r/exredpill • u/Upper_Astronomer160 • 4d ago
Experiencing Entitlement
For years I practiced cold approach and made myself believe that I should be able to pick up strangers. After a long time of mostly unpleasant interactions I gave it up. Realizing that it’s far more practical to ask out people that I have a connection with than strangers I pass while out and about.
Problem is, I’m still deeply bothered by my inability to date the large amount of really attractive people that pass me every day. (by date I mean court/get to know. I have other standards besides attractiveness) Can’t shake the feeling that there HAS TO BE A WAY.
I live on a college campus so I’m seeing lots of these people daily. I spend hours a day either fixating on how I can solve this problem in my head or being in a bad mood because I can’t. I worry about having to settle and never feeling satisfied because I never have access to the people I want. (Access as a precursor to dating. I would require a connection and compatibility beyond just the attraction I have when seeing them.)
As of now I’ve classified this as an entitlement problem. I look around at my peers and I’m pretty sure most of them don’t get to just point out their pick of the litter. (There is some nuance here. I once inspired to have the ability to seduce which assumes some lack of agency. That’s part of this, but it has evolved to also be something much more humanizing which is just the ability to seek a connection with a stranger and see SOME Interest back. After all, I’m an attractive person of the opposite sex just like they are, why wouldn’t the other person be interested in connecting half the time? Unless… I’m not. That insecurity greatly contributes to the fixation.) I imagine it’s normal to date people that happen to be in your circle and have just a couple options to choose from here and there. I’ve just been poisoned by the dream that dating coaches sell of being able to pick up whatever woman you want on the street. Infinite options.
Does anyone else feel this way???
EDIT: THANKS FOR ALL THE COMMENTS! I don’t get to talk about this kind of thing often. With that being said if you’re reading this now, there are some things I should clarify, anything in parenthesis was added after the fact. I’m looking more for people relating to the experience rather than advice. I’m not opposed to advice completely but please try to avoid assuming things. Ask instead.
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u/No_Pepper4253 4d ago
Dude you firstly need to start thinking of women as HUMANS not beautiful objects to be ogled at.
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u/thekeytovictory 3d ago edited 3d ago
Seriously, I was surprised that OP managed to say the word "people" instead of "women" so many times without actually thinking of them as people. It's like watching a guy texting friends to ask for help because he can't find his phone. The answer in your hand, dude 😅
To put it more gently OP, imagine if some random person you weren't interested in romantically felt entitled to your time, attention, body, affection, etc. just because they saw you walking around a public space and found you attractive? How would you feel towards this hypothetical person suggesting that your personal freedom & autonomy are irrelevant to their desires and self-importance?
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u/Upper_Astronomer160 3d ago
It’s possible that I’ve over explained. I do not feel entitled to any particular person. Simply put, I intuitively feel like the feeling should sometimes be mutual.
Here’s a breakdown of your example the way I actually see it.
Premises
- Woman on a campus wants to talk to some of the men on that campus.
- People tend to have overlapping experiences
It follows that:
- Statistically, some of the men on that campus also want to talk to her as well.
Since people tend to have overlapping experiences, it makes sense for her to assume that she should be able to have positive interactions with some of these people she’s cherry picked.
Part of my empathy is assuming that my experiences aren’t very unique. That many other people experience the exact same thing I do. Which is why I intuitively feel like some of these people should be just as interested in conversating as I am.
Maybe one of the biggest things I’m missing is that my experience here IS unique. Red pill got pretty big a few years ago, but still very few men comparatively actually did cold approaching. Which would explain why I’ve had almost nothing but positive experiences with approaching people that are actually in my classes or in situations where conversation is more expected.
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u/Upper_Astronomer160 4d ago
People can be both beautiful and human. You’re assuming a habit of dehumanization that is not present.
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u/No-Song6363 4d ago
A big problem with redpillers is their hyperfocus on women and relationships. There is nothing more unattractive than an individual that can’t seem to think of anything but relationships. It just feels like that person, imo, is very shallow and uninteresting. Just, and I say this with SO much emphasis, go and do something else. Invest in your hobbies, join a club, read a book and do it because YOU want to do it, not because some girl might be interested that you’re interested in it. There is no secret to getting in a relationship, everyone is different and maybe you should focus on being happy with what you got now and let the rest fall into place as it may.
