The Rawness

I don’t usually do celebrity gossip but this here is what Barack Obama calls a teachable moment so I’m going to make an exception.

First, here’s the backstory:

Eminem has hit out at Mariah Carey and husband Nick Cannon in his new song The Warning.

It’s the latest in a long feud between the pair who first came to blows when Eminem said he had a fling with Mariah back in 2001 and she denied it.

It’s been claimed recently that Mariah mocked the rapper in the video for her latest single Obsession.

It comes after Eminem mentioned Mariah in his song Bagpipes From Baghdad, which also talked about her husband Nick.

In May, Nick leapt to his wife’s defence and retorted by blogging: “homeboy is still obsessed with my wife”.

And here’s the diss track:

I’m torn on this from a power and career perspective. For Eminem, it generates lots of buzz, and the lyrics and beat are sick, yet at the same time, is it good buzz? On one hand this is a whole lot of energy to devote to a chick, especially if the underlying events go back to 2001. And it comes off like catfighting. I’m of the opinion that when dealing with a woman, whether to woo her or in an argument, you should be talking less than she is. Talk more than her and it seems like you’re trying too hard or care too much. But at the same time, he does it with such skill and panache I’m tempted to make an exception, plus he blasts Nick Cannon and his career so well, which is always commendable. I’m sorry but Nick Cannon making the jump from Nickelodeon to entertainment areas requiring street cred always irked me, kind of like if AC Slater suddenly tried to be taken seriously as a member of Terror Squad after Saved by the Bell.

Which leads to the next question: what’s the best way for Nick Cannon to proceed from here? Any way he proceeds from here just makes him look worse. He’s basically become known as the ghetto Ashton Kutcher by making himself the boytoy of an A-list cougar. He’s tried to rap before but he’s not ready for a battle rap against a lyricist of Eminem’s character:

It’s too late pull the dismissive “I’m too big for all that, it’s beneath me” move because he already publicly issued a warning to Eminem in the media. On his twitter page he’s going that route now with quotes like “Quote of the day: “Never argue with fools because from a distance people cant tell who is who” and When there are no enemies within the enemies outside can not hurt you!” and “Never take your own revenge, but rather give place unto the wrath. For it is written vengeance is mine, I will repay… PREACH!” and “”I will bless those that bless you, and whoever curses you I will curse.” Genesis 12:3″ (Even though these are all well-known sayings, they’ve all been used in Jay-Z songs, making his response come off extra unoriginal and weak) He keeps adding a new quote related to taking the higher ground and being the better man every 6 minutes or so, and the tone is becoming increasingly desperate.

Three mistakes here: First mistake, if you’re going to dismiss a beef as being beneath you, you should just dismiss it once firmly and be done with it unless the opponent keeps coming back at you harder and harder. By saying it doesn’t matter over and over and over, Cannon gives the impression that it does matter. If he pulled such a move right after Eminem’s first volley, it would have been the right thing to do. Jay-Z recently did something similar with attention-whore rapper The Game. But Cannon made the mistake of publicly calling Eminem out on the carpet and threatening him, so after he put himself out there like that with such a blatant warning and his bluff has been called, there’s no turning back and playing the high road now. He backed himself into a corner and taking the high road after warning somebody that there’d be hell to pay if they crossed you again just makes him look weak. So his second mistake was, never make a threat unless you know you are willing to carry it out and specifically know HOW you are going to carry it out. Because if the person calls your bluff and you’re caught hesitating and you wait until then to think of how to proceed, you’ve already lost. For Cannon to respond with platitudes like that at this point is like bringing knives to a gunfight. This is a guy who has rapped multiple songs calling his wife a whore and fantasizing about killing her, written songs attacking his mother and has pulled out guns on multiple people. What did you expect to happen when you called him out, and why weren’t you prepared for it?!

