I have a friend who says she’ll only go out with one other woman at a time –Dyads–she calls them. Why? She says when women are together in groups of 3 or 4, there’s a noticeable jockeying for power akin to the alpha dog tactics in animal groups. She doesn’t trust them, for she says: In those circumstances, they can turn on each other in an instant.
She knows–she’s been victimized by their behavior.
So, what is Alpha Dog Behavior? It’s the kind of thing Jack London wrote about in “White Fang,” or “Call of the Wild,” whereby one dog of a team rises as leader.
Survival depends on the lead animal’s brooking no interference; as such, he drives any would-be competitor into submission, for in the wild, there can be no competing for power. The team relies upon the reality it’s one smooth cohesive force.
I’ve known this behavior is referenced among men who vie for power in the business world (it’s dog-eat-dog world), but I never thought about this same behavior extending to females.
Until recently………..
It occurred when a group of us went out for dinner. One woman in the group (a former nurse) shared as to how she “woke up one morning with no breast on one side.” Having had a mastectomy and reconstruction, following breast cancer, she worried that her implant had ruptured during the night. Another woman in the group said she’d experienced a similar thing.
In talking further, the nurse went on to tell the other woman that the latter had undergone an unnecessary mastectomy, that her cancer hadn’t required that extreme response. More unbelievable still: The nurse gave her on-the-spot diagnosis without any knowledge of the other’s woman’s medical facts.
We were all shocked.
It got me to thinking: Women who are normally empathic and nurturing (don’t we associate these terms with women?) suddenly morph into titans of one-upsmanship in social settings. They wish to shine as informed experts, no matter what the cost to another:
And then I recalled: I’d experienced a form of this behavior before. When I was 25, I went to women’s consciousness-raising meetings put on by the local chapter of National Organization for Women (NOW). While there, we discussed pregnancy, domestic abuse, work-related issues of equitable pay, maternity leave, etc.
I went for a different reason: To resolve my future course in an abusive marriage.
When the facilitator invited us to share our own concerns, I launched into my personal Hell: My husband had been the proverbial “love of my life,” and we’d married after an 18 month courtship. But almost from the moment following our wedding, it was as if a curtain came down delineating our roles: He was the lead player and I was relegated to back-up status. Instances when I veered from the prescribed format brought forth heavy reprisals on me in the form of physical abuse that intensified over time.
I’d come to NOW to get hope from a group of “sisters.”
When I finished speaking, a woman seated next to me said: “I’m surprised that happened to you. You seem much stronger than that.”
There it was–an indictment that I’d somehow brought the abuse on myself; that I invited it because I’m weak. I just didn’t send enough clear and consistent messages to my husband that I wasn’t to be messed with.
Over the years, I’d forgotten that Alpha Dog Behavior can be a characteristic of women, too. The bottom line? It’s never attractive–no matter which gender employs. If it had a legitimate reason in the wilderness, among animals, to insure survival, that reason is lacking in human society.
Here, it’s mere grandstanding, meant to garner respect for one, at the expense of another.***
***Click her for more information on Alpha Dogs and feel free to tell of your own Female Alpha Dog experience ……..
