Replying to this separately so it can be voted up/down separatly.
Where’s my pity party? It seems that patience is reserved for those who say inflammatory things, propogate myths for decades, and then manage to say with a straight face, “no, no, I didn’t mean—what was the unpopular part again? -- yeah, that. That I didn’t mean. But yeah, sex is violence. You can keep feeling guilty.”
Do you have a bias against feminism that goes beyond disagreement? This sounds to me to be the statement of someone who feels personally injured.
Yes, I do feel personally injured. I’m told all my life what is proper behavior around women and what is not, while, right in front of my face, men flout these rules (as best I understand them) and are, for lack of a better term, rewarded by those women.
I cannot interpret advice, of the type Alicorn has given, any more charitably than “I’m trying to clean the gene pool of any man submissive and stupid enough to actually follow this advice in the real world.” To the extent that Alicorn is sincere and honest, she is an extreme outlier, and is asking for special treatment that cannot be justified by preferences of women in general.
To see why it would be special treatment, please refer to my previous comment, which may have the side effect of demonstrating my humanity. It details how I, like Alicorn, experience a negative physical reaction from PUA threads, but, unlike Alicorn, see this as a failing I need to overcome, rather than a reason to demand suppression of a topic.
I cannot interpret advice, of the type Alicorn has given, any more charitably than “I’m trying to clean the gene pool of any man submissive and stupid enough to actually follow this advice in the real world.”
Then you have impaired translation skills. Alicorn has actually given advice here in the past that—when properly translated—is actually quite in accordance with many PUA teachings. She just didn’t use PUA buzzwords like “social proof” or “direct game” to describe them. (Granted, she tended to also use very blunt and judgmental language… but no more blunt or judgmental than I’d have expected from a male of her age.)
To the extent that Alicorn is sincere and honest, she is an extreme outlier
Outlier, yes. Extreme, no. She may or may not be correct about what “works” for her, but either way, it’s none of our business or concern. She has clearly separated her statements about the way she believes things should be from discussion of how they actually are, so I don’t think that disagreements with her regarding the “should”, should be conflated with her misrepresenting the “are”.
Then you have impaired translation skills. Alicorn has actually given advice here in the past that—when properly translated—is actually quite in accordance with many PUA teachings. She just didn’t use PUA buzzwords like “social proof” or “direct game” to describe them.
I’m not familiar with those discussions, so my previous statements don’t refer to them. All the advice I’m aware of from Alicorn is:
1) Her suggestion that presupposes your problem getting dates is already 99% solved, and that fundamental changes in your life, like getting an entire new set of friends with numerous female contacts receptive to you is easy
3) Her current advice, that men should navigate the world with extreme caution that they might say something on the forbidden list.
With respect to the other Alicorn posts you refer to, she may be right. But, if I were going for a minimum-message-length optimized description of the above Alicorn posts, a great hypothesis would be indeed “She’s trying to clean the gene pool of any man submissive and stupid enough to actually follow this advice in the real world.”
Outlier, yes. Extreme, no.
I meant that she was an outlier in being offended by the “get a woman” usages, not that she’s an outlier in general honesty or sincerity.
I don’t think that disagreements with her regarding the “should”, should be conflated with her misrepresenting the “are”.
Just the same, she should distinguish her own idiosyncratic preferences from fundamentally unethical treatment of others, and in this area, she’s failed. The world simply does not agree with her claim about the atrociousness of talking about “getting a man” or “getting a woman” “because I have a lot of money/looks”.
I really do not know how to feel about this comment. While I appreciate the honesty, I really have problems with things like this:
I cannot interpret advice, of the type Alicorn has given, any more charitably than “I’m trying to clean the gene pool of any man submissive and stupid enough to actually follow this advice in the real world.”
I think it is strange that you have essentially acknowledged a pack of inconsistencies in your experiences and teachings but are unable to show charitably to one particular side. Why that side? Why does the fault automatically lie in this direction? I assume there is a long history filled with reasons and this probably isn’t the place to hash everything out. But if you are unable to see Alicorn’s side charitably it is likely there is something wrong with your perspective.
I cannot interpret advice, of the type Alicorn has given, any more charitably than “I’m trying to clean the gene pool of any man submissive and stupid enough to actually follow this advice in the real world.” To the extent that Alicorn is sincere and honest, she is an extreme outlier, and is asking for special treatment that cannot be justified by preferences of women in general.
Is it not equally likely that you are the outlier? That you have had an unusual experience combination of inaccurate advice from women? Or that you interpret such advice differently than normal?
I think that most people couldn’t express consciously what would attract them (as they don’t know until they see it—and everyone on this website is probably an exception to this rule to some extent), so I’m loath to accept your conclusion that they’re trying to remove you from the gene pool.
Yes, I do feel personally injured. I’m told all my life what is proper behavior around women and what is not, while, right in front of my face, men flout these rules (as best I understand them) and are, for lack of a better term, rewarded by those women.
