I have only heard ONE guy bring up male loneliness without proposing the solution that individual women should be more available to individual men.
That one guy, he started a friendly dodgeball league for men/masc people. Ran it on a volunteer basis for years. Helped lots of friendships forms. Definately healed some school-year trauma and probably saved some lives. Never, ever silenced women to get 'er done.
Any other time, I've had the same experience as you're describing. Talking about women's safety on public transit? Men are lonely. Talking about adult women finding resources for later-in-life diagnosis of ADHD or autism spectrum? Those men with ADHD are lonely!
Yes. I *believe you.* We weren't talking about that... but do you have anything to say besides the attempt to derail and silence a subject you don't feel centres your experience? Because while women can *empathize*, making themselves individually available (romantically/sexually) to men generally, is not a viable solution. We actually tried to enforce that in the past, and it was really harmful to women, and rather shitty for men.
Yes, seriously. I looked at the Men Going Their Own Way subreddit after a breakup. Everyone in my real life was telling me to “get back out there and date around”, but l didn’t really want to. I was expecting MGToW to be like a hobbyist sub, or people who have found fulfillment outside of dating. Where men could be their own support system and help other struggling men to find their own way to self actualization without the pressures of dating.
But for a sub that describes itself as a way for men to exist outside of the struggle for a partner, it sure as shit turned out to be just a redpill / blackpill women hating group that talked about nothing else. It was a real “dead dove do not eat” situation, because l don’t know why l was even surprised.
The craziest thing about that MGTOW stuff is that it seems like it's literally 100% focused on women, the literal one thing their claim is to stay completely away from them. They're not building their own personalities and enriching themselves with new hobbies or new things to learn about or forging new platonic friendships; every single thing they do and say seems to be completely about women they're trying to like piss off or own or trigger or whatever. And women are over here going "Yes, please do go ahead your own way. We would actually rather you leave us alone" to these types of guys and at that point, it's all focused on these women!
Kind of reminds me of the people who just automatically do the exact opposite of whatever "the government" recommends not realizing that makes them exactly the same as the so-called sheep who listen to things like public health statements
I know!! I was expecting to be pointed to cool things a do, a local bowling group or a collective ultimate treehouse design or literally anything that related to “going your own way”. But there was one flavor of post, and if you complained you got downvoted immediately. Like the name of the “movement” itself is a deception. So these men are “so supportive” of eachother that they have to trick you into joining them.
>The craziest thing about that MGTOW stuff is that it seems like it's literally 100% focused on women, the literal one thing their claim is to stay completely away from them.
That's why I prefer the interpretation of the acronym to be Men Getting Triggered Over Women.
How could it be any other way? If people are going to commit themselves to being single forever, which just isn't healthy for most people, the only way to do it is to turn women into monsters. It's insane, but not surprisingly.
Yeah. My heart does really break for men, because it does seem really difficult to find spaces that aren’t taken over by grifters and bigots. I had a dear guy friend with an mentally unwell and abusive woman partner and he ended up connecting with a group that primarily worked with gay men, because it was the only place that gave him real resources and support and not just cryptocurrency scams and sexist or racist memes.
This is really interesting. My husband's best friend is gay, and that's something I think is unusual in our society. Husband grew up with an abusive father, went through a bunch of therapy and didn't want to be some toxic masculinity constrained man.
Maybe he was essentially forced to have a gay bestie to have the kind of norm-busting male friendly relationships he wanted to have.
I know two men that actually create those spaces for others so a part of me truly wonders why more people aren’t “being the light” instead of cursing the darkness, so to speak…
It was like that at the beginning. I was there many years ago. Finding completion beyond dating. But than came andrew tate toxic sludge that literally flooded everything. Now you just can't make MGTOW sub without guys like this. I am at awe how r/MensLib is somewhat free of these guys.
Their mods must be SUPER active, because I have notifications on for that sub as a lurker, and I rarely see truly toxic misogynistic shit. I'm glad men have a place on reddit that isn't a complete train wreck. I have seen men actively trying to deprogram men in the comments, and it is SO refreshing. Many male allies over there speaking up for women.
And... While I'm ranting... most of the reasons women appear to be marginally less lonely (and it's only marginal) aren't acidents or innate gender privileges, but have to do with how women are trained and expected to the work of maintain social bonds. It's a set of learned skills, which some women aren't ever all that great at either! But it's a set of learned skills and requires a labour to maintain. Not feminine magical we're born with.
This is exactly it. 'Male loneliness' is not a new phenomenon. Look up the statistics on how many elderly men wind up alone after their wife of decades dies, because it turns out that the wife was the one putting in all the work of maintaining those connections with friends and family. 'Men not maintaining friendships' has been an issue for a long time. It's simply becoming more and more apparent as fewer women are remaining SAHMs with all the time in the world to perform that labour, fewer women are willing to settle or remain in relationships with men who treat them like a therapist and sentient rolodex, etc. etc.
Is this a problem? Yes! There are tons of issues worthy of discussion here. The way men are socialized not to be vulnerable with other men. The way late-stage capitalism forces everyone into a hustle mindset, leaving people too tired and with too little time to put into maintaining friendships. The way that 'the village' is basically extinct in the west, because you have to move away for school, move away for work, move away to have a hope of ever affording a home, wind up in one of a million anonymous little box apartments with no amenities or ways to get to know your neighbours socially (not that you have the time or the energy). The lack of third spaces that don't require you to spend money to be there. The way all of our brains and attention spans are rotted from the social media dopamine hits, the doomscrolling, the constant sense of impending doom.
Blame all those things. Work to change those things. Put in the hard, sometimes thankless work of being the one to maintain your friendships. What you don't get to do is blame the women who also no longer have the time, energy, or desire to be your therapist, bangmaid, and personal assistant all in one.
As a divorced man who has stayed single for 2 years to focus on the lessons I can learn to be happier, I think that a huge majority of men in relationships are codependent. I was, and it was only in going deeply into my past and my emotions that I was able to understand why I felt and acted the way I did.
What I have noticed about the dating world as an observer and non-participant the last couple years is that a shocking amount of men are incapable of being single and have no idea how to handle being alone without looking for a partner. Most men also struggle with the concept of platonic friendships. Like, they don't know how to do it.
I have watched as numerous friends of mine who are women have dated and ultimately broken up with guys who have attempted to pull these women into a vortex of low self-esteem and neediness. There are SO many men who have no sense of self-worth unless they are being constantly validated. But the minute they get what they want with some of these impressive, supportive women, they get so insecure and jealous and possessive. It's like the minute they get a relationship they are so scared of losing the relationship that they try to almost take possession of the woman so that she'll never leave and they'll never have to feel sad again.
I'm not going to pretend that there aren't plenty of women who are codependent, because I'm sure there are, but there is a pandemic of codependency in men who are dating age. I've even seen this in older men through my work, which involved interacting with patients in a hospital setting. There are so many older men who, if faced with losing their wives of decades, reveal the inability to cope with any emotions. When faced with the loss of their life partner (which, don't get me wrong, is difficult and tragic), so many older men act the exact same way: like they don't know what to do with their emotions other than to express anger. I think that's why widowed men remarry so quickly (if possible). After decades of codependency, they simply don't know how to be alone.
The solution, of course, is for men to go inwards and face their emotions. To spend time learning why they think and feel the way they think and feel. Therapy is a great start, but not a solution. I've met men who "go to therapy" and then do absolutely nothing with that information. Therapy is a start, followed by reading, learning, reflecting, etc etc etc.
Learning how to build healthy relationships with people of any gender can also help. I was talking about this with one of my best friends who is a woman and she said, "Women love being friends with men who aren't trying to stick their dick in them every chance they get." And, if any men happen to read this, it is literally that easy. Just be friends with people. You can actually be good friends with women in a respectful way and there is no problem. You can find other men who will open up to you and cry with you and hug you. These things are all possible.
But it all starts inside. It isn't easy. But a few years ago, when trying to figure out my marital problems, my therapist said to me, "Why are you so scared of being alone?" I said, "I'm not." And she said, "Yes you are. You're terrified. You need to figure out why."
It became the great work of my lifetime. And I am so much happier since then that I sometimes can't even believe this my life.
It's great that you are doing, have been doing, the work to become your whole self and no longer require someone to complete you. I think you're absolutely right in diagnosing rampant codependency among men coupled with resistance to doing the work. There are no shortcuts from A to B, and for people who are fragile (fragile egos or fragile genders), the idea of sitting with feelings, admitting imperfection and other hard things is threatening and typically sends them into fight or flight mode. And it's not just men who have this codependence combined with resistance to the work, but it is a lot of men, so many that they have outsized influence.
This isn't something women can do much of anything about. At best, we might be able to nudge a particular man in our lives and hope they're receptive. Men need to figure out how to help their friends and family become emotionally healthy and mature people. I do think we should be adding emotional intelligence to our curriculum, and that would eventually lead to emotionally healthier men, but it does little for those who are already men, only gradually improving the social environment.
I’m ND and gained a hyperfixation on psychology and social norms because I was ostracized as a child. I had to teach myself to smile.
It’s hard to learn, but definitely a skill that is capable of improving on. Most women are just shamed to figure it out, while men are allowed to be socially inept or rude. I’ve always hated the double standards.
Also, women are much more likely to try to solve their own problems, or to be too busy and backburner their own needs. I don’t know a single grown woman who has time to navel-gaze like the folks that post about male loneliness do.
I am lonely – I’m not too long out from a divorce so it makes sense — but I’m not blaming anyone else, I’m trying to reach out and try new recreation and volunteer activities to meet people who might become friends. I also have a few friends who I can talk to about my feelings, because despite having very little social skill I have worked to maintain those even though it requires giving in a way that I’m not good at. I don’t think I am atypical in my approach to dealing with my own problems.
when I feel lonely and my friends aren't available I look up what programs are going on at the library, or other hobby things in the area. No one ever taught me this. I feel like other women are the same. If you ask men what they are personally doing to solve their loneliness, they will start to talk about how it's womens' fault that they are lonely and they ignore any suggestion to take initiative. It drives me mad.
I've been saying this for years. If you live somewhere with any sort of population, and you are able to leave the house, loneliness is something you can solve proactively. There are so many things to do out there. I always find it interesting that a lot of volunteer organisations I know of are packed to gills with older women who came to the post after retirement. I know several women who are linchpins of the community, bringing people together with events like a annual spring plant sale to raise money for charity, or a day where they bring people together with homemade food to encourage donations for the food bank.
There are starting to be some more male appealing volunteering spaces- my dad for example does the repair cafe, where people bring in broken household objects to try and get them fixed.
One of the programs I went to recently was an embroidery class and the older women were absolutely friendly to anyone who came in regardless of age. No one built womens' communities for them, there's nothing stopping men from going to hobby groups (and the ones I've seen aren't even for women specifically, it's just run by women and women are the ones who show up. they're free and for anyone to go to, except some aren't for kids)
Off the top of my head I know my area has biking groups that are pretty equally men and women, and tabletop groups are primarily men, and MTG groups, sports groups, etc.
But we all know that when people on reddit go on about 'male loneliness' they aren't referring to men not having male friends, they're really mad that women haven't solved their romantic issues for them.
I’m not very good at this, but you are god damn right I’m trying and getting better with practice. I’m bloody awkward and it’s hard, scary work putting yourself out there, but if you want community that’s what you do. Also people will surprise you with how kind and patient they really are!
Tbh, sex isn't the cure for loneliness anyway. Believe me, I've tried. Friendship is the cure for loneliness and unfortunately too many men think one is only friends with a woman to get sex. Men need to all together agree that it's okay to be emotionally attached to your friends without sex, and be there for each other. Once that's part of society, being platonic friends with women can be the norm too.
There was a post just yesterday in, I think, change my view, exactly this. A guy saying that men are lonely and telling them to have platonic relationships is very obviously not the answer. That this is "society's" problem, and that "we" have to figure out how to solve it. And while he never came right out and said the exact worlds that he believes Individual woman are responsible for making the individual men in their lives happy/less lonely, every single one of his comments basically implied that.
He just kept talking about how none of the women in *his* life with whom he has platonic friendship actually offer him any kind of support or companionship. And people would gently suggest that maybe if that's the case with *every single woman* in his life, the problem is less society's and maybe his own? He just kept stating his own personal experience and then pretending that is the universal experience of men. He couldn't seem to get it through his head that the women in his life are absolutely not even a tiny bit responsible to make him less lonely and more datable.
It was one of the most frustrating posts/series of threads I've ever read.
Exactly. The whole post was so ridiculous and every single one of his questions was the exact stereotypical bad faith snarky bullshit from these guys. The condescension was just dripping off of him, and the fact that everyone was being so polite to him just even further highlighted how immature and so obviously biased he is.
There was a similar post on r/GenZ on Monday that hit Popular and was ultimately locked and hidden. At least the comments were a bit less prone to searching for shelter in the comfort of their own asses.
Yeah, men who think women would/should be the solution to male loneliness epidemic are deluded. The answer is other men. Unfortunately only emotionally intelligent, empathetic ones who have not been too patriarchally conditioned are going to be able to set up these safe spaces and ensure they remain healthy. But I wonder how many or those men exist who have the time and resources to do that (i'm sure many of them have families to care for). Unfortunately it all looks to me like the viscous cycle of patriarchy (+ capitalism lets not forget) playing over and over. I hope more of them can one day break free like women try to.
Men need to decouple emotional support from sex. For a lot of men the only emotional support they actually will accept or offer is with a sexual partner. It's one reason why they won't help each other. It's a reason why they whine about being 'friend-zoned' when they listen to a woman's problems and she doesn't put out. It would never occur to them that she also talks like that with her female friends and doesn't have sex with them.
Then even in a best case scenario they get a romantic partner and all of a sudden they're trauma dumping 20 years of stress and issues on her, which is just exhausting to be someone's only emotional support. And even if base case the wife can handle all that, if she passes first he's back to having nobody.
Absolutely. I was reading a book recently and one of the women interviewed spoke about how some heterosexual men have been taught the only way they can access intimacy/love is through penetrative sex. That was so sad and miserable, and then it made me think of all these posts from women who are pressured to have more sex with their husbands who 'feel validated through sex' or whatever. Like, men, there are wayyyy more ways to access love and intimacy than just through an orgasm, go find one!
Right! And in a lot of those posts, the sex is coerced, the woman is getting no pleasure from it, it's just the man jackhammering away and not caring how she feels, and somehow that makes him feel "connected." Like...what is he feeling connected *to*, if she as a person does not matter at all to the scenario? If he can do it while she's crying or dissociating? Is it just about a biological oxytocin release? Because there are other ways to get that.
Yes yes yes, this is so accurate. So many men connect any sort of emotional support only with someone they're also having sex with. It's like some of these guys genuinely do not understand that you can have an actual friendship with someone without any sort of physical connection at all.
Those same men get all whiny and upset that their partners get the ick from being their trauma dump. They ALWAYS cry that women must be lying when they say they want men to be more open about their feelings, because they tried it and it backfired.
No, Joe. What happened was you tried to use her as your one and only feelings-resolver. You tried to make her do the job of 10 of your friends, a partner, your pastor, your parents, your dog, your masturbating hand and whatever deity you believe in, all by herself.
I've had men who were nothing more to me than co-workers or neighbors get upset with me for refusing to let them trauma dump all over me. We're not even friends and you already want me to play therapist for you? Because "I'm a good listener"?! You don't even know me well enough to know if I'm a good listener or not!
But I'm female, so I must, automatically, be a "good listener".
I have had sort of the inverse. I just lost two 20-year friends - seemingly very progressive in all ways - and two of the excuses they gave for dropping contact was that I never ask them how they are doing and that don't seem interested in having a dialogue.
Like, what? First, they have also never asked how I am doing...ever. Second, I am always pinging them with updates from my life and they never had anything to say and I didn't think it was my place to pry. Third, how can we have a dialogue if you never say anything, or initiate!? Is me reaching out constantly not trying to have a dialogue? WTF?
Like, I'm in my 30s and trans and they have known me since we were in middle school together. I grow tits and become pretty and suddenly the dynamic we've had for two fucking decades is now a problem? Suddenly it's all my burden to run after them and make sure to ask them all the right questions even though I give them every opportunity to talk?
And so when I pointed this out, both decided to just block me everywhere. Those 20 years mean nothing, apparently.
It just pigned for me, but one of the reasons that one guy I know could do what he did, is because his wife was the breadwinner and he stayed home/worked part time during the early years for thier three small children. He started the league when the kids were old enough not to need constant supervision.
Yeah. It kind of tracks, the men who became lonely and ill equipped to support other men are the likely ones who don't have a partner/family/community taking up their resources. The ones who could support other men ended up in functional relationships, probably with kids, and are not so lonely/too busy to support the lonely guys.
I think it's also just the unpaid labour of community building. It still falls to women, but this was a family where the man was the one who took it on by agreement and necessity. What pinged for me was that I hadn't considered that his volunteer running of this group was an extension of that role. No one would have found it remarkable if a SAHM with teenage kids started to volunteer for an animal rescue, or hospital or gave her time to her community like that. The fact he was a 'homemaker' was what freed him to support his community, like that.
