I am remiss to do this, but the infamous PUA thread is not loading properly anymore due to the abundance of comments. I am hereby closing comments on that thread, and opening this one to continue the discussion.
On that note, I received an email from a reader named Gary. Here’s part of what he had to say:
I read your stuff about PUA’s and how they are teaching men such horrible things [...] I am so glad and appreciative for what you wrote, I was beginning to think I was being dumb for not following these guys teachings, but I am glad I didn’t. See how they play upon a man’s fears and desires? [...] I treat women with respect and as human beings. I value their opinions, their thoughts,etc. The best part is when you meet someone and treat her well and she respects that and expects that ie-doesn’t take yuo for granted. Its not sex focused like these asshats preach. So the sexual tension builds naturally between both people over time. It seems like it is so bad, that women are confused a bit when a guy like me approaches them to chat. It’s like I get murdered by assumptions. [...] I only want one woman, but getting women here to see that is hard. I am not the typical nice guy who is scared to approach,etc. I am confident and nice and genuine, but my god, I have such a hard time. I am not bitter toward women, I am bitter toward these PUA’s who are ruining it for us and for all of you. [emphasis, of course, added; edited for privacy's sake.]
Gary, thank you for writing.
Gary, I empathize with you; I really do. But for what it’s worth, the time will come when things get a lot easier for you. The resistance against mainstream PUAism will only grow from here; with it, the good men like you will have more of a chance and the manipulators will be seen for what they are. I know that sounds like a bunch of platitudes, but it’s been my experience that immorality almost always gets its comeuppance.
Once women become more and more savvy to linguistic, mental, and behavioral controls and manipulations, we will (hopefully) be able to trust without losing our agency–which means the good guys like you will be paired up.:) Hang tough, there, brother–deception and manipulation ALWAYS self-destructs.
It’s astonishing that this topic has got nearly 400 comments when the matter is so simple, respecting women and not to objectify women. Sorry I haven’t had time to read all the comments, but to me it doesn’t seem to be rocket science, using some petty skills only to sleep with a woman without regards to her personality is morally bad. Period.
Thank you for listening to Gary. There are a lot of guys who feel the same way; I am one, too. It all feels very unfair to be tarred with the sins of others, which has given me a lot of sympathy towards other groups similarly prejudiced against, including women as a whole (in our society).
I think one effective strategy against PUAs would begin with recognizing that guys like Gary and myself are their -real- prey, not women, who they see as merely tools to use. I think starving them of that prey would be highly effective at reducing their numbers in the long term, while educating women is probably the most effective at reducing the short term damage.
“It’s astonishing that this topic has got nearly 400 comments when the matter is so simple, respecting women and not to objectify women. ”
IBTP. It’s simply asking to much that women be respected and not objectified, in the eyes of those trained to believe they are entitled to the services of women.
I am actually reading one of the PUA books, “The Game”, at the moment…well, looking at it, I have to finish Audacia’s book first, but I plan to read it. There has been so much talk on this issue, both from people involved in the PUA community and people not involved in it that I decided best thing to do in order to form a more educated opinion on it was to…well, read the book.
Funny that.
MH points **this** out:
“I think one effective strategy against PUAs would begin with recognizing that guys like Gary and myself are their -real- prey, not women, who they see as merely tools to use. I think starving them of that prey would be highly effective at reducing their numbers in the long term, while educating women is probably the most effective at reducing the short term damage.”
You’ve got a good point there, buddy…it very well *could* be that men are the **main** prey, and women are being used as the tools/bait to **lure** men in, especially given that **men** are the primary ones paying umpteen kachillion dollars for learning how to hunt women.
I’m thinking that it depends on the PUA/PUA guru. It wouldn’t surprise me **at all** that for some of the PUA gurus, men are the **actual prey,** and women are the bait/tool/patsies being used for this. The PUA student/PUA thinks he’s hunting women, the PUA guru is targeting the men–for his wallet. **SLICK.**
MH, you’ve got an ** awfully** good point. Tell you what…I look forward to seeing you on this thread, and I’m hoping you have a lot more ideas to contribute. On Monday or Tuesday, I invite you to visit my blog, the Feminist Pit Bull Blog…I’d like to hear what you have to say. **Or, you could simply contribute your 2 cents here on *this* thread.:)** I think using techniques of propaganda analysis could go a long way towards inoculating both men and women against mainstream PUAism…and I’d like to have your ideas. Thank you.:))
sorry my english is terrible *which is really terrible when you consider its my first and only language*
what i was meaning is that with a stranger you can only go by thier looks. Its only through getting to know someone that you can find out about thier personality.
totally man. I just find it really lame this thing that guys have said repeatedly on here and on PU websites where it goes somethign like ‘Respect women? What! I tried that for years but it never worked [to get me laid]‘
That dont sound like respect to me man. And thats the thing it implies that wanting to have sex with someone of the opposite sex means that its inherantly disrepectful to want to. Whereas i can’t think of anything more respectful of a person than being honest with them. I mean even if you didnt like a womans personality but you found her sexually attractive and thus wanted to have casual sex with her, it would still be respectful of her as a person for you to make your assessment open. At least then you give her the respect of being honest.
But if respecting women is just there as a premise to get laid i don’t think that is respect. respect is an end not a means!
BTW been doing some mode one radical honesty its so liberating for everybody to know exactly where they stand and for them thus to react according to an exact knowledge of the true variables presented. I’m loving it.
I’ll be honest I was genuinely extremely interested and engaged while reading this thread for about 3 hours straight from the very beginning until I encountered comments from ‘scarred’ and a couple others. After reading remarks such as,
“My argument is that when one is dealing with enemies who desire to prey on you (and make no mistake, these men *ARE* our enemies–they only view us as potential lunch, targets, or furniture–nothing more)”
I have become genuinely disgusted and shocked. I have never seen such an utter waste of intelligence, knowledge and time in my entire life. This is the sort of extremist stereotyping that completely discredits the entire feminist movement. I’m sorry if you have had problems with men in your past or if you have never had a positive relationship with a male, but for you to so ignorantly label men as your enemy is simply foolish. Have you ever really deeply thought about why men act the way they do? Is the society that we live in not just as controlling for men as it is for women?
Just as,
“Makeup is part of femininity and dictated by patriarchy, but it’s more than simply trying to attract a man. It’s so deeply embedded for people to practice femininity, and women do it in all sorts of circumstances even where there will be no men around, that it’s about more than that” – tg
assuming a dominant hunter-like attitude for men is deeply ingrained in our culture, in ways that have nothing to do with women. Is it not true that men try to establish dominance and control even when there are no women around? (ie. sports) A man who does not assume that role is not only likely to be unsuccessful with women, he will also have a hard time finding male friendship. It’s a sad aspect of our society but its true. Men who do fall into this role are labeled as probably gay. To claim that women have less of a choice in thier approach to dating and mating then men is absurd.
Now, I am in no way claiming that the playing field is level or that men and women are equal in our society, I am claiming that men are not your enemy, even the ones that ignorantly try to support thier actions with semi-logical arguements. Your enemy is society, and if you hope to make a change in todays society, an attack on men and a declaration of war is probably the worst approach you could possibly take.
Now, I am terribly sorry if I’m repeating something that has already been said but frankly I am not interested enough in reading the several pages of comments that I have skipped over to post this one if they are full of misdirected hostility. I will check back sometime however because I would like to see what will be said about my opinion.
my note of resignation
As yous have probably noticed my post rate has declined. Basiclly, there are some aspects of the seduction community i like and some i dont. I am still into the idea of improving myself re women, but there are too many things about the seduction community are not for me and therefore regretably i have to annoucne my departure from it.
Thanks to everybody i have learnt from and recieved help from in many ways.
I will, no doubt see you all in the field so its not that big a change, just that i no longer wish to be formally affiliated to the community any longer.
take it easy and be nice guys
I’m in a complicated relationship and we both read “THE GAME”, there he discovered the society of men…in his terms just want to “meet” the women they wouldnt have a chance on.
Recently I discovered that he joined a PUA society. I have no problem with guys wanting to learn from other men how to meet women they want. But these PUA’s parade themselves with pictures of women they’ve “closed”. I dont view that as helpful at all to a guy who wants to have a lasting relationship. My problem would be these guys glamorize “closing in numbers” rather than teaching men how to really have a relationship with a woman. Another would be that these men prey on women by playing with their insecurities. The only way women would know about this is through educating themselves that these societies exist. As for my relationship…I can only ask him if he wants to meet other women cause why would he want to know how to when he already has me…unless he isnt satisfied of me. It ruins the chances of what you already have.
Prophet – just thought I’d respond quickly here. Although this feels like something I’ve been over a million times in a million ways. For example, in my post that came out of complete frustration at being accused of hating all men. This kind of comment is not at all helpful. It’s a distraction and to be honest I think it’s a purposeful manipulation in order to draw attention away from the actual concerns of the post.
The answer to your concern with Scarred’s comment is right there in her comment: “My argument is that when one is dealing with enemies who desire to prey on you (and make no mistake, these men *ARE* our enemies–they only view us as potential lunch, targets, or furniture–nothing more)”
Scarred has in no way suggested that ALL men are enemies to women. She has suggested that PUA men who treat women like objects through which to gain sexual gratification are enemies to women. And I think that is a very fair assessment. I’m not sure how you missed her meaning. Perhaps because you’re making it all about you? Here’s a hint: if it doesn’t apply to you, then there’s no need to get your nose out of joint. Did you read my comment policy before commenting? If not, please do. I’m really tired of hearing this sort of complaint.
Now, I’m not sure exactly what complain you had with my comment. Again, I think you’re misreading or reading something into my words that isn’t there. When talking about the dictates of patriarchy on women in terms of femininity, I’m talking about how femininity is not just about attracting a man, like the commenter I was repsonding to had the audacity to suggest. I’m talking about how femininity is a signifier of being part of the subordinate class, and how femininity is INHERENTLY oppressive. So really, there’s not too much in the way of reward for being feminine – unless you consider oppression a reward. TO be clear, NOT being feminine enough is also problematic. So you’re damned if you do and damned if you don’t as a woman.
Masculinity is not the same as femininity. Masculinity, when practiced, is inherently dominant. It’s about strength and power. I’m not talking about the men who don’t comply with masculinity. I’m talking about those who do… they are not oppressed by practicing masculinity. Masculinity is about domination. How can it possibly be oppressive to those who practice it? Sorry, but I’ve been over this a hundred million times already, and nobody has been able to convince me otherwise. I’m not budging on this one.
Finally, I’m not concerned so much with the “plight” of men who practice masculinity here on this blog. I”m concerned primarily with women. Men’s issues and concerns are embedded within cultural discourse and social institutions of our societies. They need no help from me. I’m interested in overthrowing the systems of domination that put and keep men in positions of power and privilege. So yeah, my enemy is society – but who do you think defends the current social order, who benefits from it?
that’s all for now.
well, youve pretty much agreed with what I meant actually, I think you misunderstood me as I was not clear enough.. I understand that scarred was not claiming all men are her enemy.. my point was that even the PUA who are womanizers are not the problem here.. yes they are completely wrong and twisted in thier perspective and approach towards women but I’m saying that it is society that molded them into that monster. I was using your quote to help make my point as I think it is completely correct, not trying to ‘complain’ about it. I was saying that just as, “femininity is not just about attracting a man”, masculinity is not just about attracting a women, there is deep culture behind masculinity that reinforces that behavior. Therefore, the men who assume a patriachal role or even the PUA’s who abuse this power are not really the ones to blame or attack, it is the culture that forces men to think that they should be seeking as many partners as possible, and the media that glamourizes ‘badass’ men who use ‘neg’s and don’t really respect women. “TO be clear, NOT being feminine enough is also problematic.” IMHO I beleive that not being masculine enough also creates meaningful problems for heterosexual males in our society, and therefore you cannot put the all the blame on men who fall into that trap as the easiest way to get women. If you really desire to overthrow the systems of domination then the aspects of culture which facilitate and perpetuate these trends. On top of that you ask who defends the current social order, right now everyone does… women and men both follow the path of least resistance to live the most successful life they can, and sadly, in our society the easiest way for men to get women is a dominant approach and the easiest way for women to succeed is to attach to these men. That being said it is not the men who ignorantly follow these PUA methods, your giving to much credit to the human race by assuming the average male actually thinks about how he is perpetuating the problems of feminism.
Thinking Girl: Have you ever noticed that the virulently pro-PUAor pro-patriarchy people usually accuse me of “declaring war?” Who was it–Will who accused me of declaring a “jihad?”
Have you ever noticed that these accusations come on the heels of my efforts to arm women mentally against mainstream PUAism?
I find it hilarious that when someone takes “sheep” away from one of these “wolves,” they’re the ones accusing the “shepherd” of aggression!! The “wolves” cry and scream and yell about how we’re JUST SO HATEFUL and how we have ABSOLUTELY NO EMPATHY AND JUST SO ANTI-WOLF while they’re busy tearing “sheep” apart. I find the ones who scream the loudest are the guiltiest. Wouldn’t you agree, TG?
Don’t you just love life’s little hypocrisies? I’m sure you’re just as sick of it as I am.
PUAs: If the parable fits, wear it and go run home crying to some “mommy” or “daddy” who’ll pat you on your head and give you all sorts of undeserved sympathy for your predatory behavior. If it doesn’t fit, congratulations–and avoid thinking you can even begin to silence me.
Contain: I *hesitate* to give advice, particularly when it’s not asked for…but I **will** hazard a few observations (maybe some advice), because it *feels* to me as though you’re reaching out and would like a sounding board. If I’m wrong, then please forgive me, and forget about this post. I hope none of this sounds condescending…it’s only meant as encouragement–sometimes a very hard thing to find when you care about someone who doesn’t seem to care about you…
OK, take this for what it’s worth…but from where I sit, a relationship isn’t **complicated.** People may be complicated, or *interactions* may be complicated, but not relationships. Either there’s mutual commitment and love, or there’s not. And if there’s a genuine mutual commitment, there’s almost always no questions about it in either party’s mind. If you’re having doubts, believe me, Contain, he’s not there for you.
“But these PUA’s parade themselves with pictures of women they’ve “closed”. I dont view that as helpful at all to a guy who wants to have a lasting relationship. My problem would be these guys glamorize “closing in numbers” rather than teaching men how to really have a relationship with a woman.”
Neil Strauss, the author of “The Game,” has come out in interviews explicitly and said that PUA game is completely antithetical to having a relationship. He has said that ***in order to have a relationship, you have to do completely the opposite of what a PUA would do in almost everything.*** You’ve read “The Game”; you *know* these manuevers are intimacy-destroyers. The ability to manuever, manipulate, and control people for sexual or other purposes **requires** that the manipulator–the PUA–reveals much less information about himself than his “target.” It also requires a heavy amount of dehumanization to view these women as “targets.” You had mentioned: “…these PUA’s parade themselves with pictures of women they’ve “closed.” Put this in perspective, friend: hunters parade around with pictures of deer they’ve shot or other types of trophy game they’ve “bagged.” **Keep that** in mind, particularly if your boyfriend tries to tell you that it’s just about “meeting women.”
“Another would be that these men prey on women by playing with their insecurities. The only way women would know about this is through educating themselves that these societies exist.”
BINGO. You’ve hit the nail on the head, Contain. It **IS** a sort of psychological predation. It’s not one where the woman winds up dead, physically injured, or raped. It **is,** however, a very nasty form of con artistry. It preys on the hopes, dreams, insecurities, and fears of women…and, it also preys on men–by playing on their fears of sexual inadequacy and “not being man enough” and emptying their wallets.
