Friday, June 21, 2013

White Knights undermine civilization

Yes, Mr. White Knight, white-knighting really is so bad:
I spent a long time in high school and college trapped deep within the ‘Friend Zone.’ (And if you don’t know what the friend zone is, just think about the guy who you can tell everything to, trust implicitly, yet have absolutely no desire to go out on a date with. That poor soul is trapped in the friend zone.) In fact, I was so nice that one evening, when my friends set me up with a young woman of questionable morals, rather than pick her up, I helped her get back together with her ex boy-friend.

Go me.

But you know what? I like being the nice guy. I think it is still important, and worthwhile. And while I know I’m not as nice as I think I am, I am always trying to be that guy, the one who does the right thing. It’s one of the ways I define myself.
 So why am I writing about this? Well, I’m currently working through a book (review to follow next week) and one of the things said in this book is that guys like me, the White Knights, are enabling women to continue to erode away men’s rights. And while I can understand the point being made I have to disagree because there”s a huge whole in the discussion.

Why are men supposed to be polite?  Why was chivalry important? Why did my mother and father hammer home these behaviors?

Let’s start from the simple truth that as a group, men are stronger and more aggressive than women. Yeah, I know, sexist pig, stereotypes, yadda yadda. Deal with it. Pick 15 random men and 15 random women, match them up one on one, and you’re going to find 12 or more men still standing. That’s just the way it is.

So, women are naturally going to feel about as nervous as a long tailed cat in room full of rocking chairs whenever she is surrounded by a group of men, even if she knows them. It will be even worse if they are strangers. She has no way of knowing whether they will take advantage of the power differential in order to take advantage of her. So what can we do, as men, to allay her very reasonable fears?
As Aristotle pointed out, there are people, like this gamma male, who are totally incapable of learning through the receipt of information.  It's obvious that this guy can't do it, not just because he keeps doing the same thing over and over again even though it produces results he does not like, but because his response - women's fears are very reasonable - is not even related to the claim - women are being enabled to erode away men's rights.

So fear is sufficient to override intrinsic and unalienable rights?  That's the case he is inadvertently making, and it is obviously a non-starter.  So, it is clear we cannot respond to him with dialectical reason, we can only resort to crude rhetoric.

WHITE KNIGHTS ARE HELPING WOMEN DESTROY WESTERN CIVILIZATION!  IF YOU DO NOT LIVE TO WISH IN A CAVE BEING RULED BY TOTALITARIAN THOUGHT POLICE, YOU MUST STOP WHITE KNIGHTING!

Thus endeth the lesson.

37 comments:

tz said...

I suppose he buys his alcoholic (as in drunk, addicted) frmale friends their favorite distilled product and goes and deals with those dangerous pushers so his junkie girlfriends can get their fix.

But just think, when things collapse, there will be so many more opportunities to white-knight.

In the days of chivalry, women were either consecrated virgins - nuns and mothers. Women today tend to be neither. I dislike house cats, but a de-clawed low maintenance pet is different from the feral equivalent. Women today are feral, with all the barbarity it implies.

Wars were fought sparingly, and we honored soldiers. We also honored mothers - or potential mothers - too. The latter was honoring life. Today, honoring women is honoring death - the culture of death.

Anonymous said...

One always wonders, when hearing "my mommy and daddy taught me to act this way", whether there was any similar training for how girls were supposed to behave as women, or if he's ever contemplated that line of reasoning that a laddette isn't going to be particularly appreciative of being treated like a lady - she knows she's a whore and just assumes the white knight is a stupid chump.

I like how certain things are frozen in time, forever. We still send our soldiers out with brightly-colored uniforms and have them stand in line 20 yards apart to pursue a gentleman's model of warfare, right?

Given what brain researchers will tell you about the inability to make rational decisions as the brain shuts down when gripped by fear - this man is arguing that women shouldn't vote (as there will be men at the polling facility), that we should have single-sex clubs and recreational facilities (to spare women fear while trying to unwind...), and especially women should never be in a leadership position over men (because all those fearful bucks under her might snap and kill her at any moment...). I'm sure he's afraid of the logical conclusion of his position.

