Posted: Sat Nov 07, 2009 10:04 am Post subject: Alpha males gone bad. When do they stop being attractive
I like a good alpha male in a romance novel as much as the next person, but there is alpha and then there is beyond alpha. Some romance authors take the alpha male and all the traits that make an alpha appealing and turn him pathelogical and almost a caricature - a person who today would be urged into years of counselling. While strong, protective and self-assured are all admirable qualities, aggression, obsession and possession raise red flags for me and leave me feeling worried for the poor heroine and less than satisfied with the HEA.
I have found recently that I tend to enjoy a alpha/beta mix hero most of all. Strong and domineering when the situation calls for it, but on the surface gentle and unassuming. And, there are authors that do this mix very well, IMO.
I am sure this topic has been done to death, but I just wanted to get it off my chest. Why does it have to be one extreme or another and nothing in between.
Joined: 11 Apr 2007 Posts: 578 Location: California
Posted: Sat Nov 07, 2009 10:09 am Post subject:
I tend not to enjoy the over the top stalker type alpha or the indiscriminate man slut that lots of authors write, just because I just can never believe the HEA can take place. At least not to the extent that it happens in romance books.
So for me, it really has never been attractive.
There is a difference between the strong dominant guy and the strng dominant controlling dude who stalks the heroine and keeps her like a possession.
Joined: 25 Aug 2009 Posts: 68 Location: Western Massachusetts
Posted: Sat Nov 07, 2009 10:24 am Post subject:
I think we have to remember these stories are Fantasy and we differ as individuals in what it is we like to fantasize about. Often it is men very different from the ones with whom we share our lives.
Laura Kinsale's article in Dangerous Men and Adventurous Women first made me aware of the extent to which the Hero expresses the reader.
I've noticed among my writing friends that the ones who are married to very dominant men who behave like the traditional Alpha tend write nice guy heros, while, those of us who are fortunate enough to have found kind, sensitive, faithful, beta type spouses are more likely to write Alphas.
This may also be because those of us with more dominant personalities attract more beta mates, and so it is easier for us empathize with the dominant hero within ourself.
Another issue is craft. Brilliant writers can make us fall in love with anyone. Consider Dorothy Dunnett's Lymond. He is so brilliantly constructed and portrayed it is very hard not to fall in love with him. But few writers have her gift.
Joined: 22 Mar 2007 Posts: 4127 Location: minneapolis
Posted: Sat Nov 07, 2009 11:21 am Post subject:
[quote="JMM"]Apples and oranges.
A bully's a bully - nasty, immature, wanting his way at all costs.
An Alpha male is an Alpha male - protective, used to being in charge because SOMEONE has to be, but willing to listen.
quote]
And when those two personalities converge, it makes a very disagreeable male. I'm thinking "heroes" like, Clayton, from Whitney My Love, or perhaps, Brandon from Flame and the Flower by Woodiwiss. These two guys are alphas + they are both bullies which only = nightmare. _________________ Miss Willard at first refused to get into a lifeboat, and so an exasperated officer said, "Don't waste time-let her go if she won't get in!"
A bully's a bully - nasty, immature, wanting his way at all costs.
An Alpha male is an Alpha male - protective, used to being in charge because SOMEONE has to be, but willing to listen.
The problem is when an author can't discern which is which.
That's it, exactly. I think maybe some authors think more is better and go to the extreme when portraying an alpha male only to end up with a possessive bully that is more scary than attractive.
A bully's a bully - nasty, immature, wanting his way at all costs.
An Alpha male is an Alpha male - protective, used to being in charge because SOMEONE has to be, but willing to listen.
quote]
And when those two personalities converge, it makes a very disagreeable male. I'm thinking "heroes" like, Clayton, from Whitney My Love, or perhaps, Brandon from Flame and the Flower by Woodiwiss. These two guys are alphas + they are both bullies which only = nightmare.
For me Brandon is truly an alpha, though of the disagreeable sort. He is clearly in charge on his ship and shows that he has leadership qualities, he can fight like a demon when the need arises and he always protects Heather when she needs protection, going so far as to marry her and fight for her within an inch of his life. He can be nasty, a bully, whatever, but he clearly has these Alpha male qualities.