People teaching you “proper behavior around women” are generally not trying to help you in the way you seem to expect. (In my experience, anyway)
Anyway, my only point was that you are not very neutral on this subject (which you admit), and you don’t seem to be taking that fact into account.
Silas definitely is not neutral on this topic, and perhaps could do with lowering the snark. That being said, he is not alone.
The kind of experiences Silas mentions seem common for men with certain types of personalities and social experiences (or lack thereof). They are common in the seduction community, which is massive (there is a pickup club called a “lair” in almost every major city in the world). It’s not at all uncommon for the following drama to unfold:
Male interprets prescribed behavior from women, or from various cultural authorities (e.g. religion, feminists, the media)
Male attempts to manifest those behaviors, yet encounters rejection due to some of those prescriptions being wrong, or incomplete
Male watches other men being successful who aren’t playing by the rules he was taught, or even engaging in diametrically opposite behaviors
I don’t think that female misstatement of their preferences is an attempt, conscious or subconsciously evolved, to eliminate men from the gene pool, however things may look. I summarize some research comparing female preferences and behaviors here.
I can’t really argue with this. I fit your described demographic quite well, but I don’t have a very similar experience. If it weren’t for the internet I’d probably still be single (and by now, bitter, too, perhaps...)
Is it not equally likely that you are the outlier? That you have had an unusual experience combination of inaccurate advice from women? Or that you interpret such advice differently than normal?
No, it not equally likely that I’m the outlier. Keep in mind, PUA instructors consistently, universally have the problem of “unlearning” their students of their previous conception of how to treat women. My shackling to this unhelpful carefulness about “respecting women” is typical. So typical, in fact, that simple misogyny often results in improvement in generating attraction.
I think that most people couldn’t express consciously what would attract them (as they don’t know until they see it—and everyone on this website is probably an exception to this rule to some extent), so I’m loath to accept your conclusion that they’re trying to remove you from the gene pool.
See how the mechanism might work? Women want male children that can “get the job done”. One way to filter out men who can’t given them those genes, is to feed bad advice to men. The only one who will listen to it are the ones who would let women walk all over them. And so they’re more likely to encounter men with good genes.
I’m not proposing this as a theory; I’m just showing how my proposal (women give bad advice to feed out the dumb and submissive) doesn’t require any ill will or conscious deception on the part of women; it can just be something they naturally gravitate toward without understanding why.
People teaching you “proper behavior around women” are generally not trying to help you in the way you seem to expect. (In my experience, anyway)
If what I expect is something that will actually lead to a relationship with mutual desire, that is correct.
Anyway, my only point was that you are not very neutral on this subject (which you admit), and you don’t seem to be taking that fact into account.
I’m not neutral on the topic, but that doesn’t matter. I’m the living evidence of what it’s like to walk on eggshells around women in the possibility that I might accidentally oppress them. That biases me in favor of telling others not to fall into the trap of buying into feminist standards while you get crowded out of the dating pool.
You make the mistake of thinking that women prefer alpha males/assholes consciously and intentionally while lying to you. This is almost certainly not the case. This is strange since the whole reason for PUA stuff coming up is that it represents an incidence of often unconscious bias.
In any case I firmly reject the view that “game” requires you to be a misogynist. My bet is that line of thinking is a useful error that some men find helpful for overcoming their previous tendencies to place women on pedestals and worship them. If you have general self-confidence treating people as your equal will end up resembling some versions of PUA style game.
You make the mistake of thinking that women prefer alpha males/assholes consciously and intentionally while lying to you.
I don’t think it’s that. I see two scenarios that are more likely to generate what I observe:
1) When women give advice, the question they are answering is, “Which attributes would I like to add to a guy, while changing nothing else?” rather than “What would make me actually attracted to a guy?” and the difference is enormous. Frequently, when I get advice from women, what I’m thinking in my mind is, “No, you’re telling me what you would like. I’m asking for what would work.”
2) Women have a hard time articulating what generates attraction in them, and, once they put it through the filter of “social acceptability” and “hurting feelings”, it just reverts to a repetition of what they think they’re supposed to like.
In any case I firmly reject the view that “game” requires you to be a misogynist.
I don’t think it’s an issue of misogynist/not misogynist. It’s an issue of “doing/not doing what I have been taught is ‘respectful’”. That is, the autistic-spectrum male “learning algorithm” may mistakenly infer certain behaviors as being “not respectful” and therefore “don’t do”, while this was not actually entailed by any teaching received from a female (at least, given the female’s implicit assumptions).
I don’t think it’s an issue of misogynist/not misogynist. It’s an issue of “doing/not doing what I have been taught is ‘respectful’”. That is, the autistic-spectrum male “learning algorithm” may mistakenly infer certain behaviors as being “not respectful” and therefore “don’t do”, while this was not actually entailed by any teaching received from a female (at least, given the female’s implicit assumptions).