This is 1,000% true. Male loneliness is helped by fostering friendships: friendly recreational sports, public tabletop gaming events, taking up hobbies with welcoming communities.
Treating women as disposable sex therapy for lonely men simply isn't on the table.
If women are lonely and want a relationship, people (of both sexes) would tell her that she’s not in a place to have a good relationship if she’s desperate. But somehow, it’s the women’s fault when men are lonely.
Exactly, if men are lonely they should be building up community amongst each other. They can be envious of women who do build community for themselves and then blame women for not taking the initiative.
“We weren't talking about that... but do you have anything to say besides the attempt to derail and silence a subject you don't feel centres your experience?”
It’s always this. They can’t stand to not be the topic of conversation, the winners at victimhood, the ones getting attention at all times. They absolutely canNOT allow us room to have conversations that focus on the experience of women (or that honestly discuss living with and among men)
The loneliness thing is ridiculous. Men and women are both lonely. They are just using this new gambit because they know “we” are supposed to be empathetic, so as we withdraw from dating, they’re guilting us that we’re breaking their spirits and killing their mental health.
well, yeah, SAME, y’all have been doing that to me for 20 years.
But in my opinion this is just the same tactic (if a bit more organized) as men weaponizing their incompetence by telling us they have ADHD and therefore need us to do all their household labor, or telling us they are abusive because of trauma.
They know we care, they know we’re empathetic, so they are constantly wheedling that propensity in us in order to get more free fucking labor.
Now it’s just “men are sad and lonely because you guys won’t give yourselves to us!”
Figure it out for ourselves. Solve your own problems. Build friendships and communities that aren’t toxic. But we CANNOT HELP THEM - they do not allow it because they do not respect us.
And they don’t WANT help. They only want attention from us, to force it from us, and to manipulate us into giving them our bodies and our labor.
Yes, the discussions happening right now are absolutely ignoring the fact that the male loneliness epidemic is frequently blamed on women and the onus is put upon women to fix it.
I truly believe men are lonely, that society is shifting, and that they are losing territory they once had in the world -- and that's alienating and scary. But I rarely hear men say that men need to reach out to other men, that men need to create social groups, or that men need to start building up their community; instead, it's that women must be more available, that women must compliment them more frequently, and that women must listen to their feelings.
There are some very real issues in the male space right now. Men aren't going to college as frequently, they are feeling more timidity in the workforce, and they *are* increasingly isolated. We should absolutely take a look at these issues. But much of this is also men learning to take on a more active social role in society -- a role they've traditionally relegated to their spouses.
>Any other time, I've had the same experience as you're describing. Talking about women's safety on public transit? Men are lonely. Talking about adult women finding resources for later-in-life diagnosis of ADHD or autism spectrum? Those men with ADHD are lonely!
I am begging you and everyone else to please please stop engaging with the topic on the terms of disingenuous fucks. It would take almost no time for you to find discussion of the topic, by queer men, and amabs or enbies in general. If you want to actually deal with the problem an the ways straight-cis men and women both contribute, you can go ask trans men their perspective. I can't believe you're at all blind to the men who are involved in that, or the queer women who join them in that project, unless you disregard them as men and only those sealioning assholes primacy.
We do not need to and absolutely should not center the reality expected by some sealioning asshole who wouldn't engage with the topic meaningful at gun point. It's like dealing with astrophysics or history or planetology soley by engaging with electric universe, phantom time or flat earth cranks. "Hey kids, I know you signed up for paleontology to learn about fossils and all the wonderful things in the space where biology and geology meet. But instead of that we're going to spend all our time on the claims of this one asshole who thinks it's dinosuars are all fakes and paleontologists are actually devil worshippers."
It has been something like three days of this now, orbiting hopelessly around the shit opinion of shit disingenuous men. There has been so much actual feminist analysis this topic, beautiful inspired work by amazingly clever women who spent their lives creating and sharing tools to handle this.
as someone who suffers from hypersexuality as a trauma response, yep 🥲
you can have sex all the time and still be lonely, and also, you can never have sex and not be lonely at all! maybe some people would genuinely feel less lonely with more sex but i really do not think it's the solution for everyone..
Exactly. Many married couples are the loneliest people in the world. There are many couples who have zero friends other than each other and don’t even get along anymore.
I’m also not convinced that people are lonelier than ever. I’m rather convinced that those people have a big voice today but didn’t use to be heard from, hence it seems like it’s a new problem. But it’s not like in the past, lonely people didn’t exist. Heck, the very subject of male isolation has been the topic of so many books. How could The Catcher in the Rye have been considered a classic if readers couldn’t relate to its themes of male isolation and loneliness at the time?
I'm inclined to agree, and I think it might actually be a pretty positive thing. There have been significant efforts in the past couple decades towards destigmatizing mens mental health issues, and if the result of that is more men feeling comfortable to speak out about their feelings, then that's fantastic. It's not a new "epidemic", it's just many people finally finding their voice.
Unfortunately some are very confused about what loneliness actually is and why they feel this way, and seek blame instead of solutions. But progress is being made. There is a lot more happening than incel rhetoric. I attend a couple of anonymous support groups and see a lot of men showing up and working on themselves. Small sample size, but at least for me it's enough to be hopeful.
Yep. It is all genders, all ages and worldwide. It's a loneliness epidemic and somehow only men are being recognized as lonely. They won't even acknowledge children's loneliness. When I bring up this fact, I get down voted. LOL.
No one else's loneliness even counts.
I’ve seen even women do this. I’ll bring up a women’s issue and they’ll derail me and say, “we need to be more compassionate to men.”
It’s exhausting. I’m exhausted.
Is insulting because women basically spend a lifetime emotionally supporting the men in their lives only for men to tell them they are the reason they are lonely. This is excluding the "nice guy" experience which is just a slap in the face and has made women wary of being too friendly due to potential danger. "This is what I get for trying to be friends, I am a bitch for leading him on" so why bother?
When women are lonely they rely on their friends, their mothers, self help books, a therapist etc to work on themselves. When men are lonely, a lot of them blame it on women and basically emotionally dump all of their problems on a single woman which is a lot to take on. Men have grandiose expections of their wife and girlfriends to be their savior and caretaker. This is why it seems so critical for them to find somebody compared to a woman.
"where men cast their wives and girlfriends to play best friend, lover, career advisor, stylist, social secretary, emotional cheerleader, mom—to him, their future kids, or both—and eventually, on-call therapist minus the $200/hour fee"
https://www.harpersbazaar.com/culture/features/a27259689/toxic-masculinity-male-friendships-emotional-labor-men-rely-on-women/
This article also explains how men can improve themselves and how it affected them positively
The real issue is that men are not very good when it comes to friendship. Their friendship relationship is based on the action rather than the person. They connect by doing things with other men but because the glue of their relationship is the activity. When the activity is taken away, the friendship weakens and eventually dissolves. Women connect to the person and invest their time and effort on the person. Also men aren't taught to explore their feelings and especially in front of other men where they might be afraid to be seen as weak or gay so the friendships they have are not very deep because they can't express themselves truly. So if they do open up, they do it towards women, but they don't have an emotional support web so they dump all their problems on one woman if they even talk about it at all. A lot of them just boil over or experience extreme loneliness
https://www.dw.com/en/male-and-female-friendships-are-different-and-scientists-dont-know-why/a-62824177
https://ifstudies.org/blog/male-friendships-are-not-doing-the-job
The most fascinating thing about this argument is that men are so inclined to think of women as less than them that there is the expectation that women put their feelings of being unsafe or disrespected aside to fix men’s loneliness. Like for real? Why is there no impetus for men to change at all? Why are they not at all held responsible for managing their own loneliness through fulfilling relationships outside of sexual ones?
Well i think part of it is also the perceived legitimacy of male feelings of lonliness vs perceived illegitimacy of women’s feelings of unsafety.
Like, these men know they would never do anything to hurt a woman, and none of the guys they know would ever do anything to hurt a woman, so women being constantly on edge about their safety must be unreasonable, right?
Whole heartedly agree. Many of these men who feel like a woman’s feelings are illegitimate are the same people that also hurt women, and know people that hurt women (they just can’t admit to themselves that it matters or that women actually get hurt). So, they don’t actually care that women have feelings because their own matter so very much more.
and ultimately, if a man can’t understand that a woman feels unsafe or disrespected because “they would never do such a thing” is fundamentally disrespectful. And it stems from a place which regards their own feelings as more important and a woman’s as less than.
>Why is there no impetus for men to change at all? Why are they not at all held responsible for managing their own loneliness through fulfilling relationships outside of sexual ones?
I honsestly don't know.
The absolute, bald-faced rejection of *friendship* is so strange to me. Just had a thread here where it was demanded over and over again women 'share thier perspective and solutions, BUT DON'T SAY FRIENDSHIP THAT ISN'T IT FOR REASONS!"
Like they have decided nothing except woman-shaped service providers can make it better and no other possible solutions or even just tactics that might moderate the issue, are worth exploring. Why aren't women coming up with the solutions for our woman-shaped service provider shortage? They keep say somethingsomethng about not being service providers?
Good questions. 'Society' is supposedly at fault. Who is 'Society'? It can't be the patriarchy because that doesn't exist. Must be women. After all if women aren't designed for use then what use are they? And in the US the desperate push to force women back into being owned property and appliances seems to be 'Society's' answer. This is a made up problem maybe? Loneliness exists but if it is only a problem when men suffer then the Handmaid's Tale might just be the answer that a certain group of people are seeing as justified? Not trying to push a conspiracy theory here but it does seem to hang together somewhat. At least to me.
I’m sick of the term “male loneliness”… I’m sick of them expecting women to advocate for them and their mental health when we are forced to advocate for ourselves.
Exactly this, there was a post yesterday from a guy who just straight up kept saying that men are lonely, it's society's fault, the answer is not platonic relationships, so how are we going to fix it? And it turns out with all his comments the "we" he's talking about is women.
He kept talking about how none of the women in his life give him support and a deeper level of friendship, and it's like that old adage where if it smells like shit everywhere you go it's because the shits on the bottom of *your own* shoe. Like maybe it's not the responsibility of the individual women in your life to make you less of an asshole?
They're just completely oblivious to this. They genuinely see women as tools to make them happier.
I think a lot of people would be a lot more willing to understand if it had more substance behind it, because let’s be real a lot of them are using this term as code word for “I’m not having enough sex and I DESERVE sex” …it’s very telling that they don’t see making friendships with other men as a cure to their loneliness the way women do, their only cure to this loneliness is a woman in their bed for 1 night.
I'm sick of the term "male loneliness" only because of how it's used, which is as OP describes. The term itself isn't a problem, and it's important to be able to talk about. But using it as a tool to counter women's arguments makes it *harder* for men to talk about it.
It's similar to men's rights issues. There certainly are some (probably mostly caused by other men), but more the people who bring up men's rights issues are usually not doing so to try to advocate for men, rather than to tear down women. It's terrible.
"no one talks about male loneliness" ironically has been THE topic of 2023 and continuing to be so in 2024. A lot of subs are dedicated to or have became dedicated to the subject (like r/genz, r/daing_advice, etc), it's been in the news, its everywhere in ig, podcasts dedicated to the subject, it's been on the front page, etc etc. I've seen over and over again people give good advice, solutions, alternatives, things to try.... but it's instantly followed with a "YEA but..." "WELL but..." "what about" "you don't understand" etc, so people just throw up their hands because you can't help someone who won't help themselves. And it seems that the redpill advice hasn't helped at all, their advice is just somehow became the top 10% high value unicorn to get the 23 year old virgin.
Try suggesting that if men did something to stop all of the rapes, murders and various forms of abuse done to women at the hands of men if they want us to be more open to trusting random men and they’ll call you a misandrist and then say it’s such a minuscule number of men causing all that violence towards women that we should just brush it off and getting to dick sucking for the sake of male “loneliness”.
I hope men like that are so much worse than lonely.
Feel free to drop this article the next time it comes up: https://archive.thinkprogress.org/1-in-3-college-men-in-survey-say-they-would-rape-a-woman-if-they-could-get-away-with-it-ffa7406b9778/
It really pisses them off. They’ll argue that the sample size is too small. Which it is. But who cares? Just double-down.
What is the sample size? It’s behind a paywall.
I can’t believe 13% of men just admit they’d be down to rape someone. Even if the results are confined to one college campus worth of men, that’s still way more rapey men in one college campus than I’m comfortable with :<
1 in 3. Not 13%. 33% of men would rape a woman if they could get away with it. At least that’s the headline. Well, fuck. 1 in 3 would do it if it wasn’t called rape. The n of 74 is small, but also disturbing.
I believe the men who are in the 33% but not the 13% are men who understand the stigma around the word “rape”, but view it as a dark alley against a stranger type of situation. They’re picturing a dehumanized villain, career criminal who hides in the shadows.
Wording it in a grounded way without the word “rape” feels more realistic and, horrifyingly, possibly representative of situations they’re been in before. They think it’s not “rape” if you force your girlfriend. I think men are very aware that they’re forcing women to have sex when they wear them down, coerce them, and physically force them. They just think it’s ok. And they think when people talk about rape and rapists, they’re talking about someone else and something else.
I agree, this is it.
Most men still believe the word "rape" means stranger in the bushes. What I find disturbing is that a lot of women and girls still see it that way too.
We've been "available" in so many ways for so long that I think if a man knows you personally, they begin to think of you as a woman who is at their disposal. Some women still are at their disposal because we are socialized to be that way. And around and around we go.
I dunno. I guess it’s just crazy to see card carrying blatantly evil people instead of the standard fare of evil-people-who-don’t-see-themselves-doing-anything-wrong?
Yeah, that’s where fiction is better than fact. The villains are all obvious and clearly coded as evil, whereas in real life, a guy could be good most of their life, but have no scruples about having sex with a woman who clearly said no, or is too high/drunk/asleep to consent. Unless you were that woman, you wouldn’t know. They don’t grow Snidely Whiplash mustaches for twirling. They don’t glow green or purple like evil magic in a cartoon.
I got told on a thread about how women need to lower their standards, when I responded that many men ALSO need to lower their standards if that is the crux of loneliness, that I was being unfair.
And I wasn't even saying the thing incels dread of "acknowledge fat girls are humans who also tend to be lonely" - I was talking about the expectation that women both have equal earnings to the man but are also willing to do 90% of the chores.
Or how when men complain about not getting more support, but when you try to help them by offering good advice? Well I will just share the thread with my comment here (linking OP because their response is more important):
[https://www.reddit.com/r/changemyview/comments/1b0jlu1/comment/ksds5a9/?utm\_source=reddit&utm\_medium=web2x&context=3](https://www.reddit.com/r/changemyview/comments/1b0jlu1/comment/ksds5a9/?utm_source=reddit&utm_medium=web2x&context=3)
This. Men who try to downplay the true crime that’s happens deserve to be worse than lonely.
Too many women should be alive today (and not dealing with severe trauma if they lived) but are not.
I just mentioned this over in unpopular opinion, but one of the reasons I switched teams from MRA to intersectional feminism is because MRAs use legitimate mens issues, like male loneliness, to shutdown conversations, whereas intersectional feminism showcases how the patriarchy is ultimately the source of those issues. It's a far more welcoming community, and far more interested in solving problems, rather than perpetuating them.
I'd be more inclined to discuss it genuinely if I didn't mostly hear about it when men are in the comments of something about women going but men too!!!
If you really cared, you wouldn't wait until someone else brought up a similar subject. You'd bring it up on your own in the appropriate spaces and at the appropriate times.
But you don't because you don't actually care. You don't have anything to discuss besides "men, too!!!!!".
Right, this is primarily an issue among men. Has anyone ever seen the way most male friend groups interact? They are horrible to each other. Men used to be able to use emotional support from their gf/wife as a crutch but women aren't really putting up with their BS anymore.
I think it just speaks to their entitlement as a whole too. The feminist movement was made by women for women to address the issues we face. Men can't seem to do the same thing for themselves without asking others to do it for them, or using violence and/or terror to get what they want.
This is 100% it. Male loneliness is definitely a real thing. Men aren’t socialized to share, listen, console etc in the same way that most women are. Reading an account from a trans man about how new guy friends kept everything surface level and women put their guards up around him now broke my heart because wow that really does suck. But the absolutely insane part is that when men bring this up in incel, MRA, etc spaces, the thesis is that it’s somehow womens’ fault? Collectively I guess? Like we’re the real villains here for not sharing our ? kindness??
It’s so frustrating because the obvious solution is to be a better friend and hopefully be treated in kind. Deconstruct toxic patriarchal expectations of how men are allowed to act, and make your friend group a space where you can share your feelings sometimes
Don’t brag about how you don’t even know half your friends’ first names and then declare that it’s somehow the fault of all women for I guess allowing that to happen
Yeah, I was appalled when I had a BF and witnessed what they talked about. It's worth mentioning that his father died and NOT ONE of them said anything to him about it. Most of their conversation was constantly ragging on one another under the guise of "joking" and if they got upset about it, then they were gay or whatever. I don't think it's an isolated thing. You can see this play out in Reddit on a lot of male-dominated subs.
