Things Red Pill and pickup get right about men and women

A guy asked me about what I think is true and useful in red pill, since I've written out some criticisms... it's a good question: I thought about it... and came up with some answers...

1. Women (mostly) get their value; men (mostly) earn their value. This is particularly true when people are in their teens and early 20s.

An attractive woman who doesn't eat too much sugar and isn't ridiculously lazy gets a lot of social and sexual value as a teenager, and that value stays with her well into her 30s (where it can drop suddenly... a lot of women are surprised by the drop). She doesn't have to do much to get and maintain her value. Men, by contrast, mostly have to earn our value through achievement. "Achievement" can mean a lot of different things.

"Mostly" is key because there are exceptions... women can squander their value, and some get screwed genetically, and some get screwed behaviorally by their families (if your family feeds you a bunch of garbage simple carbohydrates and sugar, then a lot of the value will go away or never arrive). Some guys have great physical attractiveness and that works with women, for a long time, without great effort... a few guys get a lot of value without having to do much work for it. There are exceptions but the overall correlation is clear. And, over longer-term relationships, dysfunctional women will inadvertently dynamite their relationships. “No matter how hot she is, there is some guy sick of her shit” is a cliche for good reason.

2. Most guys don't understand women.

By failing to understand women or what women want/feel, most guys screw up their game.

3. Women are attracted to winners.

"Winners" means can mean a lot of different things to different women, but a guy who wins at something is going to do better than a guy who doesn't.

There are many status hierarchies a guy can climb. A woman who is into a guy who climbs one hierarchy might not be into a guy who climbs another. Women do love winners.

There are a lot of guys whose lives consist of video games, simple carbohydrate + sugar intake, weed, TV, and other anesthetizing hobbies or activities. There are other guys whose lives consist of skill building, socializing, going places, building knowledge, working out, and being outside. It does not take extensive experience of the human condition to understand which group is most attractive to women.

4. Family courts in the United States are set up to attack men.

Family courts take men's money and children away, and there is very little a man can do to stop that process. Real world divorce should be required reading for any man contemplating marriage.

5. Schools are biased against men.

Same as #4, but with schools. Parents need to resist schools's desire to medicate boys, especially younger boys. I don't want to spend too much time b**ching about bias... the solution to bias is to work harder than the other guy... but it is real and exists.

6. Men are performance oriented (particularly “men” conceived as more than in a biological sense).

Video games are poisonous because they give the simulacrum of performance with none of the outcome from the real thing (as a side hobby they can be okay... for a lot of guys they are not a side hobby). "Performance" can mean lots of things, so this is similar to #3, and high, sustained performance leads to #1: achievement.

In terms of men and women "performance" is usually measured by, "are you f**king the chick?" If you f**k her... that is an unambiguous performance success measure... because it's unambiguous... a lot of guys prefer softer, squishier metrics.

7. Game works. Pickup works.

The game and pickup practices work, if a guy is willing to put in the effort and practice. "Works" will vary by guy... a guy who is male “4” is still unlikely to get female “7s”... but the tools are available for a guy to improve his sex and social life, relative to where he starts, if he wants to... most guys don't, not really.

8. Chicks are usually more passive, and guys need to be more active.

Especially with sex/dating, guys need to make the first move... and make things happen... most chicks will accept or reject offers and do little to move things along for themselves. Men create civilization, women live in it (and raise the next generation). Magnum likes to say that women veto. When I was younger I thought women were kind of like defective men because of their inability to propose, plan, and execute. Now I realize that different isn't the same as defective... if you expect a cow to be a dog you will usually be disappointed.

Many guys don't understand that it is our responsibility to ask her out, arrange the date, kiss her, escalate, etc. She won't do it, much. At most she might make it a bit easier by staring at you, playing with her hair, etc., but even that is unusual. Chicks go through the first half of their lives with guys doing things.

9. If you work, you will get better.

This is not a strictly red pill idea, but red pill guys emphasize growth and growth mindset over static/fixed mindset. Trying hard and practice matter, and yet "trying hard" isn't sufficiently emphasized in the United States and most of Western society. We influence our own destinies, and the harder we try, the more we influence. "Influence" is not the same thing as "100% control..." we are all somewhat restricted by the circumstances of birth, family, genetics, etc. But within those parameters, the people who work to seize control, get more control. If you believe you will fail... you are probably right... if you believe you can't change... you are probably right...

10. On average, differences between men and women exist

The passive-active dynamic is a specific example of the “on average, differences exist” idea.” This is pretty straightforward... you can overemphasize differences (a lot of red pill/pickup guys do) but you can also underemphasize them (media is super guilty of this).

Red pill dad has a summary of "basic red pill things." I think the distinction in #4 is rarely clean cut... and I think #9 is mostly untrue... but the others I mostly buy.

I'm sure I'm missing things, and the list above isn't meant to be comprehensive... but there is little game happening during the pandemic, so we get more speculation and, sadly, fewer field reports... I have speculated that the pandemic will change the game... probably by making chicks more k selected, and less r, on average.

When we have a lot of money, low disease burden, and extra resources, we can afford to f**k around a lot more. Cross-subsidies in relationships don't matter as much. Can the woman not cook, but she's good in bed? That's okay, order takeout. Can the man not earn, but he's hot and a practiced dom? That's okay, she'll get a job of her own. When we see incomes collapse and uncertainty rise... we'll see more k. The opposite, more r. That's my guess... it could be wrong... and it also only takes a few outliers for a "trend" to feel wrong, even if it is overall correct.