Understanding Pick Up

[soos_mite_ah]

https://www.puatraining.com/

I read a few of the articles on here (didn't read the product review or guide, some of them are super weird tbh). Most of the advice is good / obvious (ie. basic social skills), some of it is a off, and sometimes the advice they have, even if it is good it's phrased and articulated in a really weird way that can carry regressive undertones. I've actually gotten a lot of the same advice as a woman as well so it's not like the advice is only for men even though it is marketed as such.  

And in general dating I notice that the best way to differentiate between conscious and unconscious sources is to evaluate what the source thinks is a desirable man/woman (lets just say the ideal you want to be). Another way is to see how they define a quality guy/girl (who is the best to pursue). If both of those things seem reasonable go forth, if it seems mostly reasonable , go with a grain of salt, and if it seems regressive and toxic af, run. 

 

Normally when I would think about pick up and how it is manipulative I mainly think of the contents of this article. Before me really looking into it and the different types of pick up, this was my initial intro to pickup: https://www.bustle.com/p/7-pickup-artist-techniques-to-look-out-for-15897579

[mmKay]

@soos_mite_ah  it's cool that you are putting real effort into understanding male struggles with dating and attraction .

Huge point I'd like to highlight though, is that in my opinion, all this logical analysis and research into " pick up "  won't make the cut for actually understanding the opposite sex.  Let me explain.

Theoreticall knowledge, while it may point out some important insights into your own female psychology and dynamics of attraction, it simply isn't enough and may lead you to all kinds of far  fetched ideas about male sexuallity. You would have to be a horny man and actually go out there and hit on women trying to get in their pants to REALLY understand this .

What you could do to have a more precise idea is feel into your own body in the social situations that you experience with men.

What I'm trying to say is that women have an inborn biologically masterful understanding of what a quality man is. You don't have this knowledge memorized anywhere, and you never had to learn it. It is kind of like a biological software that comes with being a girl.

You already know ALL OF THIS sh?t

The problem is that this wisdom is implicit, and for you to actually understand it, you must observe your own reactions and then decipher and analyze the reasons why you feel what you feel. Why you feel attracted in this situation, why you feel awkward in that situation, why you want to get away from a guy in that other situation, etc.

If you actually manage to analyze your own behaviour I'd be seriously surprised. That would take serious self awareness and self reflection.

Because,  THIS IS the way that men learn this sh1t. From YOU!!

We don't know what works. We may hear some advice from someone but we only internalize it once we have experienced it in real life in a real interaction, multiple times.

You give us feedback. CONSTANT FEED BACK. And if guy learn this, it's because they pick up on it to polish their social skills.

You "reward us" with sex and aprooval and validation for the good kind of behaviour  ( sense of humour, being emotionally stimulating,  being unreactive, being at ease with oneself, being congruent, being a source of validation etc ) 

And you "punish us" for the autistic simp behaviour : neediness, qualifying ourselves, being overly logic, seeking validation, etc.

 

TLDR : Have feeling into your body and natural reactions to their behaviour as your primary source of authority when it comes to sexuallity instead of trying to understand the dynamics logically. You may disect and analyze the reasons why you behaved such and such later.

If a guy makes you feel cringe, unsafe, uneasy and has a bad vibe, get away. It's okay. You are actually teaching him to stop being autistic and you are following your inner intuition of what a quality is. Two birds with one stone.

PD : most likely of all the times you get hit on, it's never a guy who practices real pick up and attraction. It's just dudes with boners trying to get laid somehow, and they just try whatever. The actual ammount of guys who practice pickup is minuscule.

[soos_mite_ah]

40 minutes ago, mmKay said:

You give us feedback. CONSTANT FEED BACK. And if guy learn this, it's because they pick up on it to polish their social skills.

You "reward us" with sex and aprooval and validation for the good kind of behaviour  ( sense of humour, being emotionally stimulating,  being unreactive, being at ease with oneself, being congruent, being a source of validation etc ) 

And you "punish us" for the autistic simp behaviour : neediness, qualifying ourselves, being overly logic, seeking validation, etc.

