Say what you will about the dedicated PUAs (Pick-Up Artists) of the world: at least they sometimes actually talk to real human women. The guys in Reddit’s Seduction subreddit, I’m not so sure about.
It’s kind of sad, sometimes, to read the plaintive requests for advice on Seddit (as it’s known) from college guys who’ve fixated on some girl in some class of theirs, and want desperately to learn the secret formula to get into her pants. These aren’t guys who’ve mastered the art of “negging” women with clever little mini-insults (a favorite PUA technique); these are guys who haven’t quite grasped that you have to actually talk to a woman in order to ask her out.
Take this query, recently posted there:
My suggestion?
Write “coffee?” on your forehead, and stand in front of her. Point at your forehead if necessary.
So, yeah, I’ve been banned from Seddit.
Look, I feel for the guy. I’ve been that guy.
But just think of it from the point of view of the girl. Some guy you’ve never spoken to, some guy who doesn’t know a thing about you other than you make him feel funny in his pants, approaches you out of the blue and … slips you a note?
But really, the problem there isn’t the note. Well, part of the problem is the note, But the main problem is that college dude has never spoken to her before. As anyone who has watched Seinfeld knows well, “coffee” means “sex.” Going up to a woman you’ve never spoken to before and asking her out is a bit like saying “hi, you make me feel funny in my pants. I would like to put my penis in you. Perhaps we could chat a bit first. Though, clearly, I don’t care what’s in your actual brain, because here I am asking you out based on nothing more than the fact that you cause that aforementioned feeling in my pants.”
Pro-tip for lonely guys: remember that women are actual human beings also.
Now, this poor Sedditor got some good basic advice from the crowd there, basically boiling down to: figure out an excuse to talk to her before class, and see how it goes.
Now, Seddit may be mildly useful in giving this sort of basic advice to the truly hapless. But it doesn’t seem to be very good at getting across the notion that women are human.
Indeed, there was a strikingly similar question posted in Seddit a couple of days ago: a guy who wanted to ask out the only girl in his engineering class. His post, in stark contrast with the note guy, was bristling with PUA acronyms and lingo: the girl was an “HB8” (Hot Babe that he rated an 8 of 10 on the hotness scale); he was on the lookout for IOSs (Indications of Interest) from her, and so on and so on.
But his strategy was strikingly similar to that of the AFC (Average Frustrated Chump) with the note: he was going to walk up to her after class and ask her out for dinner. But he was planning to add one more “technique” to his approach: “kino.” In PUA-speak, kino means touch.
So, yeah, that’s what he learned from all his study of advanced PUA-oloogy: just start touching her! Women are eager to jump into bed with guys who come up to them out of the blue and start groping them. (The post itself was deleted after it got linked to in the ShitRedditSays subreddit, so no link.)
Trouble is, this guy is not the only one getting the message that Pick-up artistry is all about invading a woman’s personal space and “escalating” until she literally fights you off or given is. This is, in fact, the basic message of the PUA who calls himself Gunwich – a man who not that long ago (allegedly) shot a woman I the face after she refused his advances.
And, yes, pressuring a woman until she gives in, or up, is one way of getting in her pants. It’s also, you know, rape.
In recent days a number of Sedditers have posted advice that is little more than a how-to of date rape. A number of instances were pointed out in ShitRedditSays, and were deleted by the Seddit moderators. It’s clear this is damage control; a number of regulars on ShitRedditSays have been banned from posting in Seddit – many of whom had actually never posted there in the first place.
Here’s a discussion of one copy-and pasted date rape guide that got deleted before anyone made a screencap.
The Seddit mods say this is “fringe” stuff that doesn’t reflect how most Sedditors think. Then how is it that some of the creepiest comments get dozens of upvotes? Take this Sedditor’s advice on how to get inside a woman’s house (and then her pants) that I managed to screencap before it was deleted:
Now, there is plenty of PUA material that is not rapey. Manipulative, sure. Dopey, absolutely. But not rapey. A good Pick-Up Artist, in theory at least, should be able to tell when a woman is interested and when she isn’t, and move on when she isn’t.
