Time Line
What was first? Chicken or egg? Pickup or The System? And what is better? To answer these questions, we have to travel into a past first...
On September 1958, a boy was born. Later, he went famous under the name of Ross Jeffries.
Only three years later, i.e. in 1961, in Fresno State College, we can find today's DocLove, at that time as Thomas Hodges, as he begins his search for an answer to a question: what motivates a woman to stay with a particular man? For years later, he improves his method with a key question "Why do you stay with one man versus another?" instead of still popular and bad results giving "What do you want from your man?". At that time, he was known as LoveCop.
In 1970, Eric Weber publishes a book named "How to Pickup Girls" [34] that introduces the Pickup" term on the dating scene. There's no problem to encounter an opinion that this book contains just the common-sense stuff. Even if we make a small trip into the year of 2002, to check newer edition of the book, it is still behind The System that is about to be published yet. An interesting moment came, when Style interviewed Eric [35]. Eric openly declared his goal – the long-term relationship. Pickup was not designed as a tool to get laid primarily, a tool it became over the time.
It took twenty years to finish The System [2], so you can count the years by yourself. We may assume that DocLove read Eric's book [34], yet there's no evidence. But for sure, DocLove was aware of Ayn Rand.
In the early 80', two men appeared on the scene. First of them is R. Don Steel, author of a book for men over 35 on seducing a younger woman. The book was published in 1987 and he was affected by Ayn Rand's work.
The second man was nobody else but Ross Jeffries with his approach based on NLP. However, I can't help myself but to state that his successful actions, as they are described in [35], are in accordance with The System, although he perhaps proceeded on behalf of another belief. In late 80', he founded the pickup community [35] and the discussion group named alt.seduction.fast has been found.
Next, people came onto the scene in a fast pace – Mystery, who discovered alt.seduction.fast while making Mystery Method, Mystery's student Style, Ross's disciple DeAngelo and others.
As a next evolvement of Pickup, Real Social Dynamics came to include Pickup, but not to be about seduction only. In The System, there is a clearly written acknowledgment that the knowledge will spill into other areas of your life as well. Yet, DocLove has not come with a catchy name. See, Social Dynamic is a regular, existing scientific discipline that has its deserved credit because of being the true science [36] (prior marking Pickup as a science, please be so kind and follow the link first – especially for this purpose, I chose an on-line available article).
However, The System [2] is no science as well. Respectively, DocLove gave no scientific sources as I did with the Theory of Interest. The key benefit of The System is the idea of quantifying the interest level. This was the corner stone of the Theory of Interest.
As said, making The System took 20 years. Note the huge advancement in the pickup teaching, since The System was said to be complete. The System and Pickup have a lot in common. Is it a coincidence?
Coincidence?
How about starting with the field report? Even the ancient Egyptians kept records about crops and Nile's water level. A quiz question: What is depicted on wall paintings in the Abu Simbel temple? Just skip the word battle;-)
Moses had not traveled the desert with Israelites, because he was ashamed to show in a city with them. He wanted them to earn the Promised Land so they would not leave it as soon as they get used to it. Do you see the similarity with a woman that has to earn you by chasing you – the Challenge? And how about the story about Šárka and Ctirad from 7th century that was mentioned in the article about naïve men and feministas? The important information are known for more than thousand years.
Any man, who ever tried to impress a woman, judged his progress somehow. How about a small quiz?
What is the meaning of IOI, aka Indicator of Interest? The same as the Buying Signal in The System.
FMAC (Find, Meet, Attract, Close) – speaking freely: find her, say hello, rise her interest level and ask for her phone number. Oh, thanks for Mystery. I would never ever figure that out by myself:-O Is that given by my knowledge of finding a critical path in a directed graph with weights, or is that given by a simple fact that it always goes in this sequence? Respectively FMACA – it is expected that you try to increase her interest level after closing.
