Is a men following the ERE Lifestyle More Attractive?

[Humanofearth]

Spending money makes everything easier. From my own experience, dating was much much easier when I got shredded (veiny abs, multiple veins in arms, 1.62 chest to waist ratio). After that, getting a nice place with a corner view from a high floor in a central location, spending lots on hygiene, lasers, haircuts every 3 weeks. I’d reached a point where I noticed a few general areas had very high success rates for dates to progress. It was a combination of evening restaurants behind university street by a cute park. Nearby were several malls, a uni. The date was typically meet to get a variation of dessert, walk the park, then come see the view. I would typically kiss within the first 2 hours. But prior that, we’d sit next to each other in the dessert shop in the early evening, talking, I’d lay my head on her shoulder at some point and see whether she leans in, smiles with surprise yet excitement in her voice (typical), or pulls away (don’t recall this). Later, I’ll hold her hand, try to kiss at the park. Mention how my apartment is within view and we can see my room from here. Some would say next time, some would say okay, some would say can not. It was always a joy to spend some time. My dates were a couple hours in the evening for the minimal time dates.

If I really liked someone, we’d meet at a market or temple early on, ride the river to the beautiful mall, see the view, then go to the night market or a different beautiful park with lotus fields and spend all day together.

All the dates come with a cost. You are the man. The majority of girls will expect you to plan, pay, and create the entire vibe. This starts with being as attractive as you can. Nice clothes, jawline, physique, charming, clean probably most important but insufficient. Charming, speak multiple languages, have a world you can invite her into. Mine’s focused on health so it naturally comes with lots of walking but I time the walking for evening unless it’s within a mall.

Tldr: extreme frugality significantly hinders short term mating success for males. The biggest hurdle for men in finding good long term mates is a lack of viable options so I would argue it makes long term dating more necessary if you are frugal and without fame or abs as you aren’t sufficiently attractive to have many options from women and will choose a long term relationship with insufficient vetting of the potential partner.

[Jin+Guice]

I thank you all for the extreme privilege of doing one of my favorite things: disagreeing with almost everyone.

@suo: I agree that this is likely the wrong crowd; however, Wayne Gretzky once said...

I disagree that there is nothing one can do to increase/ decrease their chances of getting laid once one is already on a date. It's not about turning a "no" to a "yes" it's more about identifying a "yes" and not botching it and/ or identifying the plentiful "strong maybes" and turning those to a "yes."

One of the primary reasons I want this skill is because I currently have a scarcity mindset when it comes to sex and I'd like to move towards more abundance. The scarcity mindset means that when I am getting laid I have trouble not giving up things that I don't want to give up in order to keep getting laid. In most other areas I experience scarcity, the scarcity is imagined, but in this area it is real.

Part of escaping the scarcity mindset is learning to more fully accept reality, but another part of it is increasing access where possible.

I'm also 2 months out of a major break up which came with the realization that I have several emotional problems I need to resolve before seeking serious partnership again. In the mean-time I'd like to get laid and have less serious romantic relationships. Additionally I'm non-monogamous, so never out of the hook-up game forever*. I also think that having this skill is useful within a long-term relationship as it allows one to re-ignite the flames if they cool down.

*Not letting these skills stagnate is one of the primary motivators for non-monogamy for me.

@Ego: I agree that people who pursue short-term hook-ups without any depth of relationship are not likely to be happy*. Actually, I don't know anyone who doesn't pursue depth of relationship. I know people who are good at getting hook-ups and terrible and long-term relationships. They are usually quite unhappy about this.

*The exception being, as @7 pointed out, people who seem to be more or less asexual.

What I'm getting from your post is that since hooking up is not desirable over one's entire life, it's not desirable at all, with the exception of someone in their 20s. This is an interpretation, so maybe I am misunderstanding you?

This is something I fervently disagree with. Short-term sexual/ romantic relationships can be fun or meaningful or just ok. They're the sexual equivalent of a friendly acquittance, pleasant but not very deep. I think these relationships can be some of the most pleasant relationships, a true delight of being alive. I think that almost all people desire to know and be known by someone and that, more often that not, they desire this in their primary romantic/ sexual relationship. Therefore, if one only seeks out casual relationships through their entire life, this piece of them is likely left empty. However, deep relationships can often be interspersed with casual relationships.

