Loneliness is an under-rated condition that affects a lot of people. I suspect that many instances of diagnosed depression are actually loneliness, alienation, anger, grief, being left out or left behind, being poor, debt-ridden (uncomfortably saddled by one's debts), unhappily employed, etc., particularly in comparison to one's peers.

One's peers may not be living lives of unparalleled satisfaction and happiness, but maybe they are successful enough to maintain a convincing veneer of comfort and joy.

Life sucks for everyone to some degree and in some ways; for some people it sucks a lot more. We can and should be compassionate towards them. That's one thing.

Social media operate through extremely active algorithms which seek clicks and amplify whatever click-pattern gets more clicks. Thus, one ends up getting a lot more offers to look at progressive sites, conservative sites, anarchist sites, dogs-and-cats-being-funny sites, renaissance music sites OR, if one clicks in this manner, crypto-fascist sites, incel sites, nazi sites, ISIS sites, Christian nationalist sites, white supremacy sites, and so on. That's another thing.

Why do social media operate in this way? Media users may provide YouTube, BlogSpot, Tumblr, FaceBook, et al with a lot of free content, but server farms, electricity providers, employees and shareholders have to be paid for. How do social media do that? Mostly through advertising. How much a site can get for an advertisement depends on eyeball volume.

Social media are not social service providers or healthy lifestyle engineers. They go where the wind blows.

The presence of a given type of content tends to validate the views of those landing on a preferred site, be they MAGA Republicans, incels, vegans, philosophical Georgia lawyers, or aged gay socialists. We all fit into someone's market niche, like it or not, click, click, click.

"Incels. Why is this online group becoming so popular?"

I'm wondering why the topic of incels, this legion of unattractive toads, is so popular a thread on TPF.

A weird reverso of Incelitry is B&D, where some mean actually require the abuse of a woman [or in gay S&M, another man] in order to achieve sexual satisfaction. BD/SM is not, in its more extreme manifestation, symbolic -- it involves actual bondage, whipping, beating, and so on. The numbers of people involved in this behavior are fairly large, given what is involved.

I hereby swear on a stack of Kinsey Reports that this information is entirely second hand.

From the perspective of a gay man long gone from the dating scene, it does seem like these (mostly young?) straight men have a bad case of self-loathing, which in itself is odd and surprising-- that straight white men would be filled with self-loathing--if that's what it is.

I arrived in the big city gay dating scene with absolutely no preparation, no great social skills, no great assets (looks, height, wealth, etc.) and some liabilities. Still, I managed to figure out how to operate in the 1970s milieu and found partners and mates. There were / are gay men who are self-destructive and self-loathing, alcoholics to boot, who seem similar to incels.

What, other than a tendency toward self-destructive and self-loathing behavior, is keeping these guys from succeeding at least at minimal levels? Are they as inept in their occupational lives as they are in their after-hours lives?

Are they just surprised to discover Thoreau's insight--most men lead lives of quiet desperation--actually applies to them? Or is their problem that their desperation just isn't quiet enough?

How many instances of violence by incels are there? How often does bitching and carping about their sad condition turn into assault and battery (or fatal van driving)?

's the year 2045, the world is for the most part matriarchal. — Benj96

2045? maybe 2145 or 2245. Given a severe social upheaval (do not under any circumstances hope for one) men and women could, perhaps, rearrange roles. Perhaps. Maybe. Possibly. ???

For a good time, read The Dispossessed. The Dispossessed: An Ambiguous Utopia is a 1974 anarchist utopian science fiction novel by American writer Ursula K. Le Guin. It is one of a small number of books to win all three Hugo, Locus and Nebula Awards for Best Novel. (So, that's a strong recommendation!)

It's the "archy" as much as the "patri" or "matri". Actual egalitarian democratic socialism, with a diminution of stultifying sex roles would be pretty radical, if you want to establish a wild-eyed revolutionary goal.

Flipping from the alleged patriarchy to an imagined matriarchy would probably yield far fewer grand results than feminists expect, everything else being equal. Supposing that women are super social workers who know how to fix everything (men and women included) in a few years is a female chauvinist day dream. Female chauvinism is lame coming from women. As @T Clark put it, "from men it's pathetic."

