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Pick-up artist boot camp

  
 
Tuna Ghost: Pratt knot hero
06:08 / 06.02.08
I was in Japan last fall and one of the guys I was studying with went to a pick-up artist "workshop" (This one, if you care). My first reaction, I'm a little ashamed to admit, was to laugh out loud (at the guy. He wasn't present, but I was still laughing at him). Then I checked out their site, read a few testimonials and felt a little repulsed. The method described is similar to the training I recieved when I became a door-to-door salesman, but more or less aimed at convincing japanese women to have sex with you. Read the testimonials and tell me if I'm crazy to think this is a little creepy.

Testimonials

The thing is, I can see how their approach would be successful. It works for door-to-door sales, and if you're working the law of averages then it's really all about how many times you try.

When he got back, I asked him about it and told him I was a little disturbed at the idea. He looked pretty embarrassed but later told me that he's never been good at socializing, and it's even harder for him in a foreign country so he wanted to at least try it. The things he learned, he tells me, are helping be less awkward around people and feel more confident.

Forgetting for a minute how much this weekend costs (look it up! You won't believe it), I started thinking: well, that's not that bad. He's twenty, he's in a new place with a totally different culture and wants to make new friends and get over this whole awkward presence he knows he has but can't do anything about. I'm still not happy about the way the testimonials talk about women. But I can understand that the guy is twenty; he wants to be able to talk to people. Well, a more accurate statement would be that he wants to meet people and sleep with them. But really, I think to myself, how can I judge him when I, at the time, went out every weekend to clubs and bars with a similar plan in mind. I never paid anyone a rediculous amount of money to learn how to do it, but if that's the only difference then I'm not sure how or why I disagree with idea.

Well, there's the whole approach, actually. I did what I was trained to do when I was a salesman (not very well, but that was more of a motivation thing), but I knew at the time the way they teach you to handle people is a little shady. But I did it anyway, so why do I have a problem with this? I mean, I can't claim the sales training doesn't help when you meet someone, so I'm technically using the training I received when I go out to meet people. Plus the guy says he feels more confident and more capable to deal with social situations. That's a plus, right?

Is it so terrible to want to learn how to convince people that sleeping with you is something they ought to seriously consider? Why does this whole thing feel creepy, and not just in a you-just-paid-HOW-much-money way? And how effed up am I for doing almost the same thing? I want to say there's a difference between me and these people, but I'm not sure what it is.
 
 
*
06:46 / 06.02.08
People of all genders and sexual orientations go to bars to meet people they'd like to sleep with all the time.

The people who systematize the idea of going to bars to "pick someone up" are invariably men, invariably with sketchy sexist notions that they will be the one trying to get sex out of a (invariably) woman by putting the right words in the right slot and pushing the right button at the appropriate time. The idea that there's a right way to do it means that women are vending machines that dispense sex to whomever knows the right sequence of buttons to push. That's why it's creepy.
 
 
Papess
12:15 / 06.02.08
Agreed, Zippy. It's totally creepy. I have on occasion watched this TV show called "Keys to the VIP" and it makes me sick. I have been subjected to some intolerable opinions and objectifying circumstances, but this is taking that experience and making it acceptable.

I have learned a lot from "pick-artists". One of those things is the "nice ones" aren't any better than the insubtle jerks.
 
 
All Acting Regiment
12:39 / 06.02.08
Yeah, pretty much total dud. I think everyone knows that on a venn diagram with 'sexual intercourse' on one side and 'business intercourse' on the other, there's going to be some areas of cross-over (making yourself presentable, being confident, the law of averages) and to a degree you have to 'promote' yourself to make any kind of relationships, friendly or romantic or otherwise - but there's also things that are totally, totally different. Such as the whole reason for talking to the person, the magnitude of what people stand to gain or lose from the 'dialogue', and so on.
 
 
All Acting Regiment
12:42 / 06.02.08
Plus the guy says he feels more confident and more capable to deal with social situations. That's a plus, right?

Yes - but he could have got that from somewhere else. Maybe not so easily, but still.
 
 
Jawsus-son Starship
12:45 / 06.02.08
I first heard about this through the Neil Strauss book "The Game". It seems like wish fufilment for geeks with low confidence. Later, my friend Dave got quite deep into the scene, but eventually stopped going because he didn't like the majority of the people he found at the boot camps.

