Why do the " Bad Boys" get so many women?

[JimG]

While reading this thread, I was reminded of something Karl Keating wrote in an e-letter some time ago. So I searched for it and found it. Here is an excerpt:

“Some speakers who have spoken for us, when first starting out, told their young audiences that somewhere out there was a Prince or Princess Charming, someone fated from all eternity to be a young person's perfect match. Listeners were told something like this: "Save yourself for that one person that God has set aside just for you." When I learned that this is what was being said, I told our speakers to cut it out--because it wasn't true. It sounded romantic, and it sounded pious, but it wasn't true.”

I urge everyone to go back and read it. It is a small antidote to excess romanticism, which is not love, and which can kill marriage if made the only priority.

It can be found here:

http://archive.catholic.com/newsletters/kke_080108.asp

[Vatican2Rocks!]

Originally Posted by JimG

Hmm, so you're the one getting all the hotties! Do you plan on marrying one of them someday? How will you choose which hottie to settle down with in a lifelong covenant?

lol

well, for purposes of this thread, whoever he is, he will be someone that pays for all our dates. also, he will be someone that respects women and doesn't bash them.

[Vatican2Rocks!]

Originally Posted by Debora123

Sometimes people have to date multiple people in order to find the right one.

Nothing wrong with that.

I suspect the prejudice is coming from the way she worded it, which is silly IMO. But I will let her defend herself if she would like.

yes, that would be me actually. i want a number of quality men to choose from. I tend to believe that you will know who the one is anyway on first sight but i still want the freedom to choose amongst an assortment of quality men.

[Vatican2Rocks!]

Originally Posted by feed me

Thank you for reminding me of that. As long as it's for the better of a person and not the fun and games of a women. I give the credit to you for that reminder. Thank you.

@ Debora123: If we go after the quiet girls, it does nothing for us if she won't talk. Meaning if she has a genuine interest in the man, and the man goes and talks to her, and she doesn't open her mouth at all, how are you suppose to get to know her, and who she is? How are you suppose to crack that piece of ice, especially if she likes you? A woman who doesn't talk when you talk to her and she has a genuine liking for you drives me to kick her away from me. That's the biggest turn off ever.

you would have to ask her questions in order to get her to open up or you have to talk about subjects that are non threatening that allow her to just dive right into the conversation.

[Vatican2Rocks!]

Originally Posted by feed me

Not true, seen it happen lots of times. Quiet women just seem prone to never asking questions, and it ends up feeling like an interrogation to the man even when they don't ask questions, but say regular things to get the girl to speak up. Relationships are a 2 way street people. You have to speak up to get to know somebody.

maybe you're not a good conversationalist yet.

[EasterJoy]

Originally Posted by Catholic_Prime

Sin is attractive, it was what lured Eve.
And that's how it works for us.

"...do you reject the glamour of evil...?"

glam·our /ˈglæmər/
noun
1. the quality of fascinating, alluring, or attracting, especially by a combination of charm and good looks.
2. excitement, adventure, and unusual activity: the glamour of being an explorer.
3. magic or enchantment; spell; witchery

[Norseman82]

Ironically, I just saw this on MSN:

http://living.msn.com/love-relations...8-c5b7be627f9c

On another note - one that I have posted before, but is appropriate repeating for this thread - when the last lady I dated broke up with me to enter a religious community, she told me that was the risk you took in dating a religious girl and that if I wanted to get married I should look for a "bad girl" (and before anyone jumps over me, those were HER words, not mine). To this day I am still haunted by those words.

[chevalier]

Originally Posted by fontgoddess

A few thoughts:

First, can we ban the word "nice"? What does it even mean, in this context? I don't believe "niceness" is necessarily a positive virtue. In this context, I'm reading it as "not a jerk or abusive or a cheater". Well, yay you. For any emotionally healthy person, male or female, this is going to be a minimum requirement in the person they want to date. However, it is not sufficient to build a relationship on, if various other factors aren't there. If a "nice" guy asks a woman out and she says no, it's probably not because she "only likes bad boys". It's probably because she doesn't feel an emotional/intellectual/spiritual/physical attraction to the "nice" guy. It's not a judgment on his character, just her being, as they say, not into him. Men are not compelled to ask out women they are not into, and women are not compelled to go out with men they are not into.

Second, does anyone truly believe that all women, or all men, are all alike? That we are all nothing more than slaves of evolutionary psychology or biology or whatever? Thinking that way is probably one of the reasons people may be having a lack of success with the opposite sex. I think it's important to see each person of the opposite sex as a unique individual and not merely as someone who may or may not go out with you. And I can't believe that people are still trotting out that whole alpha male, beta male nonsense. Really, people. I believe in evolution, but we are not orangutans. We do have this little thing called Free Will, if we bother to exercise it.

P.S. That study in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology is hardly "science".

I see some value in the concept of "nice" as in a basic manner of interaction with others, marked by kindness and cooperation and opposite to being a jerk or an adversarial or crude or otherwise offensive manner. On the other hand there can be some problems with such a categorisation, primarily because of how subjective it is and how mixed up it can get with simply being soft (or even a doormat).

If a "nice" guy asks a woman out and she says no, it's probably not because she "only likes bad boys". It's probably because she doesn't feel an emotional/intellectual/spiritual/physical attraction to the "nice" guy. It's not a judgment on his character, just her being, as they say, not into him.

Yes, of course, but that doesn't somehow invalidate the discussion we're having here. A woman being or not being into a certain type of men (in this case the stereotypical "bad guys", without insisting on any specific, narrow definition) is very much within the boundaries of this discussion.

Men are not compelled to ask out women they are not into, and women are not compelled to go out with men they are not into.