I think being successful in short-term relationships also increases optionality for long-term relationships, with the caveat that some people (often but not always masculine) are seduced by the easy rewards of being successful in short-term relationships and fail to develop the skills necessary for longer-term relationships. I most often see this in people have a lot of short-term success very young, although many do short-term young and then transition to more long-term when older.

@urgud: I agree that the most people are likely not good at this and rely on the fact other people need sex too and if they keep trying and can get out of their own way, they'll eventually find it. I think that seduction is still a learnable skill where skills can be increased with effort.

@Humanofearth:

This is actually the answer I've been looking for, which is the accepted social script of getting through the first few dates, in particular how to navigate inviting someone for a kiss and then sex. Thank you for this answer, it's massively helpful to me.

I also appreciate your subtle emphasis on actually enjoying the dating process.

Where I disagree with you is that money is important. ERE acknowledges that if one has money and is from the places on earth and social classes that are likely to produce members of this forum, that money is almost always the easiest way to solve problems. It is technically easier to drive a car 7 miles to work than ride a bike. It is (usually) technically faster. Where ERE comes in is that there is a difference in reality between the perception of how much harder and slower a bike is versus the reality. Add that a bike increases fitness while a car detracts from it, that a car has a massive hidden time and monetary cost, while a bike has a very low time and monetary maintenance cost.


I do not disagree with what you have written about how spending money increases your chances of short-term and long-term dating success*. However, to apply ERE thinking, can a reduction in spending or change in thinking yield results that still satisfy the underlying want/ need? Can we use creativity or a small amount of extra time to reduce spending? Can we do this in a systematic way that benefits some of our other goals or meets some of our other needs?

*I also appreciate that you explained how one can spend money to increase personal fitness, hygiene and home location, which I think effect success more than "signaling financial wealth" or "paying for things on a date."

All else equal, extreme frugality hinders everything. If we accept the social script and rules as they are handed to us, extreme frugality is a bleak and dismal life. If we learn to look for the false assumptions in that script, extreme frugality becomes a beneficial and enjoyable game.


@7: Thanks for asking my other questions which are "How can I be more smooth? How can I increase my social maneuvering skills?" Aside from hanging out with my irl friends who are smooth or social masters, I think watching old Sammy Davis Jr. videos sounds like a great way to maximize fun pursuing this goal.

[Jean]

I think identifying "yes" is made by testing for them, and testing for them is made by being confident that you won't fall apart in case you get rejected.
Being confident can be attained by getting shredded, getting rich, or overestimating how lustily women are looking at you.
A skill that can be learned is making your yes testing technique less costly for women to fail. They should not feel pressured into giving a yes, even if they wan't to give a yes, because this pressure can easily turn a yes into a no.

The last yes test is to keep your underwears on and see if she takes them off you:D

[7Wannabe5]

I agree with most of what HumanofEarth wrote, based both on my own experience, and the research in "Evolution of Desire." However, the key bit would be:

have a world you can invite her into

And as Jin+Guice outlined this can definitely be achieved within the practice of frugality (not to be confused with skinflintery.) Also, I think a systems perspective could help inform where a little bit of money could be spent to best advantage. There are many realms of existence where this is true. For example, it is easy to redecorate your living room with a $5000 budget, and it is quite difficult to redecorate your living room with a $0 budget, but a $20 budget requires/stimulates some creativity and skill while still allowing you a margin of efficient use of modern materials.

[jacob]

The "world" is to be understood in its widest sense. For some, their world literally revolves around how they decorated their home or what kind of restaurants they go to. For some, their entire world is their job. For others it's their family. Some have a world that is full of adventure riding bikes across the desert. Some have an introspective world of thoughts and ideas. Some have a world that revolves around looks and clothes. Others around books or science.

Whether you're dating or simply having a conversation, you're being invited into someone else's world with them acting as the tour guide or travel partner. The OP question is essentially whether you find this or that world or theirs attractive or whether someone else finds your world attractive.

