If you’ve not yet read part 1 of this series, we highly recommend that you do that. While we described how the betaization process of relationships worked in the first part, we will focus on behaviors that show up during the process in this article.

The goal is to give you some practical examples on how women try to gain control over their partners and describe how exactly women are able to do this.

How the betaization process shows up in behavior

Women manipulate. This is as clear as the sun rising in the east and setting in the west.

Since they are the weaker sex physically, women (over the course of the evolution) had to come up with ways to get power in their relationships outside the realm of the physical.

When it comes to relationships, they use sophisticated tools and manipulate language and emotions in order to achieve their goals.

On this website, we call this the power of “judgement”. A woman tries to get to a position in the relationship, where she is the judge of good or bad behavior and inflicts emotional punishment or validation based on what behavior she likes or doesn’t like.

The compliance tools they use in the relationship are as follows:

1. Drama & nagging (set the priorities of what’s important)
2. Blaming & criticism (browbeats him on the defensive)
3. Shaming (the compliance superpower)

With these three tools she becomes the relationship leader, which allows her to:

• Task him (so he can provide for her and make her happy)

If you remember the phases of the betaization process, these tools will be used as soon as phase 2 of the process is reached.

1: Drama and nagging

Drama and nagging are compliance tools and tools of behavioral change for women.

Let’s see how they show up:

Nagging

Nagging is a long term, semi-permanent behavioral changing tool.

It works mostly through the imprinting of punishment and reward (behaviorism) into the man.

Fulfil my wishes and you make me happy (positive reinforcement / reward)

Refuse to do what I want and you fall out of favor and get to feel my nagging fury (negative reinforcement / punishment).

Quoting clinical psychologist and doctor Harriet Braiker (a woman, by the way) verbatim here:

Nagging is the human equivalent of shock grids to the rat

After some time and conditioning, the man internalizes the “rules”. It’s the same way mothers condition their children. Eventually, the man will feel in the “wrong” for not following “rules” (her rules). Nagging is the reason why this voice is in his head.

And, as you often see with couples, he follows her rules eventually if he doesn’t know how to combat the nagging.

As nagging will take place over a long period of time, we argue that it should set the priorities of what’s important.

The woman is essentially telling you to “change who you are” and, just like a death from a thousand little cuts, the low-intensity will kill the strong man over time. In this case, though, it sculpts the man into a weaker version of himself.

Drama

While nagging is a long-term behavior change tool, drama is a concentrated, focused compliance tool.

While nagging prioritizes what’s important, drama prioritizes what’s urgent.

Nagging says, “You are not okay,” while drama says, “What you are doing right now is not okay, get off your ass now to change it.”

The true reason why drama works so well is emotions. Women put a lot of emotions and passion into drama and deliver it with a self-righteous attitude that indicates, “I’m right.” In addition to this, men don’t engage in drama and aren’t used to this overemotional (and aggressive) way of communicating.

Therefore, it’s even more effective at short-circuiting men’s brains and they end up seeing it as a real emergency that has to be dealt with right now.

Most men don’t see drama for the compliance tool that it is.

Think about the following if you’re a man and have been in a few relationships already: How many times have you questioned / challenged a woman’s drama? If you’re like most men, you did it rarely.

Very rarely. Most men take responsibility for women’s drama and make it their top priority to fix whatever issue she has that’s causing her dramatic attitude.

The combination is the superpower

Nagging and drama are both compliance tools of the “judge” power position. Most men naturally feel responsible for women’s happiness and well-being (as they are the babymaker).

Women then go ahead and reinforce this frame by directly or indirectly judging men as worthy/unworthy.

In other words, both drama and nagging convey the following frame “you are not doing your job” (by her standards) and “you are not being good enough” (by her standards).

How to handle drama

As soon as a woman uses drama, your best strategy is to do the opposite of what many men do in this situation.

Don’t try to:

• Apologize
• Fix the issue
• Get defensive
• Excuse, explain or rationalize
• Don’t try to calm her down

A big portion of men end up resorting to one of the above strategies because they either:

1. Feel guilty
2. Want this annoying shit to end as soon as possible

Unfortunately, this will only make the problem bigger. Instead of standing up to disrespect or poor behavior, men show weakness and confirm that her nagging and drama work.

Think about it: If you comply or crumble every time if she nags or creates drama, what is the frame?

