I sort of don’t want to say anything until you watch this new “app.”
Okay, now that you’ve watched it, you get what I mean, right?
You see, I thought it might just be impossible to: 1. degrade women further in popular culture; 2. make men seem more loutish and brutish than they already appear in popular culture.
But I was so utterly and entirely wrong that I’m feeling just a little bit embarrassed about my own naivete right now.
Because once you’ve learned from a student, as I did today, that any person with a certain kind of hand-held device who feels he is in a big hurry to meet women can now classify them instantaneously into 24 types and then get immediate pointers — sort of like sexual Cliff Notes — on how to “score” with each one, want to know what happens?
You realize you know you can’t keep up with your usual level of cynicism anymore. That leaves you with a sense of loss. It really does.
I learned that when young men (Oh, good heavens, I presume these are indeed very young men? Please tell me they are very young men, like young enough to be wearing pajamas with feet and writing with crayons) secure the favors of their prey, the app encourages them to report back to other men about their adventures.
You can’t make this stuff up. Compared to this, the Shakira “She-Wolf“ video was a Feminist Manifesto, like Bella Abzug rallying ERA voters or Andrea Dworken explaining her opinion about heterosexual intercourse (not fun).
Actually, compared to the level of cynicism about women demonstrated by this application, Enimen sounds like Dr. Phil.
These are not guys looking for feminine companionship; these are hyenas at a kill. Not lions at a kill, guys. Hynenas.
And yet I bet this will turn into one of those “ha-ha, c’mon-honey-can’t-you-take-a-joke?-see?-women-have-no-sense-of-humor” traps where to engage with the issue in any significant detail is to sound shrill and sanctimonious.
So I won’t. (I have midterms to grade.)
I’ll simply let the app speak for itself.
And I’ll remind myself, when passing a beverage center, that somehow this whole process of finding a girl and classifying her in two seconds or less and feigning interest in her most sacred passions involves drinking a Pepsi product called “AMP.”
Remind me not to purchase any Pepsico products, will you? I think there’s an app for that. Thanks.
8 Responses to How to Pick Up Women
stinkcat - October 14, 2009 at 9:44 am
I am not sure what the point is, perhaps the app is offensive and tasteless. In a free society, we get to be offensive and tasteless if we choose to.
rightwingprofessor - October 14, 2009 at 12:34 pm
Seriously relax, it looks cute and in good fun.
vepxistqaosani - October 14, 2009 at 1:46 pm
It seems a perfectly logical consequence of current sexual culture and (if I may be heretical here) the intrinsic differences between men and women.More crass, perhaps, but not new: See, e.g., “To His Coy Mistress”.I am amused by the Greek letter applet — reminds me of what my grandfather told me when I was in high school 35+ years ago: “Education in this country started going downhill when they stopped requiring Greek in high school.”
cloie - October 14, 2009 at 2:04 pm
Yes, we all have the right to be tasteless and offensive.And we also have the right to mock, shun, boycott, laugh at, ridicule, ostracize, or just plain reject those who don’t get what’s wrong with being tasteless and offensive.
11231850 - October 14, 2009 at 3:34 pm
I suggest a 25th type: “Had a Long Day and is Really, Really Tired.” The app links to a site reading, “Just leave her alone, for God’s sake.”
stinkcat - October 14, 2009 at 4:30 pm
“And we also have the right to mock, shun, boycott, laugh at, ridicule, ostracize, or just plain reject those who don’t get what’s wrong with being tasteless and offensive.”Of course, just so long as its alright for me to have the right to mock, shun, boycott, laugh at, ridicule, ostracize, or just plain reject those who want to mock, shun, boycott, laugh at, ridicule, ostracize, or just plain reject those who don’t get what’s wrong with being tasteless and offensive.
goxewu - October 15, 2009 at 7:00 am
Would one of the insensitive male chauvinists on this thread mind pointing out that most of the complainers about the pickup app are among the least likely to be on the receiving end of it? I could do it, but I don’t want to ruin my reputation as the second coming of Alan Alda.
dank48 - October 15, 2009 at 3:54 pm
Sure, it’s tasteless, offensive, and so on.More to the point, it’s pathetic. In reality, most of the boys (not, mind you, young men: boys) will be holding the phone, so to speak, as shown. In their left hand.