“As for my relationship…I can only ask him if he wants to meet other women cause why would he want to know how to when he already has me…unless he isnt satisfied of me. It ruins the chances of what you already have.”
Just remember, Contain…the problem isn’t with your desirability. The problem is with **HIM.** This behavior is classic intimacy-avoidance behavior. Truthfully, he probably doesn’t want to be in a relationship right now–or if he does, he only wants it with women he feels he can control. If my observation is wrong, I’ll gladly retract it…**but,** it seems to me that he should be a **lot** more honest with you and just simply admit that he wants to break up. Then again, he may be just stringing you along and giving you false hopes of caring just so that he can keep you in his “stable.” Watch out for being used!
We can’t change or control his behavior…only **he** can do that. But **you** have **choices,** sister Contain…and he can’t control you once you make a decision **AND STICK TO IT NO MATTER WHAT.** Maybe you’re OK with his seeing other women, and you’ve decided (perhaps) that you’d like to see other men. That’s a choice only you can make, and it’s ***your*** decision. Then again, maybe you don’t feel like putting up with being treated like a member of a herd–and you decide to leave because you want a loving, committed relationship with someone who returns your love. ***This is your birthright!!*** Or, maybe you will decide that you just want him for casual sex, and it doesn’t matter to you if he sees you as just a lay. ***And that’s okay too!!*** My point in all this is that you know, deep down inside, what it is you really want and desire…and you have **just as much a right to it** as anybody else. If you figure out what **you** want and stick to it, he CAN’T control you. If making a decision is difficult, counseling/therapy is a healthy, effective way to go; I heartily recommend it. Then again, maybe all you need is to bounce some ideas off of the people here on the thread or your close friends. I would also recommend asking yourself if you have a pattern of getting involved with men who don’t return your level of interest/love; if you do, then I **definitely** recommend getting into therapy. I had the same problem–among others–and I **fixed** it by working hard at therapy.:)
Just search your heart…**REALLY** search your heart…and follow whatever it commands, no matter what, while taking full responsibility for your decision. I think if you do this, no matter what “unpleasant” fallout there might be, you’ll feel a lot better about life and have a **big** sigh of relief. Your heart may decide that it wants to dump your boyfriend, or may make other decisions. Sometimes following the heart is extremely frightening and scary…but in the end, it’s the only path that leads to growth. BUT–be aware that following the heart isn’t about following fears and dependencies. It’s about going for what **YOU** really want out of life…
I look forward to hearing from you again.:))
scarred you are most certainly declaring war. war does not need to be physical, and it does not need to be a negative thing.. if you truely want to make change then it is war that is necessary.
if the first part of your post was directed at me then you obviously did not read my posts with an open mind or you would have noticed that my tone and approach do not at all suggest that I am pro-PUA in any way.. I have been with the same woman for the past four and half years and I despise the bar and club ‘dating’ scenes in which PUA thrive.. I’m simply trying to put out another way to look at solving this problem, which I think is much more logical.. arming women against PUA is great, but really it’s not going to fix the problem.. your wolf analogy only furthers my point, the problem is that were still dealing with ‘sheep’ and ‘wolves’.. can you blame a wolf for going after sheep? your never going to stop a wolves desire from “tearing ‘sheep’ apart”.. instead we must evolve from wolves and sheep and the only way to succesfully make that transformation is an extensive breakdown and reconstruction of media, values, and essentially some of the very basic aspects of american society.
I’m not trying to discredit your ideas or stand up for PUA’s, I’m simply trying to introduce a different approach to the situation which I think is important to consider.
Prophet:
You ignore and misread my posts, and I’ll ignore yours.
You have your logic, I have mine.
Okay, remember the website
wwwDOTpropagandacriticsDOTcom
that I used in my last analysis of the Mystery Method website? Remember how I used an analysis of the Transfer Technique to analyze their front webpage? Now, I will post twice–once from the Propaganda Critic website in order to define another propaganda technique, the Testimonial; then I will identify **how** the Mystery Method used this in an email to a potential customer.
**************************************************
From the link
wwwDOTpropagandacriticDOTcomSLASHarticlesSLASHctDOTfcDOTtestimonialDOThtml:
(See me later at my blogsite if you just want the link;) )
The section on “Testimonials”:
“Tiger Woods is on the cereal box, promoting Wheaties as part of a balanced breakfast. Cher is endorsing a new line of cosmetics, and La Toya Jackson says that the Psychic Friends Network changed her life. The lead singer of R.E.M appears on a public service announcement and encourages fans to support the ‘Motor Voter Bill.’ The actor who played the bartender on Cheers is an outspoken environmentalist.
‘This is the classic misuse of the Testimonial Device that comes to the minds of most of us when we hear the term. We recall it indulgently and tell ourselves how much more sophisticated we are than our grandparents or even our parents.
With our next breath, we begin a sentence, ‘The Times said,’ ‘John L. Lewis said…,’ ‘Herbert Hoover said…’, ‘The President said…’, ‘My doctor said…,’ ‘Our minister said…’ Some of these Testimonials may merely give greater emphasis to a legitimate and accurate idea, a fair use of the device; others, however, may represent the sugar-coating of a distortion, a falsehood, a misunderstood notion, an anti-social suggestion…’ (Institute for Propaganda Analysis, 1938)
There is nothing wrong with citing a qualified source, and the testimonial technique can be used to construct a fair, well-balanced argument. However, it is often used in ways that are unfair and misleading.
The most common misuse of the testimonial involves citing individuals who are not qualified to make judgements about a particular issue. In 1992, Barbara Streisand supported Bill Clinton, and Arnold Schwarzenegger threw his weight behind George Bush. Both are popular performers, but there is no reason to think that they know what is best for this country.
Unfair testimonials are usually obvious, and most of us have probably seen through this rhetorical trick at some time or another. However, this probably happened when the testimonial was provided by a celebrity that we did not respect. When the testimony is provided by an admired celebrity, we are much less likely to be critical.
According to the Institute for Propaganda Analysis, we should ask ourselves the following questions when we encounter this device.
Who or what is quoted in the testimonial?
Why should we regard this person (or organization or publication) as having expert knowledge or trustworthy information on the subject in question?
What does the idea amount to on its own merits, without the benefit of the Testimonial?
You may have noticed the presence of the testimonial technique in the previous paragraph, which began by citing the Insitute for Propaganda Analysis. In this case, the technique is justified. Or is it?”
This is a very, very good definition–along with examples–of what the Testimonial technique is. Unfortunately, it’s **extremely** effective as a technique, and it’s **very** widely used even today. My observation is that it has more validity in people’s minds than Name-Calling does, and yet it’s **just** as much a propaganda technique as Name-Calling. One possible reason I can think of right off the bat as to why Testimonials are far less questioned is that it’s a **pleasant technique**–geared towards supporting the target’s desire for the product/viewpoint instead of spreading negativity around.
My next post will give a demonstration of this technique–
From an email entitled “Qualification–OAP Issue 4,” sent out to potential customers and recipients of the Mystery Method newsletter. This was sent to someone who had signed up for the email newsletter and received this in the Inbox: this is an excerpt:
“The Mystery Method is a unique and proven method of meeting, attracting, and seducing beautiful women. This can and will change your life. Check out a recent testimonial:
‘Was I skeptical beforehand? Certainly. I have quite a few friends who are naturals. And still I was completely BLOWN AWAY by the skill The Mystery and Sinn and Matador showed. They could pick a SPECIFIC target, come up with a sure-fire strategy to work her set, and do it… with a VERY HIGH CHANCE of getting a close. It’s not a gamble. It’s not a “numbers game”. With a tight game, it’s possible to go for the quality girls that you want and deserve. This was probably the single weekend with the most impact on my life, ever. “Life changing” On the second night of the workshop, it was as if something just “clicked” inside me. Everything became clearer. The confusion was gone. I get scared imagining what would’ve been if I DIDN’T take the workshop. Do I recommend it? Let me think about that… YEEEEES!!!! Two thumbs up.’
– V. A., Tuscon Arizona (Las Vegas Bootcamp)”
**************************************************
Now, taking the advice of the Propaganda Critic website quoting the Institute for Propaganda Analysis, let’s ask the following questions:
“Who or what is quoted in the testimonial?”
V.A. from Tucson, Arizona, who had attended (supposedly) the Las Vegas Bootcamp that the Mystery Method had held.
“Why should we regard this person (or organization or publication) as having expert knowledge or trustworthy information on the subject in question?”
Uhhh…beats me, guys. I have no idea as to what V.A.’s credentials or training are…supposedly he’s had experience with watching his friends, who are supposedly “natural” pick-up artists. I have no track record by which to go on to assess V.A.’s skills in contrasting or comparing ANY skill set of handling people, let alone pick-up artistry…
“What does the idea amount to on its own merits, without the benefit of the Testimonial?”
Not a HILL of beans as far as I’m concerned, because I see **no** track record kept of a percentage of satisfied customers…and also, **TRY DEFINING SATISFIED.**
Even WITH the Testimonial…note V.A.’s point:
“They could pick a SPECIFIC target, come up with a sure-fire strategy to work her set, and do it… with a VERY HIGH CHANCE of getting a close. It’s not a gamble. It’s not a “numbers game”.”
V.A., what would qualify as a “very high chance?” 20% of women approached? 40% of women approached? 90%+ of women approached “closed”?? What does he consider to be a “very high chance?”
Also, without V.A. actually naming, listing, cataloguing, and documenting the names, numbers, and faces of these women who supposedly Mystery, Sinn, and Matador “closed,” WE HAVE NO REAL IDEA just how successful the closing was–and **all** we have is V.A.’s word that it was a “very high chance.” The last thing I want to do is advocate the way of the objectifying anthropologist and help catalogue conquests, but **at least** then there would be SOME basis for the Testimonial claim made here!!
Eurosabra had mentioned in a previous post the following claimed “close” rate:
“Heck, even Zach Braff, who is supposedly B-List, hits on women in clubs by sending over an underling to deliver the line, “Zach thinks you have a hot bod.” Enough women respond to mere interest expressed in this manner that it’s simply not necessary for him to approach women in a more complex, effort-laden, time-consuming manner. With that crap line alone, he has (conservatively) a 10% success rate for which non-celebrities would KILL (or give their left nuts). ”
Now, I have to give Eurosabra some credit here!! He at least came up with a NUMBER. I did poo-poo it as being lousy compared to the success rate of a good doctor or lawyer, **but** Eurosabra at least gave me a **percentage** of success that Zach Braff alledgedly has with women. It may or may not have been accurate, but he was at least giving us something **to work with.** Not only is V.A.’s “very high chance” testimonial vague and uncertain, it **also** qualifies as a Glittering Generality at this rate–another propaganda technique.
“You may have noticed the presence of the testimonial technique in the previous paragraph, which began by citing the Insitute for Propaganda Analysis. In this case, the technique is justified. Or is it?”
I LOVE this question!:)) It made me go research the IPA. Yes, they existed; they have a Wikipedia entry and more than a few websites discuss them on the web.:))) Go Google “Institute for Propaganda Analysis” and you’ll find a whole bunch of **seriously wonderful** information on them.:))
and you scarred are the reason why your movement is getting nowhere. if you ever hope to create anything more than tension then you will have to accept the fact that there’s more out there than your own adamant opinions and pit bull feminist rage.. I had hoped to post on this blog to in order to provide another perspective to hold an intellectual debate on but you obviously refuse to accept that you may not always be completely right in everything you say.. I wish you luck in your endeavors to empower females but I hope you realize that until you develope a sense of respect and a true sense of how to really persuade others then your rants and rage will amount to nothing more than just that, rage..
More information and analysis of some of the email from the Mystery Method’s email newletter; again, this is OAP issue number 4, “Qualification.” The author is Francis, touting himself as the OAP director. To mark off my sections where I analyze the text for manipulation, I will begin and end my commentary with a line of asterisks. Here is the majority of issue #4:
“Also, to remind you: The Mystery Method is built on the M3 Model. To begin a sexual relationship with a woman, you have to first ATTRACT her, then build COMFORT, and then finally SEDUCE her. Each of these elements (Attract, Comfort, and Seduce) is divided into three phases. For example, the ATTRACT phase is divided into Attract 1 (or A1): Opening; Attract 2 (or A2) Attraction; and Attract 3 (or A3) Qualification.
Issue #1 described the model in more detail. Issue #2 focused on A1: Opening, and Issue #3 focused on A2: Attraction. Predictably, this issue (#4) explores A3: Qualification. Qualification is a pretty complex subject — so complex that a large part of the second DVD in the official The Mystery Method DVD set is focused solely around this subject. We’ll summarize the key points here.
All right? Off we go!
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“Qualification” is where the interest of the target gets heightened; the goal is to make the PUA “irresistible” to the “target” by showing interest and desire.
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A3: Qualification is often called “Male to Female Interest”. It is the inverse of A2: Attraction. By the time we’ve gotten to Qualification, we have already opened (A1) and made our target woman interested/attracted in us (A2). Now, and not before, we can express interest in her. As The Mystery said, “the amateur will hit on a woman right away. We wait 8 minutes.”
Expressing interest in a woman isn’t as easy as it sounds. Some cardinal rules:
Stay away from expressing interest in her based on her looks. An attractive woman has heard it before. A less attractive woman won’t believe you. Besides, “complimenting her looks” is the same boring tactic that every other guy uses. Find another reason that she has “won you over”.
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Although THE PRIMARY REASON the PUA is interested in most women is **because** of their appearance, they know that women get sick and tired of being objectified for their bodies. Note that this doesn’t stop the PUA from doing it–he just gets mighty subtle about it!
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Use the qualification process as an opportunity to convey even more value and establish a genuine connection. Put yourself in a woman’s shoes and ask yourself how you would choose between 2 guys. Guy A who tells you he likes you because you have a nice body or Guy B who tells you he likes you because you have great energy, you both love opera, and share the love of mountain biking? It works for guys too. Which woman would you choose? Woman A who says: “you’re rich — I love that” or Woman B:”you’re fascinating — I love that”?
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IMHO, the empathy for the PUA only goes as far as what *it can do for him* in terms of getting “the target” in the sack. Don’t be fooled. This is the hunter imagining what the deer is going to do when it scents the cornfield…
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Make her work for it. Seduction is a game and women want to play too. Don’t take away her fun of seducing you. Also keep in mind that if she is able to win you over too quickly she will think that you don’t have a lot of options, that you are not very choosy, or that she is of a higher quality than most women you meet. If she believes any of those things, you are no longer “the prize”. You can get some women without being “the prize” but not the most desirable ones.
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Truth or projection? Take your pick. Note how no exceptions are made for the “high quality” girl who just happens to be as lonely or horny as the PUA and who **might not need** the PUA to be “the prize.” And gee, doesn’t this sound an awful lot like the projection of high school boys who dump the local girl for “putting out too soon,” which makes her a “slut?” And of course, if she wins you “too easily,” well, she’s not “desirable.” Right?
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This all adds up to the fact that you have to make the woman attract you. Just as you spend A2 (Attract) attracting her, now you have to let her win you over.
That sounds easy, and the problem here probably isn’t what you are expecting. The problem is that most women are terrible at attracting men using anything other than their looks. The more beautiful the woman (and therefore the more necessary it is to find something other than her looks to be interested in), the less she will be used to using anything else. This was one of our more frustrating discoveries over the past 13 years while developing this model.
