Predictably, I got some comments calling me an AFC. Here’s the main one:

I do understand your point of view I have done the same thing. However there will come a day when you see stuff like this as missed opportunity. In the end your nice guy fantasy will be gone and so will the girl and someone else will have her instead. it sounds like you are a little negative about sex and are a little bit too sappy which is plain old afc syndrome. Your idea of her sex life is completely made up, you do not know she is monogamous by nature and if she is she is 1 in a million and maybe you should have proposed. However what happened was really nothing. This idea that not having sex is an accomplishmment is really bogus. Your whole story should be “I could have had a great night but I decided not to go for it at the end of the night because I was afraid of complications.”

The only thing I agree with you on is that nothing happened. It was just another girl, another interaction.

But I don’t think you do understand my point of view. The days of me seeing this as a “missed opportunity” are actually the 5 years behind me, not in front of me.

Someone else CAN have her, and assuming he can give her what she wants more than I can, I’d be happy for her. I’m secure enough to accept that I’m not willing to give her what she wants. I see it as “nexting” her for her own good.

Most women are fairly monogamous by nature. Again, the community skews men’s perception of women to believe that they’re all just like the club girl with the short skirt. The average American female has 7 partners in her life. HER WHOLE LIFE. Less than half ever have a one night stand.

There are robust statistics on this done by condom companies with sample sizes in the 100,000’s. Look them up (they’re somewhere here on the site).

Most people in the world aren’t huge partyers and socialites. Most people don’t really care how hot the person they made out with on Friday night was… Most people are fairly content to just date whoever they happen to meet in their every day lives and not think twice about it. This is true for women too.

If you really do want to understand my perspective (and I’m assuming you do since you’re coming here and trying to give me advice), then you should read this first: http://www.entropypua.com/blog/lr-three-girls-at-a-stripper-party

That sums up pretty well where I come from and where I was 3-4 years ago. I lost a couple friendships and broke up a new couple as a result of my actions on that night. But hey, I hooked up with three girls, laying two of them (one in the bathroom) that night. Worth it, right?

At the time, I thought so. And honestly, I wouldn’t go back and change anything that happened. It was an awesome night. But my point is, back then the sex took the priority. Girls crying, friendships ruined, people yelling… it didn’t matter, because I got laid and I was the man.

I don’t condemn that, but that’s just not my priority anymore. These days, a good friendship is worth just as much or more than sloppy bathroom sex. You can call that the “AFC mentality,” but I call it maturity. And I call it a privilege to have it, as I think it’s something that’s earned through being confident in yourself and your sexuality. It’s earned through experience.

And I’ve earned the experience to have that perspective. Seriously dude, have you ever had a bathroom lay? Once you get over the thrill, they’re really not that cool…

You’re right that I don’t want to deal with the complications. And if I was completely inexperienced, that would be a problem… If I didn’t have the experience, it WOULD be me bitching out.

But I have the opposite problem now. I meet girls like this, and I’ve already been with 20 other girls just as hot and cool as them before. So suddenly the sex isn’t that important at all, and suddenly those “complications” aren’t always worth the trouble. Why create all sorts of problems with this girl when I can go out for a few nights and go home with a girl just as hot WITHOUT all of the complications?

Let me ask you this… If you were a millionaire, would you still work for $20/hr? It’s the same thing… if you’ve slept with 100 beautiful women, why add unnecessary stress to your life for 101?

An old acquaintance from high school got in touch with me. She is doing a Ph.D program there at a very prestigious program, was new in town there and saw I was in town on Facebook and asked if I wanted to get together for a drink or something. I had been working my ass off for like three days straight, so I said sure, why not?

This girl was never attractive in high school (you can probably already see where this is going). She was the awkward lanky girl with braces and acne. I was best friends with her older brother and we’d routinely make fun of her. By the end of high school, her family and mine had become friends. So I’d categorize her as a “family friend” even though she and I were never actually that close.

Well jump ahead to earlier this week: she shows up and she’s hot (predictable, I know). She’s still nerdy and brilliant (my weak spot). And we hit it off insanely well… like not just a superficial “oh, we had fun together,” but some serious deep rapport, not-so-subtle flirting and suddenly one drink turned into seven. Next thing we know, it’s 3:00AM on a Monday night. She just spent 30 minutes telling me how she’s been too busy to date anyone since starting her grad program and invites me to crash at her place “if you need to.” (By the way, for the thick-headed or newbies, this is how girls tell you they want to sleep with you.)