However in the whole book of WML Clayton never displayed Alpha male qualities. When he has messed up big time with Whitney he doesn't marry her but writes her out a check like the worst sort of coward and let Whitney, his former fiancée (and therefore his responsibility as a gentleman and leader) face social ostracism. A true Alpha male would have apologized and dragged Whitney to the altar and be it only to make a possible child legitimate and to make Whitney "honorable" again. But he drops the girl like a hot potato instead.
He also never fights, only poor Whitney with a riding crop. When he thinks someone has slept with Whitney he punishes her instead of going out to a duel as a true Alpha male would have done (Just watch the movie "Onegin" to see how true Alpha males of that time dealt with infidelity). Clayton is far too cowardly to go out on a duel (he could get injured or die), he rather beats up little girls. A bully and a weakling, the very opposite of an Alpha IMO. He also never shows any leadership qualities whatsoever, only prances about like a bloody peacock. His only actions are to bully Whitney. He's not even a spy or a former soldier. He is just a social scion who takes himself far too seriously and who would never have been able to lead a ship or a battalion-faced with true men he would run like the wimp he is under all this bluster. Men only respect him because of his social status, something that is just an inherited privilege, nothing he has achieved for himself. He never proves himself in the book and there's not one single fight with another man.
Another issue is craft. Brilliant writers can make us fall in love with anyone. Consider Dorothy Dunnett's Lymond. He is so brilliantly constructed and portrayed it is very hard not to fall in love with him. But few writers have her gift.
I couldn't agree more, but very few romance novel authors have the chance to develop their heroes' personalities throughout several long books! (On the other hand, I was absolutely fascinated by Lymond by the end of page one of Game of Kings, and he hadn't even personally appeared yet).
To me, an alpha male is someone very self-confident, and a healthy self-confidence (as opposed to arrogance) includes being able to realize and admit that one was wrong and another person was right. It also includes treating other people with respect.
I recently read a book with a really despicable "alpha" hero - I mean Sarah Mayberry's She's Got It Bad. That man got ridiculously jealous for no apparent reason and he always tried to order the heroine around.
Joined: 12 Mar 2008 Posts: 686 Location: Bremen, Germany
Posted: Sat Nov 07, 2009 9:41 pm Post subject:
I dislike the terms alpha and beta hero anyway, because alpha and beta males (and females) are terms used for animals. These terms are not really suited to discussing the protagonists of romance novels, unless we're dealing with werewolf romances and the like.
However, since the terms have been established for certain types of characters, I vastly prefer what are usually termed beta heroes. I do like some character referred to as alpha heroes, as long as they behave honourably, but my threshold of annoyance with so-called alpha heroes is low. Controlling behaviour, unfounded violence against those that are weaker (this usually includes the heroine but also children, animals, other women and weaker men), verbal and emotional abuse and sexual assault are dealbreakers for me, which means I have to be careful about older romances and many historicals. In fact, controlling behaviour of any sort is one of my biggest relationship red flags and if a heroine puts up with controlling behaviour from the hero, I immediately lose respect for both of them.
I read Laura Kinsale's essay, and while it's one of the better essays in Dangerous Men and Adventurous Women (which I had serious problems with), I do not agree with her point about women with dominant partners preferring beta heroes and women with subordinate partners preferring alpha heroes. I can only speak from experience (but then, so does Laura Kinsale I assume), but in my experience it seems to me that many of the women who seek out romances with extreme alpha males also prefer a more traditional role distribution in their own relationships, while those who wouldn't put up with dominating and controlling behaviour in real life also won't put up with that in their fiction.
This does not apply to those alpha heroes who are honourable and protective without displaying violence, cruelty and controlling behaviour. There's nothing wrong with those alphas, it's just the bullies and jerks I can't stand.
I dislike the terms alpha and beta hero anyway, because alpha and beta males (and females) are terms used for animals. These terms are not really suited to discussing the protagonists of romance novels, unless we're dealing with werewolf romances and the like.
However, since the terms have been established for certain types of characters, I vastly prefer what are usually termed beta heroes. I do like some character referred to as alpha heroes, as long as they behave honourably, but my threshold of annoyance with so-called alpha heroes is low. Controlling behaviour, unfounded violence against those that are weaker (this usually includes the heroine but also children, animals, other women and weaker men), verbal and emotional abuse and sexual assault are dealbreakers for me, which means I have to be careful about older romances and many historicals. In fact, controlling behaviour of any sort is one of my biggest relationship red flags and if a heroine puts up with controlling behaviour from the hero, I immediately lose respect for both of them.
