Over on PUA dirtbag Roosh V’s Return of Kings blog, a guest poster calling himself Emmanuel Goldstein (oh, how clever) offers a rather revealing take on the psychology of “players” and pickup artists like himself.
After justifiably mocking “nice guys” for assuming that “girls choose men like people buy houses” – that is, by carefully weighing pros and cons and looking for the best deal – he suggests that
[p]layers … are more like that sweet old lady with saggy arms wearing a hairnet at your local supermarket, handing out free, tasty samples.
Stay with him; it will all make sense, sort of, in a moment.
You’re not even looking at her, and she beckons you over to have a taste. Even though it’s junk food, you can’t resist. You avoid sweets, and here you are eating a tiny cinnabon. And really, she won’t mind if you take just the
tiptaste.Regardless, minutes later, you’re going home with a 96-pack of cinnabons – and you don’t even eat pastries! To be completely honest, the first time it happens, you’re a little jarred and confused about how the whole thing went down so fast. …
Now, imagine that that sweet old lady is actually a funny, strapping young man, and you buying those cinnabons is a woman agreeing to sex with him the night she met him. That confusion you felt after you bought a huge package of junk food? That’s how a girl might feel after her first one-night stand.
Yes, that’s right: Mr. Goldstein is comparing himself and his fellow “players” to supermarket pastry-pushers who cajole people into eating things they know they shouldn’t eat, and that they later regret eating.
And, oh yes, that are really bad for them:
If you remain unconvinced, just remember that our economy is in shambles because tens of millions of people bought homes they cannot afford, and that half of us are comically obese from eating too much junk food. That granny sample lady is looking pretty formidable right now.
Now, there are all sorts of things wrong with Mr. Goldstein’s analogy here. Sex isn’t pastry, for one thing, and for another, women (and everyone else) should be able to indulge in either of these pleasures without having assholes on the internet getting up in their business. (And, yes, PUAs, I’m saying that as a fat fatty.) I’m just trying to point out that by the terms of his own analogy, Mr. Goldstein is saying that sex with him is a shitty thing that’s bad for you.
This isn’t someone attacking PUAs for being miserable, self-centered sexual users who are only able to convince women to have sex with them through manipulation, leaving these women feeling shitty afterwards.
This is a PUA who ASPIRES to be such a miserable, self-centered sexual user he’s only able to convince women to have sex with him through manipulation, leaving these women feeling shitty afterwards.
In other words, PUAs are devoting their lives to making women feel bad about themselves. As a life goal, this seems a bit lacking.
My my, Little David seems somewaht fixated on this PUA thing.
It’s understandable, because as I’ve said before, every night, when he uses his RealDoll, he has to know that PUAs are out triple dipping
I like her idealism in believing she could win even bro-dudes over to feminism just by explaining what feminism really is… it really shouldn’t be so hard…
But in some of the discussions she describes, she seems to give a lot of ground, and the bro-dudes still won’t swallow even the watered down feminism she’s pushing by the end. It’s super disheartening.
(I should clarify that “Confessions of a Pickup Artist Chaser” is the only piece of her writing I’ve read all the way through, and is what I’m basing these impressions on)
Fibinachi did a fine job tearing troofy a new one, I don’t need to pile on.
But damn, can’t you PUA/”Nice Guys” ™ find a new whine? Women choose who they sleep with, for whatever reasons. Please, get over it. And why is your shallowness sacred but women have to pretend they don’t have aesthetic preferences?
Oh, hello Fatrelle. I was just wondering, what do you look like? You seem to have issues with looks, and gosh, I was wondering if you had some inner demons you haven’t quite spanked in regards to appearence. Let go of the self-hate, dude, let go. And attacking someone’s appearence is weak shit…even some of our stupider trolls attack the posts and leave posters’ looks out of it.
Your RealDoll joke isn’t funny. Do you have any others?
It’s not optimism, it’s a deliberate choice to abandon her own values if it will make even really shitty men think better of her.