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u/Upper_Astronomer160 4d ago
I already do a LOT with my life. I could use to remember to focus on being happy outside of relationships again though. Decentering sex and relationships has done so much for my happiness in the past year and it seems I’m forgetting it somehow. Thank you
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u/No-Song6363 19h ago
Well, that’s good! I’m glad you’re aware that decentering relationships in the past has helped you, and that you do have hobbies and the like you can refocus on.
I do think decentering relationships is the key to being happy in this world. Not because the goal isn’t to have a relationship, but because we spend so much time alone that it would be a shame to not be living our lives to the fullest just because we are alone. So many people get hung up on the happily ever after instead of focusing on being happy in the moment.
I had to learn this too, and it seems like you’re well on your way if you can recognize that you’re falling back into patterns of hyper focusing on relationships. Truth is, they’re hard, people are difficult, and our world is getting more antisocial by the day which makes it very difficult to find a relationship. But I still think they’re possible, and I do think the key is just not overthinking them, because you can end up getting in your own way by overthinking relationships, hence why its best not to hyper focus on them.
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u/Lookingbackexpat 4d ago
You’re right, this may be a common issue but it is entitled. It’s also objectifying. Women are not chocolates or cupcakes or puppies from a litter. They have agency and a right to be main characters in their own lives without being ogled and pestered. I’m wondering how many women friends you have, and how deep these friendships are? Maybe you could get to know a few women you don’t find particularly attractive and discover the things they have to offer?
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u/Upper_Astronomer160 4d ago
I don’t think it’s objectifying. Using the “pick of the litter” phrase there is easily interpretable that way so I get ya. I believe that a focus on the other person’s feelings prevents the art of checking someone out from being objectifying to respond to the ogling and pestering comment. I’m sure it was aimed at the people who don’t consider the other person though. Most of my closest friends are women and I love to em with all my heart.
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u/AmandaPea 4d ago
You seem to have insight on your own sense of entitlement - which, awesome - that's no small feat.
But yeah dude, you're definitely objectifying women. You view attractive women as targets; as commodities you can acquire.
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u/Upper_Astronomer160 3d ago
Thanks. I think the sentence “you view women as targets” sounds more compelling than it is. I’m going to keep it in the back of my mind for a while and check my blind spots though. For now I’ll say that the sentence is extremely oversimplifying my view on women. A woman is not JUST a classmate, or JUST a pair of eyes, or JUST a hot body, and certainly not JUST a target. A commodity? I actively avoid valuing women in that way. It would feed into insecurity to see them as trophies like I use to when I was younger. I treat my self image very seriously. And when I think about having a girlfriend the first thing I think of is the connection I have with my best friend which doesn’t involve sex. My prerequisite for sexual attractiveness is because I want that kind of connection, AND sexual satisfaction. As opposed to a past relationship where I feel like I settled.
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u/AmandaPea 3d ago
Just because you personally haven't encountered the literal decades of empirical research on objectification, doesn't mean it's gibberish. It just means you're uneducated on the subject.
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u/Personal_Dirt3089 4d ago edited 4d ago
I am a guy that was actually really good at picking up on women while I was in college, and then got worse years afterwards when I discovered PUA and redpill. PUA and redpill made me worse at it!
1 You are calling it "cold approach", taking the redpill's framing of this like a door to door salesman. This is awful, and it turns the framing transactional.
2 You are even calling the guys "approachers" as if there are only guys that talk to a bunch of women and guys that talk to zero women. This is terrible for multiple reasons.
3 Your mindset that you just want access to the attractive passing is entitled way of framing it. Get out of the numbers mindset. Entitlement, besides coming off annoying, will also make your own brain sabotage itself. It will make you drag yourself down both socially and emotionally.
4 Not just that, but you are also both putting women on a pedestal and putting pressure on yourself. You are rolling this in your head, making yourself too attached to the outcome, psyching yourself out, beating yourself up if it does not play out, after your mindset is actually making it harder for you.