True but that's beside the point. Nobody says there is an obligation to accept dating invitations from men classified as 'nice' or 'not bad boys', nor even an obligation to avoid 'bad guys'. Commenting on the subject, even negatively, doesn't yet amount to a proposition of rights or obligations.

Originally Posted by EasterJoy

"...do you reject the glamour of evil...?"

glam·our /ˈglæmər/
noun
1. the quality of fascinating, alluring, or attracting, especially by a combination of charm and good looks.
2. excitement, adventure, and unusual activity: the glamour of being an explorer.
3. magic or enchantment; spell; witchery

Now we're talking! (j/k)

Originally Posted by Vatican2Rocks!

maybe you're not a good conversationalist yet.

Maybe but maybe he's average (or better) at that and wants someone who's also average (or better).

Originally Posted by Vatican2Rocks!

yes, that would be me actually. i want a number of quality men to choose from. I tend to believe that you will know who the one is anyway on first sight but i still want the freedom to choose amongst an assortment of quality men.

Quite a sense of entitlement have we!

Originally Posted by Vatican2Rocks!

I tend to believe that you will know who the one is anyway on first sight

I've 'known' that a couple of times, you know.

Originally Posted by JimG

While reading this thread, I was reminded of something Karl Keating wrote in an e-letter some time ago. So I searched for it and found it. Here is an excerpt:

“Some speakers who have spoken for us, when first starting out, told their young audiences that somewhere out there was a Prince or Princess Charming, someone fated from all eternity to be a young person's perfect match. Listeners were told something like this: "Save yourself for that one person that God has set aside just for you." When I learned that this is what was being said, I told our speakers to cut it out--because it wasn't true. It sounded romantic, and it sounded pious, but it wasn't true.”

I urge everyone to go back and read it. It is a small antidote to excess romanticism, which is not love, and which can kill marriage if made the only priority.

It can be found here:

http://archive.catholic.com/newsletters/kke_080108.asp

IMHO that can be true, it's just that there's not enough data to ascertain yes or no. One can't make such a claim out of thin air (not in the least because of the amount of predestination weaved into it) but on the other hand one can't base any argument on a premise that God doesn't care sufficiently for a single human being since God cares infinitely, and is concerned, and is totally capable of addressing each of billions of humans individually (something we may have trouble imagining). Therefore the way I see it there's a stale-mate.

[Vatican2Rocks!]

Originally Posted by Norseman82

Ironically, I just saw this on MSN:

http://living.msn.com/love-relations...8-c5b7be627f9c

Durante, along with a team of researchers, performed a study on a group of women during periods of both high and low fertility. The women were asked to view the online dating profiles of both nice guys and "sexy cads" (their words, not mine). From there, the ladies were to determine the parenting potential of the men in the photos.

And here's where the hormones come in. During the time of ovulation, women tended to perceive the bad boys as better future fathers and more dependable relationship partners. Their rating of the nice guys, however, stayed the same, whether they were ovulating or not.
"Under the hormonal influence of ovulation, women delude themselves into thinking that the sexy bad boys will become devoted partners and better dads," said Durante. "When looking at the sexy cad through ovulation goggles, Mr. Wrong looked exactly like Mr. Right,” said Durante.

Aside from sounding like a bawdy joke gift from Spencer's, "ovulation goggles" seem to have some significance. They completed another study, in which the women interacted directly with male actors who were either playing the role of reliable dad or sexy cad. The results were the same. The ovulating women believed the cad was the better dad.

So, great. Now there's scientific proof that we women like bad boys. (not so fast---see below)

the problem with these two studies is that the researchers defined nice guys and bad boys for the women---not the women.

a guy putting on an act of the bad boy who doesn't look attractive to me wouldn't get my attention on three fronts: looks, the way he dresses, and the way he talks.

a guy putting on act of the nice guy who doesn't look attractive to me still wouldn't get my attention because of looks, the way he dresses, the way he talks.

well, getting my attention is probably not the right nuance but you get the picture...he ain't getting any.

[Vatican2Rocks!]

Originally Posted by chevalier

Maybe but maybe he's average (or better) at that and wants someone who's also average (or better).

True

Quite a sense of entitlement have we!



I've 'known' that a couple of times, you know.

lol

[Nec5]

Don't hate the player. Hate the game.

And yeah, I'm joking.

A friend of mine (married woman) once told me:

"We don't even know what we want. So why do men waste time trying figure out what we want when we don't even know?"

It's complicated, but I'm going to invoke Freud and argue that most women do indeed seek out some version of their father.

[Vatican2Rocks!]

Originally Posted by Nec5

Don't hate the player. Hate the game.

And yeah, I'm joking.

A friend of mine (married woman) once told me:

"We don't even know what we want. So why do men waste time trying figure out what we want when we don't even know?"

It's complicated, but I'm going to invoke Freud and argue that most women do indeed seek out some version of their father.

i think people tend to seek out some version of their mother or the most loved member of their family, could even be a sibling type.

[mellowcalico]

You know, part of the problem might be that a lot of women turn down a man's advances by saying, "You are a nice guy but..."

I think maybe some men think that they are being turned down for being "nice" when the woman is really just trying to soften the message that she's not interested.

[Crescentinus]

Originally Posted by mellowcalico

You know, part of the problem might be that a lot of women turn down a man's advances by saying, "You are a nice guy but..."

I think maybe some men think that they are being turned down for being "nice" when the woman is really just trying to soften the message that she's not interested.

That is possible, and a bit weirder than the whole "let's just be friends" line.
At least the latter is not vague.

[E_7]

Originally Posted by Havard

Whoah, no... that's far too sad for me.

I'm thinking more along the lines of Michael Buble's Haven't Met You Yet.

I like the song (and video)