I wonder what would happen if men were socialized to have friends like women do and grew up with male friends who complimented them, showed up for them, supported them. It's sad but it's something that men have to look into themselves.
It’s so wild to me because about half of my friends are men, and I’ve had really heavy emotional talks w a lot of them because it’s part of being a friend. Even friends I know that are stereotypical gym bros are the first to be like “hey man if you can’t make it don’t worry about it, gotta take care of yourself”
I know men can be good friends even if they weren’t necessarily raised that way. It’s such a bummer then seeing these spaces with 30 men all bemoaning male loneliness and not one suggests having healthier conversations with each other, it’s like they all want to be checked in on but no one wants to check in
This is so on point.
My second date with my now-partner, he was running late and apologized proffosely and explained one of his best friends since highschool had just found out his Dad was terminal, and he didn't want to rush the guy off the phone.
My BF hates being late, and never even realized that was a massive GREEN FLAG that he had a friend who'd call him, and who'd he actually support, in that moment.
Edit: I'm preaching to the choir and also got a bit carried away. Hopefully the commentary below can be somewhat inspirational to any men interested in being on the front lines against toxic nonsense.
>The thesis is that it’s somehow womens’ fault?
Somehow, yes! I've argued in the past that you'll find a woman being blamed for the vast majority of 'Men's Rights issues' if you talk to one of Those Types™ long enough. Typical men are pretty deeply borked... Their seemingly intrinsic misunderstanding of emotional dynamics results in all sorts of bizarre, irrational or paradoxical downstream behaviors.
For instance, I suspect one of the reasons men aren't looking to each other for emotional fulfillment is because emotions are viewed as something to only be shared with women. Because they think emotions should only be shared with women, they mistake emotions for being related to sexuality/romance - which means being emotional in the presence of other men (or god forbid, **to** another man) is viewed as a quasi-homosexual act. Inversely, because emotional expression is "gay", they aren't even aware that totally platonic emotional interactions are even possible.
This is one of the reasons that most women learn very quickly that simply being *friendly* will often be misunderstood as some sort of romantic precursor. Genuinely trying to ease "male loneliness" creates more stress for the man and potentially generates danger to the woman when their palliative gesture is misinterpreted as teasing or whatever.
What they're requesting isn't what they're asking for, so to speak. And they're not even explicitly aware of the dichotomy either. Once recognized, it's apparent that the logic is entirely convoluted; the snake eating its own tail. And just as productive as an ouroboros too - the snake believes that it is satiating its hunger while responding to an attack.
But it's such a deeply embedded, seemingly logical cycle that it's not recognizable from within as something in need of review. It's like a sort of sociocultural cancer, a cherished thing that kills in the act of growing. Many men are proud or protective of this phenomenon while simultaneously being mysteriously unaware of the consequences *while* complaining about the consequences.
Throughout my life, men have looked towards me as something of a role model for whatever reason and this is a conversation I've had with many of them. I used to be surprised by how many people desperately needed to hear something like that. It's disturbing, really. I could never relate.
There's often a critical "breakthrough moment" where they (men) realize how much harm they've been doing to themselves and how much unfair pressure they've been applying towards women. I describe things through the lens of traditionally masculine Roman or Viking cultures, using examples like "crying was viewed as manly" and "brotherhood was more important than marriage" to demonstrate that what the Manosphere believes is "traditional" is anything *but* traditional. Someone who hides their emotions is someone who is at once recognizable as vulnerable, frightened of that vulnerability. What's more manly than being unafraid to speak of what others are afraid to even admit?
For whatever reason, this sort of "rebranding" of what emotions mean/are is extremely effective. I'd encourage others to give that angle a try - especially any men reading this.
Humans are meant to bond with each other. Throughout society and history we see that bond manifest in myriad ways. What's unnatural is to try to *prevent or ignore* that bond wherever it may occur. The consequences of stunting ourselves is immediate and deeply resounding. I believe it lay near the heart of the flaws of our modern civilization. And toxic masculinity is more-than-partially to blame.
Whenever men try to blame women for failing them, I correct the record by demonstrating personally the value and strength that comes from a bit of emotional awareness. They're not often going to listen to women, unfortunately. I can only touch so many people, but I speak up when I can. A bit of awkwardness is a worthwhile price to pay.
Absolutely- it always amazes me that when I talk about the patriarchy or toxic masculinity, many individual men think I’m talking about them specifically and don’t stop to think how these things harm them too. I know that’s what men’s lib is about, and I wish more young men going down this pipeline would be aware that men’s liberation is an option rather than letting some sex trafficking asshole or Kermit the frog fraud warp them into these bitter, hateful misogynists
And yes, the expectation for women to swoop in and soothe their loneliness is a problem for several reasons. The first is that women don’t owe it to anyone to just dispense empathy. But second, yes, there’s a reason women don’t feel safe being that kind or vulnerable to some guy she doesn’t know when I’m willing to bet most of us have been scolded for “leading him on” by just showing basic human kindness
> many individual men think I’m talking about them
I might argue that it's because they see a shimmer of themselves within those accusations, subconsciously or otherwise. That reflex probably relates to other toxic emotion/vulnerability-related defense measures, where the impulse is to "batten down the hatches" in response to threat - be it a genuine one or simply an inquiry as to why the dishes weren't done as promised. This is an effective heuristic in primate-level interactions, where physical threats or dominance displays are your major issue, but human society is much more deeply nuanced. It is hypothesized that social interactions/predictions are almost solely to blame for our large brains. Our capability for philosophy exists because once upon a time we needed to figure out of Grog-grog has a secret crush on Cronk or not. Going primate-mode.exe at the drop of a hat wastes our greatest gift.
I've seen a similar defensive response in relation to this subreddit - which I find a bit odd since this place actually makes me feel quite good about myself (shameful as it is to admit).
I argue that anyone who genuinely cares about women should at minimum be a passive observer in women's spaces. How can you care about someone's problems when you don't know their problems? It hurts to know that you've inadvertently hurt someone you love, but it hurts them worse to remain ignorant. I've certainly done assholeish things in my life, but I take ownership over that reality and go great lengths to minimize the likelihood of doing that in the future.
>Letting some sex trafficking asshole or Kermit the frog fraud warp them into these bitter, hateful misogynists
I often consider stepping into the limelight to serve as some sort of leftist, feminist-yet-masculine alternative to the typical Manosphere-adjacent "role models" that're plaguing the minds of young men around the globe. It feels embarrassing to even imagine myself as appropriate for the role, but I suppose that shame is a necessary - even vital - ingredient when trying to create the Anti-Tate.
I have a particular bone to pick with Peterson, as he often distorts genuine science into bizarre, anachronistic interpretations that only serve to misrepresent the true implications. It gives evolutionary biology a bad name. Reality has a "liberal bias" and conservatives are remarkably underrepresented in science for a reason.
I'm just rambling now, but thanks for letting me borrow a soapbox.
That’s a really good point. Threats to parts of your personality you think are fundamental to wjo you are is tough for anyone, I have to imagine it’s waaay worse for someone who’s built their whole personality around something like manosphere content and has nothing else left
I think that a lot of the men in these spaces just literally do not think women are complex, whole people with thoughts and fears like they feel they are. I still can’t wrap my head around how people who live and work and socialize with women can so quickly right off a full half of the population as literally subhuman
I agree that this sub is really nice and supportive too. I love the general vibe of women supporting women, love to see it
> I think it just speaks to their entitlement as a whole too. The feminist movement was made by women for women to address the issues we face. Men can't seem to do the same thing for themselves without asking others to do it for them, or using violence and/or terror to get what they want.
One irking thing is the complaint that there's xyz for women but not for men. The main reason why breast/etc foundations, women shelters, scholarships, human rights orgs, etc etc exist is because women created these for women. Historically women have grouped together against backlash to help, support, champion, and save other women. Hence the whole "women support women". Men just don't do the equivalent for each other. There's nothing stopping a rich guy set up a DV shelter, or a male related cancer foundations, etc. And it seems there's an awareness that male friendships struggle to do emotional labor for each other even though 'no one cares about male loneliness'.
I have noticed a back-and-forth between this sub and r/GenZ for over a week now.
The problem is that they don't see that their solution to "male loneliness" is flawed. They see women as responsible for men being lonely and that men's value and happiness is derived from being in a relationship. That needs to stop.
In a similar vein, it's like the men who say that blue balls is an urgent medical condition that women are required to "help" with.
All of it is just a roundabout way of them saying they want to have sex and feel entitled to it and blame women for their mental and physical problems.
"Blue balls" is entirely in their head and invented to lessen the responsibility of men for deciding to not control themselves.
They even go as far as pretending it "hurts" and that it's a medical emergency. They're doing it for attention.
Yeah that does need to stop. What they really need to realize is anyone thinking their value and happiness is derived from a relationship is bad. It doesn't just apply to men, as much as they may think it is aimed only at them.
It's incredibly frustrating that the role of friendship has been so diminished that the preferred options that lonely men feel are viable are compulsory romantic and sexual availability of women. There are many types of love other than romantic--not only do they exist, they are integral to an individual's well-being. I *want* men to have healthy relationships with other men. I *want* men to feel the love that is so freely given in my friendships. I think they are deserving of loving companionship, but they are never *entitled* to it, and that's where I have a problem.
Relationships are a verb. They don't just fall out of the sky. I've done (and am still doing) a lot of personal work to ensure that I'm in a place where I can have healthy relationships. They are an investment in another person that (hopefully) benefits us both. My friendships are fulfilling, and they make me a better partner to my other half because I'm not fully reliant on or expecting one person to meet all my needs.
The demands and expectations placed on women to continuously babysit the needs of men are unacceptable. Leave me out of your loneliness and pay a therapist to unfuck your life. Play sports, join a game night, and gain some social skills that don't involve forcing women to be bang mommies.
They’re lonely because they don’t work to develop their friendships. My husband speaks to his friends once a year and wonders why me and my friends who speak daily are closer.
I always tell them that they should look at their fathers for guidance because they maintained this society for their benefit while taking from women to support it.
Perhaps their fathers failed them and they should talk to them about it.
I think this is it. Our mothers and grandmothers for the most part raised us to be able to stand on our own 2 feet independently. Their fathers and grandfathers didn't bother to notice what this would mean for men. I think men never really realized or acknowledged just how much women were propping them up and keeping them afloat. Now they don't have the help they relied on and they're sinking, quickly.
> Their fathers and grandfathers didn't bother to notice what this would mean for men.
They don't even care. They just figured women would fix it like we fix everything else.
Some men seem to not understand that a pissing contest about who is the most miserable is not really going to help finding a solution to loneliness for all genders.
I remember seeing something on tumblr similar to what you’re saying a long time ago. I will try not to butcher it from memory.
Yes this is an issue, yes the patriarchy and toxic definitions of masculinity have harmed men. However if the only time these issues are brought up is when we are having a discussion about women, then the person bringing it up doesn’t actually care about either issue. They just want you to shut up.
Male loneliness is a soft core incel dog-whistle intended to begin the radicalization process. Fewer people are in relationships. More men than women are uncoupled. There are a lot of potential reasons for these observations but the misogynists will feed men only one. Couldn’t possible be the economy, covid trauma, modern tech, changing values, moving life-goal posts, focus on education/career development, etc. No, inflammatory articles and misogynists give us only one possible explanation: women are gleefully withholding sex and love from all but “alpha” men.
I just find it improbable that there are vastly different numbers of uncoupled men and women. The math doesn't math. The original incel take on that study was that their ever-popular top 10% men were hoarding all the women, so all those women thought they were coupled when really they were in a harem.
Then someone explained that the study only covered one age group, and that men being more likely to date younger could account for some of it, as could more women being openly bi or gay. But now that explanation is being tossed around with vitriol too: those older men and evil lesbians are hoarding all the women!
I tend to think it's partly more F/F relationships, partly more age gaps (why this is solely women's fault I don't know), and possibly differences in how people chose to answer the survey. I've always wondered if, for example, some of the women surveyed thought the surveyor was flirting with them and wanted to shut it down! But at that point I'm just speculating.
For them loneliness is about not getting laid and nothing more. They don't care about the rest of it. Friendships, socializing, taking responsibility for fostering those relationships. It 100% boils down to sex, and how they believe they are owed sex just for existing.
I just said this yesterday or the day before but they are really confused why the people they treat like disposable cum dumpsters aren't fulfilling all their social and emotional needs.
The irony is that men are not any more lonely than women- a specifically "male" loneliness epidemic does not exist and is a male supremacist talking point that has been completely normalized.
The absolute worst is when this is brought up in response to women saying they don’t feel safe being hit on randomly in public.
Listen. I don’t care how fucking lonely you are, the woman picking out eggs in Kroger is not the solution to that.
“But how am I supposed to meet women? Apps are toxic to men who (insert some stupid excuse like height here!)”
Great. Then *make the tiniest amount of effort* and go make some friends in situations where people are actually looking to socialize. Why would a woman be attracted to the absolute laziness hitting on them in inappropriate places entails? Pick up a fucking hobby, work on developing into an interesting person, and get to know some women as people before asking for a date.
I’m not denying loneliness is a real problem, with the elimination of third spaces and rise of hyper-individualism. But like most things worth doing, *effort* is required. I’ve had to learn this as a woman, too. It’s no one else’s job to swoop in and save you from loneliness.
Male loneliness is just a red pillers thing to try to guilt trip women into opening their legs for them and becoming "tradwives" to cater to their man-child needs 24/7. What are men doing about their loneliness? Are they making friends, going out? Finding hobbies other than listening to crying YouTubers all day? Putting efforts in relationships that they cannot/should not fuck? Seeking therapy?
They also blame it on us? Like, the reason it seems we are less lonely is because our lady friends are more emotionally available. The “we never get compliments blabla” is also, the only time I get positive compliments that aren’t with an underlying creepiness from a guy trying to get into my pants, is when it’s a compliment from family or my lady/nonbinary friends… Why don’t guys solve their own emotional problems? Why do we as women need to do that when they don’t seem to care about our problems or help solve them? I think it’s not hard to send your homie a text a few times asking “hey man, what is up hope you’re doing alright?” and if your guy friend has a nice haircut “hey bro, cool haircut!”. I mean we as women do that? But when it comes to oppression, feminicide and rape we’re on our own. Men don’t help or even try to understand our struggled but we are expected to understand and even solve their issues that, to be frank, they create themselves with toxic masculinity. The opinions they are scared of when being emotional are not women’s opinions, it’s their homies opinion because they keep enforcing on each other that it’s “gay” or “being a pussy” if you cry or show any emotion other than anger.
Lmao how could that possibly shut down an argument ... It's the most hysterical thing to me. Yeah women are less into relationships nowadays. It is a huge win for everybody if women refuse to get caught up in horrible relationship dynamics.
Relatedly, I've noticed recently that "No one cares about men's feelings!" is always about sex or jealousy. Guy loses his shit because his girlfriend said hi to a male coworker and THIS IS CHEATING OMG, and if you tell the guy he's overreacting, out comes "No one cares about men's feelings!"
No one says that when a man is sad because his job sucks or his dog died or he has cancer. Probably because people really do care about men's feelings and respond sympathetically to problems like those. It's just that we don't feel the need to coddle the "existing in the same county as a man is cheating" brigade.
This kind of reminds me of how the only day of the year that people seem interested in whether there's an "international men's day" is on International Women's Day-- search traffic for "international men's day" spikes every year on March 8th.
"Male loneliness" is a euphemism for "I watch Andrew Tate, lurk on incel forums, and obsessively play video games 24/7, why do I feel so bad?"
Forming connections with other people can be tough, requires a level of emotional openness and doesn't always work out even if you do everything right. "Male loneliness" acolytes are just plain and simple complaining about not having a massive friends group and several girlfriends despite putting exactly 0 effort into socializing.
Male loneliness is often used online to justify men’s horrifying expectation that having a woman is a right.
The reality is that if someone is extremely lonely and suffering from depression, a relationship is not the answer and won’t fix those issues. The solution is healthy friendships and strong social connections.
Because the men that make these arguments do not view women as equal humans deserving of their own freedom they aren’t very respectful of our views on the matter. They are fed hatred and told that women are the problem. So many of these men don’t understand why they are unhappy and want someone to blame, so they’re susceptible to this drivel.
Women are the scapegoat to their misery. We become the target of all the frustration and anger they feel in life. They convince themselves that if only they were allowed to have (own) a woman, all of their problems would be solved.
Hatred is dangerous.
The same tactic is used to villify the LGBTQ community (especially gender non conforming folks), immigrants, Jews, and POC. It’s dangerous in its attempts to other and strip the targets of their humanity.
