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Sexual loneliness: A neglected public health problem?

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Re: Sexual loneliness: A neglected public health problem?

#101

Post by trustingtrust »

itsmemattchung wrote: post #4

> One possible aid for sexual loneliness might come from online dating apps such as Tinder. In theory, online dating could provide an efficient way to find a partner. However, online dating divides people heavily into winners and losers – perhaps even more so than traditional dating. While women can get attention from thousands of men online in just a few hours, men are lucky if anyone is interested in them My wife d…

A friend of mine did a small experiment. She’s quite good looking so she made a new account and another guy friend made another account at the same time. She has usually has 3000+ likes on bumble so we wanted to see how many she gets in 30 minutes. In 30 minutes the guy got 5 because of a new account and she got 150.

The ratio is so badly skewed that the apps end up working for no one. Neither men nor women.

Re: Sexual loneliness: A neglected public health problem?

#102

Post by snowpid »

snowpid wrote: post #65
foldr wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Prostitution is already legal in lots of countries. I’m not sure that there’s any evidence that it makes a huge amount of difference to this problem.

"lots of countries" To my knowledge only Germany.

to correct me: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prostitution_by_region

Re: Sexual loneliness: A neglected public health problem?

#103

Post by farmaway »

notch656c wrote: post #32
itsmemattchung wrote: post #4

> One possible aid for sexual loneliness might come from online dating apps such as Tinder. In theory, online dating could provide an efficient way to find a partner. However, online dating divides people heavily into winners and losers – perhaps even more so than traditional dating. While women can get attention from thousands of men online in just a few hours, men are lucky if anyone is interested in them My wife d…

Tinder is straight up depressing for the median dude. My mind was blown just how much harder it was to get a date on tinder vs getting a date in real life. I can do the latter pretty easily but trying to get one on tinder would be like months of constant effort to then get ditched before the date even starts. It feels like 90% of women on there are chasing the top 10% of dudes and not settling for anything else.

>It feels like 90% of women on there are chasing the top 10% of dudes and not settling for anything else.

It feels that way because it is that way (stats from OKCupid, but I suspect the effect generalizes):

https://archive.is/lGIdO

Re: Sexual loneliness: A neglected public health problem?

#104

Post by afavour »

CSSer wrote: post #19
itsmemattchung wrote: post #4

> One possible aid for sexual loneliness might come from online dating apps such as Tinder. In theory, online dating could provide an efficient way to find a partner. However, online dating divides people heavily into winners and losers – perhaps even more so than traditional dating. While women can get attention from thousands of men online in just a few hours, men are lucky if anyone is interested in them My wife d…

Maybe you two should try it together for fun? Pro tip: You should probably agree to swipe right on everyone indiscriminately to avoid a potential argument. Not so pro disclaimer: I'm single and not married, so your mileage may vary. Please report back for... research purposes. :)

One potential danger here is single friends seeing you/your partner on the app. In the ideal world they'd bring this to your attention and you'd be able to explain it away easily. In the real world it's absolutely how vicious rumors start.

Re: Sexual loneliness: A neglected public health problem?

#105

Post by jurassic »

zb3 wrote: post #63
jurassic wrote: post #43

There are a lot of factors at play here. Porn is ubiquitous which reduces the number of people looking for real-life hookups to satisfy their immediate urges. Awareness of the health risks (STDs, etc) of having many partners has probably never been higher. And the economic stakes of an unwanted pregnancy are higher than they've ever been due to increasing restrictions on abortion. If porn were outlawed, contraception…

Porn is ubiquitous which reduces the number of people looking for real-life hookups to satisfy their immediate urges Why is that a bad thing? For me the problem is the opposite - it might not completely satisfy it, but if it'd completely satisfy the urge, then wouldn't it be a good thing?

The OP frames sexual loneliness as a problem. I don't think it's a huge leap to say porn is part of the reason why people are having less real-life sex. Morally I have no issue with it, but ease/speed/price are important factors in market behavior. It's why I'm more likely to flop down on the couch to watch Netflix than drive across town to watch a movie at the cinema, or listen to Spotify vs attend a live music performance. The cinema and the rock concert are probably better experiences, but streaming makes everything so easy and cheap I don't often seek out those experiences.

Porn access as a causal explanation also helps explain why we see the same problem happening even in Nordic countries where access to abortion/contraception is not a problem and parental leave benefits are far superior to the US.