So far, this is probably reading like a really boring LR. But wait… there’s a catch…

I readily admit that, for better or worse, two years ago I go home with her and stick it in and don’t think twice about it. But maybe I’ve finally had enough of these “deep comfort” lays come back to bite me in the ass, maybe I’m just a pussy these days… either way, on top of my other PUA spidey senses, one I’ve acquired is knowing when I’m about to ruin a girl’s world.

OK, not ruin her world, but I can tell when one is going to get seriously emotionally attached and doesn’t have the experience to handle it. This was one such case.

Now… still, probably three out of four times, I still go home and stick it in her (but at least I think twice about it now). My position in these situations is usually, “She knows I travel and sleep around a lot, she should know what she’s getting into.” It’s because of rationalizations like this that I end up having to call my cell phone provider to block girls’ phone numbers. But I digress…

But the second catch… her older brother is one of my oldest and closest friends. Her parents are friends with my parents. Now ruining her world is suddenly ruining a lot of people’s worlds.

(The other interesting caveat about the whole “family friend” thing is that I swear it sets up more of a relationship expectation from the start. This factor is almost a double-whammy of bad idea.)

So in a rare moment of clarity… I passed up on it. It felt weird and I questioned myself all the way home, but I woke up knowing it was the right move. If you’ve read my blog for a few years now, you’ll recognize this is a wholly new concept in my arsenal: recognizing not only when sex is a bad idea, but correctly acting on it… while drunk, mind you. If this was the military, I’d deserve a goddamn gold star.

Or as Rob Judge described it, “Just because you know karate doesn’t mean you have to beat the shit out of everybody.”

I think this is what normal people call “maturity.”

I do plan on keeping in touch with her. She’s totally long-term relationship material… in fact, she’s like maxed out in everything I look for in a girlfriend, so much I think it was a little scary. The last thing I want/need right now is another serious relationship. Maybe that’s why it was easier to walk away.

The other side of the situation that occurred to me is that this scenario is basically a chode or AFC’s absolute dream scenario.

Think about it: girl from your past suddenly reappears in your life and is attractive in all of the ways you look for in a serious relationship. Five years have passed, but you still have a rapport and comfort with one another removing any reason for “game.” The chemistry is through the roof with almost no effort. And on top of that, you already have the familial connections making the relationship practically pre-ordained.

I think eight years ago, I would have fantasized about this situation. I think most guys would think of this as “the perfect” scenario.

But me? It was the only situation I’ve been able to bring myself to pass up in ages. Not to mention it freaked me out a little bit…

PUA’s definitely are a different breed.

This is a follow up to Sunday’s Conversation Demolition. A reader had a great question about gaming girls at work and how having a reputation as a player can affect your career:

Does developing a “reputation” in the office seem to hurt your ability to rise in the company? PU stuff all aside. I would think maybe, especially in this day and age where women have more power in the workplace. if they are showing disdain on the surface, even if they really want your penis, that could still hurt you. But maybe not.

To be honest, I’ve never held a stable 9-5 office job for more than six weeks, so I couldn’t really answer it, but some other readers were able to offer good points.

It’s specific to the industry in which you work. In the financial services world (or what still exists of it), there are very few women in management and it’s a very alpha-centric social order, so fucking one or multiple female assistants or associates is no big deal and probably helps your office status. In other worlds, building a reputation as the office slut will not be a good thing for your career path at all.

In general though, and to quote my old Italian professor and life mentor, don’t shit where you eat. While it can be hot to fuck one of your co-workers on your work desk, and you can certainly get away with it, you’re creating a ton of potential for screwing up your career if you don’t navigate the situation well. 1,000 times more true if one of you in any way reports to the other one.

If you’re serious about your career (and you don’t work in an atmosphere where fucking co-workers is encouraged as it is in banking), dip into that pool at your own peril. There are plenty of other ways to meet hot women.

And another good point:

Keep in mind that if anything goes wrong and she uses the dreaded words “sexual harassment” you are in for a world of trouble. Not worth the risk IMO.

