# The Pick-Up Artist movement is a scam **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [January 27, 2013, 6:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-pick-up-artist-movement-is-a-scam/648543 "2013-01-27T18:31:46Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 7
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2013, 4:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-pick-up-artist-movement-is-a-scam/648543/121 "2013-01-28T16:24:21Z")
> [@Troppus](#): > > Who is taking it seriously? . The OP seemed pretty worked up over somethat that I thought was a fad like 5 years ago. > [@Nzinga\_Seated](#): > > Oh, is that what they’re selling…teaching men to be ‘comfortable’ around women? Or are they pretending to have all kinds of tricks to turn painfully shy awkward men into Lotharios. > I’m not like, “OMG! Nerds are learning wimmin magic!” I’m more like, “Yeah, so the PUA market is a scam.” A pretty salesgirl like you should know the difference between “the truth”:dubious: and “the truth!”😃 > [@Troppus](#): > > And somehow I still doubt you or a gang of PUA is a better judge of what she wants than she is. Oh I know what she wants.🆒 I think you don’t understand how sales, or scams, or manipulation in general works. People always say “I never…I wouldn’t…blah blah blah” But if you can create an emotional connection to something, that can override logic and reason and lead people to make decisions they otherwise might consider foolish. And no matter how “together” someone appears, everyone has certain fears or desires that can be played upon. Often especially those people who appear the most together. ---
**Author:** ![even\_sven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/dfb087/32.png) [@even\_sven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/even_sven)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2013, 4:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-pick-up-artist-movement-is-a-scam/648543/122 "2013-01-28T16:29:59Z")
I think the negativity and misogyny actually does serve a useful purpose. I’d rather see this being done without it, of course. But I understand why it works. In my experience, romantically challenged guys tend to start regarding attractive women as unapproachable creatures, removed from the realm of ordinary humans.This psyches them out, and undoubtedly makes their interactions weird and awkward. The misogyny serves to make attractive women seem a little more human, and a little more flawed, and thus more approachable. Living up to some perfect ideal a guy has made up in his head without even knowing you is also not fun for a woman to deal with. If you’ve gone out to a club hoping to hook up with someone, you don’t want to be the subject of some dudes elaborate love fantasy he’s already planned down to the minute in his head. I think the misogyny also helps some guys be realistic about what they are going to get out of picking up girls at a bar. While you might meet your dream princess-wife-bunny, in reality you are probably going to find a cute-ish girl to hook up with for a bit. The misogyny helps guys take their expectations way down, and realize that they can still have fun with a less-than-perfect woman in a casual arrangement. Likewise, I think a lot of romantically unsuccessful guys just have trouble imagining the normal, attractive, decent women actually are sometimes looking for a casual partner. Men sometimes think that women have magic sex lives, where wonderful men are constantly throwing themselves at our feet as we gleefully choose among the rich and handsome ones. They find it hard to believe that we are not necessarily looking for a walking wallet, and often we would be receptive to an ordinary guy who’s engaging and funny but otherwise unremarkable. Maybe the need to feel like they are “tricking” us into sleeping with them, as that’s the only way it reconciles in their head. Anyway, for most people, experience tends to eventually fill in the gaps. If you meet and have fun with enough less-than-perfect women, eventually you start realizing that there is more to a good partner than chasing superficial physical perfection. Even if you have to use negativity to get up the guts to talk to a woman, eventually you are probably going to realize they are neither goddesses nor monsters, but just people like anyone else. I’ve somehow managed to meet a lot of these guys as friends, and eventually they get frustrated that they get lots of tail, but nothing ever seems to bud into a deeper relationship. I think most guys eventually get bored of it and move on, the way most guys without a system eventually get bored of single life. Some stick too it, of course, but skeezy middle-agesters are hardly a new phenomena. ---
**Author:** ![Trom](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/958977/32.png) [@Trom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trom)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2013, 4:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-pick-up-artist-movement-is-a-scam/648543/123 "2013-01-28T16:54:55Z")
I think there’s a general impression that PUAs are misogynistic, meathead, frat boys that sleep with a different girl every night and brag about it to their bros while chugging Natty Light between fist bumps. I actually made it halfway through The Game before losing interest. I was surprised to learn that the target market for PUA “instructors” was the introverted, awkward guy playing World of Warcraft - not the confident, cocky quarterback. Everyone knows men that are naturally good with women. All the PUA guys seem to be doing is mechanically breaking down what guys that are good with women do without thinking about it. Make eye contact. Present yourself well. Be assertive. Be playful. It’s not exactly rocket science. Clueless guys aggressively “negging” people is a salient example, but I don’t think that it’s necessarily an accurate portrayal of what most PUAs are about. I think the ideal is to become indistinguishable from the guy that is just naturally good in social situations. ---
