Strong Men Get Cucked Too

There's this myth in male corners of the Internet that to not end up whipped, walked on, and cuckolded by women you've just got to be 'strong'.

If you can be strong enough, women will respect your strength and not cuck you.

And while strength of frame is one of the most important elements in a man's character (and thus, his ability to retain his women), this alone is not nearly enough.

The unpleasant fact is this: every day, in every part of the world, women are cuckolding strong men.

Many a man, overconfident in his strength, walks into relationships where wily women gain the upper hand over him, whip him (also called 'betaizing' him), or cuckold him.

Hubris, the downfall of many a hero in the old Greek tragedies, causes the fall of these men too.

Yet the fate of these men is avoidable for you.

All it takes is a little humility... a little more self-awareness... and a healthy dose of self-control.

 

Belisarius is one of the greatest heroes of all time.

He was a general of Constantinople, the seat of the Eastern Roman Empire.

After winning a battle against the Persians, Belisarius went forth toward Africa to retake the continent for Rome. Years before, the rampaging, marauding Germanic tribe the Vandals had swept across Northern Africa, conquering and subduing the bread basket of Rome, splitting it off the Empire.

Constantinople had sent a massive army before to reconquer Africa, yet the leader of the Vandals, with stealth and a bit of trickery, managed to encompass the huge army and totally obliterate it.

Fast forward a bit. The ambitious Eastern Roman Emperor Justinian sued for peace with the Persians he was currently warring with, that he might engage in his wars of reconquest elsewhere in the world.

The Emperor then sent Belisarius off to Africa with a fleet of troops, not greater in number than the last one the Vandals had vanquished. Much of Constantinople was pessimistic about this enterprise; they thought it would be another sure defeat.

Yet instead, Belisarius easily re-took Africa.

Usually after a conqueror conquered an area, he'd stay on for a while as administrator, to ensure the territory stayed conquered.

But not Belisarius. The Emperor, doubting his loyalty due to the whispers from his court, sent Belisarius from Africa off to Italy, with a band of only 5,000 men, to reconquer all of Italy, which had fallen to the Goths.

Belisarius alighted there, with his tiny army, to face off a formidable military of 150,000 Goths.

However Belisarius was no apprentice strategist. He was a master strategist.

He quickly moved to conquer Rome, which was under defended and rapidly fell. Once he possessed Rome, he rapidly built up the city's defenses, which the Goths had torn down, so that 5,000 soldiers plus a contingent of citizens could defend against an army of 150,000 men.

When the Goths arrived, they threw themselves at the walls, and were slaughtered.

Then they prepared a battery of siege engines. But as they moved them into position, Belisarius sallied forth with his soldiers, slaughtered countless of the enemy, and destroyed all the siege engines. They fought for an entire day, with Belisarius moving actively from one spot to another to hold lines and push his men forward. At last, in the confusion of victory, soldiers began to declare that Belisarius had died.

But he was not dead, and he emerged, covered in dust, and sweat, and blood, his sword dulled with sanguinary acts. Before he would agree to take rest, eat food, or drink water, he went around his entire army, to make sure his men were fine, and all were attended to.

Some time later, after holding out much longer against the endless Gothic host, Belisarius received the reinforcements he needed to retake all of Italy.

He performed these conquests -- the conquest of Africa, and that of Italy -- with a meager number of soldiers, in an undisciplined age, when generals actively avoided greatness, lest they be cast with suspicion by the court and stripped of their wealth or executed by a jealous emperor. He was (Edward Gibbon notes), considering the lack of martial spirit, discipline, or ambition of his time, arguably greater even than those great generals commanding already-established legions of the past.

The only general I can think of off the top of my head of similar merit was Philipomeon.

Belisarius was (and remains) one of the greatest heroes of antiquity (and ever).

Despite all this, Belisarius was also, much to his chagrin, a whipped husband and a cuck.

 

How Do Great Men Ended Up Whipped Cucks?

There's a small cuckold community out there with men in it who actually like to get hurt, beaten, and cuckolded by women (take this male feminist househusband).

