We hear a lot in popular culture about the human “alpha male”, and how important it is to send the right alpha male signals in order to get women. I’ve engaged in some of that myself, right here on this blog and elsewhere in my life. It’s repeated so often as to be taken for granted by most people.
More than that, it just seems to make sense: Many mammalian animals live in packs dominated by alpha males, and humans are mammalian animals, so surely it’s at least worth considering that we subscribe to the same paradigm. But could it be that we’ve all been sold an evolutionary bill of goods, here, and that we’re believing in an alpha male myth without good cause?
RED ALERT: I’m about to unleash some indisputable facts about why this whole “natural alpha male” idea is a bunch of crap…and how you can use this false perception to YOUR advantage.
I remember Adam Conover (of “Adam Ruins Everything” fame – awesome show) complaining of how much trouble he got in with his fans after a segment aired on his show about how this supposed alpha male myth really is just that. If anything, the episode argued, we should be looking for alpha females.
That’s because one of humans’ closest genetic cousins, the bonobos, actually tend toward a matriarchal social order. Poor Adam was inundated with e-mails after the show, from incensed fans insisting that there was no alpha male myth and of course there are alpha males and he was obviously just full of it.
Adam eventually went on the Joe Rogan Experience podcast to clarify his position (he does basically agree with the show’s narrative, even though he obviously didn’t write it himself). His clarification on Rogan made a lot more sense than he had time to make on his show, and brought him mostly in line with my own views on the subject. I’ll cover what Adam was saying in a moment.
Alpha Males Explained
First, though, we should all be clear on what exactly we mean when we say “alpha male”. For this, we can take a look at our historical uneasy friends, the wolves. Here is an animal about which there is certainly no alpha male controversy: Wolves live and hunt in packs, and each of those packs is unambiguously ruled by an alpha male.
This head honcho is respected by the other members of the pack — he eats first after a kill while his betas stand guard for him or submissively slink away with mouthfuls of meat to be chewed away from the carcass, and of course, he gets his pick of mates. Everybody else better either like it or be prepared to challenge his dominance – becoming the new alpha themselves if they succeed, and paying with their lives if they fail.
Due to their simple social hierarchies, mammalian animal communities will often produce alpha males who are generally dominant in virtually every situation. Human society, however, is far more complex.
If this is to be the universal definition, then there really is a mere alpha male myth among humans. I’m sure we can all agree that the above description of wolf packs bears little resemblance to our species. Our social order is very different.
And yet, as Adam argued on the Joe Rogan podcast, it is still one that allows for the thriving of confident, dominant people. In our case, however, and unlike that of the wolves, dominance is situational. The same individuals who seem to call the shots can be sending all the alpha male signals to be found in the codebook in one group, and be hopelessly over-matched “beta males” in another.
To illustrate, let’s consider a typical high school nerd (and I have painful experience with being this poor SOB, so it’s easy for me to speak with authority on the subject). He’s brainy and curious, but also awkward and weak. He has more time for books and learning than he has for sports. He’s geeky, insecure, and interpersonally un-gifted.
I daresay there are advantages to being this fellow, but in high school, an alpha male he is not. Instead, jocks rule the school, and usually abuse their social authority by bullying or at least demeaning people like this archetypal nerd. In the end, our hero will be lucky to have even one girlfriend throughout his high school years, while the football players are banging a different cheerleader (sometimes more than one) every night.
But what happens ten years from now? Those sports jocks may well have bet the farm on athletic scholarships that never panned out, while the nerd relied on his intelligence to carry him through a good college. He may have graduated and earned a master’s degree by now, and is the head of his own wildly successful software company.
There’s no question that in his office, he is very much the alpha male: All of his employees seek his leadership, obey his directives without question, and work tirelessly to earn his favor. Likely, the men among them also keep their girlfriends away from him, fearful that his wealth and authority would easily outshine their own in their mates’ eyes.
In Humans, being the “alpha male” is entirely dependent on the particular situation a man finds himself in. This is good, because it means that by carefully selecting a social environment you thrive in, you can become the alpha.
We can already see how easy it is to tweak these knobs. Take our rich software CEO and drop him into a highway bar where a drunken free-for-all slugfest has just broken out, and let’s just say he’s not getting any biker hoes that night. Likewise, he could very well have been an alpha male even ten years ago, during high school: As the respected DM of his Dungeons & Dragons group.
Sure, we all know that women, as a rule, aren’t the most prolific D&D players on the planet. But we also know that a few of them very much are. And that rare, wonderful species digs a good DM, bros…just trust me on that one.
Being an Alpha Male is All About Signaling
So it isn’t so much that we’re suffering from an all-out alpha male myth, as it is that those among us may or may not be alpha males under any given set of circumstances. The key is to send out the alpha male signals of dominance and authority; broadcast those, and women will take notice on a deep, primal level. Needless to say, this is very good news, because it means that any guy can reap the sexual benefits of being an alpha male when the right conditions are in play.
And crucially, you don’t even have to sit around waiting for those conditions to fall into your lap. You can seek them out, and so long as you know what to do when you find them, you can sexually thrive under them.
In human society, being perceived as an alpha male occurs depending on the situation. Gaining an alpha position in an online chatroom is one of the easiest things in the universe.
There are a number of real-world situations in which you can do this, but in my experience, the easiest place to be an alpha male is on cam sites. MyFreeCams (MFC) works best, because its sheer size provides the greatest selection of girls to try it on, and the community-based structure of the site makes it very easy to chat and shoot the shit.
The process itself is simple, as all you have to do to send the proper alpha male signals is to be seen as “taking control” of a cam model’s public chat room. You make jokes, contribute to and steer the conversation, and verbally “overpower” the other members (in a polite way; we’re civilized animals).
Related: Dating Cam Girls…The Truth
This isn’t too difficult with a little wit and charm, but if you’re short on those, you can pretty much buy your way in by tipping the girl generously. This is neither difficult nor expensive, as long as there isn’t a “whale” (big spender) in the room, and there usually isn’t.
To make it even easier, you can search out the new cam girls on the site, who will have only a few viewers at a time and be receiving almost no tips (these ladies will be labeled “New Model” on the main chat room list). For $10 or $20, you rule the channel: The model will treat you like a king, laughing at every joke you make and answering all of your thoughtful statements.
Practicing being an “alpha male” on cam sites has the effect of increasing confidence with women generally, even in real-life social situations. Think of it as online alpha training.
The other guys won’t be able to compete, and you’ll be the clear alpha in that environment. And make no mistake, the cam girl will take notice. This warms her up to you and makes her want to get to know you, for reasons beyond the fact that you’re a good tipper (though that helps!).
It’s scary how well this works, bros. Do it enough, and even if you’ve never been a dominant, or even particularly confident fellow, pretty soon you’ll have started an alpha male myth of your own. It’s the one about you, who owns any cam channel he likes. Go for it!