What suprised me was the proportion of people I've heard of who do this who's aim is to meet "the one". I think there's a lot of bravardo in the scene, and a lot of my friends who have become interested do so because a set of rules give the a sense of confidence they lack in the randomness of human interaction.
 
 
*
19:44 / 06.02.08
Yes, well, it's quite reassuring to think that there's nothing about yourself that you need to deeply examine, certainly no fundamental inner growth you have to do, just a set of techniques that you can master that are guaranteed to work. Or at least guaranteed to work on "the one." ("The one" being defined, circularly, as "The ch1ck it works on," I guess.)
 
 
Dutch
22:03 / 06.02.08
I read neill strauss' book, and while it ends on the note of: "if I hadn't learned about all these techniques I'd have never found the confidence to find this one person who was right for me", there are still fundamentally creepy things inside of it. For instance, one of the methods described is how to hypnotize or program a woman in a vein similar to the “vending machine proposition” that was put forward by zippy.

However, and I’m probably painting a very sad picture of myself, to someone who has had little luck with women in a relationship/sexual way, the prospect of finding one’s confidence through a “tried” method would seem somewhat alluring. One the one hand, I feel disgusted with myself for even entertaining the notion that beautiful and wonderful human being would fall for any manipulation of that kind.

In another way though, it has been disconcerting to find out (in personal experience), that a certain amount of confidence combined with a modicum of aggression vs. complimenting has been known to “work” for friends of mine. (and I’m sorry for using the term in this manner, but at this moment I cannot find another – sleep deprivation).

While I hardly advocate the widespread adoption of methods pertaining to seduction put forward by these people, I wonder if there is a truth underlying these methods that have to do more with a sad realisation of human “influenceability” (for a lack of a better term.)

With that I mean that all people in general being far more prone to reacting in a certain way to certain stimuli.
 
 
*
22:21 / 06.02.08
Well, and there's a basic problem here, Dutch. It's that someone who uses a combination of aggression and confidence in order to convince women or other humans to be attracted to them will encounter times when this technique appears to be effective. It won't be effective more times than being yourself, being friendly, and treating women and other humans as equal beings who think like you... but since in order to achieve that, you can't think of it as a "technique" to achieve some end, you're unlikely to describe it as "working" in the same way, so you don't end up with those anecdotes.

"I did absolutely nothing that I don't do with any other human--and it totally worked! Best strategy I ever used!" See my point?

The pedestal you've skirted around in this line: One the one hand, I feel disgusted with myself for even entertaining the notion that beautiful and wonderful human being would fall for any manipulation of that kind. seems to me to be symptomatic. If you find women mysterious, inaccessible beings who are beyond reproach, naturally you're going to have a hard time empathizing with them, and so you are going to lack confidence and fall into the "nice guy (who doesn't get the babes) vs. arrogant asshole (who does)." Only nice guy doesn't get the babes for some very obvious and sound reasons, which is that "niceness" usually means fawning over women while keeping them intellectually and emotionally at a distance, and seeing being open and unmanipulative about one's desires and aims as unethical behavior. Or you can learn actual unethical and manipulative behavior as a set of handy techniques from a book. Either way, you're both starting from the set of principles that women are locked boxes of mysterious yumminess that anyone who can just get their hands on the right key can open, as opposed to people who can be your best mate or a paragon or an absolute asshat like anyone else.
 
 
Tuna Ghost: Pratt knot hero
23:46 / 06.02.08
Either way, you're both starting from the set of principles that women are locked boxes of mysterious yumminess that anyone who can just get their hands on the right key can open,...

Replace "women" with "people" and "yumminess" with "cash", and how is this different from my job as a salesman? Am I culpable for that? The motivation seems the same, but not as creepy (thankfully).

Also, when I looked at my own motivations for going out, besides getting drunk with friends my plans for a great night usually included finding someone to dance with and sleep with later. At this point, I've come to see this as something that is more or less morally acceptable, and now I'm feeling a little unsure. It's uncomfortable. I'm sort of casting about for some sort of line between me and these guys, but I keep getting this image of a guy saying "yeah, I totally see them as people! People who could be my friend, my fencing partner, or just great people. And I will start discovering how great they are after I sleep with them." It's pretty close to what I was doing.