The frame is that you comply and do things for her as soon as she nags you to do them or attacks you with drama. Essentially, you’re providing positive reinforcement for her bad behavior by complying to her needs and wants (which are stated horribly and might not even be what could be reasonably expected). In this case, your crumbling/complying to drama and nagging provide fuel for her to nag you or stir up drama again. In many cases, the behavior only gets worse if you indulge in it and tolerate it.

Instead, you want to provide negative reinforcement for her drama.

There are a few tools we want to give to you:

Controlled anger to get her on her defense

Many people in the manosphere argue that getting loud and indulging in the drama is entering her frame. However, we disagree with it from a power perspective.

If you look at it from a power perspective, you essentially show weakness by letting her raise her voice without doing anything about it. You’re essentially accepting the disrespect, which not only makes you the submissive party but also poisons the relationship at the same time.

What you want to do in this situation is nipping verbal abuse in the bud. You have to assert your boundaries.

Raise your voice and meet her at her own level of loudness (and most often nastiness). This shows that you’re not going to crumble. However, as soon as you’re no longer in the position of “defender”, you must dial down your loudness and control yourself again. If you don’t do that, you become the crazy fighting couple.

Consider this example:

(she enters the room a bit later than expected, with the meal for two they had agreed on)

Her: (loud, sounding nasty and aggressive) Aaaand he left his pants on the couch again!
My God Kevin, is there one evening where we can have a nice dinner and enjoy a good evening together in a place that is not looking like crap? Is that ever possible? Here I was, cooking for both of us and again you leave your…

You: (replies with the exact same tone) Exactly! A NICE evening for Christ sake, it seems impossible to have one of those with you. You know Mary, I bust my ass all day working and was looking forward to this dinner and instead I need to hear this shit? Do you think I want to have a nice dinner with someone with that attitude? Do you think it’s even possible to have a nice dinner with that attitude?

If controlled anger doesn’t work to calm her down or let her speak in a respectful, calm and more rational tone, you should “nuke” the interaction, which is one of our favorite tools regarding any type of drama or some shittests.

Nuke (address the tone and refuse to deal with the content)

Back to the basics again:

You address the way and mode of communication (the tone and the verbal abuse) and never the content.

This can sound something like this:

You: “Look, I don’t even want to communicate with you if you are not able to act like an adult”.

Don’t address the content until the drama stops and she can talk to you respectfully. Stay on course and don’t let her manipulate you into saying some dumb shit or into attacking her.

Be stern and refuse to talk to her after your statement. If that’s not enough, use EXIT as a strategy.

This is probably one of your best boundary enforcement tools, of which you only have three. Your time, your affection and your commitment. In this case, your taking away both time and affection.

Exit

We would advise you to leave or tell her to leave if she can’t talk like an adult. In this case, you’re telling her something along the lines of:

“Look, baby, we’re not able to have a reasonable discussion right now if you’re acting like this. Contact me when you’re ready to have a productive discussion about this”.

Then you leave or make her leave.

If she suddenly makes a U-turn, you can accept it and discuss with her like normal. Make it clear, however, that there are no second chances if the behavior happens again.

After that point, if the boundary is crossed once more, you must exit, even if she does a U-turn once again. Otherwise she will not respect your boundaries.

Exceptions

Drama and nagging are not always disempowering tools for gaining control of the relationship.

If you’re not holding up to your end of the deal and the concerns are delivered in an appropriate manner, it might make sense to look at the following exceptions:

1. You’re not keeping your word

Sometimes, your woman will nag you about something you had to do or promised to do.

In those cases, she has a good reason to do it. However, you also don’t put up with abuse if you didn’t hold up to your end of the bargain. Communication must be respectful regardless.

If the nagging is not aggressive, you should:

1. Get on top of your shit and do what you said you would do.
2. Think of things you can’t or won’t do and make it a point to say “no”
3. Take care of things without delayed execution

If you promised something, you should follow through. Otherwise, you allow small-time nagging to snowball while you’re actually in the wrong.

Here’s how you can do it:

Her: Babe, come on, it’s 7:00 and our guests are about to come, you promised you would do …

You: You’re right, thank you for reminding me. I’m on it in one minute.

Then do it in the next minute.

Also, don’t promise to do something you really don’t want to do / make a promise you don’t intend to keep.

