Why are we conflating emotional intimacy and sex? They aren’t the same thing. The fact that men are often taught that they are the same thing is part of why there is a loneliness epidemic.
because for a horny sad 20 year old they are the only thing that matters in life.
no mount of companionship will satisfy his desperate need to get laid.
See that’s the thing - again, need for sex and need for emotional intimacy aren’t the same thing. The propaganda that says they are is why those boys are both horny and sad - they’re trying to meet two drives at once and failing both because of this misunderstanding. If they were emotionally stable and had community and belongingness, it’d actually be a lot easier for them to get laid and their mental health would also be way better.
have you ever been a 20 year old boy?
do you think any 20 year old boy could conceptualize the difference? part of growing up is learning things.
it’s not propaganda, it’s life. nobody at the age of 20 is stable, because they are still figuring out who they are. when i was 20 i had tons of friends and community and all that horse shit, but nothing mattered other than getting sex, because it felt so goddamn good and nothing else remotely compared to sex. it was the most satisfying experience i’d ever had in life at that point and continued to be so until i was like 30. drugs, food, parties, friends, family, none of that mattered a lick compared to the amazing feelings of sex with a girl that I liked. god, to this day those memories are the most strong, far more strong than my ‘sense of belonging’ at my university… was orgasmic super hard with a hot girl in my bed and laying there with her and spending time with her chilling and banging repeatedly. or studying together and taking fuck breaks every hour or so.
have of the ‘mental health’ crisis is just society pathological normal life, as it tightens the noose. you are not allowed to figure shit out anymore, apparent if you’re 20 and you aren’t full ‘communting a belongingness’ you’re ill and need to be ‘fixed’ or ‘corrected’.
god i’m in my fucking 40s and all i do is get lectured by semi-strangers irl about how ‘problematic’ I am for like owning a cat or other totally normal things. Or reading books. or a million other things people have randomly deecided are ‘wrong and bad’ that 10 years ago nobody cared about.
you sure the issue is the kids, or the fact the adults judging them are all paranoid perfectionist idiots who worship some ideal that doesn’t exist in the real world and to which they are forever comparing themselves and everyone else, in despair? no… that can’t be it… it’s those stupid boys who are dumb. not us!
no kids, don’t want sex, just want ‘belongingness’ that will totally… ‘fufill’ you… lol… why not just medicate them into oblivion if your end goal is this kumbaya passive bullshit ideal? or castrate them! clearly that will fix their ‘problem’.
i don’t know why it’s so hard for people to just admit sex is awesome and not having it sucks and it’s one of the most joyful experiences in human life and it very much will make you feel less lonely when it’s with someone you love and care about. this has become taboo talking point lately though, apparently wanting sex and love makes you an evil person now… instead of being a default component of the human condition.
and rather than talk about it we just insist that ‘community’ will fix it or something… lol
I never said anything about being anti-sex so I think you’re having an argument with someone that isn’t me, hope you feel better.
EXACTLY.
what these statistics hide is that they dont examine QUALITY OF LIFE , NUMBERR OF RELATIONSHIPS, TYPES OOF RELATIONSHIPS, and THE INSANE RATES OF DEATHS OF DESPAIR AMONGSTT MIDDLE AGED AND SENIOR MEN
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC10721027/ for this study of Korean middle aged men and women it was found thatt those who met more often wiith theiir friends had higher reported levels of life satisfation . YES for men AND women (and ya ya those who reported being married ALSO had higher reportrd levels of life satisfaction too BUT it sshould be noted that wifdowed people reported even higher levels of life satisfaction than all other adults who were included in the study and currently lived alone)
About 70-80% of all deaths worldwide from ‘Deaths Of Despair’ (so that includes deatha from eatting a terrible diet without exercising and dying from a cardiovascular disease, deaths from drunk driving, deaths from deliberate suicide , deaths frrom accidental drug overdoses, deaths from alcohol poisoning, deaths from fatty liver diseases ) were deaths of men per a year since we’ve started measurinng it. And very much middle aged men.
