Seen on Hacker News and sent by a sweetheart: Love in the Age of the Pickup Artist by S.G. Belknap is a must-read. A spot-on analysis of pick up artist’s techniques in the post-“The Game” era, plus a simply beautiful, personal piece of writing suitable for those who love New Yorker style non-fiction essays. The ending, about love, is wonderful. Snip:
I first turned to the pickup artists after losing in love. Or, to be precise, winning—and then losing.
(…) So how does it work? It begins in a bar. PUAs (pickup artists; this will be the first in a long line of acronyms and other assorted jargon) do often ply their trade during the day, sometimes even on the street—this is called “day game” and has its own nuances—but the classic location for seduction is the trendy club or bar. For the most part the pickup artist “sarges” alone (i.e., operates alone—the term comes from the name of one of the cats of an early pickup artist), but a “wingman” or “wing” can play a role as well (among other things, he makes the pickup artist who is “running the set” look good). After a target is chosen, she must be approached within three seconds—this is the “three-second rule,” one of Mystery’s inventions. The thought behind it is twofold: first, if a man looks for too long at a woman, she might begin to think he is creepy, or, possibly worse, a coward; and second, if a man looks for too long at a woman, he might indeed become a coward, he might lose his nerve. When it is time for an approach, the approach always comes from an angle, from ten o’clock; this is less intimidating, but also conveys sufficient confidence. The pickup artist always smiles. (…read more, thepointmag.com)
Photo by Martín Castillo Morales.
I read the whole essay in the link, it was pretty interesting. While reading I was reminded of a line that I heard in a video game, and I thought it really applied to dating: “Nothing is true, everything is permitted.”
For those of us not on the VIP list: there is no lie too ridiculous, no manipulation too daring, and no facade too opaque when it comes to bedding women.
Thank You for posting this, admittedly the article managed to wring a few tears from my eyes. :-)
OK, they lie and manipulate to get what they want (sex). But is deception not a time-honored technique on the battlefield of love? How many of the women in those bars are representing themselves honestly? I’ve known several women who have mis-represented themselves for the purpose of getting together with a guy they were interested in — everything from “Oh, I love NASCAR” to “Wow, I’ve never seen one that big before!”
All’s fair.
It’s nice to see my picture here, thanks for posting it, and congratulations for this blog.
Cheers!
I was introduced to the ‘pick up’ literature after attempting to do some research on safety of online dating for a book. I asked the assistant in a book store if there were any good books to recommend on that topic. She hadn’t seen any, but she thought I should read the Mystery Method and warn women about the type of men who read it.
Oddly enough, I did find a connection to Internet crime. The pseudo-scientific theory behind the pickup artist stuff is mostly NLP, a sort of pseudo-psychology that is popular with some Internet criminals who specialize in social engineering. Then I started to recognize names and places in the book as associates of hackers and their haunts.
The problem I have with the claims is that these people are self-admitted experts in lying and manipulation. And you can never be entirely sure who is being lied to. Some of the techniques proposed seem plausible. The rationale seems entirely implausible.
Thank you for posting this. A thoughtful but also thought-provoking piece.