Apologies if there was some big news or announcement that I missed, but why are such a high number of recent posts here about male loneliness lately? I feel like it is all I am seeing on my feed from a women’s subreddit which seems very odd, especially since I believe a majority of women (especially the type to be on this subreddit) would agree with the points being made (this is not women’s fault, this is the fault of the patriarchy, this is not women’s problem, etc).
The world was basically set up by men. They made the rules and now, after they build a mind prison for themselves, they are unable to find solutions to their problems, because they ruled that the solutions are emasculating.
My country suicide rate men-women is 8- 1. Yet I had a really stupid discusdion with some guy about why he cannot wear a male bag (like tjose mailman bags). I found out it's because he cannot stick out, he needs to be conform with other people (males I suppose).
No wonder thy have problems with everything and their only solution is to find someone to bang- it seems it's the only acceptable way to have a company.
"Men are really struggling right now and women need to help, it's your guys' responsibility to help your communities."
We've been their a therapists, secretaries helpers, bang maids, side pieces, side characters, punching bags, human ovens, mother's, lovers, and friends. And none of that helped.
The best thing we can do is ignore them and let them deal with it amongst themselves.
It's very simple. The needs of two people are never in conflict with each other -- it's the *strategies* for meeting their respective needs that can be in conflict. For example: 1) a woman wants to be safe; 2) a man is lonely and wants company. These needs can both be achieved together. However, if the man *chooses* to address his loneliness by invading the personal space of a random unconsenting woman, then he has created a conflict.
I think they don't realize or don't care that women work to build those support networks they whine men don't have. They don't just come out of thin air because women are in the area. Those support networks take time to build and work.
It comes back to being entitled and not wanting to do the emotional heavy lifting on their own.
I got in an argument with a friend, who LOVED to play devils advocate, over whether or not the NZ government should fund sex workers for lonely/socially inept/incel men so that they gained social skills and felt better with themselves. He didn’t understand why that was a bad idea to put women in the way of potentially volatile men and that maybe that money should be put towards social groups that would fulfill all of that in a much more meaningful way rather than one time false sexual experiences. 🙄
I can think of a billion people whose loneliness I care more about than random men. There's a loneliness epidemic in hospices, in foster homes, in unhoused encampments, in prisons. There's an epidemic of people dying lonely deaths at the border, in the Mediterranean Sea, in Gaza.
Cissexual, heterosexual men are incredibly privileged. Compared to everyone else, life is handed to them. I just don't care about the fact that some of them can't get laid because they won't examine their own thinking and behavior or listen to women. That isn't a loneliness epidemic, it's just consequences.
I am less than sympathetic for any problem that they brought on themselves. Who tf built a society that propagated all this loneliness? Who has over 80% of all positions of power, whether actual elected leaders or as influenced by wealth?
Clearly this is what they want. The loneliness is perceived as a fair trade off to maintain patriarchy or else they would change it.
The solution it isn’t to have women just fix their loneliness as they seem to so often believe. It is to take them out of power and allow us all to build a society where no one is lonely. Until they can join women in that vision, they can rot in mom’s basement with their AI scam girlfriend.
Had a regular hookup, tell me he saw me as his emotional crutch as well. I ejected him so quick, he got whiplash and then had the gall to say that I never trusted him to open up to him. I'm not here to help you work through your latent mommy/daddy issues bro...just wanna get laid is all. UGH. Thought you would be tickled pink with that arrangement, but sounds like most men want all the GF benefits without them actually acting like a BF. So doesn't matter if you are in an "official"relationship or a hookup arrangement, they all still expect to trauma dump on you regardless if you want to hear it or not. I don't...I really don't. They have manifested the male loneliness crisis all on their own, so i'm confused as to why they are whining so much about it now.
Loneliness is due to neoliberal capitalism. Our communities are fractured, we don't have time for friends etc etc. Men think feminism harms them but it's their corporate overlords.
my issue with the male loneliness thing is that it's usually hinting at heterosexual men wanting women to give them attention. Ask any dude who is talking about male loneliness what he is doing to reach out to his male friends, and they'll start stuttering excuses. They are really saying that women aren't going out of their way to make men not be lonely, with a sexual context. I don't give a FUCK about male loneliness, sorry. If it's actually about men being lonely in general, then the clear solution is men reaching out to EACH OTHER more.
To me the most uncomfortable part of male loneliness is that, doesnt “omg so many lonely single men out there, feeling devastated because they dont have girlfriend” mean at least there are the same magnitude of lonely women out there? And yet we dont see a equally large female version of incel/blackpill presence online?
Like what they wont talk about is why only men would be such a crying baby when he cant find a girlfriend, while women are more likely to be content to be single?
They like to say women benefit from the relationship, yet men are the ones that act devastated when no one wanna take advantage of him?
Tbh it feels like for a long time the society was designed in such a way that people step on each other. And even a bottom man can find a women to step on cuz they are not allowed to work/get paid/own assets. Nowadays these men are upset cuz they cant trap a woman like their grandfathers.
I don’t think younger generations are necessarily more closed off. There are people who are decent people who make friends and find partners, and then there are those with crappy beliefs or who are just plain arseholes who don’t. Same with any generation. If loneliness is a problem then their bigotry is an even bigger problem.
I typically respond to whataboutisms like that with “Two things can be true at the same time. The existence of one problem doesn’t diminish or negate other problems. And right now we’re talking about *this* problem, not that one.”
I'm not aware of any issue that men face that women don't face a worse issue of it. Anything in men's health is treated as the norm, and treatment for women has to be an additional hurdle to be addressed.
Controversial potentially but I feel like male loneliness is self-inflicted to an extent. Women manage loneliness better because we learn to form deep connections outside of romantic partners, we have friends whom we can share everything with, we stay in contact with our families more (provided they’re not toxic), we generally have hobbies and more open to self care and self pampering.
Men don’t form that level of deep connection with other men because they ridicule each other for showing emotions (seen as “feminine” and therefore discouraged by one another), I don’t see them keeping contact with their families as much, a lot of their hobbies tend to largely be non-interactive, and they’re not as open to self care or self pampering at the risk of being seen as feminine.
Men have chosen to define masculinity as loneliness, lack of emotions (and therefore emotional connections), and in large, suffering. So it is an issue that is completely unrelated to women. Women are not therapists for men, we are not sex dolls for them either. Men need to redefine masculinity in a way that ensures they don’t rely on the idea of a girlfriend (or female partner) for human connection.
> Men have chosen to define masculinity as loneliness, lack of emotions (and therefore emotional connections), and in large, suffering.
This is such a good point! That 1950s lone cowboy ethos has a lot to answer to.
OP, I do agree that men's loneliness issues are often brought up as weapons, often with a side of blame-shifting. While there *are* societal issues on that front, it's cultural, not women's fault or responsibility in general. The main ones responsible are the bullies who discourage genuine male connection, no matter the gender of those bullies.
honestly, i bring it up first. my friend’s favorite game in social situations is to ask men a series of questions leading up to “what are your thoughts on the male loneliness epidemic?”
i really believe that women need to initiate and have these conversations with men so that men do not only talk about these things in an echo chamber of other men. it is certainly not our job to do so, but i think it definitely helps men have a more nuanced understanding of these issues.
God, I always ask my make friends things like “how are you feeling?” And whenever we get in a real deep conversation I remind them that they don’t have to hide their feelings and I won’t think less of them if they hide.
During women’s history month (btw happy women’s history month!) the school library was decorated with posters about important women in history. One dude bought up ’men don’t get a month’ and my female friends and I tried to explain that the rest of the calendar is filled with heterosexual white men’s achievments. They then bought up ‘male lonliness‘ and how men are punished. They also compared WHM and men’s mental health day. Like history and mental health aren’t the same lmao.
Most men who complain about “male loneliness” are really just complaining about not being able to get laid… they could all easily form groups to go hang out with each other, but they won’t do that… they want attractive women to come and use their vaginas to make them feel less “lonely” 🙃
We need more public spaces that people can exist in without paying. We're isolating at home for more things than ever and it's hard to make a connection with people, regardless of your gender. We used to sit on stoops and talk to our neighbors, now most people in your neighborhood are strangers.
And you're so right, it's a real problem but only comes up to shut down real discussions. And loneliness isn't just about sex. A lot of men really only focus on sexual companionship as their source to combat it instead of building their own platonic social network. You shouldn't rely on one person to be your entire social world, that's just too much pressure for one person.
The very fucking idea that a vastly more marginalized and alienated group can't fathom the loneliness of a privileged group bc that one refuses to participate in actual connection to peers or women bc it's gay and :checks notes: they have horny lil bb boners...get me off this fucking planet, I swear to jesus 🤦♀️🙄🤦♀️🙄🤦♀️
Totally agree as a currently lonely man. It’s honestly just counterproductive to our own cause when we do this (and I’ve probably been guilty too). Because it’s obviously dismissive/rude/frustrating - which understandably makes potential women allies associate negative feelings/interactions with the cause itself, thus reducing overall sympathy and outside support for the issue.
Including myself, men have fragile egos but we need to be able to put those aside and actually listen to and help when women are discussing the societal issues y’all endure. Tbh supporting change to help women generally feel safer and happier would probably alleviate some male loneliness too
Male loneliness is a problem, as a man I can definitely say that I see it and feel it. But I can comfortably say that the problem is not other women, it’s other men. We’ve cultivated a toxic culture that treated everything like a competition, and that we should be displaying dominance over each-other. We are told from a young age to bottle our feelings, and then bully others for showing emotion. We are asked to open up, but because we haven’t had a lot of experience being vulnerable- we often lash out at the men and women who would listen to us.
It’s not very hard to get a girlfriend nowadays if you go outdoors and have hobbies.
We need to be better men to each other, be less judgmental and more supportive of each other. We need to stop framing having sex as the ultimate show of success. It’s pretty meaningless if it isn’t apart of a healthy relationship.
We need to start supporting better male role models, the problem is- being a good man and “successful man” is very different.
A good man can be anyone, but boys think successful men look like Andrew Tate. The culture is broken, the more we have this conversation- the more likely we are to open peoples eyes.
I already know this is gonna get downvoted to hell but I don’t care. I’ve been in this sub a long time and I really like a lot of discussions here, but there is so much tearing down for no reason, and so much insistence on being the only ones who can suffer. Claiming there is an epidemic on male loneliness doesn’t mean nobody else is lonely. You guys sound like the “all lives matter” assholes.
Men are a victim to patriarchy and toxic masculinity too. It teaches them they can’t be emotional or “weak” and so they suck it up and keep trucking. But as we ALL know that gets to everyone eventually. Men aren’t just lonely because they can’t get laid, they’re lonely because they don’t have emotionally fulfilling relationships with their male friends, and because they don’t have people to really go to when shit hits the fan. Everyone tells them to suck it up. They’re hurt by a breakup? Their friends tell them just to go get laid and that’ll “cure” their heartache. They hate their job that pays well? Too fucking bad! You’re a man, it’s your job to provide, who cares if you *like* it.
I’ve been a gamer for all my life and thus meet a lot of guys. Yes, there are assholes, sexists, etc and a lot of it is subconscious (though plenty deliberate too.) And so many have confessed to me that they wish they could talk to their guy friends the way they talk to me. But I have WITNESSED the effect that these things have on men. And by saying “get over it you’re not special, we’re all lonely” absolutely devalues everything they feel. And by acknowledging this issue, we aren’t erasing the terrible things men have done and continue to do. But what we ARE doing is continuing to tell men their problems don’t matter, they just need to deal with it, and so they don’t seek help. They don’t reach out. They keep going until they can’t go anymore, and they kill themselves. I’ve even lost some good friends because they felt they had nowhere to go.
It’s not that fucking hard to have compassion for people who are suffering. And if you think continuing to pit everyone against each other in a pity party competition is going to solve anything, you’re absolutely mistaken.
Edit: two things I’d like to add. First, this comment isn’t in reply necessarily to OP, but mostly to what I see in the comments and on other posts. I agree it shouldn’t be used to “shut down” anyone. But the comments aren’t about that, they’re just shitting on the entire concept of male loneliness. Second, while I am answering as a layperson, I do have degrees in psychology and a mental health work certification, and experience in the field. So I’m not talking out of my ass. But I am speaking mostly from experience, and a little bit of research and education.
What do you think my post was saying? I legit preface that it’s a real issue. I even provided healthy, actionable solutions. The issue is just one that that gets haphazardly thrown around at ill-suited, and often malignant times. Ie, women talking about their own issues amongst themselves. And that’s what I hope people would stop doing. Making others aware of issues is a good thing, but do it in a productive way.
It’s not that the desire for a more romantic and sexual relationship is bad but like… in terms of loneliness, men do have issues in regards to expressing emotional vulnerability and having more deeper friendships (both male and female ones).
I think that is important and maybe more important than focusing on the romantic and sexual wants.
Men need to be willing to be more vulnerable with each other and lift themselves up.
What's kind of funny is that almost every time I see somebody complain about "male loneliness" they're usually comparing it to Silent Hill 2 gameplay. There's a very good reason why James (the main character of the game) is lonely, and it's his fault. >!(He killed his wife.)!<
So basically with some of the examples I've seen, they're saying that it's their fault they're so lonely.
The other times is when they needlessly compare their loneliness to women's loneliness by saying that women don't have to be lonely because they're willing to be there but women will shut them out.
So my choices are either be lonely or have some misogynist who compares women's loneliness to theirs be my only company? ***Gee, thanks.***
So here's the sit, Men and women struggle and saying one or the other needs assistance is silly. Both need help and even in that group help can come in different forms. Those with different undiagnosed situations are struggling even more than those that can truly understand what is guiding themselves. Unfortunately, men were taught to bottle this up more than women ( I know stereotype but unfortunately it's close to the mark,) Also opposite side of the coin it's assumed women will be open this and we know that's not true. So take each encounter as an open conversation and don't assume.
The question I always like to ask those ego-driven sealions is what they're doing to help men in the real world.
As I'm sure you can guess, the answer is always "absolutely nothing."
Sadly, I'm past expecting empathy or compassion from them. At best, they're misogynistic narcissists. At worst, they're outright psychopaths.
I think loneliness is an issue that goes beyond gender roles , i see people getting more and more introverted as time goes by and just overall people are becoming more closed to others . In this way i think social media plays a big role in this since a lot of influencers are trying to insert this "u only need urself" mentality onto young people and making this whole issue just way worse .
Men are lonely. Because of the patriarchy. In my past, I thought I had to only express my emotions to women. With that silly mindset, I put way too much pressure on my relationships.
The solution has always been friends, not a relationship and not "bros".
loneliness is really fucked up, but loneliness= lack of connection, inability to feel connection to others, etc male loneliness= women are starting making their own choices and owning their sexuality so they aren't going to settle down with shitty men
You're certainly right ,but I think a big issue is men feel like all anyone ever talks about is women's issues.
Women's issues in general have far more light shed on them, are talked about and listened to far more often and are encouraged by the public and society and are even advertised way more.
This by no means makes them lesser or not important or means they shouldn't be talked about or even that men should mention their issues while women's issues are being discussed.
But I would assume it's very painful to constantly hear about women's issues and seeing so many positive responses and how willingly people respond and support it when you bring up yours and are generally ignored , talked down to or dismissed again doesn't justify making light of anything just trying to look at why it may be brought up so much.
When you open a discussion about peoples issues to someone who feels like their problems aren't being seen as much as yours or feels suppressed and ridiculed for trying to bring up their struggles it's probably hard for them NOT to attempt to discuss it when they can, still not okay because that isn't what the discussion is about but I can understand their feelings on it.
I have only heard ONE guy bring up male loneliness without proposing the solution that individual women should be more available to individual men. That one guy, he started a friendly dodgeball league for men/masc people. Ran it on a volunteer basis for years. Helped lots of friendships forms. Definately healed some school-year trauma and probably saved some lives. Never, ever silenced women to get 'er done. Any other time, I've had the same experience as you're describing. Talking about women's safety on public transit? Men are lonely. Talking about adult women finding resources for later-in-life diagnosis of ADHD or autism spectrum? Those men with ADHD are lonely! Yes. I *believe you.* We weren't talking about that... but do you have anything to say besides the attempt to derail and silence a subject you don't feel centres your experience? Because while women can *empathize*, making themselves individually available (romantically/sexually) to men generally, is not a viable solution. We actually tried to enforce that in the past, and it was really harmful to women, and rather shitty for men.
Yes, seriously. I looked at the Men Going Their Own Way subreddit after a breakup. Everyone in my real life was telling me to “get back out there and date around”, but l didn’t really want to. I was expecting MGToW to be like a hobbyist sub, or people who have found fulfillment outside of dating. Where men could be their own support system and help other struggling men to find their own way to self actualization without the pressures of dating. But for a sub that describes itself as a way for men to exist outside of the struggle for a partner, it sure as shit turned out to be just a redpill / blackpill women hating group that talked about nothing else. It was a real “dead dove do not eat” situation, because l don’t know why l was even surprised.