Also havent some studies come out showing that people have reported having less friends or rsther less people that they talk to and confide in per a weeek or even per a month than ever before?
Your spouse is supposed to be one of your friends , ya I gett that. But if you rely on only your spouse as your only friend ? Youre gonna get into A LOOOT of trouble if they eventually divorce from you.
Edit: We are humans. We NEED friendships. We NEED vulnerability that wont be exploited. We typically suffer from touch starvation after a long enougb time has passed… .
NEVER let anyome make you hate yourself for your genetics or make you hate yourself , or hate your friends even, for you being a human.
Yes, due to a variety of factors, people are more isolated right now than they have ever been throughout history. It’s a real problem and since the underlying factors are systemic, it is going to be very difficult to turn around.
It’s not just if your spouse might divorce you, it’s that putting all your emotional weight on a single person is 1) destined to cause problems, 2) not actually how human beings are supposed to work. We’re highly evolved hypersocial pack predators. Different individuals have different levels of social need, but we do need it. Our brains are wired to hold iirc about 150 people in it for basic socializing - not all of those are going to be deep meaningful friendships, but even the acquaintances help us meet that social need of belonging and acceptance. So many men are essentially taught that their wife is their only emotional outlet, and that showing vulnerability with “the boys” is not acceptable and also possibly dangerous. And then they wonder why they feel unfulfilled - of course they do, you can’t put all that on one person, no matter how close you are with them.
I think the problem is both a QUANTITY AND QUALITY prorblem. Modern Men, and honestly this trend has started to extend ti all people of all genders too, are encountering relationships that have decreased in total number AND in intensity.
Like a person shouldnt be afraid to attempt ro befriend as many locals as possible to increase total number of relationships. but I think that people are becoming more and more isolated or rather more and more hikkikomori like , preferring to rely on online friends and online meetups or just eschewing meetups all together and even relying on fucking AI friends , so befriending numerous people is no longer as easily possible And also attempting to befriending many peoeple will probably get you called as ‘crazy’ by the locals of your city or municipality. This last point is probably more common in small villages and towns where small talk and rumours can circulate easier , get bigger and harder, and become monstrous towards the victim in particular.
BUT THEN there is also the problem of lack of relationship intensity. People arre more distrustful. EVERYONE has been successfully painted as a double-lifed prostitute or scam artist or a drug dealer or drug abuser. And we have fallen for the bait sadly. Its getting harder to trust people who you innstely see as having ulterior motives or criminalistic empire desires. And also friendships that are physically intimate and that involve hugging , kissing on the cheeck, holding hands , etc… are just straight up rarer these days. And this isleading to an increase in touch starvation. I hearin some parts of the East lile China, India , etc… it is normal to just hold your friends’ hand on a walk. Friends should not be shamed for holding a friends’ hand or for holding each other or for havingculturally significant , and intimate customs or greetings. I hear in Italy it is common to kiss your friends on the cheek , thats literally why isaish thomas and magic johnson started doing that when they faced off against each other lol. There is nothing wrong with that.
We are humans. We NEED friendships. We NEED vulnerability that wont be exploited. We typically suffer from touch starvation after a long enougb time has passed… .
NEVER let anyome make you hate yourself for your genetics or make you hate yourself , or hate your friends even, for you being a human.
Those statistics seem to be AI hallucination.
Also, if you have one sexual intercourse encounter per year, you’re not lonely? AND you could be pounding every week and still be lonely because the chemistry is not there, the love is vapid. People can just wank or pound for sexual release, but it doesn’t solve loneliness. Hell, people are lonely in a household of 6 people. Why? Because everybody is doing their own thing, ambivalent of each other. Thus, they can be lonely.
The feeling of loneliness is likely the basis for “I missed you.” Forlorning. And it’s noticed during reflection, alone.
We grow up in schools, where we’ve known 60%+ (of our class) since 1st grade (or earlier), and now – in adulthood, we’re thrown into a world full of strangers, everyday strangers. Friends help, but it doesn’t mend that community we had in our day-to-day school work.
speak for yourself. adulthood is awesome. school sucked.