Somehow, hatred and loathing don't sound all that enticing in a prospective date. — Vera Mont

Thanks, Vera; that's valuable intel for everyone in the dating scene. Romance will blossom.

Of course, hating and loathing the same thing can be quite attractive. I require prospects to hate and loathe Republicans.

maybe not all nations have officially approved it as a new term. Some nations have though. — Christoffer

Hey-this is America -- we have no national institute approving or disallowing new words. Here, it's the province of Free Enterprise -- most likely, some sub-operation of Google.

BTW, even corporate auto-correct systems do not start (or end) with an official list. Autocorrect is built by "scraping" the key-strokes of billions of people who are typing away. I type "incel"; autocorrect changes it to "Intel" or "inches" (in this local, present tense situation). I back up and change "Intel" or "inches" back to "incel". The systems that "scrape off information" from our activities on line sees how I dealt with its suggestion. After a few more million times that this happens, it will start accepting "incel" as an acceptable word.

The fact that "incel" is still an unacceptable word to autocorrect suggests to me that it actually isn't being used, detected, and corrected all that much.

"Scraping" data from our content is de regueur, even though it marks "regueur" as misspelled and wants to replace it with "regular".

So those without them need to nurture charisma to overcome the initial barrier. — Benj96

Benj's guide to developing irresistible CHARISMA in 21 days!


Try these techniques to build DYNAMITE CHARISMA!

Manage your nerves.
Pace your speech.
Talk about what you're passionate about
Listen with intent.
Practice eye contact.
Ask clarifying questions.
Demonstrate a genuine interest.
Express deep caring about asylum seekers.
Remember little details.
Keep things positive.
Practice empathy.
Ooze sincerity.

Right. I looked her in the eye, kept things positive, spoke at a pleasant pace, and talked about Marxism passionately. She was asleep in 3 minutes.

Women lacking respect for men is run-of-the-mill. When men do it, it's just pitiful. — T Clark

:100:

maybe create a healthier dating app that emphasises more the character of a person than their appearance. Many people would go for that. There's success and money to be made and a gap to be filled in the market — Benj96

Market values and money to be made is a big part of the problem.

There are market values and money to be made in bars, too. Why don't bars result in more happily married couples? Because the raison d'être of bars is to sell alcohol which fairly quickly impairs judgement and helps sell even more alcohol. That said, I've met some very decent guys in bars, and alcohol served as the necessary lubricant.

You shag a bunch of them and maybe one stays with you. — bert1

That was my strategy as a young gay guy. Lots of shagging (which was great on its own) to shake out a good prospect, who, as it happened, came along several times -- the last being good for 30 years.

What "terrible deeds" are incels responsible for?

I think increasing social atomization is at the root of this, basically forcing young people into an artificial dating scene that for obvious reasons doesn't appeal to nor suit many of them. — Tzeentch

Atomization and anomie seems to be on target.

Then one must look to prehistory. — Vera Mont

Please site your "prehistorical sources.

The sex demographics are complicated by education demographics. According to Pew Research...

among those ages 25 to 64, men outnumber women by a large margin among never-married adults (125 men for every 100 women), but men are outnumbered by women among previously married adults (71 men for every 100 women).

Among never-married young adults with post-graduate degrees, women outnumber men by a large margin. There are 77 never-married men ages 25 to 34 with post-graduate degrees for every 100 women with similar educational credentials. Among never-married young adults with a bachelor’s degree, the male-to-female ratio is 102 men for every 100 women.

Rates of marriage are further complicated when race is figured in, not to mention gays and lesbians or cohabitants vs. formally hitched.

They only see through the lens of expectation. — Benj96

Who doesn't?

It's not just a matter of a bunch of guys holding onto an outdated ideologies, I think you underestimate 1) how biology played a role into forming these traditional ideologies in the first place, and 2) how their frustrated biological drives now plays into forming post-hoc misogynists rationalization. I bet a lot of incels coudn't care less about traditional norms and values... they're mostly frustrated, and invent stories to make it more bearable for themselves. — ChatteringMonkey

Contemporary society is a thoroughly alienating experience for many people -- not everyone, but a good share. Social media, dating apps, etc. bring the chilly competitiveness of business to the more intimate business of finding friends and sexual partners. It's great for the winners, not so hot for the losers.

