Live data from Hacker News

Why are young people having so little sex? (2018)

theatlantic.com

271–280 of 320 posts

Re: Why are young people having so little sex? (2018)

#271

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's the use of just saying it's not a thing? Make a point. I agree with OP. People around my generation (middle of the road millennial) and especially those younger have laughable basic social skills. The median 25-year-old can't talk on the phone, walk up to someone at a party and start a conversation, or act like a human being with a cashier or server. They also flake out on plans some huge percentage of the tim…

> What's the use of just saying it's not a thing? Make a point. My point is that your anecdata is garbage. Older folks saying young people don't know how to communicate is a centuries old trope. Most people can communicate just fine. Given that you are citing people flaking, one might assume that the traits you're applying to an entire generation of individuals may just be your shitty friends. Little bubbles at the t…

Your anecdotes don't carry any more water, and strongly expressing contempt doesn't make it more persuasive.

OP was offering a theory that more communication moving to media that transmits communication with less or no physical/verbal context might cause difficulties transitioning to intimate physical activity.

He has the stats on his side, so he is not trying to persuade us that there is a trend that requires an explanation in the first place.

I think you provided a good enough theory why it's okay that there isn't as much conventional sex happening; the next step is to see how it might not contradict his theory.

Re: Why are young people having so little sex? (2018)

#272

What the heck is wrong with older generations? Leave young people alone, they literally can't win in this discussion. This article is filled with baseless pseudoscience and random cultural anxiety, and without any real substance the article just ties all of it to this phenomenon that isn't even really definitively bad. People look at anything different about teenagers and young adults, and this becomes an opportunity…

You absolutely nailed it.

> I'm aroace, so I may be over-sensitive to this kind of, "we're not saying there's anything wrong with you, we're just going to imply it over and over again" talk

That is literally what it is. I'm also ace and the first thought that came to my head was "oh boy, I can't wait to see what the article and comments say."

Re: Why are young people having so little sex? (2018)

#273

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm 10 years older than you, and this doesn't resonate with me at all. Having sex shouldn't be exhausting. It's fun and easy. In fact, your whole post makes me tired just reading it. You sound exhausted. I hope you can find a way to get some rest.

> I'm 10 years older than you, and this doesn't resonate with me at all. You might be 10 years luckier. Consider home prices in 2019 versus 2009.

I don't understand what this has to do with work-life balance and getting enough sleep and sex.

Re: Why are young people having so little sex? (2018)

#275

there are a lot of reasons, many good ones given in this thread, but here is another one: men are less physically active due to more office work...less physically active means less sex drive, generally

The data doesn't indicate that men are less horny... It indicates the opposite. Men are still incredibly horny compared to women. It's that women are less interested in dating the average man than they were before.

The childless rates (25% men vs 15% women), the amount of incels (25%+ for young men), etc. it's all much higher on the male side. This isn't because men aren't interested (an incel is involuntarily celibate) but because the women aren't.

So, doesn't really follow with your theory...

Re: Why are young people having so little sex? (2018)

#276

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So they all got together/started to date as complete strangers? Yes or as loose acquaintances (they would never call each other friends or anything of the sort - just that they knew of their partner but that's about it). Not everyone was like random bumping into people off the street but almost all of them were not that far off from that. I know dozens and dozens of relationships and none of them were friends befor…

> There is no bridging that gap There's plenty of ways in a real-world context. No, friendship alone will not do it of course, but having the right attitude will. She really needs to find you intuitively compelling in a general sense, and this will be practically interchangeable with physical attractiveness in her mind. One reason I know this is that it works just fine the other way around. Many guys have experienced…

> No, friendship alone will not do it of course, but having the right attitude will.

This is very much "power of friendship" put into different wording. It's the same thing, man. Stop saying this is normal - it's by definition exceptional. I'm not saying it can't happen. I'm saying it's hella unlikely and no one should rely on that as a mechanism because it generally doesn't work.

Also - just to let you know - never tell a woman that you are dating/married/whatever that you didn't find her physically attractive. (ever) This is how I 100% know you don't know anything about women in the USA. That woman would be bawling her eyes out as soon as you said that shit. Unbelievable that you're acting as if you're the source of all information about how to date women. JFC. Are you that out of touch with how much most women in the USA are deeply ingrained with associating their natural beauty with their own worth? Are you even remotely aware of it? If you were - you'd know that if you ever told your significant other that you grew to find her attractive but you didn't find her attractive to begin with - you'd be broken up with on the spot. That's incredibly insensitive.

Re: Why are young people having so little sex? (2018)

#277

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am not entirely sure what this is a response to. Had I written Neil Strauss and the PUA movement, it would have seemed merited?

To me the original comment came off as frustrated and possibly anxious about the "rules" of dating and I tried to respond to that. Maybe i missed the mark.

Why is seeking dating advice for men is frowned upon ?

Women do it all the time and quickly learn the intricacies of dating at a young age. Friendship and courtship are two different beasts and I bet women would like to be able to go on great dates with men who know have at least done a minimum of research in this area.

Sure, there are many snake oil dating "gurus" out there but I think many men could genuinely benefit from _some_ form of this.

Re: Why are young people having so little sex? (2018)

#278

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'm 10 years older than you, and this doesn't resonate with me at all. You might be 10 years luckier. Consider home prices in 2019 versus 2009.

I don't understand what this has to do with work-life balance and getting enough sleep and sex.

You buy a house cheap. Your wages go up cause wages have been going up for a lot of industries (due to cost of housing and competition). You don't have to work as hard because your mortgage stayed the same. You can keep the same job or work less hours.

It's happening all around me in SV. Many owners who bought below $1m basically retiring early because they started making $300-500K/yr for the last few years and now are FIRE'd thanks to the incredible wage growth while they locked in a much lower COL than people who had to buy 10 years later.

Here's the fun part - we aren't expecting your standard senior IC to be making 7 figures in the next few years but that's what it'd take to be comparable to the wage growth that we've seen in SV in the last decade along with housing prices.

Re: Why are young people having so little sex? (2018)

#279
post #269

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's the reality of biology. You cannot avoid this.

Trophy relationships are avoidable. Heck, I know Ace people who started families.

Trophy relationship menas you actively went out to look for a proper partner and earned it. It's normal animal behavior to hunt for the best mate.

Re: Why are young people having so little sex? (2018)

#280

I'm surprised the article doesn't talk more about the population dynamics of any animal with a fixed amount of space: it either consumes everything it needs to survive and goes extinct, or it approaches an equilibrium population. I have to imagine that pre-agrarian humans occasionally made the wrong choice there and the whole tribe starved, so genes for population regulation were likely selected for. Less sex as a re…

This isn't how any other animal behave though. Wolves don't breed less when there is a scarcity of food, they just starve more. Making this a genetic thing is a bit of a stretch.

It's been fairly well studied in voles. A quick search turns up a paper titled:

> A mechanism for population self-regulation: Social density suppresses GnRH expression and reduces reproductivity in voles

I wouldn't expect an absence of food to do it, but instead a surplus of neighbors. By the time overpopulation starts affecting the food source it's a little late to do anything about it.

Post reply on HN