Women can smell a man with Nice Guy Syndrome. Sometimes it’s an all-out stench. Other times it’s a hard-to-place stink that becomes apparent later, like finding out, days after the fact, the cat somehow managed to shit under the sofa.
Sometimes it manifests itself when you've dared to commit the sin of leaving a text unanswered and the follow up is some variation of:
“hellooo :)?”
“what, you think you’re too nice to respond?”
“WELL F**K YOU, YOU UGLY WHORE.”
But it’s definitely a smell, and one the now dearly departed Dr. Alex on this year’s Love Island had throughout the whole series, like someone wearing laundry that was left in the machine too long.
The trademark Nice Guy signs were there from the start but were bulldozed by the masterclass in barely concealed hatred for women that was Geordie personal trainer, Adam Collard. And so the nation got behind the good doctor. Why hasn’t this adorable and ostensibly attractive gentleman with manners and a respected job got a date yet!? You women don’t know what’s good for you!
But as the series progressed, we got to see Dr. Alex’s pink-faced rage at women not falling at his feet. There was his tantrum at being romantically rejected by Ellie, even though he deigned to make her avocado toast — something he’d replicate himself further down the line with Alexandra and shrug at what the big deal was. There was him getting more excited over a Ferrari than the human woman he was coupled up with, before dumping her ("you're pathetic" she told him). And, of course, the many times he was patronising about the women in the villa’s jobs and intellects (Sir, why are you on Love Island?)
Finally, and crucially, there is his profound lack of sauce.
Give the guy a break, you say, it’s not his fault he’s a sauce vacuum! Well, you’re wrong. Let me explain.
Romantic rejection is scientifically proven to be one of the most upsetting psychological experiences you can put yourself through, and yet we willingly participate in this treadmill of shit until we find someone who will put up with us. And, whether men like to acknowledge this or not, it happens to women as much as it happens to men. I mean, Jesus eff, look at the pupu platter of rejection Laura has eaten. But, for the most part, the longer we’re on the treadmill, the more we learn what does and doesn’t work when relating to the opposite sex, we play to our strengths, we get better at reading when someone is interested, and we figure out our sauce because we know the prize is so great.
In contrast, Nice Guy Syndrome, whether Nice Guys like Dr. Alex know it or not, comes from a fundamental belief that women are inferior to you, so they should relent to your advances based purely on you doing the bare minimum of human decency. The problem is we are not arcade games. You cannot keep clumsily cramming ‘nice’ points in and expecting sexual chemistry to appear. There is no aptitude test for niceness we’re secretly conducting on men in order to decide when or if you can be released from the ‘friend zone.’ This is because healthy sex and relationships are not something you “do” to women, they are a merger that requires you to have a genuine and vested interest in the other person, as opposed to a pig-headed fixation with ticking ‘Having A Girlfriend’ off your life achievements list.
Now, I’m sure Dr. Alex’s Nice Guy transgressions have been magnified by the Lord Of The Flies meets Take Me Out format of Love Island, but the lesson remains. No matter how much of a catch you believe you are, being ‘nice’ does not entitle you to a woman’s attention. The world does not owe you love.