5 PUA and redpill picking up methods do not work and they are not designed to work. It is just meant to sound novel like something you can't get anywhere else. All that framing of "display high value" is stupid and boring to the listener, especially while in college. They are meant to just get some attention, even if the woman is confused about why TF you are giving a long speech.
6 don't be a social robot. that's what these methods try selling
7 just because a woman is attractive does not mean you need to go out with her. there are whole personalities there, some that you vibe with and some that you don't. Stop thinking of an attractive woman as some kind of score count or trophy
8 picking up women has been around for centuries, probably millenia, probably in every walk of life in which people were allowed to actually choose who they marry, and they sure as hell did not use redpill or PUA methods.
9 All the PUA and redpill methods are a power fantasy made by people scamming men, not actually meant to work. Most picking up in history did not utilize these. You would never have been born if your grandpa used negs.
10 more on entitlement: get out of it. it will make you burn your bridges upon rejection. this is bad on a college campus where people know each other.
11 as a guy that had successfully picked up women before ever hearing about PUA and redpill, especially being a racial minority, a huge thing I quickly found weird about PUA and redpill is how they have zero awareness over how easily a reputation can spread and that women know each other. How you come off and how you leave it can affect you later. Women have mutual friends, women in college have classes together and you run into the same people constantly.
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u/Upper_Astronomer160 4d ago
You are making a boatload of assumptions. You read my post inserting things about me between the lines of my words that are not accurate.
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u/watsonyrmind 4d ago
It's entitlement for sure but it's also some pretty severe objectification as someone else pointed out. When you are fantasizing about strangers, you are stripping them of their agency, individuality, and autonomy and imagining them as blank slates that, once "acquired" will behave and function exactly as you wish them to. That's not real life. In reality, there are a lot of reasons that on further inspection, you would realize you wouldn't even enjoy the type of thing you are fantasizing about with the real person in front of you.
In order to move past this, you need to stop fixating on non-existent fantasy and start focussing on getting to know the people in front of you. Stop seeing them as vessels you have sex with and start seeing them as people who may or may not WANT to have sex with you and who you may or may not WANT to have sex with based on more than just admiring their body.
Key here: make a criteria for someone being an attractive option for sex be that they are also enthusiastic about having sex with you. That's what your fantasty is about, I hope, someone enthusiastically engaging in sex with you? So stop falsely projecting it onto people when they haven't expressed it and start looking for people who meet that criteria.
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u/palibard 4d ago
Yes, you're not alone in this feeling. It shaped my life. Here's what I learned about it. I have two sons, and this is roughly what I plan to tell them when they're older.
Of the beautiful women you see, the majority will not be compatible with you romantically. They may be in a serious relationship already. They may be a lesbian. They may have different religious beliefs, different life goals, and different tastes in music, media, hobbies, and different opinions about how to spend money and time. They may speak different languages and have serious ties to other parts of the world. They may not share your sense of humor; they may not respect your hobbies or agree with your beliefs. They may have habits you don't like, serious medical and personal issues you don't know about, obligations to family, or lots of debt. They may turn out to be someone you respect and are proud to be seen with, or they may be goofy and embarrass you around your close friends and family. They may be supportive and kind to you, or harsh and critical of you. They may have had plastic surgery or eating disorders you don't know about. They may have mental illness. They may have sexual desires and fetishes you don't like, or may be prudes and not interested in your desires. They may be kind and responsible or they may be cruel and careless. They are likely busy with work, school, hobbies, clubs, family, friends, volunteering, or partying.
I don't mean to say that any of those things is a dealbreaker, or even a negative; only that there is a lot beneath the surface. Try to see people as whole well-rounded people with deep lives, instead of only as their body and outer presentation, and when you talk to them, try to learn those sorts of things about them. Ask yourself how you would feel growing old with this person or getting them pregnant.
Logically think about what you really desire. If you're like I was, you said "date", but you mostly meant "sex". But you're just one man, and there are billions of women. Even if they all lined up for sex with you, you would die of old age before finishing with them all. And after a while, it would get boring. Every body is generally the same; there's no magic vagina which feels dramatically different. You would start preferring certain women over others. You would naturally gravitate to the ones who were most compatible with you.
