The data are clear: The boys are not all right • Hacker News Board

Re: The data are clear: The boys are not all right

#751

Post by selfportrait » Thu, Feb 10, 2022, 5:05 AM UTC

hackerfromthefu wrote: post #618

selfportrait wrote: post #534

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This comment really takes you on a roller coaster. To mirror the title here, this comment is clear: this boy is not all right. Domestic terrorists? Social justice warrior nursing home staff? Patriot Act? Incel-oriented divorce court angst? Epstein? > And yet what is the national conversation about? It’s only about how all straight men of a particular “ethnic category” are racist and evil and they all need to focus on…

There's clearly hyperbole in the gp post, but there's also truth. Per HN guidelines try to take his post in good faith instead of writing him off. Be part of the solution not the problem.

To be fair there’s some truth in even the most outlandish conspiracies. That poster is undeniably an incel with distorted views on women and social justice causes. I think it would serve the boy well if you could pitch in and save him from the conservative propaganda he’s been fed, not to mention his views on women and that common whining that echoes in the halls of the Joe Rogan sphere about divorce. Divorce court is a common trope amongst reactionaries. He has clearly never talked to a woman let alone heard of the concept of a prenup? Should we get the ball rolling on the wildly delusional nurses comment or the random Patriot Act comment or oddly enough the Epstein comment that he stitched in there for good measure? I’m sure they would make for good discussion, just not in the rambling context.

I think I did decently on the front of taking his post in good faith, that’s why I didn’t ask him if he listens to Jordan Peterson (hint: he probably does).

The guy is in pain, that much is clear.

Re: The data are clear: The boys are not all right

#752

Post by rank0 » Thu, Feb 10, 2022, 5:05 AM UTC

MathCodeLove wrote: post #733

rank0 wrote: post #724

> Many boys are thus often growing up raised by single mothers, the share more than doubling between 1980 and 2019, from 18 percent to 40 percent. The study he sites at https://www.statista.com/statistics/276025/us-percentage-of-... is titled "Percentage of births to unmarried women in the United States from 1980 to 2019" I think it's quite dishonest to present this data as "2/5 men are raised without a father." I si…

Instead of stating "I dont believe that" how about you post some data to the contrary?

Sure. My data is the same study that Yang cites. Being born to an unmarried woman != raised fatherless.

Re: The data are clear: The boys are not all right

#753

Post by bradlys » Thu, Feb 10, 2022, 5:05 AM UTC

skeaker wrote: post #594

PragmaticPulp wrote: post #581

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The selection process is on Tinder, not the maternity ward, and the bar is brutally high there for men. I’ve been seeing this exact trope repeated more and more on HN lately: Some vague assertion that Tinder is the only place for matchmaking and that only a tiny number of men are getting all of the matches. It’s an objectively ridiculous claim for anyone who has experience in the real world where, yes, even “normal…

Genuinely asking, roughly how old are you? I'm in my early-mid twenties and of the ~100 people I keep in touch with my age range from high school, there has been one child born (by accident if the rumors are true) and zero marriages. Of the dozen or so people I keep in regular contact with I've gathered that this is not for lack of trying, either. Obviously there is bias here as this is all anecdotal, but I'm very cu…

If you're from an affluent background - being married in your 20s is weird. If you're single in your 30s - you should be worried but it's too late. By then - most of your friends will likely marry.

Re: The data are clear: The boys are not all right

#754

Post by Teknoman117 » Thu, Feb 10, 2022, 5:06 AM UTC

grvdrm wrote: post #558

Teknoman117 wrote: post #462

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Forget the incel subculture, media - traditional, social, or otherwise has been feeding us that for decades as well. If you're not thin and "beautiful", your romantic prospects are zero so why even try. Admittedly, it's also partially one's own fault for buying into it, but being fed a continual stream of the best looking people from a young age seriously alters one's perspective. I spent my entire teenage and young…

Just wanted to say good for you and keep it up re: 30 pounds lost! What's your exercise regimen? I know there's lot of stuff out there that tells you what to do. Not all of it easy to understand or even effective. Happy to keep replying here to give you some thoughts.