People are sometimes surprised because they're only familiar with the mainstream world (consumerism, family, work). I know one ERE example from many years ago, where the non-ERE person was expecting the worst having heard the f-word (frugal) but was smitten by the "self-organized adventure traveling"-world that they were invited into. They were expecting and initially disappointed by the lack of matching furniture but changed their mind following one Ray Jardine style mini-adventure after another.

I suppose one could use various skills to build somebody else's dream world on a budget---the "tastefully decorated living room that could pass for an Ikea catalogue---but I suggest doubling down on your own dream world instead. Disagreements might come down to individual short- or long-term focus. With a short-term focus, one needs to be more widely compatible. With a long-term focus, one can perfect the shared world instead.

[7Wannabe5]

-but I suggest doubling down on your own dream world instead.

Follow your passion and the (FITB) will come ? I am going to call you on this for the same reason you would call anybody else if the FITB was "money." I'm also not suggesting that spending a little bit of money to build a false, tacky "matchy-matchy furniture" front is the way to go. I am suggesting that according to reasonably valid research, there are some sex specific variations in what humans find attractive when dating/mating, and gaining empathy for these differences may allow an individual to spend a little bit of money/effort towards fulfilling the "substance" of these differences as opposed to spending a lot of money/effort towards fulfiling the more "superficial" aspects of these differences.

[AxelHeyst]

My takeaway from Jacob's post is:

Step 1: Double down on your own dreams and personal individuation. Do NOT conduct surveys on what 'women' or whomever likes and attempt to build something to suit the survey. This is especially important for ERE people because our dreamworlds are rare and unlikely to be compatible with most people long term.

Step 2: Meet someone who is attracted to/enticed by your dreamworld. Presumably their dreamworld will be enticing enough to you as well by virtue of the fact that they're into yours, which is rare/weird/eccentric.

Step 3: Learn about their dreamworld and put effort into the construction of a shared dreamworld, which will involve gaining empathy and effort as you said.

[ertyu]

What was mentioned but deserves additional emphasis: part of the friction in getting to yes is mechanical. As per the above, if you're out for a picnic and the mood goes the right way, it'll be take it to your place if you live across the street than if it takes an hour and 20 min and 3 bus lines to get to your place -- or if you came by bike but she did not, etc. @7w5 (or anyone else?), way back when (15 yrs ago?) there was a fairly popular book about how environment design shapes people's choice process, do you happen to remember the title better than I do? The operative principle is minimizing friction. The candy is right by the check out counter. Participation rates increase when the choice is opt-out (you are automatically registered to vote, you are enrolled in the organ donor program by default). And so forth.

Also, @JnG, scarcity thinking isn't cured by current greed and glomming. It's cured by resting in awareness, going in the middle of your torso/chest, and revisiting and releasing the tension of all those times in the past when you didn't have enough. With scarcity and sex, in particular, get yourself the existential kink book and rub one out about the not having enough, the yearning, the not being in power/being at the mercy of someone who might choose to grant or withhold what you want, or whatever there shape this might be taking for you. Right now you're efforting while still being in scarcity deep down. Do some navel-gazing, unclench, then take action from a new place.

[7Wannabe5]

@AxelHeyst:

Yes, but everything you wrote could also apply to you and your new permaculture partner Steve.

My mild frustration here is somewhat due to how masculine gaze is water we swim in, but feminine gaze is granted short shrift. I mean, wouldn’t it be kind to learn how to behave in a manner that would tend towards increasing the attraction, level of arousal, and thus pleasure experienced by female partners?

@ertyu:

“Nudge”

[AxelHeyst]

My mild frustration here is somewhat due to how masculine gaze is water we swim in, but feminine gaze is granted short shrift. I mean, wouldn’t it be kind to learn how to behave in a manner that would tend towards increasing the attraction, level of arousal, and thus pleasure experienced by female partners?

