When it comes to dating, even the best of us go through dry spells, and I am far from what could be called "the best." As an Internet comedy writer, I rank somewhere between people who clean up roadkill and child molesters on the scale of attractiveness, and the latter still get more action than I do.
I could use a few pointers.
Thankfully the Internet is here to help, and no, I'm not referring to porn. There's an entire community of "pickup artists" online who want to help turn dateless people like me into Casanovas -- the only catch is that you have to be turned into a misogynist as well.
After yet another Saturday night spent watching Cinemax and eating Bugles with one hand, I decided to take their Faustian deal and join the ranks of the seduction community. Not for the benefit of their advice, mind you. It's just that the nights aren't as lonely when you can warm yourself with the knowledge that there are people out there even more pathetic than you are.
The Basics
"What exactly is the seduction community?" you're probably wondering right now, unless you already know because you're a terrible person. The seduction community is a collection of guys who think they're just the bee's knees at picking up women. They reject our ancestors' old-fashioned "go out for dinner and treat her like a human being" approach to dating, instead relying on a combination of misunderstood biology, misunderstood psychology, and very well understood douchebaggery.
The seduction community has been online since 1994, which means that for about as long as we've had the Internet, we've had guys conspiring on it to creep girls out. But it only became mainstream in 2005, when journalist Neil Strauss realized he could cash in by writing a book about it.
Heh. "Penetrating."
The community has since exploded in popularity. There are dozens of websites, each offering forums as well as books, seminars and DVDs. A number of "gurus" have become prominent in the community, none more so than Mystery.
How could any woman not want to sleep with him?
Yes, that man is considered the foremost expert in the field of seduction. He gave himself a stripper name, and bought a hat that pimps would call garish -- but if I follow his teachings, I will supposedly become irresistible to the ladies. The blind ladies, presumably. What advice does Mystery have to offer? Let's take a look.
Seduction "Techniques"
The first thing I learned about the seduction community was that they use more slang and acronyms than the military. If I was going to blend in, I had to master their language, which is a combination of text-speak and English as understood by a retarded Norwegian.
Let's go over some basic terminology. This will help you understand both what pickup artists are saying and what awful people they are.
Neg - A backhanded compliment intended to make you look indifferent to a girl so she'll want you more, somehow. There are complex rules for determining how often you should "neg" a girl, which is good because obviously the last thing you'd want to do when you're trying to win someone over is insult her the wrong number of times.
PeaColeridgeing - Wearing some sort of ridiculous item of clothing to serve as a conversation starter, like Mystery's retarded hat.
"I'm sorry, but I have to ask. What's the story behind the codpiece?"
HBx - Hot Babe x, with the x representing how attractive the woman is on a scale of one to 10. This term is used in place of, say, referring to a girl by name, because that would be too humanizing.
FRs and LRs - Field reports and lay reports. These are detailed analyses of nights on the town, so fellow pickup artists can critique the techniques used.
Sarge - Going out to pick up girls. This term comes from the name of a pickup artist's cat, which seems like a lost opportunity because the whole seduction community would be far more hilarious had his cat been named Mittens.
Lair - A website or real life location where groups of pickup artists meet. Yes, they actually use the term lair. Like they're supervillains, vampires, or the dreaded supervillain vampire.
There are many, many more terms, but I just want to get you up to speed, not write a complete English-to-dickhead dictionary. Besides, for every piece of terminology I picked up, I forgot the definition of a real word, so I needed to stop before my vocabulary became alligators.
...the Frost?
Now let's delve into the theoretical side of seduction. At first blush, the community's advice is innocuous: be confident, recognize that rejection is no big deal, don't get obsessed with one girl, etc. That's sound advice. But then the wheels fall off and you drive into the ditch, and the ditch is full of angry hobos with knives.
For example, did you know that all women make decisions based on irrational emotions and then make up a reason for doing what they did later? It's true! Assuming you live in a bad sitcom.
Other fun facts about women, according to the seduction community:
- Women are only interested in gaining social status.
- Women lie to themselves about what they want from men, so there's no point in listening to their opinions on dating.
- All women want power by gaining control over men.
Damn, is all that really true? Why would you even want to sleep with a harpy like that?
The fundamental logic behind pickup artistry is that the only way women will sleep with you is if you trick them into thinking you're likeable. See, to these guys, love is a battlefield. And not in the Pat Benatar sense, in the "Women are our adversaries and we need to conquer them by having sex at them" sense. And that leads to some weird ideas.
For instance, using "ambiguity," or regular words that sound similar to dirty words, to "subconsciously put a woman into a sexual state." For example, if you tell a girl that such techniques are "below you," she'll supposedly start to think "I'd sure love to blow you." Man, whoever thought of this deserves a good lunch.
Strangely enough, after reading all that manly bro dude advice I came across a tip about how reciting poetry will impress the ladies. Really? I was just advised that I should use wordplay to trick her into giving me a blowjob, and now I should quote poetry at her? I don't think the average girl wants to date more than one personality at a time. Oh, and of course, it's perfectly acceptable to plagiarize.
"Shall I compare thee to a summer's day an' Shakespeare?"
Even old-fashioned cliches like using a wingman are given a baffling technical makeover by the seduction community.
Actually, these might be instructions for performing surgery. I honestly can't tell.
I had only scratched the surface of the seduction community's techniques, but since the surface was coated with slime, I had a pretty good idea of the kind of douchebags I was dealing with. It was time for me to join their Axe body spray-scented ranks.
Please continue to Part 2: Terrible Advice!
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