Andrew Cory: What it means to be a “nice guy”

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Posted by Andrew Cory:
What it means to be a “nice guy”
http://www.deanesmay.com/posts/1150043098.shtml


   There is this pervasive social idea that âniceâ people donât get laid.
   Or much of anything else. [1]Amanda steps up to debate the idea that
   nice guys ought to expect tail just for being nice. The post she is
   responding to involves a guy who claims to want to be feminist whining
   about how this wonât get him into bed with the sort of buxom young
   thang he is used to. There were so many bad premises and false starts
   that itâs a miracle Amanda arrived at a valid conclusion...

   Let me just start off by laying out my own beliefs. Iâd love to call
   myself a feminist. Insofar "[2]feminism is the radical notion that
   women are human", Iâll roll with it. Since I tend to feel that way
   about every-damned-one is human (replace the relevant bits of that
   statement with the âraceâ or creed of your choice and youâll see what
   I mean), I tend to call myself a âhumanistâ. This means that in my
   view, men are from... Earth. Women are from... Earth. Some of us want
   to visit the Delta, some the Obelisk, but everyone wants to travel...

   So what does it mean to be âniceâ? Well, in my experience, âniceâ
   means âspinelessâ and âsocially awkwardâ. When a âniceâ guy meets a
   girl he likes he does everything he can for her. He treats her as
   either a child or a goddessâbut never a co-equal human being. If he
   treats her like a child, heâs showing that he doesnât respect her
   enough for her to return that respect. If he treats her like a
   goddess, heâs showing that he doesnât respect himself enough for her
   to respect him. Either way: this guy may have made a friend. But never
   a lover....

   Non-nice people come in as many varieties as a pack of flavored
   condoms. I wonât defend each and every choiceâsome are indefensible. I
   will say that non-nice people are capable of communicating desire.
   Effectively communicating this desire is a pretty universal key to
   most peopleâs private chastity belts. In fact, nearly every other lock
   is extremely personalized. No wonderâ niceâ guys canât get to first
   base; they canât communicate their desire. Nor are they able to pick
   up on the subtle cues that a woman would really quite badly like to be
   nailed to the nearest sturdy object. This is the âsocial awkwardâ
   part...

   When looked at as a whole, it becomes quite clear: feminist men arenât
   âniceâ. Indeed, it is quite clear to me that spineless and awkward men
   arenât going to get laid no matter how egalitarian the world becomes.
   It isnât that women like men to be assholes, merely that men and women
   both like their partners to have gonads. Our speciesâ survival kind of
   depends on it...

   (cross posted on [3]Punning Pundit, a blog you should read more
   often.)

References

   1. http://pandagon.net/2006/06/10/nice-guys-vs-ms-amanda-marcotte-exhibit-3/
   2. http://www.quotedb.com/quotes/2710
   3. http://www.punningpundit.com/