Nice Guys (TM) are not really nice.

Male IT geeks tend to think they are “low status” males.

Why are male IT geeks less successful in attracting women than other males, on average? Why are there few women in IT?

Among male geeks, a popular explanation for both these phenomena is that women avoid “low status” males, because women are programmed by evolution to have sex with men in exchange for men’s material resources.

Feynman called a woman “worse than a whore” for not exchanging sex for sandwiches.

In Surely You’re Joking, Mr. Feynman!, chapter You Just Ask Them?, Richard Feynman frequented a bar and desired to have sexual intercourse with the women there. He discovered that the women in the bar did not provide sexual favors in exchange for monetary compensation in the form of drinks. Although he gained a reputation for spending money on drinks for women, he was frustrated at the fact that the women did not consider alcoholic drinks to be payment for sexual services.

Feynman felt he was being cheated, and complained to his two friends from the bar: a female nightclub entertainer and her husband, the master of ceremonies. The master offered Feynman lessons on how to ensure that a woman he meets in a bar has sexual intercourse with him:

“OK,” he says. “The whole principle is this: The guy wants to be a gentleman. He doesn’t want to be thought of as impolite, crude, or especially a cheapskate. As long as the girl knows the guy’s motives so well, it’s easy to steer him in the direction she wants him to go.

“Therefore,” he continued, “under no circumstances be a gentleman! You must disrespect the girls. Furthermore, the very first rule is, don’t buy a girl anything –– not even a package of cigarettes — until you’ve asked her if she’ll sleep with you, and you’re convinced that she will, and that she’s not lying.”

“Uh… you mean… you don’t… uh… you just ask them?”

Nice Guy (TM) at XKCD

Nice Guy™ at XKCD:

This XKCD comic is titled “Friends”.

Sadly—but unsurprisingly—many (heterosexual) male geeks at the “Friends” XKCD comic discussion thread see nothing wrong with being a Nice Guy™.

(Basically, a Nice Guy™ (not to be confused with a nice guy) is a guy who is “nice” to a woman for sex. When this does not work, he concludes that women want “jerks”.)

Related links:

• What is a “Nice Guy®?” <– Read this one first.
• “Nice Guys” = BLEAH! at Heartless Bitches International – background reading for the uninitiated
• Something Positive – another comic about Nice Guy™
• “What Happened to All the Nice Guys?” at Craigslist – the author is an example of a Nice Guy™
• Nice Guy at Wikipedia
• xkcd explains Nice Guys in comic format at Feministe
• XKCD FTW at Alas! a blog