Talk:Pickup artist

This article was nominated for undeletion on 9 March 2006. The result of the discussion was allow recreation (details)

• Talk:Seduction Community/Archive1

If you are making a comment on the content of this article, we request that you please be specific about what you consider to be wrong with it. Vague comments such as 'this is becoming spam' are not helpful to anyone. -- Sasuke Sarutobi 10:54, 2 October 2006 (UTC)

Prominent Members Of the Seductin Community

"What about Doc Love and Don Steele?" (unsigned comment)

I've not heard of either, but I've not problem adding these people. I think we should, as a minimum criteria (as I explained elsewhere), use people/companies with a significant media pick-up. Why? Because these tend to be the legitimate players in the field. They also pass notability requirements outside of the community, which I think is important, as we seem to get crusading members of Wikipedia trying to get all our pages deleted!

WoodenBuddha 11:25, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

Agree with this. Let's stick with only notable members, and list them on a separate page (which might resolve link spamming and calls for deletion of this page). Maybe the minimum criteria can be that they are mentioned in Neill Strauss' book? DutchSeduction 22:57, 17 August 2006 (UTC)

DELETION

Wasn't this article deleted? I cannot find the record of the AfD debate, but I was sure this had been successfully extirpated. Based on the remarks below as well as the article itself, it looks like this should be brought to AfD for deletion discussion (again). Is there a compelling reason NOT to AfD this article? Eusebeus 14:22, 12 May 2006 (UTC) Upd; Ok, I found the deletion debate [[1]]; was this undeleted after review? Eusebeus 14:34, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

A previous version was deleted. Someone requested a deletion review, at which it was suggested to me to rewrite the page. So I did, and it was inserted. Nobody has really had a problem with the page so far, or at least not one that can be articulated. Vague accusations of "it's becoming spam" are not really very helpful, and no reasons have been given why the article is spam or specifically which parts of it are. I don't see how anything in the discussion below even remotely mandates deletion; it most seems to be a discussion of issues between two individuals that aren't anything to with wikipedia in the first place. Is there a compelling reason not to AfD this article? Yes. It is a notable subject, and it is verifiable (I explained this in the Deletion Review, and I provided extensive documentation of the notability of the seduction community, which is in the archive of this talk page). Some parts of the page are slightly NPOV, but the solution is to rephrase them, not delete the page. If you or anyone else has a problem with this page, how about stating what it is so that other editors and I have an opportunity to improve it, instead of going straight to AfD. --SecondSight 20:39, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

• • Thanks for your reply. How did this page get recreated? It failed an AfD, and it subsequently failed at deletion review. So that suggests this is material for a speedy delete as a recreation of a deleted article. You note: It is a notable subject, and it is verifiable... but I am unclear as to how this is notable. Eusebeus 03:33, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

At the deletion review, I was challenged to create a policy-compatible version of the article, which I attempted to do. At least one person who originally voted to keep it deleted was happy with my rewrite, and it was inserted by an editprotected request. As for the notability of the seduction community, I am unclear as to how it could not be seen as notable, given how widespread and influential it is. I've bent over backwards supplying reasons why it is notable, which are already well summarized on the archived talk page. I can only invite you to explain why you think this article doesn't satisfy wikipedia criteria for notability. --SecondSight 07:27, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

Eusebeus - are you trolling? I don't see how a rational person could find the subject of a New York Times Best-Selling book, and in-production $20m film to be non-notable. That's to say nothing of the fact that it's been covered in pretty much any newspaper with any worth - all the big ones in the UK have had articles, many American ones, as you can see from the MANY MANY citations. As far as speedy-deletion goes - the article is entirely different from the originally deleted one, as opposed to a resurected article - I'll leave the onus on you to review the speedy-delete criteria here, but feel free to see the comments for Real Social Dynamics, where someone attempted to misuse the same argument. WoodenBuddha 17:18, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

• I am not saying that the sad sickos who do this kind of thing are not notable as a cultural phenom, nor the books that such sadsacks produce, but I am not clear that this is the best place for the material; however, I will accept the arguments made above, particularly in light of the arguments made wrt to keeping (otherwise nn) non-accredited colleges. However, that said, recreating a deleted article - that has failed DR no less - is CLEARLY out of process! Eusebeus 02:13, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

