I was watching
When Harry Met Sally the other night, and it got me to thinking...
Sally: We are just going to be friends, OK?
Harry: Great, friends. It's the best thing...You realize, of course, that we can never be friends.
Sally: Why not?
Harry: What I'm saying is - and this is not a come-on in any way, shape, or form - is that men and women can't be friends, because the sex part always gets in the way.
Sally: That's not true. I have a number of men friends and there is no sex involved.
Harry: No, you don't.
Sally: Yes, I do.
Harry: No, you don't.
Sally: Yes, I do.
Harry: You only think you do.
Sally: You're saying I'm having sex with these men without my knowledge?
Harry: No, what I'm saying is they all want to have sex with you.
Sally: They do not.
Harry: Do too.
Sally: They do not.
Harry: Do too.
Sally: How do you know?
Harry: Because no man can be friends with a woman that he finds attractive. He always wants to have sex with her.
Sally: So you're saying that a man can be friends with a woman he finds unattractive.
Harry: No, you pretty much want to nail them, too.
Sally: What if they don't want to have sex with you?
Harry: Doesn't matter, because the sex thing is already out there, so the friendship is ultimately doomed, and that is the end of the story.
GO HERE - THE LADDER THEORY!!
According to that website...
SPOILERS! (Click to view)Now the ladder theory description goes like this:
Bob Meets Jane
Bob sizes her up based on the above criterion
Bob puts her on the ladder
Bob meets Connie
Bob sizes her up based on the above criterion
Bob puts her on the ladder above Jane
You can recognize this has gone on because Bob says " I'd like to fuck Jane, but not as much as I want to fuck Connie."
SPOILERS! (Click to view)
Descending down to the bottom of the ladder we pass the following people:
The people we really want, who may even be out of our league, are on top.
Then come the people we like.
Moving further down we pass the people who we would fuck if we were intoxicated and would admit to doing it later.
At the bottom are the people we would fuck drunk, and would lie about doing it later.
Clinging to the bottom are the girls that are wolf ugly. These are women so ugly you would chew your own arm off to get away rather than fuck them. Usually fake teeth, or the loss of several hundred pounds can move a woman up from wolf ugly.
SPOILERS! (Click to view)
Physical Attraction/Looks - This is a big factor in attraction. This is self-explanatory.
Competition - I almost titled this section disinterest. The two are closely related. We can only pursue what runs away from us. A man who is devoted to something else besides the woman is autmatically more attractive. Any intellectual whore who has ever listened to a girl complain about how her boyfriend-ran-off-with-a-slut or how her boyfriend-is-really-not-dumb-he's-just-streetsmart-and-he- has-to-sell-weed-to-support-his-baby's-mama or he's-really-nice-even-though-he-ignores-me-and-hits-me-sometimes-but-you-don't- know-what-he's-like-when-we're-alone or he's-not-emotionally-available-that's-why-I-like-talk-to-you-until-it's-time-to-go-fuck-him while he himself is sitting right there and would like nothing better than to be with her but of course is sitting solidly on the friends ladder knows this intuitively. Ultimately, almost all guys learn this truth for themselves: The best way to never score with a woman is to show too much interest in her.
Women seem to especially like it if you are more devoted to your bad music, biker gang, forearm tattoo or marijuana. These all seem to work wonders. There are some interests you can show in a woman that will help you to fuck her: a healthy interest in destroying her self-esteem and in fucking her friends more than her seem to work wonders. Note that the following topics of disinterest have been field tested and shown conclusively not to work: Unix, literature, poetry, international politics, and sodomy.
Novelty - Let's face it, if you're like every other guy who works a normal job and tries to live a good life, you're probably like just about every other guy. Chicks don't dig this, and why would they? Who wants someone who is just like everyone else? Something different is more attractive. Like someone who does not have to work during the day like most people because they have lots of money from business or selling drugs. Or like someone who has stabbed a man and went to prison for it. Different and a veritable ticket to getting laid.