Part of the problem might be boys learning to respect women by respecting their mother or some other female authority figure. But boys don’t treat their mothers as equals, they treat them as superiors. I wonder if there is a correlation between men who are popular with women and those with little sisters. In any case, the solution surely isn’t to get pissed at feminists but to recalibrate your understanding of what it means to respect women.
I wonder if there is a correlation between men who are popular with women and those with little sisters
The author of the “Double Your Dating” products actually explicitly teaches men to treat a woman they’re interested in as if she were “your bratty kid sister”, so clearly at least one PUG has noticed this connection.
When women give advice, the question they are answering is, “Which attributes would I like to add to a guy, while changing nothing else?” rather than “What would make me actually attracted to a guy?” and the difference is enormous. Frequently, when I get advice from women, what I’m thinking in my mind is, “No, you’re telling me what you would like. I’m asking for what would work.”
Off the cuff, my advice would be to find someone for whom you don’t need to worry about what behavior “would work” and instead find someone who genuinely shares your interests and is a joy to be with, and pursue a relationship with them.
But then, having been in a love-at-first-sight sort of situation, my advice is probably as helpful as “let them eat cake.”
I’m glad you acknowledge this is a “let them eat cake response.” Not worrying whether one’s behavior is “working” is a privilege of those with behavior that works.
Of course, it sounds mechanical, perhaps even objectifying to be talking about whether one’s behavior “works” “on” others, as if they were a machine being fed input. Yet this pragmatic mode of thinking is forced on some of us by being the only viable way to solve deficits in social and dating experience and knowledge, deficits that were also forced on us due to negligent socialization.
FWIW, to me, the big difference between a particular mode of thought being objectifying or not has less to do with how one models people’s reactions than what one’s goal is. If what “works” just means what gets you laid or makes you happy, regardless of its effect on others, then you’re treating the other person as just a tool to your own satisfaction. That, to me, is “objectifying” and, well, makes you a shitty, bad person as far as I’m concerned.
If, on the other hand, you actually care about the prospective other person’s feelings as well, and what “works” is what makes both of you happy, then I can’t really see a problem.
This is one of the things that puzzles me about the whole PUA thing. Is the point of a guy changing his behaviour in such ways:
to get his foot in the door, and then, once that’s done go back to being “himself”;
to have to keep up the charade forever; or
to change “himself” for good (i.e. keep up the behaviour, but in such a way that it ceases to be an unnatural charade)?
1, I can sort of understand. 2 seems like a great way to ruin your life. 3 seems like a disaster as well if it involves becoming someone who routinely does things that one now thinks are objectionable; but could be rather more positive if it instead involves, say, becoming someone who is more fun to be around and better able to enrich the life of a significant other.
Or is all of this missing the point, which is just to get laid in the short term, and not be around for the long term anyway?
You need to do 1 and 2 (keep the charade for as long as you need) as a temporary solution, since changing yourself permanently (acquiring the necessary social skills, building confidence, body language, etc) can’t be done quickly and easily.
What is more, having an interim solution can be helpful and gives a boost to the process of improving yourself as well, e.g. even a modest success with women can increase your confidence and give you necessary social practice. It’s sort of a multiplier on your efforts of improvement.
The answers to those questions are as diverse as the individuals themselves. Different teachers certainly advocate different things, but the more ethical ones advocate, as you say...
becoming someone who is more fun to be around and better able to enrich the life of a significant other.
And grasping some of the ideas involved in that has certainly been helpful in my marriage.
Think of #3 the same way you think of any kind of self-improvement work (or if you like, a bootstrapping AI). There is no reason for it to be at all objectionable. People change things about themselves all the time and no one objects.
I certainly never meant to suggest that change is objectionable per se. But saying “just think of it as self-improvement” begs the question of whether it’s actually improvement. If you find yourself trying to become someone who regularly does stuff you now find objectionable (as per the comment I was responding to) then there’s a decent chance you’re actually engaged in an act of self-debasement instead.
FWIW, I didn’t intend the colloquial meaning (“raises the question”): I meant that the response “think of it as self-improvement” assumes precisely what is at issue (i.e. that the change is for the better).
Yes, I do feel personally injured. I’m told all my life what is proper behavior around women and what is not,
It seems that you have bought into anti-feminist propaganda—color me unsurprised. The so-called “proper behavior” you’re talking about has consistently been codified and endorsed by the existing power structure, as a means of perpetuating its self-serving mindsets and systemic biases.
This sounds to me to be the statement of someone who feels personally injured.
Btw, how is that different from Alicorn feeling ‘personally injured’ (or offended) by us having PUA discussions on LW? Can’t SilasBerta feel offended by any attempts to censor the topic?
