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Explaining Sex Rate Changes

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Re: Explaining Sex Rate Changes

#411

Post by treis »

734129837261 wrote: post #402
fratlas wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've noticed this disparity within my friend circles. The objectively attractive men match/sleep with multiple woman a month where almost all of the men with near average looks get approximately zero matches. Interesting indeed. My female friends match with almost every male regardless.

I've noticed, and apparently the statistics as well, that this trend turns around the age of 32 to 34 for men. Men usually go for women 3 to 4 years younger than themselves. Which is around the age that women need to choose whether to procreate or not. If you're a 28 year old woman without a partner you only have a few more years of being physically optimal to give birth to a healthy child. So the average-looking men…

>I am in my 30s and when I was on dating apps I'd suddenly get a ton of matches.

Which is another problem men in their 20s face. They're competing with men in their 30s for the same women. There's simply a larger number of men trying to date a smaller number of women. The numbers mean someone gets left out.

Re: Explaining Sex Rate Changes

#412

Post by AQuantized »

rofo1 wrote: post #392
papermill wrote: post #371

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sex, food and shelter are necessary conditions for an "awesome life" for most people. You could argue they aren't sufficient and you need more ( like spirituality, community, etc ), but it's disingenuous to dismiss it as an unnecessary condition that you could distract yourself with hobbies. Response to (sridca): Yes, I'm well aware of the difference between need and desire. But you can't have an "awesome life" if yo…

> Also, I said sex is a necessary condition for most people to live an "awesome life", not all people. You misread that part. And by most people, I mean everyone barring the exceptional minority with physical or genetic ailments. Strong disagreement here. Sex is not necessary. It's way overblown, and anyone that has regular sex (or the potential to get it) will concede that point. It's definitely not worth the drama…

It seems like it isn't necessary for you, but you can't project that lack of desire onto the majority. The reality is that if a large subset of people have a strong instinctual desire that goes continually unfulfilled, many will not have satisfying lives. That's not to deny that some won't move beyond it, through focus on other areas or deconstruction of their desire. However, that's unrealistic to expect for the majority.

Re: Explaining Sex Rate Changes

#413

Post by everdrive »

734129837261 wrote: post #402
fratlas wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've noticed this disparity within my friend circles. The objectively attractive men match/sleep with multiple woman a month where almost all of the men with near average looks get approximately zero matches. Interesting indeed. My female friends match with almost every male regardless.

I've noticed, and apparently the statistics as well, that this trend turns around the age of 32 to 34 for men. Men usually go for women 3 to 4 years younger than themselves. Which is around the age that women need to choose whether to procreate or not. If you're a 28 year old woman without a partner you only have a few more years of being physically optimal to give birth to a healthy child. So the average-looking men…

Similar experience here. No one prepared me for the roller-coaster effect of subjective male attractiveness. (I'm a Man) I've always felt that you could break it up pretty well by relative status. Here's how it went for me.

- 6th grade - extraordinarily unattractive to the opposite sex.

- 8th grade - not outwardly reviled.

- 9th grade - outwardly reviled again.

- 12th grade - actually dating, with a bit of interest here or there.

- Freshman year of college - lower relative interest.

- Senior year of college - enough girls are interested that they're fighting with each other.

- 1st year in the workforce - outwardly reviled again!

- 5-10 years into the workforce - hard say, got married, so I must have been doing something right.

So, did I change much between 8th and 9th grade? Or between 12th grade and freshman year of college? No, obviously not, but my status relative to the bellcurve of available men did change quite a bit. This was most evident from my senior year to college to my first year in the workforce. I went from amazing, to worthless all due to graduation!

Please bear in mind, I'm not complaining about the nature of female preferences here. However, I do wish someone had explained that this would occur, and also why it would occur. I remember being quite surprised at the time.

Re: Explaining Sex Rate Changes

#414

Post by tomhoward »

krapp wrote: post #298
tachyonbeam wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The internet and dating apps surely play a part. It's also become more acceptable to be non-monogamous. I lived in the bay area for a while and hung out among queer circles in San Francisco. It seemed like nearly everyone was polyamorous and uninterested in being in a monogamous relationship. So much that I felt kind of obligated to try the poly thing myself for a while if I was going to date. I am a little worried a…

>It also seems to me that if a sizeable chunk of young men end up feeling undesirable, unwanted, and frustrated, the consequences won't be pretty, we all lose. Those young men need to stop basing their self image on their own ego and sense of sexual entitlement. What we're seeing here, in my humble and uneducated opinion, is the end of a period in societal history where women served the role of sexual currency in a m…

> no one seems willing to suggest that men need to change the way they view sex, relationships and themselves

I'm not sure that's so true. Plenty of people are talking about that. It's hard for them to get a fair hearing and a good-faith discussion, given the modern state of affairs, in which the most extreme voices are given all the attention.