Anonymous said...

in the end, water finds it's own level. those of us who are actually valuable members of society, we will not sacrifice ourselves for society or for women. and those men who are so pathetic and weak that they are willing to sacrifice themselves for society or for women? Good bye and good riddance, the world is a better place without them. Social Darwinism is a great thing, but unfortunately the useless eaters are not killing themselves off fast enough or in great enough numbers. hence why we need a global world war to kill off billions of these stupid useless eaters. the world would be a better place if 90 percent of the human race was wiped out.

Anonymous said...

oh that last comment was by me, John Rambo, Anti-Feminist Soldier and Founder of the Boycott American Women blog.

Ron said...

Its quite a thing. These assholes think they are doing the right thing, when they are actually being selfish and cowardly.

Some of these fellas get married and go on to have decent families, kudos to them. But once one starts to recognize the inherent selfishness of their beliefs, it becomes very hard to tolerate their bullshit.

Old Harry said...

Some dude, I love your comment about once you recognize these shadows of real men, you have great difficulty tolerating their crap. Nice / polite are civilized behaviors. White knighting empowers uncivilized behavior. While this guy probably will never be as militant as the McRapey's of the world, by refusing to see what the gamma rabbits do as wrong, he empowers the enemies of civilization.
I think we're at a turning point. The battle lines have been drawn and I don't think we stand a hope of saving civilization. I just pray we survive to rebuild.

Mike said...

Its quite a thing. These assholes think they are doing the right thing, when they are actually being selfish and cowardly.

Meanwhile, when his date shows up and screams at him "you selfish mother effer, if you'd just had a sack and not talked me into going back to that abusive jerk who beat the $%^& out of me when I went back to him" he'll act incredulous. What? Me to blame for talking you into going back to a boyfriend when all of your friends thought you'd be better with me? Buuutttt butttt....

(Now I'm not saying she's off the hook, but there is an element there of leading others into sin/dangerous situations and then acting like you did not play the role of the tempter).

Unknown said...

Women ruin everything because white knights.

That is a good title for a book, by the way.

Shimshon said...

"So what can we do, as men, to allay her very reasonable fears?"

I think this goes to the crux of the matter. He says it's our job as men to allay women's fears. That's an impossible task and it's not our responsibility. And who says they're reasonable? If you go around thinking that lurking behind every penis is a rapist, you will have a lot of impossible to allay and very unreasonable fear to deal with.

Guitar Man said...

I would say that white knighting for the sake of being nice to women is actually doing a major disservice to the feminist. The proud feminist doesn't want it, and the unknowing feminist will never learn the errors of her ways if schlubs like him think they'll win the approval of women by kowtowing to their every whim and fancy.

A Nonny Mouse said...

Some people exist to serve as a warning to others.

Guitar Man said...

I just noticed his picture. Now, I hate being that guy, but he certainly fits the profile of your typical gamma.

Anonymous said...

So are the only alternatives "being a jerk in order to manipulate women into sleeping with you" and "destroying Western Civilization as we know it"? Why can't this fellow, or anyone else, simply treat women kindly and decently - yah know, like other creatures in the image of God?

Anonymous said...

The white knight brigade has confused cruelty and kindness, and fails to see how removing fears can't remove the consequences those fears would protect women from. Their mind-frame is difficult to penetrate since it is so foreign, but I was fortunate enough to stumble upon the white knight archives some time back.

Dexter said...

Why are men supposed to be polite? Why was chivalry important? Why did my mother and father hammer home these behaviors?

Sigh. Yet another idiot who is unaware that women had obligations under this old system, too. For example, she would never be alone in a group of men who were not her relatives, even if she knew them, and certainly she would never be alone with a group of strangers. (Read some of those old novels where a woman being alone with a man means they have to get married...) Thus, she would deal with the "power differential" problem in that situation by not being in that situation.

His Lordship said...

Vox, my good man, you know precisely what they hear.

You say: "WHITE KNIGHTS ARE HELPING WOMEN DESTROY WESTERN CIVILIZATION! IF YOU DO NOT LIVE TO WISH IN A CAVE BEING RULED BY TOTALITARIAN THOUGHT POLICE, YOU MUST STOP WHITE KNIGHTING!"

They hear: "WOMEN BAD! WOMEN DESTROY EVERYTHING! DESTROY THEM BEFORE THEY DESTROY YOU!"

White knights are such because they view the world in binary, as most people do--such as that strange fellow up-thread who feels that they deserve death who do not conform to his expectations.