I don't know if these men are men who've suffered some kind of trauma in the past, or have self-worth issues, or some kind of psychological defect. I'm really not sure. But these guys are out there.

However, they are not, by far, the majority of men who get cucked.

Rather, most men who end up as whipped or even cuckolded husbands are Regular Joes, just ordinary guys making their ways through life, who insensibly get pulled into relationships where they are getting not what they want -- in fact, the opposite of what they do.

Belisarius was such a guy. He was just a normal soldier, on his way up through the ranks, when the Empress Theodora, a former actress and prostitute, introduced her friend Antonina to him, and pushed for them to get together.

Belisarius fell for Antonina, married her, and the rest is history.

Antonina was a notorious and flamboyant strayer. While Belisarius was away conquering the world, Antonina was at home conquering the men of Constantinople. She walked through the streets openly with men she was partnering with, to the murmurs and distaste of the citizenry (who viewed Belisarius as a hero).

Belisarius and Antonina took a young soldier struggling with hard times on as a kind of apprentice, and, in an almost exact mirror to our own Will Smith-Jada Pinkett-August Alsina love triangle, Antonina took the struggling young apprentice her husband had taken in and made him her lover.

Numerous people tried to point out the affair to Belisarius, but he refused to believe it.

Then he walked in on Antonina and his apprentice naked in bed. The apprentice froze; but before Belisarius could react, Antonina quickly explained that they had been destroying state secrets so that Belisarius's enemies could not use them against him. I don't know how that relates to their nakedness, but against his better judgment Belisarius fell for it.

At another point, two young women provided Belisarius incontrovertible proof of Antonina's adultery.

And Belisarius finally grew a spine.

He threw Antonina out and refused to see her, despite all her requests.

Yet, after a time, she managed to get in front of him, and with tears and histrionics, she made him feel sorry for her, and he took her back.

As soon as Antonina was reinstated, she found the two girls who told on her to Belisarius, had them seized, cut out their tongues, and flayed them alive.

Thus it is to those who try to help open the eyes of the cheated on to the deeds of the cheater; as often they are fed up as prey to the vengeance of the offender as they are lauded as saints by the offended.

Antonina's lover eventually fled from her passions to live in a monastery, leaving her inconsolable. Nothing the husband did could cheer up his wife, who mourned for her lost extramarital bedmate.

Some years later, Antonina's best friend, the Empress Theodora, located this long-in-hiding lover in his monastery, brought him to the royal palace, and reunited her with him. Antonina was overjoyed, but the man lived only a year at the palace before he died, and Antonina was again inconsolable, Belisarius again dealing with a wife in deep mourning over a man she loved, longed for, and lusted after who wasn't her husband.

How did one of the greatest heroes of history end up a whipped cuckold?

 

Many Men End Up This Way, Regardless of Greatness

Greatness is no guarantor of security from whippedness or cuckoldry.

There are a number of men who end up this way.

Marcus Aurelius, patron saint of nice guys, was such a man.

Read more: Great Man Theory Is Undeniably Real

While his wife Faustina traipsed about Rome, openly sleeping with any guy she could get her claws on, Marcus held her up to the citizens of Rome as a model of chastity, and praised her privately as a chaste, pure woman. He was the only man in Rome who did not suspect her unfaithfulness.

Marcus directly brought about the decline of the Roman Empire, by shattering the tradition of the Emperor picking the most capable man to be his successor, and instead (I have no doubt at Faustina's insistence) placing his dissolute son, Commodus, on the throne.

Commodus had all of Faustina's vices and none of Marcus's virtues (perhaps he was the son of one of Faustina's many lovers, instead?), and after a reign of terror and capriciousness over the populace, he managed to make so many people fear their own arbitrary assassination that those closest to him chose to assassinate him first.

At that point, a precedent was set, and Roman Emperors spent the next hundred years getting assassinated within days or months of putting on the purple.

For all the wisdom Marcus shares in his Meditations, and all his success defending the Empire, he let himself get whipped and cucked by a woman, and she (with her progeny) undid all his work.

