Chapter 6: Women and Proxy Power

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Chapter 6: Women and Proxy Power

‘‘No other hobby takes away so much time, money, strength, and health as a woman.’’

- Anonymous –

‘‘Men mourn for what they have lost; women for what they ain’t got.’’

- Josh Billings –

In this chapter, I want to talk about proxy power and how it affects the relationships between men and women.

Imagine someone sitting on a sofa listening to the news. A weather report comes on the screen and the person watching finds it dull. He wants to change the channel to something more interesting, so he has to make a choice. He can get up and change the channel manually, or he can stay comfortably on the couch and use proxy power to switch the channel. Did you guess it? The proxy power he used was the TV remote of course. Given a choice, anyone would use proxy power, or in this case the remote. Proxy power makes your life easier because it saves you the trouble of doing things yourself.

Generally, the task of using proxy power is less demanding than doing something directly, which is to say that you expend less energy while reaping all the benefits.

In this example, you get to change the channel without getting up. It goes without saying that pushing a button on the remote is far easier than standing up, walking, pushing a button on the TV, walking back, and then falling back onto the couch. Hell, I’m exhausted just by writing about it!

As we continue with this fictitious scenario, imagine that you’re still on the couch watching TV and you want to change the channel yet again. You pick up the remote and push a button, but it doesn’t work. What will be your reaction: irritability, impatience, or anger? Now, to fix the remote, you make an effort to find new batteries, and you put them in. You go back on the sofa and try zapping it again, but now it only brings you to channels that you dislike. No matter how many times you try, you cannot get to the channel that you want because the remote is malfunctioning. This is probably the time where you will become enraged and throw the damn thing.

When proxy power fails you, you get mad. It’s a typical response since you expect it to complete a certain task, and when it doesn't you get irritated. Let's go back to the TV remote. Imagine this time that you have a TV that does not have any button to change channels manually. This time, your only option is to use the remote. There is no other way to operate the TV. In this case, if the remote malfunction you will be left with no options.

Imagine what you would do if this TV remote malfunctioned regularly. Sometimes it would work as you wished, but most of the time it would malfunction. You would get angrier and angrier at every zap that wouldn’t work. If you had the option to stand up and do it yourself, then it wouldn't be so bad, but in this particular scenario, you are stuck in a situation where you have no control. Most people will express their powerlessness by venting their anger, which will become greater on every successive occasion.

Now, I guess that some of you already know where I’m going with this. The TV remote is a simple analogy of how women use men to get things done. The man is their proxy power upon which they place numerous expectations and will go to great lengths to make it function properly. When the man does not perform the way she wants and won’t accomplish what she expects, she will feel powerless and vent her anger onto him. This is especially true if the woman can’t do the task herself or if she won’t bother to learn how to do it.

In the same way that we vent our anger on a malfunctioning remote, a woman who is in a relationship will redirect her feelings of anger onto her most valuable proxy power, the man. This way she can get more things done with ease while keeping all the benefits to herself. Arguments, resentment, and hostility in couples often stem from this simple dynamic. The way to solve this is not to accomplish every single whim of the woman, as that would only create further expectations and more demands, which will become harder and harder to fulfill until it becomes literally impossible to accomplish. Once it becomes impossible, anger will still arise and the situation will be even worse.

In contrast, men place few expectations on their partner. We may expect certain things, but they are mostly simple, straightforward, and easy to do. After all, it is impossible not to rely on your partner, but the differences in expectations between the sexes are plain to see. Men and women’s expectations are as different as the sky and the earth. Men don’t use women as proxy power. Men own their power and don't need someone else to provide and protect them.

Why is it like this? Why does one sex place so much expectation onto the other? Why is it such a one-way street? Isn't this unfair and unloving? Isn't burdening someone with your needs while he receives little in return a selfish act? Is that love or is it manipulation? Well, the truth is that it is manipulation. Evolution does not care about fairness, love, trust, or any other noble concepts. In the early development of humans, women who were protected by dependable men survived and their offspring also survived. If a woman could not find a man to protect her, her chances of survival would be grim.

