@adam-l

You and I and @FirstLight are in agreement… I was just poking the bear about Sigma Males because that’s been a running joke here for a long time.

I think WE all agree on the basic nuances of the Greek Alphabet paradigm: but it’s hard to explain easily. We all know guys who tend to be naturally dominant. Men follow them and women want to have sex with them: often to everyone’s detriment, because people mistake “alphaness” for competence.

(Read up on Alcibiades… dude was “ALPHA AF,” and he single-handedly nearly destroyed Athens early in the Peloponnesian War because everyone blindly followed him.)

@Typo-MAGAshiv and I are both former military officers, and we’re used to inhabiting a rigid hierarchy that simply doesn’t exist to the same degree in any civilian occupation. The question of “Who gives orders and who obeys them” (the alpha/beta dynamic) is not determined by anything other than rank/position. As I’ve said before here: nobody here who saw me IRL would immediately think that I’m a “Chad” or an “Alpha,” yet I have 1) done reasonably well with women and 2) been the HMFIC on many occasions. My list of past minions includes guys who were in the Battle of Mogadishu (the incident from “Black Hawk Down”), more than a few senior NCOs who could crush my skull with one hand, rangers, SpecOps guys, military cops, civilian cops, etc. In those situations those men followed my orders. If that’s not “alpha” then the word has no meaning. So am I an “Alpha Male?”

I would insist that I’m not, because my “Alpha” status was situational. Some of those guys WERE stereotypically “Alpha” - the kind of guys with natural presence - but they still said, “Yes, Sir” when I gave them orders. I follow the maxim: when in charge; take charge. Some guys can’t, and those guys will always default to “Beta” mode.

In other contexts, I’m just another guy, and if someone has expertise and is willing to lead, I’m happy to stay in my lane (although I reserve the right to speak up if something strikes me as being wrong).

@adam-l

,The TRP sidebar has a more fluid definition of Alpha and Beta being sets of behaviours which invoke female reactions

Oh does it? It's been a while since I've read everything, but I don't recall seeing such there. I could be wrong, because again, it's been a while.

As far as I know, that originated with Athol Kay, whose "Married Man Sex Life Primer" is one of the essential books in the MRP sidebar.

And yeah, that's how I tend to use them when I use them at all: alpha = attraction/arousal, beta = comfort.

I'm in favor of getting rid of the unnecessary use of Greek letters and just saying the fucking terms "attraction/arousal" and "comfort".

More on this another time, perhaps. I still have stuff from the last few days and weeks on here I've been meaning to respond to and still haven't!

@Typo-MAGAshiv

I'll make a spoiler of my view, which would be enough for long-timers in here:

The notion that "Alpha" is "a type of guy" is a female one: it's essentialist, and has been popular due to an admittedly overrepresentation of far-right thinking in the red pill. (I'm not criticizing it, just stating it as a fact).

The TRP sidebar has a more fluid definition of Alpha and Beta being sets of behaviours which invoke female reactions, which is another, more accurate way to describe them.

I believe Woujo hit bullseye when he connected the Alpha to the leader of the primal tribe. There's a primitive core in the female attraction system that makes them receptive to such a kind of projection. Sadly, there's a remnant of this in men, too, and we see it when men emotionally submit to leaders.

Now, because we live in extended societies and not primal tribes, there are several contexts that have different nstural leaders. The situational Alpha is the only real-life instantiation of an "Alpha", if we exclude the delusional Alpha.

What an AFC needs is not how to "become" Alpha, but rather an actionable way to achieve a state of positive emotions and non-reactiveness, as well as free up their capacity to lead an interaction. RPS wrote about captive audiences, how you go about making your own bubble in which you can be "Alpha", when you don't have the advantage of a 8 or 9 physique.

"Alpha" is a state where System 2 thinking is not invoked. It's being in flow.

Therefore, any man enters and leaves that state, depending on the circumstances.

That's why entering a relationship while being too alpha, usually beckfires. Either you get burned up, or the woman does, trying to pick up after you when things that demand System 2 thinking get left behind.