Oh, I misunderstood your point a bit in my above response. Yes, I certainly agree with the bolded bit. [If you are a person who desires female partners, but aren't interested in their attraction/arousal/pleasure, you don't actually like female humans, you like female meatbags. This seems obvious enough to me to not require comment, but then again I have been mystified by the mating strategies and perspectives of other males of my species...] It's a both/and as far as I'm concerned. If going all-in on my dreamworld implies that I'm going to live in such a way that no partner I'd want to hang out with will actually be attracted to me, my strategy needs a rethink. What resonated with me in Jacob's post was the point that if you lose yourself in the process of making yourself superficially 'attractive' per some metrics you read about on the internet, the only possible outcome is that you'll lose even if you get laid like a rug. Maybe I was reading in between the lines. I didn't take his post to imply that the desires of potential partners should be neglected.

Anyways, if someone really is embodying Renaissance Lifestyle then this shouldn't be a problem because they'll have an attractive balance of aesthetics, spiritual emotional and social depth, keen insight into the minds/hearts/desires of others, will take joy in the art of bringing pleasure in multiple dimensions to those that delight them, etc. That at least is how my ideal dreamworld works.

[Jin+Guice]

I agree with @7 and "appealing to the female gaze" is a good name for what I am asking about. I have some of it down pretty well and some if it I am terrible at. I also agree with the last thing @AH wrote.

Dating is a complex process and different stages require different things. I think learning to lean into who you are is important for differentiation and it is also attractive. The problem is that if you lean into who you are and that person is someone who doesn't naturally gravitate towards social or emotional skills, developing a personal aesthetic and having good hygiene (ouch that hurt to write... I am so guilty of all of these... both of my parents are engineers ) or whatever other skills actually attract the people you want to attract, you might want to work on developing those.

Knowing who you are and what you want is also important for filtering. If you aren't getting anyone you are filtering too hard for your dreams or you are unappealing*, which is doing the filtering for you. If you are getting too many of the wrong people, you aren't filtering hard enough or you are filtering wrong.

*Or demographics are working against you.

If you are looking for something very long-term, I think it's important to have a strong sense of who you are so you can differentiate as well as a world to invite someone into as you are invited into theirs. I don't actually think that ERE people are weird in a way that is unappealing or that we would have any more trouble than if we were who we are without ERE. I think ERE makes people more attractive. If you are at the FIRE/ WL5 stage you may have a hard time because though you are actually building a strong resource base, you are spending most of your time building that base and not much of your time enjoying the fruits of it. You're likely going to need another person with the exact same goal to understand and tolerate what you are doing and frankly I think that's actually a pretty bad thing to build a relationship around (though it could be good if you had other shared goals/ dreams/ vision/ understanding).

I think there is this myth that learning dating skills somehow erase who you are? A bunch of people on here have done toastmasters and they seem to have escaped as intact individuals despite their improved speaking skills. I think if you want something bad enough that it becomes an obsession or unhealthy, it's going to erase who you are a bit no matter what it is.

@ertyu: I think some of escaping a scarcity mindset is learning to accept the reality one lives in, but I also think that sometimes if I'm hungry I might want to try eating.

[Sclass]

I would typically kiss within the first 2 hours. But prior that, we’d sit next to each other in the dessert shop in the early evening, talking, I’d lay my head on her shoulder at some point and see whether she leans in, smiles with surprise yet excitement in her voice (typical), or pulls away (don’t recall this).

Kissing in 2 hours is an aggressive filter. Nothing wrong with that but it is going to screen. Kissing in two hours sounds like a good way to get or spread herpes. Bacterial gum disease too. At my age I’d say half of the people I know have both. I wouldn’t kiss them casually unless I spent the first two hours dousing their mouths with Listerine and Acyclovir.

The lean in thing was actually something my brother mentioned in his lab book. @J&G sorry I temporarily wiped that from my mind. My brother said he would try to sit at a counter or someplace with high stools next to his date and press his knee into her thigh gently and “accidentally” to see if she pulled away. That’s a pretty aggressive filter right there. He said inner thigh was better but you cannot always innocently get your knee in there. I guess if she doesn’t mind your knee between her thighs you’re in luck! Sorry I cannot describe how gross it sounded. It was in there with the Richard Feynman stuff. I don’t think this necessarily makes him more attractive - he might get tagged the horn dog who shoved his knee between their legs.

