The Lion

Well-played.

My shot at the characters:

The producer in the middle: Delta.

He's the normal guy, trying to make everyone happy and do his job, not rocking the boat too much. Guys like this are good employees but not great bosses.

Vince the voiceover pro: Alpha/Sigma.

He works for himself but is here to get the job done. His irritation at the situation is obvious - the producer should be running more interference on his behalf, instead of trying to please everyone.


On the topic of Deltas, I once had a boss who was always agitated in his position of authority. He'd talk down to the employees beneath him while kissing up to the higher bosses above him. Meanwhile, his wife ran his life outside the office. He was scared of her and pedestalized her at the same time.

One of the main points of dissatisfaction his inferiors in the office expressed was that he didn't represent us well to the higher-ups. He'd deride us in front of the big guys in a half-teasing and uncomfortable way with entirely too much bluster, then when we caught him alone, he'd always explain how tough it was to press for raises on our behalf, etc., and that we all had to make do. He seemed to fear asking for anything from the higher-ups and when he was later promoted to a higher position (he was quite competent at his own work), he failed and ended up elsewhere. He would play at being a big shot but couldn't fill the shoes so he was perpetually uncomfortable. Outside the office, though, he was a decent guy. Just not a good leader.

I'd venture to say that a true Alpha is usually better at watching out for his people. He will smack down insubordination, etc., but loyalty is often rewarded. He needs a team to lead and enjoys it.

A Delta simply isn't sure of himself enough to work well in a management role.

Oh, and the audio engineer?

Whatever his rank, he's obviously a guitarist suffering through this crummy job until his record contract goes through.

Mailvox: maintaining rank

RL asks about the way in which old tendencies periodically resurface:

I've seen a number of Gamma-related posts on AlphaGamePlan lately, and it got me thinking. I used to be very Gamma. Now, partly through following a lot of your advice, and that of some good people in my life, I've turned a lot of that around. Thank you for that. I truly appreciate what you do, and I doubt I'm alone in that gratitude.

These days, I have a good woman in my life. No, not some stunning supermodel.  You and most of your readers would regard her as rather plain, no doubt. Probably a 5 or 6, tops. But I went from having a lot of trouble attracting women, to attracting average women very easily, and pretty girls on occasion (but that was harder and never lasted long). She is feminine, loyal, and we've been together a long time now. On our second child. My income has tripled, I've become stronger physically, though again, nothing terribly impressive. Just went from wimpy to normal.

But every now and again, the Gamma side reasserts itself temporarily. Or at least it tries to. Old habits just don't want to die completely. Usually when the episode passes, I tell folks (truly) that I was just temporarily crazy, and if I wronged anybody I try to make amends for it. Most of the time I keep a lid on it, but other Gammas might want to know that this may be a lifelong battle, if their experience is anything like mine.

Is it ever really possible to move up a rank permanently? Because at times, I start thinking that though I've come a very long way, and I probably look Delta-ish (with just some weird quirky behavior once in a while) to most people, there's always a part of me that's always mired in that Gamma crap. Gamma is almost like Jungian Anima possession, in that way.

Does anyone ever fully expel that garbage? Do you know anyone who did? And if so, how? Just keep trucking? Or is there something else a man ought to do once he's seen as generally Delta-like?

Delta is good. Delta is, for some, a wonderful achievement. But I don't think anyone ever completely outgrows their old psychological habits. My suspicion is that it's rather like working out and physical fitness; the more you use your new habits, the stronger they are, the less you use them, the weaker they become.

If you think about it, even old Alphas far past their prime tend to show a flash of their confidence and swagger from time to time, so it should be no surprise if an ex-Gamma should revert to his previous form on occasion. The fact that you've learned not to make use of certain psychological channels doesn't mean they don't exist anymore.

It's certainly all too easy for me to revert to Omega patterns in social situations and retreat into a quiet corner, or better yet, another room entirely. Spacebunny has long known that if she can't find me at a social engagement, she only has to locate the library.

