The Worst Man in New York City

Once a month the Guggenheim Museum has an event called First Fridays where they open the museum at night and have a dance party where you can drink, view art, and shake your ass to a fab dj spinning. If you are savvy you can also have sex in the bathrooms. They are huge private rooms that are labeled “Unisex”. It is almost like they are commanding you to do “it” in there. I went there with someone I was dating one summer, had him sit on the seat and ten minutes later we exited, red-faced and giddy from our super-secret liaison. 

 I returned several months ago with my friend Holly, but not to bang. We went there to meet people. I sorely want a nice boyfriend to lay in bed with, to win at Scrabble with and watch movies in the dead of the winter while snow covers the City. We figured the Guggenheim would attract at least men who were into art. That is a good start, right?

 We were in the Members’ Lounge and there was a group of three guys there that were purposely drawing attention to themselves. Hovering nearby was this weird flamboyant gay-type guy ensconced in velvet and wearing a glow-in-the-dark necklace. It wasn’t a costume party.

Holly got to talking to one of the guys, and it appeared they were there with the “flamboyant -type” guy as their trainer. We surmised they were doing some sort of class on how to attract women. Holly ended up going out on two dates with the guy she met there. He was boring and too aggressive, but fairly benign, and luckily for us, shared some details on the pickup methods he learned. How creepy it that these guys were paying mad loot to learn how to pick up girls from this repulsive guy?! But it gets even more harrowing when later we find out exactly HOW they are being taught to attract women.

The Velvet Teacher kept touching me and swore he wasn’t gay. He pulled his “girlfriend” to him and started making out with her in front of me, a contrived and very gross display of lips and gums. “See? Honey, how gay could I be?” he retorted. “Yeah, um, VERY because no straight guy would do that in public to make a point,” I fired back.

Holly and I started Googling and we found the Mystery Method, which is a nationwide company that teaches men how to pick up girls by using “NEGS”. Basically they teach them to criticize women but in a backhanded way to make them feel like they might not be good enough for the men. For example, this is on their site: “You have such nice nails; they are fake though, right?” Or “It’s too bad that I’m gay because you’d so be my type.” Surely you’ve heard of the VH-1 Reality Series based on Neil Strauss’ book, The Game. It is one thing to read about something, but quite another to be witness to it firsthand. This story may be old in concept, but douchebaggery never tires.

So Holly and I shared a million laughs over this and really couldn’t believe what we were seeing could be for real. What a sad commentary on male-to-female relations in New York City if men must resort to insults to get laid. Clearly, the only women that’d fall for this would be insecure or deeply damaged ones. I didn’t know whether to yawn or gasp.

Then this past month, I went to First Fridays and the gay-type dude was there again with three different guys. Only this time instead of being enveloped in velvet he wore long blue fake fingernails. One of the guys was wearing a Santa hat for attention and the other was wearing what looked to be his mother’s satin Japanese jacket. They are advised to wear flair to attract attention. It’s called peacocking. Jeez!

This time I asked him for his name and I learned it is “Affection.” I’m serious, so stop laughing because it gets funnier.

It turns out Affection worked for the Mystery Method for two months, basically mimicked most of their ideas and started his own company called Project Manhattan where he rents himself out to teach men how to pick up girls. But that is not all. Affection proudly told me, he is “an entrepreneur that owns four other companies.”  A quick note: any guy that identifies his job as “entrepreneur” is a complete douche and the only word that really rhymes with “entrepreneur” is “manure.” Coincidence? I think not.

When I got home, I checked out the site to see some of the things they teach these guys to do; it is similar to the Game or to the Mystery Method where they suggest turning their backs on women to make them feel insecure, insulting them, etc. They have all these code words like “the game” which appears to be the term they use for stalking women predatorily and “kino” which is a method of touching girls without them getting upset by saying, “Awww, you are so like a big sister to me!” Although he told me that he felt like I was “his mom.”  There is totally a reason why I’ve never wanted kids. Imagine if your boy grew up and started calling himself “Affection” and was rude to women to get laid.

Turns out Affection was interviewed last year by GMTV, for the biggest morning show in the UK that I worked for as a NYC trends on-air reporter for a short time. The producer remembers him distinctly. That isn’t necessarily a good thing. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lYeo3nfMTQE 

So last night we laughed our asses off, but were also really sad that it has come to this. In a city where the single women outnumber the men in such vast numbers, why would anyone pay to learn this misogynistic way to acting? Sure, I knew it existed but certainly not right in front of my eyes. The Guggenheim may never be the same for me.

Affection ended our night by asking Holly what nationality she was. When she replied “Italian” he got one final NEG in by saying, “Oh, so you must dye your hair; it’s nice.”