Dating advice for "creeps" who don't want to be creepy any more.

You don't actually need to wear goggles.

So the other day we were talking here about how to have the hot sexes with someone who wants to have the hot sexes with you also. Lots of good advice in that thread, but none of it is very useful to guys sitting around at home with no one but Pamela Handerson willing to climb into bed with them. So how exactly does one find a special someone to have the sexes with  – especially if you’re one of those horny, socially awkward guys who tends to get labeled a “creep?

Well, wonder no more, because two of my favorite bloggers have some advice for you:

In a post on the Good Men Project Magazine, Clarisse Thorn sifts through the sexist garbage that permeates virtually all Pick-Up Artist (PUA) websites in search of some decent, ethical advice that can help socially awkward guys connect with women. As she puts it:

the current pickup artist subculture has a monopoly on effective advice for how to break down social interactions and talk to women. Not all of it works, but enough of it works that it draws guys in. As a pickup artist instructor once told me, “When I first found the community I was horrified by how sleazy and gross it is, but I had never had a girlfriend, and I told myself, ‘Dude, if you don’t learn this stuff you’re gonna die alone.’” 

I wouldn’t go so far as saying  that PUAs have a “monopoly” on good advice, but there are aspects of the basic PUA approach that do make sense, and do work. To oversimplify a bit, the PUA approach encourages men to do something that women have been doing for centuries if not millennia: playing hard to get. Yep, guys who don’t come across as desperate and clingy tend to do better with the ladies than guys who do. That one basic insight is worth a lot more than an e-book-full of idiotic “openers,” not to mention the sleazy sort of date-rapey shit that self-described PUAs like the gun-happy Gunwitchpreach. 

In any case, after offering a critique of some of the most obvious issues she has with PUAs, Clarisse links to a bunch of sites that she thinks can be genuinely helpful to awkward guys. Check it out.

Meanwhile, also on the Good Men Project, Amanda Marcotte – who is far less forgiving of PUAs than Clarisse -- offers some specific advice for "self-described “nice guys” who claim they want non-sexist dating advice that works, but are forced to look to PUAs because there is no one else speaking to them. "

Her first tip is golden: Dudes, if you want to score with a hot slut, stop thinking of women who enjoy sex as sluts. Or, as she puts it:

Be generous about women’s motivations. 

PUA communities spend a lot of time disparaging women with words like “shallow,” “gold-digger,” and “childish,” for having what they deem to be incorrect desires. But often, women’s choices make much more sense if you assume women date for fun and companionship, just as men do. If you don’t judge men for wanting sexiness, fun, and ego-boosting from women, then don’t judge women for wanting the same. 

For the rest of her advice, see here. 

On a completely unrelated topic: Are any of you having trouble posting comments here? If so, check your settings and make sure you’re allowing cookies from Blogger. If that doesn’t work, and you still have problems, send me an email. (See my profile for an email link.) Thanks!

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*Yes, that was a Bioshock reference.

The Low Spark of High Heeled Boys

I'm walkin' here!

Pierce Harlan of the False Rape Society has broken past the limits of mere logic, arguing that the fact that a small number of guys at a couple of events have put on women's clothing to raise money for women's causes means that rape culture doesn't exist. That seems to be the main message of a post of his today with the baffling title "Boys in bras, boys in heels, boys in pink -- all to raise money for women's causes: Is this the 'rape culture' we hear so much about?"

Harlan, posting as "Archivist," complains about several recent campus events, in which college guys have literally put on heels (to raise money and awareness about sexual assault) and bras (to raise money for breast cancer research). Harlan isn't thrilled about the causes themselves: he has sneeringly derided sexual assault awareness as "a supposedly good cause" and, while acknowledging that breast cancer research is theoretically a good thing, he's evidently tired of hearing about it.

But he seems even more hot and bothered about the cross-dressing by guys he calls "chivalrous clowns," describing the bra-wearing as "creepy" and deriding the guys "prancing around in high heels." Apparently, as Harlan sees it, these fellows are just doing it to impress the chicks:

young men will do pretty much anything to help, to curry favor with, and to be admired by young women.

It is heinous to suggest that attitudes of sexual aggression and dominance over women are normalized, rationalized, and excused by the alleged beneficiaries of "patriarchy" in our culture. In point of fact, the foolish young buffoons in heels and bras are far more representative of young masculinity in our culture than is the young rapist. 

