What causes bad boys to treat women like shit? I don't know, but here are some thoughts.
They do it because they can. They have no need to treat women well because they have an endless supply. They are gifted with qualities that women admire, so they're never without a woman, no matter how bad they treat them. Nice guys usually don't have the charisma women flock to with a snap like Fonzie, so they value and appreciate them more.
Still, why doesn't their own internal sense of right and wrong tell them it's wrong to treat women this way? Or why didn't their mother teach them? They probably are aware on some level that it's wrong, but the rewards they get from it outweigh any twinge of conscience they feel.
What are the rewards then? For men, having beautiful women is a status symbol. Men admire and respect the man who not only has lots of women but who manipulates them and controls them and disregards them. To have a cavalier attitude toward your trophy only makes men admire and envy you more. Like Jack Nicholson carelessly tossing away a thousand-dollar pair of designer gloves because he doesn't like the color, men admire the man who tosses away beautiful women right and left because he can replace them so easily. He seems "rich" in their eyes.
So the bad boy's reward for being a dick to women is the respect and admiration of other men. And women reward his behavior too by flocking him and forgiving him and ignoring his bad behavior and making excuses for him.
So the conclusion I've come to is this: we women can help change this. We don't have to give up our bad boy addiction, but we have to stop accepting their bad behavior. We have to be willing to be alone rather than put up with it. We all have to do this because it won't work if there's just another woman waiting behind who is willing to put up with it. We have to teach our daughters how to set boundaries and demand respect.
Guess what. Men can help change this too. Stop glorifying women as trophies and start thinking of them as people who deserve your respect just as much as men. If your buddy is an asshole to his lady, don't give him a high five--make it clear you do not approve.