I mean yeah. I don't know what else to say except no shit that's what we find generally attractive (and I mean everyone has their specific type or flavor they are attracted to but yeah that is like the bare minimum). I guess I would add consistency and an understanding of basic women's issues in order to not be a dick and make a woman safe, having boundaries/ self respect to the reward category and overt aggression and manipulation (as in pushing boundaries) in the punishment category. 

40 minutes ago, mmKay said:

TLDR : Have feeling into your body and natural reactions to their behaviour as your primary source of authority when it comes to sexuallity instead of trying to understand the dynamics logically. You may disect and analyze the reasons why you behaved such and such later.

If a guy makes you feel cringe, unsafe, uneasy and has a bad vibe, get away. It's okay. You are actually teaching him to stop being autistic and you are following your inner intuition of what a quality is. Two birds with one stone.

Yeah I have been doing this since I was 15 in order to understand what I like and why other women act the way they do. Because I didn't have many opportunities to date for a variety of reasons, what I did to understand what I like in a guy (and I know this might be weird) is analyze guys that are around me, even if it is platonic, to see what qualities do I find attractive or not attractive. Also as I grew up and I started getting approached more, I noticed what things did or didn't make me uncomfortable in regards to a guy's demeanor. There are guys who have approached me who might not have been my type, or I just ended up not liking them for whatever reason but nevertheless I was comfortable with giving them a chance to go on a date because there weren't overt red flags or they didn't give me a weird gut feeling. I might not like a guy, but I know decent flirting and decent approaches when I see it. Also, girls talk about this shit to each other and we do it to analyze why we do what we did or what feeling came up to compare and contrast experiences but also process different situations. But the problem I find is that as soon as we identify those things and try to say something, we get shot down with "don't ask a fish how to catch one."

As far as bad gut reactions go, it's the stuff like negging, pretending who we need a guy to be, flirting with other people to make us jealous, etc. that gives a lot of women a bad vibe. And sometimes we can't put our finger on it, but we know something is off. The women who do fall for those things either tend to be naive or not as aware of the dynamics that are involved in a situation with a guy. It can also be a lack of intuition or a misstep in judgement tbh. Sometimes those can be a one off mistake but other times we ignore the signs in our gut and intuition because there is some type of trauma regarding self worth and we desperately want to hang on to a man. In other words, it isn't healthy. 

40 minutes ago, mmKay said:

What I'm trying to say is that women have an inborn biologically masterful understanding of what a quality man is. You don't have this knowledge memorized anywhere, and you never had to learn it. It is kind of like a biological software that comes with being a girl.

Maybe when it comes to first approach yeah. But in a lot of cases, especially in dating to get into a relationship, we don't have biologically masterful understanding of what a quality man is. A lot of it is socialization and what we were exposed to as children. For both men and women, we aren't attracted to what is necessarily healthy for us, we are attracted to what feels familiar because familiarity means safety. A woman who is constantly attracted to guys who are blatantly not good for her, treat her like shit, verbally (or hell sometimes) physically abuse her, typically grew up or were exposed to a lot of dynamics that played out in similarly unhealthy ways. She is not going to be attracted to quality men. Some cases are more extreme than others but a large chunk of women do have things they need to sort through to develop a taste for quality men. We all have some work to do because we live in an unconscious society and were likely raised by unconscious parents. That can also be told for men as well. There is a reason why some guys are attracted to crazy and choose crazy and that is most often because they on some level are also crazy themselves. May not be the same type of crazy but it complements the girl's crazy and is on the same level.  

Edited January 20, 2021 by soos_mite_ah

[7thLetter]

14 hours ago, soos_mite_ah said:

I know that evil technically doesn't exist in the nature of reality in the absolute perspective but in this thread and discussion, I'm not trying to discuss the absolute. I'm discussing the relative, specifically the relative female perspective on pick up vs the relative male perspective. I guess what I'm trying to say, lets not get too ahead of ourselves.

Sure, if you say so.

For your understanding on this topic, I'll further share with you my personal experiences of the person I became getting into pickup back in the day.