2. There are bigger or valid root-causes

In other cases, drama and nagging hide some real, deep frustration. In those cases, we advise you to also deal with the root cause of the issue.

If you use our above mentioned tools, you’re pushing back on the communication style and not necessarily the content or root issue of the communication. While this is very important, you also have to address the issue below the complaint after the drama stops and she can communicate like an adult.

Let’s make a quick example:

Your girlfriend erupts in drama because you didn’t make her a gift for her birthday. In this case, you can’t only push back on the drama and leave the underlying cause unaddressed.

While this is perfectly reasonable if she can’t communicate properly, you have to address the issue eventually.

The underlying cause might be the fear that you don’t care enough or don’t want to commit.

You must address those issues. Both because that’s what leaders do and because, if you don’t want to commit, you shouldn’t string her along just for the sake of it.

In addition to this, women will not always communicate that there is a deep reason behind drama, so sometimes you have to dig a little bit to get to the issue. We would recommend you use LUCA to get to the root cause as soon as she can talk reasonably again.

3. Psychological issues

If nagging and drama do not significantly decrease as soon as you impose your frame on her, there might be issues embedded into her psychology.

Borderline personality disorder (BDP) is a common issue and creates a lot of unnecessary drama. Histrionic personalities also revel in drama while paranoids will make both partners increase their emotional outbursts.

It’s possible there is a mismatch of attachment styles, for example, the anxious-avoidant trap.

It might also be she has a really bad temperament. There are a few individuals in the world that are very negative and focus on the bad side of life.

How to handle nagging / choreplay

If you’re woman nags you, she usually does 3 things:

• Shittest you for compliance
• Trying to weasel herself out of tasks
• Trying to manipulate the situation to get more out of you

Ever married man or man in a LTR knows this sentence:

Her: “If you did more around the house, maybe I would be more comfortable and we would have sex more often”

In addition to this, every man knows that this is a trap. If you comply to this shittest, you just made yourself into a bigger plowhorse for her to exploit.

Another situation is the typical: “Hey babe, can you take out the trash” and then she gets mad when you don’t do it.

You have to be fucking careful here. In many cases, the man or the woman never made rules when it comes to doing the housework. Therefore, there is no obligation for you to do anything, unless you promised to do something.

If you’re chilling on the couch after a long day at work, being at the gym and being on your stuff, there is no reason to give you tasks. If you don’t want to do something, that gives you the right not to do it. Don’t comply with crap just to avoid her raging emotions.

Being afraid of your woman’s emotions and treating her like the judge of good behavior is exactly the pitfall so many men fall into.

In these cases, it’s enough just to say “no” and to not buckle after she unleashes her storm of emotions over you. If disrespect ensues, you set a boundary. If she doesn’t stop with the tantrum-throwing, you don’t participate in the conversation until she calms down.

If she can’t talk like an adult, remove yourself from the situation and use the same tool we gave to you above.

If you live under the same roof, don’t communicate with her until she calms down. Don’t “talk” with her about the issue.

If you refuse a task, she will probably shittest you again and try to appeal to “fairness” or use a “frame-shifting” technique to get you to comply. Don’t give in. A relationship is not about using a scoreboard to keep track on how many times someone does the dishes and how many times someone does not.

Appealing to fairness or to other honorable standards like “being a good husband” are just shaming techniques that are used in order to coerce you into action. This is typical manipulation and you must refrain from buying into that frame.

If you’re at this point, the attraction is long gone anyway, and the relationship is a pure negotiation.

How to handle Choreplay / nagging about household tasks

“Honey, the plates are to be put in the left side of the dishwasher”

“Honey, please fold the T-shirts and put them into the shelf on the upper left side of the closet”

“Honey” please put the toilet seat down after you used the toilet”

Does your blood cook yet, eh? Mine does when I imagine a woman uttering this nonsense at me…

If you’re a halfway decent guy, you already know how to keep things clean and sanitary. There is no need to do extra stuff or buy into her frame when it comes to the cleanliness of your home, how things should be ordered in shelfes or other stuff like that. If your standard is that you want things to be “presentable” then you enforce this standard.

If your woman feels like she needs to vacuum every second day or needs a specific place for the glasses in the dishwasher, she can do/arrange it herself and shouldn’t expect help from you.