The decline in Delta

There have been many different causes postulated for the decline in American masculinity. My preferred candidate is the decline of male teenage employment:

For Baby Boomers and Generation X, the summer job was a rite of passage. Today's teenagers have other priorities. Teens are likeliest to be working in July, according to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics that's not seasonally adjusted. In July of last year, 43 percent of 16- to 19-year-olds were either working or looking for a job. That's 10 points lower than in July 2006. In 1988 and 1989, the July labor force participation rate for teenagers nearly hit 70 percent.

Whether you're looking at summer jobs or at teen employment year-round, the work trends for teenagers show a clear pattern over the last three decades. When recessions hit, in the early 1990s, early 2000s, and from 2007 to 2009, teen labor participation rates plunge. As the economy recovers, though, teen labor doesn't bounce back. The BLS expects the teen labor force participation rate to drop below 27 percent in 2024, or 30 points lower than the peak seasonally adjusted rate in 1989.

If you don't work, you don't learn competence. If you don't learn competence, you remain a functional child.

Game in literature

Castalia House has published a new novel today, entitled An Equation of Almost Infinite Complexity. It's a good book, a funny book, and one well worth reading, but that's not what is of particular interest to me here. What I found noteworthy, in one particular section, was the way that the author, J. Mulrooney, expertly illustrates the hapless ways of the terminally clueless Delta.

The character referenced, Cooper, is not a complete loser. He's not a Gamma, he's not delusional about himself, but he is overly romantic, inclined to pursue more attractive women than his looks and status would tend to merit, and is almost completely unable to correctly read women or see them for who they truly are.

The following passage from the novel is an almost flawless portrayal of the massive difference between ALPHA interactions with women and BETA interactions with them. Dean is the Alpha, Julius is the Beta, Cooper is the Delta, and Thisbe is a very pretty woman in her early thirties who has been in a long-term relationship with Julius, but was Alpha-widowed by Dean.

The issue, Cooper gathered, was that Julius loved Thisbe but Dean was taking Thisbe away. Dean had taken Thisbe away from Julius before. Thisbe belonged with Julius, not with Dean. Thisbe thought she loved Dean, but really she loved Julius. Julius had picked up the pieces of Thisbe’s heart the last time Dean had broken them. Dean was not going to do this again.

This surprised Cooper, who was convinced that Thisbe was rather attracted to him. Just this morning he had been thinking of asking her for a date in the next week or two. He was confused. It was hard to believe that anything Julius was saying could possibly be about the same Thisbe. He became a little indignant. Thisbe shouldn’t have played with his emotions like that, leading him on as she had. It wasn’t right. How could she have had two boyfriends the entire time he had known her?

Cooper had much to think about. Besides his arrest and his run-in with the lawyer, he had been shocked at the things Dean and Julius had said about Thisbe. He had reserved a sentimental and romantic space for her in his mind that was, for the most part, as yet untainted with the cruder sort of sexual fantasy. Now it appeared that, all the time he had been dreaming of holding Thisbe’s hand while walking in the park, she had been trying out the newly expanded revised and updated with all new material edition of the Kama Sutra with both her boss and her boyfriend. Something like that might put things in a different light.

Yet it didn’t. Cooper shook himself, shrugging off his worse instincts in favor of his better. Thisbe was still Thisbe. If she had been foolish, if she had spent her time and her body on men who would never love her as he did, so what? Picking up the formula of a prayer he had learned long ago as a boy, he said to himself that it was not his place to question, but to love. This thought pleased him, and he repeated it: Not to question, but to love.

This is quintessentially Delta. Not to question, but to love. Not to judge, but to accept. The past is never prelude, because the pedestal is intact.