The movie “Shame” is a pretty good example of lonliness despite having sex constantly. I think it was with Michael Fassbender and from 2012, but it’s been awhile so I don’t remember. Good movie, though. Real feel bad film.
You can have sex and be a totally toxic bastard that people don’t want to be around once they get to know you. You could have sex frequently but still be deeply lonely.
Agreed. It’s dangerous to conflate emotional intimacy and sex - they aren’t the same thing and pretending they are is part of what got us into this mess imo.
The phasing is as a sudden historically unique crisis, not the generic sense of ennui common to adulthood throughout history.
I can show you black and white French films from the 1960s complaining about the same Male Loneliness
Be 2025
…years old?! Not happenin bud
There is a capitalist alienation epidemic.
‘Everything circles back to capitalism’ is really a meme because it’s true.
I do think people living under capitalism sometimes forget the human condition exists beyond the economic condition.
More free time, less economic precarity, better health, better education, a place to call home. All of that is great. But you still need to go out and meet people.
Socialism won’t make you touch grass.
Socialism will make it WAAAAY easier rto touch grass and to ‘touch’ o ther people (to deal with your touch starvation) and even to touch people’s hearts cause youll work less than half of the hours you do right now. The 40 hour work week is to kept to keep you tired ,unimaginative, disconnected from your neighbours, yoyr community, and even disconnected from your family. We have no need to work 40 hoirs a week to keep society running. We have a lot oof things that can take care of most o f the labour we do nowadays OR a lot of the 40 hour work week jobs are just bullshit jobs like stockbrokimg or being trappped in an office wasting time.
And also in a socialistic society, the human condition is placed at the centre of everythinng that is planned or done. If the people in a socialistic society collectively agree and their research and researchers also collectively agree through theor data that there is a ‘loneliness epidemic AND that the loneliness epidemiic is worsening the human condition of the people’? The poeple of that socialistic society will collectively put in the work to permanently change society so that there will probably never be another loneliness epidemic whilst fixing the current loneliness epidemic.
THATS how socialism will work for problems like these.
There is a lot of solid scholarship questioning the label “male loneliness epidemic,” but not because scholars are stupid enough to equate having sex with an absence of loneliness.
what these statistics hide is that they dont examine QUALITY OF LIFE , NUMBERR OF RELATIONSHIPS, TYPES OOF RELATIONSHIPS, and THE INSANE RATES OF DEATHS OF DESPAIR AMONGSTT MIDDLE AGED AND SENIOR MEN
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC10721027/ for this study of Korean middle aged men and women it was found thatt those who met more often wiith theiir friends had higher reported levels of life satisfation . YES for men AND women (and ya ya those who reported being married ALSO had higher reportrd levels of life satisfaction too BUT it sshould be noted that wifdowed people reported even higher levels of life satisfaction than all other adults who were included in the study and currently lived alone)
About 70-80% of all deaths worldwide from ‘Deaths Of Despair’ (so that includes deatha from eatting a terrible diet without exercising and dying from a cardiovascular disease, deaths from drunk driving, deaths from deliberate suicide , deaths frrom accidental drug overdoses, deaths from alcohol poisoning, deaths from fatty liver diseases ) were deaths of men per a year since we’ve started measurinng it. And very much middle aged men.
Also havent some studies come out showing that people have reported having less friends or rsther less people that they talk to and confide in per a weeek or even per a month than ever before?
Your spouse is supposed to be one of your friends , ya I gett that. But if you rely on only your spouse as your only friend ? Youre gonna get into A LOOOT of trouble if they eventually divorce from you.
thx for the reply but i think your kkeyboard might be shaking. mignt want tc get it checked byy a mechanic?
Women are about as lonely as men.
The problem is that they’re human and exist in an anti-human environment.
You know who else are lonely? Animals in zoos.
We have created an almost perfect anti-human environment.
The Human Condition is discredited in almost everythimg we plan and do nowadays. The people of the Global South will probably go extinct in the next 200 years because of global warming and we have planned and created car-ceentric, anti-green energy societies all over the planet .
