The Rational Male – Preventive Medicine (2015) analyzes male and female sexual market value and the games women play to manipulate men and maximize their dating and sexual returns.
Contents
Summary
About The Author: Rollo Tomassi is one of the most popular figures of the manosphere.
He is the author of one of the most popular red pill books called, just like his blog, “The Rational Male“.
Tomassi defines himself in “Preventive Medicine Volume 2” as “a student of life just as much as you are” and, he adds, “as such, I understand the value of knowing that I know nothing”.
#1. This Is Hypergamy In A Nutshell
Hypergamy is possibly the most central concept in Rollo Tomassi philosophy.
And we can summarize it as follows:
Hypergamy is the female drive to secure the best genes she can and, ideally but not necessarily from the same man, attract the most resources she can.
Rollo Tomassi says that ideally, she will get both great genes and abundant resources from the same man.
But that’s unlikely… Particularly in these days.
My Note: Are today’s men really poorer than in the past?
This is a recurring theme in the manosphere that today’s men are not as “good” or “mannish” as in the past.
And albeit that’s potentially true, I’m far from convinced about it -and there is no data to back that up, as far as I’m aware-.
Also read:
#2. The Science of Alpha Fucks Beta Bucks
Rollo Tomassi mentions the Kinsey Institute study.
The study shows how facial preferences in women change depending on their menstruation period.
And, Rollo says, women want mannish man when they’re ovulating and most likely to be impregnated and prefer more feminine men when they’re least like to get pregnant.
Rollo Tomassi claims that’s the basis, and proof of the “alpha fucks beta bucks” theory.
My Note: The study was unclear, actually
Albeit what Rollo says makes sense, the study he cites actually disproves his own theory.
This is what the study says:
However, there was no significant difference in masculinity preference between women in the low- and high-conception probability groups
Read more in the “criticism” section.
#3. This How Women Behave Depending on Which Phase They’re In
Rollo Tomassi categorizes women -and their dating behaviors and expectations- into different categories depending on which life’s phase they are in:
- 15 years old: into hot boys with good bodies, facial symmetry, right eyes color, and proper haircut.
Between 15 and 25, even a man with a beta mindset can be successful if he has a good physique.
Women between 18 and 20 are incapable to commit to anything. - The Break Phase: late teen years, moving to college she is inclined to end the relationship and enjoy her options during her peak years
- party years (20-25 YO): enjoy peak SMP and start developing and appreciation for inner alpha qualities. She longs for an ideal of alpha man with long-term provider capabilities
- Late party years: during the last third of party years she starts feeling more pressure for a long term commitment
- Epiphany Phase (28-30 YO): she realizes it’s hard to compete with younger women, she switches from offers coming to her to feeling like it’s her who needs to secure a good man.
She still hopes she can “convert” the bad alpha boys - Transitory phase (29-31 YO): competition anxiety increases, she’s now getting more interested into beta providers
- Security phase (31-34 YO): affluence, status and resources become the major attractor for women. It’s more difficult to game them because they require commitment
- Development phase (7-9 years after commitment & children): After a few years she has consolidated her position with a provider, a woman doesn’t need a provider anymore.
Her SMV decreases while his holds steadier, so she tries to become more dominant to preserve the power balance (my note: I’m not sure this is accurate: women initiate most divorces in long term marriages)
My Note:
A lot of good points in these phases.
But, as well, some mistakes some generalizations.
Ages and mores also change a lot depending on the culture, and this applies to liberal and libertine cultures (ie.: as of today it’s very western-centric).
#4. These Are Female Manipulation’s Tools
I really enjoyed these pearls of wisdom.
For example:
- “Men are incapable to commit“: it’s only women who find it hard to find a man who say that in an effort to mend their egos
- “What happened to all the nice men“: women say this one to the beta chumps to signal they’re ready for commitment… If he plays the nice guy role
- “Men need to men up“: 30 YO or older trying to shame men into getting serious, but actually masking her realization that she’s now losing all her power to attract men
- “Men are threatened by powerful women“: shaming men into giving up younger women and appreciate her other (less important) qualities
And more generally:
- Men shaming: this is what she does when she can’t find a man who “forgives her” of her wild past or when he refuses to provide
Also read:
- Commitment games women play
- Games women play (a long list)
- Are men threatened by powerful women or just being rational?
