Dear Chump,
As a matter of fact, I’ve had a few e-mails fired my way from purveyors of such seminars. Let me share a quote from an “executive live in-field dating coach” at one of these so-called seduction institutes. In it he refers to the techniques taught by his group as “scientifically based on sound scientific principles of female psychology and biology as to what traits women are sexually responsive to autonomously.” Maybe I’m misunderestimating how his flow comes across in person, but around here fancy words are not like margarita ingredients—you can’t just throw a bunch of them in a blender and come up with something that makes girls take their pants off.
Guys making themselves middlemen between other guys and pussy is nothing new. It’s called pimping. And I’m sure you’ve looked at these sites and seen that these dudes are not all misogynistic dirtbags. There is simply a quality about their desired interactions with women that speaks to a hyper-acquisitive harem mentality leaving real connection (including being a truly satisfied and satisfying lover) out of the equation.
Yes, there’s a lot that’s odious about it—the macho and discrepant attitudes towards women (they’re impossible to pick up yet they’re all there for the taking). The interest in scoring rather than relating (bragging about bagging a nurse not because you’re happy to finally have someone to talk to but because nurses are educated and still fell for your shit anyway). The perverse enjoyment in getting a girl to do something she wouldn’t ordinarily do and possibly to her degradation (very Girls Gone Wild, and on that note please read Claire Hoffman’s fucking brilliant L.A. Times piece about GGW president Joe Francis at www.latimes.com/features/magazine/west/la-tmgonewild32aug06, 0,2664370.story).
Despite all this, what bugs me most about these one-eyed snake oil salesmen is how they manipulate men. They take shy, bookish, genuinely sexy geeks (probably not unlike yourself) and with zoological and military rhetoric, turn them into unctuous, angry sexsoldiers smeared in hair pomade, wearing iridescent sunglasses and smelling like they were in an explosion at the Karl Lagerfeld factory.
Do I think their tactics are effective—like, will you get laid? Sure, but in one sense that’s directly related to the women they have you shining your Grandmaster Flash on. In the end, all I see is you fumbling for your glasses in the morning while some screeching hellcat comes into focus above you with a G-string hanging out of her low-rise jeans yelling about how classy she is and how she doesn’t usually do this sort of thing. You need a high-priced seminar to pick up girls with low self-esteem? Does it come with a restraining order? I like skanky club babes as much as the next person, but why should you give $1,200 to some guy to learn how to get with them? Get out a calculator. That’s like, nearly five bonks with a foxy, professional hooker that doesn’t get all bejiggity because she fucked you on a first date (and the next four ones). While you’re having sex with her, ask her what she finds attractive about men. She’s been with a lot more than these dudes have. I call that killing two birds with one bone.
All truth-in-kidding aside, you’re having trouble “flirting” because you’d probably rather die than grab some woman’s hand in a bar and start telling her fortune (actual advice on one of these sites). Perhaps you also feel the kind of women you’re attracted to will find these tactics embarrassing and puerile. I won’t let these guys have you, Chump, I simply won’t! You have charm that they don’t see and they will strip it all away for something irrelevant and hollow. So how would I suggest cultivating it? Look into Ducky Doolittle’s book and approach at www.duckydoolittle.com. Though Ducky focuses primarily on sexual health and pleasure, she loves men and she treats them with warm respect. She doesn’t bark at them that they’re wussies just because they feel awkward around women.