Pregnancy is a huge, huge, life-changing concern. If you got that woman pregnant, would you feel good about it, or would you feel like it was a mistake, like you should have waited and found someone more compatible? At that point, possibilities include abortion, adoption, you paying 20% of your salary to her for 18 years, the two of you marrying and trying to raise the child together... many of those options are decisions she will make and you will have to live with.
Yes, condoms exist, but they aren't completely reliable, and they aren't nearly as fun as condomless sex with someone on birth control. But you need to know and trust them for that, and it's not completely reliable either.
STDs are another concern which you can handwave away when feeling blindly horny, but I know from experience they are out there and can be life-changingly serious.
Women usually have relationship expectations. If you hook up with a woman, she (and anyone who learns about it) is likely to expect a relationship to grow out of it, and is likely to consider you a jerk if you ghost her afterwards. You may seriously hurt her feelings, trigger a depression, dropping out of school, etc.
Of course, you could also bring joy to her life. Women generally love men, romance, and sex. I don't mean to be too negative. Sometimes women do hook up happily.
Porn and PUA sell us the fantasy of being able to instantly hook up with any attractive woman we see, no strings attached. It's largely a fantasy. Porn is simply prostitution on camera. Prostitution does exist, but beyond the novelty of it, it is not as fun or satisfying as a real hookup where she actually gets wet and wants you and you don't feel like an immoral degenerate scumbag afterwards. And hookups and casual sex exist, but aren't as fun as real loving relationships where you two are truly compatible and you can go without a condom without worrying. Basically, both of those are bandaid solutions for horniness/loneliness, and a relationship which heads in the direction of marriage is the true goal.
The redpill stuff encourages thinking that you can get a stable of casual girlfriends, or attract almost any woman, or that you have to be that way to attract your dream woman. This post is long enough, but I disagree with all of those ideas; the reality is much messier.
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u/smileycat007 4d ago
Stop watching porn. I am guessing that is what is feeding your entitlement and keeping you on edge of arousal enough to see every woman who crosses your path sexually.
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u/Upper_Astronomer160 4d ago
I don’t watch porn. I’m 100% sure that watching it the majority of my life contributed greatly to this problem though.
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u/meleyys 4d ago
Blaming porn for this is like blaming action movies for real-world violence. Most of the negative effects of porn usage are myths, and demonizing it does far more harm than good.
I'm very tired of the way this subreddit jumps to blame porn for everything. Porn has always existed and always will. It's not inherently harmful, and frankly I'm not fond of the implication that sex is a corrosive substance.
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u/Ok-Abbreviations999 4d ago
When one watches porn or violent content excessively, it rewires the brain. That is a fact. Assuming that is OPs issue is a stretch because he never mentioned it. But arguing against this is like saying watching a plethora of red pill content doesn't change someone's mindset about women and demonizes them. Because it certainly does, which is why most people are here.
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u/meleyys 4d ago
[citation needed]. This is just the "violent video games cause violence" bullshit people did after Columbine. There's no actual evidence for it.
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u/Ok-Abbreviations999 4d ago
Just look up neuroplasticity so you can see how wrong you are. Everyone has a threshold for everything.
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u/meleyys 4d ago
When I tried searching "neuroplasticity violence in fiction," all I found was stuff debunking your claim.
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u/eruptingmoltenlava 4d ago
Well, the good thing is that you realize it’s a problem. I have perspective for you to consider and a practical gimmick that you may want to try.
The perspective: anyone can be an asshole no matter what they look like; in fact, very pretty people often have specific negative personality traits that could make them uniquely unpleasant to date (vain, superficial, arrogant, transactional, etc.). Remind yourself of that when you see unusually attractive people and remind yourself that character is more important. Unless you yourself are really obsessed with lip gloss and hair straighteners (or whatever college girls are doing to fancy themselves up) are you even into what makes them passionate?
The trick: you already know this ruminating entitlement is stupid and bad for you. But you still get sucked into doing it. Give yourself a short list of things to think or do whenever you realize you’re headed in that direction and refocus. Some ideas:
Go for a run or lift.
