“Nice guys finish last” is a phrase with which we are all familiar. It is often cited by amiable but sexually unsuccessful males as the reason behind their lack of reproductive accomplishments. However, it simply isn’t true. I know plenty of nice guys with hot girlfriends, and I bet you do too.
However, as with most adages, the phrase “Nice guys finish last” does contain a grain of truth. There are some nice guys who do finish last, and I would divide them into two classes: cowards and butt-kissers.
Let us define a coward, then, as a male who lives his life in intermittent but more or less constant fear. Distinguishing characteristics of cowards include a constant air of timidity, a tendency to look at the ground when speaking, and the complete inability to behave naturally in the presence of women.
Cowards do finish last, at least from a reproductive standpoint. They finish last because women despise them, for reasons that are purely evolutionary.
A cowardly male is not a good protector, nor a good provider. If Og the caveman is a coward, and unable to stand up to other cavemen when they come to pilfer his carefully hoarded possessions, then Og and his family will soon be robbed blind by braver and more assertive Neanderthals. Poor Mrs. Og will be doomed to a life prehistoric poverty, while the wives of the bolder cavemen will be cozy and snug under all the saber-toothed tiger skins which their husbands have stolen from the hapless Og. Women have always found it Darwinistically impossible to be attracted to cowards, and always will.
A coward will always be very nice to everyone. He is in constant fear of offending people, and thereby incurring dislike or perhaps even suffering a verbal rebuke, which he fears more than anything else in the world. So all cowards are nice guys, and they give a bad name to the whole class; but it is the cowardice, not the niceness, which prevents them from making babies.
If you are a coward, the best thing to do is go up to random women and ask them out. I was a coward for many years, and this is how I finally overcame my fear. You’d be surprised, too, how often it works. The corollary of “Women despise cowards” is “Women adore the bold.”
The second sort of nice guy who finishes last is (for lack of a better term) the butt-kisser. He is not exactly a coward, but he is so happy to be near a woman, and holds her beauty in such enormous awe, that he is constantly buying her gifts, apologizing for imagined wrongs, and doing her every service imaginable, all the while telling how wonderful and pretty she is.
Why don’t women like to have their butts kissed constantly? Well, women enjoy the “chase” aspect of the dating process. It is pleasant to be uncertain as to whether someone in whom you are interested is also interested in you. To kiss a woman’s butt constantly is to leave her in no doubt of your affection, and therefore deprive the dating process of its most lively and interesting aspect. In short, it’s boring to have your butt kissed all the time.
Also, women have standards. They wish to date, kiss or make love to someone of a higher social status than themselves. So if you’re constantly telling this woman how wonderful she is, then she will get the impression that you are a member of a lower social stratum than she, and therefore a poor catch. If you kiss her butt too much, she will conclude that you are below her, socially, and not worth her time.
The man of her dreams would be above her, and therefore would have no reason to kiss her butt.
Does this mean that if you’re a jerk to every female you meet, you’re going to be fending off women with a sharp stick and going through eighty rubbers a month? No. Women are perfectly familiar with the technique of affected jerk attitude, and can always spot it as fraudulent. However, I do say that you should play it cool with women, and never act too interested.
To be respectful without meekness, attentive without obsession; these are the marks of a true man.
Call Jeff a butt-kissing coward at [email protected]