The images of men and women (in many contexts) that the businesses of social media and advertising project are often very distorted, and the projections are pervasive. From media that is designed to promote consumption (of goods, services, and other people) it's no wonder that some people feel like they are the left-overs from a clearance sale.

Your exposition of the incel's condition is very through; I'm wondering whether this is based on personal familiarity with incels, or whether it is derived from a general understanding of changing society.

I don't know anyone who is or claims to be an incel--meaning just that I can't identify anyone that way. How many men are thought to be incels? Why doesn't auto-correction recognize the word 'incel'? Is there a female equivalent? Are there any rational justifications for the incels's claims?

Yes, birth rates have fallen, particularly in industrialized countries. Japan is already experiencing the unwelcome problem of too few young people in relation to the number of elderly people. Who's going to provide assistance and care? China will also experience this problem.

But some countries are not headed for the mushroom shaped demographic distribution in the near future (large elderly population on top, narrow stem of young people). France, India, and the United States, for 3 examples, will probably maintain a good age distribution while also growing slowly. However, projecting very far into the future (like 2123) is a very uncertain game, given how global warming might result in significant crop failure, disease outbreaks, intolerable wet-bulb temperatures over large areas, and so on. (The 'wet bulb' temperature is a measure of heat and humidity. At 95ºF, and high humidity, humans can not cool off -- we experience heat stroke. If we don't get cooled off, then we die fairly quickly.)

Exactly.

That doesn't make much sense to me. I don't see how it would matter whether we emit 100 billion metric tons per decade or per century. — frank

Carbon dioxide is recycled -- recaptured -- by biological processes, IF -- BIG IF -- the carrying capacity of the planet is not exceeded. Maybe the planet can recycle 100 bmt of carbon in a century without a climate consequence. 100 bmt per decade is 10 times as high, and might exceed the planet's carrying capacity, resulting in global warming.

Population is absolutely a problem. While birth rates are falling, the population is still growing -- it reached 8 billion about a year ago.

The 1890s required a lot of coal. Remember London was in a giant coal smoke fog back then? — frank

We all were using a lot less energy in 1890, London's coal fog notwithstanding. The really bad smog episodes were caused by temperature inversion layers over London, plus lack of regulation.

Here's a graph of energy usage (in MTOE - million tons of oil equivalent) from https://www.encyclopedie-energie.org/en/world-energy-consumption-1800-2000-results/



What would this kind of dramatic energy reduction mean?

1) much more walking
2) much more bicycling
3) electrified transit on light or heavy rails
4) much more physical labor
5) far fewer chemicals manufactured
6) organic farming, by default
7) much more exposure to hot and cold weather (no air conditioning)
8) much less consumption of dry goods (clothing, for instance), and other manufactured goods
9) no plastics!
10) a smaller population and not by choice

The climate is always in a state of change and has been since it first appeared on this planet. — Varnaj42

Yes, you are right -- climate is always in a state of change. We have all sorts of evidence to support that idea. Nobody (in their right mind) denies this. However, nobody in their right mind thinks the current, very rapid climate change is normal.

China is reported to be building new coal fired power plants all the time but no complaint is ever aimed at China. Why not? — Varnaj42

Au contraire! China is very much recognized as the largest current contributor of CO2 from coal fired power plants and auto emissions. China has an all-round atrocious record of air and water pollution. On the other hand, they are also building out very large wind and solar systems. No industrial country--not the US, not the EU, not China, not anybody else--can convert from coal to solar, wind, nuclear, or hydro energy without expending huge amounts of energy constructing the new systems. Coal, oil, and gas have to be used in the interim for steel, cement, aluminum, glass, mining, and other heavy industrial processes.

The big CATCH 22 for us is that a lot of CO2 will be produced solving the CO2 problem. That's one reason why our situation is bleak.

Take electric cars for example. There are about 1 billion internal combustion automobiles on the roads around the world. They produce lot of CO2. "Oh, but once we are all driving electric cars, that won't be a problem any more. Electricity will be green." Hang on. How will we produce 1 billion electric cars without generating a lot of Co2? How will we mine, refine, and transport millions of tons of raw material for all these new cars without generating CO2? Who thinks we can have millions (billions) of solar panels and a few million windmills without heavy manufacturing in the near future?