But I suppose a fact of note is that the hero in the demolition is from Europe and Europeans tend to be much more lax about sex in general than Americans, so I asked the man himself, and this is what he had to say:

I have been sleeping and fooling around with girls on various jobs, and it has never hurt my carreer.

What is very important though, at least in my opinion and also for most of the girls, is that you are discrete and keep it on the down low. Not only shouldn’t you want to be seen as a player that uses all the girls, she doesn’t want everybody to know either. This is also something that you can use to build attraction and sexual tension, for instance by mentioning how naughty it is to sleep with a co-worker. Furthermore, most bosses don’t appreciate office romances, simply because it’s distracting and thus may influence performance. So if your boss notices that you’re screwing all the girls in the office he won’t be happy about it, especially not if he isn’t getting any of them.

My advice would be to keep it discrete, and try to make sure nobody finds out.

And there ya have it. Use your judgment and discretion wisely. Or as my dad used to tell me, “Son, don’t dip your pen in company ink.” But luckily I’m in an industry that’s pretty accepting about those things.

Many of my long-time readers will remember my saga with the bachelorette and the debate that ensued afterward.

The short version of the story is that I hung out with a bachelorette party one night and ended up hooking up with the bachelorette, who subsequently gave me her number and told me to come to her hotel to fuck her. The moral dilemma was: do you do it?

What’s been raised on Erika’s blog is similar: should you hook up with a girl when you expect negative repercussions for other people?

First, I’ll give my complete answer to the question, then I’ll present the different arguments and finally, I’ll copy a post that a friend of mine made a long time ago that I think sums up this moral dilemma more succinctly and better than anything I’ve ever seen.

My perspective: I used to homewreck. It’s kind of a thrill and you get a bit of a power trip out of it. But these days I avoid sleeping with a girl who’s taken or being pursued by a friend if I can. The reason is because I’ve done it enough to see the repercussions it causes: lost friendships, pissed ex-boyfriends punching you, girls spiraling into a depression and calling you crying — all sorts of drama that I really don’t need to be a part of anymore.

My official stance on it these days is this: If I KNOW for a fact that hooking up with a girl will cause pain and problems for someone, then I won’t do it.

This basically means the following: I won’t hook up with girls my friends are pursuing (unless they give me the OK); I won’t hook up with girls who have boyfriends, fiances or husbands.

The ONLY exception here is when it appears to me that my actions and hooking up won’t cause any damage that wouldn’t/isn’t caused anyway. For instance, a married woman in Vegas who wants to go home with me after an hour, a woman who I’ll never see again. At that point, she has to deal with the consequences and I don’t, so the decision is on her.

Another example of this exception was when one of my very close female friends (former FB) found out her boyfriend — who I always thought was a scumbag — was cheating on her. At that point, neither she or I had any qualms sleeping together again. The relationship soon ended and she was better for it.

The two arguments: The first argument is the following: women are just as responsible for their infidelity, if not more, than us. Because of that, if they choose to cheat on their significant other, or ditch our friend to hit on us, then it’s their choice and their mind is made up.

This is the “innocent bystander” argument, which I used for years to justify this stuff. I know it well, and it does carry a lot of weight.

The flaw with this argument is that yes, responsibility is shared between both you and the girl — but it’s just that, SHARED. If you stand by and let it happen, you’re just as responsible as the instigator because you have the ability to stop it.

The second argument is that since you KNOW causing a girl to cheat on her boyfriend, or stealing a girl from your friend/wingman is going to cause problems, then you should never do it.

Well, the flaw in this argument is that you never actually KNOW if you’re causing a net loss or gain in a girl’s life by hooking up with her (or allowing her to hook up with you). For instance, I slept with a girl who was engaged some years ago. Her engagement fell apart, she tried to start a relationship with me, but I told her I wasn’t in love with her. She became a mess and blamed me severely for much of it. Over a year later, I ran into her and she said that getting out of that engagement was the best decision she ever made and actually thanked me for it. Did I do the right thing? Could I have achieved the same long-term outcome without causing all the short-term pain?

The truth is, our knowledge is always limited, so we can never define and know these things for sure.

The best summation of PUA Ethics I know of: When I originally posted the bachelorette story on the Boston Lair, it caused a shitstorm of debate. The thread had more than 100 replies and 2,000 views. To this day it is by far the most read and replied thread in that board’s five year history.

