Back then pick-up artists were still a major thing, so I learned and then had to unlearn all that bullshit.

Oh. Thank dear god I never tried.

However, things won’t get better if we’re treating young men as poor, helpless victims of society

They are usually victims of their own parents, who may have too differing behavior from what is common average (say, example 1) both asexual and thus treating nonverbal communication as something not very hard or important, and thinking that you'll just learn it, or, example 2) too sexual, like, sorry, one of the parents being an ex-escort and thus their child incorrectly measuring the signals sent, or, example 3) both parents having grown with their mother only or with little attention from their father, thus again not learning the skills of communication for men, one can imagine other examples).

instead of treating them like, you know, men, and telling them to take responsibility for their lives and online habits

Responsibility is fine for most, not knowing what to do is a different matter.

You’re not a victim, because you still have the power to change yourself.

That's a philosophical question. You may have noticed that what you eat and how you exercise physically and what news you hear and what people tell you all affect very much what you think and how. So whether you can consciously change yourself to some intended end is, again, a question.