Some PUA terminology for you if you don't already know, when I say set, "set" basically refers to a group of people or group of women specifically. Using it in a sentence: "Hey let's go approach that 2-set." In this example a "2-set" is a group of 2 girls.

Like I was saying previously, the main issue here is the teachings of the Red Pill mentality. It spreads quickly like a wildfire in the pickup community. We learned Red Pill either from the teachers at in-person seminars or the Youtube videos, or a combination of both. Pickup is best done within' a circle of other PUAs so everyone would go out together in groups. The PUA community in my city had a Whatsapp group. If someone was out solo, they can literally text the group and ask if anyone is out so they can approach women together. And you best believe, everyone in the community watched all these Red Pill videos too. So if everyone else is learning from the videos and talks about it or implements the theory of it in a set, and you're around them, then that sort of acts as a confirmation bias that the Red Pill teachings work. Plus, if guys go out and try to implement the theory themselves and the set works out then that acts as another confirmation bias.

Being a part of the Red Pill & Pickup community for a long while can lead you to become delusional. You become a narcissist living in a world of lies using manipulation to get his way. This all leads to the aggressive approach you're talking about. In my experience this is what happened to me. I've done hundreds of cold-approaches within' the span of a year, got so many numbers, ended up becoming a complete asshole. All the Red-Pill talk seemed like it was the just the complete truth in my mind. "Women love sex, women like this and that, she's looking for this, alpha-male, dominance, don't be a beta-male, women love jerks, blah blah blah." And if you ever tried to question it, there's always some sort of justification to back it up. So with all of this being said, its not easy as telling a guy in a delusional state of mind he shouldn't be aggressive, because it wouldn't work, he's delusional.

The end result of my pickup journey lead to, like I said, me becoming a narcissist, an asshole, was an asshole to my family, asshole to female co-workers I had back then, asshole to people in general, ended up getting me fired from a job because not only was I an asshole to the workers there, I was in such a delusional state that I couldn't even do the job properly. One of my pickup friends back in the day told me he also got fired from a job too, and I assume its because of the person he became in pickup.

On top of all this, I was also involved in a Pyramid Scheme before I even got into pickup. And I was an asshole back then too. It is strange though, obviously they didn't teach Red Pill, but they taught a type of arrogance around being an "entrepreneur." "I'm better than everyone, 9-5 is a SCAM, School is a SCAM, we don't watch TV we're too good for that, hahahah look at this minimum wage worker wearing an outfit."

So I'm writing this right now and wondering why I became an asshole in the Pyramid Scheme back then even though I wasn't taught Red Pill. Maybe the problem is the manipulative behavior after all? Or the two tie in together, the teachings & the manipulative behavior. PLUS, talking to a ridiculous amount of random people per day makes you desensitized to human interaction in general. Back in the day I would also troll the hell out of people no giving a damn about what they thought of me. They could scream at me or ridicule me but I was so far up my ass I didn't give a shit, seriously. It wasn't a healthy type of "I don't care what people think," it was an unhealthy type of it.

In conclusion, I know I was saying we need to empathize and accept these people but I was speaking from the absolute perspective like you were saying. Acceptance may have been the wrong word. After reading this hopefully I gave you some further understanding about what its like to be a PUA. With more understanding maybe you may have more empathy.

Edited January 21, 2021 by 7thLetter

[soos_mite_ah]

@7thLetter Yeah I'm starting to get the impression that pick up isn't so much of the problem rather it is red pill and the shades of red pill that can be found in even some good advice. 

There are many examples of this but here is one. I was looking at the pick up site that I linked and in one of the articles it said that in order to attract girls you need to be standoffish because then the girl will start doubting herself and start questioning "does he like me?" "did he enjoy himself on the date?" etc. And one way to do that is to text her randomly so one time you might reply to her after 3 hours and another time it might be after 5 min and that supposedly keeps her on her toes. 