In all of that ruckus, a friend of mine who went by Smallville, a Harvard Law graduate wrote what I consider, to this day, the best summation of the sticky moral issue at hand. There’s nothing more I could say that he doesn’t say here twice as eloquently or concisely. So, I leave you with this:

So basically, we have two moral positions being asserted in this thread. One is a libertarian argument: people are ethically responsible for their own decisions, and so Entropy isn’t morally responsible insofar as the girl had free choice in the matter. All the points about drunkenness and the mind-controlling power of pickup and whatnot are basically wrinkles in that libertarian argument, asking how “free” her will really was and how “free” it had to be in order to “count.” People might even argue that it would be paternalistic and wrong for Entropy to presume that he knows what’s best and constrain the woman’s freedom of choice.

The other position is roughly utilitarian: what matters in the end is human well-being. If Entropy knew that his actions would hurt the woman and he went ahead anyway, then he’s wrong and the woman’s ability to put a stop to things herself doesn’t exonerate him. There are wrinkles for this one too – maybe in the end she’ll be better off, etc etc. People might further argue that since Entropy lives a lifestyle of sexual abundance, it’s extra-wrong for him to hurt this woman when it’s not even necessary for his own happiness.

You guys are basically arguing past each other by pushing one of these positions or the other as the main consideration. People whose moral intuitions support the first position will largely agree that Entropy did nothing wrong, and people attuned with the second position will probably feel that he may well have acted immorally. You’ll never convince each other. Neither position is objectively right, or at least we have no way of knowing, so let’s call the whole thing off. The best anyone can do is live by his own code thoughtfully and well, while recognizing that his personal morals are just that: personal. Peace out.

Feel free to leave your own comments and opinions here.

What if it’s a 20-year marriage with kids and financial implications?

This always sounds cold when I say it, but like anything else, I think relationships must be looked at with a cost/benefit analysis. I know this flies in the face of everything Disney ever taught you about love, but you ARE reading a PUA blog after all.

The guy who originally raised this question is fortunate: he’s young, single, debt-free, child-free, so he doesn’t have to face any of these implications. The opportunity cost of him being in a relationship is much higher than a guy who’s married with children. It’s much easier for him to leave and find a new girl with few repercussions.

You get into some serious moral dilemmas when children become involved. Are you willing to get a divorce (or risk a divorce) over your sex life? Would you live with masturbation for the sake of your children? If so, how long?

Then there’s the financial issue. In most states, men are practically guaranteed to lose 1/2 of their net worth to their wife, if not more. If you cheat and SHE files for divorce, you may lose all of it. This doesn’t even consider legal fees and headaches.

Finally, there’s the shock to your lifestyle. I’ve never had a relationship longer than four years, but I’ve had students who come out of 10+ year marriages and sometimes they look like deer in headlights. I can’t imagine the seismic shift to one’s lifestyle after being with one person for so long and then suddenly being single again.

These are all factors I can’t say for because I have no experience with them. All I know is, they would make me think a lot longer and a lot harder about cheating.

What if you wife/girlfriend goes on medications or is physically injured which prevents sexual intercourse?

Obviously, the sex issues in these situations are of no fault of your partner. Here, I would say you’d have to have an open dialog. If you want to sleep with other people because you’re frustrated with your partner, then you need to raise the topic with her. I know this sounds absolutely fucking insane to most guys, but it’s what needs to be done, and it’s amazing how far blunt honesty will go if you just give it a chance.

If she insists that you cannot sleep with someone else, then it really comes down how much you value the relationship. My feeling with this guy’s situation is that his girlfriend didn’t want him to sleep with other girls and now he’s suddenly questioning the value of the relationship. My guess is he valued his girlfriend for consistent sex more than he realized — this happens a lot with younger guys. They think they’re “in love,” then you suddenly take away the nookie and they’re gone.

What if your partner is consciously withholding sex from you as a tool of manipulation and control?

Then your relationship is toxic and something’s seriously fucked up. My guess is it’s not any one failure, but years of poor communication and empathy that would lead to this point. I can’t imagine being in a relationship with this much resentment and disconnection. Ideally, I would get out before it ever reached this point.

