I'm more concerned about the well-being of PUAs and PUAs wanabees.
The main reasons of the lack of attractiveness are usually the immaturity of the emotional intelligence (limited empathy, inability to notice facial and body expressions, inability to identify its own emotions, limited skills in handling a conversation) and more simply the physical aspect (A and H body shape versus V shape, cleanliness, elegance).
Giving tricks to immature people, imo would tend to give them new bad habits and to postpone them to face their real problem.
If a part of your focus is to improve their social skills / emotional intelligence, to gain confidence by encouraging their efforts in doing so, to spend some time in a gym to have their shoulders larger than their waist and to groom themself a minimum, that's another thing.
Please tell me when your book is ready.
Communication is partially about what you mean to say and partially about how the other person interprets it. I think taking into account how what you say may be interpreted differently from how you intend it is important. Interestingly, I think it's this aspect that is often lumped in with cries of manipulation or trickery.
For example, let's assume you don't have much exposure to pets and animals but you quite like them. You go up to a dog or cat and reach out your hand to pet it - with nothing but the purest intentions. However, some dogs have been hit or mistreated by strangers so a sudden movement towards their head causes them to bark and bear their teeth or even bite you - or a cat to just run away. Someone comes along and says "Hey before you reach out to touch it's head, just put your hand out there so the animal can smell you for a second before going to pet the animal. That way, it's much less likely to view you as a threat and either lash out at you or run away"
The person takes on this knowledge - which could be considered empathy, or a greater understanding of the other parties (in this case a dog or cat) perspective, and goes forth for many years in the future happily petting animals and being bitten less.
This is almost exactly how I view pickup advice . Is it "manipulation" or "trickery"? I don't really think so. I see it as understanding both sides of the equation and acting with knowledge of both your intentions and how to best convey those intentions without (quite reasonable) misunderstanding on the other parties' part.
I do acknowledge that not all practitioners or students view it this way, and instead would love nothing more than the secret tricks to get her into your bed. I just think that ironically, the "devious tricks" work much better when you try to create and provide rather than steal and take - which is to say they stop being devious, yet are even more effective than before.
Ultimately the most important part of the equation is your intention. The behaviors will help you whether your intentions are pure or not, and, as many geeks have a lot of pent up frustration, they might be tempted to use techniques to "get revenge" for years of being slighted by the popular kids. However if the path is laid out properly (and this is why the spiritual aspect is important), they will gravitate towards the right mindset instead.