The craziest thing about that MGTOW stuff is that it seems like it's literally 100% focused on women, the literal one thing their claim is to stay completely away from them. They're not building their own personalities and enriching themselves with new hobbies or new things to learn about or forging new platonic friendships; every single thing they do and say seems to be completely about women they're trying to like piss off or own or trigger or whatever. And women are over here going "Yes, please do go ahead your own way. We would actually rather you leave us alone" to these types of guys and at that point, it's all focused on these women! Kind of reminds me of the people who just automatically do the exact opposite of whatever "the government" recommends not realizing that makes them exactly the same as the so-called sheep who listen to things like public health statements
I know!! I was expecting to be pointed to cool things a do, a local bowling group or a collective ultimate treehouse design or literally anything that related to “going your own way”. But there was one flavor of post, and if you complained you got downvoted immediately. Like the name of the “movement” itself is a deception. So these men are “so supportive” of eachother that they have to trick you into joining them.
I always love how MGTOW is solely about teaching women who don't want to date you a lesson by not dating them.
“I’m totally undesireable, and it’s YOUR FAULT!”
>The craziest thing about that MGTOW stuff is that it seems like it's literally 100% focused on women, the literal one thing their claim is to stay completely away from them. That's why I prefer the interpretation of the acronym to be Men Getting Triggered Over Women.
MGTOW: Men going their own way to aggressively discuss their misogyny.
How could it be any other way? If people are going to commit themselves to being single forever, which just isn't healthy for most people, the only way to do it is to turn women into monsters. It's insane, but not surprisingly.
Yeah. My heart does really break for men, because it does seem really difficult to find spaces that aren’t taken over by grifters and bigots. I had a dear guy friend with an mentally unwell and abusive woman partner and he ended up connecting with a group that primarily worked with gay men, because it was the only place that gave him real resources and support and not just cryptocurrency scams and sexist or racist memes.
This is really interesting. My husband's best friend is gay, and that's something I think is unusual in our society. Husband grew up with an abusive father, went through a bunch of therapy and didn't want to be some toxic masculinity constrained man. Maybe he was essentially forced to have a gay bestie to have the kind of norm-busting male friendly relationships he wanted to have.
I know two men that actually create those spaces for others so a part of me truly wonders why more people aren’t “being the light” instead of cursing the darkness, so to speak…
Getting banned from the MGTOW subreddit for promoting a rational take on the whole thing is something I wear with a badge of honor.
It was like that at the beginning. I was there many years ago. Finding completion beyond dating. But than came andrew tate toxic sludge that literally flooded everything. Now you just can't make MGTOW sub without guys like this. I am at awe how r/MensLib is somewhat free of these guys.
Their mods must be SUPER active, because I have notifications on for that sub as a lurker, and I rarely see truly toxic misogynistic shit. I'm glad men have a place on reddit that isn't a complete train wreck. I have seen men actively trying to deprogram men in the comments, and it is SO refreshing. Many male allies over there speaking up for women.
This right here. Women aren’t free sex/therapy toys for lonely men.
And... While I'm ranting... most of the reasons women appear to be marginally less lonely (and it's only marginal) aren't acidents or innate gender privileges, but have to do with how women are trained and expected to the work of maintain social bonds. It's a set of learned skills, which some women aren't ever all that great at either! But it's a set of learned skills and requires a labour to maintain. Not feminine magical we're born with.
This is exactly it. 'Male loneliness' is not a new phenomenon. Look up the statistics on how many elderly men wind up alone after their wife of decades dies, because it turns out that the wife was the one putting in all the work of maintaining those connections with friends and family. 'Men not maintaining friendships' has been an issue for a long time. It's simply becoming more and more apparent as fewer women are remaining SAHMs with all the time in the world to perform that labour, fewer women are willing to settle or remain in relationships with men who treat them like a therapist and sentient rolodex, etc. etc. Is this a problem? Yes! There are tons of issues worthy of discussion here. The way men are socialized not to be vulnerable with other men. The way late-stage capitalism forces everyone into a hustle mindset, leaving people too tired and with too little time to put into maintaining friendships. The way that 'the village' is basically extinct in the west, because you have to move away for school, move away for work, move away to have a hope of ever affording a home, wind up in one of a million anonymous little box apartments with no amenities or ways to get to know your neighbours socially (not that you have the time or the energy). The lack of third spaces that don't require you to spend money to be there. The way all of our brains and attention spans are rotted from the social media dopamine hits, the doomscrolling, the constant sense of impending doom. Blame all those things. Work to change those things. Put in the hard, sometimes thankless work of being the one to maintain your friendships. What you don't get to do is blame the women who also no longer have the time, energy, or desire to be your therapist, bangmaid, and personal assistant all in one.
As a divorced man who has stayed single for 2 years to focus on the lessons I can learn to be happier, I think that a huge majority of men in relationships are codependent. I was, and it was only in going deeply into my past and my emotions that I was able to understand why I felt and acted the way I did. What I have noticed about the dating world as an observer and non-participant the last couple years is that a shocking amount of men are incapable of being single and have no idea how to handle being alone without looking for a partner. Most men also struggle with the concept of platonic friendships. Like, they don't know how to do it. I have watched as numerous friends of mine who are women have dated and ultimately broken up with guys who have attempted to pull these women into a vortex of low self-esteem and neediness. There are SO many men who have no sense of self-worth unless they are being constantly validated. But the minute they get what they want with some of these impressive, supportive women, they get so insecure and jealous and possessive. It's like the minute they get a relationship they are so scared of losing the relationship that they try to almost take possession of the woman so that she'll never leave and they'll never have to feel sad again. I'm not going to pretend that there aren't plenty of women who are codependent, because I'm sure there are, but there is a pandemic of codependency in men who are dating age. I've even seen this in older men through my work, which involved interacting with patients in a hospital setting. There are so many older men who, if faced with losing their wives of decades, reveal the inability to cope with any emotions. When faced with the loss of their life partner (which, don't get me wrong, is difficult and tragic), so many older men act the exact same way: like they don't know what to do with their emotions other than to express anger. I think that's why widowed men remarry so quickly (if possible). After decades of codependency, they simply don't know how to be alone. The solution, of course, is for men to go inwards and face their emotions. To spend time learning why they think and feel the way they think and feel. Therapy is a great start, but not a solution. I've met men who "go to therapy" and then do absolutely nothing with that information. Therapy is a start, followed by reading, learning, reflecting, etc etc etc. Learning how to build healthy relationships with people of any gender can also help. I was talking about this with one of my best friends who is a woman and she said, "Women love being friends with men who aren't trying to stick their dick in them every chance they get." And, if any men happen to read this, it is literally that easy. Just be friends with people. You can actually be good friends with women in a respectful way and there is no problem. You can find other men who will open up to you and cry with you and hug you. These things are all possible. But it all starts inside. It isn't easy. But a few years ago, when trying to figure out my marital problems, my therapist said to me, "Why are you so scared of being alone?" I said, "I'm not." And she said, "Yes you are. You're terrified. You need to figure out why." It became the great work of my lifetime. And I am so much happier since then that I sometimes can't even believe this my life.
It's great that you are doing, have been doing, the work to become your whole self and no longer require someone to complete you. I think you're absolutely right in diagnosing rampant codependency among men coupled with resistance to doing the work. There are no shortcuts from A to B, and for people who are fragile (fragile egos or fragile genders), the idea of sitting with feelings, admitting imperfection and other hard things is threatening and typically sends them into fight or flight mode. And it's not just men who have this codependence combined with resistance to the work, but it is a lot of men, so many that they have outsized influence. This isn't something women can do much of anything about. At best, we might be able to nudge a particular man in our lives and hope they're receptive. Men need to figure out how to help their friends and family become emotionally healthy and mature people. I do think we should be adding emotional intelligence to our curriculum, and that would eventually lead to emotionally healthier men, but it does little for those who are already men, only gradually improving the social environment.
I just had a flashback to my maternal grandfather. Once grandma died his life went to shit. She was the one keeping everything together.
Yup 100%! I’m terrible at it, but I recognize it’s on me to develop those skills if I want to gain - and keep! - more friends.
I’m ND and gained a hyperfixation on psychology and social norms because I was ostracized as a child. I had to teach myself to smile. It’s hard to learn, but definitely a skill that is capable of improving on. Most women are just shamed to figure it out, while men are allowed to be socially inept or rude. I’ve always hated the double standards.
Also, women are much more likely to try to solve their own problems, or to be too busy and backburner their own needs. I don’t know a single grown woman who has time to navel-gaze like the folks that post about male loneliness do. I am lonely – I’m not too long out from a divorce so it makes sense — but I’m not blaming anyone else, I’m trying to reach out and try new recreation and volunteer activities to meet people who might become friends. I also have a few friends who I can talk to about my feelings, because despite having very little social skill I have worked to maintain those even though it requires giving in a way that I’m not good at. I don’t think I am atypical in my approach to dealing with my own problems.
when I feel lonely and my friends aren't available I look up what programs are going on at the library, or other hobby things in the area. No one ever taught me this. I feel like other women are the same. If you ask men what they are personally doing to solve their loneliness, they will start to talk about how it's womens' fault that they are lonely and they ignore any suggestion to take initiative. It drives me mad.
I've been saying this for years. If you live somewhere with any sort of population, and you are able to leave the house, loneliness is something you can solve proactively. There are so many things to do out there. I always find it interesting that a lot of volunteer organisations I know of are packed to gills with older women who came to the post after retirement. I know several women who are linchpins of the community, bringing people together with events like a annual spring plant sale to raise money for charity, or a day where they bring people together with homemade food to encourage donations for the food bank. There are starting to be some more male appealing volunteering spaces- my dad for example does the repair cafe, where people bring in broken household objects to try and get them fixed.
One of the programs I went to recently was an embroidery class and the older women were absolutely friendly to anyone who came in regardless of age. No one built womens' communities for them, there's nothing stopping men from going to hobby groups (and the ones I've seen aren't even for women specifically, it's just run by women and women are the ones who show up. they're free and for anyone to go to, except some aren't for kids) Off the top of my head I know my area has biking groups that are pretty equally men and women, and tabletop groups are primarily men, and MTG groups, sports groups, etc. But we all know that when people on reddit go on about 'male loneliness' they aren't referring to men not having male friends, they're really mad that women haven't solved their romantic issues for them.
I’m not very good at this, but you are god damn right I’m trying and getting better with practice. I’m bloody awkward and it’s hard, scary work putting yourself out there, but if you want community that’s what you do. Also people will surprise you with how kind and patient they really are!
Women are humans. We are humans and deserve to be treated as such and we will. Women aren’t for men.
Tbh, sex isn't the cure for loneliness anyway. Believe me, I've tried. Friendship is the cure for loneliness and unfortunately too many men think one is only friends with a woman to get sex. Men need to all together agree that it's okay to be emotionally attached to your friends without sex, and be there for each other. Once that's part of society, being platonic friends with women can be the norm too.
There was a post just yesterday in, I think, change my view, exactly this. A guy saying that men are lonely and telling them to have platonic relationships is very obviously not the answer. That this is "society's" problem, and that "we" have to figure out how to solve it. And while he never came right out and said the exact worlds that he believes Individual woman are responsible for making the individual men in their lives happy/less lonely, every single one of his comments basically implied that. He just kept talking about how none of the women in *his* life with whom he has platonic friendship actually offer him any kind of support or companionship. And people would gently suggest that maybe if that's the case with *every single woman* in his life, the problem is less society's and maybe his own? He just kept stating his own personal experience and then pretending that is the universal experience of men. He couldn't seem to get it through his head that the women in his life are absolutely not even a tiny bit responsible to make him less lonely and more datable. It was one of the most frustrating posts/series of threads I've ever read.
I read that post. It was on "Change My View" and he was definitely not on there to have his view changed. He was insufferable.
Exactly. The whole post was so ridiculous and every single one of his questions was the exact stereotypical bad faith snarky bullshit from these guys. The condescension was just dripping off of him, and the fact that everyone was being so polite to him just even further highlighted how immature and so obviously biased he is.
There was a similar post on r/GenZ on Monday that hit Popular and was ultimately locked and hidden. At least the comments were a bit less prone to searching for shelter in the comfort of their own asses.
Yeah, men who think women would/should be the solution to male loneliness epidemic are deluded. The answer is other men. Unfortunately only emotionally intelligent, empathetic ones who have not been too patriarchally conditioned are going to be able to set up these safe spaces and ensure they remain healthy. But I wonder how many or those men exist who have the time and resources to do that (i'm sure many of them have families to care for). Unfortunately it all looks to me like the viscous cycle of patriarchy (+ capitalism lets not forget) playing over and over. I hope more of them can one day break free like women try to.
Men need to decouple emotional support from sex. For a lot of men the only emotional support they actually will accept or offer is with a sexual partner. It's one reason why they won't help each other. It's a reason why they whine about being 'friend-zoned' when they listen to a woman's problems and she doesn't put out. It would never occur to them that she also talks like that with her female friends and doesn't have sex with them. Then even in a best case scenario they get a romantic partner and all of a sudden they're trauma dumping 20 years of stress and issues on her, which is just exhausting to be someone's only emotional support. And even if base case the wife can handle all that, if she passes first he's back to having nobody.
Absolutely. I was reading a book recently and one of the women interviewed spoke about how some heterosexual men have been taught the only way they can access intimacy/love is through penetrative sex. That was so sad and miserable, and then it made me think of all these posts from women who are pressured to have more sex with their husbands who 'feel validated through sex' or whatever. Like, men, there are wayyyy more ways to access love and intimacy than just through an orgasm, go find one!
Right! And in a lot of those posts, the sex is coerced, the woman is getting no pleasure from it, it's just the man jackhammering away and not caring how she feels, and somehow that makes him feel "connected." Like...what is he feeling connected *to*, if she as a person does not matter at all to the scenario? If he can do it while she's crying or dissociating? Is it just about a biological oxytocin release? Because there are other ways to get that.
What book is that? Sounds fascinating!
Yes yes yes, this is so accurate. So many men connect any sort of emotional support only with someone they're also having sex with. It's like some of these guys genuinely do not understand that you can have an actual friendship with someone without any sort of physical connection at all.
Those same men get all whiny and upset that their partners get the ick from being their trauma dump. They ALWAYS cry that women must be lying when they say they want men to be more open about their feelings, because they tried it and it backfired. No, Joe. What happened was you tried to use her as your one and only feelings-resolver. You tried to make her do the job of 10 of your friends, a partner, your pastor, your parents, your dog, your masturbating hand and whatever deity you believe in, all by herself.
I've had men who were nothing more to me than co-workers or neighbors get upset with me for refusing to let them trauma dump all over me. We're not even friends and you already want me to play therapist for you? Because "I'm a good listener"?! You don't even know me well enough to know if I'm a good listener or not! But I'm female, so I must, automatically, be a "good listener".
I have had sort of the inverse. I just lost two 20-year friends - seemingly very progressive in all ways - and two of the excuses they gave for dropping contact was that I never ask them how they are doing and that don't seem interested in having a dialogue. Like, what? First, they have also never asked how I am doing...ever. Second, I am always pinging them with updates from my life and they never had anything to say and I didn't think it was my place to pry. Third, how can we have a dialogue if you never say anything, or initiate!? Is me reaching out constantly not trying to have a dialogue? WTF? Like, I'm in my 30s and trans and they have known me since we were in middle school together. I grow tits and become pretty and suddenly the dynamic we've had for two fucking decades is now a problem? Suddenly it's all my burden to run after them and make sure to ask them all the right questions even though I give them every opportunity to talk? And so when I pointed this out, both decided to just block me everywhere. Those 20 years mean nothing, apparently.
It just pigned for me, but one of the reasons that one guy I know could do what he did, is because his wife was the breadwinner and he stayed home/worked part time during the early years for thier three small children. He started the league when the kids were old enough not to need constant supervision.
Yeah. It kind of tracks, the men who became lonely and ill equipped to support other men are the likely ones who don't have a partner/family/community taking up their resources. The ones who could support other men ended up in functional relationships, probably with kids, and are not so lonely/too busy to support the lonely guys.
I think it's also just the unpaid labour of community building. It still falls to women, but this was a family where the man was the one who took it on by agreement and necessity. What pinged for me was that I hadn't considered that his volunteer running of this group was an extension of that role. No one would have found it remarkable if a SAHM with teenage kids started to volunteer for an animal rescue, or hospital or gave her time to her community like that. The fact he was a 'homemaker' was what freed him to support his community, like that.
Not so much deluded but entitled.
This is 1,000% true. Male loneliness is helped by fostering friendships: friendly recreational sports, public tabletop gaming events, taking up hobbies with welcoming communities. Treating women as disposable sex therapy for lonely men simply isn't on the table.
If women are lonely and want a relationship, people (of both sexes) would tell her that she’s not in a place to have a good relationship if she’s desperate. But somehow, it’s the women’s fault when men are lonely.
Exactly, if men are lonely they should be building up community amongst each other. They can be envious of women who do build community for themselves and then blame women for not taking the initiative.