But it’s clear that many Sedditors aren’t learning that whole “if she’s not interested, move on” thing. They’re learning: “if she’s not interested, pressure her and manipulate her, and wear her down. And be sure to touch her. Sorry, “kino escalate.”
They’re not learning empathy. They’re learning stupid human tricks. And, worse, they’re learning to ignore a woman’s “no,” to treat it as what PUAs call LMR – that is, Last Minute Resistance. And that’s pretty much a formula for date rape.
@CB: Yes, I’ve thought he was Ion since he showed up.
@Doctress Ju’ulia
“This woman is me. Since I am 36 and very dominant, I am ignored or seen as horrifying.
Or, even better, I get hit on by the nastiest, dirtiest, slimiest, most toothless, strung out on heroin guys in the bar. Seriously. Last night I had not one but TWO drunk-ass heroin junkies try to buy me a drink/get my number. They kept trying to touch me and tell me how ‘beautiful’ I am. Ugh. Nice to know that these are, apparently, the highest quality men I can attract. /s”
“Dominant?” Is that the word feminists use these days? What’s even funnier yet is you bitchin about how the cream of the crop of men haven’t fallen at your feet. Particularly since on this very thread, the gangs goes out of it’s way bitch about men whom they assume want super-models to ask them out.
I love your description of any man who doesn’t meet your high standards as well. You must consider yourself a real prize, no wonder men can’t live up to your percieved greatness. Speaking of being “bought” drinks and such. How often have you “used” being a woman to gain all those “free” drinks, meals and what ever other goodies you can swindle out of men.
——————————
By the conversations on this blog, feminist blogs and the MSM comment sections in general, women seem to have gone the way of the prize found in a box of cracker jacks. Many years ago that prize was something pretty cool that you’d wanna hang onto, now a days, it’s crap that’s mass marketed as something valueable.
NWO, do you just see the words people write and then arrange them to suit your needs? Way to misrepresent.
“But as some of you made clear “any” contact might make a person uncomfortable, the “leaning away” might just a contact phobia and not disinterest.”
Uh…yeah, ’cause that’s likely. >.> I imagine most people with true contact phobias are going to be hard-pressed to be interested in anyone. But you’re also going to find that’s a very rare thing. Of course, if someone has a contact phobia than clearly your proximity has made them uncomfortable, so I’m not sure where you even think you’re going with that.
“Yet you proudly comment on being “afraid” to make a move when you said, “I flirted with my husband a lot and I’m autistic and I have very low-confidence.” You flirted and waited for a man to go out on a limb because you feared rejection, then have the audacity to call men cowards. Then you go on to explain about men being creepy, always “creepy.” Maybe it’s not men at fault for being “creepy” but women at fault for being “bitchy.” Or is every situation always mens fault?”
…I did what now? Um, no, I didn’t. I proudly pointed out that, despite being autistic and having low confidence, I did make a move. I flirted. A lot. Very, very obviously. Incidentally, we slept together. See how that works? I wanted to, I made it clear I wanted to, he wanted to too, and there you go.
Women are not bitchy simply because they don’t want to let you in their pants, dude. But I never said men were always creepy…I said if women always act like you’re creepy, it’s your fault, not theirs. Because, I reiterate, they’re not bitchy simply because they don’t want to let you in their pants. Finally, I also did not call all men cowards. I just don’t accept fear as an excuse. It’s not that these guys are afraid they’ll mess up. Most of them can’t be arsed to care what it takes to avoid messing up.
As made obvious by your assertion that a woman who isn’t interested in you, simply because you’re standing there mouth-breathing at her, is bitchy.
“Of course if you read the “signs” wrong you’ll be creepy for touching, or you might be considered “not interested” for not touching.”
Yeah, dude. Welcome to life. Social Awareness 101. You live and learn. I don’t want to hear any bullshit about it being hard, because you have no idea.
NWO, you really have some guts complaining to an autistic person about how hard it is to understand social norms.