The answer is that we will keep producing more CO2 for the foreseeable future as we attempt to change our economies from the bottom up.

Is there no way we can cut CO2 emissions quickly? Sure there is: We can all adopt a lifestyle based on 1890s technology. That would result in a very fast drop in the emissions of all green house gasses. Such a move would also involve the world's economies hitting a very thick brick wall at 80 mph. The only thing that would be as disruptive is probably a nuclear war or a world wide epidemic of the Black Plague without antibiotics.

In summation, then, we are totally screwed.

If this was an attempt a adolescent humor, it failed.

No, it IS CO2, methane, CFCs, and other gases. Greed has been a feature of human beings from the get go, but global warming has been a problem for a little over a century. It's industrialization and population growth. The world population reached one billion for the first time in 1804. It was another 123 years before it reached two billion in 1927; it took only 33 years to reach three billion in 1960. In the last 60 years, we've added 5 billion+, all using various pieces of the first and second industrial revolutions (which have depended heavily on fossil fuels, for which there are no great substitute).

It isn't human greed that's preventing us from dramatically and radically reducing greenhouse gas emissions. There are no great substitutes for fossil fuels (no easily portable energy dense substances without serious manufacturing or toxicity problems). It's difficult to get 8 people to agree on what to order for lunch, never mind getting 8 billion people to act on climate change in a coordinated fashion.

We are making some, limited progress. I very much doubt whether we will succeed in avoiding disaster, but we are, sort of, trying. What are you doing to help?

It ain't going away because it's a pet peeve. — Tom Storm

What? My pet peeves don't rule? I'm aghast!!!

No one was "assigned" a sex (not talking about gender) at birth until that peculiar construction was pushed by the transgendered and their allies. Similarly, "people who are pregnant" is a very recently contrived usage. The only "man" who got pregnant was a woman transgender who had had nothing removed and decided to reverse her hormone therapy and have a child. It was reported in the popular press as some sort of "breakthrough". It was a breakthrough of stupidity into sensible discourse.

I do not abide by insulting people for their sexual or gender preferences. — Philosophim

I don't either, and have followed the trans person's world view, whether I thought it was sensible or not.

Accepting their world view for purposes of conducting social services is one thing; validating their world view in a philosophy discussion about transgenderism is altogether different. I have some doubts about aspects of gay men's worldviews, too -- legal marriage, fathering children with a surrogate, service in the military, and so on. That doesn't imply that I am hostile toward fellow gays who are married, have children, and are veterans.

I didn't have to provide social services to a MAGA Trump-type (I retired before Obama was elected) but had one walked into the office, I would have provided the services they were due.

While I'm on the topic of pet peeves... another irritation is the LGBTQ clump. I'd be happier if we went back to "gay and lesbian", "bisexual". and "transgender" as separate categories, not always mentioned in one phrase. Gay men and lesbian women like being the sex and gender they are. Bisexuals (a large, amorphous group) have quite separate experiences and issues apart from the other two groups.

Drag queens, with whom the press has recently become fascinated (or obsessed--can't tell which), are not transgendered. They have been usually been heterosexual as often as (usually) gay and (sometimes) lesbian. Drag acts generally rely on exaggeration.

does not correspond with the sex they were assigned at birth — Tom Storm

One of my pet peeves. Newborns are identified as male or female, they aren't arbitrarily assigned a sex.

All this genderendering results in such peculiar constructions as "persons with a uterus" or "pregnant persons" in health care settings. Stupid, stupid, stupid. Women (females) have uteruses and women (females) get pregnant. A woman who has had a complete hysterectomy (such as for cancer) is still a woman, just as a man who has been castrated for testicular cancer is still a man.

I don't want to take anything away from your affection for Machiavelli. His advice to princes has stood the test of time, But so have the works of propagandists and public relations operators, who have found ways of guiding present tense princes without having to resort to "love me or fear me" alternatives. Better to get the public to obey without them knowing too much about how they are being led about, and who holds the leash,

The problem of our time is that the ruling elite have turned mass manipulation into an artform that would have made even Goebbels proud. — Tzeentch

Indeed.

