Negative People To Stand Up To: Pushers & Players

One problem I've had regarding being victimized or even just profoundly disappointed, repeatedly throughout my life-- is that I don't like to believe that people can be so disturbing or damaging. I want to believe the best of people. I want to offer the benefit of the doubt.

That is a problem. That is a mistake. I can see that now.

Approaching everyone with such openness and vulnerability... treating everyone I meet as if they merit my trust... is not a smart strategy. Yet I use it over and over again.

Okay-- well, I will give myself some credit for spotting certain types early on. Pushers and Players I am able to identify and treat with extreme caution right away. I can thank my father for that. Watching a con man at work (and I have!) has allowed me the educational opportunity to see through that game. Because that is what it is to them, a GAME.

Players: What we call men who are continuously making a play for sex. Womanizers. Dogs. Seduction-artists. These are the guys that believe and treat women (or men if gay) that the objects of their sexual desire are not worthy of the honor of being treated with respect. They play upon the narrative of romance and the symbols of "a successful man." They like to sweep a woman off her feet with compliments and even gifts. They make a lot of effort to look "sexy" and act suave. Whenever I see a man like this, I blanch. I'm disgusted by their blatant behavior, treating fellow human beings like toys to use and toss. And I'm embarrassed for whoever actually falls for the game. Rudeness is the answer to this problem if approached, because no other reaction will discourage them once they set their sites on you.

Women with lower self-esteem and a great need to be SEEN, to feel SPECIAL, to "FALL" in love-- are what they look for and how they get their "in." Any woman so hungry for attention she'll take almost anyone who gives it to her tends to be very open to this sort of exploitation. Also note that many domestically abusive men have strong aspects of the Player in them, as well as massive control and aggression issues. The only difference is that a Player will use for sex and move on, whereas an Abuser doesn't want to give up his toy/servant. Both see their lover as a THING, though, whose thoughts, feelings, and sovereign self-hood don't matter. Date-rapists fall under this category as well.

Pushers: What I call high pressure salesmen. Anyone who has to PUSH their idea or good for sale (like drugs, hence "pusher") knows that by itself, what they're selling is NOT worth buying. You don't need to convince anyone to trade money in for a worthy purchase or offer. Things that hold value intrinsically don't need much advertisement-- let alone a sales presentation. So whenever you get ANYONE telling you some long story that in the end means you part with your money--? Walk away. And get RUDE. Because pushers will use every strategy they have to change your mind. Your greed. Your guilt. And yes, even your need to think of yourself as a polite, civilized human being. Pushers are con men, whether they go for it personally or because another person pays them to get your money

The aspects these 2 types have in common is the use of subterfuge and CHARM to convince targets that they should give up something of value to them-- as if they (the Pusher or Player) were also in it sincerely and would be reciprocating. But they're not. They get their "mark" (what confidence men call their targeted victim) to trust them and offer what they're holding of value, be it sex or money. They are TAKERS who refuse to give. Giving, these types believe, is for suckers. 

Another big RED FLAG warning about these types is that they won't take no for an answer.  Whenever anyone refuses to honor and respect your "no," there is a massive problem going on right in that moment that you CANNOT afford to ignore! Someone is challenging your right to refuse, and that is actually dangerous. To your pocketbook or bank account at the least, and maybe to your safety, well-being and even your life.


Few people know this, but there is a sort of shallow camaraderie among such people. They recognize one another when they're working their marks. In bars or other social places where strangers meet, or in sales during day to day interactions. There are ways of playing marks, and there is an attitude, an aura of confidence and slick sparkle they give off that is unmistakable to any who know the game.

They like to gather together from time to time and brag about their conquests. How many women they fucked-- and to what extent.. ("This one time I got some 19 year old to actually let me shove a carrot up her twat-- man! Younger women are so goddamn easy!!"  <-- That is a verbatim quote one Prince Charming offered with great guffaws of self congratulations.) How to set up a con, different techniques that play on human vulnerabilities they've discovered, that sort of thing...

These guys don't feel guilty. They don't feel pain or angst or loss. They don't want or need therapy. As far as they're concerned, there is nothing wrong with them. They're GIFTED with a great insight. They "know" that people are just there for the taking. They aren't burdened by the same behavioral limitations the rest of us are-- and they love it! They think its funny. They derive great pleasure from their conquests, because they feel that all of life is a game of winners and losers, and they like to win. But to win, their marks have to lose. Game-- set-- match.