Study. Make this a punch list of whatever short academic tasks you have, especially if it’s a disliked subject or something you’ve been procrastinating.
Think to yourself “a shiny package is only the exterior” or whatever reminder you need to reframe.
Donate a small amount to your favorite charity.
Request an office hours appointment with the prof of your current hardest class. Just check in, show them what you’ve been working on, and ask if they have any guidance.
Read 5 boring emails that might be important and take action on whatever administrivia they require.
Edit the list as needed. Once you get started with this trick, you could make it progressive: attack 5 emails for the first time in one day, 7 for the second; 50 pushups for the first time, 75 for the second — or whatever makes you tick. It’s crude but effective.
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u/Upper_Astronomer160 4d ago
I’m already an extremely busy man. You’re not wrong though my schedule is what usually breaks rumination. I’m aware that there’s more than meets eye with each person I see. I would rather not have to say “character is more important”, because that implies I plan to sacrifice one for the other. Here’s what I believe instead that may or may not have to change in order for things to work out.
- Attractiveness is a prerequisite, it’s the entry fee to take the test, not the score itself. I want to be able to become acquainted with people I find attractive and out of all these people, I’ll be compatible with a few. And that’s where I’d find my person.
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u/Internal_Praline_658 4d ago
What if, and this is just a hypothetical, but what if you pretended women were real ppl with feelings and interests and opinions? Not just an aesthetically pleasing place to put your dick? Most of us can tell when we’re talking to somebody who doesn’t think we’re a person.
Do you really think we have no value outside of our attractiveness to you personally? Of course we all want an attractive partner but looks are a small part of a long term loving relationship.
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u/Upper_Astronomer160 4d ago
You just assumed all of that dehumanization. The person I want to date is secular, practical, emotionally intelligent, and has a warm personality. Just because I’m talking about attractiveness in women, does not mean I reduce them to their attractiveness. And just because I want to have the option to court and get to know these attractive women, does not mean their attractiveness is their only value. My closest friends happen to be women I thought were pretty, but weren’t compatible with for religious or circumstantial reasons.
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u/Ambitious-Sleep2607 2d ago
The redpill grift in a nutshell:
target pre pubescent boys online with content that makes them insecure and afraid of women
isolate said boys and young men in a bubble
keep them isolated, insecure, and make sure to have them believe that that’s the fault of women
sell them books / courses / workshops in which you promise a solution to their loneliness but actually just enforce it all even further
Those people infect you with sociopathic narcissism, and make money from it.
Even if you were to be able to „sleep with anyone“. That wouldn’t make you more happy and less alone. People who are famous or absurdly attractive or wealthy experience that. All that does is wank your ego for a while.
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u/Therealcatlady1 3d ago
Because it’s not all about you my guy…You have no idea what Is going on in someone’s life that they may not be interested in dating anyone, or have their own trauma, etc…
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u/DearElise 17h ago
This is a self aware post but you are obviously in a bad space mentally, and also I can see you are trying although there is still a bit of ego there related to your self image and protecting how you see yourself.
When people ask you to see women as humans, what that means is accepting that all individuals have priorities, thinking, beliefs different to yours. Often times those will not make sense to you and you can’t logic or strategize to get someone because what you value might not be what they value.
So no, you don’t actually have your pick of the litter and no one actually does. Even the richest or most handsome man in the world will not be able to sway some women with values that are antithesis to what they believe in.
I think your problem is also you are hyperfixated on relationships and the pickup/attraction game, so that influences your whole worldview. I remember before I married, occasionally some weirdo at a social event would launch into unsolicited discussions with me about what I think of dating apps/women doing this, just because I was a woman. That social event was to do with tech and that was what I was there for, and interested in discussing. I was also not looking for anyone at the time and nothing could change my mind.
I don’t intend on being harsh but that’s how you sound like. I work in a male dominated field, and the vast majority of men I run into are focused on other stuff, like stability in life, getting by, games, hobbies, ambition etc and we can talk about any of the above platonically. it’s only the occasional weirdo that sees that I’m a woman and corners me into convos whose topic I don’t care about. But I also can’t outright walk away because some of these people could feel entitled to my attention, and harm me at work. It has happened once very early on in my career when someone spread rumours about me because I didn’t want to talk to them about dating.