Hi Eusebeus. Please familiarize yourself with WP:CIV. There's a whole bunch of resources for new wikipedians in the WP namespace that will help you to guide your contributions more productively in the future! Good luck! WoodenBuddha 02:52, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

I am unaware what I have stated that is in violation of WP:CIV, although I will apologise wihtout hesitation for any personal attacks I have made against you. (Nice little newbie jab, though - slick!) Can you answer my point, btw, about the AfD/DR content recreation falling O-o-P? Eusebeus 04:26, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

"Sad sickos" is never an appropriate epitat when discussing the subject/contributors of an article. Please try to be more civil in your future discussions. Also, the speedy deletion criteria only applies to a recreation of deleted content, it does not contradict re-writing an article on the same subject. As mentioned, the first article was deleted and was subsequently rewritten to conform to Wikipedia policies which is acceptable and not at all out of process. .:.Jareth.:. ^babelfish 06:20, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

Starting to become spam

I'm of the opinion this article is gravitating towards spam. --User:Formhandle

That's great sparky, but how about you be more specific, or refrain from adding mildly troll-like comments? WoodenBuddha 17:32, 29 April 2006 (UTC)

Not trying to troll, I just see see this article (and related articles) as an uphill battle for guys like you trying to keep the writing objective since a lot of the edits & revisions have been & will be guys who are trying to promote their sites & themselves. Let's face it, this article isn't like an entry for "Oceanography" or "The Battle of Bunker Hill". I would try to edit what I can when I find time but really do not want to get involved when its likely many would claim I can't be objective due to my involvement (wikipedia policies). My primary meaning in regards to "spam" is that the article (not just your version but past revisions by others & pre-deletion entries) seems to heavily lean towards the business slant of the topic which only leads to those who will then want to edit the page in that context to endorse themselves, even if it causes the context to be distorted *for example a comment included by "DutchSeduction" in one of his edits was an out-and-out absurd falsity yet he used it as a factor to support an edit. You can mail me privately about this if you want.--Formhandle 06:49, 30 April 2006 (UTC)

Formhandle, let's discuss out in the open. I've heard you are mailing and campaigning various people in favor of FastSeduction.com. Everyone recognizes it as one of the most important sites in the seduction community, so let's just tell it like it is with both pros and cons. Can you fill us in on what you specifically think is the reality about your site? It's common knowledge that Learn the Skills Corporation is your company and that it produces a significant income from traffic and advertisements on the site. Can you fill us in? DutchSeduction 11:33, 30 April 2006 (UTC)

Yes, let's discuss out in the open, DutchSeduction. Wikipedia clearly states that people involved in the subjects being written about should not be the writers, yet there you are hocking what you can for yourself. You also seem to have the habit of saying "I've heard..." and treat is as fact when you're just spreading something you know is BS. When you say "it's common knowledge", by whom? Anything you or anyone else wants to find out is right there out in the open, anyone who drops by the site will see all the disclaimers and statements. What else do you want to know? You want to see bank accounts? Tax filings? How crude. Go ahead and call it commercial, I don't care, that's not what this is about. You say "I've heard you are mailing and campaigning various people in favor of FastSeduction.com". OK, what does that mean? It's MY site. The URL is in my mail sigs. And weren't YOU the one who recently mailed ME to encourage me to promote a site of yours? Now that I see what your attitude is, why should I? You seem hell bent on trying to get people to favor you and are doing that somethines by being negative against others. When the Lairs in the Netherlands split and both sides came whining to me trying to get me to favor one or the other, I decided that since I didn't know the real story and both sides were claiming the same thing and saying the same negative things about the other, I would favor NEITHER of you and both would need to abide by the same guidelines when posting on mASF. That didn't seem to satisfy you. So somehow between that and your issues with the Lair stuff, you've become hell bent on some sort of "I'll get them all back" campaign. I suppose Wikipedia offers that to you, but don't expect me to see statements made by you which are totally fabricated and not say anything about it. You are the exact kind of person Wikipedia does not want editing articles.--Formhandle 18:02, 30 April 2006 (UTC)

