My concern is that the LW standards of communication and goal of rationality do not correspond to PUA methods. Rewarding a user for advancing a PUA discussion does not reward rational discussion but instead rewards the ability to teach social interaction.

As teaching social interaction is not a subset of rational behavior, so PUA discussion is not a subset of LW discussion. The difference lies in the approach to subconscious stimuli; PUA exploits where LW illuminates.