Culture I am Gen Z. Men in my generation are not dating. Why should we?

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All across America, marriage, sexuality and relationships are on the steady decline among young people. According to a new Pew Research study, 63% percent of men aged 18 to 29 report being single. That means the number of single young men is nearly twice that of single young women, indicating a large breakdown in the social, romantic and sexual lives of American men. The big question is: Why?

One would think that making romantic connections would be easier than ever in our digital world, but the opposite is true. Our culture of convenience has paradoxically made dating more difficult for men as they are forced into a hyper-competitive, superficial environment that emphasizes instant gratification over true human connection. While there are several potential culprits causing this relationship breakdown, nothing has done more damage to the dating landscape than dating apps, social media and pornography.

Let’s start with dating apps. The advent of relationship websites started with Match.com in 1995 and evolved into the swipe-based platforms we know today with Tinder and Hinge releasing in 2012, and Bumble in 2014.

According to a survey of 6,034 adults, 53% of adults ages 18-29 have found someone to date through an app or site. However, new Census data shows that the U.S. marriage rate hit an all-time low in 2019. For every 1,000 unmarried adults, only 33 got married. This number was 35 a decade ago in 2010 and much higher at 86% in 1970. So, what gives?

It’s easier for men to date, thanks to technological conveniences, yet this technology has created a counterintuitive situation leading them to have a fickle attitude toward relationships, constantly searching for the next thing instead of committing to one person.

With the abundance of choices on dating apps, young men are finding it difficult to build deeper connections with a single person due to that sense of constant availability. When a minor red flag appears in a relationship that is otherwise going smoothly, why stick around and work it out when thousands of other choices are right at your fingertips? Young men are making that calculation every day on dating apps and are siding with the latter. How can you blame them with the constant programming coming from social media?

With social media today, men can scroll through their feeds and popular pages to view more beautiful women in one sitting than most men would see in their lifetime a hundred years ago.
Social media vies for people's attention leading women to commercialize themselves, which gives men an unrealistic expectation of the dating pool. On social media, people are encouraged to only show their best, even if it’s fake! With the advancements in facial-recognition technology, many times men are looking at women through heavily filtered and airbrushed lenses.

While women reap the benefit of the online attention, men are left wondering how the dating pool has gotten so far out of reach. Consequently, those same women who are marketing themselves as something they’re not are left without a partner and wondering where all the good men have gone. Through social media, both sexes are conditioned to treat themselves as a number instead of embracing true human connection and partnership.

Maybe I’m just old-fashioned, but to me, flirting face-to-face leaves a bigger impression on the potential for a relationship than reacting to girls’ Instagram Stories with the flame emoji. Coupled with the barrage of women on dating apps, the culture of constant comparison fostered by social media makes it hard for men to commit to a relationship and settle down. If that wasn’t enough, now even men’s greatest source of dating motivation has been co-opted by pornography.

There is no doubt that lust, which is carnal in nature, is the strongest driving motivation for men when it comes to dating. It sparks initial attraction and passion and draws people together. Ultimately though, lust may fade, but the emotional connection typically built upon that initial sense of attraction is what can determine a relationship’s success.

Pornography, however, completely destroys this dynamic, because it shifts men’s reward system to simply being carnal and physical in nature but lacking the emotional connection necessary for healthy relationships. Today, pornography is easier than ever to consume. Forty million U.S. adults regularly visit pornography websites, and 10% of U.S. adults admit to having an addiction to Internet pornography.

It’s easier for men to date thanks to technological conveniences, yet this technology has created a counterintuitive situation leading them to have a fickle attitude toward relationships, constantly searching for the next thing instead of committing to one person.

Research shows that about 67% of 13-year-old boys have seen at least one pornographic image on some sort of digital device in the past year, and by the age of 18, that number rises to 90%.

In porn, finding a "relationship" is effortless. With porn, this digital partner has nothing else to do but wait for you, please you and give you exactly what you think you want. If this partner ever fails to keep you entertained, they can be exchanged with a single click. Why waste your time dating, flirting and putting in effort when men can have their deepest sexual desires met online?