Hi Formhandle, what you're writing doesn't make any sense to me. I don't have any political issues with you at all, and am not commercially involved in any of those organizations. (Please check my WP editing history on various articles. I have been involved in improving this article for a long time, even after it was successfully voted for deletion 9 months ago. At that time even mentioning FS.com at all was enough to have the article removed. Now it is prominently featured in several places.) In any case if there's any section of the article you think is inaccurate or can be improved in any way, I'm all in favor. I also support presenting your FastSeduction.com site accurately and respectfully. (It's a great resource.) If there are statements in any articles you think are incorrect, please highlight them. DutchSeduction 10:51, 2 May 2006 (UTC)

DutchSeduction, what you should do is click on the "history" tab and read your comment from April 8 (comment associated with the edit). The comment iself is not part of the article but you made a statement in there which was completely fabricated and used the statement as a basis for your claim to edit. I mean, if it was a little off I wouldn't bother but it's so far off base from reality that I'm wondering if you were on planet Earth when you wrote it.--Formhandle 02:22, 5 May 2006 (UTC)

I'm sorry if the comment associated with the edit offended you. That was never my intention. What the advertisers pay to place an ad on Fastseduction.com is beyond the scope of the article anyway. DutchSeduction 10:13, 5 May 2006 (UTC)

What definition of notable or non-notable do we want to use? The following gurus are reported by Neil Strauss as being excellent: IN10SE aka "Twotimer", Swinggcat aka "Grimble", PlayboyLA This might be interesting to WP readers. DutchSeduction 13:19, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

The criteria I used was "Could I create individual pages for these characters?". This leads to: "Do any of them have a presence outside of fs.com and their own web pages? Are there media articles about them we can link to?" The answer to which was no :-) I don't feel strongly about this issue, but that was the criteria I used - we have enough "funny names" in our commercial section - as a result, I don't feel a list of names is really helpful here. As I said tho, don't really care WoodenBuddha 23:21, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

I don't really care either, although I'm in favor of mentioning characters in Style's book. The fact that they aren't as aggressive with media and PR isn't an important criteria. I think their contributions to the community are what would make them notable. DutchSeduction 13:02, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

I just discovered the "seduction community" page. I say you guys keep In10se, Swinggcat, and Playboy LA in. I have been around the seduction community for quite awhile. I've had the chance to meet all three of them. I'd say each of them has made significant contributions to the seduction community which, I think, Strauss acknowledges. As for these guys having a web presence, each one has his own website. I just did a google search on Swinggcat and he's got articles all over the internet for whatever that's worth. .--Garlic200 14:14, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

What about starting an index of most notable members on a separate page? DutchSeduction 21:24, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

I would worry this would become list-cruft. What's the value of a list of names to someone who wants to find out about the community? WoodenBuddha 21:45, 24 May 2006 (UTC I don't care much about it either way. However, perhaps its better if spammers and seduction community marketeers had a separate place to direct their attention. As for the reader, it might be interesting for them to see how the various individuals are related to one another and the community if at all. DutchSeduction 11:54, 1 June 2006 (UTC)

The page is becoming a major target for link spam from obscure blogs, etc. DutchSeduction 19:27, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

References need cleaning

Some one needs to fix all the footers and references; at present they all look like a string of web-addresses.--Sadi Carnot 14:14, 26 April 2006 (UTC)

Pseudoscience Category

I removed the article from the Pseudoscience category. Although seduction borrows many ideas and methods from various sciences, it would be a massive generalization to say that the seduction community views itself as a science, so it cannot be called pseudoscience if it doesn't claim to be science. Yes, there are some people in the community who do make that claim, but they are usually trying to sell a product. It would be more accurate to call seduction as practiced in the community an advanced form of folk psychology, or maybe a protoscience. --SecondSight 20:55, 28 April 2006 (UTC)

Criticism

Removed the criticism section because the media coverage section already mentions that the community is described as misogynistic. Also, there were no references provided for those criticisms, which will not do ("many people" is not a reliable source). If someone wants to rewrite a criticism section, I would recommend that you start by looking through the published articles cited in the article, or listed in the talk page archive; they should provide plenty of negative things that are said about the community. --SecondSight 06:22, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

