Hortense of Jezebel has a great post reviewing worst-person-in-the-world candidate Dr. Pat Allen’s new dating-advice book The Truth About Men Will Set You Free: ...but first it’ll p*ss you off!
EL: How important is being in good shape?
Dr. PA: The best bodies get the best money. It’s based on statistics. Rich women are thin unless they’re from another culture where men have freedom to have many women.
In other words the dating goal for women is men with money, the dating goal for men is women with (locally) prized bodies.
Digging deeper into the Examiner interview I also find
EL: Do men really care what you’re wearing?
Dr. PA: If he just wants sex he doesn’t care what you’re wearing. If you have a vagina that’s all he cares about. But if he’s looking for someone to relate to then he cares. Think like you’re going to an interview.
This is actually half true. In my experience men who want sex won’t much care what you’re wearing, true. But in my experience men who want someone to relate to won’t much care much what you’re wearing either. It’s not that we won’t notice what you’re wearing, it’s that it would probably be a mistake to waste a lot of time picking exactly the right thing on our behalf.
There’s more though
EL: What are some tricks of the trade?
Dr. PA: Ask for help. Or make comments. But don’t personalize it. Don’t move on him and don’t interview him. Men like to help. Hide your Thomas Guide.
And WTF with the “going to an interview” thing? It’s all sort of the women’s equivalent of PUA advice for men. Yes, if your purpose is to “get” someone then, for men and women, it might be helpful to behave as if you were interviewing for a job. But being a boyfriend/girlfriend… being a partner isn’t a position like coffee-urn attendant or tonsorial artist.
Except, evidently, in Pat Allen’s universe.
And towards the end the gloves come off — she really is just dispensing PUA-for-women
EL: Is there a Secret Weapon that will secure a first date?
Dr. PA: Look for five seconds and then smile. Unless you have something to say that’s innocuous. Be approachable. Smile. Desensitize him so he knows I’m friendly but that you’re not going to pursue him. Keep on being friendly. Then it’s easier for him to approach you.
Seems to me what we need is a book called something like “How to Land a Pickup-Artist and Live the Lie You’ll Both Love.” It would have advice about how to recognize PUA techniques and respond positively to them! Because, seriously, it might be easier to help people who want to live that way hook up with each other than to convince them it’s neither necessary nor particularly fulfilling to do so.
!@$~!#%
Submitted by 3146 (not verified) on Sun, 2009-08-23 20:30.
I hate books & advice columns like that. "Oh look at how hip & edgy I am, I am going to give you so much sex advice and if it pisses you off it's totally not because what I say is completely based in stereotypes and impractical and out of reach and worthless tripe, it's because you're just so sensitive!"
And then people emulate that approach...
Submitted by 3146 (not verified) on Mon, 2009-08-24 13:06.
Goodness, it's like "whatever you do, DON'T EVEN THINK about trying to communicate honestly, but always shroud your intentions and desires all the way!"
Submitted by 3146 (not verified) on Mon, 2009-08-24 19:56.
The thing about dating advice (all of it, seemingly), is that it basically encourages everyone to be a douchebag.
My theory is that all Dating Experts are actually closet misanthropes.
Submitted by 3146 (not verified) on Mon, 2009-08-24 20:46.
I think men on dating sites do want you to come for the interview. On the other hand its more like an interrogation, 30's rat-a-tat style.
[Hi Five. I didn't realize just how far from the dating scene I really am till the other day when someone from a meet-up group I met at a dinner party mentioned my wedding ring. If you're looking for relationships that's probably a pretty important clue about someone else's relationship status. :-) Note: *I* wasn't there with the meetup group. And by the way I'm now really curious whether those are an effective way around the formal dating process. --fl]
Submitted by 3146 (not verified) on Mon, 2009-08-24 22:29.
I mean, yes, superficial commonalities of the type that might be revealed in an interview-style interrogation might be one basis of rapport, but this advice seems aimed at those who don't yet know how to gain rapport. Also, I don't really think you'll get far trying to convince people who value certain things (looks, money) not to value them, and I don't think a great crusade to get them to recognize that those things aren't essential to having ANY relationship AT ALL is going to work. People who are fixated on NEVER getting what they want are goal-oriented in the extreme, and many, many people who aren't good at getting natural rapport (due to lesser innate attractiveness, for example, or less experience pacing themselves in conversation, appearing too eager or too distant) are familiar with "failing the interview", due to something like a stain on a shirt or being insufficiently shaven in a facial or axillary sense that day. In short, the closer you are to the prevailing paradigm, the more you're forgiven lapses in compliance, and frankly there is no real "cure" for the success/attractiveness correlation for those who are not conventionally-successful or conventionally-attractive, except perhaps Sour Grapes and a lot of trumpeting of the supposed virtues of whomever one happens to wind up with, which no one with someone conventionally-hot or -successful will ever care about.
Submitted by 3146 (not verified) on Tue, 2009-08-25 08:37.
And by the way I'm now really curious whether those are an effective way around the formal dating process.
Around? My personal experiences have been an attempt to use those (Meetup groups or dating sites, since your comment was ambiguous) as a way into the formal dating process: use them as a way to meet someone whom you then ask out on a date.
But then again, I do nicely fit the "slightly socially awkward straight male who's known nothing but rejection" mold, so either it is ineffective at just that or I am doing it wrong.