**Author:** ![VinylTurnip](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/b2d939/32.png) [@VinylTurnip](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/VinylTurnip)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2013, 6:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-pick-up-artist-movement-is-a-scam/648543/124 "2013-01-28T18:03:53Z")
> [@Troppus](#): > > And somehow I still doubt you or a gang of PUA is a better judge of what she wants than she is. Your mouth says no, baby, but your eyes say yes! Nice eyes, by the way. I think cross-eyed chicks are hot. Especially with your kind of face. Symmetry is so _boring_. Hey, leaving so soon? ---
**Author:** ![OurLordPeace](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/e8c25b/32.png) [@OurLordPeace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OurLordPeace)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2013, 8:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-pick-up-artist-movement-is-a-scam/648543/125 "2013-01-28T20:16:35Z")
> [@puddleglum](#): > > There seems to be a natural tendency on the part of young males to resent those who have power over them. In the dating world this leads to a lot of misogyny that is present in PUA circles. Also since only young men who are socially awkward would need this kind of training there is going to be alot of rejection at first. Having techniques means that this rejection can be explained with “my technique needs work” and not “I am a loser who will die alone”. > Social awkwardness can be a downward cycle. Awkwardness leads to rejection, rejection leads to low self image, which leads to isolation, which leads to more awkwardness. > PUA techniques are focused on the women but to the extent they work is how the change the man. Since all PUA artists are young men it should be unsurprising that they are focused on sex rather than meaningful relationships since that is what interests young men. > Also the nature of the internet is such that an ad that says “Learn to bed any woman you want with mind control techniques” is going to be clicked on more than an ad that says “Improve your odds of finding a girlfriend by learning how to be less awkward”. As a salesman I am sure the OP understands about using hype to draw in customers. I was reading the first part of this message, and, not having read the entire thread, I was relieved to see somebody mention that shyness is not necessarily the problem. One can have no hesitation/fear about talking to any woman, even asking her out (or anything like that) and still get rejected immediately, or after the first or second date. Rejection does lead to feeling unappealing, and so on. Losing my youth to dysthymia accounts for a lot of the rejection, but it also made the sadness worse. But then I read the rest of the post, and it made me wonder… I mean, in my late teens, once I finally fessed up to being heterosexual rather than my desired asexuality, all I wanted was a meaningful relationship. I wanted someone to hold me and take away my sadness, and vice-versa. That seemed to be what all my favorite musicians were singing/playing about, and I identified. In my sophomore year of university, I had a conversation with a friend, in which I said that I was reluctant to ask out a classmate, since I knew she would soon study abroad for a long time. His response was immediate and vociferous: “Oh, what do you want to do, OurLordPeace, get married?!?” I was speechless. I didn’t want to technically get married, but I sort of assumed that all of us classy people were after life-partners ASAP. I mention all of this because people have recommended PUA materials to me every once in a while, but I really don’t care for it. I think the stuff about body language and conversation might be handy, but I don’t like the idea of trying to trick women, even if I’ve been desperate enough to try. It seems so phony. And besides, I still can’t fathom how people date (or anything comparable) without getting to know one another first. There are some deal-breakers (or deal-makers) that determine a person’s morality, and wouldn’t anyone want those out of the way first? Forget shyness… what do you do if you’re terribly unattractive, or just awkward in other ways? ---
**Author:** ![TokyoBayer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tokyobayer/32/13989_2.png) [@TokyoBayer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TokyoBayer)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2013, 9:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-pick-up-artist-movement-is-a-scam/648543/126 "2013-01-28T21:22:32Z")
> [@Troppus](#): > > And somehow I still doubt you or a gang of PUA is a better judge of what she wants than she is. Salespeople should never take training or listen to advice from other salespeople, because no one can ever help them understand what their customers wants better than the customer, right? It’s also pretty stupid for women to talk to their friends about guys as well, right? Everyone should have that ability to be keen observers of human nature and instinctively understand what others want and need. I’m only away of the PUA move from threads here on the Dope, as there isn’t a Japanese version, but my guess is that it doesn’t cover long term relationships and how to handle differences in parenting styles. It’s for meeting people and getting them to be interested in you enough to go on a date. Not everyone is born with the ability to recognize if others are interested or not. Not everyone is a natural salesman. But, there are things you can learn which can help you. The best salesperson in the world can’t sell anything to everyone, so the claims are over the top, but no one is disagreeing with that, here. Getting advice on how to talk to people in bars does help. ---
