This is the horrifying image that faces you if you take a look at “Paul’s Corner” on A Voice for Men today.
There’s a bit of backstory here. Elam, you see, recently spent an hour chatting with PUA-sleazebucket-turned-wannabe-patriarch Roosh Valizadeh on YouTube, and during this chat Mr. Valizadeh noted that Mr. Elam wasn’t offering a lot of advice to young men on how to score with the ladies.
If Elam were in fact the real “men’s human rights activist” he likes to pretend he is, he would have simply said, that’s not really my job, you never saw, say, Martin Luther King giving speeches on how to charm the ladies into having the sex.
But apparently Mr Elam was so taken aback by the merest suggestion that he doesn’t know how to charm the ladies into having the sex that he decided he needed to make a whole new set of videos on how to charm the ladies into having the sex, of which the video he put up today is merely the appetizer. Happy Martin Luther King day, everyone!
This isn’t the first time Elam has done something like this. After facing criticism for running a giant two-part fawning interview with Roosh on AVFM early last year, Elam put up a post intended to remind everyone that sure as shootin he don’t need none of that newfangled PUA crap to get his dick wet because Ladies Love Cool Paul.
This was the graphic I came up with for my post on the subject. You have to admit it’s pretty good.
Ok, I’m just stalling now. I should probably stop blabbing and force myself to watch Elam’s latest the damn video. Here goes.
Well, ok, that wasn’t quite as horrendous as I was expecting. Elam’s most basic advice, while hardly original, is in itself not terribly objectionable: he points out that guys — and here he’s talking only about straight guys — who have more genuine interests in life beyond getting laid will end up being a lot more interesting to women than guys who spend their life learning the latest “negs” and so on.
But Elam can’t really do anything without being a dick about it, so he accompanied his unobjectionable platitudes with an assortment of nasty, if faintly ridiculous, little Elam-isms, delivered with a sneer.
Still smarting from Jeff Sharlet’s devastating expose of his little empire last year in GQ magazine, Elam suggests to would be Lotharios that “dressing nice doesn’t hurt but I don’t suggest looking like you’re a GQ reader either.”
He follows this up, for some weird psychological reason we cannot fully fathom, with gratuitous swipes at fat dudes.”Morbid obesity is a non-starter,” he announces.
And besides, if you’re morbidly obese you should probably be talking to a doctor before you attempt sex, possibly even with your hand. … Man-tits trying to bust through a t-shirt and a belt-line that looks like a seizmic fault circling your body gives you a Pillsbury Dough Boy look that doesn’t work.
Man-tits? Subtle, dude. I guess he’s still mad about that plagiarism thing.
Just FYI, Paul, more than 2/3 of American adults are classified as overweight or obese, with more than a third in the latter category. Roughly 6 percent of American adults are classified as morbidly obese. And guess what, Paul? These people have sex all the fucking time (and some are quite good at it).
Elam goes on to accuse the PUAs of trying to feign indifference towards women in order to lend themselves the air of aloof mystery that women are said to adore. Elam’s indifference towards women, he assures us, is real. (Yeah, that’s why he spends so much of his life yelling about women online.)
“Making pussy the sole focus of your existence is the ultimate drain to personal power,” Elam explains earnestly, sounding a little bit like General Jack T. Ripper worrying about his precious bodily fluids.
But the weirdest and most off-putting fluid-based metaphor comes a few moments later.
“Available sex is gravy,” he announces.
Not the meat. Get your head around that, motherfuckers. YOU are the meat. Treat yourself like it, and so will others.
Wait, what?
I’m not even going to try to make sense of that, because I’m pretty sure that if I spend even one more second of my life contemplating the fact that Paul Elam apparently sees himself as some sort of tasty sex steak, I will have to take up vegetarianism and everyone knows how inconvenient that is.
Happy Martin Luther King day, everyone!
H/T –@TakedownMRAs
Why does that man look like he’s on the brink of a homicidal meltdown in EVERY. SINGLE. PHOTOGRAPH?
Does that sign in the background say “cool zone” or “cool bone”?
I’m sorry if fat guys make your boner sad, Paul, but please don’t attempt to speak for women and what we find physically attractive. For that matter, you probably shouldn’t speak for all men, either, because I know not all of them agree with you on what makes a woman physically attractive, either.
“Not the meat. Get your head around that, motherfuckers. YOU are the meat. Treat yourself like it, and so will others.”
Not exactly Billy Collins, now, is he?
“Litany”
You are the bread and the knife,
the crystal goblet and the wine.
You are the dew on the morning grass
and the burning wheel of the sun.
You are the white apron of the baker,
and the marsh birds suddenly in flight.
However, you are not the wind in the orchard,
the plums on the counter,
or the house of cards.
And you are certainly not the pine-scented air.
There is just no way that you are the pine-scented air.
It is possible that you are the fish under the bridge,
maybe even the pigeon on the general’s head,
but you are not even close
to being the field of cornflowers at dusk.
