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On incels, dead bedrooms and the hard problems of loneliness

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Re: On incels, dead bedrooms and the hard problems of loneliness

#181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or equality of opportunity vs equality in outcomes.

I’ve seen this thrown around by Jordan Peterson and his fans but I’ve never met anyone, regardless of how crazy their ideology was, advocate for equality of outcomes outside of basic necessities. I’m convinced it’s a strawman.

There's this thing called communism, not sure if you have heard of it but it's becoming quite popular again amongst the younger generation.

Re: On incels, dead bedrooms and the hard problems of loneliness

#182
post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Haven't had a refresher on it since high school, so I might be totally out of the loop, but isn't equality of outcome the point of marxism?

Not at all. Marxism is a method of analyzing history and the present through the lens of class conflict. Generally "Marxism" is thrown around as a boogie man term by people with little understanding for something approximating extreme authoritarianism in which the state owns all the means of production and allocates everyone the same resources.

It's not "a boogie [sic] man". Marxist governments were definitely not "analyzing history", they were enacting government policies. That's what governments do, unsurprisingly.

(Source: I grew up in a Marxist country and was taught Marxism by a Marxist teacher.)

Re: On incels, dead bedrooms and the hard problems of loneliness

#183

There is a lot to unpack here, and it is difficult to know where to begin. I had a friend who was a pastor who lamented he didn't like that his yearly board game get-together with his other [often pastor] friends often ended up discussing their dead bedrooms. I have no idea how these dynamics have come to be so common, even taking into account the usual ebbs and flows in relationships. I don't know if this problem oc…

Religious couples tend to have the most fulfilling sex lives. Conservative religious couples have the best: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7060099/Highly-reli... Myself, as a highly conservative married man, my findings confirm the daily mail article, esp. when I look at the sex lives of my married friends who were more libertine in their youth. EDIT: A few theories: 1. My wife is not on birth control, whic…

I would suspect that usage of antidepressants is lower in highly religious couples. The one-two combo of antidepressants and hormonal birth control absolutely destroy libido.

Re: On incels, dead bedrooms and the hard problems of loneliness

#184

> I got absurdly lucky when I found my wife, but I spent every day without her more or less miserable. It’s arguable she’s the only reason I’m able to be happy. I imagine some of these men are similar to me in the loneliness and not as lucky in finding someone, and it’s impossible for me to not feel something. This is basically a red flag for any relationship. If the only thing making or allowing a person to be happy…

EDIT to add: the best explanation that I've heard for the feeling men have of basic unhappiness without romance and sex is toxic masculinity; the general societal rejection of deep emotional relationships between straight men. Lonely? Make strong friendships! Spend your time with other men who like you and enjoy your company and validate you. A partner is not a replacement for the natural circle of close friends huma…

>The desire to bone isn't 'toxic masculinity' and isn't something easily substituted with more friends (unless they are of the "with benefits" variety)

Wow, that's two turns of phrase that erode your point in one sentence.

Re: On incels, dead bedrooms and the hard problems of loneliness

#185

> if 51% of young men are single and only 31% of women in the same age bracket are, that implies something is up So that statistic really confuses me, how could that be the case? The data seems to imply a significant number of women are dating men far older than themselves, which just doesn't seem true to me. I'm wondering if that is a sampling error or different genders are interpreting the question differently. It…

My very strong suspicion is there’s lots of relationships that are encapsulated by this Mitch Hedberg quote:

“I don’t have a girlfriend. I do have a girl who’d be mad if she heard me say that.”

Re: On incels, dead bedrooms and the hard problems of loneliness

#186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’ve seen this thrown around by Jordan Peterson and his fans but I’ve never met anyone, regardless of how crazy their ideology was, advocate for equality of outcomes outside of basic necessities. I’m convinced it’s a strawman.

I don't know why you're being down-voted, you're right. I haven't met anyone, even in the insanely left and progressive university circles that I run in, who advocate for equality in outcome. It's equality in opportunity that's important. It's about letting 'your freedom as an individual to choose your own destiny' actually be 'free' from the start and not constrained by social mores, ingrained biases or discriminati…

You don't know any communists in your insanely left and progressive university? I find that hard to believe. I went to a fairly right wing university and the place with lousy with communists. They mostly got better, but still.

Re: On incels, dead bedrooms and the hard problems of loneliness

#187

> I got absurdly lucky when I found my wife, but I spent every day without her more or less miserable. It’s arguable she’s the only reason I’m able to be happy. I imagine some of these men are similar to me in the loneliness and not as lucky in finding someone, and it’s impossible for me to not feel something. This is basically a red flag for any relationship. If the only thing making or allowing a person to be happy…

This sounds pretty ignorant and insensitive. What someone wants or needs to live a happy life cannot be generalised. While I don’t think people owe you more than some empathy and politeness, they shouldn’t also be allowed to make sweeping judgments about your character on the basis of what you hold valuable or not.

It can be generalized. Sex drive is a biological imperative. To suppress it takes a lot of effort and adaptation. Workarounds take a lot of effort.

When you buy certain species of pets, you will only be able to buy them in pairs. Holding them solo is considered animal cruelty. I do consider holding humans solo cruelty, and people advocating things like "the world doesn't owe you a companion" cruel. Maybe the world isn't able to provide, but it should endavour to.

Re: On incels, dead bedrooms and the hard problems of loneliness

#188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> having a romantic and sexual relationship is not a requirement for a happy life. I don't have the all data off hand (see some citations below) but I believe they say married men live longer, commit less crimes and are happier. So yes in some sense, can you be happy if you are not married however, is it almost certainly harder. I assume you would find similar data for not having a romantic parter. You, a human, are…

The correlations are clear but causality less so. What if it’s not marriage that makes men happier, less prone to crime, and longer-lived - rather it is that women select for partners who are happier, less prone to crime, and healthier?

To figure out the causality, you'd need an experiment where people are randomly removed from relationships though random external events.

We do have an imperfect example of this, in the case of widowers. When someone is widowed, does their happiness tend to increase, remain level, or decrease?

Re: On incels, dead bedrooms and the hard problems of loneliness

#189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’ve seen this thrown around by Jordan Peterson and his fans but I’ve never met anyone, regardless of how crazy their ideology was, advocate for equality of outcomes outside of basic necessities. I’m convinced it’s a strawman.

Haven't had a refresher on it since high school, so I might be totally out of the loop, but isn't equality of outcome the point of marxism?

No. Marxism is for the abolish ment of social classes, with classes defined as contradictory groups related to relationships of production.

So a Marxist would want, for example, the employer/employee distinction to be abolished. But there would be no issue with inequality in the employee class, an employee may very well produce 3-4 times more value than another.

This is something that Marx explicitly wrote about - he thought that different people had different needs and abilities and thus should receive sometimes very different amounts of resources. The examples he gave would be someone that works much faster and better that someone else, or someone that has children to raise.

Re: On incels, dead bedrooms and the hard problems of loneliness

#190
>Her response was that they had so much "male privilege" and that they have no excuse for underperforming. That, thus, they should still be _ahead_ of women, presumably, despite the goal being that they... shouldn't be.

This will be downvoted and poorly received, but the fact is that women despise weak men. If a man is in a poor state, most women will be visibly disgusted by him. A man generally should not expect sympathy from women, because most of the time he'll get scorn instead.

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