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Even though it hasn't been talked about much here, probably because an average TheMotte user skews older, none of this stuff is new to the internet. It's no secret that having status, charisma and being attractive gets you far in dating, and in life in general. I think there's an interesting conversation to be had about how could one solve this issue at scale. To me, and I've talked about this multiple times on here, it all comes down to screen time. Screens are competing for every minute of our free time, and they are winning. What's easier? Going out on a friday night with the boys (expensive, requires planning and effort, payoff uncertain) or playing some games and then scrolling tiktok until you doze off? You just had a tough week at work, you deserve some rest. Screen time it is. Many people, both men and women, are just opting out from living their real life. It's especially hard to make a case for men to 'waste' their time on all this dating bullshit when it feels like you have to pretty much be James Bond (status, charisma, looks) - look at the list you wrote. Just going off anecdotes, none of my older relatives had to be an all around great man^tm to get into a relationship. My dad was a recently divorced junior engineer (never been to the gym, smoking, drinking, -7 vision, greying at 32) with a son when he met my mom. My (much) older half brother met his (very pretty) wife while being a piss broke bartender with a huge gut and round face due to all the alcohol he consumed on the job. I'm sure stuff like this happens nowadays too, but at much smaller scale. Everyone is glued to a screen, opportunities to be around another gender in an environment where it's encouraged to mingle are almost nonexistent, and hypergamy is making it feel like you have to be at the top of life before you even shoot your shot. So, somehow reducing screentime, while also increasing opportunities for men and women to interact in a natural way would solve dating issues for a lot of men. Israel's birthright, a free 10 day trip to Israel for young jewish adults, where they purposefully group up participants with people of similar age and opposite gender doing their mandatory IDF service, comes to mind.
This is still answering on a personal level, but I think Scott's take on "micromarriages" is a nice framing here. https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/theres-a-time-for-everyone
That is, frame going out with the boys and being around girls as a win in and of itself. The attitude is the same in poker: praise yourself for making the right move (probabilistically) even if the pot doesn't go your way.
I wonder how we can encourage that attitude as a society. Maybe celebs start #nophonefridays where everyone goes out without their phones. Maybe establishments start offering some sort of stamps for showing up to events, which can somehow be turned into actual clout or gain.
I'd like to see better public social spaces. Bars are kind of the default, but they feel like a particularly economically extractive kind of space. It does feel like a waste to go to a loud, crowded bar, and buy overpriced drinks for a woman just to get the chance to socialize with her. Where's a place where someone can just drop a $25 and have a nice environment to chat and meet new people?
There are all sorts of social coordination problems that religious gatherings solve. Volunteer organizations too, but they tend to be a bit more sex segregated. I've never heard of anyone IRL meeting anyone (friend, romantic, other) at a bar (I'm an older millennial). A bar is where you go with someone who has already agreed to a date. Most people I know met people at college, a club, or church, then at some point invited them to a bar. Which makes a lot more sense, it's risky to go out with someone who doesn't have any mutual friends, and is unknown in one's social circle.
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You don't have to buy drinks for women to socialize with them at bars. It's also possible to find chill bars where you can have a conversation at a normal volume. Unfortunately, alcohol is terrible for health.
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You'd be shocked at how many deny these basic realities.
But outside of that, you have a good point. As i mentioned before lack of socialization is really killing us here, but this post is geared slightly toward what an individual could do to max out his chances in the context of the current state of affairs (though i would like to see boys raised with these 4 things in mind)
It's not just a lack of socialization, but a kind of mal-socialization that seems to now go on in schools and institutions. You don't just have to learn the basics, but you also have to unlearn the bullshit ideas and habits and norms you've been acculturated into. It's like having to move to another country and integrate into a foreign culture.
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Eh, I would agree with you if we had this conversation 8-10 years ago (height of body positivity era). With rise of looksmaxxing, glp-1s into mainstream even the slowest of the bunch are admitting the obvious.
fair enough. You made a decent list. I do think it's important to not tie self improvement to getting into a relationship. Going out to dance, while hating it as an activity on its own, is an easy way to start hating yourself and life if expectation of getting a girlfriend out of it is not met.
Also dancing/bar scene has bifurcated a lot more into 'people who love clubbing' than it would have been a couple decades ago when there were less entertainment options.
I have an objectively hot female friend who would be a total catch for any guy. Very confident, green flags around being able to fit in with guy-groups, heaps of hobbies, etc. She's single at 32 and doesn’t seem to have had meaningful relationships, and isn't hooking up or anything.
Got to talking about her dating life. I asked her why not go to a bar. She said "do I really want a guy who does bars and clubs at 32?"
I do think she's holding out for a top 5% earner who's tall and handsome.
She's done a recent round of dates off apps. Nobody got a second date. She's seriously disappointed with the type of guys she has available to her. And my thinking is that most great guys (ha) are probably locked down by a great girl (ha) at that age.
