- Joined
- Oct 9, 2012
- Messages
- 6,238
Everyone knows your friends influence your thinking and behavior. One of the things I've been mulling about more recently, though, is how far-reaching this effect really is.
I've talked to guys who were hardcore into computer gaming culture, and ALL their friends and regular social contacts were gamers. These guys would INTENSELY push back the suggestion that they change their ways in order to get girls. "No way, I'm not changing," they'd say, "girls are STUPID if they don't realize what an amazing guy I am!"
I think the divide here is culture. A guy's in gaming culture, and in gaming culture, he's the SHIT. He's the bee's knees. He pwns everyone in range of his sniper rifle or his battle axe. He tears it up.
A girl's off in mainstream culture. She doesn't give a hoot about how talented a guy is with a video game fire magic spell... she cares about things like fashion and sexy smiles.
The video game guy looks down on the mainstream girl's views, and the mainstream girl looks down on the video game guy's views. Both of them think the other one is nuts!
And that'd be fine if neither of them interacted with the other, or needed or wanted to.
The problem is, video game guy wants to DATE mainstream girl, or someone like her. But he doesn't want to become acculturated with mainstream culture, and he doesn't want to understand what's appealing in her culture and become that. Instead, he wants her to recognize him for his talents from his own cultural point of view. But she doesn't have any need to - there are plenty of mainstream men around her that are appealing enough.
The majority of the bitterness among people that you see is people who want to date others with different acculturation than they have but who aren't willing to go re-culture themselves to be appealing to the people they want. Essentially, they're like spoiled little children - I want what I want, but I don't want to have to do anything to get it.
Thus, why friends are so important. If you want to date bleached blonde beach Barbies, you won't get that by having video game friends or MBA friends or law club friends - you need ripped beach hunk friends who like surfing and tattoos and work as lifeguards and wake board instructors. You get those friends, you get acculturated in that scene, and suddenly it's a breeze to relate to and appeal to the girls you want. If you want to date ambitious career women, you won't get that by having video game friends or ripped beach hunk friends - you need MBA friends, law club friends, friends in the professional consulting world. Then you get acculturated with the norms there, and learn how to really relate to and be appealing to the women from that subculture.
I think this is actually a really important thing that most guys overlook. The guys who are only semi-serious about self-improvement dabble in a bit, but whine when you tell them they need to change or that they need new friends. Your friends determine your culture, and that determines the kinds of women you appeal to most and have the easiest time getting. If you're in "ghetto basketball culture," you'll get chicks from the hood who go to ghetto basketball games. If you're in "hipster underground dive bar culture," you get the hipster underground girls who go to dive bars. If you're from "video game culture"... well, I guess there's always Lara Croft.
Point is, your acculturation determines your success or failure with various types of women, and being closed off to changing friends and cultures also means closing yourself off to the women from those cultures. Once a guy understands this, he's fine - he can then decide if he's willing to take on new friends and learn a new subculture, or if he really isn't all that interested with the women from that subculture anyway. It's the guys who don't get this, and who sit there and fume and say to themselves, "I'm NOT changing... but everyone ELSE should change and recognize my amazingness!" who suffer for their lack of awareness of it.
Your friends and your "scene" determine the kinds of women you end up with more than almost anything else.
Chase
I've talked to guys who were hardcore into computer gaming culture, and ALL their friends and regular social contacts were gamers. These guys would INTENSELY push back the suggestion that they change their ways in order to get girls. "No way, I'm not changing," they'd say, "girls are STUPID if they don't realize what an amazing guy I am!"
I think the divide here is culture. A guy's in gaming culture, and in gaming culture, he's the SHIT. He's the bee's knees. He pwns everyone in range of his sniper rifle or his battle axe. He tears it up.
A girl's off in mainstream culture. She doesn't give a hoot about how talented a guy is with a video game fire magic spell... she cares about things like fashion and sexy smiles.
The video game guy looks down on the mainstream girl's views, and the mainstream girl looks down on the video game guy's views. Both of them think the other one is nuts!
And that'd be fine if neither of them interacted with the other, or needed or wanted to.
The problem is, video game guy wants to DATE mainstream girl, or someone like her. But he doesn't want to become acculturated with mainstream culture, and he doesn't want to understand what's appealing in her culture and become that. Instead, he wants her to recognize him for his talents from his own cultural point of view. But she doesn't have any need to - there are plenty of mainstream men around her that are appealing enough.
The majority of the bitterness among people that you see is people who want to date others with different acculturation than they have but who aren't willing to go re-culture themselves to be appealing to the people they want. Essentially, they're like spoiled little children - I want what I want, but I don't want to have to do anything to get it.
Thus, why friends are so important. If you want to date bleached blonde beach Barbies, you won't get that by having video game friends or MBA friends or law club friends - you need ripped beach hunk friends who like surfing and tattoos and work as lifeguards and wake board instructors. You get those friends, you get acculturated in that scene, and suddenly it's a breeze to relate to and appeal to the girls you want. If you want to date ambitious career women, you won't get that by having video game friends or ripped beach hunk friends - you need MBA friends, law club friends, friends in the professional consulting world. Then you get acculturated with the norms there, and learn how to really relate to and be appealing to the women from that subculture.
I think this is actually a really important thing that most guys overlook. The guys who are only semi-serious about self-improvement dabble in a bit, but whine when you tell them they need to change or that they need new friends. Your friends determine your culture, and that determines the kinds of women you appeal to most and have the easiest time getting. If you're in "ghetto basketball culture," you'll get chicks from the hood who go to ghetto basketball games. If you're in "hipster underground dive bar culture," you get the hipster underground girls who go to dive bars. If you're from "video game culture"... well, I guess there's always Lara Croft.
Point is, your acculturation determines your success or failure with various types of women, and being closed off to changing friends and cultures also means closing yourself off to the women from those cultures. Once a guy understands this, he's fine - he can then decide if he's willing to take on new friends and learn a new subculture, or if he really isn't all that interested with the women from that subculture anyway. It's the guys who don't get this, and who sit there and fume and say to themselves, "I'm NOT changing... but everyone ELSE should change and recognize my amazingness!" who suffer for their lack of awareness of it.
Your friends and your "scene" determine the kinds of women you end up with more than almost anything else.
Chase
