The Guys the Cast of The Pickup Artist Want to Be

VH1 has launched its newest reality show, Tool Academy. The premise of the show is that it turns utter douchebags into perfect gentlemen at the request of their girlfriends. The men were tricked into appearing on the show, as they were told they would be competing for the title of Mr. Awesome.

Okay, anyone who's willing to compete for the title of Mr. Awesome is highly likely to be a tool. And, as you can see from the photo, these guys definitely look like tools with their over-spiked hair and fake-bake tans. And with names like MEGA and jobs including being a stripper and spending the money his girlfriend's baby-daddy is sending her for child support, you know these guys are tools.

But, watching the show, I didn't know who was more in need of help, the douchebag guys or their pathetic, self-esteem-free girlfriends. These girls put up with their boyfriends' ridiculous behavior, allow themselves to be cheated on, yelled at, put down and treated poorly, and some of them have been doing it for years. Every one of them knows in their hearts that these guys deserve to get dumped hard, and yet they've brought them on television to change them.

Okay, girls, listen up. You can't change another human being. If your guy is a tool, he will always be a tool. The only thing that ever makes a man mend his ways is when a woman he truly cares about will not put up with his crap. And not one girl on the show is the sort of girl who's going to make them do that--because if they were, the guys would have already changed.

So there we have it. As though The Pickup Artist, Flavor of Love, and Rock of Love weren't enough, now a show that is putting men on display as complete idiots is making women look completely pathetic and stupid. Good job, VH1.

Ridin' the Ho Bus

A fight involving beer throwing and a choke-out.

Girls making out.

A Penthouse pet and a retired porn star.

An acid-soaked Christina Aguilera (during her dirrty phase) wanna-be.

One girl taking shots from another girl's vagina.

Nope, we're not talking about last Saturday night at my house. We're talking about the first episode of Rock of Love Bus with Bret Michaels.

Just in case this is less obvious than my new favorite song, "Chimpanzee Ridin' on a Segway," the aim of this show is for Bret Michaels to find love, only this time, instead of being in a house, the girls are on tour with Bret, riding on buses around the country.

Oh, holy lord. Each season, the girls get trashier than the girls on the season before, and this is season three. When the Penthouse pet and the retired porn star are two of the classiest ones on the bus, you know we're scraping the bottom of the barrel. And in this version, the girls are not living in a mansion, but are divided between two tour buses. Two moving tour buses, with nowhere to run and nowhere to hide and no where to get away from the crazy Brazilian who's had an entire bottle of tequila.

Here's an example of how classy these girls are, just in case the notes above didn't clue you in: One girl, who works as a DJ, wrote a rap for Bret. Except, instead of memorizing it, she brought the words with her. And it appears that she was working on them while at the free clinic, because the lyrics were on the back of informational sheets about Genital Herpes and Gonorrhea. (Okay, this is also the wanna be and the shot taker noted above, but she got kicked off the show tonight, so I won't get to judge her mercilessly again.) Her parents must be proud.

I'm excited about this season. I think there's going to be drama a-plenty, as well as more opportunities to watch these clueless skanks humiliate themselves without realizing it. Yay!

And the biggest tool is...

Last night on The Pickup Artist 2 Mystery (whose real name is "Erik") announced that Simeon was the big winner! That's Simeon, whose name is pronounced Simian, as in ape-like. I was actually cheering for this guy to lose because he seemed the most like someone who had the potential to be a worthwhile human being, but, unfortunately, he's now been named the best at convincing a girl at a bar that he has some interest in them as a human being when, really, he's just trying to get someone to make out with him. And he gets to train other losers to dress up like idiots and go out and do the same thing. Congratulations, Simeon, you're a big tool.

I was actually watching the show Criminal Minds last week, and they featured a character that was obviously based on Mystery, whose predatory messages about being a pickup artist encouraged a serial killer to move from killing prostitutes to girls he picked up in bars. This made me really think about The Pickup Artist and the things Mystery teaches them. At the end of the day, all he really teaches people is common sense: be presentable and pay attention to the signals other people are giving you.

Honestly, he gives all these guys makeovers at the beginning of the show. When Simeon came in, he had shaggy hair, long sideburns and a mustache. Okay, mustaches are horrifying, and he did need some cleaning up. But, what Mystery did to him, was pierce his eyebrow, paint his nails, buy him a bunch of rings and necklaces and encourage him to wear hats. I like piercings, but only on guys who look like they ought to have them. Nail polish on men, take it or leave it. Jewelry, with the exception of a watch and a wedding band, should always, always, always be a no-no for men. And a hat? Um, if I meet you and you're wearing a hat and it's not cold out, I am going to guess that you're balding.

What Mystery teaches his students, in terms of paying attention to the cues people are giving him, is probably right on the money. However, those ridiculous games and magic tricks he uses to have an excuse to touch girls are way, way out of line. Any guy who grabs for my hands and says, "I want to do a trust test," the answer is, "Don't touch me, you creepy loser." I still don't understand what has to be wrong with a girl to get her to fall for that.