#5. Providers Are Culturally-Manipulated Men
I only partially agree but I loved this part.
Rollo Tomassi says that the “feminine imperative” (sic) and the cultural expectations for men to provide can become straight-jackets for men.
Rollo recommends you watch this clip from “Breaking Bad” to understand the point:
To understand how women do it, read a classic article on this website:
- How women domesticate men (with examples)
- Providers VS Lovers: the quality of the man is what makes the biggest difference
- Should you date as a lover or as a provider? This article will help you decide which strategy suits you best
#6. The More Powerful She Is, The More Honest She Is About Hypergamy
This was a very deep observation.
Rollo Tomassi says that women who can provide for themselves are freer to talk openly about their dual dating strategy (ie.: love the alpha bad boy but pretend you prefer the provider who sticks around).
The example is Sheryl Salzberg, author of Lean-In.
Salzberg openly recommends women to date around the bad boys but to only and marry settle a man who wants an equal partnership and “is happy or, even better, wants to do his fair share of chores in the house”.
LOL, Rollo Tomassi totally nailed it there.
However, women who cannot provide for themselves as much as Salzberg can, still need to play the game and pretend they actually prefer the “egalitarian man”.
This is because most women have to settle for a tradeoff between alpha men and providing men.
And when the time comes to settle down, they have to pretend they prefer the providing men.
Preventive Medicine Quotes
On what women want:
Women want men who other men want to be and other women want to fuck
On women’s position on a man’s life:
Women should be the supplement to a man’s life, not its focus
On women’s manipulation effort to make men into providers (I paraphrase):
Men need to man up is the battle cry of every single woman older than 30
This is how Rollo Tomassi defines game:
A series of behavioral modifications to life skills based on psychological and sociological principles to facilitate intersexual relations between genders
Criticism
I thoroughly enjoyed “The Rational Male Preventive Medicine”.
And I agree with much of the content.
But, same as for its predecessor “The Rational Male“, I also found much to object to.
If you’re a red-pill Rollo fan, arm yourself with an open mind before delving in.
Did you?
Great.
Then, for an overview of the red pill, see this video analysis:
OK, then let’s start:
#1. The Data Is Misrepresented (To Fit The Narrative)
Rollo misquotes studies to fit his narrative.
For example, he quotes The New York Post saying:
According to a recent study by iVillage, less than half of wedded women married the person who was the best sex of their lives (52 percent say that was an ex)
Rollo titles the chapter “nobody marries their best sex ever”, which is obviously a complete mischaracterization since almost half do.
But, most of all, he misrepresents -or misunderstands- the data to fit his narrative.
In a nutshell, he implies that the research proves that women fuck the alphas when young but marry the betas later on when looking for a beta provider.
However, Rollo doesn’t realize the research proves the opposite of what Rollo Tomassi says.
You only need a modicum of logic and math to understand it.
If women’s average sex partner count is 5 partners -just to stay on the low end of the range-, then chances she marries the best sex of her life are only 20%.
Instead, it’s more than double!
And that completely invalidates Rollo’s theory.
#2. There Are Several Unsubstantiated Claims
Says Rollo Tomassi:
The most secure, monogamous attachment women make are with men they perceive to be one to two points above what she perceives to be her own sexual market value.
I actually agree with the gist of the concept.
But… Based on what does he assign “points”, and on what scale?
The famous old PUA “0 to 10 HB scale”?
And then again:
Arguments about chores and sex life are most common in couples where the woman makes the decisions.
Female decision-making status is an even bigger predictor of relationship dissatisfaction than female breadwinner status.
(…)
Women despise being the leaders
Based on what does he say that?
Because my personal observations don’t substantiate that at all. Relationships with female leadership tend to be more stable and last longer.
So I really would have liked to check for resources. Or at least for a deeper analysis as to the “why that’s the case”.
But nothing… Just Rollo’s own ideas presented as truths.
Overall, the whole “Preventive Medicine” is basically a book built around unsubstantiated claims.
That’s not necessarily wrong.
I often repeat that a good observer of social dynamics can be better than a good researcher, but it’s something to keep in mind.
Pop Psychology
It’s funny.
Rollo Tomassi pokes fun at what he refers to as “the pop psychology of the love languages”.