I still remember when I first encountered Clarisse. She was arguing that rules stating that professors can’t fuck their students were unfair because some students might be subs and might get off on the power differential. Also, a professor who cornered an (unwilling) student in a closet and harrassed her shouldn’t be condemned because hey, Clarisse herself might enjoy that kind of thing! Self-focused, ethically questionably, and quite happy to throw other women under the bus if it serves her personal ends.
As was the case with Hugo, I don’t understand why more feminists haven’t seen through her schtick already.
::high fives LBT::
Our planets are much, much more fun!
That was the first and last I wanted to know about Clarisse. Effing Hugo is her friend so all that predatory behavior is perfectly okie dokie cuz he said sorry. He will say sorry next time too, I’m sure.
Oh, you remember that thread too? Rarely has a feminist made a less positive first impression on me than she did.
Holy fuck, this Clarisse person sounds like Pell!
@Cassandra
ok that sounds lame. I guess I have more reading to do.
Oh, no, she’s very intelligent and very well educated, and not a bad writer. It’s just the sense of ethics that’s a bit lacking.
Bear in mind that your mileage may vary, etc. I may have less patience than most for people using BSDM to excuse shitty behavior, since I’m a BSDM person and have a vested interest in not seeing the scene associated with terrible ideas.
Oh, god, Clarisse. Between her trying to get Chill Girl cred at every turn, which WHATEVER, GIRL, there was her reprehensible defense of Hugo. That Feministe piece she did in support of him was a shitshow, and she got her feels hurt and shut discussion down.
Content-wise, I meant she sounded like Pell – all that hooey about professers and students. Remember when Pell was pretending he was a professor at whichever uni it was? That was fun. He must have a collection of extra arseholes by now, he got ripped several on that thread. I wasn’t thinking she was a troll-level writer … she just sounds like she’s troll-level ethically.
I could not believe it! Srsly. I did not think it possible that any feminist on the planet was ignorant of his attempted murder confession and his many posts gloating about his predatory behavior to his students. Then here he is on a supposedly feminist blog. Sam busted their chops and we suddenly discover that care taking poor Hugo is the priority. Effing unbelievable.
hellkell – gad, she’d have had quite the treatment from the Feministe commentariat.
Granted that the Feministe commentariat can get nasty, but if you choose to post there then you need to put on your big girl panties and not shut down the conversation at the first sign of criticism.
thebewilderness – please remember that not everyone who identifies as feminist has necessarily heard of Schwyzer at all. I hadn’t before I started reading here. I’m not wild about being told I should have heard of a US figure.
@ Kittehs
Thing is, Clarisse is American, and very plugged in to the feminist blogosphere. The post people are talking about was her very specifically defending Hugo from the fact that many people wanted him out of the feminist blogosphere after his murder attempt became public. It was a big mess of “but he’s changed! why do you meanies not want to help him find redemption?”.
I’m pretty sure Clarisse is what the radfems mean when they bring up “fun fems.”
Sorry. It was not my intent to suggest that. I was hyperbole and a half there.
I didn’t know him from Eve’s house cat until I read about “well known male feminist” turns out to be predator.
Note to lurking MRA trolls: notice how we’re not saying Clarisse isn’t a feminist? Her feminism is not mine, but still.
Clarrise? Yeah I’ve read her stuff and I thought it was just me that had a problem with her. And Hugo often had a thin layer of slime on his posts that I couldnt put my finger on. A few months later and the Hugo shitstorm broke out.
What amazes me is that there are feminists who still support both of them. Why? As I recall, there were a few commenters on feministe that did support Clarisse.
Sense of loyalty, probably. People tend to support those they consider friends even when they really shouldn’t.
@ thebewilderness
Have you read about SnowdropExplodes and his confession about the time he planned to rape and murder a woman and almost did it? It really creeps me out that at one point he and I were in the same email group, but at the same time I’m going, well, never did like him, guess my instincts are pretty good.
Cassandra, eww! Where the heck were you hanging out that he thought it was okay to broadcast that? Or was it just his private blog?