Today, men in their 20s are more likely than women to be romantically uninvolved, sexually dormant and friendless. Studies have shown that men are more likely to engage in risky and violent behaviors when they lack a stable relationship, leading to higher crime rates, substance abuse and social unrest. Single men may also be less invested in building strong social networks, leading to isolation and a lack of community engagement.

Simply put, the breakdown of relationships between men and women is startling, and it is detrimental to a healthy society. The good news is that men can fix this, and the remedy is easier than we think. Leave dating apps, stop watching porn, and go talk to girls in real life.

 

[God of Nothing]

The character in that game is basically talking about boomers when he is talking about "And then come those who neither built nor conquered. They start the process of squandering..." and from there he goes on to describe Gen X, the Millennials, and eventually the zoomers. Hard to say how much will be left at that point.

Exactly. They thought prosperity was just something that happened. And then they sent all our productive jobs outside the country.
Little horrible decisions that steadily grow into massive ones.

 

[The Ugly One]

I have no idea how but the writers for this niche as fuck indie game understood this phenomena and had an NPC deliver a good lecture on it.

Spoiler

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Universal meme.

I just discovered a Chinese proverb: "You can only keep wealth in the family for three generations." In business, we talk about the founders, who are the visionaries who kick ass and work weekends to make something happen. At Intel, that's Gordon Moore, Robert Noyce, and Andy Grove. Then you have the caretakers. These people usually knew the founders well, understood their vision, and work on preserving it, maturing it, extending it, and navigating evolution of the marketplace. Again, at Intel, that's Craig Barrett and Paul Otellini. And then, finally you have the extractors. These guys just take the success of the business as a given, and mostly just make moves designed to boost their own stock options, win themselves awards, and often end up gutting the place. At Intel, that's Brian Krzanich and Bob Swan. You might get a few cycles of this. Maybe a reformer comes in to reorient the business to its original founding vision, like Pat Gelsinger is doing at Intel. Then you get a fresh round of caretakers and extractors. Or maybe it just dies.

I think it is really obvious that America is in an extractor downturn. I think the last time we had any kind of visionary/renewal phase was the 1980s. The 90s and early 00s were caretaker phases. And now the people in charge are just trying to run a bust-out operation and can't imagine it could end any other way than themselves being a lot, lot richer and everything else being otherwise fine.

 

[LurkTrawl]

I have no idea how but the writers for this niche as fuck indie game understood this phenomena and had an NPC deliver a good lecture on it.

Spoiler

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https://store.steampowered.com/app/230070/The_Age_of_Decadence/

That game is harder than coffin nails and if you complain about the difficulty on the steam forums for it the developer will personally call you a whiny bitch.

So while I haven't ever gotten that far in the game it's not surprising that kind of dialogue's in it.

I think it is really obvious that America is in an extractor downturn. I think the last time we had any kind of visionary/renewal phase was the 1980s. The 90s and early 00s were caretaker phases. And now the people in charge are just trying to run a bust-out operation and can't imagine it could end any other way than themselves being a lot, lot richer and everything else being otherwise fine.

Most of the people in charge now whether it be the "special interest groups" or government are the same people who were the movers and shakers back then, or at the very least people related to them in some form or fashion.

It just takes a long time for fuckups in a system this large that have such momentum as the U.S. did coming out of WW2 to become noticeable. Everyone in government could've been blind, drunk, and implanted with joywires coming out of WW2 - it'd still have taken decades for mismanagement from a group that fucked up to result in meaningfully destructive change.

The only positive quality that can be attributed to that group of people is that for all intents and purposes it seems that the various shit they did having such horrific negative effects, wasn't entirely intentional. More like they took several keystone factors of what keeps a civilization/society/empire running along effectively enough to meaningfully extract wealth from for granted not unlike how retards throughout history thought releasing a foreign animal into a habitat with no thoughts for the results other than positive ones were shocked at the ecology getting fucked over.

