DON’T BE A NICE GUY TO GET GIRLS

A recent article on greatist.com talked about how being nice “may be what your dating game is missing,” and is a trait that “seems to translate into physical attraction.”

Is it true?

Well obviously, women with a healthy sense of self don’t like to be treated badly. They want to be respected and considered – they want their partner to be “kind” to them. So I won’t dispute that on some level being nice can translate into physical attraction. Indeed, the article itself is well written and brings up some excellent points about the benefits of being nice.

But there are three problems with this article that need to be addressed, because it seems to me a lot of guys reading it are going to get the wrong impression.

Problem #1: Kindness Needs To Be Qualified

The western world today is filled with men who apologize for their behavior and whose primary courting technique is to appear to be a “nice guy” and “good” and “supportive” of women as possible.

Many of you are probably thinking to yourself, “so what?” After all, aren’t those all good things? Why shouldn’t you want to be a nice guy?

Well, the problem is that in dating (and in most things for that matter), actions are meaningless without taking into consideration intentions.

When Katherine Schreiber – the article’s author – talks about being a nice guy, she unfortunately doesn’t address the fact that many if not most guys already use “kindness” regularly in their interactions with women – as a way of manipulating girls into liking them.

Girls know this, even if all of them aren’t aware of it consciously, and they don’t like it.

Indeed, being nice with the intention to curry-favor with a girl is guaranteed to end up making her feel somewhere between repulsed and sorry for you – not attracted to you.

This doesn’t mean ALL kind acts will end up being unattractive, mind you.  If your intention is to genuinely add value to a girl’s life, or to be a nice guy because you just like it and it feels good, your kindness is going to come across well.

But the distinction is extremely important, and is missed in both directions.

Conventional “bro” tips on dating states that if you send flowers to a girl you’ve only recently started dating it’s a “suicidal” move, or if you buy a girl’s dinner or drinks on a date you’re “beta.”

Maybe they’re “suicidal” or “beta” when you’re doing it to get a positive reaction out of her, but if you did it because you want to, and men do what they want, including nice things – they’re going to be powerful and incredibly attractive.

For instance, my wife and I started out long distance, and at first because of that it was very casual. We had barely begun to be romantic, talked only every couple of days, yet I still sent her flowers for Valentines Day.

Was it a risk?

I knew it wasn’t.

My intention was completely non-needy. I wasn’t trying to be a “nice guy,” I simply wanted to send her flowers to let her know I cared about her Valentines Day – if she freaked out, I wouldn’t have been upset, I would have simply stopped talking to her because she’d have shown herself to be immature. As it was, she was blown away by them, and it upped my stock in her book by a long shot.

Yet years ago in High School, I shelled out major cash on a Valentines Day necklace for a girl I was crushing on. I was doing it out of hopes that she’d like it, and as a result, me, but suffice to say neither happened. I’d be surprised if she ever wore it.  My intention was needy, and it was a turn-off. Dead-end.

So whether you’re giving her objects, words, or actions it doesn’t matter – if you’re being a “nice guy” out of a desire to attract her, you’re not going to get physical attractiveness – quite the opposite. It’s not what you do, it’s why you do it.

Problem #2: “Be Nice” Is Useless Advice For Most Guys

The second problem I have with this article isn’t simply the lack of clarification on “good kindness” vs “bad kindness” but that not being nice isn’t even a problem most guys have.

Yes, some guys are assholes. Yes, they probably could get some perspective on treating women better.

But I’d be blown away to find out that the biggest problem most guys have with girls is that they’re “not nice enough.”

 Here’s why:

A lot of guys who treat women badly don’t do it because they’re bad people. They do it because they’re frustrated with women, and because they don’t get success with them.

In short, they resent women because they want them and don’t get them. So they try to take women down a notch instead.

Unrestrained meanness is almost always a symptom of insecurity. People don’t treat others badly unless they’re sadists or are in serious pain themselves.

Consequently, telling a guy to be more kind to a girl isn’t likely to end well.  If he takes the advice he’s more likely to use it not genuinely, but manipulatively, like we described in problem number 1.

And that’s not going to fix their problem. Indeed, it’s going to put them in a vicious cycle I see and girls experience all the time: guys feigning kindness and then upon not getting sex from it quickly becoming callous, cruel jerks. The “nice guy” is very frequently a facade.

Nearly every girl in the modern age has given their number to a guy who acted all sweet, asked for a sexual favor, got turned down, and then called the girl something nasty or threw a tantrum. Telling these guys instead to be more nice isn’t going to work.

Instead, tell him to build himself up. Get in shape. Take a stand for something. Accept himself without judgment. Be a leader. Teach him how to be more curious about girls and a better listener. Show him how to handle female emotions, build his social competence, get girls on dates, move interactions forward romantically, and face down his demons of rejection.

“Niceness” will come most likely with confidence. And then it will come out in the good way – not the bad.

Problem #3: Kindness Is Less Important In Dating Than Relationships

This final problem is a bit nit-picky, but it’s important.

While being nice is an attractive trait, it’s really more of a trait that makes you more successful in your relationships rather than dating.

Granted, I’m assuming you’re not being a total asshole here. But going out of your way for to do things for girls you’ve just started seeing… well unfortunately, while sometimes this can go well and girls will appreciate it, many other times it can be misconstrued as needy (or creepy) and kill the whole dynamic.

Don’t get me wrong. I think you should be a good person. You should never abuse the person you’re dating or treat them badly to bring yourself up – to ‘neg’ so to speak.

But in the beginning it’s actually a lot more important to convey yourself as independent, mysterious, masculine, and having high standards. That’s what’s going to get her interested in you in the beginning – not being nice. Indeed, it’s why “bad boys” who take this to an extreme and actively treat girls badly have pretty good dating lives (albeit, with lower quality girls usually).

Kindness IS extremely important, however, when it comes to partnership and relationships. And while Schreiber does note that being nice was rating as important among individuals in “romantic partnerships,” the article is crafted to imply that it’s one of the most important traits for dating success. And that’s not at all the same thing.

Relationships are at their crux partnerships. And partners need to feel respected and treated well after the initial sparks of attraction fade. Many guys – such as the “bad boys” – who are not nice and do excellently in their dating lives, fail miserably in their relationships because they don’t understand (or don’t care) that women like the warmth of “the fire” but don’t want to get burned.

In a relationship you can’t just think about yourself, you have to think about the other person. And being nice and empathetic are the most important ways to do that. Still, that doesn’t mean you should define yourself as a “nice guy” – even in a relationship, girls only like and respect your kindness if it’s grounded in a frame of strength.

Conclusions

Kindness is a great trait to have in a relationship, there’s no disputing that. And it’s not going to set you back in dating – indeed, it’ll improve your chances – if you remember to keep the right perspective and do it without expecting a response. A confident nice guy is one of the sexiest things out there.

But if you’ve got a bad dating life, it’s almost certain that your issue is not that you’re not nice enough – and even if it does play a role, something else is driving it.  Being a “nice guy” is almost always a losing dating strategy. Focus on learning how to talk to girls, approach them, understand them, constantly try to improve yourself, and most importantly – have fun – and that resentment towards women and the meanness that it creates should fall away.

– Pat