# About 60 percent of adults under age 35 now live without a spouse or a partner.



## scarpia (Nov 23, 2009)

From an Atlantic article called "The Sex Recession". It really could be called the relationship recession, because that is a major reason people are having less sex. Too long to post the entire thing.

https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2018/12/the-sex-recession/573949/


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## Persephone The Dread (Aug 28, 2010)

You can't really have a relationship if you both live with your parents, I mean not easily or without extreme awkwardness (guess you could just get hotel rooms or something and hang out there,) so I'm sure that contributes.


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## Persephone The Dread (Aug 28, 2010)

scarpia said:


> I used to know people who had relationships while living with parents. Maybe that is something that is changing too.


It's not impossible but it's clearly very awkward to be meeting the family early on. I don't know though, I avoided meeting the family members of anyone I've been in a relationship with so.

Anyway reading that list I think the entertainment factor is a big thing too. There are lots of distractions and other things to do these days, in the past people probably dated because they were bored. Now there are always other things to do that are quicker and easier. And if you're not desperate you become picky and niche-oriented.


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## SplendidBob (May 28, 2014)

Persephone The Dread said:


> You can't really have a relationship if you both live with your parents, I mean not easily or without extreme awkwardness (guess you could just get hotel rooms or something and hang out there,) so I'm sure that contributes.


You can, it's just not we expect as a relationship. Does call for more forward thinking parents though.

People lived in large family groups throughout history for a _long long time_. Its evidently very doable. Just we are coming out of an era where _everyone_ had their own homes, or if they didn't the state provided them. What is needed are living pods. White ones. In forests. Hovering ones. Or failing that, ladders would be fine. The wealthy people would just ninja all of those anyway and rent them out at exorbitant prices.

Re the original post, yeh, I mean there's so many possible variables for this, and they could all play a part to some degree (except for the estrogen one lmao, you can't really have porn addiction and estrogen problems preventing libido. Young people have libidos.). Anxieties, sure, antidepressants, sure, I mean good luck successfully ****ing someone taking those unless you have a massive premature ejaculation problem. Sex, wearing a condom, without being able to _possibly_ achieve orgasm, and probably without even being able to pop an erection is like having sex with a piece of air.

When I was on SSRI's the level of stimulation needed for any sensation was either sandpaper or hammers.


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## Persephone The Dread (Aug 28, 2010)

@Fungal Pete

I know it's possible it's just why would you want to meet so many people?


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## SplendidBob (May 28, 2014)

I found this quote hilarious from the article though re online dating:



> A more recent study by researchers at the University of Michigan and the Santa Fe Institute found that online daters of both genders tend to pursue prospective mates who are on average 25 percent more desirable than they are-presumably not a winning strategy.


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## SplendidBob (May 28, 2014)

Persephone The Dread said:


> @Fungal Pete
> 
> I know it's possible it's just why would you want to meet so many people?


What's not romantic about candlelight sex surrounded by the parents, grandparents and one amazingly long lived great grandparent dribbling into a bowl and soiling himself?


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## SplendidBob (May 28, 2014)

Wait, do people somehow know who I am? I thought I disguised myself with the name change and the "Totally New Member" bit. hmm.


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## Persephone The Dread (Aug 28, 2010)

Another problem is when


* *
































































































You get where I'm going with this right?

I think about this paragraph a lot:



> Some female transhomosexuals become very restricted in their partner choice, seeking androgynous blends of male + female characteristics. This is not the same as having a wide range of sexual responsivity across the male-female continuum Some of these subjects sought out only very effeminate homosexual men, transvestites, and transsexuals, and one eventually became so specialized, she was on the lookout for only Kleinfelter males.


Not that there haven't been several exceptions, but for real though.

lol 'could it be worse? Yes only slightly though'


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## blue2 (May 20, 2013)

At last I'm trendy XD..


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## komorikun (Jan 11, 2009)

If both people in a couple live with their parents, then they have sex in hotels. That's why love hotels exist in Japan and Latin America. Almost everyone lives with their parents in those countries until they get married. They also have drive-thru places in Brazil, which is a place where you get privacy to have sex in your car. A bathroom is usually available too. Cheaper than a regular love hotel.

What I found interesting is how Brazilian love hotels are on highways, kind of hidden away from the city. But most Japanese love hotels are right in the city center, where all the bars are. Westerners are more conservative about that sort of thing than Japanese.