Just for the record, the art of mass manipulation was brought to modern form by Edward Bernays (November 22, 1891 − March 9, 1995) considered a pioneer in the field of public relations and propaganda, and referred to in his obituary as "the father of public relations". (Born in Austria the year Sigmund Freud published one of his earliest papers, Bernays was Freud's nephew twice over. His mother was Freud's sister Anna, and his father, Ely Bernays, was the brother of Freud's wife Martha.)

Walter Lippman was Bernays' unacknowledged American mentor and Lippman's work The Phantom Public greatly influenced the ideas expressed in Propaganda a year later.

OTOH, why assume all technologically advanced life-forms are like us? — Vera Mont

Because aliens that are all sweetness and light are not funny. Humor has an edge and a shadow, otherwise it's just knock-knock jokes for 5 year olds.

Plus, it would be nice if, when the aliens land and ask to be conducted to our leader, — Vera Mont

They won't ask, they will tell. Administrative centers will be reduced to ashes before they land, and the first words out of their sound producing orifices will be, "We bought this ball now we are boss. Get lost, feeble earthlings, and don't let the door hit your asses on your way out!"

Westboro may not be the only group of hateful bastards, but they are well ahead in the race to prove their preeminent status in the HB category.

Are secular humanists unable to be hateful bastards? No, they are able. But birds of a feather flock together, and hateful bastards find their way to organizations where hateful bastardy is welcome. The typical secular humanist meeting wouldn't be that place, and neither would the typical religious organization.

Well, for me Islamic State or Westboro Church might be seen as examples of more extreme instantiations. — Tom Storm

I loathe and abhor both the Islamic State and Westboro Baptist Church, but you know, I suppose, that WBC is basically a profoundly dysfunctional family.

The Westboro Baptist Church (WBC) is made up of its leader, Pastor Fred Waldron Phelps, nine of his 13 children (the other four are estranged), their children and spouses, and a small number of other families and individuals.

Not exactly representative of anything other than psychopathy.

@praxis

Dorothy Day — frank

I greatly admire Dorothy Day, and find her writings of great value, particularly: The Long Loneliness (autobiography), Loaves and Fishes (about the Catholic Worker Movement), The Duty of Delight: The Diaries of Dorothy Day, and All the Way to Heaven is Heaven: selected letters of Dorothy Day. She was a pretty tough woman. She will probably be sainted someday--over her dead body! "Don't make me a saint -- I don't want to be dismissed that easily."

She modeled what following Christ means in the 20th (21st) century.

If a majority decide to give all trans folks the exact same status as that same 'majority,' then that will become 'normal.' — universeness

They won't be normal, they will be as equal as the majority make it, within the legal framework. Complete equality, within the legal system or not, generally doesn't prevail. ("All are equal before the law" is good rhetoric, but all sorts of barriers arise that prevent "perfect equality".)

trans folks as full members of the human race and not a different species. — universeness

I haven't heard anybody (anywhere) deny their humanity or describe them as a different species.

Does it make a difference if a clerk, an administrator, a lawyer, a professor, etc. is trans? I don't think it matters. does it make a difference if a M to F trans athlete brings a male body's advantage to compete with women? Many women think that circumstance is unfair.

It is merely a natural selection. — universeness

As Richard Feynman (nuclear physicist) said, "Nothing is mere". Natural selection has been at work from the getgo, about 3.7 billion years. You think we're ready to take over? I don't.

The human race has demonstrated ability to replace natural selection (or at least compete with it) and impose our own design, at a genetic level, like we have already done with domesticated animals and plants and with our continuous proliferation of technological inventions. — universeness

How successful our fiddling with the genetic level of our own species will be remains to be seen. It is waaaay too soon to assume success. Global warming and global pollution is one of the consequences of technological proliferation.

trans folks have the right to BE! — universeness

I entirely agree that trans people have the right to BE.

The evidence of hermaphrodite examples. within the human race, is some further evidence that a single biological sex is NOT some 'natural law,' that we are forced to ossify on. — universeness

Yes, there are exceptions illustrated by some species, but a rare deviation from the norm doesn't invalidate the norm. Sex (xx, xy) is nature's most effective way of maximizing evolutionary possibilities in multicellular organisms. If some species have developed other schemes, that doesn't apply to the scheme that most species exist within.

