There are supposed to be two reproductive strategies - r and k. R is many kids, doesn't take much care of them. Rabbits. K is few kids, takes good care of them. Wolves. R is what happens with undemanding environments and K is when the environments is demanding. R is "liberal" and K is "conservative."
I've been curious for a while what happens to a K in an r environment. They can become lost. Smart conservatives and smart libertarians surrounded by brainless rabbit rs. By manginas and manjawed monstrosities. By people who seek the government to "take care" of them.
I also think under a liberal r environment love mostly evaporates. It's sex over love. And the acceptance of r involves accepting the values of those mostly unconcerned with children - blacks, homosexuals, leftist women who see abortion as a sacrament.
"Heartiste has written quite a few posts with the general theme that 'chicks dig jerks'. Of necessity, most of the information and speculation that falls under this category will be anecdotal, but there sure enough anecdotes to make one wonder. The most blatant examples seem to be those of convicted murderers, even serial killers, who are besieged with love letters and proposals of marriage from a love-stricken female public.
"But anyway, turns out that there's quite a bit of evidence that chicks really do dig jerks, if you define jerks as men who have little to offer but their genes, and have a low level of commitment. And there's plenty of theory to explain it too.
"First off, sociosexuality, that is the degree to which someone is monogamous (low sociosexuality) or promiscuous (high), not only varies by nation (no news there) but varies according to the amount of sexual equality. Sociosexuality from Argentina to Zimbabwe: a 48-nation study of sex, culture, and strategies of human mating.
"...sex differences in sociosexuality were significantly larger when reproductive environments were demanding but were reduced to more moderate levels in cultures with more political and economic gender equality.
"That is, in demanding environments, one in which the woman requires a larger commitment and more male help to rear children, women are much more monogamous and presumably want their men to be provider material.
"But what happens when women don't need men as much or at all to raise children, and thus seek short-term relationships?
"During human evolutionary history, there were “trade-offs” between expending time and energy on child-rearing and mating, so both men and women evolved conditional mating strategies guided by cues signaling the circumstances. Many short-term matings might be successful for some men; others might try to find and keep a single mate, investing their effort in rearing her offspring. Recent evidence suggests that men with features signaling genetic benefits to offspring should be preferred by women as short-term mates, but there are trade-offs between a mate's genetic fitness and his willingness to help in child-rearing. It is these circumstances and the cues that signal them that underlie the variation in short- and long-term mating strategies between and within the sexes. Last but not least, we have a new study that shows that attitudes toward female promiscuity differ according to how economically dependent women are.
"At the individual level, perceived female economic dependence explained significant variance in anti-promiscuity morality, even after controlling for variance explained by age, sex, religiosity, political conservatism, and the anti-promiscuity views of geographical neighbors. At the state level, median female income was strongly negatively related to anti-promiscuity morality and this relationship was fully mediated by perceived female economic dependence. These results were consistent with the view that anti-promiscuity beliefs may function to promote paternity certainty in circumstances where male parental investment is particularly important.
"Well, we haven't quite proven that under certain circumstances chicks dig jerks, but we see that there's a fair amount of evidence that women look for commitment and provider qualities in their men, that is when they are most dependent on them. When they are not as dependent, they will look more at genetic qualities ("sexiness") and be more promiscuous.
"So with the huge numbers of women entering the paid work force over the past few decades, coupled with government subsidies that guarantee a minimal level of financial support for a woman and her children regardless whether a man is around, what qualities are women choosing now in a man? It's not the ability to provide."
2 comments:
Totally true. Unfortunately nobody is telling the young men, and most of them haven't been told the game has completely changed. Then when they fail at it, they internalize it as their own fault, not realizing the deck is completely stacked against them.
Incidentally, as you know, women always need the resources of men: either the resources of one man supporting his family, or the resources of many men by confiscation by the State (taxes). In the former, some benefits accrue to the provider. In the latter, no benefits accrue to the providers.
Apt expressions: "marrying Uncle Sam," "brides of the state."
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