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Ah-HAH! Now we get down to the **real** heart of the matter– the stereotyping, the objectification, and the blatant double-standards. Note the real contempt these people have for the women they’re trying to bed. “The problem is that most women are terrible at attracting men using anything other than their looks.” Gee, I don’t suppose the real issue is how **these PUAs don’t find anything desirable in women OTHER THAN looks?** Never mind a woman’s heart, mind, dreams, fears, etc…never mind her interests, **they’re not interesting.** [heavy, heavy sarcasm] Spirituality with props, i.e. tarot cards, etc. “Chick crack.” Films women might like? “Oh, that’s just chick flicks.” And gee, I imagine that if these PUAs were going after physics majors, philosophy majors, historians, etc., it isn’t like they wouldn’t find interesting women with real-life passions that *might be* ATTRACTIVE. Or, how about the stereotype of the beautiful woman being dumb as a post? I’ve seen photographs of Marilyn Vos Savant–she struck **me** as being pretty damn attractive. But these people wouldn’t touch her with a ten-foot pole–intellect is way too intimidating…
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The solution we’ve found is to “help” a woman attract you. We have a ton of tactics for this that we go over in our live programs, but one easy-to-use tactic to get you started is called “Bait-Hook-Reel-Release”.
BAIT: Here we use universal, general questions or hoops to “bait” her into saying something that you interpret as being an attractive quality. It’s like giving her a test where she’ll win every time. For example, asking someone “what would you want to be if you could do anything you wanted?” is a good “bait” question, since everyone will have an answer to this and you can arbitrarily interpret her answer as being very positive.
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Yes, we bait the dumb fish!! It needs your help to be “caught,” that’s for sure. (NOT.)
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HOOK: Let’s say that she’d want to be an actress. That’s the hook. You will treat her answer here as a reason why you are attracted to her.
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Hang on to your hopes and dreams, women. Remember **just how easily manipulated we all are** when someone uses our dreams as a tool to get what they want. Be WARY….
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REEL: Now we reel her in with something like “No way! You want to be an actress? That’s awesome! I really respect people who have the balls to get on stage and perform for others. You know, your first impression kind of sucked; but now that I’ve gotten to know you, I think you’re incredible.”
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Notice the “neg”: “You know, your first impression kind of sucked…” This is what Suzette Haden Elgin referred to as “Phony Leveling.” Also, note how it’s followed by flattery…”I think you’re incredible.” This is one of the many, MANY reasons why women should **slow down** any and all interactions **and get to know and study the men they’re attracted to.** If he says you’re incredible within 7 hours of knowing you, ***that’s too short a time.***
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RELEASE: After we reel her in, complimenting her, she will feel uncomfortable if you do not “release”. This is the final part of the qualification. You do this by slightly disqualifying her. Continuing with our example, you might say something like “You are trouble for me, now that I know that about you. You’re amazing. I can’t even talk to you.” And then start to turn or move away. Done correctly, and naturally (it will come off as fake the first few times you try it, don’t worry, keep practicing), she will chase after you like you’ve never seen. In our workshops guys who have never gotten hit on by women in their lives get this glow in their eyes when, all of sudden, attractive women are pursuing them.
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The proper response to someone who says, “You’re amazing, I can’t even talk to you” is to get up, say, “Okay,” **and WALK AWAY.** Don’t let someone play with your emotions like this.
Look: what makes women vulnerable to back-handed compliments, excitement, roller-coaster emotion, and other garbage is the lack of self-acceptance and self-esteem. People substitute drama for genuine interaction when they fear intimacy and self-revelation. ANYONE who flatters you like that by saying, “You’re so amazing, I can’t even talk to you” is a manipulator who’s using putting you up on a pedestal for bait. For starters, he IS talking to you and just HAS been. AVOID people who blow hot and cold; almost always, it’s a sure sign that they’re not playing it straight.
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You may need to go through this process a couple of times with different qualities to fully accomplish A3: Qualification. Make her qualify herself based on more than one good quality that she has. Try not to make it blatantly obvious; weave the bait-hook-reel-release module into natural, normal, conversation. And don’t forget the “release” step — that’s where a lot of guys make mistakes.
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And this is why, women, you need to SLOW DOWN and get to know men very, very well…and take very careful note of everything he says and the effect it has on you…or the effect you **think** he wants to have on you. Frankly, I recommend getting to know someone **for years** before even contemplating going to bed with someone, given today’s climate of head manipulation.
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Once you’ve gone through the process, you’ve done the whole ATTRACTION module. Next, you’ll be ready to move into Comfort. This is a lot easier, and we’ll cover it in the next issue.
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Step-by-step, we learn to hunt humans…hunt them through their fears, wishes, and desires…
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I have to admit, writing a short “advanced section” for A3: Qualification is hard. This is the hardest phase of the whole game, and we spend by far the most time on this in our Venusian Arts Handbook, DVDs, telephone consultations, and live programs. So, I’ll give a few nuggets of “advanced” advice here, but realize that there’s lots more to it than this. Future issues of the OAP will cover this material in greater depth.
So far, we focused mostly on the verbal portion of qualification. There is also a crucial non-verbal component. Your body language must match your explicit language. When you bait, you are neutral, even slightly dismissive. When you hook and reel, you give her your full attention and SHOW how interested you are. When you release, do it solidly, so she FEELS the change in the attention and validation she is getting.
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WATCH this sequencing of emotions. BEWARE of these changes; watch how you feel internally!!
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The “bait” doesn’t have to be a question. It’s more natural and fluid (though harder to pull off) to bait her with a statement that she responds to. For example, instead of “what would you like to be, if you could do anything?”, try “I really love home-cooked meals. Especially Italian.” If she’s into you (from A2: Attraction), she can “hook” by talking about the great lasagna she makes.
Don’t confuse the Qualification Phase with real qualification. You still haven’t known her for long enough (remember, we’re about 15 minutes into an interaction here) to actually make decisions about her yet. This is all a game so far. In Comfort is where you decide whether you like each other. Right now you’re just flirting.
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I’ve seen interrogations I’ve felt more comfortable with. Note the cold-bloodedness and calculation of this all. If there’s anything I want women to take with them once you’ve read this, I want you to develop a ***bullshit meter*** that can rival or surpass a cop’s. THIS IS WHAT MAINSTREAM PATRIARCHAL PUAISM IS ALL ABOUT. This is its real face. It was not for nothing that Neil Strauss warned PUAs about being “social robots.” The calculation and precision of it all is soul-destroying. Please, for your own sakes, sisters, learn to ***pay LOTS of attention to that man behind the curtain.*** Most of all, watch your feelings and his behaviors–not words, behaviors–and ***slow down.***
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Scarred said:
When I considered myself a PUA and didn’t have the questions about pickup and seduction that I do now, I guess I didn’t get the memo that this advice to empathize with women, and look for their positive qualities beyond their looks, was just supposed to be strategic. I actually started doing it. Oops.
I don’t think it’s projection. Remember, these guys tend to have histories of being rejected by women who they feel they have given too much to too fast.
This is a good point. Independent of any objectification and misogyny by PUAs, there is a big difference between an average PUA and the average woman he meets in a club.
What are common personality and psychological traits of PUAs?
- Introversion
- Low in sensation-seeking, or even highly sensitive
- Probably conscientious
- Above average intelligence (necessary to actual comprehend and create the complex analyses and engineering that PUAs do)
What are common personality traits of people (including women) who frequent clubs and bars?
- Extraversion
- High in sensation-seeking
- Low in conscientiousness
- Average or below-average intelligence
When PUAs compare themselves to the women they commonly meet in bars and clubs, it is not surprise that they have a low opinion of those women. Yet comparing unrepresentative males with average females is not a fair comparison. If you take anyone with the first set of traits, and compare them to someone with the second set, it’s no surprise if the person with the second set starts looking like an unruly child.
As for meeting more exceptional women, some PUAs are interested in doing so, which is why day game is becoming increasingly popular.
This is one of its faces. Other PUAs, like Juggler, also advocate giving women compliments when they show positive qualities unrelated to their looks; yet for Juggler, this is not really a “technique,” because he argues it should be sincere.
Damn… My first post here and already I’m breaking the rule about reading every single comment. But I did spend a full hour reading what I could, picking out the salient points in the discussion. I hope I can be permitted to add my (male, heterosexual) two cents. And I’ll try to be as brief as poss.
Last year, the mother of a 15 year old boy joked with me about his newfound interest in the theatre which just happened to coincide with his new girlfriend who, aha!, just happened to be a theatre junkie. Of course, to teasingly suggest to the teenager that his interest in the theatre was less than genuine would usually provoke a blush or two. My first point is that sexuality is deeply wrapped-up with a feeling of guilt, which begins with sex (the guilt associated with masturbation and so on) and then gets tangled-up with our romantic desires. (Of course, some feminists object completely to such psychoanalytic-inspired insights, but I believe that psychoanalysis, at the same time as being subjected to a feminist critique, can also be used as a feminist tool.)
The problem which the critique of these PUAs highlights is that there are two senses in which the men who use such techniques should feel guilty. Firstly, they should feel guilty because (as my example illustrates) human sexuality is organized around feelings of guilt. But, secondly, they should feel guilty for their participation in patriarchy. In other words, there is the first type of guilt which is unavoidable and just a part of what it is to be any human being (male or female), whilst there is the second type of guilt which arises because men are, in fact, actually guilty! Incidentally, this surely provides the basis on which we can reject any comparison with advice given to women in Cosmo mag etc. – whilst such advice is depressing, the women who act on it are clearly only guilty in the first sense.
So I think men (and women) who defend these ghastly training courses feel that they are defending themselves against the guilt associated with all sexuality, not patriarchy as such.
“(Of course, some feminists object completely to such psychoanalytic-inspired insights, but I believe that psychoanalysis, at the same time as being subjected to a feminist critique, can also be used as a feminist tool.)”
Actually, **this** feminist
won’t object to you using psychoanalytic insights!:) Except for Freud’s theories on women, and some of Jung’s problems with “animus-dominated” women, I have **no** problem with psychoanalytic theory and psychology whatsoever.:) In fact, if you get some time and check out some of my earlier posting on the first PUA thread, you will see me write about sexual addiction and Terror Management Theory, both of which factor into my analysis of mainstream PUAism.
“Incidentally, this surely provides the basis on which we can reject any comparison with advice given to women in Cosmo mag etc. – whilst such advice is depressing, the women who act on it are clearly only guilty in the first sense.”
I **tend** to agree, although Cosmo has always bothered me as well for encouraging women to get what they want through “feminine wiles” and “appearance.” But this is something that feminism has ALWAYS been critical of; it’s something that we’ve bitched about for years!! Then we get told we’re killjoys for criticizing beauty pressures, etc. But most feminists I know are pretty critical of women using appearance to manipulate and gain power over men. I for one think that women who do this are holding onto what looks like power but is actually a mirage.
BUT– I **do** think women shouldn’t get *personal* flak for wearing makeup, dressing a certain feminine way, etc.–or, NOT wearing makeup and dressing in a nondescript or masculine way. I think women just in general get picked on way too much by EVERYBODY regarding femininity or masculinity of dress, etc. Too often a critique of a certain idea gets turned into a personal attack and accusation of treason thrown at the “offending” woman, and **that’s** where I get issues–because to me, that smacks of internalized misogyny, given its frequent viciousness and severity.
Women shouldn’t bitch at other women excessively, because frequently women get criticized and bullied all the time in our society. Very frequently by other women, a betrayal of sisterhood!! We live in a world of Laura Schlessingers, Ann Coulters, Phyllis Schaflys, and Katherine Kerstens: women get bullied enough as it is, particularly by rightwing fascist “women” who would be happy to sell other women into slavery for male approval. That’s why it really disturbs me to see female bloggers like Renegade Evolution and Brown Femipower get eviscerated by other women on the feminist blogosphere: what are we thinking when we do this?? We should be kind to **our sisters** and mean towards those who would oppress us.
But I digress.
“So I think men (and women) who defend these ghastly training courses feel that they are defending themselves against the guilt associated with all sexuality, not patriarchy as such.”
I can **easily** see that, and it’s a shame that they’re in denial or unclear about what the real problem is, which is patriarchal dominance power games and control. People throw accusations of “sex negativity at feminists all the time, but they very often are missing the forest for the fire hydrant! I’m just not sure how much clearer we feminists could be. Any ideas on how we could get the point across better, focultisdead?
prophet – thanks for clearing that up.
see, though, the thing is that you’re right – the system needs to change. BUT. you’re missing the fact that until the system is changed, those who are oppressed by it still need to protect themselves. that’s what is going on here.
so for you, you’re hoping for an “intellectual debate” – and for the women and feminists here, we’re hoping to find a way to stop from being fucked over. surely you can understand a visceral reaction to this kind of harm to women, from women and feminists and those who advocate for women’s equality? Surely. And if not, then that’s part of your privilege. it’s male privilege to try to make this an intellectual endeavour, rather than what it actually is: an attempt to arm women against manipulative PUA tactics so they can protect themselves.
hugh – listen, you seem to think that the feminists and pro-feminists on this thread have not acknowledged that not all PUA techniques are the same. We have done this. What I continue to hold is that any difference in PUA techniques is a matter of a difference in degree, not in kind. Whether one technique is as misogynistic as another is a difference in degree. because ultimately all PUA techniques are based on the premise of women as objects, targets, things to have, protectors of pussy, preventers of male sexual pleasure. PUA reinforces patriarchy. Why? because we live under patriarchy, and everything that isn’t resistance to patriarchy is reinforcing patriarchy. If you’re not actively resisting it, you’re passively reinforcing it. Simple. PUA reinforces patriarchy, no matter how bad it is, no matter if the particular guy intends to reinforce patriarchy.
you seem to want to catch us up somehow here, hugh, and I think that’s a bit dishonest. just because we have conceded that not all PUA tactics are the same, and some are worse than others, that doesn’t mean the ones that aren’t worse are acceptable, or that they are not misogynistic in their own right. no PUA tactic gets a pass from me.
foucaultisdead – thanks for coming by! I just discovered your blog the other day, and I’ve been trying to go through archives. I bet an Archive link would help me out a bit? *nudge nudge*
I agree, I think those defenders of PUAs are indeed confused about what they are defending. I’m all for getting rid of the guilt around sex and sexuality. I’m mst definitely not all for supporting patriarchy while I do it.
Scarred – in answer to your question about how feminists can make it clear that they are not “sex negative”, I think this can be a touchy subject because there exists, in fact, some feminists who really are sex negative. Thus, your question already anticipates a sectarian split within feminism. The task (for feminists on both sides of this sectarian split) is to not allow this split to then be exploited by those elements hostile to feminism.
I noticed your nod to TMT. I read something online by James Gifford on Zizek and TMT – but other than that, I know nothing about it.
Thinking Girl – point taken about the archive link. The template I use doesn’t feature one automatically, so I’ll have to actually work out how to set one up… Oh, and thanks for the link. How on Earth have I missed your blog for this long??
Thinking Girl,
As this conversation has continued, I have become increasingly aware that we have a different focus in discussing the seduction community. I think it’s time for me to bow out of this discussion to a thread on my own blog, barring any minor points that I consider pressing.
You and Scarred focus on the potential of PUAs to uphold gendered power dynamics, and your focus is on resistance to PUAs. As you say:
In contrast, while you focus on resistance, I focus on reform. I agree that some PUA techniques enforce gendered power dynamics, and that this can be a problem. That is our common ground. I am aware that you acknowledge differences between PUAs and PUA techniques, but I don’t believe that differences in PUA techniques are merely differences in degree, not differences in kind: there are both types of differences.