Exercise regimen isn't much at the moment. I'm still 400 lbs, and my doctor said I needed to be careful what I try to do right now because I could easily hurt myself. So for now I've been trying to stick to a 3 mile walk every day, which takes about an hour. Work still being remote has been helpful in that regard. It took a bit to find shoes that didn't cause my shins to hurt when walking every day.

Re: The data are clear: The boys are not all right

#755

Post by [deleted] » Thu, Feb 10, 2022, 5:07 AM UTC

TimTheTinker wrote: post #586

wwweston wrote: post #511

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yep. A total lack of belief to the point of nihilism is a crisis of meaning, to be sure, but it tends to collapse towards either hedonism or depression rather than monomaniacal infliction of harm on the rest of the world. True determined harm usually requires ideological zeal.

> True determined harm usually requires ideological zeal. That's not what I think motivated all the US school shootings in the last 25 years. Ideological zeal that pursues actively harming others is something I don't think the US has much of, culturally speaking. No one preaches "those people need to die" or "we need to harm those people".

[deleted]

Re: The data are clear: The boys are not all right

#756

Post by asdffdsa » Thu, Feb 10, 2022, 5:08 AM UTC

The lack of emphasis, in both this and the article's comments section, about the cultural messaging we send boys is very alarming. As a kid, we were told to sit down and be quiet when all our psyche was limitless energy and activity. Now it seems like just slap on a medical addiction and drug young boys into inactivity. Girls on the other hand are told "you can do anything", "break the glass ceiling", and flourish in a social environment (which is good!).

It's time we focus more on how do we appeal to boys, and how do we get the most potential out of them. The cultural messaging is "girl power" while the counterpart is "toxic masculinity". The great heroes of the past (even the present, see how Arnold Schwarzenegger was cut down for the affair with his maid) have been merely reduced to "misogynists" or "terrible fathers" rather than reflecting on both their merits and weaknesses.

Liberal philosophy does not even try to understand what motivates and drives young men to success: it's building, exploring, and accomplishing. Instead it blindly assigns any flaw as a result of "toxic masculinity" while also ironically applying the same "toxic masculinity" it preaches against: "you need to grow up and get over yourself, things are so easy for men because we are in a patriarchy". And then when studies like the above are cited, we go around in the same circle: "men are so pathetic, they need to stop embracing toxic masculinity" while being blissfully unaware that we are the least "toxically masculine" that we've ever been in society, and yet men are suffering emotionally far more than they ever have in the past. Hint: it's the culture. We are driving innocent young men into depression, purposelessness, and masochism -- and it's shameful to see such a lack of care or empathy for it. Seriously, shame on everyone in this and the orginal article's comments that are pointing fingers and blaming this on men, rather than trying to root-cause why this is happening and working towards helping innocent young boys.

Re: The data are clear: The boys are not all right

#757

Post by jmeister » Thu, Feb 10, 2022, 5:09 AM UTC

asdffdsa wrote: post #756

The lack of emphasis, in both this and the article's comments section, about the cultural messaging we send boys is very alarming. As a kid, we were told to sit down and be quiet when all our psyche was limitless energy and activity. Now it seems like just slap on a medical addiction and drug young boys into inactivity. Girls on the other hand are told "you can do anything", "break the glass ceiling", and flourish in…

“We should raise boys like we raise girls.” — Gloria Steinem

“—Boys are going from female-dominated home environments to female-dominated school environments, back to female-dominated home environments—where boys are being told to behave.

—In our culture today, “boy energy” is at best not valued and at worse demonized.”

https://ifstudies.org/blog/young-men-and-society-we-will-onl...