**Author:** ![pancakes3](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ba9def/32.png) [@pancakes3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pancakes3)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2013, 9:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-pick-up-artist-movement-is-a-scam/648543/127 "2013-01-28T21:28:31Z")
Trom beat me to the punch, but I’ll echo it all the same. The PUA movement isn’t so much a bunch of scammers setting out to make big bucks but rather a fringe online community growing organically to the point where they’ve deluded themselves to be so convincing that they in turn delude more lonely guys, snowballing in what we see today. Pick up artists truly believe they possess tools, skills, and methods that can turn any guy into a cassanova when really it relies heavily on confirmation bias. Plus, it doesn’t hurt that they’ve codified it, even if there are different schools of thought. The book “The Game” however isn’t so much a group of these rules but really the journey of a lonely journalist who set out to write a piece and gets sucked into this seedy world of pick and he writes an entire damned book out of the experience. There’s no way you could put pick-up rules in a whole book. They probably can only fill up a pamphlet. ---
**Author:** ![treis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bc79bd/32.png) [@treis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/treis)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2013, 10:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-pick-up-artist-movement-is-a-scam/648543/128 "2013-01-28T22:54:39Z")
> [@Nzinga\_Seated](#): > > Ok, I get you. > > I shouldn’t say that social skills can’t be learned, though. They can. But by sheer practice. No one has to be duped out of their hard earned dollars for that. If something can be learned, then surely it can be taught. Just thinking about picking up a girl at a bar, I can identify many problems/hurdles/necessary skills. A brief list: (1) Identifying a girl (2) Separating her from her friends (3) Initial contact (4) Gauging interest (5) Having a decent conversation (6) Closing the deal Generally speaking most men pick up some semblance of these skills through practice and life experience. But if they don’t, why exactly can’t it be taught? If you don’t have any skills picking up women, someone who does telling you “Try X, Y, and Z it might work but don’t do A, B, and C because it won’t” is helpful. It’s no different than swimming or cooking or any other life skill that seems basic to people. It seems easy to us because we know how to do it, but if you didn’t then it wouldn’t seem quite so obvious. So there’s nothing inherent about PUA that makes it a scam. Whether or not their advice is good or worth the money, I have no idea. ---
**Author:** ![Lamia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Lamia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lamia)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2013, 11:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-pick-up-artist-movement-is-a-scam/648543/129 "2013-01-28T23:47:51Z")
> [@Nzinga\_Seated](#): > > You know, maybe it’s because I don’t get a lot of men hitting on me (and the ones that do, I actually welcome the attention) but I don’t have a lot of sympathy for women who have to put up with guys trying to game them. If a guy tried to game me, I would do one of two things…either get gamed and like it, or peep game and shut the whole shit down. I’m not a victim. Good for you, but my sympathy would still be with you in that situation and not with the creep who kept bothering you. Because he _would_ keep bothering you, at least if he’s following the Mystery Method and has decided that you’re the lady who’s going to be the next notch on his headboard. Remember, the Mystery Method is billed as being effective on literally ANY woman, and that includes women who say “no”. For the thread I link to below I browsed through as much of Mystery’s book as I could stomach, and I learned that his method is, in a nutshell… …if you’re drinking a beverage right now you may want to put it down, because I think you’re going to get a big laugh out of this… …when a woman shows “defiance” the man should “punish” her to gain “compliance”. I use quote marks because those are the exact words he uses repeatedly throughout the book. Here is perhaps my favorite quote from a book that’s just full of gems: “People will also comply if there is a threat. A man with a gun gets more compliance than one with a hose. Of course a Venusian [pick-up] artist will never actually pull out a gun. But there are other ways to punish defiance.” (p. 148 of _The Mystery Method: How to Get Beautiful Women Into Bed_) I only know you from your SDMB posts, **Nzinga** , but based on that I figure that if a would-be pick-up artist kept bothering you after you told him to get lost then you’d have no trouble being “defiant” and telling him to get lost again, laughing in his face, summoning a bouncer, or whatever. For you, and I hope for most women, the