Misogyny issues aside–which is hard to do, since the PUA community is rife with misogyny–a lot of PUA advice runs into one or both of the following problems:
1. It’s trying to teach advanced social skills to people who haven’t mastered basic social skills yet. With some social skills, you can fake it ’til you make it. Put in a little research and practice, and you can fake dressing well, projecting a decent amount of self-confidence, and knowing what to do on a standard date. It’s the more subtle things that are hard, if not impossible, to learn without real experience. A guy who has no idea how to make light chitchat to gauge a woman’s interest is not gonna be able to pull off a strange, transgressive approach, like handing her a written proposition, in a non-off-putting way.
2. It’s old and obvious. The idea of creating a false sense of intimacy by touching someone or repeating their name a lot is as old as Andrew Carnegie–which I know because, in my own awkward teenage years, I read How to Make Friends and Influence People in a desperate last-ditch effort to learn social skills.* The thing is, this advice has been around for generations. Everyone knows it. Trust me, when a woman is talking to a guy and he starts petting her arm, she knows what that means. If you do it before there’s any sense of mutual interest, it’s just going to come off as fake, pushy, and corny. You’ll look like a used-car salesman.
*It helped, actually, and I’d recommend it over PUA books and websites. The central and most useful piece of advice: people like talking about themselves and appreciate a listener, so stop trying to impress them with your awesomeness and just let them talk.
Johnny b said:
Sigh. Try reading a bit more carefully. My advice would be the same as the good basic advice he got from the people in Seddit: Come up with some excuse to talk to her before class, then ask her out. Nothing wrong with approaching people. But asking someone out before you’ve exchanged two words with them is weird and creepy.
My concern, though, is that if this guy sticks around Seddit, he may well never pick up the “empathy” thing, and will instead learn all sorts of tricks to get past women’s “resistance.” That was kind of the whole point of the piece.
Also, talking to someone for at least a few minutes before asking them out allows you to decide if you are interested in more than their looks. Or if they are actually a horrible person. Maybe this girl in the class is a Hitler-loving puppy killer. Can’t really know until you talk to her and see if she starts going on about how much she loves Hitler and hates puppies.
Also, there was a comment from Jules that was in moderation that talked a bit more about that rapey Second City monologue and gave some links. It’s back on the first page, so here’s a link:
http://manboobz.com/2011/09/02/is-seddit-teaching-date-rape/comment-page-1/#comment-56468
@shesaidwut
“I did what now? Um, no, I didn’t. I proudly pointed out that, despite being autistic and having low confidence, I did make a move. I flirted. A lot. Very, very obviously.”
Bullshit. “Flirting” is not making a move, not even close. The difference is easy to see. “Flirting,” crudely put, is simply letting others/someone know you’re on the market. The “other party,” has to “actively” approach and risk rejection, mockery, (see manboobz crew), perhaps a bit of laughter by the woman and her friends if he misread the signs, hell, he might even be considered creepy. Or in the case of the prize catch Doctress Ju’ulia, be called the nastiest, dirtiest, slimiest, most toothless, strung out on heroin guys in the bar, as she sucks down free drinks.
NWO, they TRIED to buy her drinks, not that they did. Learn to read.
Do you think women should take whatever attention is offered? Why is ok for men to have standards but not women?
CB: The, “Repeating myself” was a bit of a tip-off, since Johnny hasn’t been talking about women being aggressive, at least not where I can see it.
At that point it was, “who else talked about that”, and then the style was familiar.
Wow… this gets NWO’s goat. I think it strikes a nerve.
NWO: Doctress Ju’ulia said that they ‘tried’ to buy her drinks – indicating to me that she did not ‘suck down free drinks.’ Aou’re being obtuse. Again. Shocking, I’m sure.
Oh man. Oh man. I know it’s cruel, but if he’s here, I have to do it…
The Book of Learnin’
Indispensable Facts About the Universe from NWO
Science
Evolution is impossible, because otherwise we’d be able to watch dogs evolve into super-dogs. Unless anyone can produce evidence of dogs with super-powers, evolution is a myth.
