Thread by @UnkleAyo

I think it is just due that I spin a 🧵for ambitious/career/beautiful women currently making their bread.

Take this from a brother.

There's a strain of men who deploy a particularly psychological tool, you should discern against.

They won't like this tweet but I'll explain.

See that thing where obviously beautiful women are debased by their aesthetically deficient spouses as "unattractive" OR

where academically established women are condescendingly referred to "not the most intelligent". It isn't random.

It is a psychological calibration tool.

There are two possible descriptions for this psychological patterns. Tall poppy syndrome & Benevolent Sexism.

Before I delve unto this.

Let me paint a background picture for you & this is for women who don't know how to spot patterns.

You see some men bah.

When they initially move to you, it's not from a place of confidence. It is from a place of "I'll take a bet".

Regardless of what they show to the world, they know who they really are - in the confines of their solitude.

Lack of substance, shallow, all round unattractive.

So, when they move to you from a place of bet - they can't believe their luck that you've accepted.

Here comes the main challenge:

"This woman is better than me, smarter than me, looks better than I do, is relatively more accomplished"

How do I keep her humbled?

Lucky for most of these men, the tools are already there - neatly packaged in social constructs, religious scripts & cultural stereotypes.

They just tap in directly.

In public, it’s subtle:

"My wife? She’s cute, but she’s no Miss World."

"She just got lucky with her career."

In other more intimate scenarios, they begin to strategically target all her strong points - with sayings that repeatedly makes her feats look small.

They take the very things you’re most proud of, your achievements and chip away at them

until you start doubting yourself.

It is Tall Poppy Syndrome.

It is a social levelling tactic where you cut down one who stands taller, so you both appear on the same level.

And when they do it wrapped in jokes, "concerns, or backhanded compliments - that's called Benevolent Sexism.

Subtle but present.

The kind that hides behind
"I’m just looking out for you" or
"I’m only joking" while undermining you.

Sometimes it’s pure envy. Sometimes it’s insecurity. Often it’s both.

And the psychological angle is - it is not just mean words being said, it is deliberate recalibration.

They lower your self-perception until your new “normal” is smaller than your truth.

So when next you hear your partner utter certain statements that specifically targets your strengths and accomplishments or beauty,

I hope you immediately recognize what it is.

Good morning.