But love languages are not pop-psychology and several studies have confirmed their existence. Even psychologists who are critical of their usefulness confirm their relevance.
It’s “The Rational Male Preventive Medicine” that sounds like pop-psychology at times.
#3. Evolutionary Psychology Doesn’t Add Up
Evolutionary psychology is the best tool to understand sexual dynamics.
But not when you make up stories that sound credible but that have no scientific backing.
That’s just storytelling.
And that’s OK… IF one clearly stated that they are personal conjectures.
That wasn’t always the case in “Preventive Medicine”.
Sometimes, I found evolutionary psychology to contradict some of Rollo’s theory.
For example, the popular theory that beta males are always left holding the bag for the “alpha fucks men“.
But if beta males were consistently so stupid to provide and stick around older and less fertile women -and many surely are!-, shouldn’t these men have disappeared from the lineage?
Or, at the very least, shouldn’t there be so few of them that the “alpha fucks” strategy stops working so well?
That doesn’t seem to be the case.
Instead, it seems like beta men are creating lots of other beta men. So, in the end, it might be more correct to say “alpha fucks more and provides less”, betas fucks a bit less, and provides more”.
Also read:
#4. Young Girls Pair Up With Alphas, Old Girls Pair Up With Betas Doesn’t Add Up Mathematically
This one also doesn’t add up.
The idea of the “alpha fucks, beta bucks” is that the alphas are sexy and cool and they only give their dick.
And the betas are boring, pedestalize women, act like their emotional tampons and support them financially.
Younger women, says Rollo, want the alpha.
Older women want the betas because they stick around.
There is quite some truth in that and that is the case for some women. But reality is not so black and white.
For all women to fuck alphas as youngsters and marry betas as oldsters, there should be twice the numbers of men.
Obviously, that’s not the case.
That’s becuase reality is more complex and variegated.
Some betas also do bang (a bit).
And some alphas also do get married and stick around (just look at Trump, Berlusconi, and many other tycoons. Even if they had women on the side, they still got married).
There are indeed two more important categories of alphas:
Or watch here:
Overly Simplistic Split of Betas/Alphas
Splitting men in two categories is bound to be overly simplistic.
Just like Marx was wrong dividing society in a Manichean “owners VS employees”, so you can’t be right simplifying a complex reality to “alphas” and “betas”.
For a quick explanation, watch this video:
Or read “lovers VS provers VS friends” for a slightly deeper explanation of sexual market values.
Alpha Fucks: A Tool For Posturing & Ego-Massaging
That mantra is often used in the manosphere as a tool for ego massaging.
People who read alpha fucks think of themselves as alphas.
And then they go around repeating the mantra as an attempt to social climb on some imagined (or sometimes real) “blue-pilled betas”.
This is called “alpha male posturing”.
And as Rollo said in this same “Preventive Medicine”: rich people don’t need to say they’re rich.
And alpha men don’t need to say they’re alphas.
#5. The Ovulatory Shift Is Not The Scientific Basis of The “Alpha Fucks Theory” It’s Drummed Up To Be
Tomassi presents the ovulatory shift as if it the corroboration of the “alpha fucks, beta bucks” theory.
Logically, it makes sense.
However, the ovulatory shift in humans is a hypothesis, and the evidence backing it remains quite, well “shifty”.
Albeit it sounds very appealing, the actual results when it comes to humans are not as obvious -or as strong- as Rollo makes it sound.
Meta-analysis shows both supporting evidence and contrasting evidence.
I quote a good recent study providing a nice overview:
While some studies that measured women’s hormones to characterize current fertility reported women’s preferences for masculine characters were stronger when conception is more likely47, several recent studies have found no change in mate preferences among women at the peri-ovulatory phase for muscularity48,49, facial masculinity23,49,50, beards23,51, vocal masculinity52,53 and facial symmetry49. Thus, the extent to which ovulatory cycle shifts are associated with women’s mate preferences may have been overestimated in past research due to imprecise methodologies and small sample sizes54.
Marcinkowska et al., 2019
I personally think the ovulatory shift is probably real.
And yet, the ovulatory shift not nearly as strong as Rollo Tomassi makes it sound in his “Rational Male trilogy”.
Personal female preferences seem to stronger than cycles.
