two-twenty

sunday styles gets used

Two-twenty presents our weekly Monday feature: Sunday Styles redux (which in the future we will try v.v. hard to post earlier in the day):

We now realize why there was such a dearth of dating and/or sex and/or Internet-related articles in last week’s edition: the good folks of the SS were saving up for a doozy. Neil Strauss, erstwhile music writer and current self-described ugly person, exposes a terrifying and dangerous subculture evolving on the west coast: wearers of absurd hats who use insults, and occasionally magic tricks, to get chicks.

photo from nytimes.com

“The community”, as they call themselves, are not your average harmless, impotent, Nike-wearing Cult members. These people have insidious goals, such as stealing Scott Baio’s girlfriend. They have codenames such as Juggler, and Mystery. They have their own language, including “AFC” (Average Frustrated Chump), “PUA” (Pick-Up Artist), “IOI” (Indicator of Interest), and “neg” (a putdown used to “momentarily lower a woman’s self-esteem and to suggest an intriguing disinterest”).

AFCs pay men like Mystery significant amounts of money in order to be reborn as PUAs. Neil Strauss, straddling the fine line between ‘deep-cover journalism’ and ‘just trying to get laid’, paid him $500. What did he get for his five Benjamins? Hopefully more than he would have gotten from Juggler, who teaches skills such as “approaching women” and “mastering the art of natural conversation.”

Actually, Neil seems to have done pretty well for himself. He closes the piece with a little story about a night, not so very long ago, in the VIP room of Miami’s Crobar. In it Neil picks up two hot chicks by insulting their hair and calling them liars. He is a convert, a card-carrying member of ‘the community’, and he expects to be issued his funny-looking hat any day now.

As for two-twenty, our dating strategy is a tad different and, frankly, far more foolproof than what Mr. Strauss was taught. Neil, we would like to disabuse you of one of your most profoundly misguided notions: you can, in fact, “offer [a girl] cocaine”. Or crack or a ride on the horse or, if you’re serious about getting into the dating game, Rohypnol. We find that these ‘social lubricants’ are even more important to have in your survive-a-date kit than a sample pack of Levitra. Nothing says "IOI" like her eyes rolling back into her head. Bonus: no funny-looking hat required.

In other SS news:

Gennifer Flowers is giving Michael Jackson a run for his money in the plastic-surgery department, and the results are disturbingly Joker-like. Bill Clinton screwed the pooch in so many more ways than one.

Pulse thinks that the trucker hat is “fading into fashion’s twilight”, thus confirming two-twenty’s suspicion that the timelessly ugly headgear is poised for it’s third or fourth post-ironic meta-comeback. The catch? All the kewl kids are going DIY stizzle, nazzle.

In order to perpetuate the moneymaking machine that is pop culture it is imperative that, like the tobacco companies, we get America’s future consumers addicted while they are young and impressionable. Thus does Nickelodeon do their best VH1 impression with a show called “U-Pick Live”, a show about, um, picking things or something, but more importantly rife with celebrity guests and hosted by what appear to be a kinder, gentler Paris Hilton and a hipster impersonator, complete with ‘hoodie worn under blazer’.

Marquee, another of the crop of clubs… er… cropping up in Chelsea, has no VIP section. Or at least not one that Ben Stiller and Uma Thurman can get into. This creates uncomfortable moments like the one related in Boite, when a young lady asked Mr. Stiller to “please do ‘blue steel’” (he “affably declined”). If the lady in question had studied up on Mystery's dating advice, she would have known to open with a “neg”, such as, “Hey, I really loved you in Mystery Men. Not!”

Sunday Styles | NY Times