Staring at a woman you would like to meet, do you consider it as classy? Do you consider it as an effective solution? How about the common sense? Is it better to walk up to her and say hello? There is a 3seconds rule being attributed to Mystery – you have to approach her within three seconds. Who will be the first one to find a similarity with The System [2], where DocLove quoted a fictional Eddie? Or, who will find even an older publication? Unless he would be able to figure it on his own...
Staring is rude and it shows her that you are a creep. Smile and walk up to her.
Fast Eddie Love
By the way, have you ever thought why is Eddie called Fast? ;-) What prevents us from considering Mystery's rule as nothing but an application of Eddie's rule? Well, in the case that we take the three seconds as a fixed limit. Otherwise, it is obviously the same.
And how about DeAngelo? He propagates his Cocky&Funny method and himself as an author. I'm not quite convinced yet... – he says: have self-confidence and be funny. Is this really his invention? I have some doubts about it. Just by remembering Charlie Chaplin's Great Dictator movie from '40, DeAngelo has not invented this. He was not even born and Charlie used it to make a movie. In StarTrek, I could explain this with a time travel, but without...?
Let us stay a little longer with DeAngelo, who speaks about Attraction. It is pretty similar to DocLove's Interest Level and other ideas we can found in The System [2]. Just replace rapport with her interest level, attraction with your capabilities and consider a motivation of a mercenary and voila. You've got, what The System described before DeAngelo, not speaking about the fact that The System has a math model for the interest level – though simple, but it is there. On the other hand, I recognize that rapport and attraction are terms from Neuro-Lingvistic Programming, which originated in '70 and he met it as Ross' disciple. In 1988, it has been shown that data on NLP success were distorted [117, 118]. Given NLP claims were not successfully defended to scientific community up to date [96, 97].
Two steps forward, one step back. I've heard that DeAngelo is the author, but I've heard the same about Carlos Xuma as well. In a principle, it is the same as Swinggcat's 101 and Style's Push/Pull. What a coincidence... And how do we explain a following citation from The System? At Challenge, among others, there is written:
You go in slowly, stop, and back up slowly, and she goes bananas!
Mystery and his Cat (string) theory? Until she has not caught the prey, she continues to play. Aka, her interest level starts to drop, once she is sure of you. Do you know, who described this some years before Mystery? DocLove? Correct – Challenge.
Each of you can read The System and see the Pickup technology to be described in The System that is older than the Pickup community. It is ironic that both, Eric Weber and DocLove, pursue the same goal - a monogamous long term relationship. There are some pickupers, who don't like DocLove, they label him as AFC and it results into an even greater irony – this so-called AFC described their working principles.
History Parallels
Darwin and Wallace formulated a theory (about evolution, of course, not about Pickup;-) and they knew about each other, despite their different social class, distance over continents and with communication tools of time 200 years ago. Could that be that PUAs were not able, not mentioning the Internet, to learn about DocLove's work and to see the "accidental" similarity with their very own eyes? I don't buy that.
John Dunlop was not the first one, who invented a tire, as James Watt was not the first one, who constructed a steam engine. Construction and market played the key roles. Could this be the Pickup's case? I don't buy this too as they make fundamental errors and use selective proofs to support their theories such as The Peacock Theory that is discussed in the "Evolution Biology" article.
I understand that people of a good will are not so much after historical details, if it works form them. Nevertheless, they should be concerned. Of course, it is a matter of moral, fact that expert is not afraid to cite, etc., yet there is one more important reason:
There is a real danger that interpreted information won't be interpreted correctly – mistakes are being made, they accumulate in time and you're the one, who's gonna pay for that. And as you could see in the article about evolutionary biology, or here, this happens with Pickup.
Understand that Pickup is not about long-term relationship, it is about sex. As The System describes other women than The Good Ones (Miss Right), it opens a possibility to use its knowledge for Pickup's goals. Just to eliminate safety mechanisms, which The System contains to assure that you end up with Miss Right.