Objective: Delta

Someone commented that we spend a lot more time talking about Gammas than Alphas despite the fact that the blog is named Alpha Game. That's true, and there is a good reason for it. First, as with VP, the focus of the blog has evolved over time. Second, there are no shortage of other blogs telling men how to increase their status, how to make themselves more attractive to women, and how to get laid more. But very few are doing much to help those on the bottom end of the male hierarchy, much less seeking to understand why they are there.

I don't like Gammas myself. And from what I've learned, most Gammas aren't too thrilled about themselves either. So, we both have a motivation to help them understand the factors weighing against them, helping them deal with those challenges, and giving them the means to increase their socio-sexual status so that they will become happier, better-adjusted men who are less annoying to those around them.

I've never forgotten the behavior of one Alpha who did not reject me when I was an Omega, and who, in his own blithe way, signaled to the social hierarchy that I was all right. Perhaps that is why, when I see a Gamma preening and posturing and generally making a complete ass of himself, I feel a desire to help him stop doing that, in addition to feeling the normal human urge to kick him.

Not everyone can be an Alpha. But nearly every man is capable of Delta. That's the real objective.

Delta Story One

Act 1

DG (Delta Guy) leads a pretty normal life, but is good at one thing in particular
He has a PG (Pretty Girl) who he really likes, and is on again and off again as he chases her
PG is pretty, not hot, wholesome, and DG comments he really doesn’t deserve her
GE (Great Evil) is introduced and may be led by an evil man but is larger than one person
DG cannot ignore the GE and is called to action

Act 2

DG goes through a series of trials testing his mental and physical limits as he fights the GE
DG worries about PG and they stay in contact throughout He vows to marry her if he gets through it and she remains loyal despite his absence
AL (Alpha Leader) is introduced who the DG admires but is amazed by at times
DG loses a close, personal friend or two in the struggle against GE
DG begins to doubt his cause, his abilities, and is put in tougher situations
DG suffers even more catastrophic losses to himself or friends

Act 3

DG finds the personal strength to fight on
DG is accepted to the inner circle of trusted companions of the AL and leads a few other Deltas mostly by example
DG does his part to defeat the GE, which includes being involved in the Great Battle and events much larger than himself
DG is scarred, but takes solace in a sense of belonging with his lifelong friends, and he wants peace in his life
DG is now brave enough to ask PG to marry him, which she does
DG and PG move to a small house in the country, raise a family, and have many children and grandchildren
Story ends with an old DG and PG sitting on a porch at sunset watching the kids play as he reminisces about his life, struggles, friends, and always being loyal

Burn the coal

Well, you know the rest.

When Louise Chesney’s besotted fiancé Paul whisked her off to Jamaica to plan their dream beach wedding, she couldn’t have been happier.

She was so in love and says she couldn’t wait to marry her perfect man.

Yet just days into their holiday, handsome local hotel worker Caffrey Brown caught her eye. And one night, after Paul had retired to bed with a headache, they shared a kiss.

Weeks later, Louise, 24, stunned family and friends by calling off her engagement to heartbroken Paul, 48.

She claims Caffrey, 25, had promised to marry her instead, and love-struck Louise began to plan a life with him in the UK.

Hey, she was lucky, she didn't end up dead. But read the whole thing for the punchline. For some reason, many white women don't seem to grasp a simple fact about black men: they don't support their women. Their women support them.

Delta music

I heard this song the other day and thought that it was nicely reflective of the Delta perspective. There is no bitterness or anger, just noble resignation, pedestalization and patience. Even the music is reflective of the Delta's stodgy persistence in waiting for the woman he idolizes. That's one of the main things that distinguishes the Delta from the Beta, Alpha and Sigma. He waits for women.

