I second, unless someone else already has, the call for the roundtable. Even if we ignore the otherwise erudite topics that tend to generate the round tables (The Palin porno, Orangina Commercials, Michelle Obama's rear etc.) this one would have potential.

Of course it might actually require some introspection....something that few women in this letters thread have been prepared to do. So much easier to pile on dude who dare to be open and honest and call them names....The writing style of broadsheet posts has frequently flirted with tween level (although I've enjoyed this week's contributions more than most) is it starting to seep into the readers as well?

I'm really, truly not surprised that a female writer is not going to get the problems of dating from the male perspective. I'm not saying one set of issues is any more or less difficult than any other, because I surely wouldn't trade places with girls in the dating arena, but the things that men have to do to get dates are fucking ridiculous.

Regarding the pickup community, as it were, all the issues you're talking about have and are addressed in a variety of venues. The problem you've got is that you're taking a very, very shallow slice of the pie, namely this Mystery guy and his show, who is a pantload and completely obsessed with lines and tactics. (Note that this doesn't make him wrong. Most of his stuff is dead-on and works well for what it's intended for.) But if you're going to meet a woman of any intelligence and character and keep her around for any length of time, you're going to have to have an honest interaction with her. Women are absolutely not stupid and don't get tricked into relationships. Not the ones you want anyways.

The thing is, all this you-have-to-have-a-real-human-interaction-stupid stuff is in the material, but the focus necessarily has to be directed towards the part of the interaction that most guys have the most trouble with-- specifically, when you see a girl on the street that you'd like to get to know better, how do you demonstrate to her that spending time with you (in a sexual kind of context) is worth the bother? Any reasonably attractive girl has plenty of offers, whether she recognizes them or not, and you have to cut yourself from the herd.

And *you* are going to have to do something, and no, having a human conversation is impossible, because society dictates that you are an automatic douchebag if you're talking to a girl you don't know. "Why don't guys just talk to me" BECAUSE THEY CAN'T UNLESS THEY KNOW WHAT THEY'RE DOING. I'm pretty good at this, but I got that way because I worked at it. You have to cut through a lot of bullshit just to have an actual conversation with a girl you don't know and it's very, very hard. It's easy to just meet people through friends or work, but if you don't have those social connections, what do you do? I guarantee there are a lot of nice guys out there who you'd like to meet, who'd like to meet you, but they don't have the skills to cut through the social barriers, and women, as a general rule, are not going to do it for them. The community, as it were, is providing the nice guys who you'd like to meet an avenue to make this happen. If that VH1 douchebag came up to you, who really would be fooled if they didn't want to be? I mean, seriously.

You wrote: "I used to get dating advice from girls they told me to be nice and to be myself. let's leave it at that."

NOt sure if it was meant for me, but I'll respond anyway.

My prior post @lifelike was sent before I arrived at her posts declaring herself to be smart, nonviolent and highly evolved, only to then follow those declarations with wishes for other posters to kill themselves. OK, not important, but kinda fun to write, I'll admit.

Anyway, when going about dating and getting advice about it, an important first step is knowing what it is you want. Not what you're open to, but you want, and then parsing advice and experience accordingly. Bottom line, if you're not an asshole, behaving like an asshole isn't going to find you a compatible life mate....at least I don't believe it will.

what I want is for it to be universally acknowledged that women don't have the only problems, the only problems that matter, or,necessarily, the worst problems

Prior to feminism dominating the dialog in our society, it was known far and wide that men had tough jobs and lives.

The proof is in the pooding. The women I know today who are most vocal about being 'feminists' in their minds are the ones who are scoping out men to be their lunch ticket. The women work barely, scraping by on jobs that they desire to have rather than on practical jobs. They pine and lament that they are forced to work well into their fifties rather than, I suppose, kicking back with a tub of bon bons.

women made themselves willfully into immature brats and that became the WHOLE of the societal dialogue. Then they come on here lamenting why it is boys are not growing up either.

Can you imagine a century ago, when a man and woman worked side by side, growing a small business, the woman saying only she had the problems that mattered and that the guy ought to be pulling the weight for the both of them WHILE BOTH OF THEM pretending that she ALSO does important things too?

I know some will say the examples of women I cite are not true feminists. That is irrelevant, these women identify themselves in this manner because something about feminism resonates with in them, be it the blame leveling against the men, the lies and fabrications feminism encourages in women, the skating by on thin talents.

You can go to any university and the women's department is the place where academic talent, OBJECTIVITY, intellectual honesty, connection to other arts and sciences, open dialog about core principals and objective with those within and OUTSIDE the department are nearly totally lacking.

It will get worse before things get better. The feminists are now trying to find a new way to jab men with more hatred.