To use Pickup is like trying to use The System, i.e. The Theory of Interest as well, but accordingly to a manual with missing pages. In The System, there is information, which pickupers got rid of.
Accordingly to The System, there's no point in trying to get every babe, yet Pickup does that. Just remember what I wrote in the "Evolutionary Biology" article, when I discussed results of such behavior. And then, compare it with information in Style's The Game [35]. You'll find a match.
I'll show you one more example from history – a military nuclear program of Soviet Union. What stood behind their progress? Espionage.
And a small quiz for hard-core pickupers: Don't you think that Mystery's The Peacock Theory has absolutely nothing in common with Ross Jeffries' teaching on wearing at least one unusual thing to step out of the mass? ;-)
Few Myths for a Show
In Pickup, woman ranking goes from ugly UG1 to a hot babe HB10. They completely ignore her personality*, including her preferences on a physical outlook. Perhaps, that's the reason, why they insist that Pickup masters can get any woman. Non-sense. Not every babe would find you physically attractive to her and not every babe would be available for you – she already might have a boyfriend and be loyal, for instance. No more reasons are needed to see that you cannot have every woman that exists. As a maximum, you can have every woman, you decide to approach. Yet, we cannot guarantee even that. But, why is that possible theoretically? It is because there's a pre-filtering being done, sometimes subconsciously.
* May be, a criticism was too much that some pickupers consider 6 as neutral (why not 5.5 as they use the decimal point?), until they check her personality. Well, for a while it looked hopefully, but then I found that e.g. cheer lady has a worse rating than stripper that has a worse rating than a next-door girl that could be a model.
Consider an extreme condition – let him open at least 30 pairs, which walks together with their in hands in back pockets of each other. Statistically taken, from thirty girls, at least one of them would be Miss Right (with a high interest level under such circumstances). I agree, it is extreme, but it clearly shows the importance of pre-filtering. Disable the pre-filtering and his reported closing ratio would drop down.
Style supplied two demonstrations of the pre-filtering in [35]. First one, you ask a group on how they know each other. If your target is in a serious relationship, you eject not to ruin their happiness. It is so nice and considerable. Yet, as we look at the previous paragraph, isn't it just a virtue for a shift? Don't get me wrong, I don't say that it is impossible to seduce her anyway. It is, but not always. So sour face a bighead wears, when he is politely, but firmly rejected, despite he was feeling so sure about his victory.
Second demonstration is Mystery's weak point – strip bars. He had a list of strip club rules that pretty much guaranteed him at least a phone number every time [35]. Think for a while – what kind of women do you find at such places?
De facto, Push/Pull and all negs, in their idea, present a filter. It is just like a bad understanding of being Challenge [2]. Once she is 100% sure that you won't leave her, her interest level will start to drop. Do not push her and let her to chase you. Yet, there's one big BUT – The System behaves consistently. In examples, Pickup keeps talking about fake nails, or about another woman wearing the same clothes. In other words, you want her, you like her look so much so that your criticize her. Very consistent, indeed. If they would rather find a time to realize that she might answer politely, but think something unpleasant of them.
The more attractive woman, the less probability of her being used to hear "no" and being criticized. The trick is as following: at least a little bit intelligent woman knows, when you put her down on a purpose. If she has self-esteem, she won't put herself with it and the easiest way is to leave you. Or, she can play with you in return...
False Disqualifier is another filter that shows why Miss Right would leave you. The idea is to disqualify yourself on a purpose for a woman you want. It is just astonishing, how many people find it logical. Just for sure, let us take a particular example – you are supposed to wear socks with holes. Of course, author of this non-sense knows, what a great idea it is and how it's gonna help ya'. In the first place, you let her know that you are a slapdash person. And it goes with the idea – you disqualify yourself. In the second place, Miss Right gives some time to a thought of what kind of family you are from. In a normal, functional family, it is common that parent teach their children not to dress like a ragamuffin. And at the third, she starts to think, why she should be with you.