Overall, I find some of the “science” behind Rollo’s theories to be evolutionary psychology conveniently bent to fit the narrative.
#6. The “Feminine Imperative” Cultural Inculcation Is (Vastly) Overblown
Rollo Tomassi is almost as obsessed with this as feminists are with the patriarchy.
He seems to be convinced that there is a feminine propaganda that crooks all men’s natural instincts.
For example:
This is a major frustration for beta young men predisposed to effeminate conditioning that convinces them they will be rewarded for loyalty, support and building relationship equity
“Effeminate” conditioning?
I get what Rollo is talking about, but it’s not effeminate conditioning.
Loyalty and support are valid qualities to be exchanged in the sexual marketplace.
Maybe they’re not the ones Rollo favors -and neither are they the ones I favor-, but they’re still valid traits which do can help men to find mates, under certain circumstances.
At parity of genetics, a loyal and supportive man will most often beat an unsupportive and disloyal one for long-term mating.
It makes sense, no?
And I’m also missing what would be Rollo’s alternative here.
Disloyalty, selfishness and not building relationship equity?
It sounds like a great recipe for a great relationship… Not.
#7. The Rational Male Has Sect-Like Undertones
There are elements of sect-dynamics in this philosophy.
The group that should stick together, the “manipulative enemy” to study and defend from and other men to recruit and turn to the red-pill credo.
Labeling is also part of that game.
Sects make their members feel “special”.
And what’s the easiest way to do it if not denigrating anyone else who doesn’t buy into the sect?
Enter the terms “beta” for those who don’t buy into your theories.
The “blue-pilled betas” are the idiots and the suckers who get played.
And reflection “us”, the red-pilled people within the sect, we are the cool alphas.
I find that both childish and off-putting.
And I wished more for a thought leader.
Also see:
- Dark psychology in group dynamics: how group leaders want to strengthen the group to increase their power
And I advise you to read this article so central both to this website, and to personal empowerment:
#8. Made Up Conspiracy of “Feminine” Propaganda Used As Straw-Man
Rollo sees society as a big feminine indoctrination.
For example:
The feminine imperative has learned to recognize and exploit this natural deference by including as an inevitable part of future men’s early conditioning
(…)
The feminine imperative IS the priority.
What?
Again, I actually agree with the general principle that different interest groups try to manipulate others.
But it’s rarely an organized effort, and it’s even more rarely an organized effort which manages to dominate all other groups’ interests.
Instead, Rollo Tomassi speaks as if there were a secret sect of “master of puppets” women who successfully manipulate the media and the culture to keep men subjugated.
That is hogwash.
Let me state this clearly:
The idea that there is some sort of secret propaganda governed by the “feminine imperative” that effectively “effeminizes” men and manipulates men to serve women is nonsense.
But that’s exactly what reading Tomassi feels like.
It’s all about “feminine imperative”, “conditioning”, “feminine influence pervading men” etc. etc.
The keyword in my sentence is “effectively”.
Because sure women tend to embrace and talk up values that benefit men.
But so do men.
The truth is that society is far too complex and far too fragmented to yield so passively to any indoctrination or propaganda from a population’s minority.
Sure, everyone will be trying to pitch what best suits their interest, but rarely any voice can be so strong as to drown out all other groups’ interests (with the only exception maybe being the conservative propaganda, but even there we’re not talking about indoctrination).
Furthermore, Rollo then keeps using this made-up conspiracy as a straw-man technique to finger-point at women and “blue-pilled” society at large.
#9. Culture Encourages Male Providing Because It’s Good For The World (Not Just for Women)
It’s true:
There is indeed a strong cultural strand influencing men to behave subserviently to women.
And I have even personally spent all of my life rejecting the cultural diktat of the provider’s role.
But this is what Rollo doesn’t get:
It’s not (just) the “feminine imperative” that seeks to influence men into providers’ roles.
When men provide instead of, say, fuck and abandon pregnant women, it’s good for society.
And it’s because male providing is good for everyone that society embraces it, not because it’s part of the “feminine imperative” to trick men.
That’s what Rollo never seems to get.
Sure, women benefit when men provide, forgive their partying past and stay loyal.
But so do the children, the neighbors, the communities, society as a whole and, more often than not, those men themselves.
