From: utzoo!watmath!watcgl!dmmartindale
Newsgroups: net.singles
Title: Re: On social competition (Indirectly, at least)
Article-I.D.: watcgl.23
Posted: Sat Nov 20 14:42:18 1982
Received: Sat Nov 20 23:48:29 1982
References: alice.2231

It's unfortunate that the submitter of the comment about social competition
felt he had to forge his name.  Most of the people listening out here really
are quite reasonable human beings.
	Anyway, I think he's basically right.  I don't see anything wrong
with women waiting for men to approach them or expecting men to compete for
them IF they like the men that they meet this way.  However it seems unfair
for women to complain in general about the quality of men that they meet when
they have made no effort to get to know a wide variety of men.  Don't they
realize that by paying attention to only the ones that compete well they
are seeing a very biased sample?
	Some of the men that I knew as an undergrad were among the most
sensitive, kind, intelligent, and all-around decent people I've met.  They
were also quite shy and very socially inexperienced.  They were almost
completely ignored by women, both as potential friends and as potential
boyfriends/lovers.  I think this is sad.
	The commentator also suggests that perhaps the men that compete
well are [sometimes] insensitive clods and that this gives them an advantage
in the competition. (I hope I'm not misrepresenting his idea here).
I'd like to suggest instead that the very fact that men are forced to
compete with each other for women tends to change their behavior
in a manner that makes them either appear more insensitive or actually
become more insensitive than they would otherwise have been.
In an atmosphere where being an "insensitive clod" gives one an advantage,
people will tend to change in that direction.  I sometimes think I see
this happening to me, and I don't like it.

	Dave Martindale