But if you were married, with children, and were staked to salvage it, the most important thing to do first would be to open an avenue of communication. The wife is withholding sex as a power ploy FOR A REASON. Find out why she’s doing it. She’s probably not meeting her needs in the marriage in some way and she most likely doesn’t even know which needs they are (that, or it’s been so long that she’s forgotten why she’s resentful in the first place).

Marriage counseling and therapy are always legitimate options here. I think a small thing that goes fucking miles in managing a relationship well is how you frame the relationship. When you end up in situations like this, the relationship is framed as adversarial, and a lot of times, one partner will go at lengths to maintain that frame (consistently blaming, not trusting, etc.). If you’re able to reframe the relationship as you two being on the same team and trying to problem-solve the issue together, that immediately opens up a plethora of possibilities.

The trick is both people have to acknowledge that it’s a lose/lose situation, and to agree to help give the other person what they need to be happy if at all possible. Most people assume that they’re in a win/lose situation and that if they’re miserable, their partner must obviously be happy — this then leads to the adversarial frame where there’s a “winner” and a “loser” in the relationship, which never leads anywhere good.

My response:

1. I define cheating as extra-relationship sex where it’s NOT OK with your partner. If that’s the case, then I vote “never,” because it’s by its very definition dishonest, disrespectful and selfish. If you’re going to cheat, you might as well dump them first.

2. Your rationalizations for cheating are pretty selfish. You need to address the sexual issues WITH YOUR GIRLFRIEND. That’s the solution to your problem, not going and fucking some dumb slut. If you don’t have the patience to work through it with her, then you should question whether you want to be in the relationship with her.

3. Sex is the State of the Union, so to speak. If the sex goes south, it’s because there’s something emotionally or psychologically going wrong in one or both of the people. If this is the same girl who was raped, then bingo. She’s been emotionally traumatized and has probably shut herself off from enjoying sex… even with you.

4. Take a long hard look at your relationship and whether you want to be in it. This girl went through some shit and things may not be good for a very long time. Think about it. It may not be worth it. You may not love her as much as you thought you did. That’s fine. But don’t kid yourself or avoid the issue. Cheating is the weak way out.

This goes along with my deepest value when it comes to relationship management: painfully blunt honesty. All issues need to be brought into the open ASAP and worked through together with proper communication.

I think this guy needs to 1) decide whether he’s willing to stick it out with his girlfriend or not, and then 2) confront her with the issue, tell her that he wants to sleep with other girls outside the relationship because he’s not satisfied, and be willing to leave the relationship when he does so.

Not exactly easy, but the right thing rarely is.

1. I’m NOT saying that women should go unpunished for out-of-line actions. I just generally see violence towards women as almost never appropriate. There are plenty of other ways to retaliate. With the exception of one girl, all of the other girls who slapped me, I dropped their asses on the spot for being bitches. I stand by my statement that in this particular situation the guy was in the wrong for hitting her. He had no good reason to.

2. In reply to Don’s comment: I think you were totally in the right to stand up for yourself in that situation. If she fell on her ass and it was unintentional, that’s perfectly fine.

3. What I think about the “Captain Save-A-Hoe’s” who all stood up: predictable and tiring. I have no problem with the other guy stepping in initially to restrain the dude who slapped her, he was getting out of line. But the fucking 12 guys who ganged up on him is just uncalled for. They’re all trying to be fucking heroes and if there weren’t 200 of them, I’d be all for the original guy going Jackie Chan on all their asses. So to clarify, the first guy stepping in and being like, “Dude, calm down,” that’s reasonable. But the Pussy Platoon is totally unnecessary.

As another reader pointed out, it’s so predictable and pathetic though, the slapper guy should have realized what was coming.

I know my ideas about these situations are a bit nuanced. Although I support gender equality legally, morally, professionally and politically, in every way, emotionally and socially men and women are different. These aren’t simply beliefs I have, science can pinpoint the exact differences (hormoanal differences, physiological responses, psychological reactions, different averages in multiple intelligences, etc.). As a result, in the physical, social, emotional and sexual arenas, men and women aren’t always equals.

Examples: If I go to some crazy night club and hot girls start climbing onto the bar and dancing together. If I try to get up there and dance, a bouncer is going to make me get down within 3 seconds (I know because I’ve tried, haha). Is that fair? Technically, no. But does anyone want to see me shake my ass on the bar? No, and I wouldn’t want to see me up there either.