@human Your grooming advice is great. No sense in putting on repellent and going out expecting a positive result. I am grafting fruit trees right now and I’ve found that there are a dozen little things one can easily do (or just naively ignore to save money) that will dramatically increase the success rate of a graft. They just incur a little bit of cost (rooting hormone, disinfectant, surgically sharp tools, humidity control, temperature control) but are worth the effort if you actually want to increase your percentage of viable grafts.

Reminds me also of a gal I know who says how important her makeup is for making herself attractive. She insisted if she just puts in the effort to make herself up she is more attractive to a man. Personally I like her made up look a lot more than her natural look. It gives a more sexy vibe than the sister vibe. She’d be a fool not to put it on before dating. It costs her time and money. Why can’t the same rules apply to an ERE man?

I think when I first posted to this thread I said ERE lifestyle was repulsive to some of the females close enough to me to be honest with their feelings. (Late mom, godmother, sister.). They really hated it and said it made me ugly. If I needed to bed them I’d definitely loosen the purse strings. I’d take them to the dessert shop and make sure not to complain that I’m paying money for processed sugars that will lead to future insulin resistance.

[7Wannabe5]

if someone really is embodying Renaissance Lifestyle then this shouldn't be a problem because they'll have an attractive balance of aesthetics, spiritual emotional and social depth, keen insight into the minds/hearts/desires of others, will take joy in the art of bringing pleasure in multiple dimensions to those that delight them, etc.

Absolutely, and I would also suggest that a "Renaissance" perspective would be towards remaining curious, as opposed to disdainful or dismissive, if you read something like:

Wearing costly clothing works equally well in both contexts. Women shown slides of different men are more attracted to me who wear expensive clothing, such as three-piece suits, sports jackets, and designer jeans, than to men who wear cheap clothing, such as tank tops and T-shirts. Clothing has this effect on women whether they are evaluating a man as a marital or sex partner, perhaps because expensive clothing signals both immediate resources and future resource potential. The anthropologists John Marshall Townsend and Gary Levy have verified that the effect of the expense and status of clothing in attracting women is robust across any sort of involvement, from merely having coffee with a man to marriage.

I am somewhat chagrined to report that upon consideration, I realized that this is even true for me; a frugal woman who is often a bit of a free box slob in her own personal attire. But, it's no more that I am making some sort of rational lifestyle calculation of male mate resource potential in this regard than that your average male is rationally calculating the likely fertility and ability to feed an infant of a potential mate based on her breast development. I can see this tendency even in how some of my earliest sexual fantasies involved imagining a cute boy I liked in the 8th grade dressed up in a firefighter uniform. I mean, it's a known thing that for some reason women often find men in military dress uniform to be sexually attractive, even though military dress uniform isn't necessarily correlated with having financial resources. What's that about? Why does clothing choice of potential mate matter so much to the median female cross-culturally? At some point if I try to deconstruct it too hard, it breaks down into the equivalent of maybe a man thinking along the lines of "Why do I find lumps of subcutaneous fat attached to a rib cage attractive? Maybe I could attach two doorknobs to a cactus and train myself to accept as less expensive substitute?" As a member of my marriage support group once noted, "You can't rationalize desire." Sexual desire in humans did not evolve to support your self-actualization as Level Yellow 21st century individual.

Ian Kerner, author of many popular books on sexuality including "She Comes First", wrote about how his future wife initially wasn't that into him, one reason being that she didn't like his shoes, but he eventually grew on her over the course of many dates. It struck me as odd that a male sexologist was almost arguing that it is better to wear uggo shoes on your first date if you are a man, because then your uggo shoe choice will cause your female date to behave in a manner that signals that she is more chaste and looking for long-term, because she is actually initially less attracted to you. It's related to what Jane Juska, author of "A Round Heeled Woman" wrote along the lines of "Civilization is based on the long-term monogamous marriages between men and the women who are just barely interested in having sex with them."

[lillo9546]

From my own experience, dating was much much easier when I got shredded (veiny abs, multiple veins in arms, 1.62 chest to waist ratio).

I suspect there is a bit of Goodhart's law in there. SMV might have been a valid measure once. However, as soon as it became known, it started to attract the more desperate people, who mainly wanted to game [it].

One of the key factors in Social Market Value (SMV) is physical appearance. You can improve your SMV by getting fit, well-groomed, and dressing well.