Most people are sad about this but most people have little say in the politics of their country.I was wrong. Most people probably dont care.Most people are sad about this? Most decent people are sad about it. Many people are not decent people, or are being told that being decent people is bad, weak, and probably woke.
Actially … you are correct and Im wrong.
I am a man who believes that 'If something is substantial amongst the people? Then a MASSIVE response from the people will be substantiated"
If most people actually cared about the anti-human environment we have made …why have nost people not put in the work to change this? If most people actually cared about the effects that global warming will have on the planet , ESPECIALLY the Global South and the equitoreal countries… why have most peoole not put in the work to show that they care?
You have said it. The truth is that most people are not decent and that they dont care about either of these issues cause they just keep on and keep on mindlessly making more babies to be miserable with them and going to work in their gas guzzling cars and heck some people definitely dont even need a car to do the things in life that they do and yet… they still own them and use them far too frequently.
Don’t forget the second part of what I said:
or are being told that being decent people is bad, weak, and probably woke.
Never underestimate propaganda and peer pressure. If everyone around you acts like it is not a big thing, you won’t either.
My pet theory is that almost all stable societies need some kind of enforced normal-ness. Whether it’s being catholic and paying taxes to the king, being a cheeseburger-eating, bud light drinking, tuck-driving redneck or even being a tree-hugging wannabe-leftist academic with a bike and a mullet. Monkeys like being around people telling them they are normal. Society organises to provide a sense of “normal”. It is extremely hard to break through this, and it essentially only works if a large party of the people form a new normal.
Personally I fee l that ‘normalness’ , no matter what form it takes, shouldnt include the bombing of Yemeni, Iranians and Lebanese civilians and the deliberate depressing of wages of poor people, Or the destruction of the livelihoods of poor Equitoreal communities through climate change
Most people still see it as ‘normal’ to join the american and israeli militaries and still see iit as noormal to bomb out Yemeni, Lebanese and Iranian civilians (which is STILL happening as I type this and there has never been a substantiated uproar tto stop this)
Most people still see it as ‘normal’ that most people from the Global South get paid as if they were slaves and remain in poverty or near poverty no matter what they do oor how hard they work.
Most people still seee it as ‘normal’ just go out and about in this anti-green energy world that we have created here even though the IPCC has proven thatt climate change wil irreperably. destory every community nearr the equator and in the Global South for the next 200 years!
Please note: I chose the word “normal” for lack of a better word, and in its most technical sense only. I do not want to imply any moral judgement.
But in that sense of the word, yes, shrugging when the news show pictures of dead innocents is “normal”. Just like not too long ago it was normal to not treat black people like human beings, or a bit before that, to burn people who disagree with your religious dogma at the stake. In another part of the world, it was normal to sacrifice a poor sod every now and then to make sure the harvests are successful. And don’t get me started on the history of wars. All of this is “normal” as in, it was perceived to be just how things are by the majority.
Actually, I believe that only by understanding that normal and morally right do not necessarily have anything in common, one can understand how bad the “normal” is, and demand change. “Can’t you see this is bad and we need to do something” does not work because no, it is normal to do nothing. Creating a new normal is pretty damn hard, creating a morally better one is even harder.
First of all: that is not how it works
Second of all: the loneliness epidemic is not just happening to men, it is happening to everybody.
Third of all: loneliness can happen to anyone, even people who appear to have it all. It is not just the extreme stereotype of the hermit who barely speaks to a living soul for two years, that is valid in feeling lonely. Sometimes it’s the people who seem to have a big network of friends who are the loneliest because all their friendships are superficial and the person may struggle to commit to others and be vulnerable. Other people become distractions from a deep hurt and selfloathing, they don’t know how to address. No one is ever let in because it’s too scary and risky to show weakness. But you have 50 friends and is everybody’s pal, so you can’t be lonely, right?
And then there’s the more mundane type of loneliness, that happens to a lot of people in the first world when they enter the workforce and/or start a family. It can become terribly lonely when you don’t have the time and energy to nurture friendships and community because you work all the time and in the current day and age, social activity takes place on screens. People hang out on social media where they share pics and political views instead of meeting up for a beer or a lemonade to chat like our parents’ generations did.
