Isn’t PUA essentially about learning to socialize, albeit in a way that many find offensive? I think for people whom socializing comes naturally, it is difficult to appreciate the challenge for others that struggle. How many groups are really welcoming of people that are socially dysfunctional?
Um, something tells me hookers are not the solution to the OPs problems.
Little did I know my original post would go to a 5th page. For all I know my sons’ social anxiety won’t cause them the problems with the ladies that it did with me. Who knows, number one son could bring home a girl friend from college this Thanksgiving. Until they both started talking about the SA I wasn’t concerned, but now there’s a mild concern that it’s something inherited.
I agree somewhat with the poster above who said that asking women friends for help isn’t the best idea, although I don’t agree with the reason. I think it’s more along the lines of not wanting to hurt a friend’s feelings. Is it reasonable to say that extreme insecurity, while hardly a desireable trait for anyone, can be more debilitating for men? By my early twenties my “why don’t any women have interest in a nice guy like me” attitude turned into a fear that there was something “broken” about me that made me relationship material for almost no one. I would call it self-hate, but that’s not completely accurate. I still considered myself a good friend, son, brother, and employee. Despite having met someone, fallen in love, gotten married, and raised a family I don’t feel that I have any real wisdom to impart to guys (or women) who are in the same place I was at 18-30.
Women do not like jerks. If you are the common denominator in your lack-of-relationship problem, put the blame firmly where it belongs.
You keep resorting to ad hominem when someone makes an observation you find unsettling.
Study up on your logical reasoning, and come back when you can make a coherent argument.
Just as a data point, I became much more successful with women after studying “game” stuff but what I learned was how to make people feel comfortable and open up, not jerk stuff.
It’s neither true that PUA is all about negging nor that women prefer jerks.
I guess in your world, the Strawman is god. I’m glad your world is not the same one as mine more than you’re glad.
Grow up, please.
I became much more successful with women after I stopped caring too much about them (not on purpose). In my experience at least, women certainly tend to like you more if there’s a degree of insecurity in the relationship. However, the same thing is true for men. So it’s not a men/women thing as much as a human thing. At some level we all like/care more about people who don’t like us and take for granted the ones that do. Sucks, but true.
These threads always make me feel like some kind of space alien. I am utterly bemused by the idea that men and women are such differently motivated creatures. My husband is a ‘‘nice guy’’ in the sense that he is always thinking of others first, but not in the sense that he expects anything out of it. That’s just who he is. And that’s one of the major reasons I fell in love with him. In one of our earliest social interactions, I was feeling sick and he offered to bring me chicken soup. Not because he wanted to get laid, but because that is how he expresses his concern for others. And I know that because I paid attention – I saw that he didn’t only treat attractive young women that way, but everybody, man woman and child, regardless of what he could get out of it.
In my experience, very few human beings are that genuinely selfless. I know I’m not (though I think it’s something humanity ought to aspire to.) He was and is head and shoulders above any of those smarmy poetry-reading pseudo-romantic jerkoffs who think women are qualitatively different than any other human. We all know the type, they are the ones who think women need special ‘‘wooing’’ just by nature of having tits, and they are extremely uncomfortable to be around.
And we were friends first, best of friends, and didn’t even realize we were in love for a long time. And the thing that made me realize I loved him was, in fact, trying to imagine moving on in life without him, imagine him eventually getting some girlfriend who would be his new bestie and I was insanely jealous of the idea of any other woman having that place in his life – which I can’t help but notice is the strategy ‘‘nice guys’’ allegedly use to ensnare women. Well, it worked for me, but you have to actually be a nice guy not just pretend to be one.
It almost makes me feel outraged on his behalf that some would look at him and label him a ‘‘nice guy’’ or even ‘‘weak’’ as some have indicated, when in fact he is a goddamned warrior. I had two grand mal seizures on Monday and he was there for me, first at one hospital then the other, he was helping me get my meds sorted and make doctors’ appointments because my brain is too fuzzy to keep the details straight right now. Or let’s talk about the day I had to have a D&C procedure to remove our dead baby from my womb, and he sat there in the hospital and held me for hours while I cried, supportive enough that the attending nurse was emotionally moved by his strength.
Like I give a shit how good he is at making small talk. I had to teach him how to properly kiss a woman. As a suitor, he had no idea what the fuck he was doing and it didn’t matter. And this works both ways – if women don’t see the good in some men because they lack the polish of the casanovas, well that’s their loss too. It’s all about priorities. You get what you give.
My point is, if you are who you are because you think it’s going to enhance your chances of getting laid, you’re doing it wrong. And by ‘‘it’’ I mean being a human being.
No, unless you’re playing word games with the ‘essentially’. PUA materials includes a bit of basic socialization stuff, like the things I’ve recommended here (go to events where you can meet compatible people, make yourself appealing to the people you like, talk to people, actually ask women out). But there are a lot of different self-help and therapy related books that include basic socialization ideas, there’s nothing unique about PUA in this regard, and nothing specific to PUA either, so to say that PUA material is ‘essentially’ about that is untrue. Basic socialization is not what drives PUA seminars and classes, and is not what gets talked about on PUA blogs and message boards. The stuff that makes PUA actually PUA is packed with misogyny, manipulation, and borderline-to-actually illegal ideas.
