The Ethics of PUA

RedXIV wrote: »

Probably not, but its probably the second easiest with the over consumption of alcohol just beating it.

I'm not sure 'easiest' is 'healthiest' tbh.

But if I walk out in the middle of a busy street and ask someone the time, I don't want to know that the person has a degree in something, likes poetry and deep down is dying to be a doctor. I haven't the time nor the inclination to learn all this.

I think spending an evening with someone and asking them the time are kind of incomparable here. I'm not asking guys to learn the girls' life stories, but a different perspective than "sex target, LOCK ON!" would be nice. I think it would be much more valuable to teach people how to learn to enjoy other people's company without seeing them as a target, as that's nearly as effective for getting laid as playing a scripted game and much more ethically sound.

That leaves women with all the power to choose who to interact with. Your suggestion that a man should see a woman he'd like to talk to as an equal simply isn't true because a woman will get FAR more attention than a man.

I'm not sure how that follows, can you clarify? Women should be seen as inferior because other guys give them more attention?

Objectification might not be the answer but while woman have all the power as is the case 90% of the time, its the best alot of men can deal with.

Unfortunate but understandable I guess.

Well when I was doing it I was mainly interested in getting past the initial ice breaker, getting a conversation. I find it hard to believe, at least I hope anyway, that you will not find that as disturbing

Nah, I get that - it's just, when I see hundreds of men on reddit sharing the exact same lines with one another and sharing detailed reports of how exactly it worked it gets a little.. unnerving, I'm sure you can understand how one would find that disturbing?

When I read them, I can't help but think how the woman would feel if she ever found out about it - I know I would be infuriated.

The thing is, it IS different for a woman, and with the points I mentioned above, I hope I've illustrated some of that. Men chase, women choose to put it simply.

It's becoming less different, women are starting to approach men, too. And I think you've got a bit of 'grass is greener' in this one - it's just as nervewracking to be the chooser, believe me.

But I can promise you I've never used any of the forumlas sprouting on the seduction forums.

Fair enough.

Well thats all very well and good but I wasn't going to take the moral high ground when I wanted a relationship. Instead I learned how to make myself a better person, present myself better and use that to make my search for a partner easier. I think it's a bit unfair condemning someone who learns the rules of engagment in a nightclub when you say yourself, women are following their own set.

And I'd condemn those women too! Believe me.

At least you acknowledge the women's side thats a great start! Once again though, I can't agree with the idea that its "wanting to get one over on someone" because thats not how I view it

It's how it comes across from the PUA material that's floating around out there, it's a pretty popular position. Maybe it's just a fundamental difference in male/female brains, I don't know.

SugarHigh wrote: »

You don't get what I mean. Your actions decided their feelings so yes you did make them like you since you control your own actions.

They decide their feelings about my actions, not the other way around.

Yes there is a bid difference between conscious and unconscious manipulation but why should only those who can do it naturally get the benefits. If you can't naturally make people like you should you just live a lonely life or should you learn how to make them like you?

Again, I have no problem with teaching people confidence. I have problems with considering women "targets" and using numbers as identifiers/descriptors and turning the entire thing into a strategy, just as many men have problems with women who follow The Rules - nobody likes being manipulated.

Yes it sounds creepy but why should the person doing it care? Should he just lead a sh1t life because you think it sounds creepy?
This clearly works for a lot of people so why should they do something else if this works.

I'd like to think most people worth knowing would care about the effect they have on other people through their actions, and I'd like to think most people don't go out with the intent to manipulate others because they want to get momentary sexual gratification. Unfortunately what I'd like to think is probably completely wrong.

I don't think he should lead a **** life because I think it sounds creepy - as I've stated many times over in the thread, it's not the confidence-building I've a problem with, it's the manner in which it's put across and the tone of the text that enforces a lack of empathy and dehumanization, which are not healthy (noted by the fact that these are notorious traits of sociopaths).

unconsciously. Yes you can do it naturally so you get benefits. There isn't anything wrong with what you are doing so I don't why it becomes wrong when someone need to make a conscious effort to do it.

It's like the difference between accidentally hitting a kid who runs out in front of your car, and waiting for the kid to run into the street so you can run them over.

There's something inherently sinister about knowing manipulation because it means the manipulator has no respect for the person they're manipulating, no consideration for the feelings of the person they're manipulating, etc. Lack of empathy is not a sign of a good or mentally healthy person, anyway.

When it comes to picking up with then yes. I don't want to get into a discussion about friend zones but it's normally guys who empathize with women who get put into them. They become a friend and some asexual. The truth is treating women badly isn't a bad thing if you want to have sex with them.

Not how the friendzone thing works. The friendzone thing happens because they want to manipulate you into liking them. And that's exactly why it fails so often - a guy becomes a girl's friend because he wants to make her love him by showing her how nice he is so he can eventually have sex with her. You know why it doesn't work? Because it's manipulative and creepy.

Treating women badly isn't a bad thing FOR YOU if you want to have sex with them, sure - if you have literally no conscience and value getting laid over valuing and respecting someone as a person and don't mind people thinking of you as vaguely sociopathic. But I would be very wary of someone who was selfish enough to think that they can go around manipulating whoever they want because they feel entitled to a bit of totty, and I certainly wouldn't be able to keep on a friend like that, because I wouldn't be able to respect how they view other human beings.

