Modern society suffers from a dangerous optical illusion. We look around at our paved roads, our stocked grocery stores, and our corporate HR departments. We perceive safety as the default state of the world. Because we feel safe, we assume our primary challenge is how to be fair. We obsess over how to divide the pie so that everyone gets an equal slice. We frame our social games around “Care,” “Inclusion,” and “Equity.”
But a Game Theorist knows that safety is not the default. Entropy is the default. Scarcity is the default. The pie does not appear by magic. It must be baked in a furnace. The furnace is expensive, difficult to maintain, and competitive.
To understand the friction in modern culture—specifically the tension between traditional “Male Competitive Structures” and contemporary “Female Caring Structures” (or Feminism)—we must look through the lens of Cause and Effect. We must separate what is Necessary (that which allows us to survive) from what is Contingent (that which will enable us to flourish).
When we confuse the two, we don’t just lose the game; we lose the game. We break the board. E
The “Lifeboat” Theorem: Imagine a lifeboat (The Company) in a storm (The Market).
In calm waters (Economic Surplus), the Contingent is lovely. In a storm (Economic Necessity), the Contingent becomes a distraction. If the rower stops rowing to hold someone’s hand, the boat sinks, and both the rower and the person being comforted drown.
Therefore, the “Cruelty” of the Necessary is actually the ultimate form of kindness, because it preserves the vessel that allows the Contingent to exist.
Imagine a prehistoric village facing a harsh winter. To survive, the town needs a massive influx of calories. They have two choices, modeled by the game theorist Jean-Jacques Rousseau in The Stag Hunt 1
Option A is the Hare. A hunter can go out alone and catch a rabbit. It’s low risk, but the reward is small—only enough to feed himself.
Option B is the Stag. The village can band together to hunt a stag. The reward is massive—enough to feed everyone for a month. But catching a stag is incredibly difficult. It requires silence, speed, discipline, and total coordination. If one hunter is slow, or distracted, or incompetent, the Stag escapes.
Hunting the Stag is the Necessary Game. It represents the “Male Competitive Structure.” This structure is not “toxic”; it is existential. In the Stag Hunt, there is no room for feelings or “equality of situation.” You do not put the slowest runner on the front line just to make him feel included. You put the fastest runner there because if you don’t, the village starves.
This structure is meritocratic, hierarchical, and ruthless. It values Competence above all else. It is the engine of production. Without the Stag, there is no food.
Let’s assume the hunters succeed. The Stag is brought down. Now, the game changes. The danger of starvation has passed, and a surplus exists. Now we enter the Contingent Game: How do we divide the meat?
This is where the “Female Caring Structure”—and the core tenets of modern Feminism—shine. This structure values Distribution, Care, and Equality. It asks: Who needs the food the most? How do we ensure the elderly and the children are fed? How do we make sure everyone feels valued?
This is the game of civilization. It is what makes life worth living. However, it is fundamentally Contingent. It relies entirely on the success of the previous game. You cannot distribute a Stag you did not catch. You cannot care for the vulnerable if the strong have failed to secure the perimeter.
In a logical sequence, Production (The Stag) acts as the Cause, and Care (The Feast) is the effect.
If P (Production), then possibly C (Care).
If \neg P (No Production), then \neg C (No Care).
The crisis in modern organizations—from corporations to universities—stems from a failure to respect this sequence. We have become so wealthy and so safe that we have forgotten the Stag Hunt exists. We have convinced ourselves that the “Caring Structure” is the primary generator of value.
We see this in the rise of Stakeholder Capitalism and aggressive DEI (Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion) policies. These frameworks attempt to impose the rules of the “Contingent Game” (fairness, inclusion, comfort) onto the “Necessary Game” (production, Competence, survival).
Consider a tech company fighting for market share. This is a Stag Hunt. It requires the absolute best engineers and a ruthless focus on product quality. But if that company decides to prioritize “Equality of Situation”—hiring based on demographic quotas rather than pure merit to ensure a “fair” workforce—it introduces Signal Distortion.