I read Laura Kinsale's essay, and while it's one of the better essays in Dangerous Men and Adventurous Women (which I had serious problems with), I do not agree with her point about women with dominant partners preferring beta heroes and women with subordinate partners preferring alpha heroes. I can only speak from experience (but then, so does Laura Kinsale I assume), but in my experience it seems to me that many of the women who seek out romances with extreme alpha males also prefer a more traditional role distribution in their own relationships, while those who wouldn't put up with dominating and controlling behaviour in real life also won't put up with that in their fiction.
This does not apply to those alpha heroes who are honourable and protective without displaying violence, cruelty and controlling behaviour. There's nothing wrong with those alphas, it's just the bullies and jerks I can't stand.
I think the trouble is here that there are no clear-cut definitions on alpha males. For some alpha males are simply self-confident leaders and warrior-types and those might be honorable but aren't necessarily. For some, an alpha guy is simply one who is arrogant, bullies women and sleeps around and is shy of commitment. I find the terms are used here in a wrong fashion.
Let's take some indisputable real alpha guys:
Barrack Obama and George Bush. Whether you like them or not or think them honorable or not is not the question. If the leader of the (still) most powerful nation on earth is not alpha I don't know who is.
Do these guys bully their wives or women in general? No
Are they arrogant? Some would say yes, some would say no.
Do they sleep around and are shy of commitment? No. Both are family men. But what makes them alpha males is that they are extremely competitive and were able to-by power of their intellect, strength, charisma or sheer power of will-take over leadership. Just inheriting leadership doesn't an alpha guy make IMO. So the Duke of sluts is not automatically an alpha, IMO he has to prove his maleness on a field where his title no longer protects him. There were infant kings and kings who were mad as a hatter, so just having inherited a title does prove nothing to me. And that alpha males bully women-that unfortunately can happen, but if the hero only bullies women he's a just a weakling. He in any case has to show that he's stronger and braver than the other men around him and he certainly doesn't prove that by bullying the heroine.
I recently watched a documentary about the downfall of the Lehman brothers and and you got to see Dick Fuld (former leader of the Lehman bank) and John Thain (former leader of Merryl Lynch)
Dick Fuld is the classical example of a romance novel alpha hero, aggressive, extremely domineering, threatening, extremely arrogant.
John Thain comes along as the classic beta hero, nice, kind, supportive and thoughtful.
But in the end, who was more successful? John Thain. He manged to make the deal with the bank of America while Dick Fuld lost the game.
So in the end who was the true alpha male? IMO, John Thain. A true leader also knows when to be supportive and knows how to make friends and allies along the way. Antagonizing everyone is just plain stupid IMO and more the sign of a megalomaniac dictator, and as we know those always tumble in the end. So I guess those labels are just wrong. If the hero of a romance novel is the leader of a big corporation or a highly decorated general and comes along as the nice guy, romancing the heroine, treating her well, he is still very clearly an alpha or is he not? And a guy who's a policeman or a detective who works on the street but has still a boss who can tell him what to do and what not to do, he can be as bullying as he wants to, but he's not an alpha. He's not a leader. He's beta because he has to obey orders. There's nothing wrong with being beta (most of us are) but alphas are always leaders.
In real life I usually don't meet alphas and when, only in a professional surrounding. They are a very rare species, leaders of the pack.
I think if I met one who would be kind and honorable and a leader, too I would find that tremendously sexy, yes. A man who has power and doesn't abuse it. Wow. My cousin's husband is alpha and they have a very good marriage, even after twenty years. They still flirt with each other. He's a great guy but the downside of this type of man is that they are by nature competitive and my cousin who always leads some company has nothing better to do in his spare time than run marathons and climb on mountains, going to his limits even during vacation. I guess that might get exhausting, to live with such a man but on the other hand, he still looks very virile at age fifty-he doesn't sport a belly and looks tough and fit. I can easily picture myself with an alpha because I would probably have a beta man with no hidden alpha male potential under my thumb within a week, the women in my family tend to get very domineering once they are married and the men obey them. Not a good thing IMO. An alpha male would be great to keep the balance of power in a relationship for me but is is tough to find one. So far I haven't been successful.