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## Persephone The Dread (Aug 28, 2010)

lol



> I thought of these comments when Pornhub, the top pornography website, released its list of 2017's most popular searches. In first place, for the third year running, was lesbian (a category beloved by men and women alike). The new runner-up, however, was hentai-anime, manga, and other animated porn. Porn has never been like real sex, of course, but hentai is not even of this world; unreality is the source of its appeal. In a New York-magazine cover story on porn preferences, Maureen O'Connor described the ways hentai transmogrifies body parts ("eyes bigger than feet, breasts the size of heads, penises thicker than waists") and eroticizes the supernatural ("sexy human shapes" combine with "candy-colored fur and animal horns, ears, and tails"). In other words, the leading search category for porn involves sex that half the population doesn't have the equipment to engage in, and the runner-up isn't carnal so much as hallucinatory.


Reminds me of part of that one long unwieldy blog post:



> For each willing man, however, two have recoiled, and society now has to deal with an influenza of working-age NEETs going on disability and protest-fapping to anime crossdressers. Compare the feminine Pornhub searches above to those more popular among men: milf, step mom, step sister, hentai, 3D, VR, overwatch. What's the theme? I'll accept "femdom-y comfort" (incest, heroines), "no male competition" (POV, Freudians), or "stuff you can't thinkpiece about" (= still taboo), but the most salient trend is that they are fake, maximum pretense: you know that's not his mom, right?





> The original sin of cuck porn is being too meta. Cucks aren't jerking off to the girl in porn, nor to a male magnification of themselves, but rather to their separation from the action, to the fact that they're watching porn. That doesn't make it a fetish of weakness, an idea both empirically nonexistent and definitionally wrong. With e.g. femdom, the man's weakness is balanced by a fetish for the strength of his dominatrix. He commands her power, even as it is directed at him. Cuck porn follows a similar principle, but erases the need for a partner. It is a fetish of self-pity and aggrandizement at the cost of individual connection, and this is what makes it contemptible.


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## Micronian (Nov 11, 2004)

I look at it from an economic point of view. It's just simply unaffordable:
- low purchasing power
- increasing personal debts
- rise in costs makes it tough to go on traditional dates very often (plus the costs of a wedding, hospital costs for childbirth, skyrocketing housing costs; it all makes having relationships a financially reckless act)

...and add to this the law: divorce costs, plus the financial costs of "sexual harrassment". It's really a losing situation.



Persephone The Dread said:


> Another problem is when
> 
> You get where I'm going with this right?
> 
> ...


I've read of cases where, in the absence of men, some women will switch gender roles to compensate and become accepted "males" to the other women.


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## Persephone The Dread (Aug 28, 2010)

Micronian said:


> I look at it from an economic point of view. It's just simply unaffordable:
> - low purchasing power
> - increasing personal debts
> - rise in costs makes it tough to go on traditional dates very often (plus the costs of a wedding, hospital costs for childbirth, skyrocketing housing costs; it all makes having relationships a financially reckless act)
> ...


I don't think that's actually what's happening, and I have done a lot of reading on this subject.

Edit: So I'll break it down as much as I can in a short-ish post (and I've just copied links to some of the papers below which only show the abstracts, so for those if you want to read the full one you can copy the doi codes etc onto sci-hub. Normally I do that but meh, tired.)

You have lesbians who tend to be gender nonconforming from a young age. They don't switch roles in any meaningful sense and to the extent they do it's usually to become more feminine so they can better fit in as they age past childhood, but the degree that they try is influenced by how much they want to + how non conforming they were in the first place.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Childhood_gender_nonconformity

Then you have other women (not including lesbians,) who have a more 'fluid' sexuality so most are capable of being attracted to women sexually:

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-017-18372-0

But there are some differences between the women who identify as bisexual and heterosexual in studies. In particular bisexual women tend to have a more unrestricted sociosexual profile compared to heterosexual women and lesbians and the various other things that you can see summarized here. higher sex drives, and potentially different arousal patterns towards genitalia since one of the few studies that showed sex specific arousal patterns in non-lesbian women was in a study comparing the results of heterosexual men and women when looking at genitalia erect and not. Bisexual people were not included in this study though so we still don't know.