And a quick look in the mirror will show
that you are neither the boots in the corner
nor the boat asleep in its boathouse.
It might interest you to know,
speaking of the plentiful imagery of the world,
that I am the sound of rain on the roof.
I also happen to be the shooting star,
the evening paper blowing down an alley
and the basket of chestnuts on the kitchen table.
I am also the moon in the trees
and the blind woman’s tea cup.
But don’t worry, I’m not the bread and the knife.
You are still the bread and the knife.
You will always be the bread and the knife,
not to mention the crystal goblet and–somehow–the wine.
Vegetarianism is great, though. 🙂
That’s funny. Women have fought for centuries not to be treated just like a piece of meat, and now mr. A Voice for Men indeed takes that role away from us and gives it to men. My deepest sympathies, gentlemen.
have no idea what came over me but i WATCHED THAT.
elam is surprisingly articulate and nails the PUA’s to the wall. but.. he is old..maybe he’s articulate to make sure we can undertsand him thru his old man slurring and heavy breathing. no rage eye bulging or red ears with steam coming out either.. disappointing.
Well, the last metaphor is a bit strained, but it’s surprisingly decent and noncreepy advice. Yes, men should view themselves and their own needs as the “meat,” or sustaining element, of their lives while sex merely adds “flavor” to one’s life. One shouldn’t sacrifice one’s own health, integrity, etc. just for the prospect of sex. Of course, I may be attributing more thought into this than intended.
Ewww.
I know that there are totally a bunch of my rights that were just infringed upon by merely reading that metaphor, one of them being my right to avoid the urge to vomit over ‘fluid based metaphors’ from the weird old man of AVFM. I’m pretty sure my right to all those ‘feeeeeeeeeeemale privileges’ were infringed upon too. Whatever those are.
MRAs have it tough. They fear us and hate us, but they wanna have sex with us. And for some weird law-related reason, they can’t just abduct us and have their way with us. What. is. up. with. that. They ponder this question endlessly.
Paul Elam’s advice is sure to help. Ha, ha.
Paul Elam isn’t really in any place to call other people fat. He’s hardly svelte or a candidate for Mr. Olympia. I believe the polite term for Elam’s appearance is “paunchy.”
I seriously don’t see how these guys are offering good advice… I found that just treating people like human beings is often how you get far in life.
Likewise, I go to the gym to bulk up and try to look like a GQ reader at the same time… Would this cause a black hole in the minds of most manospherians?
What does “Look like a GQ reader” even mean?
Ragging on someone’s appearance is not okay, even if that person rags on the appearance of others first.
Yes, yes, I get the “hypocrisy” angle. It’s still not okay.
Ew.
It’s one thing if young men use the expression “getting pussy” without irony. it makes them look like douchy frat bros who are probably shitty lovers because they are selfish and don’t really care about the other person’s pleasure.
But if a man at Elam’s age talks about “pussy”… dude, that’s just disgusting. you’re an adult. you have a (now adult) daughter. Get a grip on yourself!
“Holding a copy of GQ magazine,” I assume.
More proof that when you get one, you get the other! They’re all the same. Different names, same stupid crap.
#manuresphere
Wait, isn’t Paul Elam the one that runs that whole Men Going Their Own Way site or is that someone else? Why would someone that’s going their own way need sex advice?
Even when the advice isn’t too terrible in and of itself, he’s just gotta wrap it up in awful, doesn’t he?
I mean, it’s not bad to tell guys they should have interests and hobbies, nor is it bad to tell guys they should value themselves over lots and lots of sex. Does Elam HAVE to use awful metaphors and obvious digs while he does it?
… oh, wait. It’s AVFM. Everything they do seems to have a gross-out quota.
I check out fat guys. Just say’n
The meat/gravy metaphor made me want to be celibate forever. ?
I’m also quite sad that my first thought was “at least he wasn’t advocating rape.” The bar is set so very, very fucking low.
I think Paul Elam being meat was what made Grace Slick go vegan.
The image that sprang to my mind was “in the bathroom at your dad’s house”. (No disrespect intended to GQ, that’s just the only place I’ve ever encountered it.)
The meat metaphor is almost decent (I agree that men should value themselves independently of how much sex they are or are not having), but at the same time it’s problematic. Gravy is generally regarded as a prize, a signifier of abundance, and it also gets its flavor and umami primarily from meat. Are women flour – just an extra, bland ingredient that’s there to thicken and enhance the meat? Or are they a side dish – vegetables, perhaps? Or a garnish?
Oh wait, I know – they’re the plates!
Which is why I have hobbies and other things to do, not just my kitty cats.
At risk of pointing out the blinding obvious, Paulie, you’re not exactly a slender reed yourself. But haw haw haw David Futrelle MANBOOBZ amirite?
MRA misandry, folks…straight from the very mangry horse’s mouth. Paulie thinks you’re nothing but a piece of meat.
And we all know what pussies eat, don’t we?