There is some truth to that. As a guy (or girl) you need to have your own life meaning you have a job, some hobbies, a social circle, etc. so you don't get clingy over one person. Often times we get clingy because we have all of our eggs in one basket. That spells out desperation which isn't attractive at all, or at least attractive to healthy, quality people. A manipulator or low quality person would have a field day with someone who is clingy and feels the need to bend over backwards. If you have a life, you won't have to play hard to get, you will be hard to get. And you won't have to strategically plan out when you are going to be messaging someone, it's just going to be randomly by default (meaning you won't have to play mind games with yourself or others) if you actually genuinely have other things going on and you aren't hanging on your phone just waiting for her text. Also the whole woman doubting herself and that being a good thing isn't healthy. Sounds like an insecure woman tbh. A quality girl is going to like that you have your own life but she wouldn't be sitting here doubting herself because she also has her own life.  If you are a quality guy, you won't need to have a clingy girl validating you because you will already be confident on your own. You won't feel the need to socially dominate a woman if you are already feel that you are dominant in general because you don't have anything you need to prove. Feeling the need to dominate and control is weak man energy at it's finest. 

Also this is a tangent but upon looking at all of this, I see another parallel. I feel like the female equivalent to red pill style pickup is hypergamy. The vast majority of women don't engage in that but the ones that do are typically very regressive when it comes to their notions of gender roles to the point where they can be very manipulative towards men and expect them to act in hypermasculine and toxic ways. In a way, red pill and hypergamy are responding to each other with the impression that the other comprises the vast majority of people. Meaning a woman who is into hypergamy will assume that all men are red pilled and are horny all the damn time and completely emotionally unavailable meaning you need to manipulate them to stay with you while a man who is into red pill pickup will assume that all women are superficial hypergamous manipulators that you have to manipulate to get them to like you.

IMO if you feel the need to manipulate someone or "get them to like you" odds are that person never liked you in the first place. It also has to do with respect. If I respect someone I wouldn't want to manipulate them or have them like me when it isn't their authentic expression. More importantly, if I respect myself, I wouldn't want to manipulate someone to like me because I know my worth doesn't depend on other people's opinions. Plus I would want to be with someone who genuinely likes me, not someone who has to compromise their own desires to be with me and treats me like I'm some type of second option. 

Edited January 22, 2021 by soos_mite_ah

[Preety_India]

I don't just get how these men don't get this very simple thing  

If you want an authentic relationship with a woman, start with being authentic. 

If you are manipulative with a woman and win her, odds are you are also going to lose her. 

How you get them is how you lose them. 

Seems about right. 

Basically when you think manipulation is your key skill, it comes down to abusing women, that is all. 

 

 

 

Edited January 23, 2021 by Preety_India

[soos_mite_ah]

@Preety_India They resort to inauthenticity because they believe that their authentic selves are what stopping them from being well with women. It's like the whole "just be yourself" type of advice. Some men look at that and think either consciously or unconsciously "well just being myself isn't enough because I'm not enough." But yeah, doing things out of pain will manifest more pain either for yourself or others. 

[Preety_India]

She prefers honesty but she also prefers a man who honestly loves her. 

I've seen men make this dumb analogy that if they were honest about their feelings, then she would leave, so why be honest, then women act like they prefer honesty yet they get pissed off or lose interest if the guy is honest, like what!?!???.... Yes she loves honesty and that doesn't mean that she has to settle for a guy who is honestly disliking her. 

 

This is the male equivalent of a guy telling a woman that he likes honest women and women who don't lie and then the woman proceeds to tell him that she likes him only for his money, and he then tells her he is not into her and her reply is something like "why don't you like me now, I'm being honest?" 

 

Just imagine if a woman said that. 

That's how ridiculous the whole honesty argument sounds. 

 

Yea sure, be honest, appreciated, but if you're honestly admitting that you're an asshole, then why are you so surprised that she is not okay with being with an asshole, it's time for her to cut her losses and move on from you, shouldn't she deserve a better man than some dishonest douche. 

I mean honesty is not just with speech, it's also about honesty and sincerity of intent. 