This might effect behavioural differences which sometimes impact label choice eg: the straight/mostly straight identified woman who gets off to lesbian porn but hasn't any real inclination to seek out a relationship with a woman vs a bisexual identified woman who does.

This doesn't automatically involve desire to play with 'gender roles' though which is a separate thing, though it does seem to overlap with those who openly identify as bisexual ime.

In addition quite a few people who have some desire to take on the opposite sex/relationship role have a preference for androgynous partners either their own sex, or the opposite sex, or both. Typically this seems to go back a long way in the individuals life, is a consistent preference, and is accompanied by varying levels of disinterest in gender conforming partners. The degree of androgynous traits preferred varies it's just a pattern and people like this tend to conceptualise relationships and such in somewhat novel ways.

Many people don't have such a preference though and various desires aren't necessarily rare though I mean:

(he describes this as outlandish but lol noob):


__ https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1063759262629969922
Many women who desire to take on the opposite sex role are attracted to men and date and have sex with men actually. Unfortunately your average straight man will tend not to be into that since they are attracted to femininity so I think sometimes people with this particular 'drive' tend to develop a preference for androgynous men, gay men or for women because they look for partners who might be complementary to the role they want to take on. So it can be bi-directional. Firstly considering the role you might need to attract certain partners, and secondarily the one you want to take on if that differs from the former for any reason.


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## millenniumman75 (Feb 4, 2005)

Persephone The Dread said:


> I don't think that's actually what's happening, and I have done a lot of *reading* on this subject.


Unfortunately, "reading" has often been from skewed data, too.

It's just messed up all the way around. Harassment is a valid thing, but when it doesn't apply to social awkwardness.

It's like people have no direction, nose to the cell phone, less social interaction, inability to relate, then have anxiety when another anxious person can't read what you are doing. Vicious cycle.

If this is what progress is, something isn't right.


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## Persephone The Dread (Aug 28, 2010)

millenniumman75 said:


> Unfortunately, "reading" has often been from skewed data, too.
> 
> It's just messed up all the way around. Harassment is a valid thing, but when it doesn't apply to social awkwardness.
> 
> ...


?


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## smoothlinghs (Jun 2, 2018)

We are separated because women hate men and men hate women, that is the truth. Men does not want to be equal partners, they just want to have their sex and kids without any responsibilities. Women should take care of their work, their kids and all house works meanwhile men are keeping fun with their friends. That is a no. Women are sick of men and their careless attitudes. Men can hang with men as they want to. There is no free maids, no free sex slaves and no free lunches. Also those malekids cannot afford any good manners so why women should bother at all?
I think it is only good for both genders to not be to together as they cannot do it in love and no need to make kids either to this planet either.
Crushes are great, real people are too .. people.


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## smoothlinghs (Jun 2, 2018)

scarpia said:


> . But I also think the expanding definition of sexual assault and harassment has a lot to do with creating anxiety in men. I just had 2 guys kicked out of my workplace. The sexual harassment training we got said it was harassment just to innocently touch a woman on the shoulder. You can't date at work anymore - and that's a great place to find someone because you actually get to know the person before starting the relationship so it is more likely to succeed.


Yes, how it can be so hard to understand for men what is your body and what is my body? Touch your own body, you own it and you can treat it just like you want to. You know that pua-technique took the last normality of all touching. And it is very pressuring environment to work if that reminds more of a nightclub.
You can and you must get to actually know someone so write, call, e-mail, chat, go to coffee, skating or what ever you like to get to know her.


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## andy0128 (Dec 19, 2003)

I'm surprised by these figures. What does the future have in store for us if this trend comtinues?


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## Beatnik (Jul 12, 2011)

"There's not enough people on this planet"
-No one 
(circa never)


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## CNikki (Aug 9, 2013)

Thank the generation that found it to be the greatest idea to take LSD's while listening to The Beatles all day long.


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## andy1984 (Aug 18, 2006)

I guess expectations have changed. and people are more flakey. we're not getting locked into marriages anyway. when things start to go wrong we're out of there. plus contraception. feminism - men are less rapey controlley. porn is free. movies and TV are practically free.


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## Paper Samurai (Oct 1, 2009)

Fungal Pete said:


> Wait, do people somehow know who I am? I thought I disguised myself with the name change and the "Totally New Member" bit. hmm.


