Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Sexual loneliness: A neglected public health problem?

researchgate.net

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

791–800 of 806 posts

Re: Sexual loneliness: A neglected public health problem?

#791

Post by WarOnPrivacy »

bryanlarsen wrote: post #701
WarOnPrivacy wrote: post #504

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What is left? Literally every other social activity one engages in? This implies one has energy and resources for social activities. A big chunk of the US is broke and/or exhausted at the end of the week.

The other suggested alternative (religion) generally requires a far higher time + money commitment than many hobbies, yet has thrived for millennia.

For millennia, most people weren't busy sustaining the family during ~all waking hours and year round (all the while living 1 not-rare event away from homelessness).

Re: Sexual loneliness: A neglected public health problem?

#792

Post by bryanlarsen »

WarOnPrivacy wrote: post #791
bryanlarsen wrote: post #701

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The other suggested alternative (religion) generally requires a far higher time + money commitment than many hobbies, yet has thrived for millennia.

For millennia, most people weren't busy sustaining the family during ~all waking hours and year round (all the while living 1 not-rare event away from homelessness).

No, instead most of humanity was living one not rare event away from starvation and/or one not rare event away from death by violence or misadventure.

Re: Sexual loneliness: A neglected public health problem?

#793

Post by webinvest »

ianai wrote: post #767
lechacker wrote: post #605

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Transactional sex doesn't satisfy sexual loneliness. Prostitution won't solve the problem the paper is mentioning.

The replies your comment got are very very illustrative of HN. Not much actual advice but plenty of gut responses masquerading as advice. At one point in my life most/all of my socialization stemmed from going to garage and estate sales. This was during a time where I would have been homeless without my parents. Otherwise, I’ve also gone the Forest Gump route in the past. Walking for an hour or longer has an amazing…

At the time of this comment, your comment is the only reply to his or her comment… However, thanks for sharing your story. Non-gut responses are the better kind.

Re: Sexual loneliness: A neglected public health problem?

#795

Post by bmn__ »

majikaja wrote: post #790
bmn__ wrote: post #787

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't remember having seen someone compare a basic human need (level 2 on the Maslow hierarchy) with drug addiction. What's next, addiction to nutrients and oxygen? Your thought is baffling to me, bordering on absurd. Also, the implication that the men who complain about surplus are responsible for flooding the market with supply is plain wrong. Literally no man chose to be born into this world.

Hookups are not a need. Male users are the overwhelming majority of these apps. If not age limitations on female attractiveness, then the underlying problem is the intensity of men's compulsions compared to women.

> Hookups

Careful, did you notice yourself shifting the goalpost? The article and accompanying discussion was about intimacy+sex, you just reduced this to casual sex.

> are not a need.

Factually wrong. This should prompt you to find out what the word need means, it's likely you have the wrong idea about it.

Re: Sexual loneliness: A neglected public health problem?

#796

Post by majikaja »

bmn__ wrote: post #795
majikaja wrote: post #790

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hookups are not a need. Male users are the overwhelming majority of these apps. If not age limitations on female attractiveness, then the underlying problem is the intensity of men's compulsions compared to women.

> Hookups Careful, did you notice yourself shifting the goalpost? The article and accompanying discussion was about intimacy+sex, you just reduced this to casual sex. > are not a need. Factually wrong. This should prompt you to find out what the word need means, it's likely you have the wrong idea about it.

I did consider your first point, but if serious relationships are the goal, just head to the local marriage agency. No shortage of women looking for a traditional provider.

People asked for sexual liberation - this is the result.

Re: Sexual loneliness: A neglected public health problem?

#797

Post by winter_blue »

yieldcrv wrote: post #546
winter_blue wrote: post #393

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> As in, for women the sexual transaction is big serious deal. If that truly were the case, you wouldn't see 5% of these hypersexual men monopolizing 50% of sex (as the paper says). Or maybe many women like intentionally putting themselves in harem-like situation, if in exchange they get to have sex with "hot men". Overall, it's a deplorable state of affairs.

Can you elaborate on the deplorable aspect? What's deplorable and what would you prefer to occur?

