Pick Up Artist

The seduction community, also known as the pick-up artist, PUA, or pickup community, is a movement of men whose goal is seduction and sexual success with/access to women. Members of the community are often referred to as "pickup artists" (PUA). The community exists through Internet newsletters and weblogs, marketing (e.g. banner ads, seminars, one-on-one coaching), forums and groups, as well as over a hundred local clubs, known as "lairs".

The rise of "seduction science", "game", or "studied charisma", as it is often called, has been attributed to the "chaotic" modern dating scene reportedly as a result of the increased empowerment and equality of women in western society and changes to traditional gender roles combined with the influence of distinct biological imperatives in men and women. Commentators in the media have described "game" as sexist or misogynistic, acknowledging that the techniques espoused do sometimes succeed in attracting women. Academic researchers have also studied seduction techniques and hypothesize a basis in evolutionary psychology.

The modern seduction movement dates to 1970, with the publication of How To Pick Up Girls! by Eric Weber, credited as the first modern pickup artist. However, one self-described "picker-upper of women" preceding Weber was rational emotive psychotherapist Albert Ellis, who wrote The Art of Erotic Seduction, a how-to guide for men that encouraged them to meet women through the "pickup," with Roger Conway in 1967. Ellis claimed he had been practicing seducing female strangers since he overcame his fear of approaching them through "in-vivo desensitization" in Bronx Botanical Garden in the 1930s. The 1970s and 1980s saw independent authors and teachers, but no organized community.

The seduction community itself originated with Ross Jeffries and his students. In the late 1980s, Jeffries taught workshops, promoted a collection of neuro-linguistic programming (NLP) techniques called "speed seduction" (SS), and published a short book of his techniques, How to Get the Women You Desire into Bed. Other exponents established themselves in roughly the same era, but lacked contacts with each other. In 1994, Lewis De Payne, then a student of Jeffries, founded the newsgroup alt.seduction.fast (ASF), which marked the birth of the community per se. This then spawned a network of other Internet discussion forums, email lists, blogs, and sites where seduction techniques could be exchanged.

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