I have seen countless posts from 30somethings over the past decade, who ask about how to make friends at their age because they feel so lonely and all their old friends live far away. These are men and women. Some of them are parents of newborns others are single career people who have been grinding and suddenly realized they have neglected their social life.
Everybody is lonely in this day and age. I have felt lonely for years because i had to grind at work and didnt have time for recrrational activities. I have plenty of friends, good family and a lovely boyfriend and I was still lonely because I had to work all the time. Doesn’t help that all my friends and family live far away so most of our interactions are on screens and not in the flesh. And if there is anything I think the modern first world human being is undervaluing and neglecting, it’s physical closeness and irl community. The screens have replaced that despite being the shittiest substitute for physical touch imaginable.
To me, there is nothing that can calm every cell in my body like a hug from someone i love and whom I know loves me back. It is irreplacable.
I thought “male lonileness epidemic” meant how fucking hard it’s to make friends as a guy/boymoder.
It takes extreme luck to join a friend group, and as soon as people get comfortable they start ranting about gay people or such.
Fucking this right here. Do these people have any idea how living in a red state fucks with your ability to make friends?
Not only living jn a red state only. Ive found that people living in a conservative anything fucks with friend making.
well if those gays would stop destroying society we could all be friends.
also they need to leave the frogs alone. poor froggies.
Username checks out.
You also gotta pre-emptively accept the possibility that youll NEVER meet friends or a partner who wants to be associated with you despite your best efforts. It is a possibility and there is nothing wrong with you if that happens to you and youre a kind, quiet , peaceful person. It is what it is
Human-Human relationships are sort of an ‘It Is Whatt It Is Type Of Affair’ these days. You can do everything kindly and to your best efforts to meet other like-minded people …and everyone can still not want to be your friend or lover. You can be worst than Adolph Shiter or Suharto and be surrounded with a million admirers and fake friends. It is what it is.
'Sadly it is what it is BUT At least you tried ’ is how I see it nowadays. 🤷🏿♂️
Best of wishes to you and everyone else who is lonely out here. Best of wishes on the journey comrade.🫂🫡
It’s a redirection. Capitalism demands a lot more from us than it did even 50 years go. That makes women, on average, more choosy and men tend to need to work harder to keep up if they want that happy relationship. We’re just selecting for good capitalists because bad capitalists might have kids too, but they’re more likely to repeat mistakes of their parents or die off. It’s kinda how most people can trace their lineage to royalty, because they were the ones surviving and thriving, not the peasants.
If things get worse faster than we can address them, this trend will continue. Maintaining any kind of birthrate in a positive direction would require the people falling out of the system to support it too, which are now in the majority.
So you can’t create conditions for the family makers when the losers have voting power. The family makers will always try, but there will be fewer of them, and the capitalistic pressure only creates more losers.
Capitalism demands a lot more from us than it did even 50 years go.
Because we’ve lost bargaining capacity for better living of everyone. When we go toe-to-toe for a pay raise (or simple, better working conditions), we’re alone against a rich institution. Unions granted us more than we’ve accepted it had.
having sex (perhaps just once?) doesn’t equal not lonely, though.
No, I’m pretty sure that every man who has had sex at least once in their life turned out to be a top bloke
Or bottom bloke
But can’t top blokes be lonely?
They say it’s lonely at the top, bloke.
So… more men as bottoms?
That is why most men actually prefer to be on the bottom. Less lonely.
Its best when she’s on top is all Im sayn 🤷🏿♂️
(I wouldnt know though as Im a virgin)
In fact sex being used as the indicator is actually a clue to one of the largest contributors. There’s a very wide reaching assumption that men should get most of their emotional support from their female partner. This is often very stressful to the female partner and is a fragile way to meet a basic need; if she gets sick or dies he’s probably not far behind her. Men need to learn how to compliment and hug each other platonically. It’s 2026 and it’s for their own good ffs. I keep giving my male patients brochures for men’s support groups and I really hope at least some of them are actually going.