TL;DR: cane toads

 

[God of Nothing]

That game is harder than coffin nails and if you complain about the difficulty on the steam forums for it the developer will personally call you a whiny bitch.

please be patient
i am absolutely certain vince has autism
the difficulty is what makes their games weirdly addictive despite being retarded in a lot of areas: colony ship had me hooked for the better part of last month

The only positive quality that can be attributed to that group of people is that for all intents and purposes it seems that the various shit they did having such horrific negative effects, wasn't entirely intentional. More like they took several keystone factors of what keeps a civilization/society/empire running along effectively enough to meaningfully extract wealth from for granted not unlike how retards throughout history thought releasing a foreign animal into a habitat with no thoughts for the results other than positive ones were shocked at the ecology getting fucked over.

Hanlon's razor. God, I hate how much it can be applied these days.

 

[LurkTrawl]

please be patient
i am absolutely certain vince has autism
the difficulty is what makes their games weirdly addictive despite being retarded in a lot of areas: colony ship had me hooked for the better part of last month

Hey don't get me wrong, I go back and try it every year. FYI I've never complained on the steam page for it but once in a while I'll go check it out to see who he's been berating, for laughs.

Hanlon's razor. God, I hate how much it can be applied these days.

Hanlon's razor being applied to anything more important and/or complex than an interpersonal relationship is a grave error, and I think one that has really contributed to fucking over the body politic.

At a certain point, incompetence should be regarded functionally the same as malice. If you hit a car full of kids while you were driving drunk, you still killed a car full of kids even if you weren't sober as a judge and committing the act with harmful intent.

If you're part of a group that works together to manage a nation/empire/society/a fucking hobbyist club, whatever, and you fuck up so badly that human beings are becoming fuck-repulsed, fatter than a walrus, sickly, autistic, ignorant, communist, broke, and on and on, you have fucked up egregiously beyond any sympathy for your incompetence.

 

[TowinKarz]

If you're part of a group that works together to manage a nation/empire/society/a fucking hobbyist club, whatever, and you fuck up so badly that human beings are becoming fuck-repulsed, fatter than a walrus, sickly, autistic, ignorant, communist, broke, and on and on, you have fucked up egregiously beyond any sympathy for your incompetence.

The initial fuckups can be excused, they really did think they were helping, but, 30 years of continuing to try and implement the same policies over and over when they keep failing? Because stopping trying to "help" is displeasing to their egos and political sensibilities? Now THAT is where incompetence becomes malicious.

 

[God of Nothing]

Hey don't get me wrong, I go back and try it every year. FYI I've never complained on the steam page for it but once in a while I'll go check it out to see who he's been berating, for laughs.

Hanlon's razor being applied to anything more important and/or complex than an interpersonal relationship is a grave error, and I think one that has really contributed to fucking over the body politic.

At a certain point, incompetence should be regarded functionally the same as malice. If you hit a car full of kids while you were driving drunk, you still killed a car full of kids even if you weren't sober as a judge and committing the act with harmful intent.

If you're part of a group that works together to manage a nation/empire/society/a fucking hobbyist club, whatever, and you fuck up so badly that human beings are becoming fuck-repulsed, fatter than a walrus, sickly, autistic, ignorant, communist, broke, and on and on, you have fucked up egregiously beyond any sympathy for your incompetence.

I think too many people nowadays consider fighting for the wrong thing with the best intentions as something that's justifiable and forgivable. While at the same time mocking those who just do as their told or keep their head in the sand, they make excuses for the policies that allow repeat offenders to go on crime sprees because of the poor criminals (blacks/migrants but you already knew that). They do the exact same thing as the people they mock and cause more damage than those they think aren't doing enough.

Let's take the clusterfuck abortion became for example. We went from it'll only be used for emergencies to women should be allowed to terminate their pregnancy when they're only a few months away from labor to even after the kids are fucking born. Even when you point out the various consequences, they'll rant and rave about it being their personal rights and not intruding on anyone else's when that is hardly the case when they want every state to allow it regardless if they don't want to.

And education. Oh fucking boy. It was meant to bring up those who didn't perform (again, mostly blacks and illegals) to everyone else. The side-effect of special attention being paid to the minorities was the failing of those who could've prospered. What was the end result again? A shittier education system that taught its students nothing and left everyone middling at best or illiterate at worst because schools were penalized if the retards couldn't succeed in spite of everything they tried.