Furthermore, we could make the case that a man providing for his family is embracing certain values that should respected, and not laughed at (even if we personally haven’t chosen that lifestyle).
#10. Rollo Tomassi Mistakes Cultural “Feminine Imperative” With Simple Effects of Supply & Demand
Tomassi gets this all wrong.
He says that men pedestalize women because of the “female imperative” and the “cultural conditioning”.
I don’t see it that way.
Sure, some men may fall for the cultural strand of the feminine worldview. And I even agree that, today, the feminine view is the most powerful.
But most powerful of all it’s the supply and demand of the dating marketplace that influences male behavior, not the “feminine imperative”.
Because most men are happy to impregnate most women and women are more selective, the rule of thumb is that women are the demand and men are the offer.
And that is what makes women, naturally (and on average), the object of desire.
Not the “propaganda”, “female imperative”, “conditioning” or any other made-up conspiracy.
Furthermore, we can argue that for most men, with the little options they have, it’s rational to provide for women.
For more or and supply and demand read:
- Sexual market place: an analysis of dating power dynamics
- How to date
- Date-onomics by Jon Berger
- Why successful women lose at dating
#11. Lots of Sweeping Generalizations That Make For Bad Analyses
Rollo’s theories are not wrong per se.
But they become mostly wrong when he pretends they generalize to almost everyone.
For example:
The girlfriend you expect to build a Disneyland life with will break up with you as her options expand and your restrict
I can’t believe how many pre-suppositions that sentence include. And most of them are unlikely to be true.
Especially to be all true at the same time.
For example:
- It presupposes he has a Disneyland fantasy in mind
- It presupposes she has no Disneyland fantasy
- It presupposes she goes to college, but he doesn’t
- It presupposes she wants to “shop around”
- It presupposes he does not want to shop around (really?)
- It presupposes her options expand, but his don’t
Notice that each of them are possible and, in some situations, even likely to be true.
But that they’re all true at the same time is not the most likely scenario.
Basically, what Rollo says is true… For a few cases.
But the moment he writes as if he were describing a typical situation, then Rollo’s otherwise great micro-analysis becomes a nonsense macro-theory.
The whole “Rational Male Volume 2” is fraught with sweeping generalizations.
Most of them are great analyses of specific situations, but most of them turn into very poor systemic theories when Rollo over-generalizes.
#12. Let’s Be Frank: There Are Misogynistic Understone All Through It
Same as for “Rational Male Volume 1”.
In Rollo Tomassi’s worldview, women are “hypergamy-driven”, while men are idealistic.
For example:
Hypergamy doesn’t care for male idealistic expectations of love
Of course, Rollo Tomassi portrays himself as neutral and open-minded.
But it just doesn’t come out well.
He says yes, “women can love deeply”, but take a look at the caveat:
Women can love deeply, but from an entirely opportunistic perspective
What’s that supposed to mean?
Does it mean that men “love deeply” from a purely altruistic perspective?
Nonsense.
Watch this video for more.
#13. If A Few Men Are Gullible, It’s Not Necessarily Women’s Fault, Is It?
The feeling of “Preventive Medicine” is that of manipulative men who dupe men.
Yet my feeling was that the men Rollo describes are not “typical” men, but a minority of gullible men.
Is it women’s fault if some men have Disneyland fantasies well into their maturity?
I don’t think so.
Furthermore, Rollo confuses manipulation with self-manipulation.
It’s not only women who might want to hide a wild sexual past: it’s men who don’t want to see that past.
Also read the “Madonna-whore dichotomy“.
The Rational Male Is Male Feminist Equivalent
Have you noticed the parallels with feminism?
“Feminine imperative” is the equivalent of “patriarchy” and “hypergamy” is the feminist equivalent of “toxic masculinity”.
My appeal to you, my dear reader, is to move beyond petty group-identification and to look instead at humanity, as well as genders, as subsets of the whole.
As Robert Greene says (I paraphrase) “the only sense of belonging worthy of that name is the belonging to the human race”.
Look For Win-Win Instead
Bottom line:
You can be better and stronger looking for win-win relationships within that whole, rather than looking at reasons why you should be at war.
Also read:
#14. I Don’t See A Society of Men Conditioned To Prioritize Relationships
Again another case of bad generalization.