The Emperor Justinian (lord to Belisarius) knew a similar fate.

His wife, Theodora, had been a young, fair, and beautiful actress who made her money by stripping in the theater, then charging large sums to the men who wanted to pay her to prostitute herself to them after. She got her start working in a brothel as an underage sex worker, before she worked her way up to the theater.

She became famous from these shows in Constantinople; and she used her fame to attract many wealthy and prestigious johns. At 16 she became concubine to a Syrian official and traveled to Africa with him for his governorship. At age 20, he abandoned her, and she made her way back home.

On her way, she fell pregnant, and gave birth to a son, whom she left behind in the care of his father.

Once in Rome, she got herself in front of the Emperor, and used the wiles she'd developed in years on the stage and as a prostitute to entrance Justinian. He soon married her. He had to change a law forbidding emperors from marrying prostitutes to do it, too.

This actress and prostitute wife to the Emperor then introduced her fellow actress and prostitute friend Antonina to Belisarius (who may or may not have known of her history), and the two quickly wed.

Unlike almost every other woman like this, there are no rumors of Theodora being unfaithful to Justinian, and she supposedly transformed into a chaste wife after marriage. Either that or, unlike Faustina and Antonina, she was simply much less transparent about her indiscretions.

In fact, she went so far to protect her new chaste, virtuous image that, when her bastard son sought her out after he'd grown into a man, she met him smilingly, then abandoned him to her guards, whereupon he was executed and his body disposed of. There could be no evidence to impugn the honor of Empress Theodora.

Like Faustina and Antonina, Theodora was said to have a great amount of control over her husband, the Emperor Justinian.

Justinian, an intelligent, cultured, and ambitious man (if somewhat indolent), fell captive to a powerful and controlling wife with a sordid past (and future, if you consider her son; or some of her other machinations, such as causing her husband to de-pope a pope she disliked, the first time the government had interfered with the running of the Catholic Church).

How do otherwise powerful, intelligent, wealthy, and resourceful men end up so under some women's thumbs?

 

Do you think you could date or marry a woman like Antonina, Faustina, or Theodora and keep your pimp hand strong?

Because I'll tell you, I've seen so many guys go into relationships like this, where they were totally confident they'd be able to keep control with their woman, because they are "strong dudes" and "you don't really know what she's like" and "she's actually a great girl."

Then a few years later you see the guy and he's a hollowed out shell of a man who has shifted into overdrive trying to convince everyone around him what a saint his woman is, while she's out openly having affairs and making him look bad to all (much like what Marcus was doing by talking up Faustina's 'chastity').

This is where the phrase "can't turn a ho into a housewife" comes from.

This is not some silly song lyric or cliché advice you can safely ignore because it wouldn't apply to you or your sweetie.

It is sage, sober advice for men who think they can take a woman with ruinous long-term potential and "tame" her or "save" her (or that she will change on her own).

The issue here is not strength, at all.

It is selection.

 

Too-Trusting Men Get Too-Duplicitous Women

I hate to say it, because I feel like I'm going to ruin some guys' innocence here.

But: men who are too trusting (either due to lack of experience with the female sex or due to an excess of hubris) are the men who end up with duplicitous women.

I've seen it both ways.

You get the guy who is very or relatively inexperienced with women, and he gets a girl who is much hotter than he thought he'd get. Not one to look a gift horse in the mouth, he quickly wifes her up.

However, one of the ways inexperienced men / men unschooled with women date out of their leagues in looks/personality is by taking a woman from the discount rack.

That is:

• She's crazy
• She's slutty
• Or she's some other kind of bad news

A lot of guys get so excited over the hotness or charisma or seeming compatibility of the girl they're getting that they overlook her (sometimes major) downsides and go straight to getting together with her quick.

Yet these 'discount rack' women often specifically do move quick with guys, to lock them down ASAP before the guy can start having second thoughts.

Many of them engage in a tactic called 'love bombing', where they make the guy feel so good, so loved, and so needed that he falls head-over-heels with the girl and moves toward commitment with lightning speed.

