Here is the series so far:

Part 1 — Hypergamy is a Myth
Part 2 — Hypergamy Note
Part 3 — Luck
Part 4 — Reasons for Divorce
Part 5 — A Case Study on Marriage (Intermission)
Part 6 — What is Hypergamy? (Part 1)

Today we will discuss:

Part 7 — What is Hypergamy? (Part 2)

As we’ve seen throughout this series, and especially in yesterday’s post, the three, four, or even five definitions of hypergamy that I have addressed are all compatible with the various Manosphere expressions over the last 15 years.

The problem is that the definition—outside the one in the dictionary—is ill-defined and a matter of opinion. Just consider that Keoni Galt gave three different definitions for hypergamy! It would be projection to assign to me all the confusion inherent in the ‘sphere’s inability to come to a consensus.

My “confusion” stems from having too much knowledge of the ‘sphere’s inconsistency and imprecision. It’s hard to have a single coherent refutation when there isn’t a coherent stance to refute!

That’s assortative pairing. People do not ‘marry up’ (literally hyper+gamy), they pair up laterally.

This provides a good illustration for why commenters should stick to ideas and not personal motivations (i.e. ad hominem). It really isn’t about what I want or don’t want to do. After all, in the piece that inspired this series—”Hypergamy is a Myth“–I addressed this very concern, concluding from the data that hypergamy is about preferences. Women and men want to do better, at rougly equal levels. But this desire largely gets canceled out.

In actual practice, the human tendancy towards hypergamy is rarely successful. Even when it does happen, risk of ultimate failure is more likely. That’s why hypergamy as a practice is largely a myth. And because unimplemented preferences are illusory, we can call those mythical too.

The hypergamous preferences don’t end up nowhere. Rather, they lead to extra competition and conflict, just not to actually “marrying up.” This competitive sorting process—i.e. assortative mating—takes place rapidly at the early stages of relationships becoming less prominent in longer-term relationships: bad matches get dropped early.

I’ve mentioned this before, but it’s hard for non-mathematicians to grasp: averages are abstractions, not descriptions of real things. They can be useful approximations, but one must be careful about using them.

For example, the divorce rate (an average) tells you something about what a population is doing, but tells you much less about individuals or their behaviors. If you break it down by things like the number of marriages, geography, race, ethnicity, socioeconomic status, educational attainment, wealth and income, intelligence, etc. the resulting rates vary considerably from the general average.

Consider the general statistic that women are responsible for two-thirds (not “at least 70%”) of divorces. That sounds high until you realize that divorcese among the highly educated are ~90% driven by women. So in the population with the lowest divorce rate—the higher classes—women dominate the divorces. In the rest of the population women divorce less than the average of 2 in 3. In fact, you’d be hard pressed to find any sub-population that has exactly the average of the entire population. Most are higher or lower according to their tendencies.

The problem then, with respect to hypergamy, is that you’d expect women in the lower classes to be responsible for a higher than average number of divorces as they ditch their low-class husbands for higher-class men. But that’s the opposite of what we see. In the lower classes, men are more likely to divorce than in the higher classes, and in the higher classes women are more likely to divorce than in the lower classes! Once again, actual behavior in practice does not support the claim of female hypergamy.

Similarly, the divorce rate itself is artificially high because of divorce prone men and women getting multiple marriages and divorces. Among those who shun divorce or remarriage, the divorce rate is lower than the average. As above, you’d be hard pressed to find an actual population that has an average divorce rate: most are higher or lower according to their tendencies.

We discussed this in “Reasons for Divorce” where we determined that both statements are false.

Both men and women exhibit satisfaction and dissatisfaction. It is simply not the case, especially among low-status men and women, that there is a strong distinction between the satisfaction of men and women with their marital choices. Divorce is highest where you should expect it to be: among the less educated and intelligent, the less wealthy and prosperous, those of lower status, the less religious, and the political left. And, as you’d expect, who files for divorce—and who is to blame—is more evenly split among men and women who meet those descriptions.

I find it extremely interesting that the closest thing I can find to female hypergamy is among the higher classes where a subset of women are dissatisfied with their high class marriages to high status men while their husbands are largely satisfied with their high class wives. This suggests to me that the Manosphere is predominately made up of wealthier, more intelligent, mostly White and Asian men, religious, higher status, and/or politically right men. These men are the only subset or group I know of mwhere the description “Men are satisfied with their matches, women are not” and “only women are blowing up perfectly good matches” could be widely perceived anecdotally as being rationally true.