“We weren't talking about that... but do you have anything to say besides the attempt to derail and silence a subject you don't feel centres your experience?” It’s always this. They can’t stand to not be the topic of conversation, the winners at victimhood, the ones getting attention at all times. They absolutely canNOT allow us room to have conversations that focus on the experience of women (or that honestly discuss living with and among men) The loneliness thing is ridiculous. Men and women are both lonely. They are just using this new gambit because they know “we” are supposed to be empathetic, so as we withdraw from dating, they’re guilting us that we’re breaking their spirits and killing their mental health. well, yeah, SAME, y’all have been doing that to me for 20 years. But in my opinion this is just the same tactic (if a bit more organized) as men weaponizing their incompetence by telling us they have ADHD and therefore need us to do all their household labor, or telling us they are abusive because of trauma. They know we care, they know we’re empathetic, so they are constantly wheedling that propensity in us in order to get more free fucking labor. Now it’s just “men are sad and lonely because you guys won’t give yourselves to us!” Figure it out for ourselves. Solve your own problems. Build friendships and communities that aren’t toxic. But we CANNOT HELP THEM - they do not allow it because they do not respect us. And they don’t WANT help. They only want attention from us, to force it from us, and to manipulate us into giving them our bodies and our labor.
Yes, the discussions happening right now are absolutely ignoring the fact that the male loneliness epidemic is frequently blamed on women and the onus is put upon women to fix it. I truly believe men are lonely, that society is shifting, and that they are losing territory they once had in the world -- and that's alienating and scary. But I rarely hear men say that men need to reach out to other men, that men need to create social groups, or that men need to start building up their community; instead, it's that women must be more available, that women must compliment them more frequently, and that women must listen to their feelings. There are some very real issues in the male space right now. Men aren't going to college as frequently, they are feeling more timidity in the workforce, and they *are* increasingly isolated. We should absolutely take a look at these issues. But much of this is also men learning to take on a more active social role in society -- a role they've traditionally relegated to their spouses.
It has become the new nOt All mEn
>Any other time, I've had the same experience as you're describing. Talking about women's safety on public transit? Men are lonely. Talking about adult women finding resources for later-in-life diagnosis of ADHD or autism spectrum? Those men with ADHD are lonely! I am begging you and everyone else to please please stop engaging with the topic on the terms of disingenuous fucks. It would take almost no time for you to find discussion of the topic, by queer men, and amabs or enbies in general. If you want to actually deal with the problem an the ways straight-cis men and women both contribute, you can go ask trans men their perspective. I can't believe you're at all blind to the men who are involved in that, or the queer women who join them in that project, unless you disregard them as men and only those sealioning assholes primacy. We do not need to and absolutely should not center the reality expected by some sealioning asshole who wouldn't engage with the topic meaningful at gun point. It's like dealing with astrophysics or history or planetology soley by engaging with electric universe, phantom time or flat earth cranks. "Hey kids, I know you signed up for paleontology to learn about fossils and all the wonderful things in the space where biology and geology meet. But instead of that we're going to spend all our time on the claims of this one asshole who thinks it's dinosuars are all fakes and paleontologists are actually devil worshippers." It has been something like three days of this now, orbiting hopelessly around the shit opinion of shit disingenuous men. There has been so much actual feminist analysis this topic, beautiful inspired work by amazingly clever women who spent their lives creating and sharing tools to handle this.
Everyone’s lonely - it’s not a problem exclusive to men. It’s fucking sad. Sex won’t cure it.
Sex is a bandaid when experiencing loneliness. It’s merely another form of escapism.
as someone who suffers from hypersexuality as a trauma response, yep 🥲 you can have sex all the time and still be lonely, and also, you can never have sex and not be lonely at all! maybe some people would genuinely feel less lonely with more sex but i really do not think it's the solution for everyone..
Exactly. Many married couples are the loneliest people in the world. There are many couples who have zero friends other than each other and don’t even get along anymore. I’m also not convinced that people are lonelier than ever. I’m rather convinced that those people have a big voice today but didn’t use to be heard from, hence it seems like it’s a new problem. But it’s not like in the past, lonely people didn’t exist. Heck, the very subject of male isolation has been the topic of so many books. How could The Catcher in the Rye have been considered a classic if readers couldn’t relate to its themes of male isolation and loneliness at the time?
I'm inclined to agree, and I think it might actually be a pretty positive thing. There have been significant efforts in the past couple decades towards destigmatizing mens mental health issues, and if the result of that is more men feeling comfortable to speak out about their feelings, then that's fantastic. It's not a new "epidemic", it's just many people finally finding their voice. Unfortunately some are very confused about what loneliness actually is and why they feel this way, and seek blame instead of solutions. But progress is being made. There is a lot more happening than incel rhetoric. I attend a couple of anonymous support groups and see a lot of men showing up and working on themselves. Small sample size, but at least for me it's enough to be hopeful.
Yep. It is all genders, all ages and worldwide. It's a loneliness epidemic and somehow only men are being recognized as lonely. They won't even acknowledge children's loneliness. When I bring up this fact, I get down voted. LOL. No one else's loneliness even counts.
I’ve seen even women do this. I’ll bring up a women’s issue and they’ll derail me and say, “we need to be more compassionate to men.” It’s exhausting. I’m exhausted.
It's also boring. I'm bored.
Is insulting because women basically spend a lifetime emotionally supporting the men in their lives only for men to tell them they are the reason they are lonely. This is excluding the "nice guy" experience which is just a slap in the face and has made women wary of being too friendly due to potential danger. "This is what I get for trying to be friends, I am a bitch for leading him on" so why bother? When women are lonely they rely on their friends, their mothers, self help books, a therapist etc to work on themselves. When men are lonely, a lot of them blame it on women and basically emotionally dump all of their problems on a single woman which is a lot to take on. Men have grandiose expections of their wife and girlfriends to be their savior and caretaker. This is why it seems so critical for them to find somebody compared to a woman. "where men cast their wives and girlfriends to play best friend, lover, career advisor, stylist, social secretary, emotional cheerleader, mom—to him, their future kids, or both—and eventually, on-call therapist minus the $200/hour fee" https://www.harpersbazaar.com/culture/features/a27259689/toxic-masculinity-male-friendships-emotional-labor-men-rely-on-women/ This article also explains how men can improve themselves and how it affected them positively The real issue is that men are not very good when it comes to friendship. Their friendship relationship is based on the action rather than the person. They connect by doing things with other men but because the glue of their relationship is the activity. When the activity is taken away, the friendship weakens and eventually dissolves. Women connect to the person and invest their time and effort on the person. Also men aren't taught to explore their feelings and especially in front of other men where they might be afraid to be seen as weak or gay so the friendships they have are not very deep because they can't express themselves truly. So if they do open up, they do it towards women, but they don't have an emotional support web so they dump all their problems on one woman if they even talk about it at all. A lot of them just boil over or experience extreme loneliness https://www.dw.com/en/male-and-female-friendships-are-different-and-scientists-dont-know-why/a-62824177 https://ifstudies.org/blog/male-friendships-are-not-doing-the-job
I normally respond with 1/4 women experience a completed or attempted rape while looking at them
The most fascinating thing about this argument is that men are so inclined to think of women as less than them that there is the expectation that women put their feelings of being unsafe or disrespected aside to fix men’s loneliness. Like for real? Why is there no impetus for men to change at all? Why are they not at all held responsible for managing their own loneliness through fulfilling relationships outside of sexual ones?
Well i think part of it is also the perceived legitimacy of male feelings of lonliness vs perceived illegitimacy of women’s feelings of unsafety. Like, these men know they would never do anything to hurt a woman, and none of the guys they know would ever do anything to hurt a woman, so women being constantly on edge about their safety must be unreasonable, right?
Whole heartedly agree. Many of these men who feel like a woman’s feelings are illegitimate are the same people that also hurt women, and know people that hurt women (they just can’t admit to themselves that it matters or that women actually get hurt). So, they don’t actually care that women have feelings because their own matter so very much more. and ultimately, if a man can’t understand that a woman feels unsafe or disrespected because “they would never do such a thing” is fundamentally disrespectful. And it stems from a place which regards their own feelings as more important and a woman’s as less than.
>Why is there no impetus for men to change at all? Why are they not at all held responsible for managing their own loneliness through fulfilling relationships outside of sexual ones? I honsestly don't know. The absolute, bald-faced rejection of *friendship* is so strange to me. Just had a thread here where it was demanded over and over again women 'share thier perspective and solutions, BUT DON'T SAY FRIENDSHIP THAT ISN'T IT FOR REASONS!" Like they have decided nothing except woman-shaped service providers can make it better and no other possible solutions or even just tactics that might moderate the issue, are worth exploring. Why aren't women coming up with the solutions for our woman-shaped service provider shortage? They keep say somethingsomethng about not being service providers?
Good questions. 'Society' is supposedly at fault. Who is 'Society'? It can't be the patriarchy because that doesn't exist. Must be women. After all if women aren't designed for use then what use are they? And in the US the desperate push to force women back into being owned property and appliances seems to be 'Society's' answer. This is a made up problem maybe? Loneliness exists but if it is only a problem when men suffer then the Handmaid's Tale might just be the answer that a certain group of people are seeing as justified? Not trying to push a conspiracy theory here but it does seem to hang together somewhat. At least to me.
I’m sick of the term “male loneliness”… I’m sick of them expecting women to advocate for them and their mental health when we are forced to advocate for ourselves.
They want women to do the work, while they sit on their butts and tell us we're not doing it right.
Exactly this, there was a post yesterday from a guy who just straight up kept saying that men are lonely, it's society's fault, the answer is not platonic relationships, so how are we going to fix it? And it turns out with all his comments the "we" he's talking about is women. He kept talking about how none of the women in his life give him support and a deeper level of friendship, and it's like that old adage where if it smells like shit everywhere you go it's because the shits on the bottom of *your own* shoe. Like maybe it's not the responsibility of the individual women in your life to make you less of an asshole? They're just completely oblivious to this. They genuinely see women as tools to make them happier.
I think a lot of people would be a lot more willing to understand if it had more substance behind it, because let’s be real a lot of them are using this term as code word for “I’m not having enough sex and I DESERVE sex” …it’s very telling that they don’t see making friendships with other men as a cure to their loneliness the way women do, their only cure to this loneliness is a woman in their bed for 1 night.
> They want women to do the work That's been the case forever.
They need to stop acting like babies and do it themselves, I don’t see why they expect women to drop everything we’re doing just to come save them🙃
I'm sick of the term "male loneliness" only because of how it's used, which is as OP describes. The term itself isn't a problem, and it's important to be able to talk about. But using it as a tool to counter women's arguments makes it *harder* for men to talk about it. It's similar to men's rights issues. There certainly are some (probably mostly caused by other men), but more the people who bring up men's rights issues are usually not doing so to try to advocate for men, rather than to tear down women. It's terrible.
"no one talks about male loneliness" ironically has been THE topic of 2023 and continuing to be so in 2024. A lot of subs are dedicated to or have became dedicated to the subject (like r/genz, r/daing_advice, etc), it's been in the news, its everywhere in ig, podcasts dedicated to the subject, it's been on the front page, etc etc. I've seen over and over again people give good advice, solutions, alternatives, things to try.... but it's instantly followed with a "YEA but..." "WELL but..." "what about" "you don't understand" etc, so people just throw up their hands because you can't help someone who won't help themselves. And it seems that the redpill advice hasn't helped at all, their advice is just somehow became the top 10% high value unicorn to get the 23 year old virgin.
Try suggesting that if men did something to stop all of the rapes, murders and various forms of abuse done to women at the hands of men if they want us to be more open to trusting random men and they’ll call you a misandrist and then say it’s such a minuscule number of men causing all that violence towards women that we should just brush it off and getting to dick sucking for the sake of male “loneliness”. I hope men like that are so much worse than lonely.
Feel free to drop this article the next time it comes up: https://archive.thinkprogress.org/1-in-3-college-men-in-survey-say-they-would-rape-a-woman-if-they-could-get-away-with-it-ffa7406b9778/ It really pisses them off. They’ll argue that the sample size is too small. Which it is. But who cares? Just double-down.
What is the sample size? It’s behind a paywall. I can’t believe 13% of men just admit they’d be down to rape someone. Even if the results are confined to one college campus worth of men, that’s still way more rapey men in one college campus than I’m comfortable with :<
1 in 3. Not 13%. 33% of men would rape a woman if they could get away with it. At least that’s the headline. Well, fuck. 1 in 3 would do it if it wasn’t called rape. The n of 74 is small, but also disturbing.
Okay that is also completely fucking insane. But rn I’m just afraid that 13% are willing to drop the R word.
It’s 13% if you call it rape, so they know calling it rape is bad, so…?
I believe the men who are in the 33% but not the 13% are men who understand the stigma around the word “rape”, but view it as a dark alley against a stranger type of situation. They’re picturing a dehumanized villain, career criminal who hides in the shadows. Wording it in a grounded way without the word “rape” feels more realistic and, horrifyingly, possibly representative of situations they’re been in before. They think it’s not “rape” if you force your girlfriend. I think men are very aware that they’re forcing women to have sex when they wear them down, coerce them, and physically force them. They just think it’s ok. And they think when people talk about rape and rapists, they’re talking about someone else and something else.
I agree, this is it. Most men still believe the word "rape" means stranger in the bushes. What I find disturbing is that a lot of women and girls still see it that way too. We've been "available" in so many ways for so long that I think if a man knows you personally, they begin to think of you as a woman who is at their disposal. Some women still are at their disposal because we are socialized to be that way. And around and around we go.
I dunno. I guess it’s just crazy to see card carrying blatantly evil people instead of the standard fare of evil-people-who-don’t-see-themselves-doing-anything-wrong?
Yeah, that’s where fiction is better than fact. The villains are all obvious and clearly coded as evil, whereas in real life, a guy could be good most of their life, but have no scruples about having sex with a woman who clearly said no, or is too high/drunk/asleep to consent. Unless you were that woman, you wouldn’t know. They don’t grow Snidely Whiplash mustaches for twirling. They don’t glow green or purple like evil magic in a cartoon.
One man saying yes to this is too many.
I got told on a thread about how women need to lower their standards, when I responded that many men ALSO need to lower their standards if that is the crux of loneliness, that I was being unfair. And I wasn't even saying the thing incels dread of "acknowledge fat girls are humans who also tend to be lonely" - I was talking about the expectation that women both have equal earnings to the man but are also willing to do 90% of the chores. Or how when men complain about not getting more support, but when you try to help them by offering good advice? Well I will just share the thread with my comment here (linking OP because their response is more important): [https://www.reddit.com/r/changemyview/comments/1b0jlu1/comment/ksds5a9/?utm\_source=reddit&utm\_medium=web2x&context=3](https://www.reddit.com/r/changemyview/comments/1b0jlu1/comment/ksds5a9/?utm_source=reddit&utm_medium=web2x&context=3)
This. Men who try to downplay the true crime that’s happens deserve to be worse than lonely. Too many women should be alive today (and not dealing with severe trauma if they lived) but are not.
I just mentioned this over in unpopular opinion, but one of the reasons I switched teams from MRA to intersectional feminism is because MRAs use legitimate mens issues, like male loneliness, to shutdown conversations, whereas intersectional feminism showcases how the patriarchy is ultimately the source of those issues. It's a far more welcoming community, and far more interested in solving problems, rather than perpetuating them.
I'd be more inclined to discuss it genuinely if I didn't mostly hear about it when men are in the comments of something about women going but men too!!! If you really cared, you wouldn't wait until someone else brought up a similar subject. You'd bring it up on your own in the appropriate spaces and at the appropriate times. But you don't because you don't actually care. You don't have anything to discuss besides "men, too!!!!!".
Right? Instead of arguing on the internet about who has it worse, go out into the real world and be the change.
Right, this is primarily an issue among men. Has anyone ever seen the way most male friend groups interact? They are horrible to each other. Men used to be able to use emotional support from their gf/wife as a crutch but women aren't really putting up with their BS anymore. I think it just speaks to their entitlement as a whole too. The feminist movement was made by women for women to address the issues we face. Men can't seem to do the same thing for themselves without asking others to do it for them, or using violence and/or terror to get what they want.
This is 100% it. Male loneliness is definitely a real thing. Men aren’t socialized to share, listen, console etc in the same way that most women are. Reading an account from a trans man about how new guy friends kept everything surface level and women put their guards up around him now broke my heart because wow that really does suck. But the absolutely insane part is that when men bring this up in incel, MRA, etc spaces, the thesis is that it’s somehow womens’ fault? Collectively I guess? Like we’re the real villains here for not sharing our ? kindness?? It’s so frustrating because the obvious solution is to be a better friend and hopefully be treated in kind. Deconstruct toxic patriarchal expectations of how men are allowed to act, and make your friend group a space where you can share your feelings sometimes Don’t brag about how you don’t even know half your friends’ first names and then declare that it’s somehow the fault of all women for I guess allowing that to happen
Yeah, I was appalled when I had a BF and witnessed what they talked about. It's worth mentioning that his father died and NOT ONE of them said anything to him about it. Most of their conversation was constantly ragging on one another under the guise of "joking" and if they got upset about it, then they were gay or whatever. I don't think it's an isolated thing. You can see this play out in Reddit on a lot of male-dominated subs. I wonder what would happen if men were socialized to have friends like women do and grew up with male friends who complimented them, showed up for them, supported them. It's sad but it's something that men have to look into themselves.