To me Nick Cannon’s third and biggest mistake though was marrying a woman like Mariah Carey in the first place. This woman has had a history of hanging out with guys so far out of his league when it comes to griminess and bad boy attitude. After her split with Tommy Mottolla, this woman was utterly immersed in the world of hip-hop and urban entertainment. Any chick who is so heavily involved and embroiled in the rap and urban entertainment world as Mariah Carey was for so many years is bound to have some psycho, thug and gangster bad boy skeletons in her closet. Even if she says she never dated or had sex with any guys in this bad circle, it doesn’t matter, because women often lie to cover up their scandalous pasts, and men often lie to boost their number of conquests, and once you’re caught in the middle of a he-say, she-say situation, you already lose. You never know who to believe because there’s no way to prove anything. Even if she and Eminem disagree on the extent of the fling, they both admit there was some degree of a fling between them. That should be all you need to know when it comes to whether or not to marry her.

A woman’s past is always potentially your problem when you become serious with her, so you have to know what level of conflict you’re built for and if your woman’s social circle is well beyond that level, don’t enter a relationship with her. For example I’m no gangster so any chick I met who had a history of psycho gangster ex-es I avoided for long term commitments, because her past meant a higher likelihood of stalker psycho ex-es in my future, guys with way less to lose than me. If she had tough guys in her past who were the type to maybe just have a single one-on-one fight with me and leave it at that, that was an acceptable risk I knew I could handle. If he was in gangs and into gunplay or was an ex-con, fuck that. In college I knew a lot of guys who messed with chicks with ex-es like that and got a lot of grief as a result.

I was acquainted with a girl who was a lawyer, who had a really horrible bad boy streak up through her 20s. She was the smoking hot chick who loved the high-drama relationships with tattooed asshole psycho thugs and the occasional asshole psycho cop, which is even worse because you have even less recourse against a guy like that. She had the problem later when she hit her late 20s and early 20s. She was getting older and was no closer to settling down or finding stability in her personal life, so she wanted a nice guy provider type to settle down with now that she was done getting pumped and dumped by scumbags. Problem was, a lot of her crazy ex-es, including the psycho cop, were periodically resurfacing to stalk her, show up unannounced and threaten all her new boyfriends, and none of these new nice guy professional guys were willing to put up with it. Every week was a new sob story with this woman that related to her past awful dating choices. The lesson the guys in her life learned is the lesson that Cannon is learning now. That if you’re a square and a woman has a history of traveling in circles with thugs, guidos, gangster or convicts, even if she claims never to have dated one, don’t date her and risk putting yourself in a position you’re not equipped to handle.

So I guess the questions are, does this hurt Eminem more than it helps him or vice versa? Is it some gangsta shit or bad move to kiss and tell to that extent? In general, I think getting a reputation as one who kisses and tells without provacation is one of the worst moves a guy can do, but that then begs the question, was there sufficient provocation by Cannon and Carey? And what should Cannon’s next move be? What should his past moves have been?

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A reader sent me the following email:

How do you respectfully deal with long-winded people who are above you?

As an example, today I had a phone conversation/negotiation with a
real estate CEO. He kept talking long-windedly about a subject at
which point I cut him off by saying something – it wasn’t worth his
time or mine for him to keep going.
It happened twice. He belabored a point, I understood what was going
on, so I cut him off. Later on, he started belaboring another point
and I cut him off – mid-sentence. Maybe it’d have been best to cut at
the end of a sentence.

Here’s an example conversation:

Him: “and then we’d like to do [this], which will have [a bunch of
details], and then we’d like to do [this], which will have [some more
details], and then we’d -”
Me: “Yeah, it sounds like there’s a lot going on. Do you have some
specifications written up that you can send me?”

I feel it came off as kind of rude but something needed to be done.
Just want to hear what you think. What do you do in these situations?

I can tell you what not to do. A lot of people just do abrupt conversation changes when the other person’s topics bore them that are really off-putting both because of the language they use in doing in but even moreso because of the emotion they convey.