I wasn’t trying to say he shouldn’t be offended. My implication was that because he’s offended, SilasBarta is having trouble dealing with the issue rationally. If Alicorn has a similar bias, she hides it better. (Disclaimer: I haven’t read all the comments on all the posts this has come up)
Alicorn is offended by a certain problem she perceives (objectification of women).
SilasBerta is also offended by a problem—silencing of discussions on a problem unrelated to Alicorn’s problem, but discussions on which happen to possibly include objectifications of some sort.
I don’t see why both shouldn’t be on an equal standing.
I am not trying to downplay SilasBerta’s feeling offended, and it is very possible that SilasBerta’s offense and Alicorn’s offense are about the same topic from different sides. If that is the case than my comment is probably out of place.
In my opinion, getting offended by [topic] reflects a potential issue with [topic] that may be worth addressing. Ideally, the offense as a result of the [topic] should disappear due to either (a) [topic] becoming less offensive or (b) the offended becoming unaffected by [topic].
Being offended by being offended by [topic] can be resolved by resolving the first layer of offenses. If there is a problem with the initial offense, getting offended doesn’t actually help since the initial offense is not likely to be resolved with the secondary offense.
In addition, a terrible cycle can appear if the initial offended takes offense to the offensive of the initial offense. Granted, you do not always get to choose what offends you, but when dealing with multiple layers of offense I think it is best to deal with the initial offense.
So, perhaps “categories” can be replaced by “priorities.”
Being offended by being offended by [topic] can be resolved by resolving the first layer of offenses.
Not if resolving the first layer depends on resolving the second layer first. I.e. he can’t resolve his problem because he’s being silenced when he attempts to discuss it.
Not if resolving the first layer depends on resolving the second layer first. I.e. he can’t resolve his problem because he’s being silenced when he attempts to discuss it.
The first layer problem existed before the second layer problem did. Why would the second layer have to be solved first?
Also, silencing someone is not really the same thing as being offended.
Unless you are talking about a scenario where silencing someone is the solution to the original problem? In that case the second layer really has nothing to do with offense to offense.
I feel there may be a huge misunderstanding here. I wouldn’t be surprised if it was my initial comment’s assumption that the second offense was an offense to an offense.
The first layer problem existed before the second layer problem did. Why would the second layer have to be solved first?
Because they’ve become interconnected.
I’m viewing PUA discussions as part of the solution to SilasBerta’s problem. Imposing a ban on such discussions hinders SilasBerta, which is why he’s offended. Basically, a ban on PUA discussions is effectively a ban on part of the solution to SilasBerta’s problem.
Now, I’m not saying that Alicorn and SilasBerta are equally justified in their requests. But both need to be evaluated as valid concerns.
Basically, a ban on PUA discussions is effectively a ban on part of the solution to SilasBerta’s problem.
Hardly. It’s not like there aren’t plenty of other places on the ’net to get information, free or paid, and if he lives in or near a major metropolitan area there’s probably a “lair” he can join and the occasional professionally taught workshop or bootcamp.
Unless you’re looking for specifically rationalist-friendly information, this isn’t really the place to get it. It’s only on-topic here to the extent it’s relevant to various sorts of bias and akrasia issues. For example, the PUAs’ “3 Seconds Rule” is relevant to akrasia, and I almost brought it up in reply to the “It’s all in your head land” article, except that I’m really NOT wanting to start new PUA-related threads.
Hardly. It’s not like there aren’t plenty of other places on the ’net to get information, free or paid
Well, a ban is a hindrance to the extent that a rationalist community could develop more rigorous and testable theories, and incidentally, they will probably weed out all of the misogynist and objectificationist (is there such a word?) stuff.
Well, a ban is a hindrance to the extent that a rationalist community could develop more rigorous and testable theories,
You must be new here. ;-)
All kidding aside, this community could develop plenty of rigorous and testable theories. It’s just incredibly doubtful that any of them would actually work in practice, for almost any definition of “work”, unless they were developed by people who already had practical experience.
In particular, this community is inflicted with massive “should” bias—i.e. confusing “ought” and “is”, while vehemently insisting that things that do work, shouldn’t, don’t work, should, and coming up with ludicrous explanations for both sets of falsehoods.
See, for example, the recent complaints about “marketing”; e.g. deriding breaking cryonics cost down to $1/day. There’s a reason marketers do that… and it’s because marketers have forgotten more than most people posting on this site have ever known about overcoming akrasia.
Because, if a marketer can’t overcome somebody’s akrasia enough to get them to shell out actual money, the marketer doesn’t get paid.
That’s why I group PUA and marketing under the same heading, of Arts That Work. When they’re too far wrong, the marketers don’t get paid and the PUAs don’t get laid, so there’s an inherent control over how far they can stray from the truth. This control does not apply so well to general works of self-help, or to armchair ev-psych theorizing. I actually learned far more about akrasia and motivation from marketers and PUAs than I ever did from self-help books or science papers.