Meanwhile, the guy with a big head sees all this stuff and either it doesn't register as a red flag because "no woman can get one over on me!" or because he's so caught up with male affairs (the gym, business, politics, video games, hobbies, friends) he doesn't really pay a lot of attention to his woman situation, and any sufficiently hot woman who seems to match up well with him will do.

Either way, he ends up trusting in her ("I'm sure she'll settle down once we're in a relationship") and in himself ("She might be a bit of a handful... but I can handle her!") more than either of them deserves, and he puts himself into the position he ends up in.

 

How to Not End Up Cucked or Whipped

I've written plenty on here before about how you need a strong frame throughout your relationship with a woman, always.

The more beautiful the woman (particularly if she knows it), the stronger a frame you will generally need.

Other things lend themselves to you requiring a stronger frame to keep command with a woman, including:

• Feminist beliefs
• Career engagement/potential
• Friends that pull her a different way from you
• Craziness / personality disorders
• High partner count

The only reason to date a woman with any of these qualities, in my opinion, is if you like those qualities.

e.g., I like women who have good careers, so I accept that because I'm choosing women who are both a.) beautiful and b.) in good careers, I am going to need a certain level of frame strength and I will always have to deal with a certain degree of testing from these women.

If you're a male feminist and you want to date a girl with those beliefs, then presumably you would, but if you were smart about it you would realize going in you'll be dealing with a woman who is going to test you more and assert herself more.

Same with if you were dating a woman with friends who pulled her away from you -- I don't know why you'd want that unless you really liked the challenge of it (I think some guys do).

High partner count gals might be fun if you wanted to do an open relationship and aren't the sort who'll get attached to the girl or annoyed at her late night rendezvous.

Craziness/personality disorders, I don't know why you'd want a woman with those, unless you really had no better options with women. Sadly, this is the case for many men -- though hopefully none reading this site.

On the other hand, I have known guys who (after getting burned by too-difficult-to-control women) ditched all these difficulty modifiers and went for women who were none of the above:

• Physically unattractive
• Going-nowhere career
• Traditional beliefs
• Few friends or aligned friends
• Normal, agreeable personalities
• Low partner counts

In fact, I see this advice bandied about a lot online by men who've been burned by some beautiful-yet-uncontrollable woman they dated/married. "Date a 10, marry a 6," they say.

And that is definitely one way to do it: throw out all the stuff that makes a woman more entitled (including beauty) and settle for a girl who lacks both the undesirable and the desirable "makes her harder" characteristics.

This is the "lower your sights" school of thought.

I don't subscribe to that myself.

Then there is the "be practical and know what you're getting into" school of thought, which is mine.

These qualities are IN, for me:

• Beauty
• Good career

These qualities are OUT, for me:

• Feminist beliefs
• Friends that pull her away from you
• Craziness / personality disorders
• High partner counts

I will still hook up with these girls. Just not enter into serious relationships with them (and if she's sufficiently crazy, I will not even sleep with her. Crazy girls are the highest risk girls for all kinds of bad outcomes).

Note that you don't have to be totally ultra extreme about all of these.

I have dated girls who have moderate feminist beliefs. Most women have some degree of pro-female empowerment belief system engrained in them (honestly, most Western men these days do too). If it's just a mild, passing thing with her thought it is usually fine.

Likewise, I have dated girls with mild personality disorders, like moderate obsessive-compulsive or attention deficit. Those can be annoying, but it isn't a total deal breaker if she's otherwise very good-looking, fun, kind, smart, and sexually and emotionally compatible.

However, if I know a girl goes to feminist rallies, or that she has borderline personality disorder, she is out so hard she'll be rubbing her bottom after she bounces off the pavement.

If I know she's on pills, or that she's shagged half the guys in town, or that her friends are all wild party animals, she's not going to be a girlfriend for me.

You must be equally discerning with the women you admit into your life.

This is a point I harp on repeatedly on Girls Chase.

Being strong is not enough to save you if you choose as a woman one who is a vortex.

There are women out there who are simply forces of nature.