Look, relationships are about collaboration. However, that doesn’t mean that you have to help whenever your woman feels like she needs to enforce another unreasonable standard of cleanliness.

Most men handle choreplay in one of three ways, which are all not ideal

1. To her standard and her timeline (horrible)

If she nags you about the dishes and you go and do them as soon as she wants and to her standard, you just lowered attraction even more and turned yourself into a bigger plowhorse. Well, maybe you can use the dishes to catch your tears as soon as you’re in a sexless marriage/relationship.

• On your timeline and to her standard (bad)

Now you’re her teenager who always has to be remined to do things right and slide right into a mother-child dynamic

• On her timeline and to your standard (also bad)

Now you’re the dude who can never do anything right and has to be taught how to clean stuff “the right way”, which is her way.

Well, if the above strategies are all horrible, the only thing you can do then, is to

• Do things on your timeline and to your standard

In this case, you’re doing things when you want them to do and enforce your own standard of cleanliness / order. This requires clear boundaries from your side. You have to be assertive when it comes to these things and don’t let her try to dictate terms.

2. Blaming and Criticism

Blaming and criticism are tools of verbal aggression (and toxic communication patterns, by that matter).

If you’re a man who’s unaware of power-dynamics, you most likely will try to DEER your way out of these things.

DEER is an acronym that stands for:

• Defend
• Excuse
• Explain
• Rationalize

These are bad relationship strategies. If you’re doing any of them during blaming and criticism, you convey the following messages:

1. You admit guilt
2. You confirm that she’s in charge
3. You confirm that you must serve her and make her happy.

This is why in our article about arguments, we tell you to not participate in the “attack-defend mode”. Either you try to diffuse the situation (see more later) or, if you’re not able to diffuse the situation, you Exit.

However, most men react in one of the following ways if their woman lashes out at them:

• Get defensive (bad)
• Make excuses/ explanations / rationalizations (terrible)
• Try to fix the issue (bad: it doesn’t address the real issue, which is the aggressive delivery and toxic communication patterns)
• Fight her (just as bad)
• Ask her to calm down (bad)
• Tries to understand the real issue (works on some instances, but doesn’t address the toxic communication patterns)

If you’re familiar with the Gottman institute, you will probably know about the strategy he proposes; to try to address the root of the issue and to “look beyond the complaint”.

While this is a good strategy and works most of the time, there is a crucial part missing in it. Gottman has many good approaches to relationships (especially when it comes to the four horsemen of relationships) but a rather poor understanding regarding power dynamics.

The problem here is that the woman is trying to browbeat the man on the defensive with verbal abuse and coercive tactics.

That’s the crux of the matter. Before even trying to get to the root of the problem, you have to assert your boundaries and shut the toxic communication patterns right down. The solution here is to address the communication and change it.

If there is no change of communication, there is no addressing the root of the problem (or really any participation in the communication) from the man’s side, unless she’s got her emotions in check again.

If she can’t control her emotions, you tell her to contact you again as soon as she can talk like an adult again – and get the hell out of the situation. If you want to know more about that, visit our article about arguments.

Let’s make this a little more accessible with an example:

(Enters back home after work, bought some stuff to cook for this evening)

Him: Hey honey, I bought some things, please help me store it.

(she starts going through the bags)

Her: My god, Frank, where is the milk! Didn’t I tell you to also buy some milk this morning? How can you forget such a simple task! How am I going to bake this cake this weekend! You always forget these things!

Since the man in this example indeed made a “mistake”, he often ends up on the defense there. However, this is a small issue and the woman in this case is making a hell of a deal out of it.

Think about this, though: By defending he does not only confirm her frame of power (that he must serve her and execute her tasks, and do so properly), but he also doesn’t address the aggressive delivery.

In addition to this, this example is really a nasty and aggressive way of communication that does no good for a healthy relationship dynamic.

How to deal with blaming

Here’s how to handle blaming:

Her: “My god, Frank, where is the milk! Didn’t I tell you to also buy some milk this morning? How can you forget such a simple task! How am I going to bake this cake this weekend! You always forget these things!”

(pause a few seconds while looking at her dismissively)

You: “We don’t talk to each other that way, I’m not comfortable with your tone”

You don’t address the issue regarding the milk but instead, drive the frame towards the crux of the matter: Her verbal abuse.