Female animals cannot feed themselves and rely on males to support them. Even in cases where this seems untrue, the males are still tougher. For example, female lions do all the hunting in the pride, but if they come across a really tough enemy, like a hyena, they run and get the male lion to fight for them.
Mathematics
Feminists claim that one in four women is raped in college. But since college lasts for four years, you have to multiply that by four. Therefore, feminists are really saying that 100% of women are raped in college, which is obviously untrue, not to mention proof that women are bad at math.
Medicine
Children are lined up and injected with a dangerous chemical called flouride to make them stupid.
Education
Men are legally barred from working as teachers because people think they’ll molest children. There are no male teachers in the U.S.
Most colleges are cutting their science and engineering programs to make room for liberal arts classes for feeble-minded women. For example, University of California schools have gotten rid of all their engineering majors and replaced them with women’s studies and gender studies.
Linguistics
The word “suffrage” is derived from the verb “to suffer,” because voting is hard.
Spanish and Russian use the same alphabet. The Russians just have funny handwriting.
Literature
The classical Greek play The Bacchae is a celebration of the roving lesbian gang that murdered the musician Orpheus. It is based on a true story.
The musical Chicago is a polemic about how men should be shot to death. It was written by a female college student last year.
Law
All U.S. law, from the Constitution down, has been supplanted by the extremely powerful Title IX, a law requiring that all educational, government, and private institutions be 100% female.
Government
Everyone takes orders from the U.N. and the Jews.
Pedophilia
Girls are never the victims of child molestation, only boys. Therefore, all child molesters are either women or gay.
All gay people are child molesters.
Prepubescent girls playing at the beach in swimsuits desperately want to have sex with middle-aged milking-machine technicians.
—
Anyone got any more?
“Bullshit. “Flirting” is not making a move, not even close. The difference is easy to see. “Flirting,” crudely put, is simply letting others/someone know you’re on the market. The “other party,” has to “actively” approach and risk rejection, mockery, (see manboobz crew), perhaps a bit of laughter by the woman and her friends if he misread the signs, hell, he might even be considered creepy. Or in the case of the prize catch Doctress Ju’ulia, be called the nastiest, dirtiest, slimiest, most toothless, strung out on heroin guys in the bar, as she sucks down free drinks.”
So, what, were you there with a camera or something? You know exactly what happened? No, you don’t. I initiated the flirting. Not him, me. *I* was the one at risk of rejection because I was the one who first showed interest.
Are you getting any of this or is it bypassing that hollow in your skull where your brain is supposed to be? The night we met, my husband did *not* make the first move. I did. Making a move is not about touching or kissing. It’s about expressing interest.
P.S. Women get rejected, laughed at, and called creepy, too. Sometimes even because they’re being creepy.
“NWO, you really have some guts complaining to an autistic person about how hard it is to understand social norms.”
I know, right? If I can learn, he really ought to be able to.
Thanks David!
@hellkell
“NWO, they TRIED to buy her drinks, not that they did. Learn to read.”
Ahh, so the “doctress” only accepts free drinks from men that meet her high standards? You can always tell a lady of quality by the men she accepts freebies from! My empathy just runeth over for her. I can’t imagine how many bars she had to visit before she found a man she deemed worthy enough to buy her stuff. Misogyny, it’s just ever so rampant!
shaenon: I’m torn between laughing my ass off and crying at the state of education in this country.
NWO is once again activating his LogicShield. Motto: I reject common reality and substitute my own paranoid ravings!
Special for NWO:
So, according to NWOslave, women aren’t allowed to accept free drinks from other guys, but then they’re not allowed to not accept them. Good to know.
I mean seriously. How can any of you claim to have a shred of dignity while defending the “doctress?” She’s actually complaining that the men who buy her free stuff are unacceptably beneath her.
Now ride in majestically upon your great stead Pecunium, and defend the “honor” of the fair maiden Doctress Ju’ulia!
Let me get this straight: men are allowed to call women they consider ugly every single name in the book, insult them, or even assault them for having the nerve to encroach on their Sacred Manly Personal Space ™ – or even exist. But women are not allowed to have any standards at all and should be grateful for any male attention at all. Wow, look at those goalposts dance!