Rollo says that men are conditioned to stick to relationships to the detriment of their professional achievements.
Women, instead, are conditioned to put themselves first.
I don’t know in which world Rollo lives, but in this world, it’s women who, on average, put relationships first and men who, on average, prioritize work, success, and achievements.
And in liberal societies, men are less conditioned to pursue long term relationships and do whatever they like, not more.
Men have never been free to stay single as they are today.
Rollo’s advice that men should prioritize work and not get distracted by women is also wrong, in my opinion.
Just look at the most successful men: many of them have long-term relationships and I’ve never seen any study linking bachelor-hood to male success.
If anything, it might be the opposite.
Indeed as Amir Levine explains in Attached, studies show that strong intimate relationships help men to be more confident in life and achieve more.
#15. It’s Great Analysis, But 100% Biased & One-Sided
It’s called “The Rational Male”.
But if one wanted to spoof it, they might dub it “the biased male”.
Rollo says he connects the dots.
But he only connects the dots from the biased perspective of what he wants to see.
What Rollo says is not necessarily wrong but it presents, at (the very) best, only half of reality.
There is not even a single mention of male’s own games, manipulations, and efforts to influence culture.
And sure you don’t believe men are innocent creatures who don’t partake in the sexual arms’ race, do you?
If you do, take this as a wake-up call and read around here a bit more.
#16. It’s Divisive: It Pits Men Against Women
This is what I like least about Tomassi’s work:
It’s extremely divisive.
And, in that, it’s only better than feminism because of its more realistic analysis.
But not for its effects.
Most of Rational Male’s theories are deeply, inherently divisive. And it couldn’t be otherwise because it only looks at half of the game.
We have already seen an example: women have an “opportunistic approach to love” and men have “an idealistic approach to love”.
And albeit, again, there is a backdrop of truth there… It’s just plain wrong to make it into a generalized rule.
Rollo Tomassi says quoting one of his readers:
I know how hunger feels and I assume women feel the same way.
However I have no idea how hypergamy feels like, I have never felt its pull
What a load of bullshit!
Hypergamy is nothing but the tendency to maximize one’s own returns and men equally seek to maximize their returns (the good ones, at least).
It’s simply expressed differently, in men.
Read more in:
#17. Rollo’s Theory Leads to Toxic Relationships Because He Misapplies & Misunderstands Game Theory
This is “Rollo Tomassi cardinal rule of sexual strategy”:
For one gender’s sexual strategy to succeed the other gender must compromise or abandon their own.
Which is basically a deeply flawed misunderstanding of game theory applied to relationships (also read “game theory bargaining“).
It is true that one player from each gender can gain more by short-changing the other.
For example, purely from a utilitarian point of view, a woman might get more if she can trick more than one man to finance her lifestyle and invest in her offspring.
And, similarly, a man can gain more by getting a woman pregnant and abandoning her.
This is because social relations are somewhat social exchanges and, thus, can be described in game theory terms.
And tricking others (defections) can yield outsized wins.
And at the core, that’s what this Rational Male philosophy is about: a long-winded description of how defection strategies apply to dating.
The problem is that Rollo stops there!
Rollo Tomassi never moves beyond a “me VS you” paradigm.
Why does Rollo Tomassi sees it as a struggle?
Because Rollo’s philosophy sees women as enemies of men.
And that’s why, I stated and confirm here, Rollo Tomassi’s philosophy is inherently misogynistic.
The problem with it?
First of all, morality.
When you have an enemy, all amoral ways of dealing with them become moral (see Zimbardo, 2008)
Rape is also a type of “defection strategy” that you’d use with an enemy.
But let’s stick to facts here without any morality.
Second, and most important of all, both genders can also gain if they support each other.
Which is, guess what, the standard view of relationships that society aspires to -exactly what it should do-.
Now, knowing the theory of manipulation (“defection” in game’s theory terms), is extremely important to understand reality and to protect oneself.
But listening to “red-pilled authors” pitching a defection strategy as the “real reality” that men should follow, that’s not only nonsense, that’s toxic nonsense.
The Truth of Sexual Arms’ Race
In evolutionary psychology, the defection strategy has also been referred to as “sexual arms’ race”.
It’s been well explored and discussed by Robert Wright, which I invite you to read (a good substitute for resentment-fuelled manosphere evolutionary psychology).