(Btw, the scientific principle behind using per diem breakdown is incredibly relevant to any sort of personal change project, and it involves a statistical rule discovered by Prochaska, Norcross et al regarding the precise number of standard deviations in a person’s change of evaluation regarding the pros and cons of a decision that will make them shift from “contemplating” to “acting”… a rule that holds constant across a dozen different kinds of changes, such as quitting smoking, starting an exercise program, etc. Per diem breakdowns are just one of several tools that the adept marketer uses to prompt an individual to make this evaluation shift, though I don’t know of any marketers who’ve made the connection between this statistical rule and the relevant practices. They do know, however, that persuasion must occur in the same sequence that the Prochaska rule says it does.)
Imposing a ban on such discussions hinders SilasBerta, which is why he’s offended.
If this is the case, than he is not offended by Alicorn’s offense. He is offended by a ban on such discussions. Which makes sense and has nothing to do with the layers I was talking about.
Like I said, I think there is misunderstanding of my original comment. To reword this:
Well, he can, but I wouldn’t put “being offended by [topic]” and “being offended by being offended by [topic]” in the same categories.
As this:
I don’t put “being offended by [topic]” and “being offended by being offended by [topic]” in the same categories, so hopefully that is not what he is doing. If he is offended by the proposed solution to the offense of [topic], that makes a little more sense.
Replying to this separately so it can be voted up/down separatly.
Do you have a bias against feminism that goes beyond disagreement? This sounds to me to be the statement of someone who feels personally injured.
Yes, I do feel personally injured. I’m told all my life what is proper behavior around women and what is not, while, right in front of my face, men flout these rules (as best I understand them) and are, for lack of a better term, rewarded by those women.
I cannot interpret advice, of the type Alicorn has given, any more charitably than “I’m trying to clean the gene pool of any man submissive and stupid enough to actually follow this advice in the real world.” To the extent that Alicorn is sincere and honest, she is an extreme outlier, and is asking for special treatment that cannot be justified by preferences of women in general.
To see why it would be special treatment, please refer to my previous comment, which may have the side effect of demonstrating my humanity. It details how I, like Alicorn, experience a negative physical reaction from PUA threads, but, unlike Alicorn, see this as a failing I need to overcome, rather than a reason to demand suppression of a topic.
Then you have impaired translation skills. Alicorn has actually given advice here in the past that—when properly translated—is actually quite in accordance with many PUA teachings. She just didn’t use PUA buzzwords like “social proof” or “direct game” to describe them. (Granted, she tended to also use very blunt and judgmental language… but no more blunt or judgmental than I’d have expected from a male of her age.)
Outlier, yes. Extreme, no. She may or may not be correct about what “works” for her, but either way, it’s none of our business or concern. She has clearly separated her statements about the way she believes things should be from discussion of how they actually are, so I don’t think that disagreements with her regarding the “should”, should be conflated with her misrepresenting the “are”.
I’m not familiar with those discussions, so my previous statements don’t refer to them. All the advice I’m aware of from Alicorn is:
1) Her suggestion that presupposes your problem getting dates is already 99% solved, and that fundamental changes in your life, like getting an entire new set of friends with numerous female contacts receptive to you is easy
2) The infamous “Why can’t you whiners just meet women off the internet?” (gently brought back to reality by HughRistik).
3) Her current advice, that men should navigate the world with extreme caution that they might say something on the forbidden list.
With respect to the other Alicorn posts you refer to, she may be right. But, if I were going for a minimum-message-length optimized description of the above Alicorn posts, a great hypothesis would be indeed “She’s trying to clean the gene pool of any man submissive and stupid enough to actually follow this advice in the real world.”
I meant that she was an outlier in being offended by the “get a woman” usages, not that she’s an outlier in general honesty or sincerity.
Just the same, she should distinguish her own idiosyncratic preferences from fundamentally unethical treatment of others, and in this area, she’s failed. The world simply does not agree with her claim about the atrociousness of talking about “getting a man” or “getting a woman” “because I have a lot of money/looks”.
I really do not know how to feel about this comment. While I appreciate the honesty, I really have problems with things like this:
I think it is strange that you have essentially acknowledged a pack of inconsistencies in your experiences and teachings but are unable to show charitably to one particular side. Why that side? Why does the fault automatically lie in this direction? I assume there is a long history filled with reasons and this probably isn’t the place to hash everything out. But if you are unable to see Alicorn’s side charitably it is likely there is something wrong with your perspective.
Is it not equally likely that you are the outlier? That you have had an unusual experience combination of inaccurate advice from women? Or that you interpret such advice differently than normal?
I think that most people couldn’t express consciously what would attract them (as they don’t know until they see it—and everyone on this website is probably an exception to this rule to some extent), so I’m loath to accept your conclusion that they’re trying to remove you from the gene pool.
