5 ms·

Why men are lonelier in America than elsewhere

10 points by axiomdata316 5y ago

haspoken 5y ago
https://archive.is/TGWDo https://archive.is/TGWDo
newbamboo 5y ago
- iab 5y ago
  Lonelier relative to men in other countries, it’s not a competition
uberman 5y ago
I can relate, after the birth of our kids, I have invested almost everything into my family. I spend energy ensuring my wife and kids lead happy fulfilled lives, my former life be damned. I don't regret it at all, but I do occasionally grieve for the end of other aspects/phases of my life.
- timellis-smith 5y ago
  I'm in my 40s and am exactly the same. All my energy goes into work and family and at the end of the day, there is nothing left for cultivating friendships. I tell myself that when my daughter grows up and I have more time I cultivate friendships again (though I may have forgotten how to).
rektide 5y ago
Men are often very tied to their sense of progress/making it in the world, & it's not just the tax of doing the work that makes driven people lonely. We're alienated from others, who are on different paths & who we feel will be hard to relate to. Whatever rate the friendship grows, distance will probably grow faster, as our experiences take us in different directions. How likely is it this is going to be another person who I won't be able to share my best parts with, who won't be on my level? Is what's left going to be enough? And we're alienated from ourselves; we keep close the dreams & visions of better selves, who haven't quite made it yet. It's hard to relate to others honestly because we believe in a self that's better than we are, believe in a not yet found edition. Relating the past is easy and safe, relating today is ok, but to be able to speculatively imagine & make real our better, upcoming selves: now there's a journey that's hard to engage in. Last it's hard to guess whose even worth investing in: who has the depth of character to be a rich rewarding friend, who has the time to share & enjoy, who walks a path that will be interesting? Honestly there's a lot of aspects of maleness that spike my misandry, that I don't like; how long will it take to find out all the reasons I won't like this potential friend?
timellis-smith 5y ago
> In childhood, she says, boys tend to be as open as girls about their need for friends. As they get older, they “feel they have to get into a gender straitjacket” and define their masculinity primarily as not being feminine. By the age of 15, many boys start saying they don’t need friends and worrying that close friendships will make them seem “girly”. This “clash of culture and nature”, Dr Way says, is much more marked among white boys than black ones. Is it just me that is angered by statements such as this? For me it seems to tie in with the thinking that the male is a defective female. Im my experience, men make friends by doing things together. For me it's no coincidence that the men I am closest to at any one time are my work colleagues. I wonder if the structure of schools hasn't changed, and as has been discussed here before, whether schools just don't cater for what boys / men need anymore.
- gromitss 5y ago
- naikrovek 5y ago
  > For me it seems to tie in with the thinking that the male is a defective female. men are defective females in a lot of ways, though the causes of those things are cultural and not anything inherent about being male. maybe "emotionally damaged or stunted people" is more appropriate than any gender-assigned positive or negative traits. my parents ruined me in a lot of ways, especially my mother. I'm male. I still carry her selfishness and shortsightedness with me decades later in a few damning forms: A) it is very hard for me to view myself as being worthy of the attention of any healthy female (the emotionally healthy females I've known agree that I am unworthy), B) my desire to attain even the most meaningless forms of approval from females gives those very females an extremely strong sense that I am horribly broken and to be avoided, and C) I am almost exclusively attracted to women who ignore me, manipulate me, or actively try to distance themselves from me, which is not surprising because those are the exact same interactions which constituted 95% of my relationship with my mother until I was in my mid-20s. so yeah I am a defective person, a male, made defective at the hands of a female who simply hated me (her words) for being born. (as if I had a choice.) lots (lots) of therapy means I can analyze this and understand her motivations, somewhat, but it doesn't really heal me on a fundamental level. I just won't ever be acceptable to women that I am attracted to, or wish to know on a personal level, because I am broken enough that I can only ever scare these women away. now, to the point: the fact that no men in my childhood stood up for me, reassured me in any way, or did literally anything other than say things like "suck it up", "be a man", and "are you sure you're not a girl, you're really sad all the time HAHAHAHA" and the like, tells me that yes, men actually are like defective females in a lot of ways, especially in terms of emotional awareness and emotional health.