Her: “What are you talking about, what do you mean my tone, you didn’t buy the milk!

You: “Yep I did, shit happens. But how does that give you the right to raise your voice and abuse me verbally?”

By admitting that you indeed made a mistake, you protect yourself from further attacks and show ownership of the issue. In addition to that, you make your criticism regarding her style of communication more specific and thus, more emotionally charged. You’re now playing the same game and backing her against a corner.

Her: “Assaulting you? I’m not assaulting you! I’m just saying you forgot the milk, how can I bake the cake now”

You: “You are yelling at me with an aggressive facial expression for what’s a very, very minor issue. That’s verbal abuse in my book”

In this case, use the broken record technique until she admits that the overreacted and/or that aggression is not the way to deal with issue. As soon as she does, you impose your frame:

You: (piercing eye contact) “Look, I did forget the cheese, my bad.

But to me it’s more important how we deal with issues. Because cheeses come and go, but how we deal with each other stays.

And blaming, yelling, finger pointing and any other nasty way of communicating are not what I consider good and healthy relationships.

And I want to have a healthy and respectful relationship with you because that’s how I treat you and I expect the same back.

(pause, still looking at her)

“Do I make myself clear?“

With this, you addressed the power dynamics: You’re not a punching bag for her anger. This is the equivalent of the “nuke” we use when it comes to dealing with women’s tests. If you read this far, you now have a perfect example on how to deal with these issues.

At the end, you ask her do give her buy-in, which makes the power of the statement that much more prevalent if she agrees.

Now you can move to the root of this particular issue, which is that you forgot to buy the milk.

To get to the root causes of a situation like this, think about your priorities.

And if you realize that you don’t care about milk and you don’t want to spend your life shopping for cheese, then assign the task of what it’s important to her back to her.

Tell her open and honestly that since you don’t care about milk, you will probably forget again in the future. In addition to this, you will not take any responsibility for stocking up milk ever again.

From then on, what she cares about is what she takes responsibility for.

3. Shaming

Shaming is the coercive superpower of the judge role.

Shame is a means of psychological aggression and compliance.

Researcher Brene Brown says that shame exploits our need to be worthy of love and basic respect. Shame punishes us with contempt, isolation, and stoking feelings of unworthiness.

Women know exactly what they do when they use shame in a relationship. They attack something a man feels deep inside of him:

What a real man (supposedly) has to do. Some of the most powerful attacks on manhood are:

• Questioning his success in the world, claiming that a man’s unsuccessful
• Claiming that a man is weak
• Claiming that a man is impotent
• Claiming that a man is a “pussy” or “insecure”
• Claiming you need to “keep your word” and can never change your worldview

The power of shame is enhanced when, as is often the case, the whole of society is behind the accusation – that is, the whole of society takes the position of the judge against him.

This is the case, for example, when there is weakness, because a man is not supposed to be weak. However, the power of shame is also leveraged when it comes to taking care of the family or protecting women.

Men internalize these values and beliefs that they learn over their lifespan (due to mainstream media or failed parenting strategies but also biology) that allow women to put thumbscrews on men’s masculinity without having to be too direct.

In relationships, women can exploit shame to force men into the role of provider, potentially sabotaging his own goals and dreams.

We would also argue that shame is sometimes appropriate or fair, especially when children who have a need to be fed and cared for are involved. In this case, fair game.

Nevertheless, women will often take an attitude that enlarges the scope of what it needs to be a real man to fit what they need and want.

In these cases, the shaming can effectively turn men into plow horses:

Her: I’m unhappy. Make me happy (or you’re not a real man)

You: OK, let me try some monkey dancing

Her: Protect me and make me feel safe. Buy a house in the good part of town (or you’re not a real man)

You: OK, working hard on that promotion…

Her: Make me come (or you’re not a real man)

You: OK, lemme learn how to last longer so I can make you happier…

Notice that none of the above are wrong per se. However, as soon as the balance of give and take is distorted in a relationship and a woman doesn’t hold up her end of the bargain, it becomes unhealthy and manipulative.

If you’re putting yourself on fire to keep others warm, you’re not in the golden balance of relationships and turn into a low-value provider with no standards.

This is why women lose so much attraction in stage 2, 3 and 4 of the betaization process. They use all these tactics to get as much out of men as humanly possible.