Just like a very high Gini index (the index that measures economic inequality), results in economic suffering and pain for a significant portion of the population, the current state of affairs causes analogous (here, intimacy and lack-of-sex-related suffering) for million of the less-fortunate gender+orientation (cis heterosexual men).

I'd prefer monogamy that's state-enforced[1] socially-promoted culturally-inculcated. That would go a long way in fixing the inequality (both not in countries like China and India which a separate sex ratio issue to deal with).

Even with a positive sex ratio with more women than men, in North America, if it is indeed true that top 5% end up monopolizing 50% of sex (as the linked research paper), that's a staggeringly bad and deplorable state of affairs.

[1] Enforced by fully utilizing the state's monopoly on violence (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monopoly_on_violence), e.g. with both long prison sentences, and torture or severe corporal punishment – to completely and utterly suppress and root out any violations of hypothetical future sexual morality laws.

Re: Sexual loneliness: A neglected public health problem?

#798

Post by frognumber »

kelseyfrog wrote: post #586
frognumber wrote: post #483

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That has not been my experience. It's a difference in values. There are both men and women on both sides of the cultural divide. If anything, my experience is that there are more women on my side. The stereotype that women value commitment might be exaggerated, but there seems to be at least a kernel of truth there.

That's fine. I think we've reached the part of the conversation where we're bound by not having large-scale descriptive statistics that can convince the other. Either way, my experience is completely opposite. I can't recall a single woman I know who, that when meeting someone prescribing any of these points, would not use them as a proxy for their willingness to engage in a relationship and their subsequent happines…

I don't think we need large-scale statistics to convince each other of our mutual experiences. We just need to accept neither of us is speaking in bad faith.

I don't know you, but I would speculate that you mostly interact with people from white, progressive, Western, middle-upper-class, educated, American culture, and that would be the experience there.

There are 8 billion people in the world, though. I'm an immigrant and mostly interact with immigrants. The signalling is different. Divorce is bad for kids, and a lot of people in the world would like a spouse who is committed. A lot of women want someone who will commit to one relationship and work on it.

I view marriage the same way as I do having a child, a parent, or any other family member; thick or thin, it not something you just opt out of unless something extreme happens. I do have one family member most of us disowned, but that was due to something rather extreme.

Re: Sexual loneliness: A neglected public health problem?

#799

Post by yieldcrv »

winter_blue wrote: post #797
yieldcrv wrote: post #546

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you elaborate on the deplorable aspect? What's deplorable and what would you prefer to occur?

Just like a very high Gini index (the index that measures economic inequality), results in economic suffering and pain for a significant portion of the population, the current state of affairs causes analogous (here, intimacy and lack-of-sex-related suffering) for million of the less-fortunate gender+orientation (cis heterosexual men). I'd prefer monogamy that's state-enforced[1] socially-promoted culturally-inculcat…

I disagree, but partially because I'm not sexually frustrated but I can see it happening if I get sick or poor or disfigured - which I can see as occurring all at once - so I'll entertain it for a moment.

We could probably co-opt existing antitrust laws to reach this result. Probably different against the men and women as different anticompetitive practices are put into play. Funny concept, antitrust on unincorporated businesses that trade in paid meals (dinner dates), federal jurisdiction could be extended with evidence of the interstate usage of the internet communications, that fits the interstate commerce jurisdiction, with evidence being number of matches in combination with meetups per month or some other interval. I could see it working, especially if there was a whistleblower bounty.

Re: Sexual loneliness: A neglected public health problem?

#800

Post by Woberto »

lechacker wrote: post #517

As a 30+ year old kissless virgin I have recently began noticing that the loneliness part has began affecting me more deeply than usual. I suppose noticing the first signs of aging in my face led to the realization of all things not-done. I've had a couple of episodes of despair in the past few months because of this. Unfortunately people like me become helpless. You'll be alone because you _are_ alone: you don't hav…

There's gotta be somebody you can pay to help you develop social skills. Kind of like etiquette schools or something, maybe with opportunities to practice. It's like a personal trainer of sorts. I'd charge, what, maybe $60/hr to take somebody with me to the dog park and help them engage in conversation, give them feedback and ideas, etc.
Post reply on HN