Worse, this guy would come to clubs and bars with my friends, see me meet people and occasionally leave with them and later ask me "how I did it". I didn't know what to tell him. Couple weeks later he goes to those creeps. Is that what he saw me doing? Is that basically what I was doing?





...




...I'm waiting for someone to assure me I'm not creepy, so anytime now would be fantastic.

One the one hand, I feel disgusted with myself for even entertaining the notion that beautiful and wonderful human being would fall for any manipulation of that kind.

Well that's just silly. I'm gorgeous, and I can tell you that I fall for shit all the time. Zippy makes some good points about this assumption.
 
 
Hallo, Paper Spaceboy
01:50 / 07.02.08
I feel that there's nothing wrong with going out, having a good time, and meeting someone to engage in casual sex with, Tuna. It happens, it happens often, and it is a quite natural aspect of nightclub culture or just going out in general.

The creepiness is the intent, it's the weird mentality that there has to be some kind of ritual, spell, or psychological trick to meeting somebody for that purpose, rather than simply putting yourself out there and talking to people as people, seeing if there's some chemistry worth pursuing (either casually or as something more, depending on your situation).

It might be worth putting in that the "pick-up artist" mentality is not strictly limited to men, nor is the inclination to read books and take courses on the subject; it may not always be dressed up the same way (women seem to be more typically marketed to with the assumption that long-term relationships and/or marriage is the necessary goal), but I suspect that these situations happen regardless of one's gender or background. Really, it's just that a lot of people have trouble meeting other people (either for sex or dating or marriage or at all) because of schedule problems, confidence issues, or emotional baggage and they seek guidance for that. The "pick-up artist" millieu with books like The Game take advantage of that, and they take advantage of gender stereotypes (I find, at work, when someone brings up a copy of The Game to check out at the desk, they usually give me a skeezy look, as though we're in the same stupid club because we're both men -- regardless of the fact that all men don't subscribe to the same "conqueror" approach to sex). People look to these books for help because they haven't been given the social tools necessary to feel comfortable with members of their preferred sex - and publishers take advantage of that.
 
 
*
02:49 / 07.02.08
Tuna, did the people you slept with have a reasonably good time? (I'm not asking about your sexshul arteestry here, I mean did you manage to refrain from being grossly inconsiderate and/or crossing boundaries and/or completely neglecting your partner's pleasure.) Were they in bed with you for the same reason you were in bed with them? Was everyone up front about that?

Okay then. The mentality that underlies the creepy pick-up artist is not conducive to any of that, so if as a rule you met people, were up front about wanting mutually pleasurable casual sex, and they agreed that they wanted that too and went home with you and had a good time, chances are you weren't doing that thing. Key is not deluding yourself or others about whether that is what happened.

As for the sales thing, you've forgotten about the product. Your creepy pick-up artist is trying to sell himself as someone who is interested in his targets as people. In fact, he's not; he's interested in them as sex vending machines. It's false advertising in a particularly egregious form. Do you sell a product or service you believe in, and to the people you believe will actually benefit from it? If so, you can be honest while doing it and still make sales. If not, you have to lie, and to justify lying you have to see your buyers as marks. Whether anyone actually does the former, I don't know.
 
 
Ex
07:43 / 07.02.08
In another way though, it has been disconcerting to find out (in personal experience), that a certain amount of confidence combined with a modicum of aggression vs. complimenting has been known to “work” for friends of mine.

But then what do they get? A few hours of rude activity with someone who's feeling a bit insecure and offkilter? The idea that someone who insults me is taking an interest, while seeming superior and impressive, seems rather dodgy to me. I don't doubt it often 'works'. Not poking at you, Dutch, just suggesting that it's a no-win siutation, and I think less about human persuadability, but about insecurity. I'd hazard specifically female insecurity about their looks, in the ways I've seen it presented.

