Analyzing Mildred

One of my friends routinely has a pick-up line in which he calls random girls he doesn't know Mildred. He gets it from the movie Dirty Work:

Norm MacDonald: Hey, Mildred... Mildred! MILDRED!
Traylor Howard: Oh hey Mitch...you must've forgot my name, it's not Mildred, it's Kathy
Norm MacDonald: I didn't forget your name, you never told me, so I figured i'd just guess and make one up

Quite a funny moment, unfortunately not many people have seen Dirty Work...specifically not many women have seen Dirty Work and they rarely if ever get the joke. Thus, it generally fails.

Now for the analyzing part of this post. In reality there ARE aspects of this "pick-up line" that should work. As described by an ariticle in the economist, a major form of persuasion is done by reducing their resistance to being persuaded (referred to as Omega strategies). Resistance is a thing, therefore it is finite and can be increased and reduced accordingly. A strategy that fits into this Omega categore is by "disrupting" their resistance through the unexpected:

In an experiment a few years ago, students posing as beggars found that they received small change 44% of the time that they asked directly for it without specifying a sum. If they asked for a precise sum that was a single coin (25 cents), they got it 64% of the time. But if they asked for an apparently arbitrary number (37 cents) they got it 75% of the time. The more precise and unusual the request, the less people were able to resist it.

The "Mildred" line should work on this level. No girl would be expecting to be called Mildred in the middle of the bar. Hell, no person would expect to hear someone our age being called Mildred. So, the unexpected part is down. What's the problem here? Well, from what I've learned in Social Psychology, I would explain the phenomenon of people being persuaded by the unexpected by the fact that when people expect others to behave in a rational manner. So for the situation described in the economist article, people assume that there is a rational reason that the "beggers" are asking for a specified amount of money (they're right there is a rational reason...they're doing an experiment). Most likely they'll assume that the "begger" is asking them for a specific amount of money because that's the exact amount of money they need. So, by contributing that 37 cents, they assume that they are making that person reach their goal. Meanwhile, if the "begger" asks for spare change, then the passerby will likely just assume that that begger is like all the others and that in the grand scheme of things the small amount of change they give them will have little affect on their poverty.

Now, with Mildred what sort of rationalization occurs? One rationalization could be, "Oh he must think I look like a girl named Mildred... Mildred is an old lady name... this asshole thinks I look like an old lady." Thus, the girl would react, as they often do when this line is used, in a disparaged manner. Now, how could this whole problem be corrected? My solution would to use a name that is often associated with unusual attractiveness, rather than unusual plainness. Names such as Giselle, Gabrielle, Angelina, or Scarlett. All these names are fairly unusual and generally associated with hottness. Of course if you're not going for hot, you could go for cute names such as, Lily, Amanda, Polly, or Amy. I would suggest staying away from names such as Candy, Jacki, Trixie, or Decadence, as those tend to be assoicated with strippers.

If you're havin' trouble with the high school head,
He's givin' you the blues
You wanna graduate, but not in his bed,
Here's whatcha gotta do:
Pick up the phone, I'm always home,
Call me anytime
Just ring: three-six-two-four-three-six-oh,
I lead a life of crime!