Furthermore, I find some of the generalizations here about PUA techniques and motivations to be oversimplified and premature. I believe that some PUA techniques have the potential for gender liberation, even if PUAs don’t capitalize on that potential. For example, on The View, Neil Strauss argues that men shouldn’t hit on women until the women are attracted to the men; on Current TV, he emphasizes the importance of connecting with women.
If you came and told me that “all PUA techniques are based on the premise of women as objects, targets, things to have, protectors of pussy, preventers of male sexual pleasure,” with a detailed survey of PUA techniques arguing how they fit that bill, then I would find that a credible claim. In the absence of such evidence or argumentation for that claim, or of an acknowledgment of the provisional nature of it, I find it to be premature and based on preconceptions.
You say, “you seem to want to catch us up somehow here.” And the answer is, yes, I do (or did). I’ve been involved with the seduction community for about 4 years now, as both a participant and as increasingly as a critic. I have a large amount of experience with it, and I’ve done a large amount of research on it. I was interested in seeing the views of the people here when they were exposed to the full range of PUA techniques and views. My goal was to let you guys take advantage of my knowledge on the subject, without trying to force my own conclusions, but evidently, I haven’t been able to communicate this very well. I think the solution is that I’ll leave you all do your own research and come to your conclusions, and take my own analysis somewhere else.
The fact is that based on the information about the community you guys have so far, your critique of the seduction community is about as sophisticated as a critique of feminism based on reading a smattering of Second-Wave material. That doesn’t mean the critique is entirely wrong; as I’ve emphasized, in many areas, you guys are correct. The problem I have is that you are making premature claims for which you don’t have sufficient evidence (at least, not yet), like the one I identify above; thus, your critiques are frequently overgeneralized and risk throwing the baby out with the bathwater.
I understand that you aren’t particularly worried about throwing out the baby, since your focus is on draining the bath, yet for me, this lack of concern for the baby is problematic, because my project is either to reform the community, or to take what is positive from it and leave the rest.
Rather than risk overstaying my welcome, I would prefer to agree to disagree with you, and I will start up the kind of conversation that interests me about the seduction community on my own blog, Feminist Critics. I invite anyone here to stop by. In fact, if you have any PUAs or MRAs here that you want to get out of your hair, you are welcome to send them over to me. If I need to reply to any responses to this post, I’ll do so on my blog.
[...] Artists”] to uphold gendered power dynamics, and your focus is on resistance to PUAs. As you say: What I continue to hold is that any difference in PUA techniques is a matter of a difference in [...]
hi hugh – thanks, I think that’s very reasonable. you’re right, you didn’t articulate your goal of being here very well; I had no idea that you wanted to share your knowledge of PUA with us on this thread, as it seemed like most of your posts were really more about trying to, as I said, trip up the feminists on the blog, and get us to admit that PUA really isn’t so bad after all.
As for this: “If you came and told me that “all PUA techniques are based on the premise of women as objects, targets, things to have, protectors of pussy, preventers of male sexual pleasure,” with a detailed survey of PUA techniques arguing how they fit that bill, then I would find that a credible claim” – actually hugh, I kind of doubt that’s true. I think that deep down, you’ve got too much invested in PUA, and in thinking that you’re a pretty good guy, to ever find that to be a credible claim. In fact, Scarred has provided a pretty detailed analysis of a number of PUA techniques here, and why they are misogynistic, and yet here you are, claiming that there’s still something good to be found in PUA. I’m saying, your perspective as a guy who has been invovled with PUA for a long time is skewing that analysis. of course you would think there’s still something good to be found in PUA, if it’s working for you. I’m saying, whether PUA is good or not depends on where you’re standing, and what your relation to it is.
In any case, I’ll likely come by and read your post sometime. I doubt I’ll leave a comment though – I rarely comment on other people’s blogs. Thanks for offering to take the nutbars off my hands.
foucaultisdead – glad you found it!
admission: Foucault is one of my favourites!
Foucaltisdead:
“Scarred – in answer to your question about how feminists can make it clear that they are not “sex negative”, I think this can be a touchy subject because there exists, in fact, some feminists who really are sex negative. Thus, your question already anticipates a sectarian split within feminism. The task (for feminists on both sides of this sectarian split) is to not allow this split to then be exploited by those elements hostile to feminism.”
Got it. Thank you for the clarification. I appreciate the observation, and will work on how to prevent this split from being exploited and capitalized on.
Thinking Girl:
“so for you, you’re hoping for an “intellectual debate” – and for the women and feminists here, we’re hoping to find a way to stop from being fucked over. surely you can understand a visceral reaction to this kind of harm to women, from women and feminists and those who advocate for women’s equality? Surely. And if not, then that’s part of your privilege. it’s male privilege to try to make this an intellectual endeavour, rather than what it actually is: an attempt to arm women against manipulative PUA tactics so they can protect themselves.”
THANK YOU. Maybe now this will FINALLY MAKE IT CLEAR as to what’s been going on in this thread. I thought it was self-evident, and I know that Thinking Girl and I have said this repeatedly. What I can’t figure out is why we were ignored, but never mind. Sometimes it just takes the owner of the blog to make the point of the blog or thread repeatedly.
“What I continue to hold is that any difference in PUA techniques is a matter of a difference in degree, not in kind. Whether one technique is as misogynistic as another is a difference in degree. because ultimately all PUA techniques are based on the premise of women as objects, targets, things to have, protectors of pussy, preventers of male sexual pleasure. PUA reinforces patriarchy. Why? because we live under patriarchy, and everything that isn’t resistance to patriarchy is reinforcing patriarchy. If you’re not actively resisting it, you’re passively reinforcing it. Simple. PUA reinforces patriarchy, no matter how bad it is, no matter if the particular guy intends to reinforce patriarchy.”
“just because we have conceded that not all PUA tactics are the same, and some are worse than others, that doesn’t mean the ones that aren’t worse are acceptable, or that they are not misogynistic in their own right. no PUA tactic gets a pass from me.”
These are very good points. I agree with them in principle. I’m sort of at a loss because the last thing I want to do is give a phony feminist “imprimatur” to methods of PUA that don’t consciously enforce patriarchal gender roles, but I feel a need to acknowledge that it’s possible to create methods that aren’t manipulative and unexploitative, or at least try to get away from it. The problem, is, however, we live in a patriarchy. ALL **unexamined** sexual relations and initiation thereof are going to be contaminated with patriarchal programming.
The question is, is it possible to have non-exploitative, non-patriarchal sexual relations in a society bathed in patriarchy? My feeling is that it’s *possible,* but that it takes a lot of thought.
However, one thing can be observed: if a method of attraction and approach can be designed or offered that: 1) doesn’t advocate using gender roles and stereotypes, or power imbalances to initiate and conduct sexual and romantic relations, 2) doesn’t encourage or allow exploitation and objectification–or allow viewing the other person as a “target,” 3) can be used by any person of any gender, and 4) doesn’t set out to addict other people to the approacher, I’m not going to have a problem with it. I can’t and won’t speak for other feminists, but I can speak for me–Scarred the Feminist Pit Bull. This isn’t to say that other feminists have to agree with me, because **I will ALWAYS** support my sisters:)) no matter what conclusions they come to about the problems of having sex in a patriarchy.
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TO CLEAR UP THE RECORD ONCE AND FOR ALL ABOUT **WHY** I’M ON THIS THREAD, AND WHY I FORMED MY BLOG:
I have never, not once, claimed that I’m some kind of intellectual giant. I have been **very** honest all along about the purpose of my writing on mainstream patriarchal PUAism, which is **TO BUILD METHODS OF RESISTANCE TO AND INCREASE AWARENESS OF** its methodologies. Some people are more interested in critique; that’s okay, my intellect has always in some ways been more geared towards the practical rather than the theoretical, although I’ve gave analysis a good “college try” on the first PUA thread here on the blog. I’m *still* going to analyze PUA methodology, but it’s going to be on **my** terms–which is analysis **with an eye towards resistance.** I have made this clear all along; I’ve never hidden this fact, not once. And my own feeling is that if my critique/analysis was **so** premature and overgeneralized, it wouldn’t have ignited the firestorm on this blog that it did. People respond incessantly and persistently to effectual threats, not ineffectual ones. I watch behavior, NOT claims. I’ve noticed that the reaction has become particularly fierce since I’ve started advocating using methods of propaganda analysis to deconstruct PUA advertising and methods. This tells me, quite rightly, that I’m very much ONTO something with recognizing PUA methods of approach, seduction, and advertising as a type of propaganda and marketing brought down to the **personal** level! If all women have to do is sit back and apply propaganda critiquing to the PUAs who are trying to approach them, it reveals the mirages for what they are–***doesn’t it?*** (And yes, that question was EXTREMELY rhetorical.)
Am I new to this? Certainly!! Is there a possibility that my advocated methods of resistance and analysis will change over the years? That’s a given. However, WHAT WILL NEVER CHANGE is my insistence on developing ways and means for women to refuse and resist patriarchal domination in whatever form it presents itself. I’ve said this before, and I’ll say this again: “If there’s anything I want women to take with them once you’ve read this, I want you to develop a ***bullshit meter*** that can rival or surpass a cop’s.” For this, I, Thinking Girl, and the feminists on this thread have been vilified and attacked incessantly, and there’s been a non-stop, CONSTANT effort to derail or distract our efforts. In case PUAs still can’t understand this, get this, and get this through your heads: WE’RE GOING TO KEEP ON NO MATTER WHAT.
Here’s one of the samples of some of the SHIT that has been thrown my way for daring to develop and argue for methods of resistance:
“Being a victim of past scarring events doesn’t mean that you should keep reducing yourself into a victim for the victimizers, it won’t make the certain future victimization of yourself less scarring – strengthen your mind and defend yourself with actions that aren’t knee-jerk reactions. Posting of April 17, 2007, 4:07 am by J.A.”
This person did everything they could to slur me and my work, although granted in a very sideways manner–had he chosen to be honest with himself, he would never have said this. He knew DAMN WELL somewhere, deep down inside himself, that I wasn’t reducing myself or others into chronic victims; this especially doesn’t fly with me given how much EFFORT I’ve put into developing ways of spotting and resisting manipulative PUA methods. Working on ways to prevent victimization ISN’T being a professional victim.
Or, how about this?
“I have become genuinely disgusted and shocked. I have never seen such an utter waste of intelligence, knowledge and time in my entire life. This is the sort of extremist stereotyping that completely discredits the entire feminist movement. I’m sorry if you have had problems with men in your past or if you have never had a positive relationship with a male, but for you to so ignorantly label men as your enemy is simply foolish. Have you ever really deeply thought about why men act the way they do? Is the society that we live in not just as controlling for men as it is for women?”
When this person got confronted and exposed on his bullshit about how I was stereotyping all men as “The Enemy,” he backtracked, lied to himself, and rationalized THIS WAY:
“well, youve pretty much agreed with what I meant actually, I think you misunderstood me as I was not clear enough.. I understand that scarred was not claiming all men are her enemy..”
YEAH, RIGHT. Thinking Girl understood him **perfectly well.** He slung mud at me, then got real angry when I slung mud right back and pointed out to him that if he ignored and misread my posts, I can ignore [and misread] his, that he had his logic, I had mine. For daring NOT to get bowled over by his bullshit, he posted this:
“…and you scarred are the reason why your movement is getting nowhere. if you ever hope to create anything more than tension then you will have to accept the fact that there’s more out there than your own adamant opinions and pit bull feminist rage..”
I will let his statement stand as one of the penultimate examples of male privilege that I’ve witnessed on a feminist blog. This ad-hominem non-logic was so thick you could cut it with a knife.
Now, I can have respect to a certain extent for criticism like this, although I don’t agree with it:
“The problem I have is that you are making premature claims for which you don’t have sufficient evidence (at least, not yet), like the one I identify above; thus, your critiques are frequently overgeneralized and risk throwing the baby out with the bathwater. I understand that you aren’t particularly worried about throwing out the baby, since your focus is on draining the bath, yet for me, this lack of concern for the baby is problematic, because my project is either to reform the community, or to take what is positive from it and leave the rest.”
Although I think this is well-reasoned, I also think that it’s a bad case of denial. Here’s why. Hugh and I fundamentally disagree on whether there’s a baby in the bathwater. He says it’s a baby. I say it’s a **vampire.** Maybe in some instances, Hugh is right and it’s just a baby in certain tubs. However, the more research I do into mainstream patriarchal PUAism, the more convinced I become that even if the creature may start out as a baby, it winds up becoming a vampire. If the vampire **leaves the bathwater,** then it seems to be going back towards being a baby, **but not as long as it’s in that bathwater.** Allow me to demonstrate my point.
I refer you to one of the senior instructors at Charisma Arts, Juggler’s method of PUA, a fellow who calls himself D1m1tr1. He was posted on Thundercat’s Seduction Lair–an entry entitled “The Dark Juggler Method.” Please check out the link, but I will quote from it as well:
http://www.thundercatseductionlair.com/2007/06/the-dark-juggle.html#more
[edit: all quotes from the article "the Dark Juggler Method" by D1m1tr1 have been removed, as per copyright law. The article in essence is about creating a chemical addiction in the brain of a target in order to take advantage of her. Please do follow the link and see for yourself. - TG]
Hang onto your stomach, women, because this will make you blanch hard if you think about it. You will watch the method of delibrately creating an addiction to someone if you read this.
This is HIS language, people, not mine. I’m not selling you any wolf tickets, women; read on. It gets horrifying if you really think about the implications of what he’s talking about. Could it be “just” a marketing technique? Yeah, I think it’s marketing, however I also know from my ugliest personal experience that this is ***possible:***
Women, if you read through my posts and blog, please remember what it is that I’ve warned about on occasion: QUESTIONS, particularly open-ended questions designed to get someone to visualize and use the imagination–or yes/no questions that set up a pattern of compliance. There is a **reason** for this.
Remember the posting I’ve done on sexual and love addiction on the first PUA thread at TG’s? THIS is how it begins–by euphoria and ecstacy as intially manufactured in the brain of the sex or love addict. And please understand me very, very thoroughly: THIS IS THE DELIBRATE CREATION OF AN ADDICTION. This is **also** what drug dealers like to do to the newbies–the first sample is ***free.***
WHEN, not if, I perfect methods of resistance, D1m1tr1 will most certainly NOT be able to do this to any woman he chooses, and MANY women will be able to resist these drugs. In fact, I’m thinking that a wariness of the open-ended question and the ability to recognize and refuse the inital “rush” of brain chemicals as any basis to act on or make a decision of will be enough to head off any “seduction.” I’m not going to bet the farm on that, however; that’s why our research must be ongoing.
I urge people to go back to the first PUA thread that TG has on this blog. On it, you will find my posting on Terrance Real, sexual addiction, and what my love addiction almost brought me to. I wasn’t kidding when I posted initially about how I almost threw myself off a tall building or ate a .45: I was as addicted as addicted as someone could be to a big-time manipulator and womanizer, PLUS earlier in my life I had been stung by a PUA (or possibly just an NLP master) who could have given Ross Jeffries lessons!! PUAs have done their level best to try to discredit me as someone who doesn’t know what they’re talking about, but the truth of the matter is **I know damn WELL what I’m talking about!** I LIVED with the results of brain-chemical addiction to someone: I KNOW what it can and will do to you.