Say later at that same night club, some drunk guy gets really belligerent and knocks the crap out of somebody. I’m talking winds up and punches someone in the face. Now, that person is a guy. The drunk guy is just going to get thrown out and told to get lost. If that person is a girl, not only is he going to get his ass beaten by every guy within sight, but he’ll probably get arrested and booked for assault. Is that fair? Well, a guy is much more likely to be able to take the punch and fight back whereas a girl probably won’t be able to. Fair? Technically, no, but I think it is the way it should be.

Maybe it’s the southern gentlemen in me (surely the last remnant of him) that strongly believes you NEVER intentionally physically harm a woman. It’s unnecessary. There are so many other and more effective ways to retaliate.

But as always, these things are often context-driven.

Watch this video:

The thread asked what you would do in this guy’s shoes after the girl slapped him. To my chagrin an overhwelming amount of guys said they would have slapped her back, just as the guy did. Many comments included such poignant lines as “the bitch had it coming” and “women weild too much power.” Uhh… really?

The general air of the thread was that it was the guy’s responsibility to hit her back — to not hit her would be a form of supplication and he had to be alpha.

I’d like to preface this discussion by saying, the situation is completely different with men. If a man throws a punch at me, I give myself full liberty to lay him on his back. With men, it’s a question of self defense, and there’s not really a limit to the physicality I think you should be able to defend yourself with.

With women, it’s different for two reasons. The first is the practical: women are genetically smaller and weaker than men. If you’re a decent-sized guy, like this guy in the video, like I am, I don’t care what a girl does, it is going to take A LOT for her to hurt you and very little for you to hurt her.

The same way you don’t hit a child for being obnoxious, you don’t hit a woman for being a bitch either.

The other reason gets at the core point raised on the board: power. Who has the power in this situation?

Any community guy who has read his inner game theory — and hopefully most of my readers — are well-aware of what we commonly refer to as “shit tests.” Basically, what we call “shit tests” are the conflicts in which women attack us, usually verbally and psychologically, to phase us. The whole evolutionary point of the female-to-male shit test is to phase the man, to find his pressure point, make him crumble. As most guys (hopefully) know, if the man remains composed and handles the woman’s objections (whether reasonable or not), he gains attraction.

You’re a man. You’re supposed to be a fucking rock that can weather any woman’s storm. That’s what attracts 80% of females and defines masculinity in 80% of males.

So let’s look at her slap in another light. Is the slap reasonable? We can’t tell for sure from the clip, but my guess is it’s not. Does the man face any real or significant danger from the woman? Absolutely not, you can tell immediately he could break her if he chose to. So why does he retaliate?

Easy. Anger. He’s been disrespected, so he attempts to use his brute force (unfair advantage) to impose respect on her.

I would argue that first of all, the fact he let’s a slap “disrespect” him makes him weak and “beta” (to use community terms) to begin with. The fact that he retaliates physically on a woman makes him even weaker and more “beta.” I believe the fact he begins CRYING when confronted by other guys only goes to prove this point.

So what’s the right response? Well, luckily I’ve been in thousands of sets and have been slapped a handful of times by bitchy girls, so I can answer this.

When a girl slaps me.

I look her in the eye.

And laugh…

Then I say something like, “THAT was mature.” If I haven’t known her long I tell her, “Wow, usually girls have to know me at least a month before they slap me.”

Utterly unphased. It tells her, “You can’t shake me.”

Not only that, but the self-control required not only to not retaliate, but to not even get angry. THAT’S power. She’s just unloaded one of her most extreme options in testing you, and you just take it… and laugh.

I’ll leave you with a classic movie character that many guys “model” in the community as THE most alpha dude around. Ask yourself, who’s the alpha male in this scene?

- A poster asked: “Is it wrong to pursue a girl after your friend has tried and failed with her?”
- The overwhelming response is “no, it’s not wrong,” although a couple guys commented that they’ve had problems with non-community friends getting mad about this.
- I chimed in saying I had lost a friendship in this way before.
- I was asked the following question: “Do you think that this has to do with a scarcity/abundance mindset, or is there something else at play here?”
- Another poster noted: “I think one of the main reasons is just the possibility of a deflated ego were your friend to succeed. A guy is almost sure to draw comparisons, etc, and maybe put himself down.”