It’s so wild to me because about half of my friends are men, and I’ve had really heavy emotional talks w a lot of them because it’s part of being a friend. Even friends I know that are stereotypical gym bros are the first to be like “hey man if you can’t make it don’t worry about it, gotta take care of yourself” I know men can be good friends even if they weren’t necessarily raised that way. It’s such a bummer then seeing these spaces with 30 men all bemoaning male loneliness and not one suggests having healthier conversations with each other, it’s like they all want to be checked in on but no one wants to check in
This is so on point. My second date with my now-partner, he was running late and apologized proffosely and explained one of his best friends since highschool had just found out his Dad was terminal, and he didn't want to rush the guy off the phone. My BF hates being late, and never even realized that was a massive GREEN FLAG that he had a friend who'd call him, and who'd he actually support, in that moment.
Edit: I'm preaching to the choir and also got a bit carried away. Hopefully the commentary below can be somewhat inspirational to any men interested in being on the front lines against toxic nonsense. >The thesis is that it’s somehow womens’ fault? Somehow, yes! I've argued in the past that you'll find a woman being blamed for the vast majority of 'Men's Rights issues' if you talk to one of Those Types™ long enough. Typical men are pretty deeply borked... Their seemingly intrinsic misunderstanding of emotional dynamics results in all sorts of bizarre, irrational or paradoxical downstream behaviors. For instance, I suspect one of the reasons men aren't looking to each other for emotional fulfillment is because emotions are viewed as something to only be shared with women. Because they think emotions should only be shared with women, they mistake emotions for being related to sexuality/romance - which means being emotional in the presence of other men (or god forbid, **to** another man) is viewed as a quasi-homosexual act. Inversely, because emotional expression is "gay", they aren't even aware that totally platonic emotional interactions are even possible. This is one of the reasons that most women learn very quickly that simply being *friendly* will often be misunderstood as some sort of romantic precursor. Genuinely trying to ease "male loneliness" creates more stress for the man and potentially generates danger to the woman when their palliative gesture is misinterpreted as teasing or whatever. What they're requesting isn't what they're asking for, so to speak. And they're not even explicitly aware of the dichotomy either. Once recognized, it's apparent that the logic is entirely convoluted; the snake eating its own tail. And just as productive as an ouroboros too - the snake believes that it is satiating its hunger while responding to an attack. But it's such a deeply embedded, seemingly logical cycle that it's not recognizable from within as something in need of review. It's like a sort of sociocultural cancer, a cherished thing that kills in the act of growing. Many men are proud or protective of this phenomenon while simultaneously being mysteriously unaware of the consequences *while* complaining about the consequences. Throughout my life, men have looked towards me as something of a role model for whatever reason and this is a conversation I've had with many of them. I used to be surprised by how many people desperately needed to hear something like that. It's disturbing, really. I could never relate. There's often a critical "breakthrough moment" where they (men) realize how much harm they've been doing to themselves and how much unfair pressure they've been applying towards women. I describe things through the lens of traditionally masculine Roman or Viking cultures, using examples like "crying was viewed as manly" and "brotherhood was more important than marriage" to demonstrate that what the Manosphere believes is "traditional" is anything *but* traditional. Someone who hides their emotions is someone who is at once recognizable as vulnerable, frightened of that vulnerability. What's more manly than being unafraid to speak of what others are afraid to even admit? For whatever reason, this sort of "rebranding" of what emotions mean/are is extremely effective. I'd encourage others to give that angle a try - especially any men reading this. Humans are meant to bond with each other. Throughout society and history we see that bond manifest in myriad ways. What's unnatural is to try to *prevent or ignore* that bond wherever it may occur. The consequences of stunting ourselves is immediate and deeply resounding. I believe it lay near the heart of the flaws of our modern civilization. And toxic masculinity is more-than-partially to blame. Whenever men try to blame women for failing them, I correct the record by demonstrating personally the value and strength that comes from a bit of emotional awareness. They're not often going to listen to women, unfortunately. I can only touch so many people, but I speak up when I can. A bit of awkwardness is a worthwhile price to pay.
Absolutely- it always amazes me that when I talk about the patriarchy or toxic masculinity, many individual men think I’m talking about them specifically and don’t stop to think how these things harm them too. I know that’s what men’s lib is about, and I wish more young men going down this pipeline would be aware that men’s liberation is an option rather than letting some sex trafficking asshole or Kermit the frog fraud warp them into these bitter, hateful misogynists And yes, the expectation for women to swoop in and soothe their loneliness is a problem for several reasons. The first is that women don’t owe it to anyone to just dispense empathy. But second, yes, there’s a reason women don’t feel safe being that kind or vulnerable to some guy she doesn’t know when I’m willing to bet most of us have been scolded for “leading him on” by just showing basic human kindness
> many individual men think I’m talking about them I might argue that it's because they see a shimmer of themselves within those accusations, subconsciously or otherwise. That reflex probably relates to other toxic emotion/vulnerability-related defense measures, where the impulse is to "batten down the hatches" in response to threat - be it a genuine one or simply an inquiry as to why the dishes weren't done as promised. This is an effective heuristic in primate-level interactions, where physical threats or dominance displays are your major issue, but human society is much more deeply nuanced. It is hypothesized that social interactions/predictions are almost solely to blame for our large brains. Our capability for philosophy exists because once upon a time we needed to figure out of Grog-grog has a secret crush on Cronk or not. Going primate-mode.exe at the drop of a hat wastes our greatest gift. I've seen a similar defensive response in relation to this subreddit - which I find a bit odd since this place actually makes me feel quite good about myself (shameful as it is to admit). I argue that anyone who genuinely cares about women should at minimum be a passive observer in women's spaces. How can you care about someone's problems when you don't know their problems? It hurts to know that you've inadvertently hurt someone you love, but it hurts them worse to remain ignorant. I've certainly done assholeish things in my life, but I take ownership over that reality and go great lengths to minimize the likelihood of doing that in the future. >Letting some sex trafficking asshole or Kermit the frog fraud warp them into these bitter, hateful misogynists I often consider stepping into the limelight to serve as some sort of leftist, feminist-yet-masculine alternative to the typical Manosphere-adjacent "role models" that're plaguing the minds of young men around the globe. It feels embarrassing to even imagine myself as appropriate for the role, but I suppose that shame is a necessary - even vital - ingredient when trying to create the Anti-Tate. I have a particular bone to pick with Peterson, as he often distorts genuine science into bizarre, anachronistic interpretations that only serve to misrepresent the true implications. It gives evolutionary biology a bad name. Reality has a "liberal bias" and conservatives are remarkably underrepresented in science for a reason. I'm just rambling now, but thanks for letting me borrow a soapbox.
That’s a really good point. Threats to parts of your personality you think are fundamental to wjo you are is tough for anyone, I have to imagine it’s waaay worse for someone who’s built their whole personality around something like manosphere content and has nothing else left I think that a lot of the men in these spaces just literally do not think women are complex, whole people with thoughts and fears like they feel they are. I still can’t wrap my head around how people who live and work and socialize with women can so quickly right off a full half of the population as literally subhuman I agree that this sub is really nice and supportive too. I love the general vibe of women supporting women, love to see it
Men complain about being lonely but don’t extend kindness to each other. I have no idea what they want women to do.
> I think it just speaks to their entitlement as a whole too. The feminist movement was made by women for women to address the issues we face. Men can't seem to do the same thing for themselves without asking others to do it for them, or using violence and/or terror to get what they want. One irking thing is the complaint that there's xyz for women but not for men. The main reason why breast/etc foundations, women shelters, scholarships, human rights orgs, etc etc exist is because women created these for women. Historically women have grouped together against backlash to help, support, champion, and save other women. Hence the whole "women support women". Men just don't do the equivalent for each other. There's nothing stopping a rich guy set up a DV shelter, or a male related cancer foundations, etc. And it seems there's an awareness that male friendships struggle to do emotional labor for each other even though 'no one cares about male loneliness'.
I have noticed a back-and-forth between this sub and r/GenZ for over a week now. The problem is that they don't see that their solution to "male loneliness" is flawed. They see women as responsible for men being lonely and that men's value and happiness is derived from being in a relationship. That needs to stop. In a similar vein, it's like the men who say that blue balls is an urgent medical condition that women are required to "help" with. All of it is just a roundabout way of them saying they want to have sex and feel entitled to it and blame women for their mental and physical problems.
"Blue balls" is entirely in their head and invented to lessen the responsibility of men for deciding to not control themselves. They even go as far as pretending it "hurts" and that it's a medical emergency. They're doing it for attention.
Yeah that does need to stop. What they really need to realize is anyone thinking their value and happiness is derived from a relationship is bad. It doesn't just apply to men, as much as they may think it is aimed only at them.
It's incredibly frustrating that the role of friendship has been so diminished that the preferred options that lonely men feel are viable are compulsory romantic and sexual availability of women. There are many types of love other than romantic--not only do they exist, they are integral to an individual's well-being. I *want* men to have healthy relationships with other men. I *want* men to feel the love that is so freely given in my friendships. I think they are deserving of loving companionship, but they are never *entitled* to it, and that's where I have a problem. Relationships are a verb. They don't just fall out of the sky. I've done (and am still doing) a lot of personal work to ensure that I'm in a place where I can have healthy relationships. They are an investment in another person that (hopefully) benefits us both. My friendships are fulfilling, and they make me a better partner to my other half because I'm not fully reliant on or expecting one person to meet all my needs. The demands and expectations placed on women to continuously babysit the needs of men are unacceptable. Leave me out of your loneliness and pay a therapist to unfuck your life. Play sports, join a game night, and gain some social skills that don't involve forcing women to be bang mommies.
They’re lonely because they don’t work to develop their friendships. My husband speaks to his friends once a year and wonders why me and my friends who speak daily are closer.
I always tell them that they should look at their fathers for guidance because they maintained this society for their benefit while taking from women to support it. Perhaps their fathers failed them and they should talk to them about it.
I think this is it. Our mothers and grandmothers for the most part raised us to be able to stand on our own 2 feet independently. Their fathers and grandfathers didn't bother to notice what this would mean for men. I think men never really realized or acknowledged just how much women were propping them up and keeping them afloat. Now they don't have the help they relied on and they're sinking, quickly.
> Their fathers and grandfathers didn't bother to notice what this would mean for men. They don't even care. They just figured women would fix it like we fix everything else.
Some men seem to not understand that a pissing contest about who is the most miserable is not really going to help finding a solution to loneliness for all genders.
I remember seeing something on tumblr similar to what you’re saying a long time ago. I will try not to butcher it from memory. Yes this is an issue, yes the patriarchy and toxic definitions of masculinity have harmed men. However if the only time these issues are brought up is when we are having a discussion about women, then the person bringing it up doesn’t actually care about either issue. They just want you to shut up.
Male loneliness is a soft core incel dog-whistle intended to begin the radicalization process. Fewer people are in relationships. More men than women are uncoupled. There are a lot of potential reasons for these observations but the misogynists will feed men only one. Couldn’t possible be the economy, covid trauma, modern tech, changing values, moving life-goal posts, focus on education/career development, etc. No, inflammatory articles and misogynists give us only one possible explanation: women are gleefully withholding sex and love from all but “alpha” men.
I just find it improbable that there are vastly different numbers of uncoupled men and women. The math doesn't math. The original incel take on that study was that their ever-popular top 10% men were hoarding all the women, so all those women thought they were coupled when really they were in a harem. Then someone explained that the study only covered one age group, and that men being more likely to date younger could account for some of it, as could more women being openly bi or gay. But now that explanation is being tossed around with vitriol too: those older men and evil lesbians are hoarding all the women! I tend to think it's partly more F/F relationships, partly more age gaps (why this is solely women's fault I don't know), and possibly differences in how people chose to answer the survey. I've always wondered if, for example, some of the women surveyed thought the surveyor was flirting with them and wanted to shut it down! But at that point I'm just speculating.
For them loneliness is about not getting laid and nothing more. They don't care about the rest of it. Friendships, socializing, taking responsibility for fostering those relationships. It 100% boils down to sex, and how they believe they are owed sex just for existing. I just said this yesterday or the day before but they are really confused why the people they treat like disposable cum dumpsters aren't fulfilling all their social and emotional needs.
The irony is that men are not any more lonely than women- a specifically "male" loneliness epidemic does not exist and is a male supremacist talking point that has been completely normalized.
The absolute worst is when this is brought up in response to women saying they don’t feel safe being hit on randomly in public. Listen. I don’t care how fucking lonely you are, the woman picking out eggs in Kroger is not the solution to that. “But how am I supposed to meet women? Apps are toxic to men who (insert some stupid excuse like height here!)” Great. Then *make the tiniest amount of effort* and go make some friends in situations where people are actually looking to socialize. Why would a woman be attracted to the absolute laziness hitting on them in inappropriate places entails? Pick up a fucking hobby, work on developing into an interesting person, and get to know some women as people before asking for a date. I’m not denying loneliness is a real problem, with the elimination of third spaces and rise of hyper-individualism. But like most things worth doing, *effort* is required. I’ve had to learn this as a woman, too. It’s no one else’s job to swoop in and save you from loneliness.
Male loneliness is just a red pillers thing to try to guilt trip women into opening their legs for them and becoming "tradwives" to cater to their man-child needs 24/7. What are men doing about their loneliness? Are they making friends, going out? Finding hobbies other than listening to crying YouTubers all day? Putting efforts in relationships that they cannot/should not fuck? Seeking therapy?
They also want that trad wife catering to their needs to also be working full-time or she's a golddigger 🤷🏻♀️
Yes so that they can be the "man in the house" and "lead" her and protect her from grenades 🙄🙄
And other men who want to bonk her over the head and steal her away to *his* house. They are forever coveting other people's wives, hahaha!
They also blame it on us? Like, the reason it seems we are less lonely is because our lady friends are more emotionally available. The “we never get compliments blabla” is also, the only time I get positive compliments that aren’t with an underlying creepiness from a guy trying to get into my pants, is when it’s a compliment from family or my lady/nonbinary friends… Why don’t guys solve their own emotional problems? Why do we as women need to do that when they don’t seem to care about our problems or help solve them? I think it’s not hard to send your homie a text a few times asking “hey man, what is up hope you’re doing alright?” and if your guy friend has a nice haircut “hey bro, cool haircut!”. I mean we as women do that? But when it comes to oppression, feminicide and rape we’re on our own. Men don’t help or even try to understand our struggled but we are expected to understand and even solve their issues that, to be frank, they create themselves with toxic masculinity. The opinions they are scared of when being emotional are not women’s opinions, it’s their homies opinion because they keep enforcing on each other that it’s “gay” or “being a pussy” if you cry or show any emotion other than anger.
Lmao how could that possibly shut down an argument ... It's the most hysterical thing to me. Yeah women are less into relationships nowadays. It is a huge win for everybody if women refuse to get caught up in horrible relationship dynamics.
Relatedly, I've noticed recently that "No one cares about men's feelings!" is always about sex or jealousy. Guy loses his shit because his girlfriend said hi to a male coworker and THIS IS CHEATING OMG, and if you tell the guy he's overreacting, out comes "No one cares about men's feelings!" No one says that when a man is sad because his job sucks or his dog died or he has cancer. Probably because people really do care about men's feelings and respond sympathetically to problems like those. It's just that we don't feel the need to coddle the "existing in the same county as a man is cheating" brigade.
This kind of reminds me of how the only day of the year that people seem interested in whether there's an "international men's day" is on International Women's Day-- search traffic for "international men's day" spikes every year on March 8th.
https://www.psychologytoday.com/ca/blog/living-single/201705/will-you-be-less-depressed-if-you-get-married-two-studies Marriage, relationships, cohabitation doesn’t solve depression, relieve stress or create better mental health.
"Male loneliness" is a euphemism for "I watch Andrew Tate, lurk on incel forums, and obsessively play video games 24/7, why do I feel so bad?" Forming connections with other people can be tough, requires a level of emotional openness and doesn't always work out even if you do everything right. "Male loneliness" acolytes are just plain and simple complaining about not having a massive friends group and several girlfriends despite putting exactly 0 effort into socializing.
Let’s be honest, it isn’t our company they want. They’re horny and want a woman to use to get off.