In Game Theory, a signal is information. “Merit” is a signal that says, This person will help us catch the Stag. But when you prioritize “Identity” or “Inclusion,” you introduce noise. You begin hiring and promoting people not because they are the fastest runners, but because they fit a moral aesthetic. You are optimizing for the Feast while you are still in the middle of the Hunt.
The effect of this reversal is subtle at first, then catastrophic. This is the Framing Effect in action. When leadership frames the company as a “Family” (Caring Structure) rather than a “Team” (Competitive Structure), the incentives shift.
High performers—the hunters who actually catch the Stag—realize that their Competence is no longer the primary metric for reward. They see resources being diverted to “CARE” departments that produce nothing but policy. They see the “Floor” raised to protect the incompetent, lowering the “Ceiling” for the exceptional.
Rational actors will essentially defect. They will stop hunting the Stag and start hunting Hares (doing the bare minimum to stay employed), or they will leave for a competitor who still respects the Hunt’s laws. The company is left with a diverse, inclusive, and emotionally safe group of people who are unable to compete in the market. The Stag escapes. The surplus vanishes. And ironically, when the surplus vanishes, the “Caring Structure” collapses because there are no resources left to fund it.
Now, a critic will raise a hand here.
Counterargument 1: “But isn’t a diverse team more innovative? Doesn’t ‘Care’ actually help production?”
The Response: This is a conflation of terms. Yes, cognitive diversity (different ways of thinking) helps solve complex problems. But modern Equity structures rarely optimize for cognitive diversity; they optimize for optical diversity (demographic categories) and “safety.” In a true Stag Hunt, you want a diversity of tactics, not a diversity of distractions. Furthermore, while “psychological safety” is helpful, it is a derivative of Competence. You feel safe on a bridge because you know a competent engineer built it, not because the engineer felt “cared for” during the construction.
Counterargument 2: “This sounds like a justification for cruelty. Are you saying we shouldn’t care about people?”
The Response: Not at all. I am saying that Competence is the highest form of compassion.
If you are running a hospital, the most “caring” thing you can do is hire the best surgeons, regardless of their bedside manner or their background. If you hire a lesser surgeon to satisfy a quota or to be “inclusive,” and a patient dies on the table, you haven’t been kind. You have been negligent. The “Competitive Structure” feels harsh. This is because it is binary (Success/Failure). Nevertheless, it is the only structure that guarantees the group’s survival.
We must stop viewing “Male Competitiveness” and “Female Caring” as opposing moral forces. They are functional tools to be used in a specific order.
The Competitive Structure is the Shield. It protects the group from the chaos of nature and the market.
The Caring Structure is the Hearth. It warms the group once the shield is secure.
If you bring the Hearth out onto the battlefield, the fire goes out, and the people die. If we want to preserve the beautiful, contingent values of Feminism—equity, care, and community—we must first respect the Stag Hunt’s cold, necessary values. We must protect the engine of production from our desire to distribute its parts.
Only by winning the game of survival do we earn the privilege of playing the game of equality.
The balance point should consistently and overwhelmingly tilt to creating surpluses.
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Game theory studies strategic decision-making. Outcomes depend on everyone’s choices. It uses concepts like Nash equilibria, mechanism design, and auctions. It spans economics, political science, biology, and beyond.
Nobel Prizes related to game theory (Economics, 1994–2020): 8 laureates total
Akerlof, G. A. (1970). The market for “lemons”: Quality uncertainty and the market mechanism. The Quarterly Journal of Economics, 84(3), 488–500. https://doi.org/10.2307/1879431
Friedman, M. (September 13, 1970). The social responsibility of business is to increase its profits. The New York Times Magazine.
Gilligan, C. (1982). In a different voice: Psychological theory and women’s development. Harvard University Press.
Goodhart, C. A. E. (1975). Problems of monetary management: The UK experience. In A. S. Courakis (Ed.), Inflation, depression, and economic policy in the West (pp. 91–121). Barnes & Noble.
Maslow, A. H. (1943). A theory of human motivation. Psychological Review, 50(4), 370–396. https://doi.org/10.1037/h0054346
Rousseau, J. J. (1984). A discourse on inequality (M. Cranston, Trans.). Penguin Classics. (Original work published 1754).
Why Maslow’s Hierarchy Of Needs Matters
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