One too many times I fell over you
Once in a shadow I finally grew
And once in a night I dreamed you were there
I cancelled my flight from going nowhere

It's all I can do
To keep waiting for you
It's all I can do
It's all I can do

One too many times I twisted the gate
When I was crazy I thought you were great
I kept my renditions of you on the wall
Where holiday romance is nothing at all

It's all I can do
To keep waiting for you
It's all I can do
It's all I can do

You wait in the wing like a Saturday flirt
Protecting the judge, you don't want to get hurt
Once in a moment it all comes to you
As soon as you get it you want something new

It's all I can do
To keep waiting for you
It's all I can do
It's all I can do

Don't defer, don't hire

The Chateau provides an example of how to lose hand despite power:

Beta males, especially those of the cuck variety, have a knee-jerk urge to publicly elevate their wives to positions of influence in their lives that are all out of proportion to reality. Jeb!, Kasich, Cruz…they all did it. A little self-abnegating generosity toward the wife is fine until it turns hyperbolic and comically supplicating. Beta males still haven’t learned that the handicap principle is easy to abuse and backfire on them, and that a man has to show a little alpha gumption before he can safely indulge some oily deference toward women.

Deltas, in particular, love to publicly pedestalize their wives. Put a Delta in a position of authority, and before you know it, he'll make his wife an executive of some sort. I don't quite understand the thinking behind it, but it's as if they can't decide anything without being sure to get her approval.

I know one CEO that made this mistake. He made his wife the vice-president of a technology company despite the fact that she didn't know a single damn thing about computers or even what the company did. He set her up for failure in the corporate world; unsurprisingly, the marriage failed too.

Your word is your bond as a man

Let this be a simple but very important lesson about life. Do not give out your word lightly. If you break your word you almost always undermined your credibility. Men and women of all types will notice and remember when you break your word. Most will never forget, even over small items. Women in particular lose interest in men who say they are going to do something and then do not do it.

Cruz specifically gave his word here and even worse tied it to his political career. By not endorsing Trump he broke his word, and not only did he break it, he did it when invited to Trump’s party and symbolically peed in the punch bowl when he did it.  This is not honorable. Honorable men do not do this to each other. Even Jeb! had enough sense to stay away and shut up.

If you don’t know the details of an arraignment or you have doubts, don’t give your word. If someone pressures you it’s typically a very bad sign that you may have to break it later. Be a man of honor, don't break your word and don't give it out lightly.

She's ready now

After failing to lock down any of her Alphas, 44-year-old Lisa Snowden has "suddenly" found romance with an old friend:

She's dated some of the world's biggest heartthrobs including George Clooney and CSI's green-eyed Gary Dourdan.

But it looks as though Lisa Snowdon has shunned celebrity boyfriends in favour of some normality, reportedly falling for her friend of 15 years George Smart. A source has told The Sun he was her shoulder to lean on when she split from her ex, with the pair eventually  growing closer.

Imagine that. What's funny is the idea that somewhere out there is a Delta in the throes of unrequited love, thinking that this is a success story that justifies his patient, "wait-her-out" approach.

"It's already been five years, just ten more and she's mine!"

If you build it, they will bang

Heartiste addresses a common Delta-Gamma misconception:

A fairly regular bleat from the woe-is-me contingent of hapless beta male romantic losers who’d rather wallow in self-pity than engage the frightening prospect that deliberate effort can improve one’s sex life, is the recurrent assertion that Game – or any of its organic derivatives – will only work on women who are “already attracted to the man”.

This claim is an indicator that the claimant has either

a. no experience seducing women (as opposed to listening to women talk about other men seducing them, or watching women be seduced by other men), or

b. has had the stroke of luck to land Miss Right early in life, settle down, and thereafter be cursed (or blessed, depending on your POV) to view womankind through snow white-tinted glasses, which act as convenient amplifiers that facilitate the projection of male desire onto female sexuality.

We see this all the time in science fiction literature written by low-status men, in which the attractive (usually red-headed and large-breasted) woman blitzes the unsuspecting, but delighted man who has refused to do anything except intensely respect her.