I use to know this really self-absorbed girl who, whenever someone’s topic bored her, would just totally ignore what the other person say and start her next sentence with “Yeah, anyway, blah blah blah.” Or she’d be like “Sure, whatever, [abrupt topic change to what she wanted to talk about” or “Yeah, but back to what we were saying before…” People HATED that because it came off really dismissive. (Not saying you’re a narcissist like her, just using her because she’s a really extreme example). But worse than the words she was using or her timing in interrupting was her dismissive tone. I don’t think she even realized she was doing it, but all her body language, tone and facial expressions were screaming boredom, contempt, impatience, etc. That killed her way worse than any linguistic issues surrounding her topic change.

The key is using words that make it sound like you’re enthusiastically and respectfully acknowledging what the other person is talking about, even as you’re dismissing it and moving on to another topic.

Improv has some great conversational exercises they do relating to this stuff. One is called “Yes, and…” You can see it here:
http://www.cnn.com/2008/LIVING/08/12/rs.how.to.think.on.feet/index.html

Problem is, the article uses some pretty bad illustrations of the concept. Still a good concept though.

What I do when I want to change a topic politely is do “Yes, and” but combine it with “That reminds me.” You agree enthusiastically, say something that acknowledges the last thing the person said, then add “that reminds me” to spin off to whatever topic you want regardless of whether it really relates to the original topic or whether the segue makes sense. If your acting is spot-on and you sell it with conviction and nonchalance the other person’s mind shouldn’t even pick up on what happened. When done right, the affirmative wording and enthusiastic vocal tone will register in the person’s mind as an extension of their topic of conversation rather then a shift. They don’t instinctively trigger minor feelings or rejection the way an annoyed tone, abrupt interruption and words like “but,” “whatever,” “anyway,” or “getting back to the business at hand” do.

For example, the guy could be like “I went hiking and Joe was there and Cindy and all these people from my past and work and we all saw so and so there and it was great and-” And you can be like “Yeah, I love getting outdoor exercise too! And I haven’t done it in the longest time, I miss it. In fact, we should set up something together sometime, like a hiking trip. That reminds me, let me hurry up and get those specifications from you before I forget. Don’t wanna be late.” If you stop to actually think about it, that segue makes zero sense. Why would outdoor exercise remind you of getting specifications? But when you properly convey enthusiasm and momentum, it won’t even register with the other person. The positive sentiment, vocal tone and enthusiasm register more.

Don’t get too hung up on the Improv aspect of my advice, I don’t want you to think I’m recommending you do anything as extreme assigning up for a class or anything (unless it’s something that interests you). The most important thing isn’t the words you choose and when you interject so much as the mood you successfully convey. I’m guessing on some level something didn’t sit right with you about the way you handled it, and you couldn’t put your finger on it, which is why you wrote me. If I had to guess, I think you probably let some negative emotion leak out some in your response, even if not a huge amount. A little bit of irritation, frustration, impatience, annoyance, or boredom. I say just practice saying the kind of response you said but in the same tone you would convey a response that comes in a conversation you’re enjoying having. That positive emotion will register higher than any slight rudeness from the topic change or phrasing.

The guy I knew who was best at this was a friend I had who was an actor. He could convey any emotion he wanted at will. Very impressive. So he could get away with blunt, direct or unpleasant language without ruffling feathers because he said such things with such positive emotion and warmth and exuded no negativity, just good intentions. Me, though? I still have a tendency to wear my emotions on my sleeve sometimes, and I’m horrible at hiding exasperation although much better than I used to be.

The flip side of this advice though are people like my ex-boss, a lady who would try to say critical things in an upbeat way and executed it so insincerely and over the top in her enthusiasm that it seems condescending and patronizing. She seemed to be one of those middle management people who was given communication advice similar to what I gave you but didn’t have enough social intelligence to calibrate it properly so ended up coming off like a trained social robot. I find women to be especially in the habit of falling into this trap because many of them are already naturally averse to open confrontation and like to give the appearance of consensus seeking, so when they make a conscious effort to be those things it ends up being overkill. It takes practice to strike that perfect balance, but coming off annoyed or a bit abrupt is much better than coming off insincere and fake as far as social sins go, especially when dealing with men.