Problems with this article

Whilst I accept this should perhaps remain as a topic, the arguments made below to my initial objection haveing been noted, the current article is very flawed. It appears to have been written by people with a stake in the concept of The Game, whereas clearly this is about a psychopathic phenomenon. The current content does little to nothing to address this and, as such, fails any encyclopedic standard. This could be put up for peer review to garner more objective attention. Eusebeus 00:18, 22 June 2006 (UTC)

Actually, it is not clear at all that the seduction community is a "psychopathic" phenomenon. That is merely your point of view. (I do believe there are valid ethical objections to certain practices and ideas in the community, but that is a far cry from being related to psychopathy, which is a mental disorder.) Some criticisms of the community are indeed addressed in the article: "The seduction community has been branded as misogynistic, and a review of The Game characterizes the community as "a puerile cult of sexual conquest," and calls its tactics "sinister" and "pathetic."" Of course, this article merely scratches the surface of the community so far. If you have seen criticisms of the community from reliable secondary sources, you are welcome to add them into the article. If you want to see changes to the article, please provide specific criticisms of the article's actual content, rather than simply complaining of how the authors' biases don't match up with your own. --SecondSight 02:02, 22 June 2006 (UTC)

My own bias, having been reasonably described above, would preclude me from making edits that would likely be acceptable to the more committed editors of this article. I *do* think that this is psychopathic behaviour, but that does not of course mean that I am in any way correct. A peer review would garner this subject outside consideration from other parties and provide valuable feedback about this strange social phenomenon. Hence my suggestion. I assume no editor would have an issue about putting this up for PR....? Eusebeus 22:40, 22 June 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for clarifying. I would be fine with a peer review. --SecondSight 06:00, 23 June 2006 (UTC)

seperation of 'practices' into seperate article

since this article focuses on the community, not so much the techniques, it seems that further expansion of the "Practices" section should be made into a seperate article.

Agreed. We can do this when it gets longer. --SecondSight 21:45, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

It should really be done now. Every mention of a specific technique makes the article itself POV. Statements like "Most member of the community think X or do Y" is biased. We now have links to prominent community members. Just move each discussion of specific techniques or concepts to the prominent community member who practices that technique. DutchSeduction 14:26, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

New additions and POV phrasing

Casaniva, thanks for helping out with this page. Some of your edits have been great, like mentioning routines, patterning, and the social robot phenomenon. Some of your other edits I have reverted, because they are not written from a neutral point of view, which wikipedia requires, or because they don't cite sources (see the policies on WP:NPOV, and WP:V). I will go through most of these edits specifically:

From the part on negs, I removed this text:

They are often used to 'Kock a woman off her pedestal' and swallow up her self confidence. eg 'Did you leave your personality at home today?' This technique is widely disliked by women. It is not pleasent to be 'Negged'.

I also removed a description of negs as "insults." See the Mystery Method page which claims that they are not supposed to come off as insults. Negs are also not supposed to "swallow up her self confidence." If "Did you leave your personality at home today" is a neg from a specific pickup artist, we can mention it, but we should cite who it is from. Also, who says negs are "widely disliked by women?" I mean this literally, because you need to cite a source to make claims like that on wikipedia. If you want to put this claim back in the article, then you will need to cite a reference from a reputable secondary source per Wikipedia's verifiability policy. Also, claims like "it is not pleasant to be negged," are merely your subjective opinion, and consequently not encyclopedic.

From the part on C&F, I removed this:

The Pick-Up Community holds that arrogance is not a bad thing. Frequently saying 'Thank You' when accused of it.

Actually, many pickup artists say that arrogance is not the goal (see David DeAngelo's explanation of C&F on his page). Yes, saying "thank you" when accused of arrogance is a response that many pickup artists would use, but we should attribute it to whoever is advocating it before including it on the page (in the future, we might have a section on "shit tests" which could mention stuff like that).

From the routines part:

Many critics say that it is easier just to be oneself.