How shaming shows up in everyday interactions

Shaming is effectively used by women in even the smallest daily interactions. As soon as something does not fit their code of morality or “their truth” they are essentially trying to impose their code of morality onto the boogieman of this “false” morality.

Shaming tactics can take different forms: The most prevalent one when it comes to the manosphere and giving advice on how to have a better relationship where the man is power-positive are probably the following:

“Who hurt you?”

“You’re just insecure and jealous”

How to deal with shaming

For shaming to work, you have to have an internal compass that guides your behavior according to what is “right” and what is “wrong” when it comes to interactions with women.

Female shaming enlarges the scope of “what it means to be a real man” in order to serve women.

Essentially, this is the same strategy that feminists used to coerce men into compliance for several decades. The only reason why this works is because men buy into the frame of “being a real man” these women present.

As soon as you don’t give a fuck what the definition of a “real man” is according to someone else, shaming has no effect on you anymore.

This is why it’s so adamant to build your own frame, have clear boundaries and know what you want/ what you don’t want. Everything out of this worldview is either funny, intriguing or interesting. Nothing more.

If you have a clear vision of what type of man you want to be, there is no reason to buy into anyone else’s worldview or let shaming affect you.

Being resistant to shaming requires work!

However, this requires some internal work. If you really want to get rid of the effects of shaming, you have to identify psychological issues you have that prevent you from plowing through shame. These could be nice-guy behaviors, an inability to say “no”, no sense of internal worth, a skewed morality code that has been implemented in you by women, or something else.

The biggest problem we see when it comes to this issue is the fact that men have programmed their mind in the wrong way. Everything you experience on a daily basis shapes your self-image.

If you are surrounded by non-productive influences on a daily basis, you will always be manipulated to believe into a skewed worldview without you ever noticing it. Notice that every mainstream movie, music, television, news and most blogs buy into the frame of “putting a woman on a pedestal”.

Be careful what you surround yourself with.

We know that you cannot get rid of outside influences that manipulate you, but you can surely choose which influences are able to manipulate you. Using our blog as manipulation to create your own frame or at least a part of it, is definitely a better idea than listening to pop-music on a daily basis.

You can get rid of all unattractive and non-productive behaviors by using the right resources. Most of them will be on this blog after some time. We got some serious shit for you here, whether you’re a man or a woman. Don’t worry.

4. Tasking

Tasking is essentially what we talked about in phase 3 of the betaization process (putting him to work).

Drama, criticism and nagging are the support tools in order to coerce you to fulfil tasks she deems important.

What do women look for here?

They look for your compliance, without questioning them.

Many women start giving him tasks early on to test his strength and mettle to resist her.

The more he performs her tasks, the more likely he is to commit and invest. Thus, tasking also serves as a woman’s early screening tool for providers.

It can start innocently enough.

For example, if you’re both sitting on the couch and she tells you to get her a glass of water. You were thirsty anyway, so what does it matter, right..? Wrong.

Or you’re out shopping and she hands you her purse / the cart and says, “Hold this.”

Or it may take a while longer.

If you seem strong, independent, and rebellious enough, sometimes the chores and shaming don’t start until you fully commit to the relationship.

It may surprise some men that their wives’ demands increase dramatically when they cross an important commitment point such as “exclusivity,” “official status,” or “marriage.”

This is because you were in charge to begin with, and she didn’t dare take a judicial position over you. Also, you probably rejected a few attempts at drama and tasking. That doesn’t mean she will stop trying to domesticate you, though. It just means that the process is on hold.

Until when?

Until her power increases, which may be after a major milestone like an engagement.

Some men, such as the super-rich, the extreme lover types, and the men with high sexual market value, may never reach the point where the woman tries to take over.

But 99% will.

So buckle up.

It’s fucking hard to resist the tasking, especially when she appeals to a sense of fairness, and uses shaming, drama, guilt and other manipulative tools.

In these cases, her conviction and self-righteous attitude make her frame ironclad, and it feels like it’s a foregone conclusion that she’s right and he’s wrong.

In the end, it looks like a mother-child dynamic, with the mother “knowing” what’s right and the man being the rebellious child who doesn’t live up to her righteous expectations.

This is exactly what we’re talking about when it comes to stages 2, 3 and 4.