SugarHigh wrote: »

That's fine for you but what about people who just aren't naturally likable. People who will evoke negative reactions in others if they be themselves. They need to fake a different personality just to get on with people.

They shouldn't have to fake it, though. They should want to learn how to improve their social skills, and build towards them, but faking it is unhealthy and will only result in unhappiness when all is said and done.

I don't think there is only a certain type of woman that this stuff works on. You said yourself it could work on you and yet you've studied so you aren't naive. I don't see how their view of women is bitter, it's obviously negative but how is it bitter?

Maybe there is, maybe there isn't. I don't know.

It's bitter because they probably turned to stuff like this in the first place because they were mad at girls for turning them down. A lot of guys who use it tend to be very bitter when talking about women which just complicates the negativity.

Also I don't see why only viewing women as sex objects is bad for them if that's all they want. Obviously it's bad for women but why should he care?

If that's what they actually wanted from him, then why did he require PUA to get it?

He should care because normal, healthy human beings don't typically dehumanize other human beings. People who don't give a crap what they do to other humans are usually not healthy people (whether they recognize that or not is another thing entirely).

I don't see why he should put other peoples happiness ahead of his.

And I don't see why he should put his happiness above other people's. When your happiness has the chance to potentially hurt someone else (as most people are when they find out they've been used), that's when it gets into 'wrong' territory. Particularly when you have no conscience about the acts.

leggo wrote: »

The concepts you refer to do not encourage men to see themselves as better than women. Just equal. Hence the 'needing confidence' part that is core to its existence.

They do through the terminology.

And as for being viewed as the 'prize'? Surely you'd love to be seen as a prize by a boyfriend, i.e. Something worth fighting for. If you perceive that as being a sexual conquest...take that up with individuals and not the practise as a whole.

Sorry, no, I really wouldn't! I'd much rather be seen as a person with actual thoughts to offer up than some trinket to be won or fought over. I don't find that notion particularly appealing at all.

SugarHigh wrote: »

Nah I definitely think it promotes the denigration of women. That's why it works.

PUA is clearly bad for women but good for men. Liah you keep claiming it's unhealthy but haven't really backed that up. From what I can gather these guys lives get improved by being able to pick up women.

Unhealthy from a psychological perspective. I seriously think that the lack of empathy required for a lot of what PUA entails is indicative of some serious issues the person has, more than likely deeply rooted in insecurity.

Their lives may superficially improve but their attitude towards fellow members of the human race is certainly not a healthy one, by any stretch of the imagination. It's like how I'm sure the WBC's views are great for them, but I still think they're awful people for the message they send out. I wouldn't stop them doing it, but I will vehemently disagree with what they're doing from a moral perspective.

It should be noted that lack of empathy or guilt when manipulating or deceiving others is correlated with sociopathy and other mental disorders. I'm not saying that the guys who use PUA are sociopaths by any means, but that questions such as "why should I care that I may potentially hurt someone" are vaguely sociopathic in nature. Hence why it's seen as "bad."

SugarHigh wrote: »

But it's this attitude of thinking your better than women that makes it work. I think the guy who looks down on women will do better than the guy who treats them as an equal. PUA basically demonstrates this.

Yes, they will do better at sleeping with lots of hot women, but at what cost?

At the cost of manipulating woman after woman, at the cost of potentially hurting woman after woman if they find out they've been manipulated, at the cost of viewing an entire gender as nothing more than sex objects, at the cost of becoming insipidly arrogant, at the cost of making women everywhere even more distrustful of men's motives and therefore making it harder on the genuine men who don't use this stuff because now they have to convince us they're not lying, at the potential cost of their own mental health, at the potential cost of probably not being able to forge an actual meaningful relationship with a girl because he's been treating them as objects for so long?

Is it really worth it, just to get sexual gratification?

SugarHigh wrote: »

Learning social skills involves faking things you don't do naturally. Someone who understands social situations has to teach you how to act.

And as I've stated repeatedly, that's not the part of it I have the problem with. There's nothing wrong with learning how to socialize. There is something wrong with dehumanizing an entire gender to learn how to socialize.

If they are bitter because they get rejected than surely PUA will make them less bitter?

Doubtful. They'll just come to resent women more over time because they're told that they shouldn't see them as anything more than objects to have sex with, so anything else a woman does that isn't sex-related is likely to annoy them (seen examples of this, it's really not pretty..).

What?

This is just your opinion of what a healthy person is. If treating people like **** makes you happy, why stop?

Because it's ****ing with other people's heads. Would you want someone to **** with your head for their own fun? Using you like an unknowing puppet? I seriously fecking doubt it. It comes down to the basic tenet of 'treat people the way you would like to be treated.'

People who have the "if treating people like **** makes you happy, why stop" mentality don't have friends for very long and end up isolated and alone, because while they may win people over with their superficial charm for awhile, people will cop on, and the person with that attitude will be left alone, probably growing more resentful and bitter by the day.