Deconstructing money/power
It was previously assumed that money was a fundamental unit of attraction to a woman. Further investigation has revealed a better understanding of this very important piece of the woman's rating system. The piece which was formerly labelled money has been replaced by a money/power paradigm. The two are almost always intertwined in a way that makes them hard to distinguish, so I don't think it productive to make a chart of how they breakdown exactly. One almost always follows the other in any case.
What is important to know about the money/power piece is that previously it was thought of as static. Now we know that the money/power piece of attraction displays time-variance. That is, the amount of money needed to get maximal "points" in the money category varies according to the age of the woman. When a woman is younger her perspective is different as to what makes a lot of money. As she gets older the amount of money neccessary for full points increases.
For a girl of 16 full points for money might be obtained by having access to a car and beer money. When she is in her early college years, a nicer car and enough money to join a fraternity is probably sufficient. As she advances into her twenties what we consider to be the normal money chart will begin to manifest itself -- that is, she'll want the richest man she can get.
At no point that we can discern does money ever not become a factor. Take any guy. Take a woman that has that guy. In no circumstance that is known would she not rather have a guy just like that, but with more money. Actually, maybe in one circumstance -- when the guy has enough money to buy her basically everything she wants. This is self-evident, I should think.
Dreams of a Final Theory
I think is very very close to a final analysis of how a woman's rating system works. If you are very attractive, rich, and novel and show no interest in her she is almost guaranteed to want to fuck you. Indeed, isn't this the very definition of Alpha Male? In this way we have derived from our theoretical framework an idea that agrees with observation and experiment to many degrees of accuracy. It also provides a frameowrk for the Logic. Strive to be attractive, novel and aloof and you will go far.
SPOILERS! (Click to view)
The first thing to notice here is that a woman has not one, but two ladders. This is becasue in addition the normal ladder, a woman also has a friends ladder. The friends ladder is where a woman puts guys that she considers "just friends". More to the point where she puts guys who don't get to have sex with her.
The problem arises because a woman never lets a guy know which ladder he is on. Obviously there is a huge difference, or gap between these two ladders. It is in this gap that kisses of death are delivered and intellectual whores are made. All a man can do is "go for it" and make a move on a girl; ask her out, try to kiss her, write her a love note or whatever. If he's on the good ladder fine. If he is on the friends ladder this is a case of ladder jumping. The man is trying to jump the gap from the friends ladder to the real ladder. The girl has two choices at this point: she can let him on the ladder and all is well, or, more likely, she can kick him in the head, and off the ladder. If you look you'll see that below the ladder is the Abyss(what was it Nietzsche said about a man being on a rope stretched over an Abyss?....well it's worse than he thought; there is no rope.) So the man falls into the Abyss. The Abyss isn't really as bad as it sounds. Mostly it's a period of self-loathing, embarrassment, and of course utter awkwardness with the girl in question if they are talking at all.
To fully illustrate the point I'll now examine some common scenarios and their ladder theory explanations. For purposes of these examples Tom will be our boy and Jane will be out girl.
Scenario 1: Tom meets Jane. She's pretty and seems interesting to talk to. Tom and Jane start haging out and talking more and more. Tom develops an attraction to Jane, and one day tries to kiss her. Jane tell Tom she doesn't think of him that way and she wants to remain friends. The next few weeks contact between the two falls off. Jane starts fucking an outlaw biker.
Ladder Theory Explanation: Tom met Jane. Tom was immediately placed on the friends ladder. Tom didn't know this. Tom tried to jump ladders. Jane kicked Tom in the head rather than let him on and sent him hurtling to the Abyss below. The oulaw biker was not on her friends ladder (they never are) but rather on her good ladder.
Scenario 2: Tom meets Jane. She's cute and seems smart. After an appropriate amount of time he asks her out on a date. She acccepts and they have what seems to be a perfectly nice date. Tom thinks he has a chance with Jane. He asks her out again. She says no, either explicitly or by never returning his phone call. Tom has no idea what the Hell just happened. Jane starts fucking an unemployed alcoholic.