10 points by axiomdata316 5y ago

haspoken 5y ago

https://archive.is/TGWDo https://archive.is/TGWDo

newbamboo 5y ago

iab 5y ago
Lonelier relative to men in other countries, it’s not a competition

uberman 5y ago

I can relate, after the birth of our kids, I have invested almost everything into my family. I spend energy ensuring my wife and kids lead happy fulfilled lives, my former life be damned. I don't regret it at all, but I do occasionally grieve for the end of other aspects/phases of my life.

timellis-smith 5y ago
I'm in my 40s and am exactly the same. All my energy goes into work and family and at the end of the day, there is nothing left for cultivating friendships. I tell myself that when my daughter grows up and I have more time I cultivate friendships again (though I may have forgotten how to).

rektide 5y ago

Men are often very tied to their sense of progress/making it in the world, & it's not just the tax of doing the work that makes driven people lonely. We're alienated from others, who are on different paths & who we feel will be hard to relate to. Whatever rate the friendship grows, distance will probably grow faster, as our experiences take us in different directions. How likely is it this is going to be another person who I won't be able to share my best parts with, who won't be on my level? Is what's left going to be enough? And we're alienated from ourselves; we keep close the dreams & visions of better selves, who haven't quite made it yet. It's hard to relate to others honestly because we believe in a self that's better than we are, believe in a not yet found edition. Relating the past is easy and safe, relating today is ok, but to be able to speculatively imagine & make real our better, upcoming selves: now there's a journey that's hard to engage in. Last it's hard to guess whose even worth investing in: who has the depth of character to be a rich rewarding friend, who has the time to share & enjoy, who walks a path that will be interesting? Honestly there's a lot of aspects of maleness that spike my misandry, that I don't like; how long will it take to find out all the reasons I won't like this potential friend?

timellis-smith 5y ago

> In childhood, she says, boys tend to be as open as girls about their need for friends. As they get older, they “feel they have to get into a gender straitjacket” and define their masculinity primarily as not being feminine. By the age of 15, many boys start saying they don’t need friends and worrying that close friendships will make them seem “girly”. This “clash of culture and nature”, Dr Way says, is much more marked among white boys than black ones. Is it just me that is angered by statements such as this? For me it seems to tie in with the thinking that the male is a defective female. Im my experience, men make friends by doing things together. For me it's no coincidence that the men I am closest to at any one time are my work colleagues. I wonder if the structure of schools hasn't changed, and as has been discussed here before, whether schools just don't cater for what boys / men need anymore.

gromitss 5y ago
naikrovek 5y ago
> For me it seems to tie in with the thinking that the male is a defective female. men are defective females in a lot of ways, though the causes of those things are cultural and not anything inherent about being male. maybe "emotionally damaged or stunted people" is more appropriate than any gender-assigned positive or negative traits. my parents ruined me in a lot of ways, especially my mother. I'm male. I still carry her selfishness and shortsightedness with me decades later in a few damning forms: A) it is very hard for me to view myself as being worthy of the attention of any healthy female (the emotionally healthy females I've known agree that I am unworthy), B) my desire to attain even the most meaningless forms of approval from females gives those very females an extremely strong sense that I am horribly broken and to be avoided, and C) I am almost exclusively attracted to women who ignore me, manipulate me, or actively try to distance themselves from me, which is not surprising because those are the exact same interactions which constituted 95% of my relationship with my mother until I was in my mid-20s. so yeah I am a defective person, a male, made defective at the hands of a female who simply hated me (her words) for being born. (as if I had a choice.) lots (lots) of therapy means I can analyze this and understand her motivations, somewhat, but it doesn't really heal me on a fundamental level. I just won't ever be acceptable to women that I am attracted to, or wish to know on a personal level, because I am broken enough that I can only ever scare these women away. now, to the point: the fact that no men in my childhood stood up for me, reassured me in any way, or did literally anything other than say things like "suck it up", "be a man", and "are you sure you're not a girl, you're really sad all the time HAHAHAHA" and the like, tells me that yes, men actually are like defective females in a lot of ways, especially in terms of emotional awareness and emotional health.