Re: The data are clear: The boys are not all right

#758

Post by rmak » Thu, Feb 10, 2022, 5:13 AM UTC

adriand wrote: post #689

8f2ab37a-ed6c wrote: post #520

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Women as an "interest group" have been incredible at PR this last century. Men, on the other hand, have yet to realize that they can't coast on the existing historic momentum and have to start speaking up. It doesn't help that folks who attempt to represent men's rights are instantly smeared as either pathetic incel losers, or as alt-right oppressor misogynists. There's no in-between that I'm aware of. From what I ca…

Feminism isn’t about putting women ahead of men though. It’s about creating equity. Feminism is needed because of the ongoing power imbalance between the sexes. There are still very few arenas in which men do not enjoy the advantage. The men’s rights stuff is toxic because it’s about conflict. It’s about pushing back against feminism, which is essentially fighting against equity. With that said, I see nothing wrong w…

Feminism is never about equity or equality between sexes. The most straight forward and correct definition of feminism is women wanting to be equal to or surpass rich and powerful men. Women never wanted to be equal to average men. Average men are disposable. Women had it better than men almost everywhere since the beginning.

Feminists are out rightly man hating. They are not allies of men/boys. They start killallmen trend, they started endfatherday, feminists support not jailing women for anything, NOW, the largest feminist org in the us oppose shared parenting, feminists in Canada shut down male dv centers....

Re: The data are clear: The boys are not all right

#759

Post by dillondoyle » Thu, Feb 10, 2022, 5:16 AM UTC

TeeMassive wrote: post #743

As a F'ing "straight cis White male", here's my experience: WTF can I do? Work is sparse and obtaining one is never clear. Being stronger is not even an advantage now. Now I'm a programmer and now workers are in short supply but that was hell back in the days. In primary school a lot of female teachers would explicitly felicitate the "girls for being better than the boys" and give them privileges for being "better".…

A lot of these grips are on you, not women or society.

How has onlyfans ruined dating?

Who said lifting weights is dangerous? It's very healthy even in old age!

There is a HUGE amount of things to do besides eating and playing video games. Perhaps you lack the motivation or imagination to do literally anything else.

No school has children sit for 8 hours at a time and any gender at almost any age would have a hard time having the patience to do that. Also implying that men can't go a whole 8 hours being nice?

I'm not sure what you think is fun, but yeah if it's actually legitimately dangerous for others you shouldn't be doing it unless in an environment where everyone consents to it.

In what situation - besides war - is violence good? + Insults, what function do those have and how will that help you live up this idea you have in your head of your role in society or get the partner you want?

Perhaps it's the other ways around and it's your perception that's wrong and in fact most women aren't attracted to those behaviors.

Yes it's wrong that men aren't believed and don't report abuse. It's also the exact same for women and other genders.

But, there's a person for everyone, no matter how different or however they view gender roles.

But yeah if you have strict, unchangeable views and behaviors that do not meld with the majority of potential partners you might have to go somewhere where women have less options and will settle for money/more stability.

I for one am happy that people do not have to make those trade offs and get stuck with 'traditional marriage' as defined by the viewpoints above.

Re: The data are clear: The boys are not all right

#760

Post by jolux » Thu, Feb 10, 2022, 5:19 AM UTC

rayiner wrote: post #269

ytwombly wrote: post #150

US-based cis-hetero white man here. The data reinforce the impression you get glancing at the headlines or spending a day out anywhere in America observing other men. Dare I say it even reinforces what I know from painful firsthand experience as a man, at the lowest points in my life. I was lucky though, with a supportive family who helped me through the confusing years of early adulthood. You can point to the declin…

> You can point to the decline of organized religion and with it traditional gender roles, but then what explains the relative stability in post-Christian Europe? As far as I can tell, Europe isn’t all that post-Christian. Even countries that have low levels of people actively practicing religion still carry a strong cultural legacy from Christianity: https://www.europenowjournal.org/2019/10/02/the-catholic-nes... Co…

Polling is one thing but the economics on this are extensive and they mostly reject your suggestions here. Female labor force participation is U-shaped with regards to GDP (https://www.nber.org/system/files/working_papers/w4707/w4707...), once you reach the middle part of the curve it starts to increase again as GDP increases, probably because employment becomes more lucrative to women than raising children or staying at home.

If there is an effect here it can't be all that significant, if you look at wealthy countries with larger welfare states than the US most have a female labor force participation rate at least as high.