Ladder Theory Explanation: Jane misrepresented which ladder Tom was on. He thought he was on the good ladder because of her acceptance of the date. Mistake. This led to an unintentional ladder jump. He was kicked into the Abyss. In this situation, Jane often wants to stay friends becasue you are so interesting and funny or some shit like that. If this happens, I'm sorry. This is most likely to be a ninja-bitch.
Scenario 3: A girl says any of the following to you:
"You're like a brother to me"
"You're like a big teddy bear"
"I feel like I can talk to you about anything"
"You're so nice"
"Can you help me with my homework"
Ladder Theory Explanation: You are on the friends ladder. So Sorry.
You can see that a lot of problems can be avoided (though sadly not problem two) by declaring as soon as possible to a girl that you will not be friends under any circumstances. You can explain that she is too attractive or you can be blunt and say you don't want to bend your "friends" over a table and fuck them, but would rather play poker and go to the races with them, thus disqualifying her from friendship. As long as you are clear. This may scare a girl away. But if it does what would you want with such a skittish little twit anyway?
The main point of the Ladder Theory:
>>>IF A MAN FINDS YOU ATTRACTIVE, YOU CANNOT BE FRIENDS<<<
SPOILERS! (Click to view)Many women want to argue this point and say things like " I have lots of guy friends." Maybe. There are exactly 3 cases whereby a guy and a girl can be friends:
The guy is gay.
The guy does not find you attractive.
The guy already has a woman much higher than you on the ladder
Even Nietzsche knew this. Most guys know this intuitively. Most girls doubt. I have a challenge for all of you girls who still doubt. Pick a guy who does not meet any of the criterion on the above list that you think is your friend. Then ask yourself this question: If you were both alone at his place one night, and you excused yourself to the bathroom and came out naked and asked him to have sex with you would he:
Tell you he doesn't want to risk the beautiful friendship you have created with messy physical entanglements.
Comply
Remember this only works if you are honest with yourself. Number one is of course something that guys hear all the time. Intellectual Whores refers to it as the Kiss of Death. It is more likely that he will jump you eagerly.
What do you think of the Ladder Theory? Are men and women never really "just friends" because the sex part always gets in the way?
So for example, if my attractive friend has a boyfriend, loves him and I respect her and/or him (if I don't respect them they're not really a friend) there is no problem. I've been in this situation many times and it works fine. There is just a fundamental mind frame that changes and they become something other than an object of desire. I can shut it down pretty effectively on command.
Now...if she is flirty, doesn't draw out distinct boundaries, is clearly attracted, basically not committed to the sexual cease fire (I've been there too) and I'm attracted...well this is bad. I usually cannot be strong for the both of us. This is where I see the situation break down.
If both parties conspire to sabotage the sexual cease fire through boundary testing and innuendo....it really was doomed from the start.
So basically, if a woman wants to just be friends, it is entirely do-able as long as she is serious about it and committed to it through action.
The one wrinkle to this is...if she is single, the guy sometimes has a hard time convincing himself to not "give it the college try", or simply he has difficulty not attempting to win her over out of fear that he may miss an opportunity for true love because he was not aggressive enough or didn't pursue her and induce the situation to it's potential conclusion. He mises signals because he is wearing the "blinders of hope".
Basically the "missed opportunity" syndrome. I'm sure you're familiar with it. The old, "at least I tried" or "I'd go crazy thinking I had a chance but didn't take that chance and know for sure."
So things get complicated because humans have a fantastic ability to sublimate the obvious signals being sent by another if they are blinded by love or desire. It's self-actualization gone wrong. It's those guys you always say "can't take a hint."
A lot of "dense" or "persistent" guys are just plain meat headed morons, in which case they just want to get their dick wet....but I assume you would never befriend one of those type, so we're back to the previous explanation.
It's complicated...but I love the link and discussion...interesting...thanks