 

So only being honest in speech as a copout doesn't cut it. You do the wrong, then have the honesty to pay for it. Of course your honesty is respected and hats off for that, but wrong is wrong and if you stole money, then you do the time for it, if you manipulated someone, then be ready to face consequences as well. 

If you don't want the consequences, then don't do the wrong thing. 

Life is hard, tough titty. 

If you get something the right ways then good. 

If you can't get something, yes there is frustration, but accept it. 

And if you still want it by all the wrong means, then be ready to accept consequences. 

 

Edited January 23, 2021 by Preety_India

[Preety_India]

Manipulative men also don't show that they're manipulative. 

That's why they are manipulative. 

 

[soos_mite_ah]

5 minutes ago, Preety_India said:

Yea sure, be honest, appreciated, but if you're honestly admitting that you're an asshole, then why are you so surprised that she is not okay with being with an asshole, it's time for her to cut her losses and move on from you, shouldn't she deserve a better man than some dishonest douche. 

I wasn't necessarily trying to defend their argument for manipulation, just explaining their thought process and how insecurity plays into it. It might be an explanation or reason but it sure as hell ain't an excuse. 

IMO, if a person's authentic self is an asshole, that person should evaluate that and fix whatever is causing them to be an asshole which will then lead their authentic self = not an asshole. They needs to fix their asshole tendencies with some introspection and self awareness instead of masking that shit with manipulation and hoping that a woman/ man won't see through that facade. It will create less headache in the long run and will help them fix other areas in life where they might be lacking

[Preety_India]

1 minute ago, soos_mite_ah said:

I wasn't necessarily trying to defend their argument for manipulation, just explaining their thought process and how insecurity plays into it. It might be an explanation or reason but it sure as hell ain't an excuse. 

IMO, if a person's authentic self is an asshole, that person should evaluate that and fix whatever is causing them to be an asshole which will then lead their authentic self = not an asshole. They needs to fix their asshole tendencies with some introspection and self awareness instead of masking that shit with manipulation and hoping that a woman/ man won't see through that facade. It will create less headache in the long run and will help them fix other areas in life where they might be lacking

That's good advice but manipulative guys are like bank robbers. They think others are fools and they themselves are too smart, they think they are winning. 

They only win sex, and it works because that's all they want. 

It's a dangerous predator prey relationship. 

You can't reason with a manipulator and have a sweet talk with them because they think they are better than others. 

They have grand delusions about their sense of self. They will never admit that they have flaws much less introspect or fix those flaws.

But they get surprised when shit hits the fan and all their manipulation gets exposed and the girl promptly dumps them. 

They're never ready for the finale. 

Well, what they sow is what they get. 

Then they go around carrying resentment. But they never want to look in the mirror. 

One good recipe for ending up alone all life and in old age is to keep playing mind games and accomplish nothing. 

I watch a lot of these men who are like well into their 50s and still trying their games, and i think to myself, they're so miserable, having played women all their lives, they have a long list of women who dumped them and how they play victim and tell the next woman how all those women were bad women and how it absolutely wasn't their fault. I laugh at their misery.. 

They are so deluded, they never see past themselves. They will face consequences of their actions for the rest of their lives. Life is a mirror. What you become is shown in it.. 

[Preety_India]

@soos_mite_ah only one advice for such men - clean up the act. 

But I don't think that they care to change, in which case they deserve the suffering and resentment. 

Then I say - 

Let suffering be thy lesson. 

Edited January 23, 2021 by Preety_India

[soos_mite_ah]

@Preety_India Agreed you can't have a sweet talk with a manipulator, man or woman. You need to call that shit out and enforce some boundaries. You need a tough love approach to these types of situations which means no nonsense. If they don't understand that this type of behavior isn't acceptable based on how people treat them, they will either find a person who will put up with bs or they will cry about how they are alone and no one likes them, which will then lead them to wallow in self pity and blame everyone else instead of taking responsibility. It just turns into an endless cycle of delusion and pain. As they say, you can lead a horse to water but can't force it to drink. Pain can be an indication that you need to improve something or you have a lesson to learn. Lessons repeat until you learn and for some people, those lessons repeat until they are in the grave. 