It seems so surreal to me that other men don’t hug each other, or tell their friends that they love them
Its so strange how that evolved too, my dad, who was silent generation and arguably one of the manliest men I have known, still did the back smacking one handed hugs with his close friends. When did men stop doing this?
many men do have emotional support from friends and comradierie though. Oddly, the more macho and often homophobic they are, the more gay it seems.
because that’s gay.
but for real, for every person that says men need to talk about their feelings and hug it out… you realize that there are 10 other people who would regard you as being gay/not a man for doing that, right? and that includes men and women.
real world is more complex than internet nerds want to believe.
Furry here, we do that stuff. It’s pretty good, can recommend.
Also men used to do that a lot more, before the world wars.
We do it a lot more but it does exist in other places just less hug centric more a hand on a shoulder. Normally social groups and clubs. it requires older men that are not entirely Jaded to set the example. Unfortunately those guys mostly have passed at this point and most boomers don’t have the cognitive bandwidth.
Sometimes I lightly punch my friends in the balls to thank them for being vulnerable around me.
sometimes I rub their butts and tongue their balls to remind them that someone cares.
As a men with almost a bromance with his best friend… Frrrrrr.
Like, let’s not even go as far as a hug (for many it’s simply uncomfortable, whether it’s with a man or a woman; I only hug my mother and my sister, for example xd), but there are other forms of intimacy and emotional support that shouldn’t be tied to gender.
I mean, words of affirmation, the simple act of crying openly or expressing fears, anxieties, feelings or emotions, or expressing love or affection (platonically, as many mistakenly associate an “I love you” with something exclusive to romantic relationships); even just staying near to each other or hanging out with each other is a huge help.
Romanticism is something overrated and the same goes for sex, and I say this as someone who is alloromantic and allosexual.
And of course, they’re for sure a genuine and legitimate, and overall valid way of social and emotional interaction and intimacy, but not the only one or the best one for everyone.
deleted by creator
Having a ton of sex doesn’t equal not lonely either.
Like Barney from HIMYM, or Charlie Sheen in 2.5 men.
I think you can generally assume that men who have a ton of sex, aside from for hire, know and interact with a lot of people.
That doesn’t equal not lonely.
Much of the time it’s a mask hiding how lonely they are.
I agree. That is essentially my original comment.
There is no male loneliness epidemic; there is a loneliness epidemic. They have been talking about it since at least 2020 and it predates the pandemic. Anyone calling it a male loneliness epidemic is absolutely engagement farming. The entire manosphere is a rage-bait-engagement-farming scam.
it is particularly male though because studies show older men don’t have friends
no men have friends.
and women have friends, but hate all of them and talk about how awful they are.
which once is better off?
i mean the multiple studies concluded women and that men need t o allowed to share emotions in American society
studies tell us obesity is bad for us.
and we keep getting fatter.
almost as if people don’t listen to studies, and act on impulse and emotion…
They were talking about it way before the epidemic. I remember at least as far back as middle Obama presidency that there was a show talking with one of his campaigners and they brought up the statistics on the number of people that would claim to have X amount of “close friends” declining.
There is a definite difference in the man/woman divide though on those numbers.
It’s useful to talk about how the loneliness epidemic affects men and women differently. But when someone talks about the “male” loneliness epidemic and all it’s statistics about virginity, you know their bigger problem is how they spend their time online.
Oh, agreed. Anyone who brings virginity into the context of adults having fewer and fewer relationships that matter is either an incel or a troll.
Not just engagement. Back when it was just a loneliness epidemic, there were talks of maybe bringing back third places, or changing society to help. Then it became a male epidemic, and suddenly it was someone else’s problem, it’s an individual issue, no need to make a cause of it.
who would want to help men? that’s gay.
There’s a general loneliness epidemic, but there’s a difference between men and women.
If only I knew earlier that the males are all suffering with virginity. I could be out there solving this thing one by one (I’m gay).
i don’t think the virgins are on grindr
I know. They’re on 4chan.
TIL that the opposite of loneliness is having had sex
We could learn a lot from anon
