So there is a loneliness epidemic caused by capitalist alienation. However, I wonder if lack of material conditions also adds to this. I just keep seeing lots of my broke guy friends depressed because they can’t find a partner and it is so hard for them to meet new people. This makes me wonder if their financial situation is the main reason.
Absolutely, but one factor that is overlooked on the matter of romantic relationships is the manufacturing of unreasonable beauty standards, especially of women, most men are looking for a “trophy” wife, and that limits much of the people who they look for to begin with, or reduces the motivation to start because they feel that “lowering their standards” is a failure so why even bother?
So I think that it is a cumulative pile of factors that reaches that point, by the side of women toxic masculinity, regular systemic misogyny, in particular domestic abuse, could probably play a factor on the issue too.
Other things are as I believe you mentioned, the tendency of capitalism to individualize peoples lives and for sure not having the means to go out and do things that are viewed as couples things like dinning out going to the movies, or going to the bar,or equivalent,with your friends as well, and the fact that being broke makes you put most of your energy into not being broke, and the rest of it into managing how to.survive on such few resources
What is “women toxic masculinity”?
Could be the rarer-in-comparison potential for some women to paradoxically demand toxic behaviors out of men in their relationships, or worse(which I have personal experience with), women performing the same kind of lack-of-consent, ‘if you don’t want to fuck you’re less of a man/a b[redacted]/a f[redacted], this that and the third’ flavor nonsense-- F.D. Signifier has spoke on this a little, but always clarified that it is way rarer than the male-spurred exercise of toxic masculinity; so I rly don’t know how much bearing this notion of “women toxic masculinity”(sic) has on the issue.
Either way, I consider it an issue less pertinent to politics and more to interpersonal dynamics, which all those factors are FUBAR right now mostly because a still-substantial percentage of men aren’t willing to work on themselves in ways to actively dismantle the toxic paradigms they’re living with.
There’s also the disturbing rise of “femcel” groups like /r/FemaleDatingStrategy, which seems to mirror the toxic ideology and tactics of incels. A large part of that is basically women doing the PUA thing to get a trophy husband, though that’s largely in economic terms (salary might be prioritized over looks).
You mean to tell me that wasn’t just a false-flag bit the incels were perpetuating? Those are fuckin real?
Oh yeah, classic case of “the dream of the oppressed is to become the oppressor”. I went through that subreddit a while back and was shocked to see how toxic and fucked up a mirror they’d made of incels.
Lots of advice on abusive relationship tactics and how to be effectively controlling and manipulative. It read like a bunch of sociopaths trying to outdo the redpillers. I sympathized somewhat because I got the sense that many of them were victims of abuse and considered it a way to ensure they wouldn’t be victimized again.
Serious “fight fire with fire” vibes.
Edit: Looks like that subreddit is dead now, and they’ve moved on to another platform. Maybe they were risking a ban due to all the rabid transphobia.
Totally normal approach to dating. A relationship is a zero-sum game for domination and control. So why not play to win?
Really disappointed I didn’t see more complaining about the current meta. It’s totally pay-to-win.