Here was my response:

Both are true. Although the former was the cause and the latter was the effect. Let me explain…

He was my best friend through most of college. When I found the PUA community I started getting results pretty quickly. So whereas for two years, he and I used to stand around college parties with our beers, talking about how hot certain girls were but never approaching them, suddenly within a few months I was getting make-outs and lays. This was awesome at first, and he was excited for me, and I even tried to help him… but it soon started to generate friction, as I continued to get hotter girls more often and more consistently.

It came to a head after about a year. We both met this girl at the same time and were both into her. She was beautiful, smart, sweet, and she was responding warmly to him — something he wasn’t used to from a girl of her caliber. He asked me not to go for her, so I obliged. He blew it.

We ran into her AGAIN a few weeks later and he gamed her AGAIN. This time he got her number. But he never worked up the nerve to call her.

Another few weeks go by and I run into her by myself out at a bar and talk to her. She was giving me IOI’s and was fucking hot as shit. So I said fuck it, he had two legitimate shots and over a month to make something happen and he didn’t. He had gone after girls that I messed up with and I never cared (and at times, girls who I laid as well… but still didn’t care). So what’s the big deal? So, in this respect, yes, it was a question of scarcity versus abundance mentality. But that’s just the surface… the reverberations of that problem ran deeper and ended up crumbling the entire relationship.

I didn’t tell him I fucked her even though she became my main MLTR pretty quickly. I probably should have told him. About a month later, I brought her to a friend’s party. I was sitting on the couch with my arm around her. Completely unannounced and unexpected my buddy shows up, sees us, turns around and leaves five minutes later and has still not talked to me to this day.

In the end, it wasn’t just the scarcity/abundance mentality. It was the fact that I succeeded where he failed… and not just failed at like golf or poker or something, but with women. Most guys have a TON of pride and base a lot of their self-value on their success with women. The fact that he would have to watch me enjoy and repeatedly fuck this girl that he wanted, tried and failed would be a constant reminder of this shortcoming. I guess his ego didn’t want to deal with it. And not only that, but he probably perceived that I was doing it to gratify MY own ego… to SHOW him that I could do it, even though to me it didn’t matter either way.

They tell you when you get into this that you will lose friends. YOU WILL. Looking back, it was for the better. Overall, he had become a negative influence on my life and I had become a negative influence on his. Once we weren’t able to be lame college kegger guys together, it exposed our friendship… or lack thereof.

In the end, whatever happens is for the better. If a guy is willing to cause drama and threaten the friendship over a random girl… then maybe you should question the value of the friendship.

I called her and the answer was a garbled mess, girls fighting in the background — screaming at each other — all that was distinguishable was, “NO! I DON’T GIVE A SHIT” and then a click. Called back, nothing. Called back, nothing. Wait two minutes, called back, phone is turned off.

So I had the decision to make: should I just show up at the hotel and bang on her door? A couple things prevented me from doing this:
1. The fact that I was still likely to get cockblocked HARD even when I got there.
2. The logistical fact of where the hotel was and relative to my apartment — the fact that I’d be up until 6AM and and dropping $50+ on cab rides. The logistical fact that I may not even be able to get into the hotel, and the fact that she may not even let me in if I did get there. All in all, the chance of success of just showing up and trying was very low.
3. The moral ambiguity of the situation.

So I called it a night and went home. Could have I still laid her? Maybe. But I don’t think the odds were in my favor at that point.

Why did I do it? I agree with the majority of responses I’ve gotten to this: that ultimately, her life is HER responsibility and I can’t or shouldn’t be held accountable for the decisions that she makes. I’ve never had moral qualms with fucking a girl who’s cheating on somebody else, and even in this more extreme situation, ultimately, I figured she knew herself, her desires, and her life better than anybody else, so who am I to choose for her?

But there are some counterarguments that I believe hold some weight:

Counterargument #1: With great power comes great responsibility argument: This was the main point my wingman made, and I have to admit, I agree with it to an extent. Girls think less rationally when they’re drunk. They think less rationally when their buying temperature is through the roof. As a PUA, I’m going to be adept at putting girls into these situations and therefore have to be more careful in my value judgments. I see it as being like a charismatic politician: once you gain this skill-set, you begin to possess more influence over people than the average person. With that extra influence comes a greater moral weight on your shoulders to affect people positively, to give value and to not violate them in any way.