No intelligent junkie, pothead, coke head, or meth user deludes himself or herself that the drug dealer actually cares about the customer. Is there a possibility that some mainstream PUAs care? Maybe, **but I sure as hell wouldn’t bet the farm on it, and I SURE AS HELL am not going to leave my well-being and safety up to them.** Real caring and love doesn’t involve getting women so addicted to you that you can manipulate them and get them to do **whatever** you wish. And if your desire is casual sex, the LAST thing you want is to be addicted to someone, because how the hell are you going to move on??
We talk about drug cartels and big-time drug dealers in this society, as well we should. While I tend to be pro-legalization regarding drugs, I will NEVER claim that drug dealers and members of drug cartels are fine, upstanding citizens. We have, for the most part, NO PROBLEMS recognizing hard-drug pushers as vampires and parasites on society. Given that the chemicals in our brains regarding emotional bonding are very, very powerful, mainstream PUAs are just as vampiric and parasitical, IMHO.
At best, your local pot-and-acid dealer might be a harmless chap caught in an economically rough time in his or her life; at worst, the head of the Cali and Medallin Cartels are monsters. And the harder the drugs, generally, the more monstrous the dealers. Also, the higher up the drug-dealing chain you go, the more monstrous the people become. Given what you’ve just read from D1m1tr1, and given all the **other** PUA gurus out there, what makes you think they’re any different? Yes, the “baby” in the bathwater in **many** cases is a fucking vampire–so **many** cases that it’s NOT worth taking the chance that it isn’t!!
I’m not sure how much clearer I can make it that mainstream PUAism is the creation of emotional subjugation and slavery of women. There is NOTHING HERE that will do women any good, and ultimately it will only harm us. Feelings of euphoria and ecstasy are **only** feelings; and unfortunately, because women get battered by life in a patriarchy all the time, we frequently wind up miserable a big chunk of the time–so we get fooled by people who “make us feel good.” **This** is what renders us so damn vulnerable to this stuff. Our vulnerability MUST end, and only women can rely on ourselves to get out of this mess. If we find **some** trustworthy men to help us, great!! But first and foremost, self-reliance FIRST. Because I guarantee you that THIS clown, Thundercat, ***isn’t*** going to help you:
“This really sounds like basic push/pull stuff to me. I wonder why Juggler would be against this? I always worry when I hear about people trying to be “PC,” because let’s face it – a lot of this stuff ISN’T politically correct! Political Correctness is based around feminist ideals (among other things), so how can you help guys overcome obstacles set upon them by society by being PC?”
The saying on the bumper sticker about feminism is~what? “Feminism is the radical notion that women are people.” You see, the idea that women are people and deserve better than to get hooked on some misogynist pig is apparently viewed as just an unfair “obstacle set upon men by society.” The idea that women are people? That’s just “PC.” Please note that this was Thundercat’s reaction to D1m1tr1′s post. Women, please forget about thinking that some PUA brain-chemical pusher is going to view you as a human being, or that he’s actually going to care about you.
Finally, I will leave you with the words of Hugh Ristik, whom I wish would actually believe what he wrote here, because it is the TRUEST thing he has ever written. I’ll just want to add this one thing: you don’t have to **be** a sociopath in order to cause the **damage** of one if you adopt a quasi-sociopathic attitude to justify your dealer actions:
“The seduction community is a group of men who believe that women are attracted to what pro-feminist author R. W. Connell would call “hegemonic masculinity.” Prior to the community, some of its members buy into masculinity, and some do not. What they agree on is that women are attracted to masculine men (we’ll save the question of how true this is for later). Since they believe that the vast majority of women have such preferences, they believe that the only practical way to approach sex and relationships with women is by learning to perform masculinity better. Unfortunately, the performance of masculinity, as feminists have correctly pointed out, can have negative consequences both for these men and for the women they interact with. For example, in seduction forums, I have protested the maxim “don’t give a shit,” a classic example of male stoicism. Only a sociopath truly doesn’t give a shit. This doesn’t mean that PUAs are sociopaths, but it is disturbing that they feel they need to adopt stoic and quasi-sociopathic attitudes in order to be successful with women.”
Yes, Virginia, the baby in the bathwater really IS a vampire.
scarred, while I truely respect your adamance and fervor on these issues – for you to denounce my posts as “ad-hominem non-logic” baffles me.. while I understand that my posts may have made you furious, and that you regard the male voice as unimportant in the issue, they are certainly rooted deep with logic. I’ve seen a great deal of serious problems dealing with these exact issues in my own life and in people close to me.. and I wish you would stop and take a deep breath, and think about what I’m saying, instead of planning your rebuttal.
What im saying is that your quest to help women ‘develop a bullshit meter’ is important but you would be MUCH more effective in the long term if you stopped focusing on how the current world is fucked up and stepped back for a second. If you hope to create change and raise awareness I beleive that starting from the root of the problem would be a much better use of your time. If you want to protect women from the evils of patriarchy then why dont you analyze the patriarchy and explain why it’s not working..
tg you say that “it’s male privilege to try to make this an intellectual endeavour, rather than what it actually is” but in my opinion thats exactly what this is, if you are speaking online through a blog than this is certainly an intellectual endeavour.. your not going out and literally trying to stop these PUA’s in thier actions, your trying to spread awareness, on an intellectual level in order to empower females..
I understand that it is important to address current problems but the issue with working from within the system and trying to fix certain aspects of it from the inside is only useful in the short term. So, instead of trying to protect women from PUA, spreading awareness of the real problem might be more effective. The best analogy I can think of atm relates to computers since that is what im currently looking at. If a computer program or operating system is obviously heavily flawed and is not working for a current situation, it is rare that the developers will attempt an entire reworking of the program.. instead they start an entirely new project. What your doing is similar to trying to analyze and fix every small problem with a computer program that is not even useful anymore.. now I understand that starting a new computer program is infinitely easier than reworking a major aspect of society, but the cause that you fight for will never truely be settled until the system as we know it is overthrown. Although it may not be evident in my posts I am all for this change.. I am genuinely concerned with many aspects of present day society and feminism is an important one, but IMHO revolution is the only way out.. your never going to truely fix the situation by addressing specifics that are simply a byproduct of a larger problem.
What I really mean by all of this – getting to the thread relevant point – is that the problems you face are not because of men, they are not because of PUA’s, they are because of the overwhelming power of society to conform to a patriachal standard combined with the even more powerful forces of greed and selfishness. Men and women are both following whatever path is the easiest for them to get what they want, it just so happens that the way our society is set up, men are privledged. The media along with many other overwhelming forces are bombarding men with images and ideas that treat women as objects, and actually make women work from under that premise, think about it, as men treat women like objects, women are forced to treat themselves like objects to a certain extent to succeed in today’s competitive atmosphere (a relevant example to tg – breast augmentation) and all of this simply perpetuates the patriarchy.. your efforts to break down the PUA and protect women from them are very interesting, but if it is awareness and change you seek, then I beleive there are much better ways to approach the situation, and frankly IMHO, as I said before, I don’t beleive youll get anywhere with the attitude and tone that you assume.. while the more extreme feminists may support you fully, I would hope that you seek the support of more than a handful of women because realistically you will need male support if you ever want change to occur, and unless you begin to address others with respect and consideration your message will never truely touch the large majority of the people who encounter it..
“I’ve seen a great deal of serious problems dealing with these exact issues in my own life and in people close to me.. and I wish you would stop and take a deep breath, and think about what I’m saying, instead of planning your rebuttal.”
Go take **your own advice.** You’re in no position to lecture me or demand that I think about what you’re saying after you admitted that you couldn’t read my posts and accused me of labeling men in general as the enemy. When you’re not being reactive and nasty yourself, you’re condescending and patronizing, and I won’t have it. **Check your own tone at the door, mister,** you’ve got a LOT to answer for, with an attitude like this!–
“…frankly IMHO, as I said before, I don’t beleive youll get anywhere with the attitude and tone that you assume..”
“…unless you begin to address others with respect and consideration.”
This is what you would say to a second-grader. Naah, I think you should take your own advice first. You work on you, and I’ll work on me. Want to overthrow the patriarchy? Do it in yourself first by asking yourself why you feel compelled to talk to a grown woman that way JUST BECAUSE she won’t roll over and nod her head up and down at what you have to say.
OTHERWISE, FUCK OFF.
Got it?
We’re all adults here, and if you think something needs to be accomplished, YOU DO IT instead of trying to assign me or other people “tasks” based on what YOU think will fight patriarchy!
“If you want to protect women from the evils of patriarchy then why dont you analyze the patriarchy and explain why it’s not working..”
Why don’t YOU do this?
And by the way, how often has this been done before? By how many people? To what effect?
“I understand that it is important to address current problems but the issue with working from within the system and trying to fix certain aspects of it from the inside is only useful in the short term.”
Short term by whose yardstick?
You’ve been to my blog; you know that its larger scope is to fight manipulation IN GENERAL, and not just mainstream patriarchal PUAism, although this is a useful “first arena” to fight in. Manipulation is one of the **BIGGEST** weapons of patriarchy, something that’s been in very widespread use since the dawn of empire in human history. It’s taken thousands of years to develop, and will take probably thousands of years to bring down.
“What your doing is similar to trying to analyze and fix every small problem with a computer program that is not even useful anymore..”
Wrong analogy, bucko; if you’ve sat down and thought it out, I’m working on a big section of the MACHINE CODE!!
“…but IMHO revolution is the only way out.. your never going to truely fix the situation by addressing specifics that are simply a byproduct of a larger problem.”
You think a revolution is the only thing in order? YOU go start one, but count me out; revolutions rarely. “Meet the new boss…same as the old boss…” And that’s largely because the new boss picks up the old methods of the old boss… The **machine code** of patriarchy rests largely (although not entirely) on linguistic manipulation and abuse; it also rests on economic and military/physical domination. This too will be dealt with. ON MY TIME, NOT YOURS.
“What I really mean by all of this – getting to the thread relevant point – is that the problems you face are not because of men, they are not because of PUA’s, they are because of the overwhelming power of society to conform to a patriachal standard combined with the even more powerful forces of greed and selfishness.”
Uh, I do my **own** thinking for me, thank you very much. While certainly we live in a patriarchy, we live in this **because individuals choose to participate in one.** We live in a society, sure, but we’re NOT a hive mind; there is **individual** collusion and cooperation. Using YOUR logic, we should quit prosecuting rapists, because after all it’s only the “overwhelming power of society,” and individuals can choose to refuse and resist patriarchal modes of operating.
Sure, society IS a very powerful thing…but the only thing that has ever changed it is a small, motivated group of people doing the right thing. Go read Margaret Mead; that’s what’s inspired me.
“The media along with many other overwhelming forces are bombarding men with images and ideas that treat women as objects, and actually make women work from under that premise, think about it, as men treat women like objects, women are forced to treat themselves like objects to a certain extent to succeed in today’s competitive atmosphere (a relevant example to tg – breast augmentation) and all of this simply perpetuates the patriarchy..”
This is disingenous arguing on your part. There is NOTHING we have said on this thread, on this blog, or on MY blog that contradicts this; in fact, my blog is advocating the study of propaganda techniques as how PUAism uses them. However, I also advocate that propaganda techniquing be applied to advertising…and yeah, WHEN I BLOODY WELL FEEL LIKE IT, I’ll get around to covering the media as well. ON *******MY******* TIME, not yours.
“… your efforts to break down the PUA and protect women from them are very interesting, but if it is awareness and change you seek, then I beleive there are much better ways to approach the situation…”
THEN GO DO IT.
Don’t sit there and argue with me and try to tell me what to do, and roll around in **your own male privilege**–
GO DO IT.
No one person can handle everything. If you want to get somewhere in life and actually get something done, **you have to focus on only one to three specific subjects.** I chose to focus in on something that TO ME seems highly relevant, and for a beginning blogger, I seem to be commanding one hell of a lot of influence, positive **and** negative. YOU SURE AS HELL are paying attention to me, for better or for worse, so I must be doing SOMETHING right, now aren’t I? You sure seem hellbent on trying to derail me, which in my opinion is just fucking despicable.
Why do I think this way??
Try this on for size!!
Imagine a class of women taking martial arts and physical self-defense–we’ll say, just for giggles, Krav Maga.
Now, imagine that you’re trying to bully and derail the martial arts instructor and the rest of the students from learning Krav Maga by telling them how anti-male they are and how they shouldn’t be learning to defend themselves because they should be focusing in on the patriarchy and how “the more extreme feminists may support them fully but you would hope that they seek the support of more than a handful of women” **when these women are trying to learn how to defend themselves** against potential attackers!!
THAT is what a good analogy looks like, and in fact it’s a **damn** good analogy of just **how you’ve been acting** on this thread towards me and the other feminists here!!
I think your real motivation isn’t to stop patriarchy; it’s to derail the STATED PURPOSE OF THIS THREAD–a purpose which Thinking Girl and myself and other feminists **have already agreed on**, which would make you either a closet PUA sympathizer or a PUA–one of the two. Maybe you’re not aware of it, or maybe you are: you decide for yourself. There are LOTS of critques on patriarchy on the Net, but not many blogs or threads offering specifics–a precious commodity. Why the hell would you want to try to stop and “refocus” what we’re doing **when there are shitloads of people already doing this??**
And I’m basing this opinion on your ACTIONS, not your words. I learned a long time ago that NOT everyone who says they’re my ally IS my ally. And if you don’t like my level of distrust, too fucking bad!! And my advice to you is to stop wasting my time and yours, BECAUSE:
Bye!!! I’m not going to waste any more text on you.
byrdeye – you are most certainly NOT welcome to post here. go trolling somewhere else with your misogyny. OR did you miss the comment policy that I’ve drawn attention to oh about a million times since these threads started in which I make it absolutely fucking clear as crystal that I do not allow MRAs to post here, as they clearly operate from a non-feminist framework?
Scarred – thanks for that post. god. bio-chemical manipulation – good way of putting it, good way of recognizing what is actually going on.
hmm.. I find it interesting that you did exactly the opposite of what I respectfully asked which was to read my post without solely thinking of how you would disagree with it. I’m wasting my time here, there is obviously nothing I can say that would be correct seeing as how I am male and can’t possibly recognize what is actually going on.
but atm I have nothing better to do so I’d like to defend myself… firstly, I’d say that I have not talked down to you in any way, if you read my last post from a non biased perspective I have been completely respectful and mature. Comparing my skipping over posts, while I shouldn’t have done that (I have read them all now), with your hastily pretending to read my posts isn’t a legitimate excuse, in fact I would rather you have skipped my posts than to try to pick them apart without actually understanding my points. The things I say to you have nothing to do with the fact that you’re a woman so don’t even try to bring that into the picture, and the reason I’m compelled to keep posting is not because you do not agree with me, it is because you are not even attempting to hear me out, you read my words with contempt and you think about how to argue them. I am not your enemy, or I shouldn’t be anyways, yet you act like you Must defend yourself. I am not assigning you any tasks or asking you do to anything, I am simply providing my opinions, which I personally beleive to be valid and useful, which to my understanding is what comment sections on blogs are for. If you are going to hold a discussion online then be prepared to encounter differing view points. If you continue to fight off every opinion in such a manner as you have done here then you will never change anyones mind, you will only appeal to people who already agree with you. If thats what you want to do then fine, but I was under the assumption that you were interested in making change.
“Wrong analogy, bucko; if you’ve sat down and thought it out, I’m working on a big section of the MACHINE CODE!!”
this doesn’t make any sense, if your going to try to discredit my analogy you should probably at least have some idea of what you’re talking about. Machine code refers to hardware instructions given to the CPU which are all derived directly from computer programs. If you were talking about changing hardware then that is sort of irrelevant seeing as how we probably won’t have the ability to change human hardware in a useful way any time soon. What you might be refering to is the operating system, which still parallels my analogy seeing as how new operating systems are developed on a regular basis.
