As a result of a lunch conversation with a female friend recently, who was bemoaning her recent breakup and lack of success on the dating front.
Lots of “nice guys” are in reality clingy, annoying, assholish, entitled creeps. Which is why they don’t make much headway; women (and men) can see who is polite, courteous and gentlemanly and if you have to call yourself a “nice guy” you probably are none of these things.
Likewise, my friend is loud-mouthed and obnoxious, a harpy if there ever was one. She likes to use the old “men are intimidated by strong confident women, like me” trope. Which, IMHO, is bollocks. She is no great catch, she is a lousy partner, which is why no one stays with her (seriously, she demanded that one guy go with her to the opera, as opposed to go to the hospital to be with his mother who had just had a coronary artery stenting, since he had a sibling who could be there and she really did not want to go alone or with a friend…
I have known many women who are strong and confident; they don’t usually need to say that they are, you see it in their actions and the way they carried themselves. Ditto with real “nice guys”.
Similarly, people who tell you what good Christians they are. Or those who brag about how smart they are. Or how rich they are. Yeah, if ya gotta tell me, you’re doing it wrong.
I would think not, only because the “nice guy” is left out because he’s meek, whereas the “strong woman” is left out because she’s abrasive. One trait actively annoys the partner, whereas the other causes them to not be noticed in the first place.
If I had to make a terrible guess, I would think the female equivalent of the nice guy is the slight tomboy. Because she’s not a girly-girl, she won’t spend a lot of time on her appearance and make her prettier than she actually is, so she won’t get noticed by the guy on the street. At the same time, she has enough tomboy interests to be a part of a group of guys, but not noticed in a sexual way.
In general, women who meet several of the following criteria are likely to be the female equivalent of the nice guy: Highly educated, ambitious, confuses “arrogance” with “assertiveness” or “confidence,” career-driven, tall, hostile feminist (as opposed to genuine feminist,) physically muscular, etc.
There’s even a saying for it in China these days - that there are 3 genders. Men, women, and women with PhDs. Men marry women, while women with PhDs go unmarried.
One commonality between “nice guys” and “assertive women” is that they confuse traits that they find attractive in the opposite gender, with traits that the opposite gender would find attractive in them.
It is in our nature to protect our egos, distorting reality to tell yourself that you are amazing and other people have serious flaws for not liking your positive attributes is normal sadly.
In that regards I’d say women who claim men don’t like them because they are strong and independent are the same as men who say women don’t like them because they are nice.
But usually it is the person making the claim who has problems. They may lack a social network, social skills, value as a sexual and romantic creature, they may like the wrong kinds of people, etc. But accepting that hurts the ego.
The vast majority of long-term (more than a year or two) supposed lonely nice guys (who weren’t horribly disfigured, morbidly obese, or otherwise well outside of the norm in presentability) that I’ve actually met and interacted with either weren’t putting any effort into romantic connections, or weren’t actually nice guys.
Be a nice person and put yourself out there, and for the vast majority of people of whatever gender, if you keep trying eventually you’ll meet someone.
From the last time we talked about “nice guys”, I learned that there are two types . One are the guys who portray themselves nice, but they are actually assholes. And then the other “nice guys” are the ones who think that women should be attracted to them simply because they aren’t jerks, and any woman who is looking for something more must be into jerks (or “Chads”…the lingo is ever-changing).
The first type of Nice Guy knows he’s not nice. He’s knowingly using “nice” as a bait. The second type of Nice Guy geniunely is nice, but he’s stupid for thinking that means anything in the relationship game. One is fooling others. The other is fooling himself. So it seems to me that the “strong, confident woman” is similar to the second kind of Nice Guy.
The vast majority of long-term (more than a year or two) supposed lonely nice guys (who weren’t horribly disfigured, morbidly obese, or otherwise well outside of the norm in presentability) that I’ve actually met and interacted with either weren’t putting any effort into romantic connections, or weren’t actually nice guys.
Be a nice person and put yourself out there, and for the vast majority of people of whatever gender, if you keep trying eventually you’ll meet someone.
I don’t know if suppsed strong, confident women are similar, but I’d bet that for the vast majority, if they consistently put a little effort out there, eventually they’ll meet someone.
Part of the issue is like you said in your other post, women value socioeconomic status in a mate (far) more than men do. Generally a man is more willing to date down in socioeconomic status than a woman is. So the more socioeconomic status a woman accrues the more she hits a triple whammy if she is only willing to date men of equal or higher SES.
The pool of men she has available shrinks, because the more demanding she is of men with high ses, the fewer men who fit her demands. The higher the level of income, wealth, status and education you demand, the smaller your dating pool becomes.
The men she does want have many options, many of whom are younger, prettier and nicer than her. She can’t compete to win the men she wants.
Like it or not, a woman’s romantic value on the market declines with age. By the time a woman accrues a high level of socioeconomic status, she is usually at least 30.
I don’t think it’s that nice guys think that niceness itself should be a winning trait, as it is that they think that “nice” is better than “not-nice” on the totem pole of attractiveness. Like, as if, supposing everything else is equal (income, occupation, appearance, etc.) that a guy who is nice should be a B+ and a guy who is a jerk or bully should be a C-.
They are confounded, then, when the jerk is a B+ and the nice guy is a C- (again, assuming that all other factors are equal.) it’s a case of mistaken assumption.
The counterpart to the genuinely nice guy is the genuinely nice girl – aka “The Wallflower” – who unfortunately has no opinions to share, no ability to stand up for herself, and is too shy to even signal her interest in a guy.
The “Strong and Confident Woman” is either an attention-seeking prima donna or a spoiled brat who expects to get her way all the time and throws a tantrum when things go wrong. Her male counterpart generally falls into the broad category of “asshole.”
For a few immature individuals, that might be the case. But in the long run, for actual nice people, they’ll turn out more successful, in general, than the jerks, when it comes to real connection and love. Their assumption is right – that being nice really is more valuable than being a jerk. It just might take a little time to realize it.
You can turn the whole theory upside down, and say generally a man is not willing to date up in socioeconomic status. Then instead of blaming women, we can blame men…yeah this thread will turn out great I’m sure. (sarcasm)
I know a woman with an ivy league graduate degree and a six figure income. She claims she can’t find a man because many men are intimidated because she earns 2-3x more than they do. In relationships it causes problems because the men become Insecure.
I read an article claiming stay at home husbands are far more likely to have affairs than men who are breadwinners.
I don’t think it’s the same. If you do a dating experiment where women who earn $100k ask out men who earn $25k, you’d probably get far more “yes” responses from the men than “yes” responses from women if men who earn $25k were to ask out women who earn $100k. (assuming everyone knows everyone’s income in the experiment.)
But wasn’t that the assuming back in the 80s, hence we got the “easier to get killed by terrorist than getting married after 40.” Statistically, they found out it’s not true.
I do remember reading an article in China, (can’t find it anymore) where higher income women can’t find husbands despite the gender ratio. Obviously does not apply to U.S.
Either way, there seem to be a lot of lonely people out there.