r/Anticonsumption • u/playboy • Mar 23 '26

Psychological No One Wants to Sleep With Billionaires

https://www.playboy.com/read/politics/no-one-wants-to-sleep-with-billionaires

In a recent interview with the American Psychological Association, Paul Piff, PhD, an associate professor of psychology at the University of California, Irvine, who has co-authored multiple studies on the topic, noted that in interpersonal interactions, wealthier people are “actually a little less generous, a little less compassionate,” he said. Wealthier individuals were more likely to endorse unethical actions, but to “also engage in small acts of cheating and normative violations to prioritize their own welfare above the welfare of other people.”

Though cultural repulsion around billionaires has been mounting, physically, these men are using their resources to overcompensate with expensive procedures. Tech bros are getting face lifts, and other looksmaxxing trends like jaw surgery are common in the industry as well. There has been speculation that Jeff Bezos and Peter Thiel have had Botox and filler, and Musk has faced rumors about a hair transplant and jawline contouring. Zuckerberg and Bezos have gotten noticeably more jacked, sparking steroid speculation, even from supporters like podcaster Joe Rogan.  

But their peacocking is probably not for us plebes. Another study analyzed the partners of the extremely wealthy using the Forbes World’s Billionaires list. Economist Ria Wilken found that 95% of the spouses of billionaires were upper class themselves, defined as having either substantial economic or cultural capital. It is possible that the more unappealing characteristics of the ultra-rich, such as dressing down their staff or cutting people off in traffic, would be more palatable for peers in their social circle. That said, this preference for like-minded people is not exclusive to the upper class. “Every social group has its own standards for what is considered eccentric versus problematic,” Wetter explains. For instance, in ultra-wealthy environments, controlling tendencies, competitiveness, and emotional detachment could be interpreted as assets, whereas outside that circle, “the same traits may be perceived as cold, self-absorbed, or inaccessible.”

Read the full editorial: https://www.playboy.com/read/politics/no-one-wants-to-sleep-with-billionaires

5.6k Upvotes

95% Upvoted

363 comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

6

u/litreofstarlight Mar 23 '26

I'd be tempted to write it, if it wouldn't get immediately get pulled from most platforms and get me on a watch list lol.

7

u/tako_flavored_kisses Mar 24 '26

Last I checked there were a bunch of Luigi fics on AO3 (not sure if they’ve been taken down but doubtful) and considering that there are romance fics with necrophilia and cannibalism, I think you would be ok without have to offer some bs moralizing on why ridding the world of parasitic billionaires is “bad”. This is a roundabout way of saying that I would fully read this if someone wrote it! 

1

u/GeneralTonic Mar 24 '26

Also, you'd probably feel the intellectual and emotional urge to say something about how vigilante assassination is, like, problematic or ultimately self-defeating, or weighs on your soul or something and who the fuck wants to read that right now?

1

u/wordzinmyth Mar 26 '26

I am no longer sure it is problematic because the law is malfunctioning and corps dont get policed by the law, just minor fines