“Uh, I do my **own** thinking for me, thank you very much. While certainly we live in a patriarchy, we live in this **because individuals choose to participate in one.** We live in a society, sure, but we’re NOT a hive mind; there is **individual** collusion and cooperation. Using YOUR logic, we should quit prosecuting rapists, because after all it’s only the “overwhelming power of society,” and individuals can choose to refuse and resist patriarchal modes of operating.”
No, using MY logic we should figure out why rapes occur and address that issue instead of focusing on how we can catch and prosecute the rapists.
Using Your logic all women who perpetuate patriarchy must be ignorant.. if they truely could refuse and resist to participate why would they?
What the hell does any of this have to do with my time and your time.. this blog is not your job, and noone else is forcing you to do this. if you don’t enjoy discussing these subjects openly (which will always bring about debate and disagreement) then give this shit up. If you’re not willing to respectfully communicate with others then write a book or give lectures don’t post on blogs.
On top of that I didn’t see anywhere posted a STATED PURPOSE, I was under the impression that blogs like this are used to explore and discuss the topic, which I was certainly doing.
your analogy is almost correct except heres the major flaw, you are not a teacher in this setting, and the readers are NOT here to take a class. But, assuming that part was correct, this would be more like me coming into the class and saying hey, why do you need to defend yourself? who is going to attack you and why? I’m not trying to derail anything I’m trying to approach another aspect of the situation which in my opinion is more important.
On a side note, commanding me to do things is sort of misguided seeing as how you have NO IDEA who I am or what I have done.. I’ve looked into these issues thoroughly and I have been acting on them. So before you try to attack me and say that I am asking you to do things while I roll around in my male privledge, you might want to consider that. i find it hilarious that you would say, “And I’m basing this opinion on your ACTIONS, not your words.” for obvious reasons..
I have a question.
Most of this discussion seeks to disuade men from folling Pickup doctrine. It seeks to point out the evils of this form of “manipulation.”
I can tell you from experience that while I did manage to find the occasional ‘hookup’ as your run-of-the-mill ‘nice guy,’ for the most part I spent most of my time being rejected.
Since I have began persuing pickup, which I might had has not taught me any forthright manipulation, but rather how to communicate my personality in an effective, attractive way, I have become much more successful at meeting and attracting women.
Am I a different person because of this process? If anything, I am more honest about who I am and what my expectations are than I ever was as a nice guy.
In fact, as a ‘nice guy,’ I’m willing to admit my motivations were no different than the player sitting on the barstool next to me. I wanted to get laid by attractive women. The only difference was the route I chose to travel to meet that end was the less successful one. I see no evil in wanting to get laid. It’s a basic instinct of life in general, to procreate.
So what method, then, is being offered here as an alternative? As a nice guy you have few choices… either accept the fact that you aren’t getting laid, or change something. I chose to change something and I am immesly happy with the results. Interestingly, I also feel as though I have in some way improved the lives of most of the women I have met through this process as well. I have not caused anyone hurt or suffering, and am seen in general as a fun, exciting and intelligent individual.
So my question to the author of this blog, and those taking a similar position in this argument is what exactly are the guys who are ineffective at meeting and attracting women supposed to do when they’re lonely on a Saturday night? Live with it?
Thanks for taking the time to read my comments.
“Imagine a class of women taking martial arts and physical self-defense–we’ll say, just for giggles, Krav Maga.”
Good example. Imagine a bunch of Israelis learning Krav Maga, with the express intention of fucking up some Arabs.
Naturally, the latter are going to take exception and disrupt the classes somewhat.
I’ve been following the discussion since the beginning, and am learning a lot, but a public forum dedicated against a group that perceives itself as positive must expect resistance.
Would it be possible to split this thread, perhaps? Into one that allows PUAs to defend PUAdom and another exclusively for anti-PUA tactics and discussion?
I would certainly find both very interesting.
crh:
PUAs are not an oppressed group, simply because women don’t care to be tricked into the sack. Women have the right to resist manipulation, and that’s all there is to it.
The fact that you claim this: “Imagine a bunch of Israelis learning Krav Maga, with the express intention of fucking up some Arabs,” betrays two mindsets: a) anti-Semitism, and b) equating feminists and women who don’t want to be manipulated or attacked by these tactics with oppressors. This creates the strawman illusion that the people who want to defend themselves are out to get you, *when all they want to do is to NOT be manipulated and to see through it.*
I’m not interested in “fucking anybody up,” per se, although I’ll do what I have to do to defend myself should the necessity arise. I’m interested in putting an END to manipulation. If you can’t tell the difference, there isn’t anything I can do about that…and, I don’t believe for a New York minute that you’re really motivated to do so.
Let’s put the shoe on the other foot, shall we? If we were discussing methods of foiling NLP methods by used-car salesmen to prevent people from getting suckered into buying cars, we wouldn’t hear a peep from you, I firmly believe. NOT one peep. So if you really think you’re not doing anything wrong or anything manipulative, why the yelping?
“Would it be possible to split this thread, perhaps? Into one that allows PUAs to defend PUAdom and another exclusively for anti-PUA tactics and discussion?”
Are you telling me you don’t think you get enough representation on the web, with one hell of a lot of sites devoted to the art of mainstream patriarchal pick-up? Why don’t you go do your own thread defending PUA tactics on one of those sites…or build your own site?
Or, if what you’re doing is SO on the side of the angels, why would it need defending?
“…a public forum dedicated against a group that perceives itself as positive must expect resistance”
Sure. And there are lots of con artists, identity thieves, and car thieves who think they’ve got the *perfect* right to do what they’re doing!!
Crypticfox:
“Most of this discussion seeks to disuade men from folling Pickup doctrine. It seeks to point out the evils of this form of “manipulation.””
It started out that way…it turned into something else, **namely** how to combat PUA manipulation. I would advise that you go back and read the thread–VERY carefully.
“I see no evil in wanting to get laid. It’s a basic instinct of life in general, to procreate.”
Uh, we’re not members of the Junior Anti-Sex League here, Crypticfox. We object to deception and manipulation…and if you’ve read the thread, you’ll find **LOTS** of examples posted, from various PUA methods. There’s a LOT wrong with getting laid if it involves manipulating someone with behavioral controls and emotional tricks.
“I can tell you from experience that while I did manage to find the occasional ‘hookup’ as your run-of-the-mill ‘nice guy,’ for the most part I spent most of my time being rejected.”
This attitude has already been dealt with before on this thread. If you THOUGHT you were being a nice guy and didn’t get “rewarded” for your “niceness,” a good argument has already been made that you weren’t **really** being nice.
“In fact, as a ‘nice guy,’ I’m willing to admit my motivations were no different than the player sitting on the barstool next to me. I wanted to get laid by attractive women.”
Then, this tells me that you WEREN’T REALLY a nice guy after all, because you’ve just admitted that your motivations were no different that the player next to you. The women sensed that your motivations weren’t copacetic, and the ones with self-esteem avoided you. The real problem is that you weren’t viewing women as human beings, just objects to get laid by. For what it’s worth, a lot of people have that problem…and it’s destroying our society and culture.
The next task for me and other feminists is to educate and help empower women so that they don’t get taken in by PUAs and players **either.** And there’s circumstantial evidence percolating around that this is **exactly** what’s starting to happen.
“Since I have began persuing pickup, which I might had has not taught me any forthright manipulation, but rather how to communicate my personality in an effective, attractive way, I have become much more successful at meeting and attracting women.”
This is your claim, but look at your statement:
“…which I might had has not taught me any forthright manipulation…”
This is a contradiction in terms. “Forthright manipulation.” This is an oxymoron. You CAN’T have forthright manipulation, it’s either manipulation or it isn’t. This wording is confusing and contradictory…and disingenous. “Forthright manipulation” is like “being a little bit pregnant.”
“So what method, then, is being offered here as an alternative? As a nice guy you have few choices… either accept the fact that you aren’t getting laid, or change something.”
“So my question to the author of this blog, and those taking a similar position in this argument is what exactly are the guys who are ineffective at meeting and attracting women supposed to do when they’re lonely on a Saturday night? Live with it?”
**************************************************
This TOO has been dealt with on this thread–a long time ago. So, allow me, TG, to get *very* sarcastic:
Yes, Crypticfox, we all know that “lonely” men who don’t regularly get laid swell up with symptoms of bubonic plague…we know that men who don’t regularly discharge their semen have their testes turn midnight blue and inflate to the size of a swimming pool and explode!!! Yes, resisting manipulative PUA tactics is just another tactic us dirty rotten horrible feminists are using to PERSONALLY get you to explode into tiny little bits, because you **poor** dears obviously can’t go without using women as cum dumpsters every other nanosecond.
There, I’ve discharged my sarcasm and frustration. Thinking Girl, if you want to edit that section out as an unnecessary flame, be my guest.:)
**************************************************
It is NOT our responsibility as feminists to “offer alternatives;” it’s not our job to help you get into the pants of women! We have repeated ourselves *incessantly*, and this has been mentioned repeatedly on the thread.
This is what I’ve come to think of as “drive-by” posters. These are PUAs who either don’t care to read the thread, or claim to read the thread–and will then post with the purpose of trying to make the feminists here look like meanies out to “deprive” men of sex, or try to wear us down by using the same old tired arguments that have been addressed before, or will try pathetically to demoralize us, or will attempt to justify and rationalize their behavior, or will attempt to distract us and enrage us with an end to derailing our attempts.
Essentially, the PUAs are trying to run their own **counter-propaganda** program on us…using the following axioms that Professor Hugh Rank has listed on his website, Persuasion Analysis. (You will find this site listed on my blogroll back at my own blog.) These two axioms are as follows:
Counter-Propaganda Axioms:
Axiom 1: When they intensify, downplay.
Axiom 2: When they downplay, intensify.
Axiom 1 is generally passive: it often involves a lot of passive resistance. It CAN involve a lot of distraction, sidetracking, NOT listening (hear that?), asking trivial questions, and “confusing the issues” from the issues of what’s we’re trying to discuss…and, dear readers, if you read the thread from the beginning to end, you will see an AWFUL lot of these attempts!
On the other hand, what we feminists have been doing is more along Axiom 2, which is: questioning, complaining, sorting out/clarifying, **whistle-blowing**, and investigating. Alertness, inquisitiveness, and active engagement has been a lot of what we’ve been doing here.
I will refer you to the URL
http://webserve.govst.edu/pa/Schema/intro_s.htm
for further details. Fellow feminists, you will find this ******illuminating.******
“Or, if what you’re doing is SO on the side of the angels, why would it need defending?”
Ah. I was getting ready to bitch at you for random hostility, but this makes sense of it all.
Perhaps you’re confusing me with a PUA? I guess my handle isn’t particularly distinctive.
I’ll let the personal jibes slide, since they were based on that assumption.
On to the meat of the matter.
The way PUAs tell it, they’re not tricking women into the sack.
They make it sound like they’re learning how to look good, talk well and go through the motions of human mating.
You make it sound like they’re playing some massive mind game.
Perhaps the truth lies somewhere between the extremes, perhaps not, but endless interjections are disrupting this thread.
Indeed, you are now engaged with a PUA apologist and another that you perceived as such, effectively destroying your momentum.
Having two simultaneous discussions in one thread isn’t really working out. Having one thread for each might be enlightening.
I decided to comment more today on “drive-by” posting and how it relates to the Intensify/Downplay Schema that Professor Rank talks about on his website “Persuasion Analysis”:
http://webserve.govst.edu/pa/Schema/intro_s.htm
When we read this thread on mainstream patriarchal PUAism, one of our goals should be to watch and recognize the enormous amount of attempts at **confusion, diversion, and **omission** that PUAs have aimed at our resistance of their methodologies. I’ve noticed that “drive-by-commenter” PUAS delibrately ignore the issue of STDs, particularly the ones that can’t be so easily prevented with condoms!
With only one or two exceptions (Eurosabra, hats off to you–you at least **touched** on the issue)–the PUAs have not addressed it. If you read Professor Rank’s page on counterpropaganda, you will find that ***omission*** plays a huge role in downplaying elements of the arguments that one doesn’t like:
http://webserve.govst.edu/pa/Schema/techniques.htm
The issue of HPV, human papilloma virus, was raised early on in the first PUA thread:
“(Condoms stop AIDS but aren’t that effective against HPV.)”–Scarred, March 28th, 2007, 5:37 pm.
There are certain strains of HPV that are NASTILY carcinogenic; they have been documented to cause cancer of the cervix and now recently have been **seriously indicted** as causing throat cancer in non-smokers; a recent study by Johns Hopkins offers that it may **dramatically be more of a factor in causing this disease** than the tobacco habit! The journal “Adonis Mirror” lays this out:
http://www.adonismirror.com/wordpress/?p=7#comments
Richard Leader, the editor of “Adonis Mirror,” is succinct and cruelly sharp in his assessment of patriarchal sexual behavior:
“But more than that, men need to be cognizant of the reality that male power has crafted. A sexual culture of predation, where deceit is encouraged and exploitation celebrated, has shaped HPV into something akin to a man-made disease. A vaccine might treat a symptom but it will take far more than Gardasil to cure it.”
My point in all this is that WOMEN ARE DYING FROM CERTAIN STRAINS OF HPV!! Condoms, well-used, stop the HIV virus surprisingly well, but not **HPV.** Now, for this *reason,* I am all in favor of *immediately* immunizing populations as fast as governments and private businesses can do it. HOWEVER–
the more sexually active a population is, statistically the **more likely** you’re going to see the emergence and spread of a really vicious sexually-transmitted disease.
THIS is one of the biggest reasons why monogamy makes perfect sense from a public-health point of view!
And, if nothing else, THIS is one of the BIGGEST motivators why women and men alike should really avoid the “hook-up” culture and recognize mainstream patriarchal PUAism for what it is–a foolish, risk-taking, nastily manipulative and subjugatory game that potentially plays with the lives of the women and men involved.
Scarred said:
At some point, could you define exactly what you mean by “manipulation,” “behavioral control,” and “emotional trick,” and explain why you consider them to be wrong?
Scarred:
“Then, this tells me that you WEREN’T REALLY a nice guy after all, because you’ve just admitted that your motivations were no different that the player next to you.”
No, I admitted that my motivation were no different than any other straight males. I use ‘Nice Guy’ as a general term to describe men who end up in ‘let’s just be friends’ scenarios with girls they are attracted to. I used to be this guy.
Pickup is the result of how the psychology of human social interaction works. The Pickup community didn’t invent the system, it evolved as an effective darwinian method of selection. The pickup community simply reverse-engineered what guys that were successful were doing; however, this does not mean that all PUAs go out to manipulate women into bed. I can’t speak for everyone, but I actually meet women because I enjoy their company. *GASP!* Sometimes it ultimately results in sex, but there’s no manipulation there… it’s just two people that enjoy each other.
Your arguments are fine and dandy in a perfect world, but your brand of idealism simply isn’t how things work in the real world. You even had to result to sarcasm when addressing what you really wanted to say, which is in itself a mask you felt you needed to put in front of your real position.
Why do you think men spend countless hours… hell, years attempting to mold themselves into a person that a woman will be attracted to? Do you honestly believe that a person who would put in that much work in order to acheive acceptance is an evil manipulator?
I have met hundreds of PUAs, and most of them are very compassionate men who have simply reached a point where they were forced to admit that what they were doing was wrong, and take a new approach.
