Rational Philosophy

More Valentine’s day ice-water; on the philosophy of charm and its opposite: Bill Clinton, Vladimir Putin and British men.

In recent history, Bill Clinton, as president, stood out for many as man of great personal charm. Bill Clinton in his supporting role as Hillary’s pit-bull has been less widely admired for his charm. Vladimir Putin charmed George Bush early in Bush’s presidency, and he seems to have charmed a Russian populace eager to swoon again for strong, dynamic leadership. But, as an outsider, Putin’s charm seems about as thin as the ice on the Dead Sea.

I wonder what role charm plays in life, how it works, and when it breaks down?

Charm is a form of deception in which the deceived is complicit. The charmer uses strategems to make the charmee feel special. The strategems work to falsify or exaggerate the degree to which the charmer really believes in the charmee being special. The charmee on some level recognizes that he or she is being charmed but appreciates the effort being exerted. The apparent exchange then: “I like you; thank you for liking me,” masks a more subtle exchange “I am willing to exert myself for your benefit; thank you for exerting yourself for my benefit.”

Looked at this way, we can see that charm doesn’t really work unless the person being charmed feels on some level or in some way inferior to the person doing the charming. That’s why Vladimir Putin can charm the Russian people who have felt somewhat rudderless in the post-cold war era, or George Bush who doesn’t hold a candle to Putin in terms of ruthlessness and political savvy, but not the average westerner who reads the news and sees right through Putin’s waxy smile.

The person doing the charming also has to have something to gain from exerting the effort. This can sometimes be directly related to the process of charming — getting something out of the charmee. But it can also be indirectly related. Bill Clinton, I hazzard to propose, charmed people as president in order to develop and sustain a cult of charm. He positively glowed with charm and understood that this glow would extend to far greater reaches than the person toward whom he was directing his attention at any moment in time.

Bill Clinton the dutiful husband has nothing personally to gain from being charming. He’s not running for president. One can’t imagine that he’d be happy back in the White House playing, at best, second fiddle to Hillary. Consciously, I’m sure he believes he’s supporting Hillary, but subconsciously he’s undermining her through his charmless tactics.

The British men surveyed by a manufacturer of large screen TVs probably did so anonymously. And yet, there’s still something charmless about the statistic that 50% of them would trade in six months of sex for a 50 inch screen. (I imagine you can hear the French men laughing all the way from Dover as they purchase their ferry tickets for a quick trip to woo the not-so-merry maids of England.)

Charm or lack of charm can be a characteristic of nations as well as individuals. I can say this because I’m British, but the British (with the exception of the shrinking upper class) are charmless because they feel inferior to everyone. The charmer has to feel superior to someone. The French feel superior to everyone, which makes them the people most capable of charm, but their arrogance is their achilles heel — most of the time they can’t be bothered to be charming because they feel they have nothing to gain from it.

And since I’m generalizing offensively, I’ll say that men tend to be less charming than women unless they’re trying to seduce a woman… or get her to buy them a large screen TV. 

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