Edited January 23, 2021 by soos_mite_ah

[Preety_India]

@soos_mite_ah exactly. I kinda laugh at them. I got no mercy for those who deceive others. 

They gotta pay for what they do.

 

[Preety_India]

4 minutes ago, soos_mite_ah said:

@Preety_India Agreed you can't have a sweet talk with a manipulator, man or woman. You need to call that shit out and enforce some boundaries. You need a tough love approach to these types of situations which means no nonsense. If they don't understand that this type of behavior isn't acceptable based on how people treat them, they will either find a person who will put up with bs or they will cry about how they are alone and no one likes them, which will then lead them to wallow in self pity and blame everyone else instead of taking responsibility. It just turns into an endless cycle of delusion and pain. As they say, you can lead a horse to water but can't force it to drink. Pain can be an indication that you need to improve something or you have a lesson to learn. Lessons repeat until you learn and for some people, those lessons repeat until they are in the grave. 

The problem with predatory men is that they stay predatory. They never change because they are Incapable of self reflection. 

Kinda reminds me of gold digger women. They go around stealing the guy's money, end up in jail, but when they are out of jail, they start looking another guy to con and steal from. They just think they are too smart for society even if they were caught in their lies. 

 

[Preety_India]

@soos_mite_ah

11 minutes ago, soos_mite_ah said:

@Preety_India Agreed you can't have a sweet talk with a manipulator, man or woman. You need to call that shit out and enforce some boundaries. You need a tough love approach to these types of situations which means no nonsense. If they don't understand that this type of behavior isn't acceptable based on how people treat them, they will either find a person who will put up with bs or they will cry about how they are alone and no one likes them, which will then lead them to wallow in self pity and blame everyone else instead of taking responsibility. It just turns into an endless cycle of delusion and pain. As they say, you can lead a horse to water but can't force it to drink. Pain can be an indication that you need to improve something or you have a lesson to learn. Lessons repeat until you learn and for some people, those lessons repeat until they are in the grave. 

 Manipulative men kinda remind me of this case of con job. You gotta watch it full to soak it in, just see the level of manipulation the woman did in this case, the extent to which manipulation and trickery goes.. 

 

 

[Preety_India]

@neutralempty I'm laughing and happy tbh. Feels like a relief actually. 

[7thLetter]

@soos_mite_ah Exactly.

The whole idea of Red Pill in my understanding revolves around the idea of using specific tips & tricks to get yourself to seem like a "High Value Man" and to make the woman feel insecure about herself because this is supposed to make the woman "chase" you. They believe it makes the woman chase you because they take the idea that being standoffish or being non-needy is attractive and take it over the top, because nobody wants someone who is needy right? But I think its just different when you use it as a manipulative technique. In most cases I would assume girls would be able to sense that the guy is faking it, but I guess it depends on how good the guy's manipulation skills are.

Another important thing to point out is that, people who follow Red Pill teachings truly believe that there's only two paths in life when it comes to dating, you're either Red Pill or Blue Pill. I assume you understand what Blue Pill is, but if not, its basically the "Beta Male" approach to dating. Being needy, being weak, doing everything the girl wants, basically kissing ass and being the girl's bitch. And in general, most girls don't like this type of behavior so that's why men lean towards the Red Pill, and try to become more Alpha.

In a sense, this is all true. In general, girls do like the stronger men so Red Pill has some partial truths to it. Although it becomes a problem when it creates an entire cult and simple dating tips turn into the exploitation of women.

They don't really know any other alternative. But here's an example of an alternative, "Casey Zander" on Youtube. He's against the whole idea of Red Pill & Blue Pill. Check him out if you want to understand more, but basically he promotes the idea of ACTUALLY being a "High Value" man. Getting your life together, building your body, confidence, etc. Red Pill teaches you how to SEEM like you're a high value male. So I really like his work, I really think his teachings are the best alternative to Red Pill because it transcends the idea of Red Pill. He talks mainly about how you should focus more about improving the product, rather than improving your sales pitch. Because Red Pill is all about the sales pitch. And of course the product in this case is improving who you are.