Re: Explaining Sex Rate Changes

#415

Post by JetSpiegel »

magicalhippo wrote: post #343
jamescostian wrote: post #127

Ask a heterosexual woman in that age range about how many awful conversations she's had with men in that age range via dating apps. She won't say "a few", she'll say "A LOT", and be able to show that the vast majority of messages she gets are either very dry or insanely forward (sexually). If you're a great-looking guy and you can't start or hold a good conversation, you can still get laid on the basis of looks. But…

> or insanely forward (sexually) If you're not after a relationship but to get laid, then that might be a good strategy. Yes you'll get much fewer positive responses but but the false positive rate should be way lower.

> If you're not after a relationship but to get laid, then that might be a good strategy.

Why not replace your headshot with a dick pic, in that case?

Re: Explaining Sex Rate Changes

#416

Post by TheAdamAndChe »

bencoder wrote: post #346
krapp wrote: post #298

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>It also seems to me that if a sizeable chunk of young men end up feeling undesirable, unwanted, and frustrated, the consequences won't be pretty, we all lose. Those young men need to stop basing their self image on their own ego and sense of sexual entitlement. What we're seeing here, in my humble and uneducated opinion, is the end of a period in societal history where women served the role of sexual currency in a m…

> What bothers me about this conversation is that disastrous, society-shattering consequences are always mentioned if women keep choosing not to have sex with more men, but no one seems willing to suggest that men need to change the way they view sex, relationships and themselves. I may have missed part of this conversation but I don't think there's a suggestion that women are doing something /wrong/ or that they nee…

> discussions around this often get over-run with misogyny and bitterness

If the adaptation required is to become part of the 20% of men that 70% of women pursue, bitterness from the 80% of less-desirable men is inevitable since they can't compete, which inhibits their ability to obtain a mate and have a good life.

Sure, a mate isn't _technically_ required to live a good life, but in our intensely individualistic society where the number of friends men have is dropping precipitously, relationships form a core of socialization for many men.

Re: Explaining Sex Rate Changes

#417

Post by sridca »

AQuantized wrote: post #412
rofo1 wrote: post #392

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Also, I said sex is a necessary condition for most people to live an "awesome life", not all people. You misread that part. And by most people, I mean everyone barring the exceptional minority with physical or genetic ailments. Strong disagreement here. Sex is not necessary. It's way overblown, and anyone that has regular sex (or the potential to get it) will concede that point. It's definitely not worth the drama…

It seems like it isn't necessary for you, but you can't project that lack of desire onto the majority. The reality is that if a large subset of people have a strong instinctual desire that goes continually unfulfilled, many will not have satisfying lives. That's not to deny that some won't move beyond it, through focus on other areas or deconstruction of their desire. However, that's unrealistic to expect for the maj…

Just because most people feel something does not make it a fact.

Re: Explaining Sex Rate Changes

#418

Post by everdrive »

tachyonbeam wrote: post #72
gnicholas wrote: post #69

In a way, this mirrors how technological advances have created winner-take-all markets in other areas. Thanks to CDs (and then the internet), we can now all listen to the very best musicians in the world — where previously we just had to settle for whoever was the best in our town. Similarly, technology may be shifting the dating/intimacy market toward a winners-take-most equilibrium, which favors the most attractive…

The internet and dating apps surely play a part. It's also become more acceptable to be non-monogamous. I lived in the bay area for a while and hung out among queer circles in San Francisco. It seemed like nearly everyone was polyamorous and uninterested in being in a monogamous relationship. So much that I felt kind of obligated to try the poly thing myself for a while if I was going to date. I am a little worried a…

>but because having a stable long-term partner seems like it can be beneficial in helping people through hard times

This becomes truer with age, too. How much extra energy do you have at 45? Do you have an extended family to help you? Not everyone has a good family, but with a marriage you have two chances at having a family. People will say polyamory doesn't preclude this, but there are hardships I'd never consider outside of a serious marriage. (full time financial support, integration into a family structure, etc.)

Re: Explaining Sex Rate Changes

#419

Post by ivanhoe »

simonh wrote: post #342
dsr_ wrote: post #306

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You might consider that formal polygamy is directly linked to (a) religious authoritarianism, (b) gender inequality, (c) reduced education for women, (d) lowered economic productivity, (e) low standard of living. When all those things travel together, it's not clear that polygamy should be viewed as the primary cause.

That's a good challenge, thanks. I suppose we'd have to do a historical analysis of societies to try and tease out the relative effects of each of those factors independently. It’s not clear to me how the first three would lead to social instability though. There have been plenty of religiously authoritarian cultures that were quite stable. Similarly gender inequality and reduced education for women have been common…

It's hard to draw conclusions on that subject as many prosperous polygamous cultures in the past have been destroyed or assimilated simply because Christianity and other monogamist cultures were technologically superior and/or simply more aggressive. IMHO far too many variables were in play through ages to just pull a simple connection like that today.

Re: Explaining Sex Rate Changes

#420

Post by RandomInteger4 »

Cthulhu_ wrote: post #236
RandomInteger4 wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sounds like something out of Nazi Germany. I'm all for people engaging with the community, but enforced?

Strongly encouraged, then? I mean I do believe social education should be part of one's upbringing - it's not going to happen for a lot of people otherwise.

Strongly encouraged is a lot better.
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