XX and XY is the law (norm) from which a very small number of mammal offspring will deviate. Deviating from the norm is no kind of offense at all -- but it also isn't "normal". From my perspective, it's OK to be "not normal". Lots of people are born with various "not normal" features. Some of the "not normal' features are in varying degrees problematic, and others are not problematic. I was born with defective eyeballs. Normal? No, Problematic? Yes. I was born gay, and belong to the 2% of men who are exclusively gay. Normal? No. Problematic? No. (Other than that if 10% of men are gay, who is getting my share?).

I don't count transgenderism as normal, but also don't count it as problematic. Again, there is such a thing a normal, but bring abnormal isn't automatically problematic. Being born with a very deficient brain is abnormal and problematic. Being born with a very effective really smart brain is also abnormal, but not problematic.

You're not a spokesperson for women on trans rights though, nor is anyone as unsurprisingly their opinions on this and other things vary. Which makes all of that rather patronising, no? — Baden

Are you qualified to judge what can be said about trans people or women, outside of your role in TPF?

If copperhead snakes are hermaphrodites and green turtles change sex, how much relevance does that have to us? There are species that can regenerate lost lost parts, but no matter how inspiring you find regrown tails, you won't be regrowing your foot or arm if it lost.

Likewise, it doesn't matter to me if some geese mate in homosexual pairs. Yes, it's fascinating that gay male geese may go so far as stealing an egg from another nest so they have something to hatch, but so what?

Despite my desires for this thread to cool off some. — Outlander

From the perspective of this elderly gay guy, it would be a good idea if the whole alt-gender movement cooled off.

I grew up in a time and place where homosexuality wasn't discussed (except as a very negative reference) and where sexuality was strictly procreative (and better be within the bonds of marriage). It's a different world today. While once what could not speak it's own name, or in the case of transgenders, didn't have a name, is now publicly discussed a lot, and (a small number of) children are making decisions about which gender they want to be.

At the same time, there is a high rate of attempted and successful suicide among young people dealing with these sexuality issues. It is possible that adolescent's psychological distress is, paradoxically, exaggerated by wide open public openness. A lot of public discourse just isn't very helpful.

Pre-Stonewall, many young people (and adults for that matter) (to use the term of those times) who were sexual deviants could hide in a closet (so to speak). Hiding one's sexuality wasn't healthy, but it gave persons time to slowly (and privately) prepare themselves to go public. In addition, there were sort of secret places one could be sexual. When a gay person did decide to go public, they tended to be older adolescents or adults, and had more personal resources to deal with negative public reaction.

Many children are dealing with their various sexual issues openly, and I think they are often doing so without the psychological development to deal with all the issues that they encounter. Social attitudes make life even more difficult. The result is perhaps enough stress that too many seek relief by killing themselves.

The 10 year old who wants to 'be' the opposite sex might be better off if they waited until they are older and have more personal resources available. Will a delay be frustrating? Sure, but it's a question of balancing risk. The risk of too much too soon and death, or delay and better success. There is a huge difference between the experience a 40 year old will have in deciding to publicly transition (even if it is a bumpy ride), and the stress a 14 year old deciding to publicly transition will experience.

being assigned male (or female) at birth

No one "assigns" a newborn's sex at birth -- they "recognize" sex at birth. The use of the verb "assign" is in support of the contention that sex (like gender) is ambiguous, fluid, changeable, etc.

]Trans ideologues' distortion of language results in screwy messages like this -- instructions for patients at the U of M surgery center:

"Due to the risks of anesthesia, patients of childbearing age who have a uterus will be asked for a pregnancy urine specimen in pre-op, so we ask that you not empty your bladder while waiting in the lobby.

I do agree with the "no bladder emptying in the lobby" part. Another example is instructions that apply to "pregnant persons". It just isn't the case that any odd "person" will happen to be pregnant. It will always be a female.

According to the UCLA Williams Institute of Law, 1.3% of the population is trnasgender (depending on how the data is sliced and diced). What is strange is that terms like "women" are dropped to accommodate the very small portion of the population who were born with a penis and testicles (and don't have a uterus) but who now classify themselves as women.