8 hours ago, soos_mite_ah said:

Feeling the need to dominate and control is weak man energy at it's finest.

For sure. You might've watched it before but Leo has a really good video titled "How To Be a Man - Part 2 (Advanced Version)" Where he talks about the healthy approach to being a man, manipulation tricks out the window and becoming more authentic.

8 hours ago, soos_mite_ah said:

I feel like the female equivalent to red pill style pickup is hypergamy. The vast majority of women don't engage in that but the ones that do are typically very regressive when it comes to their notions of gender roles to the point where they can be very manipulative towards men and expect them to act in hypermasculine and toxic ways. In a way, red pill and hypergamy are responding to each other with the impression that the other comprises the vast majority of people. Meaning a woman who is into hypergamy will assume that all men are red pilled and are horny all the damn time and completely emotionally unavailable meaning you need to manipulate them to stay with you while a man who is into red pill pickup will assume that all women are superficial hypergamous manipulators that you have to manipulate to get them to like you.

Interesting, didn't really know hypergamy was a thing. I feel like this is taught though in movies or even the opposite, but I never really thought much of it.

I think hypergamy is more of a common thing with women who are "hotter" than the average woman. The Instagram model type women from Hollywood who get all the attention from men. They most likely see themselves as high value in the dating marketplace so they believe that they deserve the best of the best.

8 hours ago, soos_mite_ah said:

 

IMO if you feel the need to manipulate someone or "get them to like you" odds are that person never liked you in the first place. It also has to do with respect. If I respect someone I wouldn't want to manipulate them or have them like me when it isn't their authentic expression. More importantly, if I respect myself, I wouldn't want to manipulate someone to like me because I know my worth doesn't depend on other people's opinions. Plus I would want to be with someone who genuinely likes me, not someone who has to compromise their own desires to be with me and treats me like I'm some type of second option. 

The thing is though, when guys go out and do pickup they don't know any of these girls at all. These are cold approaches, they literally just meet them there and then. At the mall, at the club, in the streets, in the library, at the gym, wherever it is. So they just assume the Red Pill is correct, and they use the same sales pitch on every single girl hoping it would work out. Its like door-to-door sales, they know any of these people and they use the same sales pitch on every single person hoping they make a sale.

Its a different story though of course when its someone you know from your workplace or your friend group for example. In that case yes I agree attraction should come naturally, not using manipulation tricks to try to get them to like you.

[soos_mite_ah]

4 minutes ago, 7thLetter said:

The whole idea of Red Pill in my understanding revolves around the idea of using specific tips & tricks to get yourself to seem like a "High Value Man" and to make the woman feel insecure about herself because this is supposed to make the woman "chase" you. They believe it makes the woman chase you because they take the idea that being standoffish or being non-needy is attractive and take it over the top, because nobody wants someone who is needy right? But I think its just different when you use it as a manipulative technique. In most cases I would assume girls would be able to sense that the guy is faking it, but I guess it depends on how good the guy's manipulation skills are.

In a sense, this is all true. In general, girls do like the stronger men so Red Pill has some partial truths to it. Although it becomes a problem when it creates an entire cult and simple dating tips turn into the exploitation of women.

That's what I would say I was reacting to (either internally or externally through replies) when I saw pick up related posts on this site. Making a woman or really any person feel insecure is one of the hallmarks of manipulation and there is plenty of ways to be attractive to the opposite sex that doesn't involve being an asshole scheming behind the scenes. And this is also why I say that most girls can easily smell the inauthenticity or can intuitively tell that something is fishy because the whole thing seems at best a used car sales man approach to dating. 

6 minutes ago, 7thLetter said:

 

They don't really know any other alternative. But here's an example of an alternative, "Casey Zander" on Youtube. He's against the whole idea of Red Pill & Blue Pill. Check him out if you want to understand more, but basically he promotes the idea of ACTUALLY being a "High Value" man. Getting your life together, building your body, confidence, etc. Red Pill teaches you how to SEEM like you're a high value male. So I really like his work, I really think his teachings are the best alternative to Red Pill because it transcends the idea of Red Pill. He talks mainly about how you should focus more about improving the product, rather than improving your sales pitch. Because Red Pill is all about the sales pitch. And of course the product in this case is improving who you are.