And it's not my opinion of what a healthy person is, it's pretty much the standard for what people consider to be of healthy mind.

Of course you should put your happiness above everyone else's. Don't even deny you do this everyone does. Your happiness often has the chance to hurt people so big deal? If one guy get's a job over another his happiness hurts the other guy. If a girl turns down a guy for another one her happiness and the guys she chose happiness is negatively impacting the one didn't get chosen.

I will never, ever make the conscious decision to choose my own happiness when that choice means dehumanizing another person or has the potential to cause hurt. I just won't. I wouldn't be able to live with myself if I knowingly screwed over someone else.

Yes, everyone's selfish now and again, but most people aren't selfish to the extent that they will purposely put other people in their line of fire.

You are constantly making other people unhappy whether you like it or not.Obviously you are going to justify your own actions and these guys will justify theirs.

Probably, but never purposely or consciously, unlike PUA who presumably know that the women don't want to be manipulated yet do it anyway.

Maybe he does PUA to turn the tide, he's just putting himself first because otherwise he will be miserable.

Maybe he should find a way to make himself happy that doesn't require potentially making other people miserable.

strobe wrote: »

So many people, male and female do this stuff too, all the time. They just aren't aware they are doing it. I've seen girls coming onto guys using 'negging' (which seems to be one of the things which most 'disturb' people) several times. I'm sure they would call it 'playful teasing' or something like that and have never read 'The Game' or anything similar but 'negging' is exactly what they were doing.

I think motivation would be the main factor here in terms of the ethical question.

This isn't what I have the problem with, though, strobe, it's how it's conveyed, how it's presented. The core of the material, what you get from reading between the lines? Solid stuff. But the way it's marketed and consumed is, simply, offensive and very worrying.

There's nothing wrong with giving people a nudge in the right direction in terms of how things will come out sounding, how not to put your foot in your mouth, how to chill out when you approach, etc. I'm 100% behind all of that. What I am not behind is the fact that it's used as a manual for manipulation by consumers, and that the language leads those consumers to believe that it's okay to objectify.

Try putting yourself in a girl's shoes and reading some of this stuff (especially when people are arguing that it's perfectly fine to fuck with other people to get what you want). Keeping in mind that, as females, we're (generally speaking) used to being physically more vulnerable as is (which is something I'm very aware of every time I'm in a pub; I don't know about other girls, but the fact that most men are bigger than me does make me feel a bit vulnerable), and now we are also emotionally more vulnerable because we have the potential of being manipulated and strung along without knowing, being effectively made a total fool of. Think about how you would feel if men, who are all bigger than you, saw you as prey, saw you as something to manipulate, and had no problem encouraging your objectification and had no consideration for how you may feel about being manipulated.

I honestly don't think you would like it.

And yes, motivation is the main factor here, and from what I've seen, the majority pick it up solely to get women into bed (which I have a problem with), it's the minority who seem to use it for its intended purpose of self-improvement (which I have no problem with).

Wolfe Tone wrote: »

In fairness liah many women are manipulative and string lads along in relationships so its not a worry that only women have.

As I have stated throughout the thread, a few times now.

I think you should read the book tbh, can't do any harm.

I don't see the point, it's not as if The Game is the only source of PUA material and I've seen plenty of other stuff. And it's not the book I have the problem with.

It helps lads get their foot in the door so to speak rather than be the guy standing on the sidelines watching other men do their thing and thinking "why arent I able to be like that?"

And I've said multiple times I have no problem with that and even encourage it.

People take it to extremes of course, but its no different to someone who naturally does these things going out and pulling women all over the shop just for sex.

And the only people I am railing against are the ones who take it to extremes and have no consideration for the women they're manipulating; I thought this was clear.

SugarHigh wrote: »

It is ok objectify people. Your perfectly entitled to view people how you wise I don't see why you should decide what's an ok way to view people.

Sure, everyone's perfectly entitled to do whatever the hell they want. It doesn't mean that it's a good attitude to promote.

This comes across as playing the victim. While yes women are physically weaker it's not like this becomes an issue for most people, how often does a mans strength gain him anything in relation to a woman?

You go on about how men should see women as prey then get after me for playing the victim?

It has become an issue for me because I have history with sexual abuse.

Imo I think women are better at manipulation and mind games so you can't really claim they are more vulnerable of being manipulated.Cosmopolitan has been doing this a lot longer than PUA has been around.

And as I've said throughout the thread I've an equal amount of contempt for them and think they're giving my gender a horrible name.

Of course no one would like it to happen to them. But it does happen to them by people who haven't learned how to be manipulative but by people who are just naturally good at it. If it anything it's basically arming yourself when everyone already has a gun. That's basically what someone with no social skills is, someone who can be easily used and treated like crap by those who are better at socializing.
What's wrong with wanting to get women into bed?

Again, nothing - wanting to have sex is perfectly natural. I've had ONS myself, I really don't have a problem with it. As I have said repeatedly, it's not the actual advice I have a problem with. It's the manner in which it's presented that I disagree with because it lends itself to selective interpretation and people use it to justify treating other people like crap.