Nothing to add for now. This guy’s stuff is great.

I’m going to be doing a post expanding on some of these ideas next week.

Recommended Reading From Alain De Botton:

Commenter Entropy left this comment:

Will anyone of you light a cigarette for a woman without being asked? I think it lowers your value–insofar volunteering to do anything for a pretty woman without being prompted–will lower your value. I will recommend a robust cigarette-centered NEG to go along with your assistance to help her light her cigarette. Baring that, dont help her at all.

This is a very good question. Watch this space, I’ll answer this question later today. In the meantime if you so desire, feel free to leave your responses to this question in the comments if you have any suggestions.

UPDATE:

So here are my thoughts on the matter. Rather than just give a yes or no answer, I’d rather take you through a thought exercise to train you in how to think about the game overall.

I think a lot of guys who are looking into interaction advice get caught up in finding hard and fast absolute rules to use in every situation. A rulebook and set of scripts that can be used across the board in every situation for success. Yes you should always neg. No you should never neg. Always buy a drink. No, never buy a drink. Always wait two days at least before calling. No, wait seven days. No, you should call immediately.

Let’s backtrack a second. The key here is not just to memorize rules or steps to universally use in every situation. The key is to understand what the larger purpose of all the specific advice is, what the ultimate goal is that the advice it trying to steer you toward. Once you understand that, you can alter the rulebook at will depending on the situation, and you can begin to understand why two people can do totally opposite styles yet still get good results.

When it comes to social interactions (all social interactions, not just dating), the ultimate goal of any rule is to convey lots of value as quickly as possible. Value means having something to offer rather than just being a “taker.” Picture when a moderately to shabbily dressed stranger comes up to you in the street in the big city and starts a conversation in a near-apologetic tone. He says “Excuse me, can I have a minute of your time? I just noticed you walking here in your sharp suit and…” Think of the times in the past this has happened to you. What is the first thing you think? “Is this a bum?” “Oh geez, spare me the story and just ask me for the money so I can just say yes or no and move on.” “Are you a salesperson? What are you trying to sell me today?” And so on and so on. Bums, cold callers, pushy salespeople, network marketing recruiters, we immediately see them as “value takers,” so the moment they approach us we resent them and start rehearsing rejections in our head. We feel they are solely there to take value from us for their own benefit without giving enough value back in exchange.

Now picture if someone comes out of a chauffered stretch limo in an impeccable three piece custom suit and said the exact same words “Excuse me, can I have a minute of your time? I just noticed you walking here in your sharp suit and…” How do you feel this time? It’s the exact same words but this time I’m sure it has a different effect. The difference is that the person now has the appearance of being a potential “value giver.” He may be a mogul or someone who can give you a job. He may be someone important about to tell you something to enrich your life. He may be someone who is connected that can help you along at some point in your life. He may be a celebrity. Maybe he’s a salesperson who is actually offering something very useful or a deal too good to pass up. Whatever he is, you are interested enough to know more and to find out for sure if he has any value to pass along to you. Or let’s even use a bum again for an example. Say instead of being the bum with a long sob story, say he sang you an incredible song and did an amazing comedy routine that livened up your day for a few minutes. And then he asked from money. Because he gave you some value first, you don’t mind giving him some in return. The sob story beggar street guy is a value taker. The performing street guy is a value giver. Both ask for money but the value context is totally different, hence the different results.

Another example, think of a shabby-looking nightclub blasting lame music and letting any low class person in. There’s a guy outside trying to cajole any and all people passing by to enter. Telling you drink specials, promising girls and a good time, following you down the street harassing you to come in. There are a handful of desperate looking badly dressed scrubs on a quick-moving line thirstily ogling every girl who passes. Compare that with the place with a glamorous exterior, a red velvet rope, an insanely difficult door policy, celebs rolling up, a line down the block filled with beautiful classy women and high status and a bouncer who pays you no mind as you pass by or even as you engage him. Which one is more likely to be considered as a “value taking” spot and which one is likely to be considered a “value giving” spot? Which one will enhance your reputation more when you tell other people the next day that you got into it? Which one will likely lower your reputation if you brag you got into it?

