Sex and Society.net

The success of businesses depends the most on two factors: the product itself and its marketing. You may be surprised to learn how much things are the same for the sexual success of us humans.

Product development or death

When a business is selling itself, it is proposing to trade what it has, which is one unit of its product, to what the customer has, money. The better the product, the more customers want it and the more they are willing to pay for. With a better product the company can either sell as many products with a higher price or sell more with the same price, both ways resulting in more of what it wants: money.

The number one reason why corporations rise and fall in size are successess and failures in product development. Google is the global number one in search engines with a huge margin, because it has for a long time delivered what users have wanted the most – relevant search results. McDonald’s has developed the hamburgers and the fast food experience that best responds to the desires of the biggest amount of customers, making them the most successful company in the field of fast food.

Marketing is #2

Both of these companies spend lots in advertising, McDonald’s in TV and print ads and Google in affiliate marketing – for example paying the Mozilla Foundation to have Google Search as the default search in their Firefox web browser.

But all the marketing in the world cannot prevent people from exercising their free choice to switch to a better product as soon as one exists. The switch doesn’t happen overnight, and that’s why Nokia still has the possibility for a comeback after the decline in their market share in smart phones that has lasted for years. But even if they make a comeback, their mistake in letting their competition get ahead in product development has already cost them billions of euros in lost business. If they continuously fail to offer something that is on par or better than the competition, they will shrink out of existence.

Sexual selection is the same as business

Any human’s success in sexual selection is most dependent on the product that the individuals themselves represent. In the heterosexual market the potential buyers are the members of the opposing gender.

Just as we are offering ourselves as the trophy, what we are looking for is another person. More literally, we offer the company of ourselves and the services we can provide as an exchange for the same from the other person.

Our product is ourselves, the way we behave and think and what we are capable of. Or marketing includes our choice of clothes, make-up and so forth. Mix these to match the desires of those who you want to want you. Just like with corporations, the results of marketing are shorter-lived than the results of developing your product.

A key to happiness is understanding that the best you can get is the best one who wants to get you.

“What’s so scary about gender quotas”, asked a columnist in today’s business newspaper. She wasn’t joking, either: believe it or not, similar laws have already passed in Spain, Norway and France.

What the legislators in those countries and the proponents in other countries haven’t understood is that gender quotas in corporate boards are a bad, bad idea. They even the outcome, not the setting, and they mess with something vitally important: the economy.

Don’t Even the Outcome

Evening the outcome in a running competition would mean that despite everyone running at different speeds, the judge declares in the end that everyone ran the distance in exactly the same time. This is a total and equal evening of the outcome. Saying “you all deserve a gold medal just for participating” may be good for motivational purposes, like in a teambuilding exercise. When aiming to perceive the differences between participants, evening the outcome is the absolute last thing to do.

The outcome can also be evened partially and inequally. A racist evening of the outcome would be for example announcing that if the gold and silver medal in the 15 km run in the Olympics are won by a black person, the bronze has to be awarded to a white person.

That sounds unjust and doesn’t make much sense to most of us. However, laws now make the same mandatory by sexist criteria in the boards of corporations in Spain, Norway and France.

False Predicament

One core tool of feminist propaganda is spreading the view that women have been victimized and need to be compensated somehow. In this case by being awarded a minimum amount of seats on corporate boards. Here’s a comparison.

• The feminist claim: “There being less women than men on corporate boards is caused by sexist discrimination against women.”
• The truth: People make different choices based on their priorities.

For men, it’s more common to have a priority of obtaining career success and power, because throughout the evolution women have had a preference for men with ambition. For women it’s far more common to have raising children as a top priority. There are more men than women willing to put in all the hard work and sacrifices necessary to guarantee being the most competent one of the candidates for a corporate board of directors. There are more devoted moms than devoted dads.

If feminists were logical or even remotely concerned about equality, they would have also proposed gender quotas for prisons.

If Free Choice Combines With Sexism

The feminists are almost right about something, though. People do have a slight preference to work with people who are somewhat alike to them. As men have forever aspired to the helms of the corporate world and are thus the majority there, it may mean that the majority has a slight preference to working with men. That’s just guesswork, though. It could as well be that men would rather surround themselves with beautiful women.

Capitalism to the Rescue

Capitalism works for equality in this case. Any company that would choose its board members based on any other criteria than competence and the best combination of individuals would be at a disadvantage. Any sexist companies will likely shrink and go bankrupt while equalist companies grow larger and continue to hire more people.

If there is sexism in one company or even in all companies of one country, globalized capitalism fixes that so that the end result is gender-equal. Keep in mind, though, that these sorts of developments in society don’t happen overnight.

Don’t Mess With The Economy

Messing with the economy is dangerous business. Not just can it create inequality, as the proposed and sometimes passed gender quotas undoubtedly would or have already done. It can ruin a lot of lives. We live and breathe the economy and the companies are what keeps the economy ticking. To force corporate boards to be selected partially on a sexist basis means that the boards will make poorer decisions.