The truth of the sexual arms’ race is that it coexists with the many -and likely stronger- incentives for cooperation.
And you can minimize the incentives to defection while enjoying an awesome and supportive relationship.
TL,DR: Rollo Tomassi “red pill” is a potentially highly toxic misinterpretation of relationships.
I warmly welcome readers to seek more information -at least if they’re interested in win-win and supportive relationships.
#18. Not Good For Seducers Who Love Women
I’m glad I can say this:
I am a man.
And I have been mostly single because I enjoy adventures. And I really dislike feminism because it pitches women against men.
And I even think that this society is on a warpath against (white) men, especially with divorce law.
This gives me some credibility to criticize Rollo Tomassi’s philosophy.
And Rollo Tomassi’s philosophy is toxic for men who love women, including men who like to sleep with lots of women.
Because seducers who like women, like women, and they don’t consider them as enemies!
Also read:
- Psychological breakdown of womanizers: the different types of womanizers, including those who love women
- Types of seducers: different seducers’ styles with pros and cons
Real Life Applications
- Don’t cave to ultimatums: women give ultimatums when they feel their control is slipping and they need to hurry. But they will lose respect for men who cave in (also read “how to handle breakup threats“)
- Don’t be vulnerable: vulnerability has become all the rage with Brene Brown, but Rollo says it’s a hoax. You will not be more attractive “opening up” and “showing your weak and tender side” (I agree, read: vulnerability is NOT power)
- Don’t settle because you’re afraid of dying alone: the image of passing away around your family is a fairytale dream. If you work on yourself, male value does not go down like female does (Rollo says men peak around 36-38).
Instead of fearing to be alone, fear misery in a passionless marriage. - Don’t buy PUA programs: Rollo doesn’t believe in PUAs selling programs and “cures”. The information is freely available and your reality is too specific to find answers in a single course / program
CONS
On top of the criticism:
- Not really as open-minded as professed
Rollo says at the beginning of “Preventive Medicine” that “he knows that he doesn’t know” and he invites readers to form their opinions.
That’s all nice and good… In intent.
But he doesn’t seem always very open to being wrong -or to warrant dissenters the freedom to disagree-.
I find indeed that “The Rational Male” is at times aggressive and bellicose towards anyone who disagrees:
- Sometimes It’s Unclear
It was difficult to follow when Tomassi was talking about which phase was which.
For example, he has two different names, “transitory” and “epiphany” for what seems to be the same stage.
The fact he keeps changing names one minute after the other makes it confusing.
It’s a pity because the content he talks about is good and some insights are genius.
- Simplistic nomenclature
I can’t help but finding this “beta/alpha” “blue pill/red pill” dichotomies too simplistic and, sometimes, used child-like fashion (such as: “you don’t agree, so you’re a blue-pill dipshit”).
- Very bad mindsets for relationships
Rollo is convinced his books are helping men (he says “saving lives”).
But I’m slightly worried that for each “saved life” there is an adversarial, toxic relationship looming.
PROS
I have a long list of criticism for “The Rational Male Volume 2” as you can see.
But that’s not to say there isn’t a lot of great wisdom in here. As a matter of fact, there is a lot of great wisdom and deep analysis:
- The analysis on “social conventions” is genius and spot on
- Rollo’s analysis of the dynamics of shaming as an ego-protection is superb stuff
- Top notch analysis of female and society’s social shaming of men (for example: to provide and accept her wild past)
- Eye-opening analysis of the diverging interests of women and men, together with the cultural struggle that ensues (but keep in mind Rollo only focuses on one side of the equation)
- Super funny -and deep- analysis of “Lean-In” by Salzberg (with which I wholeheartedly agree)
Preventive Medicine Review
“Preventive Medicine” is powerful medicine.
But not necessarily in a positive and effective way.
It reminds me of how the heroine was marketed as a “cure” for cough.
“Preventive Medicine” is somewhat similar: it (effectively) “cures” the patient of Pollyannish views of dating and relationships while potentially infecting him with misogyny.
In short:
“Preventive Medicine Book 2” can open your eyes if you’re a beginner, and it can ruin your intimate relationships.
It doesn’t have to be both.
And it’s up to you to make it possible it’s the former and not the latter.
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