So it goes with rules like “negs,” drink buying, cigarette lighting, etc. [This is the most important part of the piece so pay attention:] It’s not the action that matters so much as the context of the action. Is the action taking place in a “value giving” context or a “value taking” context?

In two different contexts, the exact same action can convey two totally different meanings. For example, let’s go back to the example of the two nightclubs. Picture if at the first lame nightclub I described, the desperate door guy promoter stops you and your friends and says “Wow, you guys sure are a sharp group. Come inside, we’ll set you up in VIP.” You’d look at the line of losers, the shabby looking exterior of the club and the eagerness of the promoter and his compliment will come off as a sign of weakness making him look lamer. Now picture you and your friends are passing by the second club and as legions of the beautiful people are clamoring outside to get in, the door person suddenly drops what he’s doing to approach you and say “Wow, you guys sure are a sharp group. Come inside, we’ll set you up in VIP.” Exact same action, a compliment. Exact same words and sentiment. But it has a whole different effect this time because it’s coming from a perceived “value giver” than a “value taker.”

Let’s alter the examples again slightly. Let’s go back to the first shabby club again. Say you pause outside just to survey it and see if you want to go in. It’s as I described before and initially seems unimpressive, and the guy comes up to you. You expect him to beg you to come in but instead he throws you a curveball and says “Nice as you guys look tonight, it’s doubtful you’re getting in. Even if you’re on the guestlist. It’s just been that kind of night. But if you hang around who knows?” This statement might be enough to get you intrigued, even if its for only a split second, in a nightclub you would have never remotely been interested in going to before hearing that statement. Suddenly you wonder if you misjudged the club. Suddenly you are curious about what’s beneath that exterior. You’re intrigued. The club is not eager to take value from you after all. In fact, it may have value to give. This is the same concept behind the neg. But in the case of the second club, the value it has to give is obvious from the start. And the fact that it is not eager to take your value because it has so many options is also obvious. So a similar statement from the door guy at that club is unnecessary to intrigue you. In fact, it may be overkill. The same goes for “negging.” To be a value-giver, you have to be able to pass a two-prong test: (1) how much value you potentially have to offer and (2) how desperately you need value from others,. The better you are at conveying yourself as a value giver, the less value-conveying shortcuts, tricks and rules you need. For illustration of this two-prong test, look at how banks decide who to give loans to. They don’t go by the person who has the least value to offer and blatantly conveys their desperate needs to take value from the bank, even though such a person would probably appreciate the loan the most. No, they choose who to give value to based on who (1) has a lot of value to offer in return (in the form of assets, a steady paycheck, dependable payment history on credit report and savings) and who (2) doesn’t have as desperate a need for the value (also something a credit report tells them). The person who seems to already have the most money and needs the money the least is the person the bank seems most eager to lend to.

One more example. Think of movie character archetypes. Say you have a do-gooder people pleaser character. Total nice guy wuss. Say you have the alpha male ladies man. For example, the characters Alan (Jon Cryer) and Charlie (Charlie Sheen) from Two and a Half Men. If Alan were to give flowers to a woman, shed a tear in front of her or declare his undying love for her, it just goes as more evidence of his loser persona. If Charlie were to do the exact same things, he would get credit for showing some vulnerability and it would be seen as endearing. Same act committed by both, but thanks to different value-giving and value-taking contexts conveyed, it leaves different impressions depending on who does it.