That means there will be less jobs. Everything good will happen less often. Everything bad will last longer and happen more often. A less than optimal board will not choose the best strategies. Companies will not be able to create the best products or the best service. Neither will they be as able to make the decisions that make the economic downshifts pass faster or occur less often.

Following any propaganda, feminist or otherwise, is a dangerous road.

What’s Next

Norwegian economy runs largely on oil income, making them a terrible comparison. Spain, which adopted the law in 2007, has a more usual economy. They have hit a new all time high in February 2012: 23.6 % of the whole country and 50.5 % of all younger than 25 are unemployed. Likely not caused by just one sexist law, but rather goes to tell that this law was likely only one of the misplaced acts of the government.

France has approved a similar law in 2011 with a six-year adjustment period for the companies. The near future may not be the best time to buy shares of French companies with international competitors.

Sources

http://www.businessspectator.com.au/bs.nsf/Article/France-sets-quota-for-women-on-big-companies-board-D3S8W

http://www.datosmacro.com/en/unemployment/spain

Men who are submissive towards their spouses are happier in their relationships, according to a study by University of Iowa. The claim was made by National Examiner, a U.S. tabloid quoted by a Finnish gossip website.

While the original research was not available, we can still learn something surprising from the claim by analyzing it in light of current social theories. The claim is that heterosexual men, who let their spouse be the boss in the relationship when it comes to everyday affairs, end up arguing less often and enjoy happier marriages.

Partner preference contradicts the study

The claim seems controversal, when one remembers that women prefer dominant men as their partners. However, dominance can come in many forms, and can affect life outside the relationship rather than the relationship itself. Another reason why the female preference to dominance in men might not make the claim dubious is that the vast majority of men are not dominant. Most of the relationships in the population are between a woman and a non-dominant man.

Men and women have different causes of happiness

As the study is about happiness about a relationship, the key is not the preference for a partner but the causes of happiness in a relationship. These are different for men and women. According to another study, the two factors that had the most effect on men’s happiness toward a relationship were the beauty and young age of their partner. Other factors weighed far less in importance. As a stark contrast, one of the most important causes for happiness in a relationship for women were the partner’s sacrifices for the benefit of the relationship.

Because the setup of dominance in a relationship is mainly caused by the balance of the sexual market value of the partners, this has profound implications. All other factors being equal, the partner with a lower sexual market value can compensate by putting more effort into the relationship. Whether that is the woman or the man may just make the difference the study has reported.

Attractiveness is a small number

In the following example, partners have sexual market values on a scale of 1 to 10, where bigger number denotes a partner more desired by the opposite sex. Famous, good-looking and rich actors are among the most desired partners and would rank at 10, while the vast majority of the population would be considered to be somewhere around 5.

1. A man with a sexual market value of 6 meets a woman with a sexual market value of 5. The woman compensates by putting more effort into the relationship, letting the man call the shots in daily affairs and otherwise offering him the favorable position in the relationship – so much so, that it feels roughly good enough for him that he doesn’t mind that her other qualities are not the best thing he could get. Now, in the eyes of each other, they feel that they are in an acceptable relationship for staying together. His sexual market value of 6 is matched by her value of 5 + sacrifices worth of 1.
2. A man with a sexual market value of 5 meets a woman with a sexual market value of 6. The man compensates the same way as the woman of the previous example did. Now in her eyes, he brings 5 + 1 = 6 to the table, which matches her sexual market value of 6.

Truth in a tabloid?

According to the current social theories, the second couple may be happier, because the man values her beauty and youth more than having dominance in the relationship, and the woman values his sacrifices towards the relationship more than most of his other attributes.

A cause of arguments

The preferences mentioned above can be indirect causes of arguments in a relationship, if the woman tries to better her “relationship deal” by getting her partner to do more sacrifices. A woman once told me she had nearly caused the end of her marriage by behaving badly towards her husband for months. For the life of her she couldn’t find any reason for having done that. Luckily her eyes opened before the relationship was beyond repair and they were able to recover from the situation. They are now a happy, loving couple, and treat each other with care and respect.

A word of caution

Even if the statistics wouldn’t lie, they can easily mislead. The study and most of this article concentrated on the situation when the other partner needs to compensate by submission. The happiest relationships are likely among two equals who don’t feel the other person owes more to the relationship than the other.

An article claims to list “the worst, most insulting, and simply bizarre quotes about women” of 2011. A good example in how many misleading feminist messages it is possible to fit in a single piece of writing.

Here are some awards to celebrate propaganda gone wrong: Read the rest of this entry »

Gender equality, income and the media in Finland are connected in a particular way which will be uncovered in this blog post.

Lies, damned lies and statistics

In Finland, the general perception is that women earn less than men for the exact same jobs. The population has gotten this view from the popular media and it is used as a political argument for supporting women in the expense of men to balance the injustice, whether through research funds that employ mostly women or by suggested laws that would enforce publicly listed corporations to have a quota of females in their boards of directors (seriously).