Learning how to be attractive is NOT manipulating women… it’s manipulating one’s self. I have manipulated myself into a person that women are immediately attracted to. I have addressed my body language, the speed and tone of my speech, the things I choose to reveal about myself, the stories I tell, but all of these things are still real, and they are still me. I have simply changed my presentation, and I do not appologize for that.
Hugh:
Yes, I can, and would be happy to do so!
I’ll do even better; I’ll *define* these terms, and then provide examples of what I mean by each!
From the Merriam-Webster” Collegiate Dictionary:
*manipulation*: 2 b: to control or play upon [people or situation] by artful, unfair, or insidious means esp. to one’s own advantage.
My *own* observed definition:
*behavioral control*: manipulation designed to gain control of someone’s behavior and get him or her to do what *the controller* wants them to do.
My own observed definition:
*emotional trick*: to create an illusion–or to feed or encourage an illusion–within someone leading them to believe that the illusionist or a situation has a certain emotional condtion or other highly desirable situation when in fact that emotion or situation doesn’t exist or does not exist fully.
Okay, i just found out I don’t have the time to post *more* on this tonight, but you have my word that when I get to the computer tomorrow morning, I’ll return to these definitions and provide examples PLUS why I think it’s *wrong* to use manipulation, control, and trickery.
Thanks, Scarred.
Alright. Before I go into detail, I’m going to start off by giving a general caveat, Dear Readers.
The reason *why* I’m deciding to “explain” why I think it’s wrong to use manipulation, control, and trickery, is because apparently it’s not self-evident to a lot of people, which is a damn *shame.* In the past, I refused to do this because I regarded this as attempts at diversion and obfuscation–attempts to derail the purpose of the thread. However, it appears that I’ve been able to give enough methods of resistance of mainstream PUA tactics that I can take some time out **for a comment** and state my ethical position for the thread.
I have decided to, ON A ONE-TIME BASIS, declare why I think this is wrong. Pay attention very closely, because this is the last post you’ll ever see me explaining *WHY* I think manipulation, control, and trickery is wrong when it comes to sex, romance, relationships, and affairs of the heart. I will not debate or explain my views after this: take them or leave them.
We have a common saying in our culture: “All is fair in love and war.” NO, IT’S NOT.
When wars are fought, they are fought *by the little guys and gals* running around; generals plan and order, but the people doing the fighting are the ground-pounding grunts, the sailors, the pilots–in short, people who are *actually* putting their lives on the line and getting killed while killing. In other words, war is hell. It’s mass-scale murder, to be exact: the ugliest endeavor known to humanity. And the “little people” fighting the war CANNOT, for their own personal survival, fight by Marquis de Queensbury rules. War is the ultimate threat to one’s life, and it requires all the resources at one’s disposal when you’re in a firefight to survive and overcome the enemy. This is not to excuse or justify war crimes or rape, BTW; they actually don’t do a thing to win a war in reality, but frequently exist as a way to take troop frustrations out on the enemy population; they also have a very nasty habit of goading the enemy population to fight hard enough to *win* the war. I’m talking about the actual *fighting.* This CANNOT have any moral inhibition; if you want to survive, you had better do anything and everything you can, including using methods that would horrify any civilian. Yes, General Sherman indeed said it best when he said, “War is hell.”
NOW, because war must be fought by any means necessary, you *must* use deception and trickery to overcome your foe. Honesty is a surefire way of defeat: it’s guaranteed. It is not for nothing that the Mossad has as its motto, “By way of deception thou shalt wage war.” You use deception, trickery, and manipulation on your enemies, period. The equasion is simple: intimacy+honesty=death+defeat.
You **don’t** want your enemies familiar with you and your plans, and you **don’t** want them to know what you’re up to. War **by definition** is about zero trust, for either side.
By now, the picture is taking shape: dishonesty, manipulation, deceit, and trickery, are **by nature** adversarial. They create distance, prevent intimacy, and set up a situation by which aggression and domination are greatly aided. In fact, you can argue that manipulation, deceit, and trickery are **in and of themselves** highly aggressive acts. It limits or even eliminates the choices of the people being deceived! People instinctively know this, IMHO; this is why trickery, manipulation, and deceit is seen as a hostile act–even if the manipulator doesn’t have a hostile intention. You can claim that “I didn’t mean any HARM by it,” and this **STILL** for the most part isn’t going to stem people’s rage!
NOW. Supposedly, having sex with someone is supposed to be consensual, and it’s supposed to be an area in our society where we’re allowed to let down our guards, emotional and physical, yes? Sex, romance, and relationships are **desired** by most people to be areas of pleasantry and refuge, supposedly a break from the demands of life. I will observe that with the increasing stress of modern life, the **need** for romantic/relational refuge is greatly increasing. Are we all agreed here? OK, I hope so, because I want people paying VERY close attention to what I’m about ready to say:
When you consciously use manipulation, trickery, deceit, or conditioning on a person that supposedly you want to have “intimacy” with, you have JUST SET UP AN ADVERSARIAL SITUATION, AUTOMATICALLY, REGARDLESS OF YOUR INTENT. If and when the person cottons onto it, THAT’S how it will be received. This is why wives and husbands explode with rage when they find out that their spouses have been cheating on them; this is why parents frequently exhibit extreme anger and get very punitive with kids who lie to them; this is why employers fire employees who falsify their educational credentials, **even if** the employees are actually quite competent! People naturally react very nastily to deception, domination, manipulation, and trickery. This is why identity thieves and con artists get nailed hard; it’s why child pornographers and pedophiles are nigh-well universally hated. It’s also why little kids often get really harshly and unnecessarily spanked when they’re caught lying–because the parents are instinctually [over]reacting to a perceived threat!!
THE MOMENT you bring in behavioral conditioning (that’s what I should *really* say instead of “behavioral controls”), deception, trickery, and manipulation into what is SUPPOSED TO BE a relationship/encounter with a “friendly” person, you have **just** treated them as though they’re the enemy, or a *potential* enemy. Or, an obstacle or piece of furniture!! **This** is how the deceived are going to perceive it. People will react with great hostility once they figure it out, if they have any real spine. It will NOT be pretty. If you can understand the anger of a manager who gets pissed off when an employee calls in sick while artificially croaking “Hack, hack,” for the umpteenth time, or who is furious because said employee is claiming that grandpa has just died for the fourth time, THEN you should be able to understand why I and other women and feminists are **furious** about the manipulation, trickery, deception, and emotional and behavioral conditioning that mainstream patriarchal PUAism brings to WHAT IS SUPPOSED TO BE an area of safety and trust.
Now, if you think that women–or men– don’t have the right to expect safety and trust in having sex and relationships, you and I will have absolutely nothing to agree on–and in fact, I WILL see you as an adversary, to be combatted by any legal and honorable means necessary. If you get hot and bothered by adversarial situations, then my arguments won’t mean squat to you–and ***stay the hell away from me and mine.***
BUT–if you have the same desire for peace and refuge, then hopefully THIS will be convincing.
I will also make this last observation. A culture and civilization is only as viable as the informed and free choices that its inhabitants have access to. The more dishonesty, deception, control, manipulation, and trickery come into the picture, the more the choices and freedom of the citizenry are eroded–and, arguably, the more **degenerate** the culture and society become. Believe me, people, Empire Rome, the Byzantine empire, and Machiavelli’s Italy were NOT fun or healthy places to live in.
I elected to use secular argumentation in this post. I have my religious reasons for why I think manipulation, control, and trickery is immoral, but I elected **not** to use them here because I’m aiming to convince both the secular and the religious of my position.
I don’t have enough time today to post examples of mainstream PUAs using trickery, deception, and manipulation, but I will tomorrow. (I wrote and *rewrote* my comment, perhaps far too often.) I’ll give examples of each to **specifically** illustrate these qualities in action, like I **said** I would. I miscalculated how much time I would need to post examples **and** put forth an argument on my moral position; I will do this on the **next post.** I will also, true to my focus, add what I consider to be effective methods of **resistance.**
I will **reiterate** **once** **again** my original position, because I will ALWAYS stick to my guns here:
“We object to deception and manipulation…and if you’ve read the thread, you’ll find **LOTS** of examples posted, from various PUA methods. There’s a LOT wrong with getting laid if it involves manipulating someone with behavioral controls and emotional tricks.”
TG: check your email ASAP. It would appear that I’ve done something VERY, VERY effective.:) Alas, something will have to go due to an oversight of mine…but that’s okay, we’ve got something to put in its place that’s just about as effective.:)
Since it appears my role here is pretty much devil’s advocate, and I have extensive experience with NLP-PU, I’d chime in here with the idea that PU is response to “hegemonic femininity”–the women who are approached are, more often then not, the ones who are making the Western feminine sex role/object-of-desire role “work” for them, in contexts–nightclubs–where it means free drinks, approval from attractive members of the appropriate sex, etc. etc. I’ve read many, many feminist blogs about the burden of this sex role, so would counter with the question “Can you acknowledge that there are women for whom the ‘system’ DOES, undoubtedly, WORK, in aiding them to attain the object of THEIR desires?” Yes, say MacKinnon and Dworkin, but their every orgasm is complicity in their oppression yadda yadda.
I see most of the objection here falls under the rubric that “generating attraction” through the replication of gendered power relationships is trickery, falsehood, deceit, or that the replication of these gendered power relationships is itself harmful to women–which many PUAs are going to read as “hetero sex is harmful to women”, because many, many men came to PU through making desexualized approaches that DID NOT replicate the GPRs in question, and they feel that the resulting lack of attraction was because of a failure to play the masculine sex role AND that attraction STEMS from the proper performance of gender.
In a broader sense, WHERE does attraction come from? http://www.feministcritics.org has brushed up against that question in several threads, so far to no satisfactory conclusion…
TG, I posted again: I think the spamulator caught it.:)
Eurosabra, welcome back; I’m happy to have you here again.:) Just wanted you to know although we butt heads a lot, I respect and like your thoughtfulness a lot.:) And I have **no problem** with you being a devil’s advocate, because between you, Hugh Ristik, Thinking Girl, and myself, we’re creating enough neuronal connections and new neurons to fill a galaxy.:))
“…so would counter with the question “Can you acknowledge that there are women for whom the ’system’ DOES, undoubtedly, WORK, in aiding them to attain the object of THEIR desires?” Yes, say MacKinnon and Dworkin, but their every orgasm is complicity in their oppression yadda yadda.”
See, I can see where some women **do have a belief** in “hegemonic femininity”–the really attractive “hotties” who often sneer at feminism! These women are frequently used to “getting what they want” through their looks and demeanor; Brain was able to convince me of that.
BUT. My rejoinder is that they’re **still oppressed**–so in that sense, I agree with Dworkin and MacKinnon. I’ll explain why.:)
The **oppression lies** in that they frequently set their sights TOO DAMN LOW in terms of what they desire for their heart and their life. They have been pixy-led to believe that an ornamental existence, filled with orgasms, is the penultimate goal of life. They do not bring out and perfect their inner talents in life, and they don’t understand that they have become endorphin junkies and are frequently viewed by others with a great deal of contempt as attractive parasites. These women frequently have an unconcious but real self-contempt, and they often spill it out onto “less attractive” women and men. Women **do** get more “permission” from society to be less driven and not have to “perform,” but while women are frequently more secure in not having to prove their gender, they **OFTEN** have another insecurity–that of feeling powerless and unimportant.
I really think that’s the dilemma of Paris Hilton in a lot of ways. This is a woman who’s got extreme looks and enough wealth to found her own private army, and could command potentially an enormous amount of power…but she doesn’t concentrate, and she doesn’t have a mission in life. People like to badmouth her and laugh at her, but I feel sorry for her–I really do. And she’s trapped inside this image of being a jet-setting butterfly ornament, and I think that deep-down inside, she feels worthless and parasitic. She has a hard time paying the piper and taking responsibility for her actions, and she seems to measure her worth by how much press she gets.
She creates drama for attention. I myself have laughed uproariously at her antics when I haven’t been pissed at her drunk-driving. But she could get the same attention, with a LOT more respect, if she set out to devote her life and her well-being to, i.e., funding vaccines for children in Africa the way that Bill Gates has done.
Or, let’s say she decided to get serious and become a firefighter–actually went out and got the discipline and training to fight fires in Los Angeles or wherever her home city is, although I would hope she would avoid putting her six pets in the firetruck when responding to a call.:)))) This TOO would get media attention–but she would earn as **RESPECT** as a contributor to civilization as one of its rescuers, provided she really busted her ass to be **good** at it.:) But her basic problem in life seems to be that she thinks her looks and her femininity are her worth…
It is my solid, undeniable belief that EVERYONE on the face of the earth, man or woman, needs PURPOSE and a MISSION in life that may include relationships but MUST not be limited by them. This is not to badmouth stay-at-home mothers and wives, it just means that they may have to be much more careful about allowing themselves to feel useless, because a hard-working domestic engineer (female or male) is very badly underappreciated and underestimated for contributions to this society.:))))
Okay. You had asked, Eurosabra, what people here think where attraction comes from. You know, I don’t really know. But I can try hazarding a guess.:)
I think that attraction comes from within oneself, as desire…it comes from a certain initial feeling of *lack* within oneself, and one spots something or someone outside of ones’ self as a fulfillment of that lack. That’s a fairly Buddhist way to look at it…but not invalid. Is this to say that attraction is bad? Not at all…because we **all** have these little gaps within us, we’re always going to be a mite susceptible to feeling attraction.
I dunno, though…the older I get, the more I just have come to admire **appreciation,** rather than attraction. There’s just something to be said for admiring and appreciating a pretty face such as that of Jodie Foster or David Bowie…or a waterfall, a dragonfly, or a gorgeous black panther with a shiny coat,:) or a waning moon low and red-orange on the horizon.:) Damn if there just isn’t something to be said for just admiring the tiger lilies or a Zen garden instead of getting hot and bothered. Appreciation doesn’t mess people up and cloud judgement the way attraction does…it’s gentler, but in some ways much deeper…it lends itself to the **mystical** in life very easily:))…
well, I must admit, I get lazy with this thread. People leave comments, that end up in moderation, and then I let them sit there and stew for a while because I don’t have time to sit down and respond to them. Mostly because I don’t much feel like repeated myself over and fucking over again all the time. I keep hearing the same old same old BS from so many of the PUA supportive comments I get here, and really, why bother to approve them, respond to them? I’ve heard it all before. I’ve responded to it all before. IF not me, then someone else. There’s not a whole lot of uniqueness involved in these comments pro-PUA. So, dear PUA-supportive readers, if you have a comment or question or demand of me, and I seem absent from answering, it’s because it’s been dealt with before. go and re-read. I”m not going to even bother cutting and pasting for your lazy asses. the answers are there, most likely. do your own goddamn legwork and find them yourself. this feminist is done spoonfeeding PUAs on this thread. it’s far too dull for words. and it’s not the point of this post or this blog to answer your questions or challenges. it’s about resistance to your tactics. so sorry if your knickers are all twisted up because you think you’ve done nothing ethically wrong and you really are a decent human being instead of a misogynistic asshole who manipulates women, an oppressed class in society, for your own sexual gratification. sit with that feeling for a while. I don’t give a rats ass how you feel about being called out on your bullshit.
then, the threat of legal action! how exciting! guess ol’ D1m1tr1 didn’t like his tricks being exposed – for free. goes to show you again that it isn’t just women who are being taken advantage of by PUAism.