unwanted pick-up attempt is probably no more than an annoyance. But if the question is who do I feel sorrier for, the man who pays money to learn how to be more annoying or the women he subsequently annoys, then my sympathies lie with the women. > [@Troppus](#): > > Who is taking it seriously? Those of us complaining find the whole poser scene to be amusing or at worst: annoying. It’s not extortion; it’s just another way to separate men from their money. PUAs aren’t rapists; but single women might want to be aware of the game. I’d be pretty sure that some of them (although I hope a very small percentage) are in fact rapists. The self-proclaimed pick-up artist we had around here a while back bragged that a pick-up artist could rape a woman but convince her that it wasn’t rape. (He did this in a [Great Debates thread about rape](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=608090), not even in a thread about pick-up artists. He was [Pitted](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=609845) and faded away soon afterward.) And as I’d pointed out in a thread on the [thread about the “Mystery Method”](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=495855) about a year and a half before that, _The Mystery Method: How to Get Beautiful Women Into Bed_ basically says that if a woman changes her mind about wanting to have sex then the man should just go ahead and rape her. ---
**Author:** ![Loach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/loach/32/350_2.png) [@Loach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loach)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2013, 12:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-pick-up-artist-movement-is-a-scam/648543/130 "2013-01-29T00:26:10Z")
Just wondering if this is really anything new. There were “How To Pick Up Women” books advertised in comic books at least as far back as the 60s. ---
**Author:** ![Gyrate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gyrate/32/3588_2.png) [@Gyrate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gyrate)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2013, 12:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-pick-up-artist-movement-is-a-scam/648543/131 "2013-01-29T00:55:57Z")
> [@Loach](#): > > Just wondering if this is really anything new. There were “How To Pick Up Women” books advertised in comic books at least as far back as the 60s. “Step 1: Kick sand in her puny boyfriend’s face…” ---
**Author:** ![Loach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/loach/32/350_2.png) [@Loach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loach)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2013, 1:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-pick-up-artist-movement-is-a-scam/648543/132 "2013-01-29T01:04:09Z")
> [@Blackberry](#): > > A guy once told me he didn’t usually like mudsharks but I seemed different. I wonder if he was purposely doing that or was just naturally a fucking idiot, but in any case it definitely did not work. > [@Gyrate](#): > > “Step 1: Kick sand in her puny boyfriend’s face…” Hold on a sec let me write this down. ---
**Author:** ![Troppus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/a587f6/32.png) [@Troppus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Troppus)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2013, 1:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-pick-up-artist-movement-is-a-scam/648543/133 "2013-01-29T01:09:16Z")
> [@Loach](#): > > Just wondering if this is really anything new. There were “How To Pick Up Women” books advertised in comic books at least as far back as the 60s. Probably not, except now the PUA bs is online for free. The proof that it could be worse than the comic book promises was in the thread that \*\*Lamia \*\*mentioned. **Lamia** , I remember that guy. I didn’t believe him, actually, I don’t believe much that any PUA advocate says. They read like a pyramid schemer; full of unrealistic promises and overblown claims to success. But those online PUA communities are saturated with blowhards and posers with little if any dissension, so they do sound like diciples. ---
**Author:** ![Jragon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e19b73/32.png) [@Jragon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jragon)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2013, 1:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-pick-up-artist-movement-is-a-scam/648543/134 "2013-01-29T01:19:30Z")
> [@Gyrate](#): > > “Step 1: Kick sand in her puny boyfriend’s face…” That’s ridiculous… The REAL way to pick up chicks is to [Be a Zebra!](http://dresdencodak.com/2006/03/23/be-a-zebra/) But seriously, is negging functionally different from “teasing”? Because I’ve gone and looked up tons of negs and they seem to be the exact same thing, and I’m left being rather confused about how this is in any way novel. The negs read exactly how my friends and I tease each other. ---
**Author:** ![Troppus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/a587f6/32.png) [@Troppus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Troppus)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2013, 1:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-pick-up-artist-movement-is-a-scam/648543/135 "2013-01-29T01:27:58Z")
> [@Jragon](#): > > That’s ridiculous… > > The REAL way to pick up chicks is to [Be a Zebra!](http://dresdencodak.com/2006/03/23/be-a-zebra/) > > But seriously, is negging functionally different from “teasing”? Because I’ve gone and looked up tons of negs and they seem to be the exact same thing, and I’m left being rather confused about how this is in any way novel. The negs read exactly how my friends and I tease each other. You already have a relationship with your friends and know to avoid any sensitive topics. Approaching someone you don’t know with a put-down is nasty, and requires the PUA to study his target and find defects to draw attention to. One is good natured, affectionate teasing, the other is mean and foul mannered. ---