Several years ago the similar political agenda was morally boosted by news that reported that women are less accident-prone as drivers and thus safer for all of us who leave our homes. What this and the reported income inequality have in common is that they are false, the evidence is easily available and most journalists choose to ignore it. Read the rest of this entry »

In case you’re wondering why have sex more than just once to see what everyone’s speaking about, the reason is health benefits! Some people say that sex is the second best sport after football. When you think of the amount of injuries you avoid when coupling instead of running after a ball, having sex might after all be healthier than playing football. Here’s why.

Benefits for women

Regular sex is vital for maintaining higher estrogen levels in women. Higher estrogen has been associated with better bones, better cardiovascular health, and a feeling of joy in life.

Benefits for men

For men, regular sex leads to a higher testosterone level, which leads to greater confidence, vitality, strength and energy.

These pieces of potentially life-saving knowledge come from the book The Power of Five by Harold Bloomfield, M.D., as quoted in Mars and Venus in the Bedroom by John Gray. Enjoy responsibly.

Reuters writes “women find happy men less sexually attractive than those with expressions that show pride”. Women also find men radiating a sense of naughty guilt to be attractive according to researchers of University of British Columbia.

They conducted a study by showing pictures of the opposite sex to both men and women. Participants were then asked for their initial reactions on sexual attractiveness based on the expressions they saw.

Women saw smiling men as too feminine or as desperate for sex. Jessica Tracy, the professor who directed the study, interpreted the study as supporting the view that women are attracted to bad boys. Read the rest of this entry »

The best invention in the history of mankind is capitalism. The idea is simple: You get paid only for helping others. Nobody buys from you unless it benefits them. Not only does it benefit them, but it benefits them more than keeping the money or using it for anything else.

As a general rule people do what’s best for themselves. The society as a whole benefits from capitalism because what is best for oneself is a good thing for the others, too. A baker makes bread for others to eat, sells it, and then buys the services of a plumber. Everyone seeks to benefit everyone else, because that’s how they benefits themselves.

Sex is another matter. Sexual desire is so powerful that according to Tuzin (1995) individuals have risked their lives, families and reputations while following their sexual desires.

Sexual desire is part of our biology. Mathematically speaking both men and women have as much sex in heterosexual relationships. However, men and women generally don’t have the same aims in their relationships. Statistically speaking men want a lot more short-term sexual partners (Symons 1979, Buss & Schmitt 1993).

Differences in this part of sexual desire are the root for a social conflict that divides each and every society that has ever existed on earth. In many interactions between human males and females, having sex appears to be a perfectly good result for males, but females seem to find that as the wrong outcome. What females see as a good outcome is a male committing resources for the female, for example time or money, which the males are not really that into.

The result of this conflict is that human relationships require constant compromising. In a typical marriage the woman wants the man to be at home and with the kids more, while the man might prefer going to a bar or to see a football game with his friends and risk a chance of meeting someone to have a short-term sexual relationship with.

It’s not just between men and women, though. Females compete between each other. Males compete between each other. And it’s not between individuals either: women around the world campaign for limiting the power of other, especially more attractive, women.

In many Western countries there are constant political campaigns to ban different forms of sexuality: prostitution, sex shops, porn, short skirts… The common thing to these is that they’re all something that men enjoy more than women. So some women supply this need, as per capitalism goes, and most of the rest of women try to combat this competition with legislation. By reducing the supply of sex they would increase their own negotiation power over men. The less whores, the more men there are that are desperate enough for sex that they don’t mind being in a relationship with a person they wouldn’t otherwise like enough to live with.

In the Middle East the mass of average women start all kinds of hell when someone proposes that women shouldn’t need to wear a veil over their heads. You’d suppose women would be against that sort of restriction to their lives, right? No! It increases the power that attractive women have over men. That decreases the power all the other women have over men. You can almost hear a Persian woman saying “When it’s about the civil rights of some bitch across the town or making sure your man stays your man, you do what you gotta do, sister.”

Want to create world peace? Help men and women enjoy the same things in sex and elsewhere. Open-minded information sharing is a good way to start.

There are two very fundamental biological differences between men and women:

• Women’s ability to reproduce is limited to a maximum of about one child per year. Men’s ability to reproduce is limited only by the amount of women they can fertilize.
• Women’s minimum investment per child is nine month. Men’s minimum investment is the fertilization.

Neither one of these has changed in the last five million years. Nearly all differences between the behavior and physiology of men and women stem from these two. Here are two revealing examples: Read the rest of this entry »

The first 3D porn movie is being made in Hong Kong. The three million dollar film is starred by Japanese singer and actress Saori Hara. Both China and Japan have stricter porn regulation laws than most industrialized countries. According to director Stephen Shiu, this just makes their film more popular. Even if the movie sucks, 3D does make porn more real. What took so long?