You have a choice. You can either wait for a woman to be attracted to you or you can work at building her attraction to you. That doesn't mean it's always possible to do so, because some attractions simply cannot be built, but if the latter doesn't work, you can be damn sure that the former won't either.

Alpha Mail: Growing out of Gamma

ER explains how he escaped it:

I was raised by a single mother who was deeply narcissistic and emotionally incestuous with her children. It was classic narcissism; externally, she was beautiful, stylish, charming, witty, well read, and well travelled. Inside she was a damaged, angry, reactive, frightened little girl in deep pain. The dozens of failed relationships strewn in her wake revealed someone incapable of empathy or emotional connections. She masterfully used rage and the induction of guilt as primary parental tools.

I should have become a full blown gamma (or gay, had the emotional incest taken a slightly different form). All the elements were growing within me; narcissism, lack of empathy, inability to ever be wrong, emotionally reactive, holding grudges, the belief that I was smarter, more talented, and better looking than I really was, etc.

But somewhere along the line as a young man I started realizing that I was profoundly screwed up. It was probably the grace of God that allowed me to see it. Most gammas are never able to see themselves truthfully. It's too painful. But as painful as the process became for me, I sought to fix it.

Neil Strauss has a new book called The Truth. It's a very dark story--I almost couldn't get through it, but ultimately it's a story of redemption. His mother too, was terribly emotionally incestuous. His descriptions of her hit very close to home.

What I do want to say to guys like Aaron, although most are operating on such a subconsciously reactive level that they are incapable of honest introspection, is that there is hope. The reality is, just like with alcoholism, you can never be cured. But you do learn to see with clarity and recognize when those old emotional triggers are misfiring. You learn to build new thought patterns, new habits, new pathways, and eventually, you can achieve emotional health and happiness.

Just as a man without confidence can learn "game", and eventually those patterns become more dominant than the old ones, the gamma can become a well functioning, healthy individual who is capable of emotional depth and strong human bonds.

But it starts with a kernel of recognition. And that, my friends, is the hardest part.

I have great respect for Deltas who have surmounted their socio-sexual handicaps and developed into socio-sexually normal men. Far too many young men are overly obsessed with becoming something they are not rather than the best of what they can be.

There is nothing wrong with being Delta. It is, for most men, a very psychologically healthy and satisfying place to be.

Deltas and Gammas are the real problem

A young man falsely accused of rape learns who enables the narcissistic accusers:

Manginas Are The Real Problem

This became abundantly clear when I first shook hands with the investigator. Based off of the fact that his office was plastered with pictures of his mother, I’d guess that he never had a father around.

He was a boy raised by a single mother, on a noble crusade to stop the evils of patriarchy—and he’s the real problem. That police officer who automatically assumes that the girlfriend is telling the truth, that judge who has a deep seeded hatred for men, because he thinks it will get him laid, and that mangina in your workplace who offers women endless emotional attention when they tell him that they were “raped”? They’re the real problems.

It’s very easy to get caught up in your anger towards women (I know that I certainly was for a while). But the problem isn’t women. It’s the men that raise them, the men that encourage them, and the men that appoint them.

If the investigator wasn’t a mangina, how do you think my appointment would have played out? I would have told him my side of the story, shown him my log of text messages, and he would’ve dismissed the case because there was ZERO evidence to support her claims.

If we want to have any hope of reclaiming our past culture, we must start with men. Modern women are merely a symptom of a larger problem, they are not the cause. The root cause is the lack of masculinity in today’s men. The patriarchs of the past weren’t complete morons, unaware of what women will do for attention or social status.

They weren’t desperate for sex, they weren’t socially retarded, and they sure as hell weren’t weak. They were strong, confident men who ruled with compassion. The idea that patriarchs are cruel is ridiculous. In fact, it’s quite the opposite—manginas are far more cruel when they gain positions of power than any patriarch would ever be.

Men of low socio-sexual rank are the core of the problem here, because they simply refuse to believe women are anything but pure, innocent creatures taken advantage of by evil higher-rank men.