There's not a lot of logic in this, er, argument, but in an earlier posting Harlan elaborates on the distaste he feels towards the "Walk A Mile In Her Shoes" event, which was held at the University of Montana (clearly a hotbed of radical feminism). 

It would be downright shocking if this or similar events ever prevented a single sexual assault from occurring because: (1) prancing around in high heels and similar useless stunts has nothing to do with preventing sexual assault; and (2) the vast majority of young men who strutted their stuff and who participate in such events are highly unlikely to ever rape a woman.  ...

If we want to curb sexual assault, we need to teach our young people the truth, but the truth doesn't jibe with the current rape meta-narrative that holds only one gender responsible for stopping it. ...

Young people generally do not understand that women experience much greater after-the-fact regret than men do. Sometimes feelings of regret are translated into feelings of "being used," and sometimes feelings of "being used" are misinterpreted or purposefully misconstrued as "rape."

Asking the police, a judge, or a jury to sort out what happened in an alcohol-fueled tryst based on a "he said/she said" account puts an impossible burden on our law enforcement and judicial apparatuses. ...

There is no "rape culture"; there is no "rape continuum."  Rape is committed by social deviants, not the nice boy next door. It is almost a certainty that none of the charming young buffoons who strutted around in women's heels yesterday will ever rape a woman. ...

The sad, politically incorrect fact of the matter is that young women have far more power to stop rape than innocent young men by not putting themselves in situations where rape is more likely to occur. 

There's a lot of bullshit condensed into these short paragraphs. There's victim-blaming, of course: do we regularly attack murder victims for "putting themselves in situations where murder is likely to occur?" There's his weird complaint that actually investigating and prosecuting date rape puts an "impossible burden" on police and the judicial system: should we simply stop enforcing laws against all crimes that are hard to investigate or prosecute? And there's his unwillingness to accept the simple fact that rapists all too often do look exactly like the "nice boy next door." As for his complaint that these events target the wrong people, see here for an argument as to why it makes sense to raise awareness specifically amongst those men who are NOT likely to rape women. 

In the past a few MRAs have asked me why I put the False Rape Society blog in my "boob roll" -- and formerly in my "enemies list." This is why. Spreading blatant misinformation and blaming victims: these are not exactly good ways to actually reduce the number of men falsely accused of rape.

And here's another thought for the MRAs reading this, Harlan included: if you are truly as concerned about testicular or prostate cancer -- or any other male malady -- as you so often and so loudly claim to be, take a few moments away from your constant complaining about feminism and/or women, and actually hold a fund raiser yourselves. In a comment on his latest post, Harlan writes: "My problem is this: how about an event to raise funds for male suicide, etc. once in a while?" You know how events like these happen? PEOPLE ORGANIZE THEM. There is nothing stopping MRAs from organizing such an event on their own. How about it, guys? 

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*Yes, that was a Bioshock reference.

The Giffords shooting: Misogyny has consequences

Reason #1538 it's not such a good idea to spend time online nursing your resentments towards the opposite sex because no one from that sex seems to want to have sex with you: Because that kind of, sort of, makes you a little bit like Jared Loughner.

The Wall Street Journal managed to track down what are apparently some comments Loughner made on a gaming site; they're full of his usual conspiratorial nonsense (his lunatic theories on grammar and currency) but they're also, as the Journal notes, "peppered with displays of misogyny." One posting

titled "Why Rape," ... said women in college enjoyed being raped. "There are Rape victims that are under the influence of a substance. The drinking is leading them to rape. The loneliness will bring you to depression. Being alone for a very long time will inevitably lead you to rape."

This is the dark side of the "incel" mindset. (That is, those who turn their "involuntarily celibate" state into an identity.)

Another time, the Journal reports, Loughner

started a thread titled "Talk, Talk, Talking about Rejection." He solicited stories of rejection by the opposite sex. The next day he wrote, "Its funny...when..they say lets go on a date about 3 times..and they dont....go..." Three days later, he wrote, "Its funny when your 60 wondering......what happen at 21."

There is other evidence that Loughner nursed anger towards and hatred of women and authority figures: he apparently scrawled the phrases "die bitch" and "die cops" on a letter he'd gotten from congresswoman Giffords.

As Amanda Marcotte points out, there are a lot of people out there who've responded with anger at the very notion "that misogyny might play a role in the choice of a young man to shoot a powerful woman in the head ... ."