For sure. You might've watched it before but Leo has a really good video titled "How To Be a Man - Part 2 (Advanced Version)" Where he talks about the healthy approach to being a man, manipulation tricks out the window and becoming more authentic.

I'll have to check those sources out. There is a HUGE difference between seeming high value and actually being high value. That's what I was essentially trying to articulate in the example of being standoffish and how there is a partial truth to it but has a weird red pill like vibe to it as well. 

9 minutes ago, 7thLetter said:

Interesting, didn't really know hypergamy was a thing. I feel like this is taught though in movies or even the opposite, but I never really thought much of it.

I think hypergamy is more of a common thing with women who are "hotter" than the average woman. The Instagram model type women from Hollywood who get all the attention from men. They most likely see themselves as high value in the dating marketplace so they believe that they deserve the best of the best.

While I was trying to figure out my dating life, I accidentally ran into some hypergamy like sources. I delved into it more not because I agreed with it but because the whole thing seemed really fascinating. A lot of the women who are attracted to hypergamy are not necessarily hotter than average but they are women who keep getting screwed over by fuck boys, guys who don't commit, and guys who treat them like shit. Some of them also have this impression of how everything was better in the 1950s or so when traditional gender roles were the norm because these women want to step into their femininity so they can have a man take care of them. Some of their advice makes sense like don't be desperate, have standards, don't date guys who don't have their shit together, but like red pill they take it to an extreme to the point where they have very materialistic notions of standards and having your shit together as well as a narrow definition of what it means to be a woman.

Also a lot of women fall down the whole hypergamy pipeline on YouTube by starting out with trying to embrace their feminine side more (that's another reason why those videos started popping up in my recommended). Personally, I grew up with a lot of internalized misogyny and I didn't embrace my feminine side so I wanted to find sources online to find ways that I could honor that part of myself more and undo any internalized stigma I had towards what was considered feminine. The sources ranged from basic how to do your hair and makeup videos, to new age divine feminine type sources, and to the mess that is hypergamy. 

18 minutes ago, 7thLetter said:

The thing is though, when guys go out and do pickup they don't know any of these girls at all. These are cold approaches, they literally just meet them there and then. At the mall, at the club, in the streets, in the library, at the gym, wherever it is. So they just assume the Red Pill is correct, and they use the same sales pitch on every single girl hoping it would work out. Its like door-to-door sales, they know any of these people and they use the same sales pitch on every single person hoping they make a sale.

Its a different story though of course when its someone you know from your workplace or your friend group for example. In that case yes I agree attraction should come naturally, not using manipulation tricks to try to get them to like you.

That's what a lot of women on this forum is taking about when we talk about the limits of pick up. Red pill makes a caricature of women which makes it hard to actually connect with women. It's the same used car sales man vibe all over again that usually makes a woman want to auto reject (many but not all). That's why you have to approach so often. When I first came to this forum and I saw men talk about 50-100 approaches, I thought that was insane. I knew that it is in a way more difficult for guys because they are expected to be the ones approaching and that many guys are bound to be rejected numerous times before they get a yes, but 50-100 seemed way too big of a number. To me, that figure is so big to where you need to reevaluate the tactics you are using. If you only succeed 1-2% of the time, there is something up.

Also, with these parallels I'm observing, I'm really getting the impression that the best dating advice is usually gender neutral and doesn't make a caricature out of the opposite sex. I feel that the best  pieces of  relationship advice show you how to relate to people and deal with them effectively instead of painting the opposite sex as some type of alien species that has the complexity of a rubix cube times 10000. 

[Preety_India]

3 minutes ago, soos_mite_ah said:

Making a woman or really any person feel insecure is one of the hallmarks of manipulation and there is plenty of ways to be attractive to the opposite sex that doesn't involve being an asshole scheming behind the scenes.

I know right. And I don't get how it's justified.