Yes, young women are crazy. This is known. This is not new. What is new is the way in which they are not only permitted to run amok, but encouraged to do so.

The ironic thing is that it is almost never the genuinely bad boys who are accused of rape. It's usually the delta who thought he got lucky and outkicked his coverage one night.

Gauging your success

If you think like you’ve been making improvements in your life and increased your status here are some ways to tell.

Shopping

Female retail workers go out of their way to help you, genuinely smile at you, and very friendly when they don’t have to be.  Yes, they are paid to be friendly and helpful but here are some signs: she makes small talk about your purchases and wants to know what you like, there are a couple of open registers and she flags you over to hers with a big smile, when helping you with something she makes unnecessary physical contact like a hand on a shoulder or standing close enough to press against you, if you appear disinterested in her small talk she tries multiple times to engage you in conversation. Most women in retail are three to six but since people generally try for two ranks above themselves add two to whatever you gauge her at and you get a rough idea of where you stand.

This is a good opportunity even if you have zero desire to actually go out with the girl to practice some game if you’d like. Don’t break eye contact first, say something slightly inappropriate, compliments, negs, etc. Remember there’s no downside here only opportunity. You’ll probably never see her again unless you frequent the store.

Work and community

You are invited to attend important meetings in and out of work and they desire your opinion when you have no obligation to attend. This isn’t an instance where you get roped into a group invite for a meeting, but someone specifically asks for your attendance and opinion on something only tangentially related to your job or area of expertise.

You are invited to attend social events by the higher ups at your company.

After a meeting at work upper management doesn’t give you that look to leave if touchy small talk ensues. The after meetings are where a lot of the important stuff is actually decided.

An attractive woman in the office brings in food and offers it to you first or only to you.

You end up with an invite to social events attended by the local politicians and minor celebrities in your area. (If you don’t attend and then get another invite you are almost certainly a Beta, Alpha or Sigma.)

Social

You are in a social setting and go sit or stand by yourself for a moment and a small crowd of people you know starts to form around you. You suddenly find that younger and lower ranking men naturally gravitate to you and then the women follow. To be clear this is when you are doing your own thing, intentionally give yourself some privacy, but then people show up anyway to be in your presence. If you are indifferent enough they’ll figure it out and leave. Being an introvert I find this is mildly annoying because many times I’m by myself for a reason, but I try to use the opportunity to build relationships and solidify my status.

Since improving status is typically a long process many times other people will point out the change because it gradually becomes natural for you. Some men will “suddenly” be jealous of your female attention, women will comment on something important you did or just want to be in your presence. Only on introspection will you realize that people are treating you differently. 

Control your deltas and gammas

Or your movement will weaken and fail as it is undermined from within by low-rank men seeking to appease women:

The political left is a paradoxical amalgamation. They’ve built a tent which includes feminists who say that “gender roles” are a societal construct; transsexuals who believe that they were born into the wrong sex; SJWs who scream that all sexual harassment accusations are to be believed; multiculturalists who cover up refugee rape sprees; anarchists who promote violence against police officers; gun-grabbers who want to empower the state; socialists who hate the free market; and corporate slaves addicted to their brand logos and cheap signalling.

They’re an endless mess of contradiction and disagreement, and yet they remain consistent on one thing: attacking, isolating, and destroying anybody who stands against their narrative.

Meanwhile the political right seems to discover a new fractious dispute every week. Despite a coherent and relatively simple set of beliefs which unite its members—individual autonomy and responsibility, distrust of large governments and military-industrial complexes, a respect for family and tradition—the infighting is constant, and it plays right into the hands of our enemies. It’s more than just disagreement and discourse, it reaches the levels of outright strategic insanity, utterly autistic over the need to from political alliances.

