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On incels, dead bedrooms and the hard problems of loneliness

residentcontrarian.substack.com

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

#931

Post by defterGoose »

theropost wrote: post #380

It must be confusing to be a boy these days with all the conflicting messaging on how they should or should not be. The expectations of men are conflicting, confusing, uneven, and ever-changing. Equality is thrown around, with many exceptions across the board. Men simply bite their tongues in society, and are expected to do so without much complaint. Men are told to share their feelings, but then ignored or shamed wh…

And then in the midst of the #MeToo movement, you have books like Fifty Shades of Grey setting sales records, and you're like, "Hol' up".

I think the answer here is that the expectations being thrown into the ring from all parties are unrealistic and self-serving, and the only true bastion of sanity is the one provided by raw biological drives. We as humans can continue attempting to put ourselves above our animal nature, but it does seem that we might be destined to fall on our face.

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

#932

Post by supernovae »

robocat wrote: post #717
supernovae wrote: post #668

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Shorter work weeks, universal healthcare, affordable housing, open borders, freedom to travel, less consumerism, more time for friends/family...

I thought countries that have most of those things seem to have as many problems with depression and anxiety? And countries without those things perhaps don't? Which are the correlations that actually matter?

nah... go look up quality of life ratings and you can see these countries do great.

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

#933

Post by jjgreen »

ethbr0 wrote: post #567
Fargren wrote: post #556

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That would imply all sexual exclusive relationships are healthy, which is very much not the case. Sexual exclusivity and relationship health are orthogonal.

I think you're taking the set theory a bit too far...

∀ X [ ∅ ∉ X ⟹ ∃ f : X → ⋃ X ∀ A ∈ X ( f ( A ) ∈ A ) ]

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

#934

Post by ldarby »

strofcon wrote: post #927
ceilingcorner wrote: post #240

These issues are far more serious than is known and commenters saying “too bad, you don’t deserve to date someone” really don’t understand how ineffective this approach is. You can’t just shame tens of thousands of men into accepting a substandard life. Disclaimer: I am not making any ethical judgments here, just observing. This problem didn’t really exist before for three reasons. One, widespread access to prostitut…

"You can’t just shame tens of thousands of men into accepting a substandard life." I would challenge the "substandard life" assertion, as it's a framing issue. The biological need for sex is indeed great, I won't argue that point - but I don't believe that lacking sex necessarily makes a life substandard. In all fairness, it is extremely difficult to re-frame something so primal, but I think a stronger focus on accep…

There are many variations of standards of life. Some are objectively better than others. Compare a wealthy person to someone whose standard of life was so bad they froze to death on the streets in winter, due to homelessness.

There are many factors that affect standards of life, including e.g. having a shelter or not, etc. Other factors make less of a difference to the standard, e.g. access to education. This is all obvious and should go without saying. What you're trying to say is that 'having sex or not' is not a factor that affects the standards of life, but I think it quite obviously is one as well.

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

#935

Post by sizzle »

piva00 wrote: post #416
schnevets wrote: post #245

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am frequently surprised by the number of "dead bedrooms" I know about among friends, and I sincerely believe the problem is the western world's secretly coy perception of sex. There is a superficial surface level that is extremely wrong (for example, Successful people have sex, the most successful people have the hottest sex with the hottest partners; Sex isn't about planning it's about letting the desire overcome…

> I think this is a very Americanized perspective, though, so I would be especially interested in hearing perspectives from other cultures. I agree this is very Americanised, I can chime from two different perspectives and cultures: Brazil and Sweden. Brazil is... Very Americanised, I believe that the same issues the USA has with sex are present in Brazil, it's expressed in some different ways but the underlying issu…

Pornography from a young age might be warping their perception of sex and what it’s supposed to look like making them unable to please a woman who needs time to warm up instead of going from 0-100 like men are portrayed as doing.

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

#936

Post by CRConrad »

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #595
robocat wrote: post #581

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Depression and anxiety usually reduce libido. Edit: Also an unhappy relationship often can lead to poor sex, depression, and anxiety.

Sounds like we need to address depression and anxiety with something other than drugs.

Also, you need to address birth control with something other than drugs.

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

#937

Post by CRConrad »

dqpb wrote: post #917
dTal wrote: post #890

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Before considering lofty philosophical ideas like "Justification" But... that was the whole topic. We're not talking about whether hunger causes violence, or whether sexual frustration causes rape. No doubt they do. The point was that labeling "food" as an essential need doesn't constitute an endorsement of food-related violence, and by analogy labeling sex as essential doesn't constitute an endorsement of rape.

The parent did say “I suspect the real issue is that it offered an explanation (not a justification)”, which is close to the point I was making.

I read your GGP just like the GP did: Somehow you managed to make it look like the point you were making was the complete opposite of what you're now saying it was.

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

#938

Post by CRConrad »

throwaway8581 wrote: post #924
oblio wrote: post #881

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not really. In many of them it's just about having kids.

At least all the Abrahamic religions, which I'm most familiar with, emphasize the good of sexual pleasure between spouses. That sex is only for procreation and not pleasure is a common misconception of the Christian view.

> That sex is only for procreation and not pleasure is a common misconception of the Christian view.

Yup. Very (perhaps most) common, for instance, among Christians.

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

#939

Post by CRConrad »

gautamcgoel wrote: post #774
alpaca128 wrote: post #655

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As someone living in a country where prostitution is legal I have a hard time seeing how your argument goes from that to dystopia. It's heavily regulated and controlled, which is better than people doing it anyway without any oversight and the safeties from that. And even aside from that I don't see a problem with it, of course as long as it's 100% consensual. Maybe I'm missing some obvious problem, but the thing cur…

Just out of curiosity, which country are you describing?

My guess was Germany.

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

#940

Post by CRConrad »

ceilingcorner wrote: post #842
alpaca128 wrote: post #655

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As someone living in a country where prostitution is legal I have a hard time seeing how your argument goes from that to dystopia. It's heavily regulated and controlled, which is better than people doing it anyway without any oversight and the safeties from that. And even aside from that I don't see a problem with it, of course as long as it's 100% consensual. Maybe I'm missing some obvious problem, but the thing cur…

The issue here is that the idea of “100% consensual” is 100% unrealistic. If working as a prostitute is acceptable and pays 10x the average salary, living costs adjust in reaction, then what is consensual about this? Allowing unhealthy or undesirable behaviors to be economically lucrative doesn’t make them ethically good. To me, the scenario is dystopian because it’s saying we are incapable of managing our own desire…

> Allowing unhealthy or undesirable behaviors to be economically lucrative doesn’t make them ethically good.

You're pre-supposing that prostitution is unhealthy or undesirable. Isn't that exactly the stigmatising attitude that makes it "dystopian"?

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