But the fact is that misogyny has consequences, and one of its most common and most predictable consequences is violence towards women. Misogyny plays a role, as Marcotte notes, even when the perpetrator of this violence is "crazy."

What I’m seeing here is that Loughner, mental illness or no, completely absorbed society’s teachings about male entitlement and female sinfulness, that men have a right to have needs filled at women’s expense, and that women give up their rights to bodily autonomy if they do things deemed unladylike, like have sex or drink alcohol.

And just as those who spew hateful political rhetoric -- filled with talk of guns and targets and "second amendment solutions" to political "problems" -- shouldn't be surprised when someone takes that rhetoric seriously, so those who spew misogyny online shouldn't be surprised when someone acts on that misogyny and attacks a woman. As Marcotte puts it,

just because someone has a mental illness rarely means that he’s completely unaware of the world around him.  Loughner’s ability with a gun or his thoughts on rape didn’t spring fully formed from his brain, but are the product of an individual interacting with a specific environment.

Those who contribute to that toxic environment -- whether they're Sarah Palin talking about "reloading" or some random woman-hater talking gleefully online about bashing "bitches" -- share in the responsibility when someone pulls a gun and shoots down a female politician he's convinced himself is a "bitch." 

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*Yes, that was a Bioshock reference.

Gunwitch Update

From the Gunwitch,com forums

Some updates on the Gunwitch story. (Here's my original post on the subject, "Gun-loving pick-up guru allegedly shoots a woman in the face.")

The woman he (allegedly) shot is apparently doing surprisingly well. The most recent news story on the incident I've found -- posted on the 6th -- says she was about to be released from the hospital:

April Lagasse, the mother of 20-year-old Amber Tripp, who was shot in the face with a .357 caliber handgun on New Year’s Eve, says her daughter has “recovered miraculously.”

Tripp, who was initially treated at Sky Lakes Medical Center in Klamath Falls before being air lifted to Oregon Health Sciences University in Portland, underwent surgery Wednesday and is scheduled to be released and return to Klamath Falls Thursday.

On what is evidently her Myspace page, the status update now reads: "Hello wonderful world i got shot and im still sexy."
 
Meanwhile, on Gunwitch's message board, someone claiming to be Amber Tripp's sister has posted her account of the incident:

Hello my name is Meagan Tripp. My sister is Amber Tripp , the young women that wS shoot in the face on News Years Eve. It is a pure mircale that she is alive. Allen Ryese shot my sister in the face after he had been grabbing and touching her inapporite and my sister pulled her knife out and told him to leave her alone. My sister then put her knife away and went into a bedroom for about fifteen minutes. When my sister came out of the room Allen walked up to her and shot her in the face with a 357 magnum . The bullet that came out of the chamber was the only 38 bullet in the gun. The other two bullets were 357 s. This man had plenty of time to decide to shot her or not. This awful evil man deserves to rot in prison

Later, in response to some of those who responded to her, she added:

My sister is alive. No I personally was not at his brothers house when it happened. I did not know Allen personally but yes I do recognize him and his name. No it was not drug related and yes he shot her in the face point blank .

One of the regulars on the board responded to her original comment with this "hilarious" remark:

Post pics of her face w/ timestamp

boobs optional

Another posted:

honestly, she was pulling a knife on him. It wasn't going to change her oppinion to show her his gun after shit like that. Not even sexual state would have helped him there.

Still another:

Self defence against meth-addict crackwhore!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

And one more:

I like that it was in the face. Super disrespectful.

Some discussions of the case on other message boards:

PuaHate

Personal Development for Smart People Forums

BorisPoker.com

Sample comment from the latter:

to be fair to him though, shooting a bitch in the face is a pretty solid neg

Some blogs that have posted about the shooting:

On Feminist Critics, Hugh Ristik discusses some of the reactions to the incident, and critiques feminists (including some commenters here) for generalizing about PUAs. He ends with this:

Gunwitch, if you really shot an unarmed woman, then fuck you. Fuck you for putting a bullet in a woman’s face. Fuck you for fueling many women’s fears about male sexuality. Fuck you for contributing to a stigma against harmless guys who are trying to study pickup to improve themselves.

As for the small subset of PUAs or MRAs who are making excuses for Gunwitch, and the feminists who are trying to paint Gunwitch and the people excusing him as representative of PUAs, or of men? Stop, just stop.

