June 25, 2009

Duck, duck, duck... goose!

The principle of feigning disapproval is something that all pickup artists emphasize, but with younger girls you have to make it more clear that you're just teasing and not so serious. They're more neurotic, and so more easily shut down by disapproval. As long as they're pretty sure that you're not seriously scolding them, girls love being teased.

Sure, they'll respond with, stoooooop! you're meeeeeean! But they'll have a smile on their face, a giggle below their voice, and a longing look in their eye. A guy who's desperate would never risk insulting her, so they infer your status from the apparent risk you're taking.

It's even more true when they are too physically forward, and you pretend they're moving too fast or haven't won you over enough to be that aggressive. Again, the desperate loser will act like he's just won the lottery -- "dude, that chick just touched my arm!" -- and once she picks up on this, it's game over.

One of the greatest tests is when, in a public venue, a girl puts her hands where you imagine a therapist might say, "Now show me where the bad girl touched you..." It's not as easy to deliver the standard line, "Hey, that's five dollars for every time you touch me, you know..." in a collected manner.

For some reason, I'm quite prone to getting my butt grabbed by girls in a nightclub. It's like approaching a girl cold -- no matter how many times it happens, there's still an initial shock as your mind races about how to respond. Actually, the first time, the girl gave me a nice open-palm smack. (It was this girl at the teen dance club, in fact.) The next several times, it was again a couple of high school girls who attacked me drive-by style at the club. They looked over their shoulder mischievously as they passed me, wanting to be caught so that I could give them that stern "why is your hand in the cookie jar?" look.

I can only imagine what a trip to Barnes & Noble would be like if the mall were darkly lit and packed with people.

It may be hard for guys to grasp how pent up with sexual tension the average teenage girl is. But if you remember being in their room when you were a teenager, or if you've seen any of them in their room on a YouTube video or something, you can't help but notice how covered their walls are with pictures and posters of hot boys. It isn't so different from the guy's room with all the swimsuit models on the walls. Fast-forward to when she's 25, and those posters are nearly all gone. By 30, for sure. For the social scientists, this would be an interesting way to measure female libido across the lifespan, aside from hormone levels or whatever -- what percent of their walls' area is devoted to pictures of boys?

Last week at '80s night, I decided to add something in addition to the mock-stern look and/or words to follow it up. I heard a group of girls screaming behind me -- all roughly 18 and just out of high school, probably there to have some good memories of their last summer before college. Or hell, they could've talked their way in and only been 17.

Figuring that they were just yelling to signal their fun level, and knowing not to spin around anyway, I paid them no mind. And then -- did one of them just grab my ass? It wasn't bold enough for me to tell. After all, I was in a really packed area where people are walking by all the time. Pinch! Grab, grab! Now there was no mistaking it. I could feel hands coming in from at least two different girls, a couple times each.

Without turning around, I twisted my upper body a bit toward them, and looked over my shoulder to give them the usual fake disapproval look. That's usually enough to satisfy their thrill -- they got caught. But this time I added the "shame, shame" gesture by shaving one forefinger with the other.

omigod, it like totally wasn't me! one said with an anxious smile. no, i mean, like omigod i'm serious... I couldn't have cared less whether it was her or her friends, as they were all pretty young, full of energy, and half-naked.

Unlike all other instances, this time after my mock disapproval they started going at it even harder -- grab, grab, grab! pinch pinch! (Seriously girls, I'm not just an object. I mean, at least be polite and ask my name before you goose me.) There's something in that "shame, shame" gesture that pushed them over the clitoral boner threshold. I'll have to remember that for the next time.

Aside from this lesson, you can also take away from this a pretty good opener, used in the right venue. It has to be a darkish bar or nightclub, somewhere where it's conceivable that a girl might grab your ass stealthily as she passed behind you. After walking near her, act like you just recognized where you saw her before -- "Hey, are you the girl who just grabbed my butt (ass) back there?" You're demonstrating value -- even if you don't have a sculpted butt, she'll still infer that you have something about you that makes other women want to make a bold move on you. She'll say it wasn't her, of course, but you reply simply with, "I didn't catch who it was, but she looked kinda like you." Make a cocky/funny segue about how awful it is that women treat you as a mere sex object, that they don't value you for your brains and charm instead, bla bla bla, and then you're into the conversation.

4 comments:

  1. It really does help to have a rehearsed response to affectionate contact initiated by a girl. Ignoring it is only slighty better than being dumbfounded like a deer in the headlights is or saying something stupid like "wow, thanks". My line is "Easy (as in 'easy there, girl', not 'easy as cake'), I just met you." If I get more of it subsequently, it's something about marriage: "Okay, where are we going to get married?" If she does more than giggle or give a cross-eyed look, it'll usually be somewhere temperate and tropical. "Fine, but I get to choose the honeymoon. The Rockies." Just like that, we have an inside joke that makes it really easy for me to advance my sexual interest with plausible deniability if she pushes back.

    More generally, being equipped with pre-meditated responses for a host of regular occurences in flirtatious situations is helpful. Like a preliminary interview (maybe not in academia, but in industry), delivery is as important as the substance of the response, and great interviews require some prep.

    ReplyDelete
  2. An interesting observation, and an excellent tactic. Considering just having been goosed, the simple non-verbal neg is doubly effective for not vocally portraying any shock or surprise that might be incongruent - a teasing response delivered without control isn't much better than no response at all.

    I may just shamelessly borrow this one from your play book. Simple, but pure genius.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Haha, spread super glue on the back of your jeans - catch them redhanded.

    My recent experiences have been an eye-opener for just how well girls respond to playful/mildly stern rebuttal of their advances. I wish I had known this when I was younger rather than wasting my (relative) youth in the "Dude, that girl smiled at me!" phase.

    ReplyDelete
  4. You're underestimating the 25+ age group. I had a twenty something flight attendant do it to me at an airport once and a number of 20's, 30's (all hot) women do it on other occasions -- none in a dimly lit nightclub. At the office, at parties, etc.

    ReplyDelete

You MUST enter a nickname with the "Name/URL" option if you're not signed in. We can't follow who is saying what if everyone is "Anonymous."