You might be asking yourself, where exactly is a post titled “Hookers, Blow and Round-the-World Tickets” headed.

Why, to FlyerTalk of course.

These are all answers to the Kat007’s question, “What’s your goal in MS?” – some of the answers presumably being more tongue-in-cheek than others:

First you get the money …. ~amolkold

To crush your enemies, to see them driven before you, and to hear the lamentations of their women. ~Stoughton

Ditto. And I like traveling in Asia and Latin America to do paid and volunteer English teaching. Pillaging and teaching are complementary when they are done with points and miles. ~carpentry4thought

All farcical responses aside, this is a really interesting discussion revealing how different people approach Manufactured Spend differently, and how some see it as possibly the beginning of the end of the FF game.

I started churning and MS with the goal of getting two RTW trips on 1World. Then AA did away with their RTW tix. Now I m doing it to get a couple free trips overseas annually. ~Navybones

I’m small potatoes in the MS world, but I do what works for me, which is well under $5K a month in MS. I like to earn at least 25-30K a month in points, besides sign up bonuses, and doing MS helps keep the points balances high. Just a $1000 at Office supply (5K UR points) and the 2 Citi offers (4K AA points) keep a steady supply coming into the coffers. Add bank direct, some shopping portals and my significant real life expenses, and I’m earning more points than I can spend every month. My points balances are steadily rising, and I’ve been on 10 vacations in the last 18 months. ~StartinSanDiego

Smart parasites don’t set out to quickly kill their host. ~AlohaDaveKennedy

And Andy2 makes a valiant attempt at making a statement about manufactured spend in general using some of the comical responses as the metaphorical foundation of his argument:

Take for instance the lucrative Citi Card 100,000 mile offer for the $450 annual fee, $200 statement credit, and the need to spend $150 or so in manufactured spending fees to get the 110,000 miles. … Some (such as the frequent flier who desires a return to the system in which most miles were earned by flying) would disapprove, but it is largely harmless. But canceling the card to avoid paying the fee is like the john taking the money he initially set on the nightstand back as he leaves in the hope that she does not notice. Canceling the card and trying to keep the $200 is like the john not only taking his payment back but getting in her purse while she is in the bathroom and taking some of what she earned from her last customer.

 

When she realizes that she is not making very much money being a hooker, because of a few unscrupulous johns, she is likely to quit. Tough luck for her relatively more honest johns who really liked going to see her.

 

The reasonable MS goal setters are a bit like those honest johns.

What are you when it comes to manufactured spend? Are you an honest john? A dishonest john? A thieving john? Or a frequent flyer who desires a return to the old system?

Yes, those are your only options.

Read the thread in its entirety: What’s your goal in MS?