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Occasionally we are told that there is an epidemic of "male loneliness" or "male sexlessness" - an increasing number of young men are going long stretches of time with few or no sexual partners. But why is this a problem? Why should anyone care except for the sexless males themselves?
Evolutionarily, men have always been the disposable gender - the average male was historically much less likely to produce any offspring than the average female. In fact, depending on which estimate you go with, the average male is still significantly more likely to reproduce in a first world Western country today than he would have been historically. So why is there such concern over this particular dip in fertility?
You might say that a high number of sexless males is more likely to lead to violence and social instability - but plainly, that hasn't happened so far, certainly not on any appreciable scale. It's never been harder to imagine actual widespread social unrest occurring in the modern West, given how thoroughly people have been anesthetized with material abundance and cheap entertainment. (This question has been raised a few times recently, about the possibility of the culture war "going hot" over the Trump verdict or the border crisis or whatever - I am of the opinion that no, it won't "go hot", and such a development is essentially unthinkable at this point). Plus, certain MENA societies provide a case study in how you can have a resilient social order where the majority of women disappear into the harems of rich men and the majority of men are left sexless - these may not be pleasant places to live, but the society is capable of reproducing itself all the same.
What if the incel problem is downstream from the problem of marriage and therefore relationships being unattractive arrangements for both men and women, but especially men? This just came to me, but I used to be a loner guy. Pretty much the entirety of my 20's was spent alone. Tragic from a certain perspective, but I'm not crying over it. Now that I've had girlfriends I'm struggling with the idea of actually staying with one long term. Not because I'm emotionally, intellectually, or otherwise incompatible with the women available to me, but I just don't see the point. I take on all this risk and responsibility... for what? They take on a dependent role and have children (probably unattractive for them) for what? The answer can't just be sex. I feel like everything that once made marriage an attractive or necessary arrangement for both parties has been totally eroded and now we're just running on the fumes of the fuel that once made marriage desirable.
The implicit point of this analysis isn't that men have become especially unattractive and this is what's fueling the loneliness epidemic, but that the clear obsolescence of marriage has taken away any motivation for men to become attractive to women and to actually try.
Women probably feel the same thing and aren't trying to be "marriageable" in the way they once might have, but their role as the selector makes the problems that result from this societal issue seem less serious, though obviously they are feeling the effects as well. I think most women want to be married with kid(s) eventually, but invisibly, imperceptibly, their opportunity for accomplishing this passes them by, and they either have to settle for a man they otherwise wouldn't have if they knew what the deal actually was in their youth, or they go it alone.
You should have kids. It’s incredibly, unbelievably rewarding. Unless you’re literally on track to be the next Lincoln, having kids will be by far the most meaningful and impactful thing you do. And kids need a stable family life, so you should get married first.
I'm begging the people who push this line (which is true on its face) to actually run some calculations and estimate for the class how many actually marriageable women are available in the pool.
How many are single, heterosexual, haven't had kids already, are not grossly overweight, are not riddled with mental disorders, don't have a huge bodycount or any Onlyfans, and are actually interested in having and raising kids in a committed, monogamous relationship.
Otherwise you're basically telling guys to go bobbing for apples in a tub full of acid.
If you’re middle class, live in the downtown core (rather than fat suburbs) of a major coastal city and are under 30 and dating under 30 year old women then…yeah, there are a pretty large number of these women, tens or hundreds of thousands of them depending on where you are. Certainly enough not to ‘give up’.
If you're living in a city the number of male suitors is going to be large as well.
So it seems likely that the males are going to be in a state of hypercompetition until they get lucky enough to pull an eligible woman. And many, many won't get so lucky.
And the harder the males compete, the less worthwhile the actual reward is, which will lead some to "drop out."
The stats on males without relationships seem to bear this out.
Why is the number of eligible men higher than the number of eligible women? 5’6 Salvadoran construction workers and 6’ software engineers and guys in the hood with records aren’t competing for the same women.
Multiple reasons. At least partially because of stuff like this:
https://nypost.com/2024/06/14/sports/bill-belichick-72-is-dating-24-year-old-former-cheerleader/
A 70 year old man can date a 24 year old.
https://www.elle.com/culture/celebrities/a45069426/who-is-leonardo-dicaprio-girlfriend-vittoria-ceretti/
A 50 year old can date a 25 year old.
https://www.cnn.com/2015/07/05/us/billy-joel-marries-girlfriend-alexis-roderick/index.html
A 66 year old can marry a 33 year old and pop out two kids with her.
Literally any heterosexual male aged 20-80 can try to compete for the same pool of desireable 18-30 year old females.
And social norms aren't pressuring against this. No, this isn't limited to celebrities, those are just the ones that get attention.
Every single 20-something woman taken off the market by an older man is one less available for the young men. Which by definition will decrease their chances of finding one.
Stats bear out that women are significantly more likely to be dating or married to a "much" older man than a man is a much older woman.
And young men can see these headlines and realize what it means for them.
Then of course there's my point that women are using corporations as a substitute for husbands
So men have to compete with megacorps, too.
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