Rarely is the question asked: is our children learning?

I mean, life in general is pretty exhausting. You know how birds fly away when you walk too close? It’s not because they’re jerks, it’s because they’re scared if they don’t, they’ll die. Life in a state of nature is praying you don’t get hurt and thus get eaten and to constantly either be looking for food, trying not to get eaten and recovering. (Some animals, like whales have it a bit easier but still…)

If you walk down any street, most people are wearing clothes made by children in sweatshops.

In general, people don’t really care about abstract ethical concerns even ones affecting them until it actually harms them or someone they know.

I remember when we thought things couldn’t get dumber than George W…

As a guy, we can be real jerks.

My guess is that he probably wants more short term casual relationships but also knows that most women want long term (and those who want short term have no end of possible suppliers.) So, if he wants to sleep around, he probably has to claim he that ultimately he is looking for a long term relationship. (Would you have gone on a date if his profile just said casual?)

I’m also striding through middle age and sorry to say, in a lot of senses, dating doesn’t get easier. Honestly, I think a lot of people have coupled up and a higher proportion who haven’t, haven’t for a reason.

There’s also an interesting phenomenon I’ve seen in early middle age where guys who seem dependable etc couple up with women who would seem “out of their league” as priorities shift to starting a family etc. Of course, the flip side is this also removes a lot of the nice but kind of unremarkable guys from the dating pool.

All that being said, I’d say there is still hope! The big advantage of dating later on in life is that you know who you are, what you want and hopefully, you’re not afraid to ask/demand it! Meeting people in person, whether community groups, sports, hobbies, volunteering or anything else is tricky but deeply rewarding. The other folks around our age who also don’t have families and kids are often pretty friendly and happy to make new friends as our old friends get busier with their new families etc.

Good luck out there!

It’s the same issue with pretty much any interesting post in the fediverse. As I’m subscribed to a lot of different communities across different instances, I see the same thing over and over.

I imagine/fervently hope we’ll sort it out eventually.

I am so lucky my teenage drinking years were before smartphones were ubiquitous.

As a Canadian, driving or biking on American roads is wild, it’s like you’re rolling a couple of years after an apocalyptic event.

“I kick ass for the Lord!”

Which lines up with the data pretty well, considering rates of sex have been dropping steadily since the 80s. Your assertion that that happened “in the last decade or two” is just you being wrong.

You might actually look at the data instead of just being wrong?

https://ifstudies.org/blog/sexless-america-young-adults-are-having-less-sex

As far as books, you asked me a specific question: Do I read more than I game?

Do you read as much as you game? Do you really think most people find books and video games equally appealing?

For someone who claims to read a lot, you seem to miss a bunch. Aiming that books are as widely popular as video games is a pretty silly take. You could google for a couple of minutes to figure out the reality.

https://news.gallup.com/poll/8926/reading-time-fundamental-most-parents.aspx

You are rejecting anything that doesn’t fit your worldview outright.

By bringing evidence and time lines? Like what, I should’ve agreed that endocrine disrupting chemics are to blame despite being around for decades before the fall in teenage sex?

Or I’m supposed to seriously believe that reading is as common among teens and youth as books? Seriously? If you have any teacher friends, you might bring forward this uhh, interesting idea. Just be ready for some laughter and to explain that yes,it was a serious question.

I mean, on books being as common as books, is that actually a serious thought? Maybe google for half a second?

so you just reject that I spend more time reading books than playing games.

That didn’t happen? Believe it or not, you’re not every or even average youth. Weird huh?

If you don’t know what something like motivated reasoning means, maybe check before you start complaining about being accused of bad faith arguments?

I say desperate because your “arguments” have gotten progressively sillier. Maybe you really don’t know about endocrine chemicals and how long they’ve been around but seriously comparing the addictive/time suck nature of video games to books is utterly nonsensical.

(And no, I haven’t dated a gamer. I and the folks I date tend to spend our time outside. Though it would be a marvel for gender equality if I had to give some nice lady a video game ultimatum!)

Why didn’t this collapse when books became cheap and available?

Do you read as much as you game? Do you really think most people find books and video games equally appealing?

data shows that sperm counts have been dropping since the 70s, and native birthrates have been below replacement since the 80s

You’re conflating fertility and teens having sex.

The drop off in teen sex is way more recent than either of those, started in the last decade or two.

This really seems like ever more frantic motivated reasoning.

now that we have endocrine disrupting chemicals being dumped into the environment.

The decline in teenage sex is very recent (last couple of decades) whereas endocrine disrupting chemicals have been dumped for decades and decades prior to that.

This seems like realllllllly motivated reasoning on your part.

Never thought about it like that! It’s probably just like how so many under 30s living with their parents these days isn’t a sign of distress, they probably just love their parents more than every other generation!

What fascinating insights you have.

Absolutely, there’s definitely folks who were already not good at socializing turning to video games. Buuut, I think the cheapness, ubiquity and quality have all improved so much that it has become a much easier alternative than it was in the past.

Like, if you lower the price of cigarettes, many who smoke those cheaper smokes would have smoked anyway. But as the price drops, it’s easier for those marginal smokers to continue to do so and for new ones to start. (You had to be pretty dedicated to suffer through Ultima VI etc.)

And the timing also kind of makes sense; for the last couple of decades there’s been a marked decrease in teenagers and young adults having sex. I assume part is the ubiquity of porn but I can’t imagine teenagers are just getting less horny…

Manosphere is a huge part. I just think that the impressive improvements in video games have increased the pool of lonely young men on whom the manosphere preys.

As a crude example, I had surgery and finished Persona 5 while recovering. Mentioned that to a coworker when I returned and he was stoked and talked about his multiple playthroughs on that and his experience with the others in the series. With a full time job, that’s so very many weeks worth of time just devoted to a video game instead of meeting people, socializing, finding a partner etc.

I’m going to date myself here but mid 90s and earlier games were fairly niche. There were definitely folks who played them a lot but today, I don’t think it’s entirely unusual for a kid to have spent a weekend gaming.

I don’t think there was a hard dividing line but as much as I loved say, Rebel Assault, you couldn’t really throw hundreds of hours into it.

Probably going to be an unpopular take online but… A lot of the most chronically single people I know are very into videogames. Not sure which way the causation runs or maybe it’s a self reinforcing cycle but there does seem to be a relationship.

The folks I know tend not to be the angry incel type but I could very easily see a pathway that goes something like: video games are cheaper and easier than putting yourself out there, thus you isolate, but isolation kind of sucks and no one likes to blame themselves, so the “manosphere” and it’s precursors are there to tell you it’s actually women/wokeness/the Libs that are responsible for your angry singledom…" To me, I see them at least partially a factor in the hard gender split in politics these days.

The timing also kind of maps out. Video games have moved from niche to one of the most lucrative entertainment industries. The generation of young men raised by really quality games was coming to electoral age just about 2016 and boy, did things start going g off the rails.

I’m not blaming everything on videogames and do play some myself but I do wonder if they’ve contributed to the problem.

Yeah, exactly. I actually worry that social media acts as junk food activism, an activity that feels like activism but really just takes up time and energy that could be used well to no effect.

How many times have you seen someone raging online arguing that they’re fighting for X and will always fight for them?