Unknown said...

So are the only alternatives "being a jerk in order to manipulate women into sleeping with you" and "destroying Western Civilization as we know it"? Why can't this fellow, or anyone else, simply treat women kindly and decently - yah know, like other creatures in the image of God?

I would suggest removing you gamma filter first before I bother giving you a good answer.

Stickwick Stapers said...

If you go around thinking that lurking behind every penis is a rapist, you will have a lot of impossible to allay and very unreasonable fear to deal with.

That's not necessarily at the root of a woman's fear when she's around men. It's the same sort of fear children often feel towards a father who is the head of the household. It's vague and undefined, but you feel like you'd just better not mess with Dad, because something -- you don't know what exactly -- might happen.

For all the feminist bluster about how empowered and independent and capable they are, women really do feel vulnerable a lot of the time. It's natural to feel a bit of fear around a group of men you don't know. As I said before, it's not really even a defined fear. You're just cognizant on some elemental level that you're in the midst of something that could crush you like a bug if they so chose*. That being said ...

For example, she would never be alone in a group of men who were not her relatives, even if she knew them, and certainly she would never be alone with a group of strangers.

Exactly. It's rare for me to be alone in a group of men unless I'm related to at least one of them. I've occasionally been in the position of having to monitor a group of men who are doing work on our house, and it makes me feel uneasy. Even when they're polite and deferential, I still feel a bit of dread until they're finished and out the door. It's perfectly natural for a woman to feel this way -- and it should motivate her to avoid groups of men to whom she's not related.

* When a feminist woman's false sense of physical empowerment clashes with the very real biological awareness that she's actually quite vulnerable around men, you get the hysterical belief that it must arise from men's hostility towards women, rather than just a natural biological response. Back in the day when it was unseemly for women to be around men she wasn't related to, you didn't have this problem. Women quite sensibly just avoided such situations.

Anonymous said...

He vastly overstates the "fear" involved here, to give himself an excuse to keep acting the way he wants to act. Yes, a woman feels "vulnerable" around a bunch of men, but that hardly translates to the kind of fear he describes. If she's sensible, she doesn't hang around with a roomful of strange men in the first place. If she's with men she's attracted to, the vulnerability is actually exciting for her, and she doesn't want some white knight taking that away from her. Hence the outright contempt she feels for the white knight who tries to talk her out of dating the bad boy. She doesn't want a completely safe man.

If she does hang around with groups of strange men, then she's a risk junkie getting off on the "danger," however small it really is.

VD said...

Why can't this fellow, or anyone else, simply treat women kindly and decently - yah know, like other creatures in the image of God?

He can. But then he wouldn't be a white knight. You were posing a false dichotomy.

CarpeOro said...

The White Knights are ignoring the fact that the game has changed. To use sports metaphors, the playing field will always remain the same size. The goal post remain a certain distance apart. But feminism and has moved the goal post at the women's end of the field. Since the rule is that the goal post remain a certain distance apart, that forces the men's goal to move also. Feminists and White Knights insist that the male goal post is the same location as always. White Knights playing with this handicap never find the goal.

One of the points (when it comes up) with my wife that I disagree on is "chivalry". She expects all of the things attendant to it from the old days, plus the new rights. For instance, Gentleman can't hit Ladies. I say of course they can't, but point out that the obverse is also true. She then says "so you are saying I'm not a Lady?" and I respond "not if you hit me". One of the parts of having to retrain my wife. I have found simple logic doesn't work but persistence and keeping to my principles does. Never compromise.

Jehu said...

Strange creatures that with half their mind fear behind every penis an unscrupulous ravishing thug, and with the other half hope it's true.

Amethyst Dominica said...

I love how he describes the end of his hypothetical fight between 15 men and 15 women. He's completely wrong of course. What would REALLY happen is that at the end of the fight, all 15 women would be completely unharmed, while 7 of the guys would be lying on the floor beaten to bloody pulps. The other 8 guys would be standing triumphant with blood on their fists, having been recruited by the women to fight for their side.

"Women are powerless" indeed......

Natalie said...

Those who have an idea that it's either white knight or jerk might benefit from skimming a couple novels by Grace Livingston Hill. A lot of what she wrote was tinged by the legalism (drinking and dancing are WRONG!) of her day, but she got her gender roles right. Her men didn't take any guff from the "bad girls," but somehow they almost always managed to be scrupulously polite. Makes one remember that the phrase "well bred" used to mean something once upon a time.