As stated by @Humanofearth, it's incredible how drastically you can change the way others perceive you, not just women. After gaining 10kg of muscle, starting a grooming routine, and dressing well, I noticed that my life changed significantly, from the friends I knew to new acquaintances and even ordinary women I met everywhere.

There is truth to this: working on your appearance can change how others perceive you and give you a positive halo effect. People started to behave differently towards me, acting cooler, more interesting, and more attracted.

I don't want to mention other factors like money, but I firmly believe that achieving a minimum standard of appearance is crucial for social recognition based on your positive qualities. This can be a game-changer for your life, even if you want to live a frugal lifestyle.

Imagine two people with the same lifestyle, but one cares about their appearance and hygiene while the other doesn't. Which one do you think would get more social engagement?

We are still visual people.
I've also learnt that you must dress for something you want to be considered of in life. Because people will immediately categorize you by how you're dress. This is not a good thing, but it's something about our unconcious, and I want to dress like I want to be, so I can let you understand who I am.
It's not getting the expensive clothes or the expensive car, dont' get me wrong, but rather, give "storytelling" to your character.

Not being desperate/being comfortable with oneself is perhaps the most subtle signal there is.

Then, this positive feedback you get from people, will automatically turn into "being comfortable".
Imagine someone who's fat and is getting bullied.
Imagine someone who's fit and is getting adored.
Those two people have two different outputs to their identical inputs.

One of the best way to be attractive is to be happy. If ere allows you to be happier, it will make you more attractive.
If you attract a partner with something that you don't naturraly provide, you'll make yourself miserable trying to keep those partner.
Edit: I would add that we are very lucky to belong to a specie in which sexual competition is mostly a positive sum game.

Sure!
And this is why you have to create, visually create, and image of you person.
Who are you? Which story do you want to tell?
Visual appeareance it's the start of everything, and then, there is your deep self! But that is reserved for few people in your life.


Also, i came to say that is very easy to get a STR with a women nowadays with digital apps, and accessibility.
But it's still tricky for anyone on the way to their 30's, to find a "keeper" in the common places...
Where would you search for a keeper nowadays?

[Laura Ingalls]

If I was in the market for a long term relationship but otherwise myself having a partner with time affluence would be more important than money affluence. I don’t care about all your fantastic traits (funny, sexy, reads good books, likes to hike, whatever random commonalities fit) if you aren’t available. If the reason you’re not available is that you work 80 hours a week, are single parenting triplets, full-time elder care provider, or play countless hours of first person shooter video games is somewhat immaterial.

[zbigi]

I mean, it's a known thing that for some reason women often find men in military dress uniform to be sexually attractive, even though military dress uniform isn't necessarily correlated with having financial resources. What's that about?

Isn't that a bit obvious? Uniforms signal a bunch of very positive traits from a perspective of a woman looking for a long-term partner and father of her children. Just off the top of my head: courage, strength, competence, composure, willingness to put oneself at risk to defend others. Of course, that's the ideal, and in practice e.g. NKVD thugs wore uniforms as well - but the archetypical ideal of the warrior and defender works.

[7Wannabe5]

@zbigi:

Yes, it is quite obvious. I was attempting to make the point that the reason a suit is more attractive than a tank top is that we now largely inhabit a Modern post-Warrior context in which that "uniform" signals competence. In a more primitive context, it might have been the bear claw necklace of a tribal leader. My point is that maybe it is interesting that a human technology such as clothing/ornament seems to be so deeply baked in the cake of female sexual desire. I might be wrong, but I think it would be much easier for the average man to select a sexual partner from a room full of completely naked women than it would be for a woman to select a sexual partner from a room full of completely naked men. We need more information even in the context of a brief relationship, because even within the context of a brief relationship, a female is placing a larger bet on the line.

