Monday, July 09, 2018

Cargo Cult

Remember Cargo Cults?  You learned about them in freshman anthropology, or maybe just heard someone talking about them.  The idea was that primitive tribes really liked the good things that westerners brought when they came to study them, visit, set up bases for war in the Pacific. After the westerners left, the tribes would make airstrips of radios out of coconut and straw in an effort to make them come again.

Women have received more college degrees than men for years now. There is a growing advice literature about women "settling" for men who are less clever if they want to get married, most recently this, by a female anthropology professor, ironically. Less clever? Really?  Especially WRT degrees that come with high debt and no clear connection to the well-paying jobs that we are told men always end up with? Perhaps there is a tinge of cargo cult behavior in this. Women got degrees - any degrees - because these credentials were what the men had seemingly used for so many years to get power, money, and good things.  That was of course largely true at one point, yet it has gradually become less true over the years. Getting just any degree isn't quite so useless as building a radio out of straw, but it has aspects of this.

It remains true that Americans continue to think of a person with a degree as smarter and more capable than one without, and this is more true of advanced degrees. Yet that was never more than partly true, was never universally acknowledged, and is becoming less true as we go forward. A college professor is not going to saw off the branch she is sitting on, and likely will not even notice that her definition of "less clever" has serious limitations.  The rest of us can do those young women - and thus young men - a favor by pointing out that an expansion of the definition of "Mr Right" should start with expanding the definition of clever.

12 comments:

David Foster said...

A lot of this is really more about status rather than about smarts. It may well be the case that the non-degreed auto shop owner has a higher IQ (as well as better financial prospects) than the political science with an Ivy League undergrad degree, but he's probably not as good for bragging rights with the girlfriends.

Grim said...

I’ve harbored a similar thought for years. Good to see it expressed.

james said...

Sometimes money, sometimes status, sometimes just something admirable? I puzzled about this a bit too. With, of course, the disadvantage of not being a woman. A decade later I might have written something different...

RichardJohnson said...

A college professor is not going to saw off the branch she is sitting on, and likely will not even notice that her definition of "less clever" has serious limitations.

When the Gentleman's C has become the Gentleman's A- should I also say the Gentlewoman's A- it becomes more difficult to sort out "clever" by grade average.

Not to mention profs who give As to those who parrot back the prof's political/social line and hand out bad grades to those students who give well- reasoned arguments for not parroting the prof's line.

Taking political bias aside, those who get degrees are those willing to jump through the hoops. It isn't just an issue of intellect.

BTW, Maxine Waters was a Sociology major, a major which to me signifies not so clever.(I include some Sociology Ph.D.s I have known in that category- though those with Sociology Ph.D.s would be better classified as "not as clever as you believe you are.")

bs king said...

There is something very weird about this phenomena, and I'm not sure cargo cult even captures all of it. As others have mentioned there's an ego element to it, probably related the "I'm doing important work, you're just doing things capitalism rewards" mindset. We've set up an credentialing system now where people can get recognition for thoughts without having to tie them in to the market for years. Far be it from me to criticize anyone for getting superfluous degrees, but you gotta take a look at the big picture occasionally.

Thinking about this though....we probably need a quick chicken/egg check....are women who have trouble with their love life or don't know what they want more likely to go on and get degrees, or are the degrees making their love life harder? Seems some women could use this in reverse, to justify things after the fact.

I also suspect there's a dab of "these are the women editors give column space to" going on here. Despite the professor's concerns, college educated women (and men) are more likely to get married and stay married than any other educational group:
https://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/2013/article/marriage-and-divorce-patterns-by-gender-race-and-educational-attainment.htm

Christopher B said...

Agree with David Foster and bs king. This is more about status than wealth. We've eliminated the need for a woman to marry to obtain resources for herself and her children, resulting in the shift of the primary purpose of marriage to be bragging rights about the status of the man she could convince to commit to her. If you're already an aspiring UMC professional, a blue-collar husband isn't much of a catch even if his income potential is good.

Texan99 said...

