An Admonishment

Let me give you guys out there a word of advice: If you’re a poor sap like me, don’t ever read any books about the evolutionary psychology of sex. They are just too depressing. I’ve read two or three now and, after finishing each one, I have spiraled downwards past melancholy, past utter perdition, and straight to suicidal. This is because these texts lend scientific credence to what I have suspected all along, namely, that I am not particularly attractive to women.

These books all tend to say the same thing: “The idea that beauty is in the eye of the beholder is basically a bunch of junk. Look. Genes are selfish and just want to be passed from one generation to the next. And evolution has instilled within us various methods for finding the best possible person with whom we can reproduce. These methods vary depending upon our role in the whole affair, i.e. – our gender.”

Women, for example, bear the burden of having an embryo develop in their wombs for nine months, risk life and limb in that dreadful business of childbirth, and then suffer with an infant suckling at their breasts for a stretch, causing them to become sore, etc. Men, on the other hand, don’t have wombs and thusly needn’t worry about some parasitic fetus gestating therein or its egress. Ergo, the only worry we have is getting frustrated for a time because we are forced to watch some wrinkly ball of skin take our place at the breasts of our goodly wife. We tend to think that those tits are ours and don’t like to see anyone else playing with them. Except, of course, if another woman is playing with them. (Or our wife is playing with her own tits.) Let’s face it here, we men just want to get laid. It wasn’t a bunch of women drooling over the release of the DVD director’s cut of When Larry Ate Sally or The Hunt for Pink October – it was men.

What this all boils down to is that women invest quite a bit in this whole sordid baby-making affair while we men ideally need only donate a single sperm and then bust out of Dodge. The spanner that gets thrown into our works is that we human beings take forever and a day to grow up and become self-sufficient. Other animals are out in the world kicking ass and taking names within a few months of birth while we humans are weighted down with lazy-ass, unemployed slugs who live in our basements well into their thirties. (You never see adult horses playing Nintendo in Mr. and Mrs. Ed’s stable, do ya? Sloth seems to be a uniquely human trait.) Ergo, human fathers need to hang around after meiosis.

“So what?” you ask. “The fact that men go out and try to get laid all the time while women seek commitment isn’t exactly news.” Fair enough. But I’m getting to my point. You see, these various roles dictate what we seek in a mate. When we say men primarily look at the physical beauty of women, we are really saying that men are looking for signs that a woman is healthy and can carry a pregnancy to term and beyond. Our male ancestors sought women with clear skin, long hair, good hips, etc. and so do the men of the 21st century. (Regarding the last item, there seems to be a universal preference for women whose hip-to-waist ratio is about 0.7.) While this may be the year 2003, our brains are still wired in the same way as those of men c. 40,000B.C. If a woman can’t grow a decent mop and her skin is all carbuncular, she probably ain’t long of this earth. And if her hips are too narrow, what are the odds of being able to squeeze out that eight-pound mini-me from her belly?

Women, on the other hand, are thinking, “If that son of a bitch doesn’t want to stick around, I will just have to make him.” One of the ways they do this is by concealing the fertile time in their menstrual cycles. Unlike female chimpanzees, our closest genetic relatives, women don’t find their labia turning pink when in estrus, however funny that would be. Instead, women merely undergo a small change in temperature. Although I’d be willing to give it a shot, I suspect that most women would be turned off by some Neanderthal wielding a thermometer during foreplay. Thusly, we men are compelled to stick around to ensure that the offspring we raise are our own and not the milkman’s.

Anyway…So what do women seek in a partner? Since women invest so much of their time and physical effort into the production of progeny, they, not surprisingly, seek men who can materially invest in them and their children. Hence, women seek men of stature and material abundance. Joe Six-Pack may be a nice, handsome guy, but if he’s poor, what will he be able to provide to his offspring? The Aztec Sun-King didn’t have a harem of 1,500 nubile, young women because he blew his paycheck every Friday night down at the tavern.

Women look for men with power and with stuff. And it is for precisely this reason that I am unattractive to women and thusly get depressed. I may have a basement full of stuff, but it ain’t the stuff women are looking for. I haven’t amassed piles of wealth nor do I have armies of men who obey my every word. As Hank Kissinger observed, “Power is a great aphrodisiac.” And, being a lowly Help Desk Analyst, I ain’t got none.

About the only thing I’ve got going for me, say the evolutionary psychologists, is my above-average height. If someone is bigger than we are, it is natural for us to feel at least some initial intimidation. Our brains equate physical size with power. This probably accounts for why men tend to make $3000 a year above the norm for every inch of height they are above the average. This also probably explains why I’ve gotten laid in the past. My height sort of fools women for a time, they go temporarily insane. But it wears off eventually and they leave.

If you think this is all bullshit, sit back and ponder it for a while. Did the hot chicks in high school date the A students or the jocks? You don’t see groupies hanging out backstage after the performance of a symphony orchestra. They’re looking to hook up with a rich rock’n’roll star. Do you think Anna Nicole Smith married that old geezer because she thought he resembled Brad Pitt? Fuck no! He was rich and powerful. Did I mention he was rich and powerful?

Despite how positive my mother says it is that I am a nice and intelligent young man, neither of these traits has gotten me very far. After all, nice guys finish last. Rich and powerful guys finish first, however. (And most rich and powerful people are assholes.) This being the case, in the interest of my sperm, I have decided to forsake my niceness and become a jerk. $$ + power = pussy. When I’m in public, I’ll have a gorgeous babe on my arm featuring a slender gynecoid figure and its attendant 0.7 hip-to-waist ratio. She’ll be nice and hypermammiferous too. I’ll be able to buy her collagen injections for her lips so they’ll look like she could suck a golf ball through a garden hose. I don’t care if she’s only after my money because I am only after her snatch. True love is a myth, people! And since I’ll be so rich, I will be able to afford to hire someone to keep an eye on her. Yeah, you heard me right. Men have always felt that way – witness eunuchs, chastity belts, and female circumcision – we just have gotten to the point of using less gruesome methods of making sure the pussy stays put. I ain’t footin’ the bills for some other guy’s genes getting passed on down the line.Despite how positive my mother says it is that I am a nice and intelligent young man, neither of these traits has gotten me very far. After all, nice guys finish last. Rich and powerful guys finish first, however. (And most rich and powerful people are assholes.) This being the case, in the interest of my sperm, I have decided to forsake my niceness and become a jerk. $$ + power = pussy. When I’m in public, I’ll have a gorgeous babe on my arm featuring a slender gynecoid figure and its attendant 0.7 hip-to-waist ratio. She’ll be nice and hypermammiferous too. I’ll be able to buy her collagen injections for her lips so they’ll look like she could suck a golf ball through a garden hose. I don’t care if she’s only after my money because I am only after her snatch. True love is a myth, people! And since I’ll be so rich, I will be able to afford to hire someone to keep an eye on her. Yeah, you heard me right. Men have always felt that way – witness eunuchs, chastity belts, and female circumcision – we just have gotten to the point of using less gruesome methods of making sure the pussy stays put. I ain’t footin’ the bills for some other guy’s genes getting passed on down the line.

So, if I seem a bit glum, know that it’s only because I am all-too aware of my brackish countenance. And if I seem a bit quiet, know that it’s only because I am plotting away to become rich and powerful. My goal is to put as many copies of myself on this planet as possible.