271–280 of 322 posts
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All PUAs are assholes. Not all assholes are PUAs.
An interesting thought experiment would be to consider what you'd think of a female pick up artist.
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The whole PUA thing is about manipulating vulnerable people so you can have sex with them. No it isn't.
Yeah! It's about empowering socially awkward people who just have trouble holding conversations! That's why it's called "pick up artistry": because you're picking up conversations! Wait... --- I honestly wonder how far up your ass your head has to be to completely ignore just how saturated the PUA community is with terms designed to objectify, marginalize, belittle, and disparage specifically women, and just how many…
He didn't say the end goal is "picking up conversations". Mindcrime was almost certainly taking offense to the infantilizing attitudes expressed in the quote he included, not to its reference to sex.
For the most part, the end goal is sex, and sometimes it's long-term companionship. There's nothing wrong with either of those.
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I honestly wonder how far up your _ss your head has to be to completely ignore just how saturated the feminist community is with terms designed to objectify, marginalize, belittle, and disparage specifically men, and just how many of the highest regarded figureheads of the community are throbbing c_nts whose only goal in life is to find a modicum of self worth by pandering to the most cliche stereotype of fragile, vulnerable femininity.
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See? It's easy to disparage large groups!
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> You have to consider any situation holistically. What you call exploitation is often a tremendous improvement over the alternatives those folks have in their countries of origin. To consider the situation holistically would mean to look at the global system of capitalism bootstrapped by years of outright colonization and exploitation that lead to the situation where doing low-skilled manual labour is considered an…
This is Armenian Radio. Caller asks us, what is difference between capitalism and socialism? We reply, under capitalism, man exploits man; under socialism, it's just the opposite.
As for the more fundamental question of "why can't we just all get along?" -- we'll just have to keep working on it...
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Low level cruise employees ... are paid ridiculously low wages The service staff work for tips. No wages. No benefits. I was shocked when I first heard this. I asked around, a lot. Everyone confirmed. I personally hate the cruise ship experience. The master/servant dynamic makes me very uncomfortable.
I love it how everyone is extrapolating their personal cruise ship experiences -> every cruise ship in the world ever.
That their working conditions are only mostly terrible is sufficient for me to act on my values.
I'll give analogy. WalMart screws their workers, their suppliers, and their host governments (and by extension us tax payers). Not in every case. But enough to piss me off.
So, yea, I'm not shopping at WalMart. Maybe they're not all bad. Sorting it all out is too much work. Especially when I have plenty of options that are mostly good.
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One big difference between PUA culture and startup culture is that the former is generally more expressly proud of its misogyny.
I know I will get downvotes for this... But "here comes the shaming language" ... Let me know when you are as equally hard on women for learning all the PUA tip-equivalents (for their gender) from age 5 onwards, through to the Vogue Teen and then the Cosmo years. EVERY SINGLE women's magazine you see on the shelves at the supermarket, has the equivalent of "PUA tips and tricks" in every issue. Such as "how to make hi…
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An interesting reply. But doesn't seem to address anything about the question I posed and more an attempt to throw a positive spin on PUA. I mean, what you suggest here is that people are manipulative and sad before they become involved in the PUA community, and that the joining of said community is an attempt to free them of these negative traits? I get confused by this logic because as far as I can tell the PUA com…
Some people seem to be able to learn how to socially interact on their own. Others need coaching. Is it dishonest if it is coached? All social interactions at some level of depth eventually involve pursuasion of a sort. The question is when does that become unethical?
Truly A question we all must answer for ourselves.
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Generalizing about groups can be problematic. However, not so when you're generalizing based on what the group has in common. The whole PUA thing is about manipulating vulnerable people so you can have sex with them. It's definitionally assholish. Assuming that a given PUA is an asshole is like assuming an Englishman speaks English. It's not a perfect correlation, but it's certainly the way to bet.
I know some awkward nerdy guys who took up DJing partly so that people in clubs open to casual sex would find them interesting and choose them over others. Does this make them assholes? PUA strikes me as a "sales and marketing" technique to advertise yourself as an interesting casual sex partner. There are some asshats who manipulate, but then there are also high-pressure salespeople who manipulate; that doesn't make…
It's not cool. Yes, learn social interaction. Yes, learn how the other sex work. Yes, learn how they think. But PUA isn't this: it's gaming women for sex.
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Can't tell if trolling or serious... Take a train.
He's serious, and so am I. Trains go on rails, so a driverless car can go many places trains can't. Can't wait for it to become reality either. Like in Children of Men, but with time better.
If you haven't read it, in the book, there are numerous driverless cars that operate a bit like taxis: you can hail one or you can summon one. They take you to your destination, and then rejoin the pool of free cars that are ready to take people places.
There's a minor plot point where one of the characters fights with the embedded logic of the car, which refuses to take him where he wants to go (and indeed refuses to just "stop the damn car so I can get out" since he wants to get out along the shoulder of a freeway on-ramp or something like that).
Vinge's driverless cars are neat (I would be 99% happy with them) but they subvert the automobile's typical role in American society: rather than being an enabler of rugged independence, it only allows you to go where the state says you may go.
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Can't tell if trolling or serious... Take a train.
In the US, even if you are willing to deal with the vagaries of erratic schedules, long-distance trains are problematic for the kind of hacker tourism that many on HN might be interested in, but still doable. Some observations to share from my own experiences: Multi-day long-distances are best experienced in a cabin with a shower facility. These cabins get booked out a month or longer in advance. This cuts down on th…
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I am annoyed with this comment. You do not seem to realise that there are many parallels between the "PUA" community and the startup community. Both are about people striving to meet their goals. You should read "The Game", by Neil Strauss. He documents the process of becoming a pickup artist, the people he met, the stages he went through. And as you read it, you will realise something - the only surefire way to beco…
The climax of the book was when Neil realized that indoctrinating yourself into the PUA community creates strange, robot like humans incapable of real connections and that lasting relationships are based on having real substance behind the facade and tricks of the PUA community. It's strange how half the people who read this book ended up infatuated with the over-glamorized lifestyle of the "pickup artist" and missed…
Yes, he realised that the culture of trying to trick women into bed via tricks or routines was wrong, and the people who went down that path had flawed, weak personalities. It's interesting that on HN we tend to laud people who try to "hack the system" - but it's a shortcut, it's not real, and even if you succeed you can't handle it when you get there.
He realised that the real way to "win" women was to be yourself, the very best version of yourself you could manage. That is the central truth to which I was trying to refer. If you want to get the girls, be cool and confident and popular and successful. If that doesn't drive at least 50% of the startup community then I don't know what does.
I think we actually agree, except you have picked up a negative bias somewhere that I don't have. I liked that book very much. I have never been, nor want to be, a "PUA" but by god do I understand the sentiment.