I never needed to marry to get resources, but I also have a hard time imagining marrying to get bragging rights about my man's status. Is this the flip side of bagging a trophy wife? Aside from the brute fact of wanting the best DNA possible, the more obvious benefit of having a smart husband is gaining a mate one can keep talking to for decades, not to mention a mate who can help solve whatever problems come up. I wouldn't claim to be blind to credentials, but they're of the most use with someone you have no other source of information about, like one candidate among many in a stack of anonymous resumes. When it comes to a life partner, it's not hard to figure out whether a guy is bright or not without asking the staff of a university to chime in with an opinion.

David Foster said...

"the more obvious benefit of having a smart husband is gaining a mate one can keep talking to for decades, not to mention a mate who can help solve whatever problems come up"

Even Dr Johnson, way back in the Olden Days, said: "A man of sense and education should meet a suitable companion in a wife. It is a miserable thing when the conversation can only be such as whether the mutton should be boiled or roasted, and probably a dispute about that.

David Foster said...

Of course, it is commonly believed that male status is a factor in female sexual attraction, operating below the conscious level, in addition to any explicit thinking taking place about mate quality. Girls who jump in bed with rock stars or famous writers are not usually doing so because of their extraordinary handsomeness, in most case...some of it is bragging rights, sure, but some of it is probably actual attraction.

Male leads in romance novels are usually men who are or will become people of high status.

https://chicagoboyz.net/archives/42398.html

Texan99 said...

It definitely is commonly believed, especially by men! And in a society in which woman had almost no other avenue to status, it made sense. I'll be interested to see whether it becomes less true over time. I know almost no women who are primarily interested in looks, though that approach seems to be, if not universal, at least strongly active in men. But I also know few women who are mostly interested in income potential. Myself, I found a sort of "nesting" instinct irresistible. There are guys who are ready to settle down and guys who aren't. Handiness is a very attractive trait. Loyalty, a demonstrable willingness to give up any "wild oats" phase a guy may have been going through in youth.

Assistant Village Idiot said...

I think the difference between "a husband I can brag about" and "a husband I can be proud of" is a real difference in women. Perhaps it is the same trait, but used in a sensible, adult way vs used in an impulsive irresponsible way. How men might fulfill those expectations is different as well. I would rather be the latter husband than the former, and so would likely attract females who agree.

Some women do prefer powerful status-y men. I see it at work, and even at church. I also see women in both places who disapprove of that attitude. I think there is another way of looking at this, the concept of ceiling versus floor. There are women who want a husband who is going to reach for the stars and light up the sky. They are embracing a level of risk, whether they know it or not. Other women don't care about fame or fortune, but do choose making sure they have someone who is not a drag or a failure.

I may be more aware of who women choose than who men choose, because the men are often my friends, or at least pals, and why they chose the women they did I consider private and none of my business. It is an odd division that I don't see my female friends that way anywhere near as much.

bs king said...

@David Foster - I would go a step further and suggest that both genders actually reflexively react to mens status, but their actions from there differ. Looking at the list of romance novel male leads, it looks very similar to male protagonists in movies popular with men (stretching sheriff to equal cop of course). The only thing missing is military, and reading the back of most romance novels will inform you that a huge number of those male leads are former military, regardless of current profession.

If you gender swap this thought, it seems to hold. Men rather famously react to female beauty, but every study I've seen on the subject suggest we all treat good looking people better than not-as-good looking people. It's possible that an attraction to beauty is also part literal attraction to beauty, part attraction to the status boost from having an attractive partner.

To that point, I saw a video awhile ago that interviewed blind people about how they judged attractiveness, and some of them commented that they grew more attracted to people if their friends told them the person was attractive. Interesting manifestation of status+beauty there, even among people who you'd think would be immune to it.

https://www.westernjournal.com/l/james-russo/blind-people-explain-how-they-can-tell-if-somebody-else-is-beautiful/

My thought would be that we are all more aware of status and beauty than we consciously realize, though probably in different measures, with different reactions, and probably decreasing with age.