Charisma = Sex = Humor = Leadership

And How That Makes the US Powerful

The 12th Man Theory

From the movie What Love Is:

Transcript of the key pieces:

“Say there is a woman in a room with 10 men, and all 10 men are telling her how beautiful she is, and how amazing she is and they are lighting her cigarettes and buying her drinks and just treating her like gold. 

Then, all of a sudden, in walks the 11th man, he takes one look at her and says "hey how ya doin'", turns his back on her and starts talking to his boys. THAT'S the guy she wants to be with, the 11th man. Not any of the 10 men who were treating her well all night, but the one guy that couldn't care less. Why? 

Because, for some reason, women don't want nice, they don't want real, they don't want to be treated well. I mean, not at first, and sometimes not ever—and I think that's crazy. And I refuse to play that game .... 

I don’t want to have to play that game, get a girl by pretending that I don’t like her. I want to be with a woman who is real. Who digs it when I’m nice to her. Who doesn’t see that as weakness or take me for granted when I tell her that I think she is more amazing than anything else in the entire world, but unfortunately most women aren't like that, they say they are, deep down inside they want to be, but ... they're not."

Let me add something:

Then, all of a sudden, in walks the 12th man. He has a nice suit, impeccably worn. He stands straight, stops at the entrance of the bar and looks around with a smile. His friends pour in on both sides, merrily bantering. A couple of them stop and ask him: “What do you think about this place, should we stay and get a drink?”

But he doesn’t respond. His eyes laid on the woman. He is now looking at her, and starts walking towards her. “Sorry I’m late, I hope you didn’t get tired from waiting for me all your life. I like your earrings. They’re daring, but also feminine. They made me curious and I wanted to know you better. Hi, I’m Sam.”

Is she going to choose the 11th man or the 12th?
Why?

The Disraeli Strategy

As I’ve said before, I used to be as charismatic as chard. I still am. But now I can flick a switch and appear somewhat charismatic—if I do say so myself. I attribute most of this change to The Charisma Myth. It had a memorable anecdote:

In the torrid London summer of 1886, William Gladstone was up against Benjamin Disraeli for the post of prime minister of the United Kingdom. This was the Victorian era, so whoever won was going to rule half the world. In the very last week before the election, both men happened to take the same young woman out to dinner. Naturally, the press asked her what impressions the rivals had made. She said, “After dining with Mr. Gladstone, I thought he was the cleverest person in England. But after dining with Mr. Disraeli, I thought I was the cleverest person in England.” Guess who won the election? It was the man who made others feel intelligent, impressive, and fascinating: Benjamin Disraeli.

But he couldn’t make every audience member feel intelligent, impressive, and fascinating. So why did he win? 

The Funny Lie

What is humor?

In their book The Humor Code, Peter McGraw and Joel Warner claim that jokes are a benign violation:

“Things that are true but that people avoid saying (a violation), yet not so bad that people are uncomfortable (benign).”

Why do we laugh?

In The Elephant in the Brain, Kevin Simler and Robin Hanson argue that it’s a signaling mechanism: We’ve evolved to laugh when something could be taken as serious, but we want to signal that we understand it’s playful. This is why humans laugh 30 times more when they’re with others than when they’re alone.

So we find something funny because it allows us to quickly signal to somebody else: “I realize you are making a violation of the code, but I understand this is positive for me. You and I are part of the same team. Your violation is benign to me.”

Nerdy Werewolf

In her latest series on what makes good sex (paywalled), sex data analyst @Aella argues that the most attractive and sexually exciting men to her are those who combine two traits at the same time, both inside and outside the bedroom:

1. They can lose themselves in passion. They let themselves be sexual beings.

2. They dominate the situation at every step. They understand what is going on and what needs to be done.

From her research, it looks to me like about 50% of women or so are interested in this type of man.

Club Membership

I don’t want to belong to any club that would accept me as a member.—Groucho Marx.

Groucho Marx

Leadership

Managers follow the rules. Leaders know what rules to break.—Me, reinventing the wheel.

Obama was a strong leader when he said “Yes we can!”

And so was Trump for his supporters when he said Mexicans are rapists.

What do all these things have in common?