[white belt]

Dating as an ERE man means you risk suffering from the same "marketing" problem that @Jacob had with ERE when his blog posted about lentils, living in an RV, and darning socks. Talking about things you don't do suffers from the freedom from problem, while framing things related to freedom too is generally much more appealing. Since most ERE people should have interesting nodes in their web of goals, it's probably best to focus on showcasing those, at least in the first couple of dates. Sure, you can try just going way outside the Overton Window on the first date and that will be a very strong filter, but depending on your goals you might be scaring off a lot of compatible matches because it's just too much of a shock at first. The more you fit the model figure (tall, dark, handsome, fit, dominant, etc) of the feminine gaze, the more leeway you have with things outside of the norm. Of course, if that's you then you probably have no shortage of women beating down the door to date you, so most of this advice is going to seem unnecessary.

I suspect that if you're already here on the ERE forums, then you might benefit a lot from thinking about things in terms of SMV. Most forumites have a lot of skills they've built up over the years, but they often have not built up the soft skills associated with signalling. Or rather they have largely been ignoring such signalling or actively counter-signalling. Ignoring signals is a luxury and if you aren't having the dating success you want, then it's probably going to require some changes. I'd argue that the proliferation of online dating has made signalling more important. This is in contrast to a lot of the folks who seem to gravitate to the PUA space who have no skills and are trying to fake signal that they do.

I was attempting to make the point that the reason a suit is more attractive than a tank top is that we now largely inhabit a Modern post-Warrior context in which that "uniform" signals competence. In a more primitive context, it might have been the bear claw necklace of a tribal leader. My point is that maybe it is interesting that a human technology such as clothing/ornament seems to be so deeply baked in the cake of female sexual desire. I might be wrong, but I think it would be much easier for the average man to select a sexual partner from a room full of completely naked women than it would be for a woman to select a sexual partner from a room full of completely naked men. We need more information even in the context of a brief relationship, because even within the context of a brief relationship, a female is placing a larger bet on the line.

Perhaps this is nitpicking, but the reason a suit is more attractive is that a well-tailored suit is designed to be flattering on the male figure*. Padded shoulders look broader, waist looks slimmer, limbs will look more proportional, etc by design. In other words, you can be a pretty average (somewhat pudgy/out of shape) adult male and look much more appealing to the feminine gaze with a suit. However, if you are already very fit, I've personally experienced the issue of even a well-fitting suit concealing some attractive physical features. e.g. "I didn't know you had all these muscles hiding under that jacket". In that case a tank top is probably going to be more attractive. However, outfits are very context dependent so the most important thing is to wear something that is clean, unwrinkled, and appropriate for the occasion. Don't wear a 3 piece suit to a coffee date and a walk in the park unless you're in a region where that sort of thing is common (Europe, Japan, etc?). Don't wear a tank top to Dorsia. I think 90% of the time in the USA a good bet for casual first date attire for man under 40 is going to be something along the lines of an ironed/steamed plain t shirt that fits (solid color, no logos), jeans that fit, and shoes that are appropriate for your region/season. As an ERE man, I'm not taking a girl on a first date to anywhere that requires more formal attire because those places cost $$$ and I wouldn't want to signal that I'm trying to woo a girl by spending a lot of money on her (this usually backfires as many women have prior experiences with guys doing such a thing to justify acting like assholes).

With all this talk of dating systems a la Feynman and @Sclass' brother, I'm surprised no one has posted this (comedic) clip: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bg5ZrkaGlFA

* = I grok what you are saying about uniforms. I am in the Army after all

[zbigi]

@7Wannabe5

I totally agree. When talking to women, it's clear to me they pay much attention to what the guys are wearing. Whereas guys don't care that much about what a woman wears, unless it's come kind of skimpy outfit. The tragedy is that each sex acts out their preferences (and not the opposite sex's) - women spend gigantic amount of time and money and time on clothing, which guys don't even notice half of the time, whereas guys wear dilapidated crap [1], which can massively put off girls.

[1] Talking about myself here.

[lillo9546]

The more you fit the model figure (tall, dark, handsome, fit, dominant, etc) of the feminine gaze, the more leeway you have with things outside of the norm. Of course, if that's you then you probably have no shortage of women beating down the door to date you, so most of this advice is going to seem unnecessary.

God bless women which don't have the height bias on men.

And yes, once you're fit, like 15% bodyfat or less, clothes become difficult to fit you.
Clothes do better fit someone who's chubbier than you, ahaha.