Small little decisions having extreme consequences.

 

[LurkTrawl]

Because stopping trying to "help" is displeasing to their egos and political sensibilities?

I don't think they were ever trying to "help" anything. All the evidence points to, at best, trying to help themselves whilst not rocking the boat so hard it capsized. Which, it's doing right now.

Small little decisions having extreme consequences.

Even before that though I think it's the same problem inherent to any structure involving people above a certain size whether in hypotheticals, concepts, or actual social structures be it hierarchical in a casual sense or in the case of a government. That you're dealing with too many individuals lumped together as a group to make accurate blanket statements or decisions beyond the absolute most bare-bones deductions.

Combine that with people who are "at the top", who have an ingroup/outgroup preference based on their own economic class and position of power within society, who are inevitably going to be egomaniacal at a minimum due to the nature of their status, who also haven't seen any real reprisal for any of the shit they've been up to for half a century, and you get people who are out of touch making decisions they think can lead to them having their cake and eating it all to themselves with no consequences from the comfort of their ivory towers.

A good example and the most clear-cut I think a person could make is making the military appealing to a progressive audience. The thought behind it was clear: "We can market to the woke crowd to 'look good'* and pull in more recruits, while not suffering any significant losses in recruitment as we can rely upon our established base of generational enlistment to be our reliable supply. They're not going to stop signing up to 'serve their country' any time soon, they sure didn't for the past twenty years..."

But due to them taking that base for granted, buying into their own bullshit* causing the lever-pullers responsible for that decision to genuinely think that's where the zeitgeist of the country is at, and fucking nobody who'd point out how retarded that idea is being allowed within a twenty-mile radii of any position that would allow common sense to leak into the planning-phase discussion for it, they're now experiencing a precipitous drop in recruitment.

It's my own partial theory of sorts as to why every empire is doomed to fucking collapse. It's the square-cube law of human social groups. Past a certain size, complexity, and centralization of the two, the stratification of society as people who inevitably infest the higher echelons of said society are self-interested assholes who work to ossify the strata into permanence occurs. Decades of this self-interested cooperation between people on that layer to extract wealth ends up where we're at now - a corporatocratic oligarchy that when viewed from below believably functions in a directly conspiratorial manner that when analyzed objectively is simply the outcome of years of serendipitous, opportunistic maneuvers to gain mutual benefit between multiple parties on this upper strata of said society.

The results of which are obvious - look around you. It's a system that stopped functioning for its own sake decades prior in order to better function for the benefit of those who most benefit from it - to better give more unto those who already get the most. When a system is too fucking large, there's just no way for the people at the top - even if they wanted to do so - to serve the society under them effectively. Nor can such people, if at one point during the coalescing of power, people, and culture they do in fact exist, gatekeep indefinitely those who would seek to use it for their own benefit. As ultimately the kind of people who want to turn to the government to regulate competitors out of existence through backchannel negotiations, people who are willing to sign up to government to be those contacts, people who are the essence of what we call "government corruption" will always be there and will always be the ones to eventually get their way and work as this society/culture/economy destroying influence to what they believe is their indefinite benefit out of sheer persistence if nothing else.

This country wasn't founded on the idea that the federal government was the end-all, be-all, last stop for power. I like to think precisely for this reason, the folks who founded the United States of America knew their history and sure as fuck didn't, presumably, need to read Fate of Empires to know what became of nations that decided to embark upon the path of centralizing their government, culture, and economy. The most unscrupulous among us end up climbing the ranks to the top, pulling up the ladder behind them, and immediately begin engaging in wealth-extraction as well as aggressive guarding of any remaining paths to power in order to build their retarded utopian vision. Because ultimately such people are almost always stupid enough to think that the good times will never end, as at the end of the day they're parasites with no understanding of why what they take for granted is neither infinite nor invulnerable to harm from their own scheming.

 

[Duke Nukem]

Whenever they do, they have incompetent morons doing the questioning and making the worst arguments possible. Rick Santorum, Todd "rape victims can't get pregnant" Akin, or the Duggars come to mind.

Every ideology has its share of retards, but the contemporary left is all retards.