Because of the lack of contraceptives, women were pregnant most of the time, and if they could not motivate men to work for them, they would die. A woman had to use proxy power, or men, in order to live and have a chance to raise her kids. So what did this mean for most males? It determined that they needed to work not only for themselves but also for others. It meant taking on more risk and sometimes even dying; dying to protect, dying to provide.

It was so imperative for women to control their men that those skilled at making men work for them survived and thrived, while the rest died and never passed down their DNA. In other words, the women who succeeded and flourished in the chaotic environment of the wilderness were the best at using proxy power. Think about it for a minute. If you were going to die and your only opportunity to survive was to manipulate and use someone, then you would probably do it. In fact, effectively anyone would do it. Wanting to live does not make women evil, it makes them human.

If surviving also meant that you made someone’s life harder, that you caused him suffering, then you would likely turn a blind eye to his pain. If your only hope at avoiding the skeletal hand of Death was to find and manipulate someone and make him work for you, wouldn't it be foolish to have too much empathy for this person? An excellent way to maximize your gain would be to care for your savior when he faces temporary difficulties, but only on the basis that it will help him to go back to his role of protector and provider, and with the prerequisite that you won't encounter any risk that could jeopardize your situation by doing so. Investing more effort than that would be to your detriment, and as such, it would be best to get rid of any excess compassion. The conditions for your survival will compel you, either consciously or unconsciously, to become indifferent to the suffering of your benefactor.

On the contrary, you would encourage this savior of yours to provide and protect you by telling him how heroic he was, as this would grant you better chances to live. Motivating your savior is an intelligent thing to do if you want to live to see another day. You could even encourage this protector to die for you, especially if it was your only way to get out of a particular situation alive.

Not surprisingly, studies show that as a man’s income increases, his wife’s working hours decrease. In other words, the more a man earns, the less his wife works. Men tend to work more hours as they get married and have children, and they tend to make roughly 20% more earnings on a yearly basis compared to single men. Yes, married men and men with kids work more hours while their spouse's working hours diminish. This is no coincidence. If you think that taking care of children is an exhausting job, you have been fooled. Taking care of your kids and watching them grow is a pleasure and a privilege that most women enjoy. Working hard, away from the ones you love is a more laborious task, by far.

Don't believe me? Then let's look at this in reverse. Imagine a man who does not work. He stays home to take care of the kids, and he does the housework. This man enjoys the company of his children every day, and he has time to invest in a couple of hobbies. His responsibilities are small and easy to handle, and while he is busy raising the children, he generally doesn’t experience too much stress. Meanwhile, his wife works and provide for the family. Her money is not hers to use, or at least she can only use it once her family's expenses have been taken care of. She is the pillar of the household putting the meat on the table, and if she stops everything will collapse. The financial burden of the family is on her shoulders, and she constantly feels the pressure that comes with this role. She is always away from the one she loves, and she works hard every day.

Now, imagine if that stay-at-home dad complained and regularly nagged his wife, saying that he was working harder than her and that he deserves a break, and that maybe she should do half the housework. Wouldn’t he seem spoiled, pretentious, and ungrateful for daring to mention such a ridiculous idea? Afterall, his wife is working hard to provide for the family while he watches his children grow. Doesn’t it look like he enjoys himself while he leaves all the hard work to his wife? Why is it that we can only see the hypocrisy of this situation when we reverse the roles?

The truth of the matter is that women work when they don’t have a choice, and when they work by choice, it is only to get out of the house. Women who cannot get a man to provide for them, are forced to work hard. They don’t have a choice, but they still dream of getting their hands on a dependable man who could take care of them.

This is the way women have always survived throughout human history, and this is the knowledge that mothers pass down to their daughters. This is what women learn, and this is what they do. At this stage, it must be hardwired in their DNA.

When you hear a woman say that she wants ‘‘a dependable man’’, that she wants to ‘‘look up to him’’ or that she wants to ‘‘feel secure around him’’, it only means that she wants a skillful proxy power. She wants a provider that will be productive and efficient; someone that will be at her service.

Fellow men, do not be fooled into becoming someone else's proxy power. Doing so would mean that you have no self-respect and no intrinsic value. You have more value than that, and you should hold yourself in higher esteem.

This chapter was inspired by Diana Davison’s video titled ‘‘The Psycho-ology of Women.’’

You may consider checking out her YouTube channel.

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