Whence does this weakness come from? From the same place it always has. Ever since Adam tried to suck up to his rebellious wife, disobeying God by way of supplication, our race has been cursed with effeminacy and thirst. Any time you see stupidity and discord amongst men of the political right, at the center of it you will find woman; each and every time a right-wing movement fails, it is because of the pathos and sexual desperation of its constituent males.

Each group does this in their own unique way, justified by their ideology, but the result is always the same: infighting, dissolution, and absorption by the political left.

One reason why the Alt Right remains strong is that its leaders are disproportionately a) Game-aware, b) Alpha, and, c) homosexual. Thus, it retains a strongly masculine element and is considerably less susceptible to the enervation of libertarianism, conservatism, and other ideological movements.

Of course, this is also why it is denounced as fascist by the feminized Left.

Don't offer unsolicited help or too much of it

Gamma-hover: When 4+ woman enters a room and a Gamma suddenly finds a reason to be near her and offer helpful advice on whatever she is doing regardless of her actually needing help.

Delta-advice: When a Delta is asked to help a woman 4+ but goes way overboard trying to do most everything possible for her, defending her actions despite possible bad behavior, and offering way too much information in an effort to be helpful.

Gammas and Deltas are both entirely too helpful to semi-attractive and attractive women. It’s condescending to the women and smacks of desperation (Gamma) or a desire to be seen as a defender of womankind (Delta). If a woman wants your help she’ll ask for it and you aren’t required to help any more than you are required to help a man. If she does ask for help don't make her task yours. If a man walks into the room to perform a task do you leap to your feet in an effort to get close and help? If an extremely unattractive woman walks in are you racing to her side as well to offer assistance?

I have never seen a man offer unsolicited help to a woman be successful in attracting her. I have seen a woman ask a man for help for something and hit it off because he’s already in play; the request is an excuse to talk to him, but the help is secondary and isn't the focus.

Not raising a Gamma (Part 1)

Dexter asked “advice on raising sons not to be gammas?”

First you need to take heed of all of the advice about not being a Gamma yourself. You need to set the example first, but don’t take time off to straighten yourself out. If you are behaving like a Gamma around your son stop it immediately the best you can and work on improving. This list is not ordered by importance.

• Support your son in healthy activities even if it’s not something you would do or even particularly like. Don’t belittle his choices simply because it’s not something you would do.
• Allow him to fail and be wrong about things and then help him understand his mistakes and learn from failure. If you encourage him to lie about his failures you will make him scared to fail so he won’t try and a liar as well.
• Don’t publicly ridicule him, embarrass him, or compare him to other boys because you are angry at his behavior. If he embarrassed himself publicly he will know and already feel shame. Take him aside to discipline him and make it very clear why he is being punished. His punishment should be appropriate to the offense and not revenge for making you look bad or angry. If punishment is seen as revenge you will fill him with wroth.
• If he has a physical or minor character flaw don’t regularly point it out and mock him about it. He knows about it and has likely already been picked on about it. You don’t need to pile on, but rather need to encourage him through it.
• Allow him to see you be wrong about something and take responsibility for it.
• If he’s knows more about a subject, is right and you are wrong don’t use your position of power to take away his success but rather celebrate his knowledge or admit he’s right and you were mistaken depending on the situation.
• If he wants quit an activity he needs to take up a similar activity. For instance if he doesn’t like one sport he can try another, but he can’t just quit and play X-box.
• Teach him how to fight and defend himself, but that it’s always the last option and not the first.
• Spend time with him in traditionally masculine hobbies and activities, and chose a few which are particularly difficult and physical in nature.

Fear of being ordinary Part I

While men of all stripes engage in self destructive behavior a Gamma practices a consistent and weird dishonesty about himself which hampers every aspect of his life. Why lie about yourself when there’s no benefit and it is unneeded? Discerning the origin and purpose of this self-deception has perplexed me for some time but I think that I now found the answer.