They cannot be directed, led, or controlled.

Read more: Her Raw Material or Your Relationship Skills: Which Matters More?

The strongest men on Earth will eventually (often, quickly) be worn down by uncontrollable women.

Any man who goes with them will eventually leave in fury and frustration, or bow to them and accept being whipped and cuckolded (although he may instead choose to lie to it about himself, claim the girl's a saint, and go nuts attacking all the people who suggest otherwise).

You cannot date a vortex.

You can only get away from it... or get sucked in, tossed about by its winds, and eventually thrown out and shattered.

 

No vortex-women, no vortex. Right?

Simple enough.

All close relationships have drama.

You're never going to meet another person with exactly the same wants, drives, and direction in life as you. Arguments occur when two people feel bound to each other yet feel like things aren't going the way they want.

The trouble is that if a woman's wants are too far distant from your wants, she is going to be on you continually until either you break her or she breaks you.

Typically speaking, the partner who is on offense (the one nagging, needling, and complaining) is going to be the one who wins in the end, if by nothing other than attrition.

You can't win on defense.

Thus, when men get together with women who are too much of a handful, they invite into their lives a continual stream of nagging, needling, whining, complaining, shouting, and drama that will, sooner or later, cause them to alter their behavior. You can avoid losing control of yourself and your relationship by choosing wisely.

That means if you're inexperienced, go get some experience with women and avoid the drive to wife up the first girl who falls into your lap (because she may truly be an angel... or those wings you mistook for angel wings may instead be those of a succubus... but either way, inexperienced you will not be able to tell the difference).

And it means if you do have some experience, set your hubris aside.

I've had a bunch of relationships with beautiful, ambitious women with plenty of options and forceful personalities. I have subdued these women, and had them admit to me that I was the only men to have done that -- they bossed around their former boyfriends and left them when they failed to keep up with them. I know I can stay in control with even very powerful women on an upward trajectory in life.

But I won't date crazy chicks.

I won't have a long-term relationship with high count girls, or avowed feminists, or women whose friends yank them toward paths too far distant from the one I'm traveling down.

The simple reason is because I don't want my entire life to revolve around either handling drama or, alternately, insensibly bending myself to the will of some woman who is just on me 24/7 with drama over the tiniest things, getting me to change this little behavior, then that little behavior, then this BIG behavior, and so on, until I'm whipped and cucked.

When I enter into a relationship, my radar is up looking for any sign that a woman is one who is going to bend over backwards trying to whip me at some point.

Not because I don't think I can handle it. Maybe I could.

Maybe I could date a crazy, high count feminist girl whose friends are always telling her to come go on some all-girls trip to Drunk Slut Island, and manage to maintain a firm pimp hand over her. It's possible.

However, I do not want to.

If you think you can ever totally tame a woman like this, and turn her into the perfect little wifey, you're mistaken.

You will always, always be working to keep this girl under control.

I don't want a woman I need to keep under control. I want one I am aligned with, who wants what I want, and isn't fighting with me all the time to do things I don't want her to do, or get me to do things I don't want to do, or to get me to stop doing things I want or need to.

This should be what you seek too: not a woman you must control, or that you hope will (past some indefinite point in the future) 'settle into' alignment with you, but rather a woman who's lined up with you -- with what you want and where you want the relationship to go -- from the get-go.

Treat your relationships this way, and you can avoid ruining your life's work, like Marcus Aurelius, or being the guy everyone pities despite his great works, like Belisarius, because his woman is running around on him, disgracing him everywhere she goes.

There are plenty of women out there who (while they will still cause drama and headaches) are not going to be these totally horrible, cucking, whipping women.

In fact, the women who whip and cuck men are a (highly visible) minority of women.

But they are a danger to you if you're a self-improvement orientated man.

If you dress well, if you make your own money, if you've achieved some level of prominence, these women will seek you out.

It's your duty, to yourself, and to those others in your life who care about you, that, as you elevate your profile and become a better, stronger, and more capable man, you become more discerning at the same time, and screen out the women who are going to be a problem if you let them in.

Chase