She did the career thing, and has somewhat waited out the pool of guys that she considers worthy of a relationship. She's probably going to settle for somebody at one point and be somewhat quietly disappointed.
If she had planned to start looking seriously for the love of her life in her 30s and expects that she'll have the same success, as measured by the "quality" of the man, as the women who make this their top priority from the time they're 19, she's in for a bad time. The really good ones--both men and women--are locked down early, as you've surmised. By prioritizing career, she's made a tradeoff, whether she realizes it now or not. There is no "having it all".
Of course, there's always black swan events. If, against all odds, she finds her doting 6'4" doctor with the chiseled abs and jaw, she'll be on reddit's
r/askwomenover30in a few years giving really bad advice to people who will then be in the situation she's in now.It does need to be said- focusing on becoming a normie housewife(after all, you basically cannot be a career oriented woman without college first, which is going to last longer than that) starting at 19, or in the right circles perhaps 16 or 17, has fairly good odds of working out.
But this woman does not want that. They want a ‘high value’(they and I may disagree on the definition/relative importance of terms here) man. That 6’4 doctor is not going to marry a woman without a college degree. If she’d focused on this at 23(I don’t know how she would do this, but assuming she did) rather than on career advancement, sûre, she’d have had better odds of landing the high-powered husband. But wealthy men do not marry waitresses.
Male doctors mostly marry other doctors and other healthcare professionals, probably for reasons of availability. I'd be surprised if they cared whether their partners have a certificate, a 2 year degree, or a 4-year degree. (less surprised if they had some preference for or against other doctors)
Medicine's particularly tricky to get with normies due to a combination of relocating a lot during peak years and absolutely brutal hours. Most top tier earning/educational professions don't have the same risk of being banished to the middle of nowhere for 3 years in order to get residency or specialization requirements out of the way.
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How many doctors marry CNA’s? I’d imagine ~all of healthcare working male doctor spouses are doctors or RN’s, near the top of the hospital hierarchy, not the legion of phlebotomists and nursing assistants below them.
There is still a very strong correlation between woman’s education and her husband’s income.
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Well, not the first time, anyway.
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Agree on all points. I mentioned in another reply that in addition to her real monday-friday job, she is also a qualified physio and is still working at a hospital on sundays. I'm guessing she has half a chance with a doctor who comes out of a bad break up or something.
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I can understand not liking the nightclub scene. But I would give the laidback bar a chance; I see mostly older people at a lot of these places, and they are one of the few third places still around to find people today.
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What hobbies? Can't she meet any interesting people through said hobbies?
A huge variety. The usual chick stuff, she does pilates, has a side gig cake making business, works a second job at a hospital as a physio on sundays (I suspect her plan with this is to meet a doctor), studied data analytics in her spare time, mostly for fun and to help her with random tasks at work. She's done a lot of different dance styles, coaches high school gymnastics.
She also does charity work.
Whether you're interested in those things or not, she is definitely out there doing things. And compared to the average instagram scroller, she might be in the top 5% in terms of extra curricular activity. And she's a thin, blonde, athletic looking person. She's attractive.
I'm not single, and I'm more her big brother type of work friend. I would never date her because she's got way too much going on in a week to week kinda way. But there's a lot of guys who would be able and very willing to match her energy (I would have though??)
This is the point where I start laughing hysterically.
No. No, there is not. The reason I say this is because I do know of atleast one person who does match that energy - and the amount of hoops that he had to jump through to find someone who did match him was... well, it wasn't herculean, but it was definitely more than one and definitely more than you'd expect given the guy in question.
Ironically enough, to a medical doctor. Albiet, one who was still in school, but she later graduated and started practicing. So.
If anything, you detailing her list of hobbies explains pretty much everything about her and why she's having so much trouble.
If she does end up happily married, it'll likely be through a remarkable conflux of near impossible events. Or she unexpected matches with someone that's her total reverse, I dunno.
I'm sure the people do exist who'd match her energy, just in the modern world of dating-app brain a lot of 'matches that would be perfectly successful if arranged marriages/strong family introductions were still a thing' end up getting nuked since the dude held a fork wrong on the first date and she gets irrecoverable Ick.
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They may be entirely gender segregated hobbies.
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The good guys (Doctor who is a 10 or whatever) are either locked down or full time dating app lifer whose stuck in their own stasis of go nowhere hookups.
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Or not. At least from my PoV, it seems that one part of the relationship recession is women who got a wrong impression what kind of guy they can realistically have a long-term relationship with and what real relationships entail, and after seeing the reality that is possible, they decide to forego long-term relationships altogether. And as you say, these women often don't sleep around much either; They are, for lack of better word, volcels.
But otherwise I agree, settling and then quietly resenting your partner is also a popular option.
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Did she use to visit night/dance clubs when she was younger?
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