Now we are just spinning our wheels. In the last post, hypergamy was defined as “lack of character.” Now it is defined as “attracted only to those people who are more attractive than me.” This is a perfect example of the Dalrockian Manosphere’s ill-defined ‘hypergamy’ as it deviates from the standard, easily understood dictionary definition. The goalposts are constantly moving. It also fails to distinguish between hypergamy as a desire and hypergamy as an action. Is hypergamy defined by what a woman wants or is it defined by what she does?

This is not an insignificant question. If you include what she supposedly “wants,” you can claim that all women are hypergamous, even the happy ones who would never divorce their husbands. Why? Because you think you know that their true motivation is to ditch their husband as soon as a better option presents itself. This is not science, because it’s not a falsifiable position. No matter how many times a woman proves she loves her husband and wouldn’t divorce him, the assumption that she is hypergamous remains assumed.

In short, the broad definitions of hypergamy that we’ve seen are just thinly veiled ad hominem, argument from authority, and guilt-by-association. The ‘sphere presumes that they know the motivations of women even when the data says otherwise and even when the women and their husbands say otherwise.

“Who you marry has absolutely nothing to do with this.” That’s a blankslatist claim, encompassing the idea that everyone is a tabula rasa—a blank slate—interchangeable cogs in a big machine. It’s the idea that there can’t be inherent differences (nor, thus, inherently different outcomes)

“How you feel about it and how you take action on those feelings has everything to do with this” encompasses the blankslatist view that everything is a matter of environment. Any differences are thus attributed by different external factors that are not inherent to individuals.

Few in the ‘sphere are aware that their view of women is rooted in this leftist philosophy.

This is why despite the strong and obvious evidence that different groups have different motivations and outcomes, the blankslatist simply ignores it because it doesn’t confirm his bias that all are inherently equal.

When you hear a sentence that starts with “All women…” you are about to hear a blankslatist claim; a claim that could only be true if blankslatism were true.

Blankslatism is not a true description of reality. It is false. Any claims that rely on it are also false.

Who you marry has a massive impact—but not absolutely everything—on all of the things we’ve been discussing. Were it not for leftist philosophy, this would be obvious.

Note that this is different from determinism. If “All women…” statements were about some global inherent attribute, then there would be no sense in making moral judgements about—and assigning blame for—something that can’t be changed and isn’t a matter of agency. After all, you don’t blame the apex predator for eating baby seals: it’s their nature, not a character defect.

The problem isn’t with the complexity or simplicity of the explanation. I understand quite clearly what is being said. It’s just that what is being said is obviously wrong.

Men are not happy with their looksmatches.  They often complain about their miserable choices, both of their available choices and of those they actually chose. Just look at the Manosphere, where I could find a nearly limitless supply of dissatisfied men. Many of those men are seething with resentment. Some men will willingly divorce if things don’t go their way, for example:

So why say that men are happy when this is obviously false? Why make such simple, but obviously incorrect, claims?

Perhaps Deti would counter by saying “women divorce their husbands because they want a better-looking husband, but men divorce their wives because they don’t like her as a person.” Even if this were true as a rule, should we award men a prize for this? It’s curious to me why one of these is truly terrible, but the other one is not.

I won’t presume to speak for Cameron, who can speak for himself.

What I will say is this: I’m not going to embrace something that is obviously false. I’m not going to generalize personal anecdotes. I’ll repeat what I said:

Calling hypergamy a myth is not a denial of the symptoms that hypergamy supposedly explains.

In closing, here is the thing I’d like to share. Believe in something greater than yourself. Don’t worry about the approval—or disapproval—of others. Find a spouse and latch onto her for life. Speak positively about your wife, so that no one can claim that you spoke ill of her. Be kind, generous, and polite. Don’t bully, but instead go and do something good! Exude gratitude, graciousness, joy, hope, and optimism. Be self-aware. And avoid unhappy people. If you can’t do that, make boundaries (such as primarily posting on your own blog, utilizing anonymous links, and obscuring your sources). Try starting there, men.