Here’s an article about two PUA guys who ended up destroying their business in a progressive community when someone connected them to their semi-anonymous PUA–related posts. It gives a good feel for what PUA is ‘essentially’ about, if it was just socialization they wouldn’t have had such disturbing blogs for people to find. 'Pickup artists' and rape culture
I can’t answer first hand what “people whom socializing comes naturally” think, since I’m very much not in that group, I would probably have been diagnosed as somewhere high-functioning on the autism spectrum when I was a kid if they had today’s knowledge back then. I have found that most people actually struggle with a lot of social interaction, they just don’t talk about it much. Plenty of groups are fine with people who aren’t perfect at socialization but at least make an effort, though ‘nice guys’ often define ‘welcoming’ weirdly. PUAs are only welcoming of people that are socially dysfunctional because they can remove cash from them with books, seminars, classes, programs, and other paid services, it’s not some sort of benevolence or charity.
SpiceWeasel, I hope my wife would say similar things about me (except we fell in love very quickly and I had the kissing thing down pretty well despite limited experience). It sounds like you knew a good guy when you saw one. If you’re a space alien, Ms. P may be from the same planet.
Spice Weasel, what you have there of course is not a Nice Guy[sup]TM[/sup], but a good (hu)man. Which is what we all should seek to be first.
Yeah, that’s sort of my point. I realized I may have come across more judgmental sounding than intended. My whole thinking is, life is hard enough, you know? It’s lonely enough, painful enough, difficult enough without creating these arbitrary distinctions between humans. And really with these kinds of conversations, that’s all I see, just people making human connection harder than it already is. We are all driven by the same need for love, acceptance, understanding, appreciation, what have you. That holds true regardless of gender. I feel like some people get so caught up in the game they forget why they’re playing.
(In Sr. Weasel’s defense, kissing is a singular subjective sort of thing, I’ve just never been particularly shy about saying how I want things. I’ll admit I am more romantically assertive than the average female. I would rarely be interested in a guy, but if I were, well, he would know it. Many things I am, coy is not one of them.)
To add - I think that is one of the greatest tragedies of the PUA movement. It takes a very basic, human need for love, and twists and exploits it by creating even more distance between men and women than those men might have felt to begin with. It rubs salt into a wound and then posits itself as the cure. The leaders of these movements are emotional vampires capitalizing on the worst parts of human nature.
I don’t even know what you men mean when you are talking about “nice guys.” In my world, if a woman calls a man a “nice guy” that means she thinks he’s pleasant company but she, personally, isn’t sexually attracted to him. All that means is the guy needs to keep looking because somewhere there is a woman who will be. Since, you know, women aren’t all the same.
From your various comments, I suspect many of you mean the exact opposite of a nice guy. You mean the men who scare women by having the following traits: 1. You don’t think women are just people, as in, all different with different desires, needs, and quirks; 2. Consequently, you view women as some kind of desirable but strange thing; 3. You think if you do x, y, and z, women are obligated to have sex with you; and 4. You go around blaming women for things that are your fault. I’ve met quite a few men like this, and most women feel uncomfortable around them, probably because they are potential abusers, which is why they get turned down.
If you’re an actual nice guy, you can easily improve your sexual attractiveness by going to the gym and getting fit (fit, nicely muscled guys are always more attractive), getting a better haircut, and investing in some stylish clothing that actually fits. If you’re rather awkward, try taking some acting classes so you can at least pretend to be confident.
If you’re one of the latter, well, good luck to you, none of that will help.
Who knows? It’s believable that he’s serious, since an actual well-known PUA has said that the only reason he wipes his ass, blows his nose, or cleans eye gunk in the morning is that women won’t sleep with him unless he does. I’m not making this up, here are his own words about it: http://www.rooshv.com/men-must-groom-more-than-cats-to-get-laid
And here’s an article mocking this and some other posts by him (which also shows it’s a pattern, not just a one-off joke or misinterpretation):
We’re talking about the guys who call themselves “Nice Guys” but, well, aren’t. The term is in quotes in the title, that wasn’t an accident by the OP. Here’s a simple article explaining the term http://www.shakesville.com/2007/12/explainer-what-is-nice-guy.html and a page with links to some more ranty articles on the topic http://www.heartless-bitches.com/rants/niceguys/ng.shtml
I think this is badly misguided advice. People love to say ‘hit the gym’, and it’s not a bad idea to do it for health reasons, but it isn’t going to fix anything for dating, and doesn’t have much of anything to do with dating or hooking up. Same thing with stylish clothes and hairstyle - beyond ‘reasonably clean and fits decently’ it’s not going to make a real difference. Yes, in some social circles you need to be super-fit and hit style trends to be taken seriously, but you’re also going to need to go to events and actually talk to women, which going to the gym and changing clothes won’t help with. I mean, I date women younger than my last major change in style for hair or clothing, and I’m pretty obviously not a gym rat.
Well, the thread was debated rather cleanly and fairly for several pages before deteriorating.
He brushed his teeth “at least once in the past week”? Good lord.
I can’t even think about this rest of the list.
Some women do like jerks. Some men also like jerks. Some people are jerks, and most jerks have people who like, or even love, them.
Of course, when someone says that “women like jerks” apart from a few “outliers,” well that person is saying that most married/involved men are jerks. It’s insulting both to men and to women.
My husband is one of the nicest, best men I’ve ever met. Most men are good people, not jerks. Most women are good people, not jerks. Most people are in long term relationships with non-jerks.