks down. But that’s because they’re dirt poor. There is no perceivable wealth, nothing extra for women to pursue. But if you’re a woman in this society, you can change husbands anytime you wish and have kids with several different men because… Read more »
@Ozy, I don’t see conflated definitions. Money’s just a cultural artifact that represents social dominance. There are several dimensions to social dominance, there are local maximums of each in cultures and sub-cultures, and there is variance in sensitivity among individuals. Your last definition is a word play that seems to discount the scale on which “awesomeness” runs for either sex, which is what hypergamy is really all about. Ballgame pointed it out elegantly with the dating site survey; men think vast majority of women are awesome while women only think that the best of the best are awesome. @Schala, good… Read more »
Hypergamy – I think we are getting a little semantic slif=ding on this term here. It may refer to, but does not primarliy refer to women dating up interms of men’s looks. It refers, at least on the MRA blogs that invented the term, to women mating upward in economic terms. Poor girl marries rich man, the Cinderella fantasy. And it’s not just ameme in storybooks – Reba McEntyre had a great song a long time ago about it: http://www.lyrics007.com/Reba%20Mcentire%20Lyrics/Fancy%20(Don't%20Let%20Me%20Down)%20Lyrics.html
EE: That’s an interesting point. Do we know that all those women on OKCupid are ranking the same men as less attractive than them? I mean, I would rank anyone who can’t use an apostrophe properly as less attractive than me, but that doesn’t mean women are hypergamously attracted to good grammar. 🙂
kilo: True, that’s a fourth category, although to be honest in my experience with the sort of people who use the term “hypergamy” on the Internet very few of them acknowledge that women can be physically attracted to men at all.
Schala, another good point. Still, you could also not reply. I wish okcupid would release more fine-grained analyses (like the regression they did for the “mathematics of beauty” post, or just a lot more variable transformations plotted against each other), because their data are a social scientist’s dream come true, but you have to go with the limited perspective they can offer in a short blog post that’s intended for a general audience. Adiabat, I’m not quite sure that I follow you. Sure, I think it’s reasonable to assume that overall people message people that they find attractive. I do… Read more »