Human brain has a tendency to accept an obvious explanation [37, 38, 39], without asking an analytical questions such as I did in previous paragraphs. As an example, take celebrities standing in the lime light. If you use some technique and you get some woman, you have a tendency to believe that you've got the kind of person you wanted. "Obvious" explanations are not always the correct ones – once upon a time, Sun orbited around the flat Earth.
Relationship
Although Pickup is not about a long-term relationship, time to time, somebody might try to talk you into an idea, how Pickup is about a long-term relationship and how it values women. Or somebody might serve you a nice, politically correct story, how it is going to improve your life. For these reasons, I evaluate it accordingly to its actual teaching, not what is being told. Take its highest goal – FC with HB10 and the LTR in a Pickup way gets cracks. The highest goal is to have a sex at a first encounter with woman so beautiful as much as possible. I still don't see any effort for a quality, long-term relationship. However, having FC repeatedly while one waits flutters many egos – There is no 'ctrl' button on Chuck Norris's computer. Chuck Norris is always in control.
Do I hear that some of them are really concerned about LTR? Franco, for instance? If he would understand that so much, he would have to change Pickup success rating in the first place. Woman that let her getting laid with a complete stranger is not quite a guarantee of a quality long-term relationship. Take a look of what Franco writes about himself at his website. You'll find some wonderful, and I would say fantasy, statements there. For instance, he made hundreds of women happy since his 17. In present time, he is 45. Hundreds is a plural, thus at least 200 in 29 years. Calculate it over and you'll get 7.54 weeks per one woman in average. These are even not two months. Until you have two months over, you cannot seriously start talking about having a relationship. And if those hundreds would be 400, we talk about less than 4 weeks per one woman – and we still assume a zero time transition time from one woman to another.
Even pickupers, including PUAs, are only people and as such, sooner or later, they'll long for a long-term relationship. Some would never figure out that something's wrong, some would. As an example, we can take Style and Lisa Leveridge. She found him physically attractive, but the Pickup's heritage in him was too strong to keep her personal interest level high. He got to the point, when he clearly realized that Pickup left him unprepared for somebody like Lisa:
All the ten-night stands and threesomes in the world wouldn't be enough to get me over my one-itis. The PUAs were wrong.
Pickupers
Some pickupers act as fanatics and PUAs like Mystery are un-impeachable gods for them. This article is not intended for these people, as it would be nothing but a waste of time.
I've not seen an article like this one. So, for one or another reason, even smart people practice Pickup as they don't know everything about it.
In The Game, Style describes as he used few openers and all he got was "We've already heard this one.". Except cases such as "What's your (home) phone number?", The System, and The Theory of Interest, they do not prescribe the exact words – see "Too Shy to Approach a Woman?" article. I see Pickup as an attempt to implement some ideas of The System in practice.
To have some fun, you're gonna enjoy the ride. Nevertheless in the big picture, the overall goal matters. Are you after sex, or a relationship? Pickup or The System? That's the point of view I found in the internet discussions. Pickup presents one night stands, so it is said to be about seduction. DocLove talks about relationships, so The System is said to be for the long-term.
The desire for a long-term relationship will get you one day. To some people, it will be a shock. So, what are you gonna do then? Will you be ready, or will you blow it up? The key is that a working principle can be verified with the scientific method. Neither Pickup nor The System stand up to the scientific standards.
Some pickupers have my respect for respecting my view, despite the fact that they don't like it much. They realize that the present state effectively degrades entire Pickup to nothing more than a pseudoscience. They will be either able to stop the process, or they will be left with nothing else, but to bear up with Style's ex-opinion. In 2006, Stylelife Academy was born to teach you Pickup, so that he abandoned the opinion:
To win the game was to leave it.
To prevent a misunderstanding, I recommend reading The Game – until the end, prior making a conclusion.
Picture: Style and Lisa Leveridge. Before the breakup.