Imagine walking through a museum and looking at all of the old photographs of the men. In the past there were men of all ranks like today but specifically think of the common man, the Delta. In those old black and white photos from a hundred or more years ago you might wonder, who are these guys? What did they do? They aren’t famous, and even finding out the names of many of them might be difficult or impossible. If you have access to old photo albums from your family you’ll likely see some male relatives you’ve never seen or thought much about, but they lived, many raised families, and all had one thing in common. They died.

Everyone reading this blog today and of course the author himself is destined to die. Being able to deal with the impending death of oneself is part of the maturity of manhood. Every rank besides Gammas generally comes to grips with this, even Omegas. Once again Band of Brothers is a perfect example of the Deltas dealing with death, the fear of death, but doing what they need to do. In the episode “Carentan” Private Albert Blithe is shown overcoming his very real fear and getting out of a foxhole, fighting, and killing. Joining the military and facing death head on is one of the chief ways men have proven their courage throughout history.

Gammas don’t get out of that foxhole unless they graduate into Deltas in the moment. In fact Gammas generally position themselves in the military far behind enemy lines if they can manage it. They are natural cowards despite their blustery talk which is why they immediately back down when threatened with any real physical violence. Deltas aren’t naturally brave, but can be when called upon each according to his ability. That’s why a Delta will get punched by an Alpha, but the Gamma rarely even takes a punch as they flee or appeal to authority at first opportunity.

When a Gamma is sick with a mild cough they will let everyone know about it and make a big show of it. If a Gamma contracts a serious illness there’s certainly no stoicism involved, but you will notice they act like they are the first person in history with the illness and want to talk to everyone about. They will try to include everyone around them into their illness to ramp up the magnitude of it, like it’s a near national emergency that some random guy is sick. A Gamma can’t be just an ordinary guy with an illness, but rather a special guy who requires more attention, care, and involvement from those around him.

If someone else is sick, particularly if it is serious, they might obsess over the illness as they subconsciously imagine themselves being in that same state. You’ll also see that all illness discussions focus around death and generally lead to death. For example if you come in with a bad cough the Gamma doesn’t offer words of encouragement, but rather will either relate a story about them coughing, or tell of someone they vaguely knew who thought they had a cough but found out it was a fatal condition, dying just weeks or months later. This is one of the most annoying traits of the Gamma, in which if you mention an illness they don’t listen at all, but immediately give you an information dump on the illness in which the result is inevitably fatal.

If a Gammas has psychological problems like depression or Imposter Syndrome they will try to involve as many people into it as possible. It becomes their “thing” in which they use to be special and demand those around them treat them in special ways, or become special because of it. I’ve been around real mental illness with a family member and normal people want to try to get cured even if the desire is imperfect, not turn it into a group discussion or use it to be special.

If someone they know dies young, particularly of an illness they might obsess about it, or show nonchalant disregard about it because of their inability to deal with it at all. If a Gamma loses a parent when he’s an adult he acts like he’s the first adult child to ever lose a parent. Many men have lost loved ones and written about their experiences, but the Gamma doesn’t do it to honor those who have died, express grief, or even write to others with words of encouragement, but is narcissistic and turns the death of another into something special about the Gamma.

Delta Man: 30

I met two former hipster couples this last week who are around 30 and starting to get serious about life. They still have some of the clothes and tats from the lifestyle, and a few of the attitudes, but the perpetual adolescence is fading. So what’s the big difference? After years of aimlessness they finally focused in on real jobs and careers, with one couple talking of children. It’s better late than never to grow up. I spent most of my 20s just screwing around, but at least I had enough sense to keep a career going.  If you are approaching 30 it’s time to grow up and be a man, and not a man-child.

If you need a checklist here you go:

1. Steady work and a career with real goals
2. Responsible with money (regular bill paying, paying off debts and reducing debt, saving money)
3. Buying a home and not renting
4. Starting a family

Boys don’t do these things, men do. It’s hard, mostly thankless work, but you’ll be better for it.