 

[God of Nothing]

It's my own partial theory of sorts as to why every empire is doomed to fucking collapse. It's the square-cube law of human social groups. Past a certain size, complexity, and centralization of the two, the stratification of society as people who inevitably infest the higher echelons of said society are self-interested assholes who work to ossify the strata into permanence occurs. Decades of this self-interested cooperation between people on that layer to extract wealth ends up where we're at now - a corporatocratic oligarchy that when viewed from below believably functions in a directly conspiratorial manner that when analyzed objectively is simply the outcome of years of serendipitous, opportunistic maneuvers to gain mutual benefit between multiple parties on this upper strata of said society.

This may just be the biggest flaw of democracy. Giving everyone a voice means you also give the corrupt fuckers who want power and wealth more than anything else one. While they may have been peasants in ages bygone who could at best be bandits, they are now rich thieves on a scale most people can't even fathom. I suppose it's the price to pay for a long period of equality and freedom.

That's not to say autocracies are immune to it: we just need to look at Rome for that. Aurelian was murdered for being too hard on corruption. Hundreds of years later and it's still remembered as a goddamn tragedy. Price of administration systems as well. As you said, self-interested groups infiltrate the higher framework of society and infect the rest of it with others like them for their own benefit.

 

[LurkTrawl]

self-interested groups infiltrate the higher framework of society and infect the rest of it with others like them for their own benefit.

Until it collapses. Then the cycle starts over again.

 

[Mr. Zed da Robot Poon Fed]

Conservatives are massive TERF cucks that don't want to kill babies, and this moron proves it once again.
Ask a conservative if women should have to be drafted (or take any kind of responsibility to a problem) and they'll say "no of course not, men and women are different!"
Ask a conservative if women should be able to vote (or have any equivalent power to men) and they'll say "well of course, women are important and should have all the same rights!"

Conservatives, just like feminists, will always refuse to place any kind of responsibility on women and blame men.

Very true. Look at Dave Ramsey, for example:

Wife gets herself into debt. Husband had debt from gambling but ends up paying it off. Ramsey and his black cohort blames the husband for supposedly instilling enough trauma to put her in debt. I'm having trouble finding the video in the pile of videos he has, though.

What girls in real life? Am I supposed to wish them into existence, is that part of the "easy fix"?

Nevermind that a lot of them I found to be...much, much older when I touch grass or something.

The trouble with this is the pursuit of happiness itself may just cause more suffering. If I had to give an alternative, I'd say to pursue the things you want. And if you can't have those things, oh well. Focus on the things you have. It's just the things I want are all out of reach, which is why I'm not happy a lot of the time, and what little I have is something that fills me with emptiness.
but that's just me

"Happiness" is honestly whatever you make it. This dating situation has helped me realize that.

Sure, women love a bad boy.

I know this is a sarcastic comment, but it is pretty difficult to gauge what a woman wants in a relationship, even if they directly say it to you.

 

[derpherp2]

Most of the people in charge now whether it be the "special interest groups" or government are the same people who were the movers and shakers back then, or at the very least people related to them in some form or fashion.

It's not just that these faggots are fucking insane by the way they are ACTIVELY hampering any effort to restore any form of sanity to the bureaucratic... processes... the old fucker in age of decadence cannot fully grasp just how delusional the "squanderers" are. But you guys might.

You've seen it with all the nepo-baby lolcows here. They legitimately think there is no end to the prosperity they leech off of, to staggeringly horrifying levels of acceleration to the point that they view their hedonism as some frugal shit. And anyone that points this out - well you guys already know what fucking happens to lolcows when you try to tell them what the obvious consequences of their actions are.

The issue is, as our feeder says. Lolcows fuck up their lives. Politicians fuck up ours.

 

[dustbuster]

This may just be the biggest flaw of democracy. Giving everyone a voice means you also give the corrupt fuckers who want power and wealth more than anything else one.

Slight correction.
Giving everyone a voice rather than those with demonstrated responsibility and skin in the game results in "corrupt fuckers" weaponizing retards via propaganda.
The united states didn't have foreign wars with no benefit to average Americans in the form of wealth or territory before universal suffrage.