Why do men mansplain and why do people (particularly women) hate it? People sometimes struggle to articulate what mansplaining is and why they dislike it, but I’m surely not the discoverer of this argument.
Recently I was talking to a colleage during a strategy game session. He said “You are bad because you made these mistakes” and I said “yes I am bad at these aspects of the game. Alsol, you should have invested more into anti-aircraft guns”. He immediately began repeating a list of mistakes I had made, as evidence that his investment in AA was optimal. But I have seen the AA formula so I made a technical argument for strong AA in the late game. He stepped back and said “Well you were trashtalking me so I had to...”.
Then I realized that we were not explaining the game to one another or discussing the best build. We were really having a dominance fight, through vaguely technical arguments. Once you realize that men do this, you see it fairly often. Recently I said that transaction costs were built into the bitcoin code from the beginning, and a friend argued back that only third party exchanges charge transaction fees. It took me a while to prove him wrong because the content was about dominance, not about bitcoin[1].
Meanwhile I’ve been learning to flirt with women. Originally I though that you cannot disagree with a women while flirting, since it is a dominance play ala man world. But actually you can disagree in a non-conflictive way. For example, on Tinder I asked a women what she reads, and she said “I don’t think reading indicates intelligence or curiosity”. I responded by saying “I accept the argument on intelligence, but I expect curiosity and reading are correlated. Otherwise would be too surprising”. I have found this type of disagreement actually gets a longer response (signal of interest). My theory is that the qualified disagreement shows intelligence, status and social intelligence.
1 - To his credit, he eventually accepted the technical argument
We were really having a dominance fight, through vaguely technical arguments. Once you realize that men do this, you see it fairly often.
This is a great observation! But, as often happens in political debates, “mansplaining” is a motte-and-bailey term, which could mean the thing you just described, or it could mean “a man tried to say something”, or anything in between, depending on who used it and in which context.
Also, it is not an exclusively male behavior, despite the name. I have no strong opinion on whether it is a mostly male behavior, because I assume that most female dominance fights happen out of my sight, for various reasons. But I am pretty sure I have seen women fighting for dominance using supposedly factual arguments a few times.
Originally I though that you cannot disagree with a women while flirting, since it is a dominance play ala man world. But actually you can disagree in a non-conflictive way.
Depends on whether the specific woman finds dominance attractive. And that probably also depends on the type/degree of dominance, her mood, and how well you know each other. Yes, this “partially agree, partially disagree” strategy seems like the golden middle way between being disagreeable and boring.
Depends on whether the specific woman finds dominance attractive. And that probably also depends on the type/degree of dominance, her mood, and how well you know each other. Yes, this “partially agree, partially disagree” strategy seems like the golden middle way between being disagreeable and boring.
I think many women, perhaps a majority, find a more dominant man attractive. Basically ensure any fact-based dominance display doesn’t make the other person feel stupid. Good rule for lots of interactions.
With a term like mansplaining that’s used in quite different scopes by different people it would be helpful to start with a more clear definition before going into why people do it.
True. I should rephrase my thesis “What people often mean when they say “mansplaining” is explanations which are intended to express dominance rather than to mutually arrive at better understanding”.
The problem with mansplaining -
Why do men mansplain and why do people (particularly women) hate it? People sometimes struggle to articulate what mansplaining is and why they dislike it, but I’m surely not the discoverer of this argument.
Recently I was talking to a colleage during a strategy game session. He said “You are bad because you made these mistakes” and I said “yes I am bad at these aspects of the game. Alsol, you should have invested more into anti-aircraft guns”. He immediately began repeating a list of mistakes I had made, as evidence that his investment in AA was optimal. But I have seen the AA formula so I made a technical argument for strong AA in the late game. He stepped back and said “Well you were trashtalking me so I had to...”.
Then I realized that we were not explaining the game to one another or discussing the best build. We were really having a dominance fight, through vaguely technical arguments. Once you realize that men do this, you see it fairly often. Recently I said that transaction costs were built into the bitcoin code from the beginning, and a friend argued back that only third party exchanges charge transaction fees. It took me a while to prove him wrong because the content was about dominance, not about bitcoin[1].
Meanwhile I’ve been learning to flirt with women. Originally I though that you cannot disagree with a women while flirting, since it is a dominance play ala man world. But actually you can disagree in a non-conflictive way. For example, on Tinder I asked a women what she reads, and she said “I don’t think reading indicates intelligence or curiosity”. I responded by saying “I accept the argument on intelligence, but I expect curiosity and reading are correlated. Otherwise would be too surprising”. I have found this type of disagreement actually gets a longer response (signal of interest). My theory is that the qualified disagreement shows intelligence, status and social intelligence.
1 - To his credit, he eventually accepted the technical argument
This is a great observation! But, as often happens in political debates, “mansplaining” is a motte-and-bailey term, which could mean the thing you just described, or it could mean “a man tried to say something”, or anything in between, depending on who used it and in which context.
Also, it is not an exclusively male behavior, despite the name. I have no strong opinion on whether it is a mostly male behavior, because I assume that most female dominance fights happen out of my sight, for various reasons. But I am pretty sure I have seen women fighting for dominance using supposedly factual arguments a few times.
Depends on whether the specific woman finds dominance attractive. And that probably also depends on the type/degree of dominance, her mood, and how well you know each other. Yes, this “partially agree, partially disagree” strategy seems like the golden middle way between being disagreeable and boring.
I agree with all of those points.
I think many women, perhaps a majority, find a more dominant man attractive. Basically ensure any fact-based dominance display doesn’t make the other person feel stupid. Good rule for lots of interactions.
With a term like mansplaining that’s used in quite different scopes by different people it would be helpful to start with a more clear definition before going into why people do it.
True. I should rephrase my thesis “What people often mean when they say “mansplaining” is explanations which are intended to express dominance rather than to mutually arrive at better understanding”.