Unknown said...

Piece of advice to those who often mistakes white knighting for a decent man.

White knighting is basically defending someone (a woman) blindly. And it does not matter if the woman is a stranger.

That's it.

White knight sees a girl in trouble, white knight comes to her rescue without bothering to know what the trouble is or why she is in trouble.

A good example of white knighting is what those indian guys did to another indian guy for slapping an indian girl who happened to slapped him first.(go to youtube and search for it)

Now compare that to another video of a man and a woman walking together then another man hits her just for the fun of it. Her companion immediately attacked the guy.(again, search it on youtube).

That is an example of a decent man.

A decent man defends a woman who did not put herself in troubles way but trouble went her way and he happens to be their capable of helping her. And the woman is usually someone he knows.

See? Decent man != white knight.

What about a nice man? Is a nice man not a decent man?

No. You see, a nice man is a white knight. A decent man is never a white knight.

Nice man = White knight
Decent man != White knight

Therefore Decent man != Nice man.

Retrenched said...

White knight gammas are like that little troll guy in '300' - they throw other men under the bus, thinking it might help them get some.

Anonymous said...

David DeAngelo had a good line: you can be nice, without being "a nice guy."

Anonymous said...

Well, Tobias, I would suggest moving out of your mom's basement before you... oh never mind. But ad hominem is always good for a laugh.

At any rate, I'm willing to grant that there is such a things as this white knight pathology, but I find myself wondering, going from your example, whether there is really no kind of ethical imperative for stronger people to help the weak. I should like to think that if I saw a big fellow beating up a small fellow, or a woman, or a child, that I would at least try to do something about it. But I suppose that makes me some kind of fool?

Now, I'm not trying to defend Mailer to the hilt - he lays it on a bit thick (although, if he happens to know a lot of ladies who curtsy, I don't see any reason why he shouldn't bow; when in Rome...

incidentally, it's rather amusing that he thinks Italians furnish a good example of male chivalry and restraint. I can think of many characteristic Italian virtues, but that's not one I would have come up with.)

VD said...

I should like to think that if I saw a big fellow beating up a small fellow, or a woman, or a child, that I would at least try to do something about it. But I suppose that makes me some kind of fool?

Why? What if the small fellow attacked the big fellow? Do you truly feel no compulsion to know what is actually taking place before just leaping in?

There is nothing wrong with intervention when it is necessary. But the mere fact that a small man or a woman might be dumb enough to attack a larger man does not necessitate intervention.

Res Ipsa said...

A man can be polite, have good manners, be chivalrous, be caring, affectionate, and a generally all around good guy without being the relational equivalent of a door mat.

Jeez dumbass; if you like the friend zone stay there. IF you don’t, don’t play that game. Learn how to speak the truth. “I was interested in seeing if you were someone I might be into. I respect that you’re dealing with your last relationship. Hope that works out. C’YA!”

See very polite, very nice guy, very caring even. Very see ya around I don’t have time for your “healing process”. Just walk away. If she isn’t into you, don’t waste time on her. There are lots and lots of girls that would see you and think “he’s kinda cute bet he’s fun to hang out with”. Spend time asking them out. If a girl “friend zones” you tell her you were looking for a “friend with benefits”. If there isn’t any benefit to the relationship, MOVE ON.

Laura Prowicz said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Ingemar said...

White Knight = Mother who keeps giving her 200 lbs. five year old Slurpees

Dexter said...

I should like to think that if I saw a big fellow beating up a small fellow, or a woman, or a child, that I would at least try to do something about it. But I suppose that makes me some kind of fool?

Is it foolish to risk being shot or stabbed or even punched in the face by that big fellow? On behalf of a total stranger?

To ask the questions is to answer them...

Unknown said...

Stupid gammas.

I guess its too much to ask a gamma to remove his gamma filters.

His Lordship said...

"84829942-3a88-11e0-83da-000bcdcb5194" is Legion, for he is many.

Dexter said...

84829942-3a88-11e0-83da-000bcdcb5194 hates being confused with the inhabitant of the adjacent pod in the matrix, the pathetic beta male 84829942-3a88-11e0-83da-000bcdcb5193.

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