People teaching you “proper behavior around women” are generally not trying to help you in the way you seem to expect. (In my experience, anyway)
Anyway, my only point was that you are not very neutral on this subject (which you admit), and you don’t seem to be taking that fact into account.
Silas definitely is not neutral on this topic, and perhaps could do with lowering the snark. That being said, he is not alone.
The kind of experiences Silas mentions seem common for men with certain types of personalities and social experiences (or lack thereof). They are common in the seduction community, which is massive (there is a pickup club called a “lair” in almost every major city in the world). It’s not at all uncommon for the following drama to unfold:
Male interprets prescribed behavior from women, or from various cultural authorities (e.g. religion, feminists, the media)
Male attempts to manifest those behaviors, yet encounters rejection due to some of those prescriptions being wrong, or incomplete
Male watches other men being successful who aren’t playing by the rules he was taught, or even engaging in diametrically opposite behaviors
Male becomes bitter
I’ve done several posts on this subject on my blog: When You Have Feminist Guilt, You Don’t Need Catholic Guilt and Why Respecting Women as Human Beings is not Enough
I don’t think that female misstatement of their preferences is an attempt, conscious or subconsciously evolved, to eliminate men from the gene pool, however things may look. I summarize some research comparing female preferences and behaviors here.
I can’t really argue with this. I fit your described demographic quite well, but I don’t have a very similar experience. If it weren’t for the internet I’d probably still be single (and by now, bitter, too, perhaps...)
Very interesting—thank you for the links.
No, it not equally likely that I’m the outlier. Keep in mind, PUA instructors consistently, universally have the problem of “unlearning” their students of their previous conception of how to treat women. My shackling to this unhelpful carefulness about “respecting women” is typical. So typical, in fact, that simple misogyny often results in improvement in generating attraction.
The cause of an adaptation, the shape of an adaptation, and the consequence of an adaptation, are all separate things. It’s not necessary that women be trying to remove me from the gene pool, but certain adaptations give them certain rules for handling certain kinds of men. The useful advice that PUAs give, diverges sharply from any advice any woman will openly give you. So why is female advice so consistently divergent from working advice?
See how the mechanism might work? Women want male children that can “get the job done”. One way to filter out men who can’t given them those genes, is to feed bad advice to men. The only one who will listen to it are the ones who would let women walk all over them. And so they’re more likely to encounter men with good genes.
I’m not proposing this as a theory; I’m just showing how my proposal (women give bad advice to feed out the dumb and submissive) doesn’t require any ill will or conscious deception on the part of women; it can just be something they naturally gravitate toward without understanding why.
If what I expect is something that will actually lead to a relationship with mutual desire, that is correct.
I’m not neutral on the topic, but that doesn’t matter. I’m the living evidence of what it’s like to walk on eggshells around women in the possibility that I might accidentally oppress them. That biases me in favor of telling others not to fall into the trap of buying into feminist standards while you get crowded out of the dating pool.
You make the mistake of thinking that women prefer alpha males/assholes consciously and intentionally while lying to you. This is almost certainly not the case. This is strange since the whole reason for PUA stuff coming up is that it represents an incidence of often unconscious bias.
In any case I firmly reject the view that “game” requires you to be a misogynist. My bet is that line of thinking is a useful error that some men find helpful for overcoming their previous tendencies to place women on pedestals and worship them. If you have general self-confidence treating people as your equal will end up resembling some versions of PUA style game.
Good points, but I object to these:
I don’t think it’s that. I see two scenarios that are more likely to generate what I observe:
1) When women give advice, the question they are answering is, “Which attributes would I like to add to a guy, while changing nothing else?” rather than “What would make me actually attracted to a guy?” and the difference is enormous. Frequently, when I get advice from women, what I’m thinking in my mind is, “No, you’re telling me what you would like. I’m asking for what would work.”
2) Women have a hard time articulating what generates attraction in them, and, once they put it through the filter of “social acceptability” and “hurting feelings”, it just reverts to a repetition of what they think they’re supposed to like.
I don’t think it’s an issue of misogynist/not misogynist. It’s an issue of “doing/not doing what I have been taught is ‘respectful’”. That is, the autistic-spectrum male “learning algorithm” may mistakenly infer certain behaviors as being “not respectful” and therefore “don’t do”, while this was not actually entailed by any teaching received from a female (at least, given the female’s implicit assumptions).
Part of the problem might be boys learning to respect women by respecting their mother or some other female authority figure. But boys don’t treat their mothers as equals, they treat them as superiors. I wonder if there is a correlation between men who are popular with women and those with little sisters. In any case, the solution surely isn’t to get pissed at feminists but to recalibrate your understanding of what it means to respect women.
Respect=/=defer.
The author of the “Double Your Dating” products actually explicitly teaches men to treat a woman they’re interested in as if she were “your bratty kid sister”, so clearly at least one PUG has noticed this connection.