I grew up in a home with a man like this. My father wasn't a total sociopath, he wasn't physically cruel to animals or people for example. He could form attachments. He felt guilt (if only a limited amount of it) when he hurt someone he cared about. But he also felt that softer feelings were weaknesses that SURELY other people would exploit in him, so he beat those feelings down hard. Its like he was born normal and got sucked into the philosophy and lifestyle of a sociopath that brainwashed him.

And, as a matter of fact, that is kind of what happened to him... he started out a ballroom dance instructor. Poor, but he loved dancing, and music, and he even liked to sing bass for men's vocal groups (late 40s/early 50s). He grew up abused by his dad and neglected by his mother (gee, I wonder what that's like?) and left home with a LOT of baggage. His life of crime began when rich women paid him for sexual services beyond the dance instruction. He thought that was awesome, but it didn't happen often enough to support himself. He tried college, but was too scattered to get beyond a year-- and he drank too much. He tried the military, but couldn't take the authoritarian, regimented life-- and he drank too much.

At some point, he ended up homeless and ran into some guy playing chess in a city park somewhere in California. My father was good at chess and the guy stunned him by beating him quickly in a short handful of moves. My father lost all the money he had left to a chess shark. But instead of getting angry, he was intrigued and asked questions.

I don't remember the name of the man who took my father under his wing, but I remember the story. My father was in AWE of this guy and said he turned his life around. Basically, the Shark guy was a con artist who was bored and a braggart. He enjoyed teaching this early 20-something the ropes because he got off on having a follower. He gave my father ideas on how to seduce more older, rich women. And also how to cheat at EVERY game that people gamble money on-- like dice, cards, chess. He taught him how to cheat in Vegas until the mob chased them both out. (This was the 50s/60s when the mob still ran Vegas openly.) He even taught him how to join a multi-man con game to take one or more rich guy's money. (I saw at least 7 pyramid schemes like this growing up.)

The Shark had truisms that my father repeated to me growing up like, "Never play any game unless you can cheat." Over a span of a year or so, they hung out and my father was introduced to the world of the Confidence Man. And that's the way he lived his life forever after. He traveled the world on other people's money several times over, and even got free plane rides with con schemes (just running last minute to board a plane waving an old ticket.) The largest con they ran at the end of their time together-- he set my father up to lose all his money from a big score to the Shark, with a note that just said, "That's your final lesson, Mark"-- which is like the worst insult in the fraternity of liars, being called a 'mark.' The lesson of course, that it wasn't safe to trust anyone, even if they didn't take you the first time you trust them-- its always a set up to make the mark trust you more later for a bigger score...

My father never got caught. He only did jail time for unpaid PARKING TICKETS and in small towns for hanging out and being a stranger (its called "vagrancy", its basically bogus-- but they were right to do it because my dad was up to no good, small town people aren't savvy like city folk!) Towards the end, my father added gem smuggling to his repertoire because who suspects elderly, well-dressed men of that sort of thing? My family didn't live on that money after I was 8 or so, though, because his alcoholism led to too many mistakes to count on rent money. But he kept it up until he had a series of strokes while in Hong Kong smuggling rubies. We were poor and the asshole was smuggling rubies..! *rolls eyes* But at that point, he did it for the thrill, and the all-expenses-paid travel.

Getting back to my point, there was some real advantage in seeing the Players & Pushers "behind the scenes"-- and I'm talking about the professionals, here. Once you've heard them talk to each other, listened to them plan out a game, brag about a score, compare stupid marks to one another-- it changes the way you view anyone who reminds you of these types of people. There were some women who did it, too, by the way.

So--! I identify the obvious Players and Pushers (out for sex or money) easily and consistently, and have avoided many troubles that way. I taught my husband (who was SUCH an easy mark when we met! OMG) and now he's really good at seeing it most of the time as well. There's a vibe they give off I seem to smell, if that makes any sense. And personally, I have never been used for sex or had my money conned out of me in my entire life. And who can say that-? Like I said, I give myself some real credit for this.

My problem is that when it comes to people who have an agenda that is NOT about sex or money, I don't always see it coming. I don't see the ego issues, the power players, the copy cats and cheaters. People that are not obvious sociopaths, but who take some tips from that playbook, are the ones I need to identify more quickly... and that is what I'm going to talk about next.