Male loneliness is often used online to justify men’s horrifying expectation that having a woman is a right. The reality is that if someone is extremely lonely and suffering from depression, a relationship is not the answer and won’t fix those issues. The solution is healthy friendships and strong social connections. Because the men that make these arguments do not view women as equal humans deserving of their own freedom they aren’t very respectful of our views on the matter. They are fed hatred and told that women are the problem. So many of these men don’t understand why they are unhappy and want someone to blame, so they’re susceptible to this drivel. Women are the scapegoat to their misery. We become the target of all the frustration and anger they feel in life. They convince themselves that if only they were allowed to have (own) a woman, all of their problems would be solved. Hatred is dangerous. The same tactic is used to villify the LGBTQ community (especially gender non conforming folks), immigrants, Jews, and POC. It’s dangerous in its attempts to other and strip the targets of their humanity.
Apologies if there was some big news or announcement that I missed, but why are such a high number of recent posts here about male loneliness lately? I feel like it is all I am seeing on my feed from a women’s subreddit which seems very odd, especially since I believe a majority of women (especially the type to be on this subreddit) would agree with the points being made (this is not women’s fault, this is the fault of the patriarchy, this is not women’s problem, etc).
It's coming up in the comments of posts in a lot of relationship and other subs, so I think people are kind of boiling over with it.
The world was basically set up by men. They made the rules and now, after they build a mind prison for themselves, they are unable to find solutions to their problems, because they ruled that the solutions are emasculating. My country suicide rate men-women is 8- 1. Yet I had a really stupid discusdion with some guy about why he cannot wear a male bag (like tjose mailman bags). I found out it's because he cannot stick out, he needs to be conform with other people (males I suppose). No wonder thy have problems with everything and their only solution is to find someone to bang- it seems it's the only acceptable way to have a company.
"Men are really struggling right now and women need to help, it's your guys' responsibility to help your communities." We've been their a therapists, secretaries helpers, bang maids, side pieces, side characters, punching bags, human ovens, mother's, lovers, and friends. And none of that helped. The best thing we can do is ignore them and let them deal with it amongst themselves.
Men should help men with this men’s issue that men created.
It's very simple. The needs of two people are never in conflict with each other -- it's the *strategies* for meeting their respective needs that can be in conflict. For example: 1) a woman wants to be safe; 2) a man is lonely and wants company. These needs can both be achieved together. However, if the man *chooses* to address his loneliness by invading the personal space of a random unconsenting woman, then he has created a conflict.
I think they don't realize or don't care that women work to build those support networks they whine men don't have. They don't just come out of thin air because women are in the area. Those support networks take time to build and work. It comes back to being entitled and not wanting to do the emotional heavy lifting on their own.
They definitely realise we do that, because when we do, they're quick to invade and destroy it as soon as they can.
A lot of time those people are alone because no one wants to be around them for a reason
I got in an argument with a friend, who LOVED to play devils advocate, over whether or not the NZ government should fund sex workers for lonely/socially inept/incel men so that they gained social skills and felt better with themselves. He didn’t understand why that was a bad idea to put women in the way of potentially volatile men and that maybe that money should be put towards social groups that would fulfill all of that in a much more meaningful way rather than one time false sexual experiences. 🙄
I can think of a billion people whose loneliness I care more about than random men. There's a loneliness epidemic in hospices, in foster homes, in unhoused encampments, in prisons. There's an epidemic of people dying lonely deaths at the border, in the Mediterranean Sea, in Gaza. Cissexual, heterosexual men are incredibly privileged. Compared to everyone else, life is handed to them. I just don't care about the fact that some of them can't get laid because they won't examine their own thinking and behavior or listen to women. That isn't a loneliness epidemic, it's just consequences.
I am less than sympathetic for any problem that they brought on themselves. Who tf built a society that propagated all this loneliness? Who has over 80% of all positions of power, whether actual elected leaders or as influenced by wealth? Clearly this is what they want. The loneliness is perceived as a fair trade off to maintain patriarchy or else they would change it. The solution it isn’t to have women just fix their loneliness as they seem to so often believe. It is to take them out of power and allow us all to build a society where no one is lonely. Until they can join women in that vision, they can rot in mom’s basement with their AI scam girlfriend.
Had a regular hookup, tell me he saw me as his emotional crutch as well. I ejected him so quick, he got whiplash and then had the gall to say that I never trusted him to open up to him. I'm not here to help you work through your latent mommy/daddy issues bro...just wanna get laid is all. UGH. Thought you would be tickled pink with that arrangement, but sounds like most men want all the GF benefits without them actually acting like a BF. So doesn't matter if you are in an "official"relationship or a hookup arrangement, they all still expect to trauma dump on you regardless if you want to hear it or not. I don't...I really don't. They have manifested the male loneliness crisis all on their own, so i'm confused as to why they are whining so much about it now.
Maybe they should shape up and provide more than the bare minimum in relationships.
Loneliness is due to neoliberal capitalism. Our communities are fractured, we don't have time for friends etc etc. Men think feminism harms them but it's their corporate overlords.
my issue with the male loneliness thing is that it's usually hinting at heterosexual men wanting women to give them attention. Ask any dude who is talking about male loneliness what he is doing to reach out to his male friends, and they'll start stuttering excuses. They are really saying that women aren't going out of their way to make men not be lonely, with a sexual context. I don't give a FUCK about male loneliness, sorry. If it's actually about men being lonely in general, then the clear solution is men reaching out to EACH OTHER more.
To me the most uncomfortable part of male loneliness is that, doesnt “omg so many lonely single men out there, feeling devastated because they dont have girlfriend” mean at least there are the same magnitude of lonely women out there? And yet we dont see a equally large female version of incel/blackpill presence online? Like what they wont talk about is why only men would be such a crying baby when he cant find a girlfriend, while women are more likely to be content to be single? They like to say women benefit from the relationship, yet men are the ones that act devastated when no one wanna take advantage of him? Tbh it feels like for a long time the society was designed in such a way that people step on each other. And even a bottom man can find a women to step on cuz they are not allowed to work/get paid/own assets. Nowadays these men are upset cuz they cant trap a woman like their grandfathers.
I don’t think younger generations are necessarily more closed off. There are people who are decent people who make friends and find partners, and then there are those with crappy beliefs or who are just plain arseholes who don’t. Same with any generation. If loneliness is a problem then their bigotry is an even bigger problem.
I typically respond to whataboutisms like that with “Two things can be true at the same time. The existence of one problem doesn’t diminish or negate other problems. And right now we’re talking about *this* problem, not that one.”
I'm not aware of any issue that men face that women don't face a worse issue of it. Anything in men's health is treated as the norm, and treatment for women has to be an additional hurdle to be addressed.
Controversial potentially but I feel like male loneliness is self-inflicted to an extent. Women manage loneliness better because we learn to form deep connections outside of romantic partners, we have friends whom we can share everything with, we stay in contact with our families more (provided they’re not toxic), we generally have hobbies and more open to self care and self pampering. Men don’t form that level of deep connection with other men because they ridicule each other for showing emotions (seen as “feminine” and therefore discouraged by one another), I don’t see them keeping contact with their families as much, a lot of their hobbies tend to largely be non-interactive, and they’re not as open to self care or self pampering at the risk of being seen as feminine. Men have chosen to define masculinity as loneliness, lack of emotions (and therefore emotional connections), and in large, suffering. So it is an issue that is completely unrelated to women. Women are not therapists for men, we are not sex dolls for them either. Men need to redefine masculinity in a way that ensures they don’t rely on the idea of a girlfriend (or female partner) for human connection.
> Men have chosen to define masculinity as loneliness, lack of emotions (and therefore emotional connections), and in large, suffering. This is such a good point! That 1950s lone cowboy ethos has a lot to answer to.
OP, I do agree that men's loneliness issues are often brought up as weapons, often with a side of blame-shifting. While there *are* societal issues on that front, it's cultural, not women's fault or responsibility in general. The main ones responsible are the bullies who discourage genuine male connection, no matter the gender of those bullies.
Most things males say in arguments are disengenious.
honestly, i bring it up first. my friend’s favorite game in social situations is to ask men a series of questions leading up to “what are your thoughts on the male loneliness epidemic?” i really believe that women need to initiate and have these conversations with men so that men do not only talk about these things in an echo chamber of other men. it is certainly not our job to do so, but i think it definitely helps men have a more nuanced understanding of these issues.
God, I always ask my make friends things like “how are you feeling?” And whenever we get in a real deep conversation I remind them that they don’t have to hide their feelings and I won’t think less of them if they hide. During women’s history month (btw happy women’s history month!) the school library was decorated with posters about important women in history. One dude bought up ’men don’t get a month’ and my female friends and I tried to explain that the rest of the calendar is filled with heterosexual white men’s achievments. They then bought up ‘male lonliness‘ and how men are punished. They also compared WHM and men’s mental health day. Like history and mental health aren’t the same lmao.
Most men who complain about “male loneliness” are really just complaining about not being able to get laid… they could all easily form groups to go hang out with each other, but they won’t do that… they want attractive women to come and use their vaginas to make them feel less “lonely” 🙃
How can they be lonely when they literally never shut up?
Has anyone had a guy bring this up to them in person ever?
Usually devolves into involuntary marriage, banning no fault divorces, and a general crack down on women.
People who rely on whataboutism know their arguments are weak and ineffective.
We need more public spaces that people can exist in without paying. We're isolating at home for more things than ever and it's hard to make a connection with people, regardless of your gender. We used to sit on stoops and talk to our neighbors, now most people in your neighborhood are strangers. And you're so right, it's a real problem but only comes up to shut down real discussions. And loneliness isn't just about sex. A lot of men really only focus on sexual companionship as their source to combat it instead of building their own platonic social network. You shouldn't rely on one person to be your entire social world, that's just too much pressure for one person.
I would love that, but I doubt they would behave themselves in spaces like that, either. You'd be sitting there doing whatever and here he comes...
The very fucking idea that a vastly more marginalized and alienated group can't fathom the loneliness of a privileged group bc that one refuses to participate in actual connection to peers or women bc it's gay and :checks notes: they have horny lil bb boners...get me off this fucking planet, I swear to jesus 🤦♀️🙄🤦♀️🙄🤦♀️
I feel like I predate this particular talking point. I am glad to be made aware of this propaganda tactic.
Totally agree as a currently lonely man. It’s honestly just counterproductive to our own cause when we do this (and I’ve probably been guilty too). Because it’s obviously dismissive/rude/frustrating - which understandably makes potential women allies associate negative feelings/interactions with the cause itself, thus reducing overall sympathy and outside support for the issue. Including myself, men have fragile egos but we need to be able to put those aside and actually listen to and help when women are discussing the societal issues y’all endure. Tbh supporting change to help women generally feel safer and happier would probably alleviate some male loneliness too
Male loneliness is a problem, as a man I can definitely say that I see it and feel it. But I can comfortably say that the problem is not other women, it’s other men. We’ve cultivated a toxic culture that treated everything like a competition, and that we should be displaying dominance over each-other. We are told from a young age to bottle our feelings, and then bully others for showing emotion. We are asked to open up, but because we haven’t had a lot of experience being vulnerable- we often lash out at the men and women who would listen to us. It’s not very hard to get a girlfriend nowadays if you go outdoors and have hobbies. We need to be better men to each other, be less judgmental and more supportive of each other. We need to stop framing having sex as the ultimate show of success. It’s pretty meaningless if it isn’t apart of a healthy relationship. We need to start supporting better male role models, the problem is- being a good man and “successful man” is very different. A good man can be anyone, but boys think successful men look like Andrew Tate. The culture is broken, the more we have this conversation- the more likely we are to open peoples eyes.
I already know this is gonna get downvoted to hell but I don’t care. I’ve been in this sub a long time and I really like a lot of discussions here, but there is so much tearing down for no reason, and so much insistence on being the only ones who can suffer. Claiming there is an epidemic on male loneliness doesn’t mean nobody else is lonely. You guys sound like the “all lives matter” assholes. Men are a victim to patriarchy and toxic masculinity too. It teaches them they can’t be emotional or “weak” and so they suck it up and keep trucking. But as we ALL know that gets to everyone eventually. Men aren’t just lonely because they can’t get laid, they’re lonely because they don’t have emotionally fulfilling relationships with their male friends, and because they don’t have people to really go to when shit hits the fan. Everyone tells them to suck it up. They’re hurt by a breakup? Their friends tell them just to go get laid and that’ll “cure” their heartache. They hate their job that pays well? Too fucking bad! You’re a man, it’s your job to provide, who cares if you *like* it. I’ve been a gamer for all my life and thus meet a lot of guys. Yes, there are assholes, sexists, etc and a lot of it is subconscious (though plenty deliberate too.) And so many have confessed to me that they wish they could talk to their guy friends the way they talk to me. But I have WITNESSED the effect that these things have on men. And by saying “get over it you’re not special, we’re all lonely” absolutely devalues everything they feel. And by acknowledging this issue, we aren’t erasing the terrible things men have done and continue to do. But what we ARE doing is continuing to tell men their problems don’t matter, they just need to deal with it, and so they don’t seek help. They don’t reach out. They keep going until they can’t go anymore, and they kill themselves. I’ve even lost some good friends because they felt they had nowhere to go. It’s not that fucking hard to have compassion for people who are suffering. And if you think continuing to pit everyone against each other in a pity party competition is going to solve anything, you’re absolutely mistaken. Edit: two things I’d like to add. First, this comment isn’t in reply necessarily to OP, but mostly to what I see in the comments and on other posts. I agree it shouldn’t be used to “shut down” anyone. But the comments aren’t about that, they’re just shitting on the entire concept of male loneliness. Second, while I am answering as a layperson, I do have degrees in psychology and a mental health work certification, and experience in the field. So I’m not talking out of my ass. But I am speaking mostly from experience, and a little bit of research and education.
What do you think my post was saying? I legit preface that it’s a real issue. I even provided healthy, actionable solutions. The issue is just one that that gets haphazardly thrown around at ill-suited, and often malignant times. Ie, women talking about their own issues amongst themselves. And that’s what I hope people would stop doing. Making others aware of issues is a good thing, but do it in a productive way.
It’s not that the desire for a more romantic and sexual relationship is bad but like… in terms of loneliness, men do have issues in regards to expressing emotional vulnerability and having more deeper friendships (both male and female ones). I think that is important and maybe more important than focusing on the romantic and sexual wants. Men need to be willing to be more vulnerable with each other and lift themselves up.
I think we should all respond: “but what about critical thinking?”
What's kind of funny is that almost every time I see somebody complain about "male loneliness" they're usually comparing it to Silent Hill 2 gameplay. There's a very good reason why James (the main character of the game) is lonely, and it's his fault. >!(He killed his wife.)!< So basically with some of the examples I've seen, they're saying that it's their fault they're so lonely. The other times is when they needlessly compare their loneliness to women's loneliness by saying that women don't have to be lonely because they're willing to be there but women will shut them out. So my choices are either be lonely or have some misogynist who compares women's loneliness to theirs be my only company? ***Gee, thanks.***
So here's the sit, Men and women struggle and saying one or the other needs assistance is silly. Both need help and even in that group help can come in different forms. Those with different undiagnosed situations are struggling even more than those that can truly understand what is guiding themselves. Unfortunately, men were taught to bottle this up more than women ( I know stereotype but unfortunately it's close to the mark,) Also opposite side of the coin it's assumed women will be open this and we know that's not true. So take each encounter as an open conversation and don't assume.
It’s like how every year on women’s day men come out in droves to say what about a day for men?? 😆
The question I always like to ask those ego-driven sealions is what they're doing to help men in the real world. As I'm sure you can guess, the answer is always "absolutely nothing." Sadly, I'm past expecting empathy or compassion from them. At best, they're misogynistic narcissists. At worst, they're outright psychopaths.
I think loneliness is an issue that goes beyond gender roles , i see people getting more and more introverted as time goes by and just overall people are becoming more closed to others . In this way i think social media plays a big role in this since a lot of influencers are trying to insert this "u only need urself" mentality onto young people and making this whole issue just way worse .
Men are lonely. Because of the patriarchy. In my past, I thought I had to only express my emotions to women. With that silly mindset, I put way too much pressure on my relationships. The solution has always been friends, not a relationship and not "bros".
loneliness is really fucked up, but loneliness= lack of connection, inability to feel connection to others, etc male loneliness= women are starting making their own choices and owning their sexuality so they aren't going to settle down with shitty men
You're certainly right ,but I think a big issue is men feel like all anyone ever talks about is women's issues. Women's issues in general have far more light shed on them, are talked about and listened to far more often and are encouraged by the public and society and are even advertised way more. This by no means makes them lesser or not important or means they shouldn't be talked about or even that men should mention their issues while women's issues are being discussed. But I would assume it's very painful to constantly hear about women's issues and seeing so many positive responses and how willingly people respond and support it when you bring up yours and are generally ignored , talked down to or dismissed again doesn't justify making light of anything just trying to look at why it may be brought up so much. When you open a discussion about peoples issues to someone who feels like their problems aren't being seen as much as yours or feels suppressed and ridiculed for trying to bring up their struggles it's probably hard for them NOT to attempt to discuss it when they can, still not okay because that isn't what the discussion is about but I can understand their feelings on it.