 Just a wild stab in the dark; are you 'the artist formerly known as Bob'?


andy0128 said:


> I'm surprised by these figures. What does the future have in store for us if this trend comtinues?


 Japan is kinda like the canary in the coal mine for this seeing as they've had this issue for longer and it's more widespread.

"Japan's population is set to plummet from 127 million to 88 million by 2065 - and is projected to drop even further to just 51 million by 2115 if current trends continue."

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/...t-children-demographic-timebomb-a7678116.html


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## millenniumman75 (Feb 4, 2005)

Persephone The Dread said:


> ?


People can write all they want to these days and it's perceived as truth.

We re getting more and more messed up because we aren't communicating like we used to. Accusations and paranoia fuel isolation. Isolation fuels flawed thinking as real. And so on and so on and so on.


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## Paper Samurai (Oct 1, 2009)

scarpia said:


> Japan is actually going to have to allow immigration now.
> 
> *Can Japan survive without immigrants?*
> 
> ...


 Loving the idea of robots to fix the problem, being a little stereotypical here but that is what you'd pretty much expect the Japanese to do.


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## Persephone The Dread (Aug 28, 2010)

millenniumman75 said:


> People can write all they want to these days and it's perceived as truth.
> 
> We re getting more and more messed up because we aren't communicating like we used to. Accusations and paranoia fuel isolation. Isolation fuels flawed thinking as real. And so on and so on and so on.


Well I was talking about scientific studies and the like in that post (I then edited the post later partly because I realised that sentence was a bit vague though, but you quoted before I finished.)

Also still kind of confused tbh because it seems like everything you said in that post and this one is more replying to the general thread topic than anything I was talking about in the post you quoted.


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## SplendidBob (May 28, 2014)

Paper Samurai said:


> Just a wild stab in the dark; are you 'the artist formerly known as Bob'?


The name change isn't working, burn down the VS offices etc .


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## SplendidBob (May 28, 2014)

smoothlinghs said:


> We are separated because women hate men and men hate women, that is the truth. Men does not want to be equal partners, they just want to have their sex and kids without any responsibilities. Women should take care of their work, their kids and all house works meanwhile men are keeping fun with their friends. That is a no. Women are sick of men and their careless attitudes. Men can hang with men as they want to. There is no free maids, no free sex slaves and no free lunches. Also those malekids cannot afford any good manners so why women should bother at all?
> I think it is only good for both genders to not be to together as they cannot do it in love and no need to make kids either to this planet either.
> Crushes are great, real people are too .. people.


Well tbh if I am going to be hating anyone its men. I get on much better friend wise with women. That isn't to say I get on brilliantly with them, because I don't really get on brilliantly with anyone, but honestly, in real life of those who I could call friends, 5 (and maybe a new one, if she isn't interested in me romantically, which I doubt she is given I have told her all about my madnesses lol) are women. One of those 5 its a sorta FWB scenario (though she sometimes tells me she loves me, wants to have my babies and marry me and **** like that lol), and another one is kinda ignoring me atm lol, so not doing amazingly on the women friends front either. I have 0 male rl friends though, so I definitely prefer the company of women more.

1. Sex is fairly meh.
2. Intimacy is great
3. Kids are meh
4. I have no desire to hang with men



millenniumman75 said:


> People can write all they want to these days and it's perceived as truth.


That's what science is for. It's a way to tease away at the truth of things. People formulate hypothesis, test them, and then see if they were right. Then other people try to repeat what they found. If they can, you have something that's probably more true than what "people can right".

What you don't want to do is hear something and go "hmm, that sounds about right" or, "hmm, that matches up with what I believe already" (the latter being how people typically operate).


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## funnynihilist (Jul 29, 2014)

I've been "poo poo'ed" over the last 5 years for saying that monogamy as we know it is dying but here we are!


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## iAmCodeMonkey (May 23, 2010)

I foresee sex robots in my future. Lol. :grin2: >


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## Persephone The Dread (Aug 28, 2010)

Fungal Pete said:


> Well tbh if I am going to be hating anyone its men. I get on much better friend wise with women. That isn't to say I get on brilliantly with them, because I don't really get on brilliantly with anyone, but honestly, in real life of those who I could call friends, 5 (and maybe a new one, if she isn't interested in me romantically, which I doubt she is given I have told her all about my madnesses lol) are women. One of those 5 its a sorta FWB scenario (though she sometimes tells me she loves me, wants to have my babies and marry me and **** like that lol), and another one is kinda ignoring me atm lol, so not doing amazingly on the women friends front either. I have 0 male rl friends though, so I definitely prefer the company of women more.
> 
> 1. Sex is fairly meh.
> 2. Intimacy is great
> ...


