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20160226

You can't fight biology.

Women are hardwired to look for men with resources or the ability to get them. It comes down to whether a man can provide the woman with a safe and clean place to have her babies. In the past, this signal has taken the form of physical strength, number of slaves, land, goats, whatever. Today, it's jobs and/or money.

Then add a layer of the instinctive hunger for status within any social species.

For a given batch of economically successful women, most would rather share a successful man or stay single rather than compromise and mate with a low-status man with no resources.

Can't blame women for looking for these things the same way men can't be blamed for looking for youth and fertility in a woman.

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Not sure why getting downvoted.

To dismiss out of hand thousands of years of evolution and think the last 50+ years of modern societal change can completely counteract biological forces is.. wishful thinking?

I mean, this explanation is at least as good as any other speculation in this thread.

I did not downvote the parent.

My claim: almost every human adult has had at least one sexual partner. I can only find decent studies surveying modernity, but for example: http://www.nbcnews.com/id/19374216/. Assuming most humans having sex is not a recent development, any evolutionary pressures, if they exist at all, on the sexually active population are unclear at best; however, there may be pressures against the tiny few who go through life abstinent.

Your claim might be false.

"After a study by the National Institute of Population and Social Security Research last year found a massive increase in the number of virgins in [Japan], some academics criticised the way the research was reported.

Of 5,000 single people surveyed, the government department found 42 per cent of men and 44 per cent of women had never had sex."

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/japan-couples-s...

My views of Japan's sexuality mostly align with those in that article. It talks about the recent trend of many Japanese not having sex (I claim that historically, most humans in general do have sex); furthermore, it claims a likely significant cause is the extreme pressures needed to maintain social status. It does quote a man citing similar trends in Britain; strange again, considering that at least as of 2014, studies show Britain having about a 4% virginity rate. Japan seems to be an outlier whose culture is resulting in a collapse of sexuality. Can you extrapolate evolutionary selection pressures from this?

Because it's the worst kind of ad hoc evolutionary psych bs?

Women marry a lot of different kinds of men, for example: men who make them laugh. Men who are attentive, or ambitious, or well spoken, travelled, groomed, serious, sensitive, quiet, gregarious or any number of adjectives, none of which directly reflect their income.

In simple terms, a lot of,the thread here is guys super imposing the logic of power and position onto 'women'.

A specific type of person seeks mates primarily because of their position, these tend to be ambitious and ambition valuing people.

This is in no way the full set of women.

Yes Statistically, the logic of evolution will result in a bias. Women would love to marry an Adonis who was a PE fund owner, or a cardio-neuron surgeon.

It doesn't mean people wither away, waiting for it to happen.

The most popular trope is not of dr rich, or mr moneybags - its Prince Charming.

Your spouse will be found through the places you visit, the education you attend, via the people you meet, the places you work and and the hobbies you enjoy.

Not just because of the size of your paycheck.

And your spouse will very likely try their level best (all things held equal) to help you out when your paycheck is down, the same way many wives have been all through the recession when people were laid off, and their husbands (and themselves) weren't rising up the corporate ladder.

You may never know why, precisely, your spouse decided you were worth spending the rest of their life with.

But its not just because of biological programming.

Many people who fight for social equality between the sexes also believe that all psychological differences between the sexes are cultural, not biological. The post above directly opposes that viewpoint, and thus got downvoted.

Personally, I don't agree with their belief. We can acknowledge differences between the sexes, yet maintain equal opportunity for those who want to oppose the norm.

"All psychological differences between the sexes are cultural, not biological" is obviously not a reasonable view. The view you need to address is that current, rigorous psychology has yet to advance to the point where it can quantify the innate psychological differences between the sexes; further, culture is a highly confounding factor that we don't yet know how to isolate in regards to sexuality.

It's very popular to white knight/feminist with little regard to data or reason right now. This ostracization will lead to more extremism, loss of empathy, and further gender alienation.

Meet the new boss, same as the old boss.

> Today, it's jobs and/or money.

or being supportive, or making their life better/easier/funnier. I have dated women that were higher status than me and I'm still friend with many of them.

Being nice is a much more appreciated quality than being wealthy, especially if at work they must fight everyday to prove that their value is the same of men in the company, if not higher.

The same applies to women: I prefer nicer ones and, I must say, usually it is associated with higher education.

Not everyone can become rich or have a good job, that's true, but everyone can become a better man.

EDIT: I'm in my 40s, not exactly a kid anymore.

There's a lot of comments basically calling women golddigging p-zombies but not citing any evidence or personal experience here. I think that's more family pressure when it exists.

People are hardwired to prefer partners they find attractive. Beyond a well documented bias towards symmetry in and a certain range of ratios of physical features, attempts to find some sort of innately desirable traits that are not confounded by the incredible strong signals sent in a given culture & generation's media always fail. When you say, "Women are hardwired to look for men with resources or the ability to get them. It comes down to whether a man can provide the woman with a safe and clean place to have her babies," it's quite peculiar how societies with more of the first have a massive decline in the second.

The snarky way to reply to this is, if you're so smart, why can't you get laid?

edit: are not confounded by. Also, if you're downvoting in response to something other than the useless snark at the end of my post, please comment.

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