Anyhoo. the offending portion of the comment in question has been removed.
for the record, for once and for all, there will not be two separate threads on this blog about PUA – one for supporters and one for resistors. Not a fucking chance. In fact, I really don’t feel like publishing any more PUA-supportive comments. So, from now on, I simply am not going to. This thread is about resistance to PUAism. it is not about allowing equal opportunity to PUAs to defend themselves. There is no valid defense. PUAism is indefensible. It is not salvageable, in my opinion. At the heart of PUA is a defense of patriarchy, and that is bad for women. so defending PUA is essentially defending women’s oppression. and in case you didn’t notice, this is a feminist blog. I’m pretty much against women’s oppression.
also for the record, for once and for all, I’m not here to offer an alternative to PUA. Yeah, I know, PUA works for PUAs, due to a fancy little thing called women’s internalized oppression. And since I’m the one with the problem with it, and I’m the one demanding that guys be more ethical and less sleazy, then it’s my responsibility to find a better way for PUAs to go about the business of getting laid.
yup, just like it was the slaves’ responsibility to find a good alternative to slavery, and the Jews’ responsibility to let the Nazis know about a better way to rule Europe. hmmm. wait a sec – placing the burden on the oppressed class to come up with a better solution that the oppressor class can then either accept or reject… wait a minute, that doesn’t sound like it’s going to work!
how about this: people who do nasty things that violate basic human decency should STOP, because it’s the right fucking thing to do. jesus, why is that so hard for you people to understand?
so, that’s all for now kids. to recap:
1. no more comments from PUA-supporters are going to be approved. it’s a distraction from the goal of the thread.
2. if I haven’t responded to your inane demand of me, it’s because it’s already been said. go look for yourself.
3. no separate thread for PUA defense.
4. no alternative pickup method, pre-approved by feminists!, will be provided.
good night.
Well said, TG.:))))))))))))))))))))))))
On WHY MANIPULATION IS WRONG:
The Ethical Harm of Manipulation
Scarred, it is pretty sad and pathetic that we actually have to explain why it is that manipulation and taking advantage of someone is morally delinquent.
Yes, I agree, TG…and I hope I haven’t enabled people to derail the purpose of the thread by taking a time-out from detailing methods of resistance. I’m back to it now, believe me, dear readers…
NOW, there’s an elegant link in TG’s post called “The Ethical Harm of Manipulation.” You also have *my argumentation* on the subject. No more spoonfeeding. If you can’t see this…too bad, so sad.
NOW, getting back to the IMPORTANT subject of developing methods of resistance to PUAs and other manipulators, here’s **two links** to my blog on learning NLP **precisely** to counter influence and manipulation, something it’s actually EXTREMELY effective at but has not generally been emphasized:
http://feministpitbull.wordpress.com/2007/07/05/beware-the-open-ended-question-an-opportunity-for-anchors/
http://feministpitbull.wordpress.com/2007/07/11/collapsing-anchors-and-getting-free-of-unwanted-attachment-attraction-or-emotion-of-any-type/
The first thread is good for teaching how to recognize when NLP conditioning is often applied…the second thread leads to another link which has information that is VERY, VERY useful for getting rid of unwanted emotional attachments, influences, and states. I can also offer this link directly **here:**
http://www.circlesoflight.com/hypnosis/nlp-3.html
In some ways, the second thread is more useful than the first, but I recommend reading both of them. I have test-driven and applied the information and quickly succeeded in getting rid of an unwanted state where someone was trying to manipulate (goad) me into doing something stupid. I can attest to this method’s power and efficacy.
You can and WILL get rid of ANY unwanted state, regardless of what it is…and this will make you one hell of a lot less vulnerable to manipulation designed to “elicit attraction.”
Manipulation almost always plays on people’s emotion. Eliminate the unwanted emotion–or its strength–and you’re now in the driver’s seat, **regardless of who’s trying to ring your chimes.**:)
Thinking Girl,
I happened upon this blog when I was searching for ‘counter’ PUA information and propaganda. As a woman who has dated a man who not only was a member of PUA, but was the President of the local Chapter, I found it disgusting that I allowed myself to be misled by their slimy tactics, particularly since I consider myself to be a strong, intelligent, and intuitive woman. Granted, I knew very little about this organization before we dated, and I always thought such groups were too obscure and ridiculous to take notice. But when I learned of his association with PUA, my interest was piqued and I took the time to try to understand it. The more I allowed myself to dig, the more I was disgusted. The relationship ended very soon after I got him to confess that he doesn’t believe women and men are equals.
I was completely disheartened with the dating scene after this experience. But it’s encouraging to see that the ‘anti-PUA’ dialogue is gaining momentum. I hope that the effort to educate both men and women on the evils of this manipulative edge of society becomes so strong that PUA and organizations like it ultimately dissolve.
Blotto: I’d like to invite you to come over to **my blog** to check out the information there. The web address is as follows:
http://feministpitbull.wordpress.com
I’d like to invite you to come there and see what I’ve got. And more is on the way!:) I’ll be posting here soon, AND more info’s coming on my blog.
I’d be interested in hearing your story about what happened. I’m sorry to hear that you were manipulated.:( However, don’t kick yourself. You didn’t know what you were up against, and my experience has told me that most mainstream patriarchal PUAs are no better than con artists. You were on the receiving end of their dehumanizing tactics because they don’t see the humanity of women, for the most part; they’re either too busy using women to slake their lust, or they’re into it for the power and control. **Some** are into it to get relationships, but I shudder to think about what the implications of the relationship will be for **any** woman they get involved with. A (very) few seem to be decent, moral, egalitarian people.
I heavily recommend you read both of the PUA threads either here or at my blog. You will see an astonishing amount of rationalization and denial of the manipulation and deception of their tactics, and then you will realize that ***women have to arm themselves against this nonsense.***
And the so-called “help” that is out there, isn’t; to the best of my knowledge, the only “anti-player/PUA resources” out there have been put out by Ray Gordon, whose woman-blaming and -controlling agenda is about as misogynist and as domineering as **anything** I’ve seen out there. Gordon, among other things, openly and viciously blames American women for the state of the dating scene and has said nice little screeds like this: “…it is like the end of slavery for slaveowneres, in that women will nver again be able to keep the upper hand tht they have. Either they have to have sex with AFCs, men that have been repulsing them, or they have to admit that they want the PUAs, which will cause more nice guys to stop being nice.” Quote, unquote. This is straight from his book review of “The Game” (author: Neil Strauss) on Amazon.com.
With “friends” like these, who needs enemies, eh, Blotto?
That’s why I said, “Enough is enough.” FEMINIST WOMEN have to get together and form our own resistance and build our own agency and independence in the face of these tactics, methodologies and ideology. If **some** men, **trustworthy** feminist allies, want to help out, that’s ***great,*** we shouldn’t turn it down. But really, it’s up to us. No one can do it for us, and it’s up to us the “prey” to get it together and put up the resistance and the exposure of this emotional and behavioral conditioning that elevates the PUA at the expense of the women he uses.
In a sense, we’re like the very nascent feminist resistance to sexual assault circa 1969: sexual assault awareness in America was very dim. In terms of our culture’s awareness of relational, dating, and sexual manipulation, this is 1969. We have a long road ahead of us, but there is a proverb that states, “The journey of a thousand miles begins with one step.” Welcome to the march, Blotto.:)
I came across this website looking for feminist critique of the seduction community. Im not here to defend the obviously manipulative tactics like using hypnosis. I just find the pua world interesting and would like to present a different feminist take on the matter that I found represented in a discussion thread on the Swedish feminist website feminetik.se.
Some feminist writers actually saw many ideas described in The Game as a positive development in the battle of getting rid gender roles. For example men putting effort into their looks and making their clothing ornamental to make themselves the object of attraction was seen as a step outside the typical male role. Also the focus on learning to correctly interpret social signals was seen as a positive feminisation since such skills are often attributed to women and thought of as “female intuition”.
How would you guys respond such points of view?
I would have to take an honest and HARD look at their take on it.
There’s also questions of whether **all** of the ramifications have been looked at thoroughly.
**However,** I’m glad you pointed this out. I was completely unaware of it; thank you.
Ahhrg, this is what I get for not studying a Scandinavian language: the website feminetik.se is in **Swedish,** and I can’t read a lick of it. Sorry, Sideshow Joe, can’t tell you what I think of it.
Tell you what: if you can get an English version of the website and pop on over to my blog and deposit the URL there, I’ll have a look at it.
Im afraid theres no English version of the website. However, try reading The Game with the frame of mind that its a feminist concpiracy! Some of the stuff advocated there, like being sober when approaching women romantically and never lying to a woman could just as well come out the mouth of a feminist.
From a more conservative perspective Ive also come across the idea that the pua craze is part of a “pussification of America” since men are even encouraged to paint their fingernails (like the pick-up-artist Mystery). I.e. the anti-feminists have reservations about the pickup comunity aswell.
On a more personal note, I do understand that women feel they are being tricked by pua tactics, and partly I agree with them, particularly when it comes to the use of hypnosis. I also find it manipulative that guys pretend to be into new age nonsense like astrology and palm reading just to bed women. I however feel there are some positive aspects too. For example, even the more sinister side of the pua world does not make a distinction between “whores” and “madonnas”. It is seen as a natural thing that women, in general, desire sex just as men do, as long as they are not made to feel like sluts about it.
I don’t know Joe, the ‘tactics’ advocated in the Game are all about lying. Demonstrating ‘higher’ (survival) value, negging, active disintrest, etc, its all smokescreens and deception. Soberness, whilst approaching in the bar whilst is simply based on the fact that mystery never drank, does create a power differential between a man that is in full control of his faculties and a woman who has alcohol intake.
Failing to make a distinction between whores and madonnas is not because PUA scene has adopted feminist principals, it is down to the fact that it sees all women regardless of her marital status as ‘fair game’. But given the fact that the madonna/whore dichotomy is so prevelant in our culture it creates a systematic breakdown of that so that any qualms that a ‘rAFC’ may have about the morality of going for a ‘taken’ women are duly disintigrated. So, its all about breaking moral conceptions of men rather than having a liberating viewpoint of womenhood.
Despite that i would love to read a translation of that blog
Sorry I’ve been avoiding commenting on the thread.
I’ve got the cold from HELL.:(
Will be resuming on this topic Sunday or Monday.
Stixzz, you’re absolutely right.
Well guys, Im afraid I havent got the time or the energy to translate the threads on feminetik. My advice is that you practise your openers, NLP, DHV:s, negs and peacocking and hang out at internet cafes. When unsuspecting Swedish tourists come by, use your methods to seduce them into translating everything on the site:) You have an opportunity to get the first “translation-close” ever!!!
Im not choosing sides in the debate yet. Considering how much trouble my female friends have with drunk, horny, rude afc type guys approaching them, I find it difficult to see the PU community as such a grave threat to women. Ive never seen a pua guru do his thing in real life though, so I cant say that I know what Im talking about. Wont take part here any more, but I will glimpse where this entertaining debate leads though:)
-Joe
sociological study on seduction community, might be intresting
https://webspace.utexas.edu/ejc329/ElanaCliftThesis.pdf?uniq=-wk7fye
Will be reading this, stixzz…THANK YOU.:)
Scarred – re: that other site, in Swedish… try Google Translate? I don’t have time to do this before I go away for the weekend, but perhaps give it a try….
http://feministpitbull.wordpress.com/2007/07/26/other-little-known-overlooked-or-forgotten-tactics-in-resisting-manipulation/#comments
Thought I’d provide a link to my blog that talked about a forgotten aspect of resisting manipulation…good old-fashioned assertiveness training as initially developed by Manuel J. Smith in **1975**!!
I had forgotten about this oldy-but-goody.
I also HEARTILY recommend getting the book, “When I Say No, I Feel Guilty” by Dr. Smith.:)
Next couple of days, I’ll be commenting a LOT more…sorry for not saying much recently, guys.
TG, I think my comment got caught in the Spamulator because it had a link.:)
Hi guys!
Just thought I’d let everyone know that Elana Clift, the **author** of the sociological thesis out of the University of Texas, has appeared on my blog and would like to discuss the thesis! I have created an **entire thread** devoted to discussing the contents of her thesis, so I invite you all to the thread on my blog dedicated to discussing her thesis work.
I’ll post the link next time…this is exciting!:)
http://feministpitbull.wordpress.com/2007/08/01/a-thread-for-discussing-elana-clifts-thesis-picking-up-and-acting-out-politics-of-masculinity-in-the-seduction-community/
This is the thread if you’d like to come on over and read and discuss Elana Clift’s thesis on the politics of masculinity of the PUA community.:)
Jsut saw this post and found it extremely interesting and relevant to discussions here and on the other thread about the link between this BS and advertising.
check it out
someone quoted me in an article he wrote about PUA. here’s the link.
Pickup Artist Shares his Secrets
Mystery tried to “pick me up” at a bar last fall. I knew who he was, but decided to “play dumb” for fun. I know that I am, clinically/technically, a “highly suggestible” person (history of childhood abuse predicated much of that); nevertheless, I was shocked at how effective his technique was. Within five minutes, I was responding to him as his techniques intended me to (and I’m a long-standing feminist, 29yo, who’s generally socially neutral if not hostile in pickup situations). I’m glad to see a PUA-defense thread and I hope it’s spread further.
(Incidentally, my friend snapped a picture, in which you can see my actual face attempting to flee from him as he used “the claw” technique–which is doubly funny since that’s my nickname.) The whole episode gave me nightmares.
Speaking of Cosmo, here’s something I wrote about this subject:
Smilin an pleasin massah: women as house slaves in Cosmo headlines
Here’s a selection – feel free to post your own examples and parallel:
“Decipher every move your man makes. You can gauge crucial information with a simple glance at him. By picking up on the subtle nonverbal messages he’s sending, you’ll discover tons of clues about his personality and how he really feels about you.”
- Cosmo, summer 2008
“In Uncle Tom’s Cabin, Harriet Beecher Stowe (when talking about “pure slaves”)… described their ‘tendency to repose on a superior mind and rest on a higher power.’”
- James O. Horton, wilsoncenter.org
Tactics used in creating the “perfect slave”: “To implant in the slave a sense of personal inferiority… and awe the slave with a “sense of the slave-owner’s enormous power” so the slave would “stand in fear”…’
- A Turbulent Voyage: Readings in African American Studies, Floyd W. Hayes II – part IV: Discovering the Meaning of Black Identity: Psychic Dimensions of Oppression.
——
“Do guys think you have girlfriend potential? This quiz will reveal if you’re sabotaging yourself.”
- Cosmo headline, summer 2008
“A good slave, like a good wife… was one who did not become masculine or rebellious… he or she, never outgrowing dependence, would thus retain a master’s fondness forever.”
- James O. Horton, op. cit., explaining the views of pro-slavery advocate George Fitzhugh
“(A slave owner was counselled to) ‘attempt to persuade the bondsman to take an interest in the master’s enterprise and to accept his standards of ‘good conduct’ ‘… thus the slave owner sought to train slaves to accept unquestioningly his value system or criteria of what was good and true and beautiful.”
- A Turbulent Voyage, op. cit.
—-
“Sex Tips from Guys – their all-time favorite mattress moves, revealed”
- Cosmo, summer 2008
“A black mother taught her daughter… to seem accommodating and tractable to the slaveholder, smiling and ready to please…”
- Little Known Facts about Slavery, website – http://www.theblackmarket.com
“I been cooking out for white people since I was nine years old. I am a good cook they all tell me and I tries to be clean with my cooking.”
- interview with Mary Mays West, Widener, Arkansas, age 65Répondre à votre article
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