Here's a no-brainer: the best advice all season came from Tara, the traitor to her gender who has been enlisted to help train future pickup artists. She said, over and over and over, "Just treat them like they're a person." I still don't understand why people have to learn that.

So, congratulations to Simeon. And ladies, if some guy comes up to you in a club and says, "Hey, what's this from: Nobody puts Baby in a corner," walk away, because Simeon is about to try to pick you up.

Even more sad news

Today's a sad, sad day. Brian, the crazy be-afroed Asian has been kicked off The Pickup Artist 2. Actually, this is not so sad. Since he didn't learn Mystery's magic technique, he probably won't actually ever touch a boobie, much less reproduce.

Okay, on tonight's epic pickup adventure, first the nerds make up stories about themselves so that women would bid on them at a charity auction. The lad who won made up a story about having gone to Italy to learn wine making, but he was quickly followed by the Mormon contestant who revealed that he had left for his mission "a boy and came back a man." I wonder how the Mormon church feels about him learning how to take advantage of drunk bar hags. Just saying.

Mystery had the nerds picking up "hired guns." This means that they were picking up bikini models following a fashion show--and, shockingly enough, wingskank Tara reveals to the audience that she had earned a lot of money over the years as a hired gun (a girl who is hired to be a waitress/model/bartender only because they're "hot"). And, finally, one of the guys who had been consistently criticized for being "too high energy" and "showing too much interest" in the girls as human beings, won the challenge. How? By being himself--and agreeing to go get a pedicure with one of the bikini models. Of course, it doesn't hurt that this guy is probably the most attractive of the guys.

And then Brian got kicked off, and he was devastated. I still don't get it. Basically, Mystery teaches these boys how to be douchebags, and they love it. And other people PAY to be taught how to be douchebags. Why? All you have to do is go to Lincoln Park and you can get a demo of how to be a douche for free. And the Popped Collar former frat boy won't be biting Linda Perry (of 4-Non Blondes) look.

Wow, do I feel bad for this kid's family...

So I watched episode 2 of How to Get Crotch Rot--I mean, The Pickup Artist 2 on VH-1, on which Brian, faced with the prospect of having to choose 2 of the other douchebags-in-training to be his "wingmen" (i.e. people he would share his talent win with to make them safe from being eliminated) said the following:

"I know it's only been 2 weeks, but I feel like these guys are really like members of my family. They're like a hair on my butt."

Okay, what?

If you regard the members of your family with all the love and respect as a hair on your butt, something tells me you either undervalue your family or overvalue your ass hair.

And frankly, although I will never stop wondering what kind of women actually respond to the techniques "Mystery" is teaching, perhaps Captain Butt Hair here shouldn't be taught to pick up women on the off chance one will actually sleep with him and spread his genetic material to another generation.

In other news, Mystery gave one of the contestants a "special tool" to help him pick up women in the club--a fluffy black boa. And the special tool who got this accessory from Mystery (you see what I did there?) had no idea what to do with it. He just kind of put it around his neck and pretended he wasn't wearing it. According to Mystery, however, that accessory is "magic in [his] hands."

Okay, show of hands, who amongst us would not run from a man in a club wearing a fluffy boa?

No Wonder People Think Women are Stupid...

Ladies, do you see this man, right here, on the right? Would you let this man take you home with him? Would you let him kiss you? Hell, would you let him speak to you?

No, neither would I. But for a second season, VH1 is allowing him to teach sexually/socially challenged young men how to pick up women. And his advice isn't, "Find the one so drunk she can barely stand and drag her out by the hair," which surprised the crap out of me.

His name, in case you weren't clued in to the fact that this loser is a complete ass hat, is Mystery, and he's the host of The Pickup Artist. And his method of teaching men to pick up women involves changing everything about the men (creating avatars) and wowing women with childish parlor tricks and asinine riddles. And in every episode, he goes into a bar (albeit after his students when the girls are waayyyyy drunk) and picks up girls left and right.

I cannot be the only girl in the world who, upon seeing this guy approaching me, run as far and as fast as I can away from him. He's wearing a fur hat and has Tommy Lee's lip-print tattoo on his neck. And this is one of his less objectionable outfits. He wears goggles. GOGGLES!!! But no on his eyes--oh, no, this fashionable fellow puts them on top of his cowboy hats and his ski caps (which he is wearing in Arizona, in the middle of the summer). And you can't see it, but he has a ponytail. A friggin' PONYTAIL!!!

So he's not attractive, his conversation is just pointless inane bullshit and he dresses like a freak. Why is this man able to pick up a woman, much less teach someone else to do it? And I'd love to see the quality of woman who falls for it. I imagine her to be slightly classier than Tila Tequila, but not quite as classy as any cast of Flavor of Love.