A lot of socio-sexual red-pill notions came easily to me: someone pointed it out, or I read a certain article, and I said, “Duh, of course, why didn’t I realize that before?” What hypergamy is, what shit tests are, why the Bratty Little Sister Frame works, etc. — as soon as I encountered such a concept I recognized the truth of it, plus where it came from and how it’s affecting society now. So I don’t find most of it mysterious, and I keep wanting to move past discussing the What and Why of it, and move on to the How of dealing with it. (Which I hope to make a focus of this blog in the future, but for now I’m going to ramble about something I’ve been musing on, because it’s been too long since I posted.)
That’s not true of everything, though. One conundrum that still puzzles me is: why was I such a blue-pill, pedestalizing, white knight for the first 10 years or so of my adulthood? The usual reason given is that our society indoctrinates men with it, and that’s certainly true, but I think it’s too simple. If it were only about environment, I might have been blue-pill, but I shouldn’t have been one of the worst ones around.
I grew up in a traditional family with a mother who stayed at home and a father who was clearly the family authority and disciplinarian. There was very little divorce in my extended family; I was almost the first to win that award. We went to Church — post-Vatican II modernist Church, granted, but still Church every Sunday. We didn’t have a TV for a few years, and when we did, we weren’t allowed to watch a lot of “adult” shows (we’re talking “Dallas” here). School was liberal, of course, as they all are, but it was a small rural school where the latest novelties run a decade or two behind.
As an example of my parents’ attitude: one time a woman was in the news for something lascivious (I don’t remember whom, but think Paris Hilton 20 years earlier), and I asked my mom something about that “lady.” She told me in no uncertain terms that the woman in question was no lady, and even became angry (very unusual for her). I actually argued a bit, because at the age of 13 or so, I somehow already thought all women were ladies, but she didn’t like that at all. So while I’m sure I ran into plenty of feminist indoctrination, I also had more good traditional upbringing than most kids got. So why did I completely ignore my parents’ example and wisdom, and treat every pretty girl I took a liking to like The One True Princess?
As I said, this has puzzled me for a while, until the other day when I watched the original Star Wars for the first time in ages. (The Rifftrax commentary makes it a lot of fun.) Suddenly I knew where it came from: I was trying to be Luke Skywalker.
For those who haven’t seen the movie or have forgotten, a quick synopsis of the important points: Luke is a farm boy (like me; he even pretty much looks like I did) who gets pulled into a quest to save a beautiful princess named Leia. He falls in love with her the moment he sees a fuzzy hologram of her, of course. He gets hooked up with a swashbuckling alpha ship pilot named Han Solo, and they rescue the princess. As soon as Luke meets her, he starts kissing her butt and trying to be her hero, while Han treats her like a burden and argues with her constantly. Luke is the one who actually saves her life more than once, while Han is mostly focused on saving his own skin. Naturally, I was rooting for Luke to get the girl the whole time, and couldn’t figure out why she didn’t respond to his heroism.
Here’s the stupid thing: Luke never gets the girl. In fact, she turns out to be his sister, and she ends up with Han. So why did I spend my 20s acting like Luke instead of acting like Han? I think it was the sister thing — they couldn’t be together anyway, and she probably wasn’t attracted because he seemed too familiar, so that’s why she didn’t respond to his awesome treatment of her and went for the bad boy. I think that’s how I rationalized it, and assumed that women who weren’t my sister would respond to being treated like princesses.
Of course, now I know that’s not it at all. The movie’s actually painful to watch at points, when Luke is whining about Han’s rudeness and selfishness or staring at Leia with big puppy-dog eyes. It’s so obvious that he turns her off with every supplicating word, while the way Han switches between ignoring her and treating her like a stuck-up brat completely turns her on. I don’t even know if that’s the subtext they were going for, but it’s clearly there — now. Even princesses love bad boys.
So I blame George Lucas. Maybe if Luke and Leia hadn’t turned out to be brother and sister, I would have understood the real reason why Han got the girl. Or maybe not. I don’t think I’ve gotten this one completely figured out yet. More on this later, perhaps.
(In case it’s not clear, much of the above was written tongue-in-cheek.)
Cail Corishev 
“In case it’s not clear, much of the above was written tongue-in-cheek.”
But much of it wasn’t, and the parts that weren’t raise some very good points. I think a lot of men – both those who have truly swallowed the red pill, and those that still don’t understand all but just sort of outgrew the worst of their feminized, pedistalizing instincts – look back on their wimpy younger days and shake their heads in dismay.
One of the interesting things is thinking of all the lessons that one overlooked, ignored, or rationalized away, and to see how blindingly obvious everything is in hindsight. Your Luke/Han Solo example is a less serious (but I think legitimate) one. But everyone has similar things they can recall.
The time you took some girl out to a nice dinner and treated her so politely, asking about her family and her school, and then got brushed off with a kiss on the cheek at the end of the night. You justify it by saying, “oh, maybe I accidentally said something rude” or “maybe she’s the kind of girl who’s saving it for marriage” (even though you see her grinding away on the dance floor at a party a week later).
The time you were at a party or bar or concert and some girl you always liked was there, and you get all worried and pessimistic because she overheard you when you said something rude or arrogant to someone else. And at the end of the night, when she’s all over you, you think “I’m so lucky – she heard me say something offensive but still somehow likes me! How amazing!” Still not understanding.
The good news is, for most guys, it sinks in after a while if you keep an open mind. For young men, the key is avoiding getting a girls pregnant or picking up an STD, always keeping a positive and confident view of oneself, and, no matter what, having an open mind. If young men can stay on that track, it’s never to late.
I like your writing, btw, I’ve read your comments on several other sites but just discovered this page now.
Thank you; I really should post more here, but commenting elsewhere is just so much easier than starting with a blank page. 🙂
I’m with MKP–I look forward to your new posts. Keep it up.
Well done.