She glances in his direction, while batting her blue, long-lashed eyes. For a moment, they connect. Victory is near, as he motions to the bartender to send her down a cocktail of her choice. She giggles to herself quietly, knowing she has won the game. As he walks over to talk to her, she no longer wants to know his name. Do we hear Kanye West’s “Gold Digger” melody ringing in our ears?

Katie Hegoas, 20, knows what she’s doing when it comes to scheming free drinks from guys at bars. She refuses to bring more than $10 out with her a night because she knows some guy will pick up the rest of her tab. Girls do this time and time again, having no reservations about using their sexuality to get what they want. Are getting free drinks from men with no desire to ever see them after that night, or accepting a free dinner and a movie on the first date with no intent to date them a second time, forms of modern day prostitution? The victims of this cruelty will say “yes,” but the players who know how to work the bar to their advantage will always say “no.”

“I’ll buy a guy a drink, but when it comes to substance, the guy best be paying for dinner,” Hegoas says. “I’ll offer to pay for dinner, sure, but if he dares accept my offer, the deal is off. And he can say ‘peace out’ to the option of date number two. Splitting the bill is for you and your brother!”

Anthony Lerner, 26, agrees with Hegoas when it comes to picking up the check for the girl on a first date.

“As a man, I am a firm believer in paying on the first date,” Lerner says. “I don’t think that it is an obligation, but more of a custom and a sign of things to come in the future. It’s a primal gesture of showing that you are the provider. It’s just what a gentleman should do in my opinion.”

Regardless, if you have the same opinion as Lerner, that a man should whip out the cash at first or not, there are many girls who will take advantage of a man’s generosity.

Take Marilyn Monroe’s character, for example, who didn’t make a secret of hunting for a rich man in “Gentlemen Prefer Blondes,” especially when she sang a tribute to diamonds, “a girl’s best friend.”

Thirty years later, Madonna satirized that shallow gal with dollar signs in her eyes in her pop hit “Material Girl.”

Today, there are still plenty of examples in Hollywood and beyond of that good old-fashioned “gold digger.” Anna Nicole Smith immediately comes to mind.

But new statistics from the online dating company Match.com suggests a downtrend in the number of women looking to marry Mr. Moneybags, and surprisingly, an upswing in the number of men who seem to be seeking Ms. Moneypenny.

Furthermore, one in three single men say they want to snag a woman who out earns him, according to the dating Web site True.com. Could it be that the traditional gold digger is on the decline?

Lerner does not think “gold digging” is over by any means but, more or less, still in its prime.

“I had thought the era of gold diggers ended in the 1960s with the women’s movement,” Lerner says. “But I’m here to say that from where I sit, it’s still alive and well. Perhaps today’s women, seeing their mothers not so happy in the workplace makes them decide they’d rather stay home and have a man support them, if they can find one.”

Lerner even has a three-step-system when buying a drink for a female at a bar, so he knows for sure he is not being fooled by the J.Lo’s rocks that she’s got.

“There are only three reasons to ever buy someone a drink: one, they are your homey, two, it is their birthday, or three, you want to bang them,” Lerner says. “I have bought plenty of drinks for girls and my girlfriends at bars, which fits under the first two options, however buying a drink for the third reason I have never done, because if a girl is going to hook up with me it isn’t because I bought her a drink, it would be because I’ve impressed her with my looks, charm, wit or she just wants to have sex.”

Crystal Cautillo, 21, one of Hegoas’ allies, says she doesn’t think any girl is a “gold digger” because she accepts free drinks from guys at bars. Hey, if you buy her a drink, she’ll even throw in a dance with you.

“Guys buy me drinks all the time, and usually I’ll dance with them for a song or two, but then I’m out of there,” says Cautillo, an Abercrombie and Fitch employee. “It’s not prostitution, because even if you hook up at the end of the night, it was your choice to do it or not to do it.”

So, ladies and gentlemen, what we have here is a tie. Who is right? Is it wrong to take free drinks from guys at bars, or is there nothing dishonest about accepting a freebee?

Hegoas stumbles out of Blue Light, a dance club and bar in the Marina, laughing her ass off. Cautillo follows shortly behind her. Both received three drinks from guys they’ll never talk to again because, let’s face it, they gave the guys the wrong digits. They even got the suckers buying their drinks all night to give them money for the cab ride home. They not only left the guys at the Blue Light lonesome this evening, they also left them with an even more horrible thing to stomach: blue balls. Those men may make more money for the next girls who prey on them for free cocktails, but those balls will never get better.

“Drinks don’t mean the guy is going to get something out of it,” says Cautillo, recalling the numerous times she’s gotten a good buzz at some poor sap’s expense. “If you feel obligated to hook it up with him after he buys you a drink, you are just plain dumb.”

Hegoas agrees with Cautillo that you’re the “chump” if you feel bad at the end of the night for receiving free drinks. After all, the guys were the ones offering.

“I don’t think women accepting a drink from a guy at a bar is wrong in any way,” Hegoas says. “I think it’s a way of getting drunk...duh! I’ve accepted many drinks from guys, with no intention of dating him ever. Probably like one in 50 are actually date-worthy. Sorry, it’s true, and that’s not my fault. So I shouldn’t be judged for it.”

CONTACT SWETZ AT ELLY@SFSU.EDU