Tuna, loads of people on nights out fancy some sex, or may fancy you, and if these techniques were about identifying who might be in that category, I'd be happier with them. I don't even think learning some basic tips on what someone's body language might suggest, or how to tell when someone's engaged in a conversation, if those things don't come easily to someone. Knowing that, for example, if someone keeps making eye contact and nodding at appropriate moments and sometimes touching your arm, they're probably interested in what you're saying and don't feel hostile to you - it's not really a system, it's just being aware of possible meanings of an interraction.

But most of these tips and techniques have either a gloss of the mystical ('She may seem frosty, but if she's putting on lipstick, that means she's really interested, Freud says so') or a basis in the mechanical ('If you use these three key words and touch her left ear, bingo!'). And they often encourage the reader to either ignore a person's explicit statements ('Shove off, I just want to talk to my friend'), or somehow chisel round them. If a person really doesn't want to be rude with me, that's part of that person, and part of their sexual makeup, not something I have to weasel round to get access to that person/sex.

So - flirting fun. Consensual well-informed fun rude stuff a nice thing to happen. Reflecting on your past experiences - not a bad way to work out whether a person you've recently met might think well of you.
Concretising that reflection into a system of universal rules, particularly ones which promise to tell you more about a person than they can tell you about themselves using words, or promise to get round that person's understanding of their own best interests - dodgy.
 
 
Less searchable M0rd4nt
09:24 / 07.02.08
And they often encourage the reader to either ignore a person's explicit statements ('Shove off, I just want to talk to my friend'), or somehow chisel round them.

And on that note, can I just mention that I've had nights out--anticipated, looked-forward-to, longed-for, badly-needed nights out with people I don't see nearly enough--COMPLETELY FUCKING RUINED because some douche who'd bought into this kind of system wouldn't take "look, I just want to talk to my friend, okay?" as an answer, either from me or from another FI chum. I don't appreciate having my attention continually yanked away from an interesting conversation by someone who wants to tell me yet another unfunny joke or wheel out yet another criticism of my body/accent/friends/dress etc.; and I REALLY DO NOT FUCKING APPRECIATE HAVING TO SEE TO A MATE WHO WAS HAVING A GOOD TIME 10 MINUTES AGO BECAUSE SOME DOUCHE HAS DRIVEN HER WEEPING INTO THE FUCKING LADIES' LOOS IN THE COURSE OF TRYING TO GET INTO HER KNICKERS.

I wish these shitbirds would just bite the bullet and pay a prostitute if they need to get laid so badly. I guess that doesn't fellate their egos sufficiently though.
 
 
Less searchable M0rd4nt
09:28 / 07.02.08
PS: It is also creepy because, well, this, basically.

(Triggering for survivours.)
 
 
Dutch
12:35 / 07.02.08
This mostly in reply to zippy.

I seem to be falling into the Nice Guy™ rhetoric/thinking time and time again. You are correct in stating that the set of principles from which this method of reasoning arrives is flawed. It is flawed, if not surely degrading. I know this rationally, but a still the Nice Guy™ spews his

“I am not an arrogant womanizer. I am an attentive, caring, sensitive person who talks with women in a respectful way, so why can’t I get laid?”

The problem is then, that the attention, the caring and the respect one should give to people in general in my view, is used as tender for some sort of unilaterally desired transaction, which is demeaning to what I normally see as the basically decent way of being and communicating with people.

To be honest, I am trying to kill the Nice Guy™’s way of thinking inside of me. It’s just that I sometimes slide back into the self-pitying whine that the good Bill Bailey attributed to modern American (emo)rock.

Thank you for reminding me of the negativity that dwells in such a way of thinking, toward women, and toward one's self.
 
 
rakehell
14:04 / 14.02.08
As someone who has always been interested in communication and expression, when a lot of my friends became interested in pick up, I ended up going along to a seminar and being offered a job as an instructor with one of the better known companies - if there is such a thing.

I didn't end up taking the job for various reasons, but I did get to go along to a few "boot camps" as an observer and most of what I saw was fascinating. The types of students, the instructors, the techniques, attitudes, expectations, results, etc, all varied and gave me new insights into people - not all good.

(The competition aspect that was mentioned is quite correct and it was surreal to attend a popular nightclub on a Saturday night only to realise that the place was crawling with students from various "schools" all in quasi-competition with each other.)