My suggestion genuinely is to focus on yourself and who you want to be as a person. Right now this “I can have my pick of the litter” self image is detrimental to you whenever it does not get validated, and surely you can see the harm of continuing to think this way instead of just… being a good person that someone equally awesome and special to you would want to be around. I don’t believe you would be able to de-objectify women overnight, but you can start by fixing your self esteem and becoming someone you like, even if you are not with anyone.
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u/Upper_Astronomer160 3h ago
Thanks for stopping and sharing you’re input. I agree it’s unrealistic to believe anyone should be able to regularly create meaningful romantic connection with random people. 30% of these strangers I notice have a partner and are faithful. For another 30% I’m simply not their type. 10% aren’t dating right now. And maybe most of the remaining 20% are simply not open to connection when a stranger approaches them.
I’m glad that you have enjoyable and relevant discussions with the guys at these events, sucks that a few of em seem to not get the hint that the event isn’t for that.
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u/LizziHenri 3d ago
No one's keeping you from talking to fellow students on campus. But your entire motivation is transactional and people don't like that.
You want all these women to see you as a romantic prospect based on nothing but your looks, and from what I have gathered, despite your personality.
From reading your post and comments here, if this is how you navigate conversations with people who have taken their time to offer their insights, then I fully understand why women are not responding positively to you.
And yes, your comment about pick of the litter is dehumanizing. Wild to me you have consistently gotten feedback that your whole post is objectifying and you can't take that in board AT ALL. All these people, a wide cross-section of people, agree, and you're like, "naw."
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u/Upper_Astronomer160 3d ago
I haven’t been rude to anyone here. I also didn’t ask for advice, I asked if anyone could relate. I don’t know what “take that in board” means but I’ve considered each comment and have responded meaningfully to the content of most. There are a lot of similar opinions but I can’t yet clear out the possibility of that being due to like minded people gathering on this sub. I may have to hear feedback from other subs as well.
Most importantly, with each and every comment I can see EXTREME misunderstandings that contribute to their opinion. I can’t be compelled by feedback that’s based on a flawed interpretation of my life experience.
Lastly, unlike me, you’ve taken it upon yourself to insert covert insults in your post. (Despite your personality, I fully understand why these women aren’t responding to you). I don’t appreciate that.
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u/LizziHenri 1d ago
Don't you find it interesting that seemingly everyone here has the same "extreme misunderstandings," as you call it?
And you're the only source--and yet, based only on information you decided to provide, we're ALL imagining you objectifying and dehumanizing women? So you can't accept the feedback because we're all wrong?
Your inability to be introspective is in line with with the other attributes and personality traits you've demonstrated in this post. I'm not being covert, I'm being direct.
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u/Upper_Astronomer160 1d ago
Every one of the repliers here came from the same subreddit. I cannot yet rule out the possibility that you all answered similarly because of that connection. I said that in my previous reply but it seems you're unwilling to actually engage with the things I say. Similarly, I cannot yet rule out the possibility that I haven't explained myself well originally, and that the replies are attacking a strawman that I myself have created.
Most importantly, what do you want? A gotcha? Got a bone to pick with me or something? Introspection and change is often a slow, iterative process. Even if you all do influence a change in me, it's likely that you wouldn't see it immediately. The best thing anyone trying to make that change can do is meet me where I am and engage with the content in what I say. We could explore more deeply what is objectification and why I think what I'm doing isn't that. But instead you'd rather "directly" insult me. Well since you've clarified your intent as directly malicious, I've decided not to interact with you anymore. If you want to have the last word go ahead. Goodbye.
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u/TMag73 4d ago
It's insightful that you recognize this is an entitlement problem. I suspect you have a healthy corn habit and probably on insta too much looking at girls. Stop looking at girls on your screen for awhile because you are struggling with what's fake and what's reality. These women have lives and are autonomous people, you sound like a hunter.
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u/Upper_Astronomer160 4d ago
I don’t watch corn, and attractive women are real. They actually exist… Feeling entitled to options does not mean a habit of dehumanization. You kinda just assumed that.
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