**Author:** ![Lamia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Lamia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lamia)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2013, 1:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-pick-up-artist-movement-is-a-scam/648543/136 "2013-01-29T01:47:42Z")
> [@Troppus](#): > > **Lamia** , I remember that guy. I didn’t believe him, actually, I don’t believe much that any PUA advocate says. They read like a pyramid schemer; full of unrealistic promises and overblown claims to success. But those online PUA communities are saturated with blowhards and posers with little if any dissension, so they do sound like diciples. I think it’s pretty likely that **TheWhoToTheWhatNow** was a troll; what’s more troubling to me is that he had to go that far to get the board to turn on him. He’d been making ridiculous claims and generally being a total one-trick pony for a while and a number of posters seemed to think he was the coolest dude ever. > [@Jragon](#): > > But seriously, is negging functionally different from “teasing”? Because I’ve gone and looked up tons of negs and they seem to be the exact same thing, and I’m left being rather confused about how this is in any way novel. The negs read exactly how my friends and I tease each other. That depends. Do you tease your friends because you feel they’re being defiant and that you must punish them in order to cause them to comply with your wishes? ---
**Author:** ![Pine\_Fresh\_Scent](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/43a26b/32.png) [@Pine\_Fresh\_Scent](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pine_Fresh_Scent)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2013, 1:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-pick-up-artist-movement-is-a-scam/648543/137 "2013-01-29T01:55:39Z")
> [@pancakes3](#): > > The book “The Game” however isn’t so much a group of these rules but really the journey of a lonely journalist who set out to write a piece and gets sucked into this seedy world of pick and he writes an entire damned book out of the experience. There’s no way you could put pick-up rules in a whole book. They probably can only fill up a pamphlet. It also didn’t hurt that Courtney Love would hang out at their swingin’ bachelor pad. It’s like Steve Martin’s advice on how to become a millionaire: “First, get a million dollars.” A recently-divorced friend pestered me into buying that book to turn me into some kind of wingman. I’ve only thrown two books in the garbage vs. donating them after I was through. This was one of them. ---
**Author:** ![Jragon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e19b73/32.png) [@Jragon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jragon)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2013, 2:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-pick-up-artist-movement-is-a-scam/648543/138 "2013-01-29T02:01:42Z")
> [@Troppus](#): > > You already have a relationship with your friends and know to avoid any sensitive topics. Approaching someone you don’t know with a put-down is nasty, and requires the PUA to study his target and find defects to draw attention to. One is good natured, affectionate teasing, the other is mean and foul mannered. > [@Lamia](#): > > That depends. Do you tease your friends because you feel they’re being defiant and that you must punish them in order to cause them to comply with your wishes? So it’s a matter of intent? Okay, I suppose. (And Lamia, no, of course not. That’s what my Iron Maiden and the Catherine Wheel is for, silly) ---
**Author:** ![Troppus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/a587f6/32.png) [@Troppus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Troppus)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2013, 2:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-pick-up-artist-movement-is-a-scam/648543/139 "2013-01-29T02:06:37Z")
> [@OurLordPeace](#): > > Forget shyness… what do you do if you’re terribly unattractive, or just awkward in other ways? You become awesome, all by yourself first. You learn new things, find hobbies you love, join clubs, churches, or charitable organizations. Find a Toastmasters in your area. Talk to strangers, all of them. And listen, learn how to make small talk, learn how to find things to appreciate about others. Get out of your own head. Smile or say hi to passing strangers. Make yourself fun and interesting, treat self-improvement as you would any other hobby or project. ---
**Author:** ![Troppus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/a587f6/32.png) [@Troppus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Troppus)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2013, 2:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-pick-up-artist-movement-is-a-scam/648543/140 "2013-01-29T02:08:02Z")
> [@Jragon](#): > > So it’s a matter of intent? Okay, I suppose. > > (And Lamia, no, of course not. That’s what my Iron Maiden and the Catherine Wheel is for, silly) Yes, and it’s a matter of prudence. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-pick-up-artist-movement-is-a-scam/648543.md?page=6) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-pick-up-artist-movement-is-a-scam/648543.md?page=8)