Max on FKIN, a PUA blog, offers a blunt assessment of Gunwitch:

He embodies all of the worst traits of the seduction community.  I sincerely hope he rots in prison for the rest of his natural life.

On Love Letters in Hell, Amanda talks about the creepy, date-rapey aspects of his technique.

On Love Bites, Clarisse Thorn expresses her ambivalence towards the PUA subculture and her disgust with Gunwitch:

The diverse pickup subculture freaks me out a lot of the time, and frankly I’ve had hours of pickup artist research where I have read what these men have to say and felt like I wanted to take a vow of chastity rather than ever risk having sex with one of them, ever. ... I think there’s good in the subculture. ... But, damn. News like this is awfully hard to stomach.

You said it.


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Gun-loving pick-up guru allegedly shoots a woman in the face

Actual logo for Gunwitch's "The Way of Gun"

A creepy, gun-loving pick-up artist (PUA) guru whose "technique" for charming the ladies is just one small step away from actual date rape has been arrested for allegedly shooting a woman in the face. 

And, no I'm not making this up. Allen Reyes, known in the "seduction community" as Gunwitch because of his love of guns, apparently got into an argument with a 20-year-old woman at a party in his hometown of Klameth Falls, Oregon. This woman is now (at least according to the latest news report I have managed to find) in critical condition at a local hospital with gunshot wounds to the face. (See here for more details, and here for Jezebel's take on the subject.)

The man known as Gunwitch, arrested Monday, is apparently quite gun-obsessed. On his website, he notes that he's "an avid hand gunner." One of his PUA audio tapes is called "The Way of Gun" and -- especially creepy in light of the charges he faces, the logo he chose for it features an actual gun and, well, see the picture at top right.

Gunwitch has never been what anyone would call a "nice guy." His slogan? "Get laid, not liked."

Unlike many seduction gurus, Gunwitch doesn't recommend a lot of gimmicks or clever opening lines or subtle techniques of manipulation. His "technique" is simplicitly itself: lurk around in  places where lone women tend to congregate, and when you see a woman who makes you horny, don't wait for your boner to go away, just get into a "dominant" frame of mind and start pestering her. Then, if she shows anything that looks like interest, ISOLATE her and work your magic. If she doesn't seem interested, don't give up, keep pestering her until she gives in or bluntly rejects you.

He goes through his technique in more detail on his web site. Let's look at some, er, highlights.

So where's a good place to meet the ladies? Aside from the old standbys -- coffee houses, the gym -- Gunwitch recommends lurking around the magazine racks:

I like the magazine racks at dept stores, where I can stand there and wait 'til some Cosmo magazine reading hottie comes into what feels to her like your space, and feels like she's approaching, then boom I'm on it "so what ya reading?"

Learn a thing or two from someone who knew how to get the ladies "isolated" quickly: Ted Bundy:

ANYWHERE you see them you must imagine having sex with her, visualize it, feel the desire and lust. ALWAYS do this as soon as you see a woman you find attractive and eventually the state you will go into when seeing a woman will be one of -sexual- state, rather than panic or fear of meeting her. This makes approaching random lone women easier. Ted Bundy, the infamous serial killer/sociopath didn't feel fear or panic when he saw a target. He felt rage, sexual perversion and desire to kill, hence NO fear to approach them, of course wanting to have sex isn't the same thing, but its still more effective than feeling fear or confusion about your desires and direction.

Don't worry about invading her personal space. In fact, make sure you do:

Since you aren't gonna be seductive or sensual standing 2 feet away from her, you need to be within 6-8 inches of her.

Even though you've just met her, don't be afraid to start groping her:

Touch her. Since touch is the first step in getting her comfortable with you as a sexual creature, you want to sneak this in slowly. A good progression is: hands, arms, lowers back, upper back, face (while whispering something to her) and hair, then thighs (hand placed but relatively stationary), and upper legs.

Don't take no for an answer unless she really really means it:

I commonly get snubbed, the cold shoulder ... or overall rejected with the women I have sex with right away, but I just persist and eventually things take a turn. 

And remember, get her alone as quickly as possible:

ISOLATE. You cannot have sex with women in public or in front of people with any consistency. If that's your bag, try it with women you are already in a relationship with. You have to get her alone with you. ANY opportunity to isolate BEFORE going into sexual state should be taken as well of course.