When a guy is not very good with women or is a beginner at getting good with women, hard fast rules of thumb and regimrented steps are more necessary, because he’s not used to quickly conveying what value he has value to give or that he’s not desperately in need of value to take. Chances are he’s spent most of his dating life as the equivalent of the beggar or pushy salesman in my first example, or the person who goes into the bank trying to get a loan by talking about how strapped for cash he is an how much he needs the loan. He’s used to always coming in broadcasting his low value and his desire to take value from others. He has no natural instincts at conveying high potential for giving value or low need for taking value. Not with his words, not with his body language, not with his physical appearance, not with his fashion choices. Like the beggar he’s only trained himself to broadcast how little he has and how much value he wants/needs to take. What the woman feels from the typical guy is similar to what most people feel when getting approached on the street with a pitch from blatant value takers like beggars, junk salesmen and telemarketers. The approached person thinks I know you want something, I’m sure you’re offering nothing or something I have no interest in, the sooner I can get you away from me the better.

So back to Entropy’s question. Is it weakness to light a woman’s cigarette unsolicited? Is it necessary to neg her when doing it? The answer is…it depends on how skilled you are at quickly setting a high-value-offering, low value-needing context. Or as I like to call it, your CRED (as in street cred). The higher the value you convey yourself as having to offer and the lower the you convey yourself as desperately needing value, the higher your cred. Some people scream high cred without uttering a word, just by eye contact and/or body language. Or by their entourage. Or their swagger. If you can reach this level, your mere aura does the job of a neg for you. This should be your ultimate goal. The negs, the rules, the scripts, the stories, those are all stepping stones to this final goal, not the goal itself. Once again, cred is how much value you potentially have to offer to others combined with how little you seem to need value from others in return.

If you rush over from across the room with eager body language, your arm outstretched and zero swagger to light the cigarette, you have no cred. Even a playful insult won’t help negate the weakness and desperation you’ve shown. On the other hand if you have the looks, swagger and aura that can demand attention and electrify a room the moment you walk into it, you can walk across a room confidently holding deliberate, smoldering eye contact for no other reason than to light her cigarette and still come off as high cred. No neg needed. The neg would be overkill. Most people fall in between both extremes. Be honest and evaluate where you fall in the spectrum of ability to instantly convey strong cred and that will tell you how much vulnerability, exerted effort or unsolicited niceness it’s safe for you to show up front. If you’re a rookie at conveying strong cred quickly, you need to show as little vulnerability, exerted effort and unsolicited niceness up front as possible and keep it that way until you feel you’ve reached a point in the action where you’ve conveyed strong cred. With time and practice, as you get dirty in the game and get better instincts and skills, you’ll know how to generate instant and insanely strong cred and you’ll get away with showing levels of vulnerability, exerted effort and unsolicited niceness that would kill most other guys if they did it (of course no matter how good you are, there are limits to this). Thanks to my ability to generate high cred, I’ve done stuff successfully that I routinely hear people say you should never do. I’ve called women an hour after getting their numbers. I’ve opened women with over the top compliments. I’ve lit women’s cigarettes unsolicited.

And of course when evaluating whether to use tricks such as playful insults and teasing or waiting a few days to call a number, it’s not just your cred alone in a vacuum you have to evaluate, it’s your cred in relation to the girl’s self-perceived cred. If you convey so much cred in relation to their girl that she feels way outclassed, she’ll doubt your interest is genuine because she’ll start thinking your out of your league. This is a way that the confidence and swagger of high cred can backfire. With this dynamic, insulting her even playfully or waiting too long to call her will confirm to her you’re out of her league and not serious about her, maybe just toying with her out of boredom, and end up messing you up. And remember, it’s her self-perceived cred that’s the issue, not what you perceive it to be. If a girl is a 9 to you and the rest of the world but has low self-esteem and sees herself as a 6, and sees you as having high cred, you can’t neg her because she’ll actually take you seriously. You can’t wait too long not to call her in a gambit to establish lack of neediness because she’ll take it as a high-status guy toying with her and not really being interested. On the flip side, if you are dealing with a 6 who’s self-perceived value is a 9…well, what would you do that for? You know better than that. Kick her to the curb!

So I know it’s not an easy yes or no answer as far as whether to light the chick’s cigarette or not. I know “it depends” often sounds like a cop-out answer, but it really does depend. It depends on both your conveyed cred and her self-perceived cred and how big the gap is between the two.