The problem here is, that men are often not able to resist their women when it comes to these shaming attacks and drama. Instead, you should deal with the way your woman bosses you around. If she refuses, you do nothing. You don’t want to give positive reinforcement to any kind of drama.

After dealing with her aggression, you should execute a task if you promised to do it.

If you didn’t promise anything, you should seriously stand up and have an eye-to-eye conversation about “who wanted to have the task executed.”

If it was your woman, you should tell her it’s her job.

The more tasks you execute, the more normal it becomes

Cognitive dissonance dictates that the more a man executes a woman’s tasks, the more he will internalize that it’s the right thing to do.

And through back-rationalization, the more he executes, the more likely it is that he will rationalize his actions by telling himself that “she must be worth it”.

So, with tasks, she is also increasing her power and more effectively framing herself as “the prize” of the relationship.

Don’t overreact to tasking

However, don’t overreact to tasking. If you overreact to tasking like crazy, the situation might as well get abusive.

Look at this example from Hare’s boos “Without conscience”, where he described a psychopaths behavior:

One night she asked him lightly if he felt like stepping out the corner and bring her an ice cream.
He didn’t reply.
When she looked up, he glared at her and said “always got everything you wanted, didn’t you”, he said in a strange, snide way.
He accused her of being pampered and being used to people doing everything for her.
She said “what are you talking about, I’m not like that”.
And then he got up and left.
And never returned.

For the author and the narrator, his behavior was incomprehensible, while her request seemed “normal”.

But did you notice the power dynamic?

She asks him to do a pretty big job: to go out for her and bring her an ice cream she wanted.

However, because of his overreaction, he may actually seem abusive.

Therefore, it is important that you learn to recognize the power dynamics, like the man in the example, but also that you learn to behave appropriately, unlike the man in the example.

How to deal with tasking

While we already mentioned some of the solutions in the paragraph about nagging, we wanted to drive the point home again here.

Dealing with tasking consists of two things:

1. think about what you can do and what you can’t

Look guys, if you want to be in a successful relationship, there are some things you have to take responsibility for. You’re not little boys anymore. However, before you let someone else decide what these responsibilities are, think about what you can do and what you can’t do yourself.

If you do this job well, communicate it well and enforce your decisions, then drama, nagging and tasking will drop to (near) zero.

2. Return tasks that you don’t want to do.

Tasks that she wants to have fulfilled are to be sent back to her, every time.

You could approach it this way (going with the milk example once again):

You: “Wait a second. Did I want milk to bake a cake or do you want milk to bake a cake? Because as far as I know, you want that milk. So why are you asking me?”

We also would add the following:

You: “Here is the point: if something is important to you, you must take responsibility of doing it yourself.

And if I didn’t agree to do it, it’s also your task.

Or do I come and task you to change the toner on my printer? Do I ever get angry if the batteries on the remote are not replaced? No. Because I care about the TV set. And I don’t push it on you, do I?

And yes I also want to help you on tasks we didn’t agree on. But the point is that you cannot demand it and then go crazy about. Because then I get crazy right back at you.

And getting crazy at each other is not the relationship I want to have.

Did I make myself clear?”

Basically, you do the following:

• Do what you agreed on doing
• Task her to do her own tasks

As soon as she tries to unload her stuff on you, you enforce these boundaries.

3. Execute without following orders

If you care about not looking like a submissive follower, you can also do the following instead of jumping up as soon as she reminds you of something:

You: “Thank you for reminding me, I’m on it in two minutes”

You: “It’s on my to-do list”

Tasking + Drama + Shaming = Plowhorse

If a man resists in doing something or is slow in taking action, a woman may combine all the tools at once to unload a “fool proof anti resistance tool” onto the man in order to make him comply to her demands.

This is a deadly female cocktail including the following ingredients:

• Drama, to make action seem more urgent and important
• Shame, in the sense of “do something (or you’re not a real man)”
• Tasking: go do it for fuck sake!

Note that the drama itself often involves shaming without the need for an overt attack on masculinity.

This is because most men feel responsible for making women happy. They feel that it is their job to “do something.” Even when “doing something” actually means “doing something for the unreasonable needs and wants of a woman.”

Not doing it, especially when it is very emotional, is shameful for men. And women (unconsciously) take advantage of that.

To deal with this, you can follow the same steps as above.