If she's with friends, stalk her like a panther stalks his prey until she is alone:

At a bar, when you see a group and want one of them, WAIT for her to leave the herd, wait for her to be coming out of the bathroom (not IN as she may have to piss bad), wait for her to go to the bar to get a drink, wait for her to be ALONE to approach, and then try to keep her from her friends.

And don't give up:

Of course if a girl NEVER goes into sexual state for a long period of time, you just try to isolate her anyway and "make the ho say no". NEVER eject. Always either get either a lay, or a rejection.

Did I mention that you shouldn't give up? If you're making out with her and she doesn't want sex, just keep pressuring her until she says yes:

[S]ometimes, she'll say "I don't know you enough" ect. When this happens don't get mad or upset ect. Just say, "I understand" or "ok, this is nice though huh?" then go back to necking and making out. Eventually go back in for the sex, if happens again say "I understand" and go back in for more kissing and making out, and repeat until it goes through. Hell even if she never gets ready, what have you got better to do than make out with some hot little number? You've got no real "make the ho say no" style of getting a close or getting a rejection to work with at this point, as she already has said no but MAY change her mind.

Just remember not to actually rape her:

DO NOT struggle or tug or bear weight on her at this stage, as that is considered rape. Use persistence not force, and you'll be ok.

 Somehow I don't have a lot of trouble thinking that the allegations against him might just possibly be true.

On the discussion forum for his "Witching Hour" podcast, though, while many of his fans seem genuinely shocked by what has happened, at least some of are defending him, or otherwise making light of the shooting.

One started a topic called "Shoot to Kill," and declared "Thats my man."

Another chimed in with a little ditty:

Shoot to kill, Klamath Hills
too many podcasts and too many pills yeah!
Shoot to thrill, pickup skills
Jerkin off to Barry Kirkey gonna fire at will

(Barry Kirkey is another PUA guru who has done podcasts with Gunwitch.)

Still another offered this take:

Im sure Gun has a perfectly good reason for shooting that girl in the face

This last comment struck some on the message board as utterlly hilarious.

I'll update this, or perhaps do more posts, as the story develops.

Big thanks to the Man Boobz reader who alerted me to this story.

Flash Mob

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Consent. It's so ... American.

Hey ladies!

Sex is so confusing. Take the whole notion of "consent." How are you, as a dude,  supposed to keep track of whether or not, say, a woman has actually consented to sex with you? I mean, are you supposed to ask? If she says "no," how do we know she's really saying "no?" Maybe she's saying "know," as in, why don't you "know me" in the Biblical sense? Like I said, it's very confusing. 

Apparently things are a lot simpler in France, at least according to this dude on Jezebel. In France, apparently, if you happen to espy a comely mademoiselle, you can just start groping her:

At the clubs in the 8ème, off the Champs-Élysées, and all along Rue de Rivoli, it is fairly common to watch men literally grab and touch the girls who weave through the crowd. Men often draw a finger down an unknown girl's cheek or under her chin like a doting Uncle; they can be seen pinching girls' noses, throwing arms around shoulders and even stealing kisses.

And according to this dude, whom no one's ever heard of, the French ladies love it, just love it!

Parisian women deny or accept these advances with a decisiveness many American women lack. Naturally, some girls in Paris walk away and reject these strong come-ons. But one can observe many of them reacting with knowing laughter; these women understand the game. ...

Parisian women seem to derive a feminist power from this chauvinism that makes them come across as strong, self-determining, and completely aware of themselves as permanent objects of desire. And drunk or sober, it seems Parisian women get exactly what they want while their men, if rejected, are left to hammer doggedly away at other targets.

That sounds about right. I mean, what woman doesn't want strange men hammering doggedly away at them all hours of the day every time they step outside?

It's all very sophisticated. Very Continental. Heck, it's very The Continental.

Anyway, so apparently some feminist bloggers are, you know, griping away, like the ladies do, that Jezebel, ostensibly a feminist-ish blog, would run such a thing. Ladies, come on! What are you, prudes? Americans? Men who read this dude's piece may lighten up a bit and start acting a lot more French. Who are you to deny the women of America the chance to have strange men, with questionable personal hygiene and an extensive knowledge of cheeses, running their fingers down their cheeks?

Note: This post contains sarcasm.