A lot of people here are making assumptions about how socialised people can be. I met people terrified of opening up and talking someone in that way. For them a class like this is by no means the end point, but rather the start. I guess it's a lot more attractive to be shown a series of steps, or whatever, than to be told "just be yourself" because some of these people don't know who they are.

Beyond the skeezy stuff, a lot of "the game" is concerned with figuring out who you are, what you like and what you would like in a partner. This comes very naturally to some people (who also happen to frequently be the people who object to the whole idea of these things) and couldn't be more alien to others. It's probably no coincidence that a great percentage of the people I met had very active online lives.

Worth mentioning at this point is that not all schools rely on techniques or body language training, so do deal with broader and more general conversation techniques - probably most akin to selling, if you are the product, how do you best present yourself?

It's also worth noting that there are a lot of people (men and women) who go out to clubs and bars perhaps not specifically to be picked up, but with the notion firmly in mind, so not all these guys are hawks preying on the unwary.

If anyone has any specific questions, I'll try and answer them as best I can from a quasi-insiders position.

Alternately, if anyone wants any tips, you can PM me.
 
 
*
14:26 / 14.02.08
Beyond the skeezy stuff, a lot of "the game" is concerned with figuring out who you are, what you like and what you would like in a partner. This comes very naturally to some people (who also happen to frequently be the people who object to the whole idea of these things) and couldn't be more alien to others.

Methinks you assume too much. There's probably still a thread on here somewhere that I started by wondering whether I have diagnosable social anxiety disorder.

It's not the idea that people can learn better social skills that bothers me, as you would know if you read any of my posts. It's the marketing of these skills as tricks to obtain a commodity, a woman's affection, that will theoretically be dispensed to whomever has the tricks down. Admittedly they may not actually be taught that way, but you still end up with a class full of people who are there because they think they will get a magic key to unlock a box full of yummy, rather than because they want to be more comfortable being who they are in relationship to other people.

This kind of marketing relies on the proposition "woman = desired thing" rather than the proposition "woman = person with desires just as rational and irrational as my own." The former proposition is sexist. So this setup relies on and perpetuates sexism.

If you can find me one of these classes that is just as welcoming to socially-awkward straight women, lesbians, and gay men as it is to straight men, you may well have happened upon one that breaks that formula.
 
 
rakehell
14:59 / 14.02.08
Hey. Yo. Wah. I totally wasn't aiming any of that at you. I have no idea who you are or what you're like, I was talking with regard to my experiences over the last couple of years.

But your latest reply makes me think of two points that seem common in this thread.

1) Are you saying that there is no point at which a woman can be a "desired thing" without it being sexist?

2) You seem to be implying that there is a common way of communication that works for all people to all people. Which clearly isn't true. I haven't a class that would exclude any of the people you mentioned, but how likely is it that they'd get more out of it than my grandmother would from the "Interview skills for finance professionals" seminar I attended last week?

Fuck, I also realise that I sound like some sort of apologist, which I'm not, but I think this goes deeper than "nope, it's shit".
 
 
Dead Megatron
15:51 / 14.02.08
Are you saying that there is no point at which a woman can be a "desired thing" without it being sexist?

Hey, I'm all for the notion that displaying sexual interest does not make one sexist, but I reckon that phrase would have worked much better if it said "desired person" instead of "desired thing".

Just sayin'
 
 
Leigh Monster loses its cool
16:36 / 14.02.08
You seem to be implying that there is a common way of communication that works for all people to all people. Which clearly isn't true. I haven't a class that would exclude any of the people you mentioned, but how likely is it that they'd get more out of it than my grandmother would from the "Interview skills for finance professionals" seminar I attended last week?

I do think it's weird that the "method of communication" such a class teaches apparently only applies to straight males talking to straight females. Is there a set of questions whose answers only matter if you're a straight guy talking to a straight girl? It seems to me that if you're actually trying to get to know someone, the kinds of information exchanged should apply across the board.
 
 
*
19:24 / 14.02.08
It's no problem; you made a generalization and I pointed out that it was a generalization, that's all. And, by the by, I enjoy talking about this subject and get quite animated about it, but I don't have any real attachment to it. So if I seem to be railing against you, please don't take offense. I'm more just having fun with the argument. I'll let you know if it strays into territory that I feel invested in.