Joined: 12 Apr 2007 Posts: 176 Location: Northern Finland
Posted: Sun Nov 08, 2009 7:02 am Post subject:
Ditto to most of what Kerstin said.
I don't like these terms either. I'm never quite sure what exactly the person using them means with them so to me they seem pretty useless as adjectives describing the hero.
I used to specifically seek out "alpha heroes" in my reading, I still often do and the different interpretations people have for the words "alpha" and "beta" make it really difficult at times. I find that I still don't quite understand what people mean when they speak about "beta" heroes. (For some reason "alpha" seems more established be it in good or bad.) I thought I did, but I've begun to think that we each have our individual interpretations that seem to be pretty different from others. So what sort of adjectives/behaviour (good and bad) would you categorize as "alpha"?
I'd say (off the top of my head):
confidence
good self-esteem
intelligence
the inclination to be the one who makes the decisions in a difficult/controversial situation
control/restrain
focus
And whether or not the man turns out to be a bully or a hero is up to the skill of the author? Are any of these not also applicaple to a "beta" hero in your mind?
I don't like these terms either. I'm never quite sure what exactly the person using them means with them so to me they seem pretty useless as adjectives describing the hero.
I used to specifically seek out "alpha heroes" in my reading, I still often do and the different interpretations people have for the words "alpha" and "beta" make it really difficult at times. I find that I still don't quite understand what people mean when they speak about "beta" heroes. (For some reason "alpha" seems more established be it in good or bad.) I thought I did, but I've begun to think that we each have our individual interpretations that seem to be pretty different from others. So what sort of adjectives/behaviour (good and bad) would you categorize as "alpha"?
I'd say (off the top of my head):
confidence
good self-esteem
intelligence
the inclination to be the one who makes the decisions in a difficult/controversial situation
control/restrain
focus
And whether or not the man turns out to be a bully or a hero is up to the skill of the author? Are any of these not also applicaple to a "beta" hero in your mind?
T
I think many of those traits might be applicable to beta heroes as well or beta males in real life. I also think that some betas have potential to become alphas and might show that potential in a dangerous situation where they keep a cool head and make decisions. But in general a beta hero/man feels comfortable with taking orders and doesn't feel the need to give orders or automatically be the leader of a group. For me personally a beta man is one who in private life would back down in an argument with his wife for the sake of peace even if he knows his standpoint is right and valuable. He doesn't like conflict and prefers a cozy home. Of course there might be beta men out there who are no leaders but who can take a confrontation with a strong woman without backing down.
But since that term has been derived from the animal world, alphas are per definition leaders IMO, no matter how assertive a beta might be in private life.
Anyone disagree with the leadership theory? What's your definition of an alpha?
Joined: 25 Aug 2009 Posts: 68 Location: Western Massachusetts
Posted: Sun Nov 08, 2009 8:45 am Post subject:
SusiB wrote:
I couldn't agree more, but very few romance novel authors have the chance to develop their heroes' personalities throughout several long books! (On the other hand, I was absolutely fascinated by Lymond by the end of page one of Game of Kings, and he hadn't even personally appeared yet).
Exactly. And when he does appear, though we believe he just burned down his mother's castle, he is irresistible.
Going to another extreme, when we first meet Darcy he is rude and snobbish and has obnoxious friends, which should rule him out entirely. It doesn't.
One of my biggest peeves about today's romances is that too often the heros who are supposed to be Dark and Dangerous rarely are. If they growl in chapter one they must stop to pet a puppy in chapter two to assure the nervous reader they really are a very nice man.
I like heroes who are magnetic, dynamic, larger than life and who would never be described by anyone as "very nice men" but whose impact is such it can transform the heroine's life. I like them to be a bit haunted and have trauma in their past but only if it isn't the Same Old traumas that we see trotted out over and over again.
What turns me off is shallowness. When we are told someone is a billionaire, or rake, or powerful warrior, but don't see any evidence of that in the way he behaves when he steps out onto the stage, then we can only evaluate him on the actions we are told about, and if they are ones that seem evil, we will reject him.
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