Re: Sexual loneliness: A neglected public health problem?

#106

Post by cuuupid »

hammock wrote: post #55
cuuupid wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be fair this is not entirely due to social dynamics but rather due to MatchGroup companies following identical monetization patterns. They’re just capitalizing on male desperation and artificially widening or narrowing the gap depending on how much you pay. If you observe the actual dating climate it’s nowhere near this bad and in larger cities like NYC it can even be closer to 1:1. Rather than a social problem th…

Singling out dating apps, or worse a single company thinking their monopoly created the problem, is missing the forest for the trees. The social dynamic exists independent of dating apps which monetize and exploit it. The dynamic is the same in real life, for example at a nightclub where women drink for free, promoters who bring them get paid per girl, and lonely men pay $40 cover for a chance to shoot their shot

If dynamic in real life is 1:2 then it’s 1:1000 on dating apps. Also I would actually blame MatchGroup here, they’ve been fighting dating apps with better models for years, every company they swallow has adopted the same bad ethics (case and point Hinge), and the only company that’s managed to stay afloat away from them (Bumble) is suing them. They are most definitely a major component of the problem

Re: Sexual loneliness: A neglected public health problem?

#107

Post by fxtentacle »

recuter wrote: post #91
honkler wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

technological advancement enabled dispropotinal wealth accumulation, also enabled disproportional partner accumulation. So the underlying problem is that industrial revolution and it's consequences have been a disaster for the human race.

Have I got news for you about the disproportional partner accumulation situation preindustrial revolution..

But weren't harems typically reserved for the unimaginably wealthy, even back then?

Re: Sexual loneliness: A neglected public health problem?

#108

Post by 0xbadcafebee »

This is hilarious. They found that young men are having less sex, young women are not having less sex, and some young men are having way more sex. And they conclude the problem is "loneliness". No, dude, the problem is young men are increasingly not worth having sex with.

This of course has precedence in the natural world. Not every male is always having sex. Most often, a smaller number of males that are considered the most desirable sire more children. It's a Darwin thing: you mate with the most successful of your species to carry the best genes and adapt to your environment better to survive longer.

But it doesn't have to be that way. More males could simply become more attractive partners. Or more females could lower their standards (but honestly I think their standards have been low enough... I mean, have you seen my gender, next to its opposite?).

Rather than treat sexual loneliness as some kind of unfortunate but normal condition, let's encourage these people to make themselves more attractive. And by attractive I mean the general concept of desirability, which encompasses the entire spectrum of the human condition, not just the body or some societal trope of gender norms.

Re: Sexual loneliness: A neglected public health problem?

#109

Post by wonderwonder »

f-securus wrote: post #5

Legalize prostitution and regulate safety and perhaps incels would build confidence and learn to socialize a bit from paid sexual interactions? I'm kind of ignorant to the subject of what is the cause of 'sexual loneliness' but I believe the world's oldest profession shouldn't be pushed into the shadows as that causes more problems than it prevents.

100% this. How many acts of violence by lonely men would be avoided if they had just had the opportunity to go out, drop $150 and have sex. Especially sex that catered to whatever fetish they happened to indulge in. I have no scientific numbers to back this but I am willing to be the answer is "a lot". I feel like if an isolated, angry virgin was able to have sex in a non judgmental environment they would lose their hostility and likely be all the better for it.

Re: Sexual loneliness: A neglected public health problem?

#110

Post by TopRattata »

yibg wrote: post #49
cuuupid wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be fair this is not entirely due to social dynamics but rather due to MatchGroup companies following identical monetization patterns. They’re just capitalizing on male desperation and artificially widening or narrowing the gap depending on how much you pay. If you observe the actual dating climate it’s nowhere near this bad and in larger cities like NYC it can even be closer to 1:1. Rather than a social problem th…

I don't know if that's true. From most data I've seen women's preferences skew towards a small percentage of men. i.e. most women want the same guys, which are the small minority. This leaves (making up numbers) 80% of women wanting 20% of men. Where as men tend to be less discriminating in their choices of women.

>This leaves (making up numbers) 80% of women wanting 20% of men. Where as men tend to be less discriminating in their choices of women.

Well... kind of. Except that men also tend to all be looking at the same pool of younger women, while women tend to look for men closer to their own age, according to OKCupid's data.

https://www.businessinsider.com/dataclysm-shows-men-are-attr...

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