1) Are you saying that there is no point at which a woman can be a "desired thing" without it being sexist?
As much as I hate to say it, DBF has hit it. A woman is not a thing to be desired. And desire for sex with a person is a different notion than desire to have that person, as a thing. Negotiating mutual sexual pleasure has to be just that... two (or more) people, each with their own desires, and the mutual desire to find a way to satisfy them together. There are things that people can change about themselves that would otherwise render this happy situation less likely, and you can probably teach that. But the "put the coin in the slot and the sexy comes out" mentality is one of those things that needs to be changed... and I've never heard of one of these seminars that addresses that.

2) You seem to be implying that there is a common way of communication that works for all people to all people. Which clearly isn't true.
I'm saying, straight out, that no method of communication works for all people in some arbitrary group (i.e. straight men) to all people in some other arbitrary group (i.e. straight women) any better than it would work for, say, two gay men of traditional mindset.
While different people have different communication styles, if you see a fundamental difference in the way Women communicate vs. the way Men communicate, that's already a problem. Most women are taught that they are supposed to communicate in a particular way; many of them follow that without too much difficulty. But many others are left feeling like they are somehow deficient for wishing they could just walk up to an attractive man and say "Hey, you are hot, and I'm looking for something casual; are you interested?" and cut out all this slimy subterfuge, without people thinking they're crazy. Classes that teach Men how to communicate with Women assuming that Men and Women communicate differently reinforce the exact kind of divide they're purportedly teaching people to bridge. And why not? If that divide didn't exist, there would be no market for these classes.

Individuals have different preferences for how they want to communicate, and how they want to be treated in relationships. Maybe there are women who protest that they don't want special treatment on Valentine's Day but actually they will be really insulted if they don't get a dozen roses and a heart-shaped box of chocolates; for each of these there's one woman who really thinks Valentine's Day is for suckers and anyone who buys into all that materialistic crap is a phony. And some man who will be disappointed because he really enjoys shopping for flowers and picking out chocolates. If you're going to have a class based on how Men should pick up Women a priori it's going to be based on stereotypes. If you're going to have a class for people who want to be better able to approach and initiate conversations with people they are interested in sexually, you have identified your target market, who already share certain characteristics, and they are free to identify their own target market... and you will have to work harder to suss out what will work for each person and their desired person, OR develop some common tools that each person can use to identify the traits they are looking for in their desired person and what communication styles are likely to work with a person who has those traits. Teach them how to apply the tools and come up with their own answers, and you will ALSO have taught them how to see the person they want to approach as a whole person and not just a target, if you've done your job right. I may be missing something, but the fact that all these classes are targeted at straight men looking for straight women tells me they think there's one right approach for straight men that works on straight women, and that's inevitably going to be based on stereotypes. Which means it's inevitably going to offend and alienate some people.
 
 
rakehell
16:33 / 15.02.08
This is a complete generalisation, but I think that a lot of these classes are aimed at straight men because they're quite often the only ones who can afford it AND to see that investment as worthwile.

I should also point out that there are a lot of these classes which are dodgy as hell and rely on scripts and what not, but there are others that have moved on and present an entirely different range of material.

I find the former as repulsive as you do and whenever I met one of these guys was reminded of little more than robots. Seeing them interact with people was like watching a living choose your own adventure book, at best. The worst was watching them flubber when someone presented a response they were unprepared for - worst, but also quite hilarious.

The other thing is that I would be classified, for want of a better term, as goth. So going out to these extremely mainstream clubs was quite an eye opener for me - and most classes are focued on "night game". There are a lot of girls who go out with the intention of getting picked up and are essentially looking for the most interesting/impressive guy. So these classes help you be that person.

One of the reasons I like the goth scene is that girls walking up to guys and saying "Hey, you are hot, and I'm looking for something casual; are you interested?" is not some freak occurrence. The dynamic that exists in mainstream clubs wouldn't go go away if the whole pick up scene disappeared. It exists because it fills a need.

And like I said, I met a lot of people for whom this was extremely beneficial and in fact did help them go from seeing women as "unobtainable objects" to someone you could have a genuine interaction with.
 
  
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