You know someone I know did a survey on this (I guess on r/samplesize)


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## Tetragammon (Jun 2, 2015)

Sounds like a cause for celebration. This planet is already overpopulated with humans; we could use a steady decline in population for a few generations, at least.


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## Micronian (Nov 11, 2004)

Persephone The Dread said:


> You know someone I know did a survey on this (I guess on r/samplesize)


I wonder how the charts would look like if the context dealt with watching sports, playing sports, or drinking beer....

men don't bond through plain talking, they bond through competition.


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## andy0128 (Dec 19, 2003)

scarpia said:


> The people with the high birthrates are the Africans and Muslims though. Bringing in people with different cultures causes problems - look at Germany. Import too many foreigners and you could end up with sharia law!


There is no doubt it causes problems so you can't blame the japanese for looking to alternatives.

Things are going to get very ugly for high birthrate countries as the US and europe slowly shut their door on migrants. I'm not sure there is much cause for optimism as its pretty much a cultural thing to have large families regardless of whether its sustainable.


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## Blue Dino (Aug 17, 2013)

This is actually surprising to me, especially if these stats are all based on Americans. If it's an eastern country, I would not have been as surprised.


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## SplendidBob (May 28, 2014)

scarpia said:


> Delete 9000 posts so no one can recognize you. That should take a few months.


Good point  I guess there are only a few of us on that many.



Persephone The Dread said:


> You know someone I know did a survey on this (I guess on r/samplesize)


Not sure how I should interpret that.

1. Men are deluded about how well interactions go with women
2. I am actually bisexual (the difference looks small enough to be inconclusive for straight men).
3. Women are much better at invoking positive feelings than men
4. Women pretend to like interactions much better than men
5. Men see other men as competition and essentially just a waste of time.

I can't see it being good in any direction.

Still, if the survey was from reddit it can be thrown out totally. Because redditors. So there is that.



Micronian said:


> I wonder how the charts would look like if the context dealt with *watching sports*, *playing sports*, or *drinking beer*....
> 
> men don't bond through plain talking, *they bond through competition*.


And the bolded are examples of why I don't like interacting with men. All of those things are ****. Except drinking beer, and even that is **** because:

1. It should be done with women / alone
2. It should be wine.


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## Persephone The Dread (Aug 28, 2010)

Micronian said:


> I wonder how the charts would look like if the context dealt with watching sports, playing sports, or drinking beer....
> 
> men don't bond through plain talking, they bond through competition.





Fungal Pete said:


> Good point  I guess there are only a few of us on that many.
> 
> Not sure how I should interpret that.
> 
> ...


If you like I can post the scale they used later when I'm not on my phone.

That particular subreddit is actually used for academic research too lol, but yes strange place. Seemingly overrepresentation of people with paraphilic interests there too so although it's widely used, not ideal. Reminds me of the WEIRD sample paper too (about western uni students essentially being aliens on a global scale so results don't tend to generalise.)

https://www.theatlantic.com/daily-d...ed-industrialized-rich-and-democratic/181667/

It wouldn't surprise me at this point if it was true among say young Western people, based on anecdotal evidence but yes I expect various things would impact results like degree of gender conformity, sexual preference, how irritated you are by men/women flirting with you or trying to have sex with you. Whether you bond more over shared interests or working together, or competition based stuff compared to other stuff.

Yes being in male dominated environments I have noticed people will often only talk to you if they respect your level of expertise or you're on a similar level of ability or if they can use you. It's very networking oriented. At least at uni level before that I noticed most people didn't care at all and were lazy and didn't want to be there (sixth form, mostly guys, software development.) I dunno what academic environments that are female dominated are like because the only one I was ever in was an art class in sixth form which won't be representative because fine art.. It was very awkward and anxiety inducing (not because it was mostly female, though I didn't talk to anyone for most of the time there, but because I was bad at the subject matter coupled with I dunno just awkward.)