Now, in the end, does she have agency? Yes. But EVERYONE is subject to influence by those around us. The argument here is that, given PUA skills and a large amount of influence over any given girl, we are now vested in part of that responsibility for their actions.

The problem with this argument, and the reason why ultimately I disagree with it is that it’s a slippery slope. It’s the same reason I take the same side in the “Should fuck a drunk girl?” argument. Sure, she may be drunk enough to not make a 100% rational decision, but she made a 100% rational decision to get that drunk with me. Sure, she wasn’t 100% rational when her buying temperature was that high, but she made the 100% rational decision to let me hang around and game her. Even if she doesn’t know what she’s doing, she did at some point. If she’s not to be held accountable for anything she didn’t 100% rationally choose, when does it end? Is she suddenly not responsible because she had no control over whether I approached her or not? Where does it end?

In the end, I do think there is a legitimate ethical issue behind this, but I find it to be minor in the greater scheme of things. A person’s free agency and ultimate obligation to their own actions outweighs any outside influence by a ton in situations like this.

Counterargument #2: The Abundance Argument I found this one interesting and also agree with it to an extent. The argument is similar to the first in that I am in a unique moral situation given my greater power.

Assuming I have the ability to pull a SNL a high % of the times I go out, I will have the ability to SNL more than one girl on any given night and in any given venue. Because of this, my opportunity cost of ejecting from this girl and sarging another is almost nil. Whereas sleeping with girl will cause a gigantic rupture in her personal life, in a majority of girls’ lives, it won’t. Therefore, I stand to gain/lose VERY LITTLE by sarging her rather than somebody else. Whereas she has a SHIT TON to lose by sleeping with me. Given this huge disparity in value, there is a moral difference in choosing to sarge the bride or somebody else. It’s like trying to get a homeless man to loan you a dollar when there are hundreds of perfectly wealthy people around the corner. There IS a moral dilemma in it.

Regardless, I reject this argument because I believe it can be argued that she DID possess more value to me than some other random girl there. 1) She was one of the hottest girls there that night and 2) I had already invested time and energy into the set. Flimsy considering her MARRIAGE is in the balance, but if we go by the assumption that I’m not responsible for anything in her life-situation (which I don’t think I am — see above), then that’s a non-issue.

Random Points that I don’t Agree With:

The Marriage is a Social Construct Argument: The argument is that since marriage is a social construct and not real in any literal sense, breaking it is in no way intrinsically wrong.

I agree that it’s a social construct, but that’s not important. What’s important is that SHE VALUES IT. For instance, you could make the argument that a lollipop really holds little or no value — so does that mean stealing one from a little kid isn’t wrong? No, it’s fucked up because the kid values it highly.

Her friends cockblocked out of self-interest: I think this is WAY off the mark. Let’s be real. The bride would wake up the next morning and her first thought would be, “Oh Jesus, WHAT DID I DO?” followed by an emotional meltdown. I completely accepted this fact at the time and do now.

My issue isn’t her short-term quagmire, but rather the long-term affect on her life. My perspective was, if she’s going to cheat, she might as well do it while she’s single. I actually slept with an engaged girl a year or two ago and it ended up ruining their marriage (i.e., she called it off because of what we did). Although she was a wreck for a long time, down the road (like a year), she seemed grateful for what happened.

Is it possible to know how this would have played out? Absolutely not. But the fact is, the friends were looking out for the girl’s long-term interests despite whatever short-term whims she had at that very moment because they recognized the bride wasn’t completely able to think rationally.

Woulda, Coulda, Shoulda: Finally, as in every set — this one was imperfect, and some very experienced guys have commented on how I could have pulled this off better.

- Go for the bathroom pull. This crossed my mind briefly that night. Logistically, within the club, it would have required getting past all of the cockblocks again. I also fucking hate bathroom lays. I’ve done two and both were miserable and awkward experiences.
- Being more discrete. This DEFINITELY could have worked, but I don’t think was possible given my mindset through the night. By the time I realized she was attainable, the cockblocks had already been initialized and were on full alert. If I had gamed her with the intent of getting her from the beginning, I could have pulled her aside early on, and planned a meet-up afterwards.