Off the cuff, my advice would be to find someone for whom you don’t need to worry about what behavior “would work” and instead find someone who genuinely shares your interests and is a joy to be with, and pursue a relationship with them.
But then, having been in a love-at-first-sight sort of situation, my advice is probably as helpful as “let them eat cake.”
I’m glad you acknowledge this is a “let them eat cake response.” Not worrying whether one’s behavior is “working” is a privilege of those with behavior that works.
Of course, it sounds mechanical, perhaps even objectifying to be talking about whether one’s behavior “works” “on” others, as if they were a machine being fed input. Yet this pragmatic mode of thinking is forced on some of us by being the only viable way to solve deficits in social and dating experience and knowledge, deficits that were also forced on us due to negligent socialization.
FWIW, to me, the big difference between a particular mode of thought being objectifying or not has less to do with how one models people’s reactions than what one’s goal is. If what “works” just means what gets you laid or makes you happy, regardless of its effect on others, then you’re treating the other person as just a tool to your own satisfaction. That, to me, is “objectifying” and, well, makes you a shitty, bad person as far as I’m concerned.
If, on the other hand, you actually care about the prospective other person’s feelings as well, and what “works” is what makes both of you happy, then I can’t really see a problem.
Btw, it’s mechanical on the side of the man as well—being forced to output behavior which you normally would not, and might even object to doing.
This is one of the things that puzzles me about the whole PUA thing. Is the point of a guy changing his behaviour in such ways:
to get his foot in the door, and then, once that’s done go back to being “himself”;
to have to keep up the charade forever; or
to change “himself” for good (i.e. keep up the behaviour, but in such a way that it ceases to be an unnatural charade)?
1, I can sort of understand. 2 seems like a great way to ruin your life. 3 seems like a disaster as well if it involves becoming someone who routinely does things that one now thinks are objectionable; but could be rather more positive if it instead involves, say, becoming someone who is more fun to be around and better able to enrich the life of a significant other.
Or is all of this missing the point, which is just to get laid in the short term, and not be around for the long term anyway?
You need to do 1 and 2 (keep the charade for as long as you need) as a temporary solution, since changing yourself permanently (acquiring the necessary social skills, building confidence, body language, etc) can’t be done quickly and easily.
What is more, having an interim solution can be helpful and gives a boost to the process of improving yourself as well, e.g. even a modest success with women can increase your confidence and give you necessary social practice. It’s sort of a multiplier on your efforts of improvement.
The answers to those questions are as diverse as the individuals themselves. Different teachers certainly advocate different things, but the more ethical ones advocate, as you say...
And grasping some of the ideas involved in that has certainly been helpful in my marriage.
Think of #3 the same way you think of any kind of self-improvement work (or if you like, a bootstrapping AI). There is no reason for it to be at all objectionable. People change things about themselves all the time and no one objects.
This “self” business is probably nonsense anyway.
I certainly never meant to suggest that change is objectionable per se. But saying “just think of it as self-improvement” begs the question of whether it’s actually improvement. If you find yourself trying to become someone who regularly does stuff you now find objectionable (as per the comment I was responding to) then there’s a decent chance you’re actually engaged in an act of self-debasement instead.
Just a reminder that “begging the question” and its variants are jargon in logic, and so it seems the colloquial meaning should be avoided here.
FWIW, I didn’t intend the colloquial meaning (“raises the question”): I meant that the response “think of it as self-improvement” assumes precisely what is at issue (i.e. that the change is for the better).
It seems that you have bought into anti-feminist propaganda—color me unsurprised. The so-called “proper behavior” you’re talking about has consistently been codified and endorsed by the existing power structure, as a means of perpetuating its self-serving mindsets and systemic biases.
Btw, how is that different from Alicorn feeling ‘personally injured’ (or offended) by us having PUA discussions on LW? Can’t SilasBerta feel offended by any attempts to censor the topic?
I wasn’t trying to say he shouldn’t be offended. My implication was that because he’s offended, SilasBarta is having trouble dealing with the issue rationally. If Alicorn has a similar bias, she hides it better. (Disclaimer: I haven’t read all the comments on all the posts this has come up)
Well, he can, but I wouldn’t put “being offended by [topic]” and “being offended by being offended by [topic]” in the same categories.
Alicorn is offended by a certain problem she perceives (objectification of women).
SilasBerta is also offended by a problem—silencing of discussions on a problem unrelated to Alicorn’s problem, but discussions on which happen to possibly include objectifications of some sort.
I don’t see why both shouldn’t be on an equal standing.
I think there may be a typo in there somewhere.
I am not trying to downplay SilasBerta’s feeling offended, and it is very possible that SilasBerta’s offense and Alicorn’s offense are about the same topic from different sides. If that is the case than my comment is probably out of place.
Why not?