As for the alcohol thing well, it's hard to have a social life in the UK if you don't drink period. Alcoholic nation. Lol. I like drinking so it never bothered me when I used to hang out with people irl (I don't now,) but I know people who didn't who have made it work and those who didn't and struggled as a result. Though I think if you are extroverted enough and have a significant interest in being around people and don't mind being sober around people who aren't you can make it work.

I've noticed on this forum men tend to say they get on better with women whenever someone asks so the effect is definitely more pronounced in places like this. I think with women here they tend to answer more 50/50 - that surprised me initially as I feel it's easier to be weird and asocial around men but I'm not sure if they were judging based on closeness of the relationships but posters seem to answer that even for general 'getting along' which suggests that's not all that's going on.

Also have to consider subgroups. I get on better with nerdy/geeky people. Autistic people are also much easier to talk to, and anyone who is neurodivergent in some way. It does end up being mostly guys.


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## SplendidBob (May 28, 2014)

Persephone The Dread said:


> If you like I can post the scale they used later when I'm not on my phone.


Yeh cool 



Persephone The Dread said:


> That particular subreddit is actually used for academic research too lol, but yes strange place. Seemingly overrepresentation of people with paraphilic interests there too so although it's widely used, not ideal. Reminds me of the WEIRD sample paper too (about western uni students essentially being aliens on a global scale so results don't tend to generalise.)


Gasp at using reddit for academic research hehe. Actually glad I got the chickens research project rather than the social phobia one, because, how the **** am I going to get social phobia participants to participate in experiments? All I could get would be online results from people who *say* they have social phobia, and as we know, that definition is rather loose, to put it mildly. One would need to have access either to secondary care patients (and here in the UK secondary care just stuff a pack of seroxat in the patients hand and tell them to **** off) or university mental health (both of those would be an ethical ****ing nightmare), so what's left, online surveys of self identifying SA sufferers who have partners, houses, jobs etc and are yet "crippled by the nightmare of SA"?

At least with chickens I can be ****ing certain I am getting a chicken when I do a test on a chicken. Well, almost.



Persephone The Dread said:


> It wouldn't surprise me at this point if it was true among say young Western people, based on anecdotal evidence but yes I expect various things would impact results like degree of gender conformity, sexual preference, how irritated you are by men/women flirting with you or trying to have sex with you. Whether you bond more over shared interests or working together, or competition based stuff compared to other stuff.


Reddit in particular though also seems to draw a less "traditionally masculine" bunch of men, I think. "Real men" (who might prefer the company of men) are probably out either chopping down trees or at a stock exchange or something. Tech savvy internet users probably are a horrible sample for "men" in general. And yeh, for sure (depending on what's being tested) university psychologist students can be a really ****ing awful sample. One of our lecturers actually said this. He was saying how one of his colleagues HATED psych students because they always came in trying to figure out what the experiment was actually about with their half arsed year 1 psychology knowledge lol. For sure, you have to be very careful where you draw the sample from.



Persephone The Dread said:


> Yes being in male dominated environments I have noticed people will often only talk to you if they respect your level of expertise or you're on a similar level of ability or if they can use you. It's very networking oriented. At least at uni level before that I noticed most people didn't care at all and were lazy and didn't want to be there (sixth form, mostly guys, software development.) I dunno what academic environments that are female dominated are like because the only one I was ever in was an art class in sixth form which won't be representative because fine art.. It was very awkward and anxiety inducing (not because it was mostly female, though I didn't talk to anyone for most of the time there, but because I was bad at the subject matter coupled with I dunno just awkward.)


Being in a female dominated university environment is basically _heaven_ for me. I love it. Women are typically friendly towards me, and the environment seems quite non competitive. And I suck at social interaction. But I am also at an age where I get a sortof inbuilt "respect" thing lol (it's bizarre). Lecturers are super respectful, classmates are, as if I have some kind of competency and ability to function as a normal human.



Persephone The Dread said:


> As for the alcohol thing well, it's hard to have a social life in the UK if you don't drink period. Alcoholic nation. Lol. I like drinking so it never bothered me when I used to hang out with people irl (I don't now,) but I know people who didn't who have made it work and those who didn't and struggled as a result. Though I think if you are extroverted enough and have a significant interest in being around people and don't mind being sober around people who aren't you can make it work.


Very true.



