Tuesday, October 4, 2011

The Strip Club Litmus Test of Alpha Cred

Here's something I was thinking about recently.

A good rough measure of how alpha a given guy is is how comfortable he is around strippers. Not whether he seeks out strip clubs, but should he find himself in one for whatever reason (e.g. a bachelor party) how he comports himself while there.

Strippers are experts - nay, professionals - at using men's own sexual desire against them to extract money. Moreover, the measure of their expertise is that (most of the time) they get paid despite not actually providing what the man really wants - namely, to have sex with the stripper.

From conversations with various guys, I have come to the conclusion that the proportion of males who are made distinctly uncomfortable by strippers and strip clubs is far higher than is commonly acknowledged. And there are very good reasons for this. The normal dynamics of male/female interactions are completely reversed, and a good number of these changes seem to me to turn the power advantage towards the stripper.

A lot of this comes from the fact that the social norms of what is acceptable behaviour are drastically reversed. In polite society, it's rude to stare in general, it's ruder to stare at a woman's breasts, and if someone happens to be naked in front of you for whatever reason, you should look away (or at best steal a furtive glance).

The challenge at strip clubs is not so much that that these social norms are reversed (which is odd enough in itself), but moreover the ambiguity in how much they're reversed. Looking in general is clearly okay, but it's still surprisingly challenging to maintain composure in a conversation while staring directly at someone's crotch. If you don't believe me, try it some time. But if the man looks away, it's an implicit acknowledgement that he wanted to look, but chickened out.

Moreover, the question of what exactly is allowed is left deliberately unclear. Obviously he'd like to touch her, but the bouncer might beat him up. Okay, so now he's getting a lap dance. Surely now it's okay to touch, right? Wait, you're still not meant to. Maybe just once?

Reader, this feeling is not accidental - it is exactly the response that strippers are aiming to generate. When someone feels unsure of what to do, they are more likely to pay money just to be on the safe side of what's expected and allowed in the situation. Imagine a used car salesman skilled in the most powerful pressure selling techniques, in a market where they know everything about what the price is and what you're buying, and you know nothing, and they're using that against you to their fullest advantage.

Can you see why a good number of men may not actually enjoy this, female nudity notwithstanding?

This is also why the response of men in these circumstances says a surprising amount about them.

Betas are likely to constantly second-guess themselves about what they can do, worried about what the girl will think. They're more likely to actually avoid the whole situation, and either just pay a ton of money quickly, or try to hide in corners or make themselves inconspicuous, which of course is completely ineffectual. Strippers know that trick too. What they'd actually like is to just get out of there, but usually the male peer pressure that brought them there makes this difficult.

The natural alphas I have known have all maintained an easy, somewhat cocky rapport around strippers. They're comfortable with staring, but do so with a smirk. The reality is that they don't really care what the stripper thinks, and are just enjoying themselves. And this kind of aloof, amused indifference in the face of female sexuality is a character trait that in other contexts is likely to be attractive.

The reality is that there are more betas in the world than alphas. I would wager that far more bachelors than you think would be quite relieved to dispense entirely with the tradition of strippers at bachelor parties.

No comments:

Post a Comment