The Revenge of the Simps
How Overvaluing People Will Ruin Your Life
The online community (largely YouTube and Reddit) has been inundated with a new hot topic and a new figure to lambast and laugh at: the simp.
What is a simp? A simp is a simpleton. It’s usually a male who overvalues women and is desperate for their approval but a woman can also be guilty of this. Simping transcends sexuality and gender, and people absolutely love to hate on them.
Why? Because it’s pathetic. It’s cringe-inducing torture to see someone prostrate themselves for another human being. It’s painful to see someone betray themselves, their values and their friends for affection from an object of desire.
But I’ve done it, and maybe you have too to some extent. To realize your own mistakes is both a sobering experience and a liberating one. But you have to see what you are doing in order to break the spell of self-disrespect.
The Origin of Simp Tendencies
Basically, one becomes a simp because one overvalues the sex/gender that one is attracted to. It’s really that simple. But it is important to see just how insidious this process is. I’ll talk about both sexes.
I remember watching Titanic as a kid and I could see that the men were largely left onboard while the women and children got into the lifeboats. “Women and children first” was what my mother told me. The Boy Scouts of America actually have this saying as their motto of the sea.
This motto in the mind of an impressionable young man teaches him to defend women and children. This is a good thing but it might be used in contexts beyond the sea, which can be a huge problem.
Moreover, women and girls are viewed as the more delicate and sensitive sex. Men and boys see how their counterparts wear their emotions on their sleeves and how graceful, gentle and weaker they are and believe that the feminine truly is more delicate.
And while that may be true, women have a pain threshold that surpasses men. They may be more emotional, but they can bear pain that men cannot. One could make the argument that men are the ones who are more sensitive and delicate.
Regardless, men and boys put women on pedestals, whether by socialization or by their own machinations and women simply do not like this. To be honest, no one does. If you posture yourself as beneath anyone, they will treat you as you are allowing them to treat you.
With women, they live in a male-dominated world. It almost seems as if the default sex/gender is masculine and women and girls just have to find their place in it.
They have various restrictions placed on them whether by family, society or religion. These restrictions are usually to preserve their sexuality and reproduction. Men largely make these restrictions and older women sometimes coerce younger ones to comply.
But in a strange twist, the masculine may also try to enhance the feminine by inculcating them to achieve a certain standard of beauty. This is obviously confusing because a women or girl is to be chaste but she is also compelled to be sexy. Older women encourage this too but less directly.
The natural affinity a heterosexual woman would have to a man is then mixed with a certain Stockholm syndrome where the sex/gender who imposed all these rules on how she should behave is viewed as endearing.
She looks at her captor and falls for him and his kind with a warped perspective. She views him as a rescuer when he may not actually be one. Nevertheless, the masculine is put on a pedestal because she has to please the people who told her how to act, dress and live.
If she doesn’t comply with the standards the whole world is complying with she could be left all alone, and no human wants that.
Of course, gay men and women can also be simps. They want what straight people want: affection and acceptance for who they are.
Without having a solid sense of self, people can be swayed into different ways of being. This solid sense of self is usually present when parents acknowledge and love their child for who they are.
This isn’t a problem unique to gay people. Anyone can suffer the pain of a parent who chastises you for who you naturally are and what you naturally want to do.
But this is the tl;dr (or summary) of what I wrote above. If you were never accepted enough, you learnt that you weren’t acceptable. Imagine that.
Therefore, you will shape-shift yourself to fit in places where you don’t belong. You will look to your object of affection just as you did your mother or father who didn’t fully accept you.
This explains why we see our peers go after people who cannot love them and side-step those who can. Many of us are programmed to choose the people who cannot love us because that’s the only love we have ever known.
Also, because we don’t accept ourselves we cannot accept people who are like us. The vicious cycle of failed romances, embarrassment and simping never ends until we acknowledge that we are indeed simping.
The Solution to Simping
Can the simp get revenge? Yes and no. The simp by definition cannot. However, if the simp sees his or her simp tendencies, acknowledges that this way of being will never bring happiness and chooses to drop it, they can be free.
The reforming simp has to re-parent themselves. They have to:
1. Accept themselves as they are. This means accepting that they made mistakes and embarrassed themselves but are choosing a different path.
2. Know their values and interests, and stick to them as long they believe in it. It’s okay to change as long as you are changing because you want to.
3. Live authentically and tell the truth, especially to yourself.
4. Set boundaries about what is okay and not okay.
5. Be honest about what they want in a partner.
6. Only date people who live up to your standard.
7. If someone messes up, forgive but understand that there will be consequences. Your trust will take a hit and you will naturally recoil from the person.
Do not betray yourself because you don’t want others to feel bad. Love yourself by taking the space you need and see if the other person can live up to your standards. And finally,
8. Remember that the person you are dating has standards too. Respect those standards. If you cannot do it, leave. If they cannot respect yours, leave.