Persephone The Dread said:


> I've noticed on this forum men tend to say they get on better with women whenever someone asks so the effect is definitely more pronounced in places like this. I think with women here they tend to answer more 50/50 - that surprised me initially as I feel it's easier to be weird and asocial around men but I'm not sure if they were judging based on closeness of the relationships but posters seem to answer that even for general 'getting along' which suggests that's not all that's going on.
> 
> Also have to consider subgroups. I get on better with nerdy/geeky people. Autistic people are also much easier to talk to, and anyone who is neurodivergent in some way. It does end up being mostly guys.


I think for me its male competitiveness. Admit weakness (mental health) in front of men, and they will place themselves above you on a hierarchy. With women I tend to get kindness. There is definitely some kind of dominance thing going on with men, and its something I have no wish to participate in (or maybe I just perceive it that way, entirely possible). The two female dominated environments I have been in (psych classes, library) have been awesome. The male dominated ones (some offices for my old web dev business) ****ing horrible.


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## komorikun (Jan 11, 2009)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sovereign_states_and_dependencies_by_total_fertility_rate


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## Persephone The Dread (Aug 28, 2010)

Fungal Pete said:


> Yeh cool














> Gasp at using reddit for academic research hehe. Actually glad I got the chickens research project rather than the social phobia one, because, how the **** am I going to get social phobia participants to participate in experiments? All I could get would be online results from people who *say* they have social phobia, and as we know, that definition is rather loose, to put it mildly. One would need to have access either to secondary care patients (and here in the UK secondary care just stuff a pack of seroxat in the patients hand and tell them to **** off) or university mental health (both of those would be an ethical ****ing nightmare), so what's left, online surveys of self identifying SA sufferers who have partners, houses, jobs etc and are yet "crippled by the nightmare of SA"?
> 
> At least with chickens I can be ****ing certain I am getting a chicken when I do a test on a chicken. Well, almost.


Chicken research project lol? Sounds interesting.



> Reddit in particular though also seems to draw a less "traditionally masculine" bunch of men, I think. "Real men" (who might prefer the company of men) are probably out either chopping down trees or at a stock exchange or something. Tech savvy internet users probably are a horrible sample for "men" in general. And yeh, for sure (depending on what's being tested) university psychologist students can be a really ****ing awful sample. One of our lecturers actually said this. He was saying how one of his colleagues HATED psych students because they always came in trying to figure out what the experiment was actually about with their half arsed year 1 psychology knowledge lol. For sure, you have to be very careful where you draw the sample from.


Yeah true I think the average redditor is probably a guy aged 18-40~, slightly left leaning politically, bit nerdy, knows quite a bit about some technical subject or another, not very physically active but it's going to vary a lot depending on the subreddit too but there's definitely a stereotype there of someone like that.

I'm on reddit sometimes (mostly lurking though,) and I actually helped chop down a tree a couple of years ago haha. It was an interesting experience (cause not a regular occurrence for someone like me,) but I did feel bad about that later though after reading some responses here when I posted about that and also generally because I liked that tree lol. It was a significant portion of the view outside my window for a long time, plus my vaguely hippy ways.



> Being in a female dominated university environment is basically _heaven_ for me. I love it. Women are typically friendly towards me, and the environment seems quite non competitive. And I suck at social interaction. But I am also at an age where I get a sortof inbuilt "respect" thing lol (it's bizarre). Lecturers are super respectful, classmates are, as if I have some kind of competency and ability to function as a normal human.


Oh yeah when I was at uni there was an older guy on our course who was in his mid 30s or so, almost every one else was in late teens/early 20s. He was also older looking too so stood out that way and beardy and such. He was very respected and basically everyone knew who he was (to begin with there were about.. 70-100 students or something like that but about 3/4 of these dropped out or retook years later on.)

But he also was very good at what he did and had a background in a vaguely related area (made real models for Games Workshop,) was very talented in zbrush (though less experience with low polycount stuff,) even before starting the course. He'd post work on this forum for the university that a bunch of people from the games programming and games art courses used before uni started (like the summer before,) and before people added each other on Facebook (that thread got to over 100 pages, and basically no one else used the forum lmfao just a bunch of people posting 3D models and discussing games and stuff because yeah really hammering in the level of geekery there,) so think that had an impact too. About half way through the year or so he moved up to the year above because he was working at a higher level.



