I know some people will be wary about the use of the phrase "cope" and think this is going to be an "incel thread" but it isn't. I am not an incel, in spite of my sympathy for incels. I concede that I do think there are many aspects of "black pill"/"lookist" theory (which I regard ultimately as a subset or spinoff of Red Pill theory) which are correct, however. Yes, I think women are just as shallow/superficial as men; women want hot dudes.

A "cope" refers to a belief which is gratifying to hold, but not true. Its a self-therapeutic delusion produced by motivated reasoning. A "cope" is a lie which is believed in because it is nicer to believe in it than to accept the actual truth.

I believe a certain argument found amongst some Red Pillers is a cope. This argument is as follows:

1. Women who sleep around when younger ultimately are dissatisfied when they decide to settle down with a reliable-provider-who-isn't-sexy. This is because they have been 'alpha-widowed,' their ability to pair-bond with a man has been damaged by their college sluttiness, they are perpetually damaged goods, their vagina has been 'used up' by Chad, etcetera.
2. As a consequence of this, women would in fact be happier under traditionalism because if they are socially shamed away from riding the cock carousel when younger, they'll have lower standards and thus Beta Bob will appear sexy to them. They will thus have a happy life when they commit to Beta Bob, but only if she doesn't get pounded by Chad beforehand.
3. Traditionalism therefore is utility-maximizing for both women and the majority of men, and only Chads lose out, therefore it is a social optimum and all utilitarians should support it.

This is a cope. I propose that what it really works out to is a rationalization intended to avoid the fact that most marriages under traditionalism were not happy, loving, romantic and satisfying, but rather entered into for social acceptability reasons as prudent decisions between people who often did not experience romantic love for each other. Ergo, a return to traditionalism is not utility maximizing; it would reduce the utility of a very large number of women and a substantial number of non-Chad men. Traditionalism means most people will be in loveless marriages. If your goal is satisfying romantic love, traditionalism won't give it to you. Traditionalism only worked when people didn't believe marriage was about love (which I am going to define, for purposes of this argument, as "affection + lust"), when they gave up love in favor of prudence. Traditionalism means either starfish sex or marital rape; she will not see you as Chad merely because she never got plowed by one in real life before.

And that, ultimately, is the "black pill." There are in fact some men whom will never be the object of a woman's lust. Traditionalism gave these men an unloving wife who married them out of necessity, not love, and all the associated costs of having to support such a wife. It gave these men some starfish sex or the right to rape their wives, and this at most represents a reduction of the woman's utility and an increase in the man's (but arguably did not even give the man much utility at all, because if you're raping a woman it is very clear she is not into you and the simple fact is that men want to be wanted).

Advocates of a return to traditionalism for utilitarian reasons, as I see it, work backwards from an idealized version of traditionalism that never really existed (and thus think would be better than traditionalism actually was) to a set of premises about female nature which yield the conclusion they want to see. These premises are the idea that if you keep a woman virginal before marriage, slut-shame women who sleep around, and perhaps (in some versions of the theory) use religious indoctrination... basically deny women a basis for comparison of their man to a "more alpha" man... don't let her "use up her vagina"... stop her from "damaging her ability to pair bond"... she'll respond to her man as if he were Chad.

This won't happen. Women have intense, full fantasy lives. Anyone who looks at romance novels will see that women, irrespective of their life experiences, really like hot and powerful dudes. They already, and perhaps always, have a basis for comparison even if they don't sleep around when young (romance novels, after all, sold back in Victorian times). The typical woman's biology simply won't feel aroused at a guy who isn't hot. What women under traditionalism did was enjoy their fantasies, their "mommy porn," and then decided to do the "practical" thing and marry a man who was "good husband material" whilst continuing to jill off over Fantasy-Chad/Prince-Charming/Mister-Darcy/etc. and just resign themselves to the fact they won't be getting him.

Dreams of low-standard-yet-inexperienced-women enjoying hot-married-sex with the only man they ever fucked? This is a cope. A complete cope. Traditionalism will sacrifice the utility of many women (who, going by their actions, often prefer singlehood to marrying Beta Bob), and even the utility of many men (who, if they are honest, would not want to be merely a useful provider to a woman who doesn't really lust after them). Chads would get less utility too, and whilst I totally understand a desire to stick it to Chad and make him pay, he's a person and in utilitarian analysis he must be counted. At most, it may help men who genuinely want to be fathers but can't attract women, but would they want to have offspring with 50% of the genes of a woman who doesn't love them? Arguably not.