In my opinion, getting offended by [topic] reflects a potential issue with [topic] that may be worth addressing. Ideally, the offense as a result of the [topic] should disappear due to either (a) [topic] becoming less offensive or (b) the offended becoming unaffected by [topic].
Being offended by being offended by [topic] can be resolved by resolving the first layer of offenses. If there is a problem with the initial offense, getting offended doesn’t actually help since the initial offense is not likely to be resolved with the secondary offense.
In addition, a terrible cycle can appear if the initial offended takes offense to the offensive of the initial offense. Granted, you do not always get to choose what offends you, but when dealing with multiple layers of offense I think it is best to deal with the initial offense.
So, perhaps “categories” can be replaced by “priorities.”
Not if resolving the first layer depends on resolving the second layer first. I.e. he can’t resolve his problem because he’s being silenced when he attempts to discuss it.
The first layer problem existed before the second layer problem did. Why would the second layer have to be solved first?
Also, silencing someone is not really the same thing as being offended.
Unless you are talking about a scenario where silencing someone is the solution to the original problem? In that case the second layer really has nothing to do with offense to offense.
I feel there may be a huge misunderstanding here. I wouldn’t be surprised if it was my initial comment’s assumption that the second offense was an offense to an offense.
Because they’ve become interconnected.
I’m viewing PUA discussions as part of the solution to SilasBerta’s problem. Imposing a ban on such discussions hinders SilasBerta, which is why he’s offended. Basically, a ban on PUA discussions is effectively a ban on part of the solution to SilasBerta’s problem.
Now, I’m not saying that Alicorn and SilasBerta are equally justified in their requests. But both need to be evaluated as valid concerns.
Hardly. It’s not like there aren’t plenty of other places on the ’net to get information, free or paid, and if he lives in or near a major metropolitan area there’s probably a “lair” he can join and the occasional professionally taught workshop or bootcamp.
Unless you’re looking for specifically rationalist-friendly information, this isn’t really the place to get it. It’s only on-topic here to the extent it’s relevant to various sorts of bias and akrasia issues. For example, the PUAs’ “3 Seconds Rule” is relevant to akrasia, and I almost brought it up in reply to the “It’s all in your head land” article, except that I’m really NOT wanting to start new PUA-related threads.
Well, a ban is a hindrance to the extent that a rationalist community could develop more rigorous and testable theories, and incidentally, they will probably weed out all of the misogynist and objectificationist (is there such a word?) stuff.
You must be new here. ;-)
All kidding aside, this community could develop plenty of rigorous and testable theories. It’s just incredibly doubtful that any of them would actually work in practice, for almost any definition of “work”, unless they were developed by people who already had practical experience.
In particular, this community is inflicted with massive “should” bias—i.e. confusing “ought” and “is”, while vehemently insisting that things that do work, shouldn’t, don’t work, should, and coming up with ludicrous explanations for both sets of falsehoods.
See, for example, the recent complaints about “marketing”; e.g. deriding breaking cryonics cost down to $1/day. There’s a reason marketers do that… and it’s because marketers have forgotten more than most people posting on this site have ever known about overcoming akrasia.
Because, if a marketer can’t overcome somebody’s akrasia enough to get them to shell out actual money, the marketer doesn’t get paid.
That’s why I group PUA and marketing under the same heading, of Arts That Work. When they’re too far wrong, the marketers don’t get paid and the PUAs don’t get laid, so there’s an inherent control over how far they can stray from the truth. This control does not apply so well to general works of self-help, or to armchair ev-psych theorizing. I actually learned far more about akrasia and motivation from marketers and PUAs than I ever did from self-help books or science papers.
(Btw, the scientific principle behind using per diem breakdown is incredibly relevant to any sort of personal change project, and it involves a statistical rule discovered by Prochaska, Norcross et al regarding the precise number of standard deviations in a person’s change of evaluation regarding the pros and cons of a decision that will make them shift from “contemplating” to “acting”… a rule that holds constant across a dozen different kinds of changes, such as quitting smoking, starting an exercise program, etc. Per diem breakdowns are just one of several tools that the adept marketer uses to prompt an individual to make this evaluation shift, though I don’t know of any marketers who’ve made the connection between this statistical rule and the relevant practices. They do know, however, that persuasion must occur in the same sequence that the Prochaska rule says it does.)
If this is the case, than he is not offended by Alicorn’s offense. He is offended by a ban on such discussions. Which makes sense and has nothing to do with the layers I was talking about.
Like I said, I think there is misunderstanding of my original comment. To reword this:
As this:
Might help.
Have I claimed to be “personally injured” anywhere? I don’t think I have, but if I said something that sounds like that, I’d like to know.
What I’m implying is that both you and SilasBerta are having a negative emotional reaction. Can you say your reaction is justified while his is not?
I don’t think I can answer that question unbiasedly, because SilasBarta routinely makes me very frustrated.
Said much more diplomatically than mine. Good job.