> I think for me its male competitiveness. Admit weakness (mental health) in front of men, and they will place themselves above you on a hierarchy. With women I tend to get kindness. There is definitely some kind of dominance thing going on with men, and its something I have no wish to participate in (or maybe I just perceive it that way, entirely possible). The two female dominated environments I have been in (psych classes, library) have been awesome. The male dominated ones (some offices for my old web dev business) ****ing horrible.


Hm yeah that makes sense. I miss uni sometimes though, even though I wasn't particularly good at what I was studying (well there were some things I was better at than others.) and the workload was a lot, quite stressful. Others I'd meet/occasionally hang out with who weren't on my course or the games programming one (who we worked with a bunch and shared computer labs with,) had way smaller workloads and seemed to spend less time working. Nostalgia I guess and my life is **** now so there's that lol. Yeah.

I didn't mind the competitiveness either in the context of work/study and there were a lot of things I liked about that environment like the drive/ambition a lot of people had was very positive. I think what bothered me at the time was that with some people and it wasn't everyone, but yeah a significant portion, it kind of extended to everything. Like if they can't use you in some way they won't associate with you and will look down on you.

I do think that women are more empathetic in some ways though, and try and make you feel involved and express concern about you etc (it's certain kinds of women though like the friendly/bubbly ones.) I think I find that slightly uncomfortable though because of my own issues.

Oh and online I've noticed there are certain kinds of male personalities/attitudes I find very annoying so there's also that but I can't generalise from that because it's a specific blend of traits.


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## smoothlinghs (Jun 2, 2018)

Fungal Pete said:


> Well tbh if I am going to be hating anyone its men. I get on much better friend wise with women. That isn't to say I get on brilliantly with them, because I don't really get on brilliantly with anyone, but honestly, in real life of those who I could call friends, 5 (and maybe a new one, if she isn't interested in me romantically, which I doubt she is given I have told her all about my madnesses lol) are women. One of those 5 its a sorta FWB scenario (though she sometimes tells me she loves me, wants to have my babies and marry me and **** like that lol), and another one is kinda ignoring me atm lol, so not doing amazingly on the women friends front either. I have 0 male rl friends though, so I definitely prefer the company of women more.
> 
> 1. Sex is fairly meh.
> 2. Intimacy is great
> ...


No, they just are not smart enough to get same results :b . I am glad you are hanging out with wise women so you can reach out the superior wisdom.


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## Neal (Jan 14, 2012)

komorikun said:


> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sovereign_states_and_dependencies_by_total_fertility_rate


Yikes...


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## MCHB (Jan 1, 2013)

Shocker!


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## Neal (Jan 14, 2012)

scarpia said:


> That's why Trump wants to build a wall.
> 
> back to the sex recession in the west.
> 
> Mark Halperin just wrote a book about it;


That's in Africa though. I thought he was trying to block the southern border.

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk


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## iAmCodeMonkey (May 23, 2010)

opcorn


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## Neal (Jan 14, 2012)

scarpia said:


> South America isn't too picky about who gets in. They could just let Africans in and ship them up north.
> 
> Just looked it up and maybe that is changing though.
> 
> https://www.usnews.com/news/best-co...as-progressive-immigration-laws-begin-to-fray


"Ship" them north lol... I don't think you're gonna see many legit African immigrants coming in mass numbers like that caravan all over the news. Anyways I'm not gonna highjack your thread about that.


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## leaf in the wind (Mar 28, 2017)

Highly endorse. Living alone is the best. 

Contrary to contemporary wisdom, I find it way more expensive to be part of a couple. It also takes an emotional toll and a restriction on your personal and professional freedoms. Especially as a woman.

Most men are also terrible at sex and not worth it in that aspect.


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## KILOBRAVO (Sep 17, 2011)

scarpia said:


> Look at Japan:


maybe they're just super super tired from overworking? I mean, the Japanese are too tired to even bother cooking fish, so..........


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## Persephone The Dread (Aug 28, 2010)

KILOBRAVO said:


> maybe they're just super super tired from overworking? I mean, the Japanese are too tired to even bother cooking fish, so..........


That is part of it, but the current generation are mostly rebelling against the stressful lifestyles of their parents and grandparents. But also in the past you were sort of guaranteed a job for life in Japan but that is no longer the case and the environment is very unpredictable now which puts people off as well so they just kind of take cheap temp work or drop out of society completely:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freeter

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NEET

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hikikomori


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