Hypergamous Detachment Mechanism

I first became conscious of the darker feminine attributes when I was about 18, while having a man to man talk with my good friend Jack. Jack had just broken up with his girlfriend and was not dealing with it very well. In fact, he was a mess. The break up had been far less than pleasant, his girlfriend had cheated on him and she made sure that he saw her with her new lover while he was on a group outing. Jack was perplexed at how a woman who once seemed so soft and loving could so quickly turn into someone so cold, spiteful and calculated. After all, he had done everything that he was told would make him the perfect boyfriend, like taking dancing class, playing guitar for her and many other things manginas pride themselves in.

I reflected on my own experiences and was also shocked to find that women were quite different from the perfectly gentle, caring creatures I had been constantly told they were. Since then I have spent a great deal of energy trying to understand why the sex that are supposed to be the loving nurtures can also at times be the most spiteful and unfeeling.

What I found is quite intriguing, studies show that both males and females are instinctively non monogamous. That means that both men and women have the natural instinct to find multiple mates, however the way in which they act on this instinct is quite different. As we are all constantly reminded through the media, men are equipped with the biological mechanisms that influence them to chase several mates at once. However what we are not told is that females are also equipped with a biological mechanism that allows them to act on their instincts as well. Females are not only polyandrous but are also hypergamous, in that they shift from one mate to the next, always looking for the opportunity to move on to a more powerful and/or resource rich partner[1]. This was because prehistorically women where constantly pregnant or nursing infants and her first instinct was to ensure their survival. For this reason she is equipped with an instinct (or mechanism) that allows her to objectively choose a mate and move between mates according to their ability to protect and provide her (and her offspring) with resources [1].

I´m sure we are all aware of the very shallow and materialistic reasons many women choose their mates, but what I think is the most important discovery here is the shallow and materialistic reasons they leave their mates, and their instinctive ability to do so.

As you would imagine, when moving from one partner to another, emotional attachment will only be an impediment. Therefore a part of the female mating instinct is a mechanism that allows her to leave her partner for another without compunction, or, in other words, detach herself emotionally.

Emotional detachment is a typical human behaviour during certain periods of life, such as during the teenage years, while others are born with it permanently. For teens its purpose is to force them away from his/her parents so that they can gain full independence[2]. For women the symptoms and purpose are almost identical, in that they wish to detach themselves from something and are able to totally disregard the feelings that would prohibit them from doing so. The symptoms of the psychopathic syndrome linked with emotional detachment are described as “an egocentric, narcissistic and deceitful interpersonal style, expression of callous and unemotional affect” [3]

Does this sound…familiar?

Often women go a step further than just emotionally detaching themselves from the feelings of the previous mate but can replace her love for him with hate. With these feelings of hate and resent she may also take acts of revenge or extract resources from him during the separation process [1].This is the underlying cause of the disproportionate amount of female initiated divorce rates and the terrible and unscrupulous treatment of their ex husbands during and after the fact.

The purpose of this essay is not to demonise women, as I have pointed out both sexes have potentially harmful traits and many women can be very loving and supportive. However, the problem is that our culture is in complete denial of the female hypergamous detachment mechanism, (or in other words a woman´s ability to leave her partner and take advantage of him materially with little emotion or inhibition). Along with being denied, this primitive behaviour is enabled and even encouraged through the divorce courts resulting in terrible consequences for all involved.

I believe it is our responsibility to inform this generation of young men of this problem, because I’m sure we have all ignorantly walked into this situation once ourselves, just like Jack.

References

[1] Buss. David. M, Schmitt. David. P, (1993) Sexual Strategies Theory: An Evolutionary Perspective on Human Mating, Psychological Review, vol.100 No.2

[2] Lynch. John H and. Ryan. Richard M, (1989), Emotional Autonomy versus Detachment: Revisiting the Vicissitudes of Adolescence and Young Adulthood, Child Development, Vol. 60, No. 2

[3] Scholte. E.M.and Van der Ploeg. J.D. (2008) Social and emotional detachment in Dutch children, Dutch Institute for Pedagogical and Psychological Research