True, but we need to cite actual critics, instead of using weasel references to "many critics." (Tangentially, although "just be yourself" is often given as advice, it isn't particularly useful. Specifically, it is so ambiguous as to be almost meaningless. Furthermore, the men who would join the seduction community are often lacking in social skills, and many have been social isolated for much of their lives, so they have learned maladaptive social behaviors and mindsets. Consequently, "just be yourself" is terrible advice for them insofar as it encourages them to keeping doing what they are already doing. What they are already doing hasn't been working, which is why they are joining the community in the first place.)

From the patterns part:

designed to manipulate a woman's subconcious mind into supplication

First, I've taken out all uses of the word "manipulate" because it is generally not a neutral term. Also, I don't think it's true that the purpose of patterning is necessarily to induce supplication (though certainly some may have that goal).

From the field reports section:

Critics point out that this striving for conquest is not necessarily a good thing and that a woman finding herself mentioned on a field report would likely be extremely angry with the pickup artist. In some private forums ('Lounges') on the internet pick-up artists post up pictures of their conquests like trophies.

There are so many problems here: First, "critics": which critics? Second, you refer to the posting of field reports as "striving for conquest." That is merely your value-judgment on that practice (wikipedia is not about pronouncing whether anything is a "good thing" or not, though wikipedia does describe value-judgments from reputable secondary sources). It happens to correctly describe some pickup artists, but not others. I'm sure it's true that many women would be angry to find field reports about themselves, but we need a reference to include that in the article. Also, saying that pickup artists post up pictures "like trophies" is also biased phrasing. Certainly some may hold that motivation, but others may not.

In short, some of your edits have been very helpful, and please review the editing policies WP:NPOV and WP:V for the future. If you are looking for sources to cite claims from, then check out that sources already cited in the article, and those here. --SecondSight 21:45, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Like I've said above, discussions about C&F belong on the DeAngelo page, talk about Negs belongs on Style's or Mystery's page, etc. No specific technique is representative of "the community" as a whole. DutchSeduction 14:28, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

Why is Fight club pointed to in notable members?

Good catch. Fixed now. Tyler Durden is the nickname of Owen Cook, leader of Real_Social_Dynamics. DutchSeduction 14:22, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

Dutch seduction wars and the "official" lairlist

Obviously there is a fight in progress between www.nllounge.nl members and the www.DutchSeduction.com lair. This is why http://lairlist.com keeps being promoted by the wikipedia user DutchSeduction - which must be the PUA called "Stripped".

Here is something I found on a mailinglist (RunningaPUAgroup) I deem trustworthy today:

Lairlist.com is a hoax lairlist ran by stripped, bigbear, xtatic, and

his ten other aliases.

Stripped was kicked out of the dutch lair nllounge (first there was only one) and started his own lair at www.dutchseduction.com. Since then he has been terrorising the community claiming everywhere that our lair at www.nllounge.nl had no rights to exist and should be removed from the lairlist.

When stripped didn't get things his way, he started up www.lairlist.com, a list that is selective and does not include lairs that stripped is enemies with. (stripped is enemies with a lot of people).

Check for yourself at: lairlist.com is a selective list. Check

under 'the netherlands": our lair www.nllounge.nl is on not on it.

The original lairlist originated in the yahoo group called "RunningaPUAgroup" they use the database RSS feature to synchronize lair links. Various sites, including fastseduction.com or bristollair.com get their lair lists from here. www.lairlist.com is a censored rippoff from the original list and since the site got hacked a while ago it's not even possible to register your own lair there anymore.

To me it seems obvious, that lairlist.com is FUD and Spam and needs to go. --Eddy yosso 14:48, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

Clean-up tag?

I don't see any explanation on this talk page for the clean-up tag, so I will remove it in a few days unless someone gives some reasons why it should stay. --SecondSight 00:38, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

Have removed tag, started cleaning up article. Will do more. -- Sasuke Sarutobi 00:23, 2 October 2006 (UTC)

photos

http://puapics.white.prohosting.com/

has photos of the PUAs linked to on the template. since most of those pages lack photos, perhaps some of you with more wiki skills than me could add a few ?