"The Sexodus: The Men Giving Up On Women And Checking Out Of Society"

iptba · 08-12-2014 07:15PM #1

I thought this article discussed an interesting phenomenon that may not get discussed much:

THE SEXODUS, PART 1: THE MEN GIVING UP ON WOMEN AND CHECKING OUT OF SOCIETY
http://www.breitbart.com/Breitbart-London/2014/12/04/The-Sexodus-Part-1-The-Men-Giving-Up-On-Women-And-Checking-Out-Of-Society

I've no idea how common it is in different countries.

I have read before about some Japanese young men doing this.

There are also communities on the internet called MGTOW = Men Going Their Own Way. A lot of them seem to be men who are divorced and are not happy about how things worked out, rather than being young men.

For what it's worth, the author is gay so not actually an advocate of the position.

eviltwin · 08-12-2014 07:53PM

Don't see anything wrong with it. Some people are just happier on their own. Its sad if someone is turned off a partner because one ex treated them badly in the past, so many great people out there and they miss out on all of that out of fear or whatever. The opening paragraph of that article kinda says it all

My generation of boys is f**ked," says Rupert, a young German video game enthusiast I've been getting to know over the past few months. "Marriage is dead. Divorce means you're screwed for life. Women have given up on monogamy, which makes them uninteresting to us for any serious relationship or raising a family. That's just the way it is. Even if we take the risk, chances are the kids won't be ours. In France, we even have to pay for the kids a wife has through adulterous affairs.

Not all women are cheaters, not all women are fooling men into raising kids who are not their own. There are still many long lasting and successful relationships out there if you just look. But as I say, their call, the only ones they have to answer to are themselves.

ancapailldorcha · 08-12-2014 08:07PM

Funnily enough, I was wondering earlier today whether I should start a thread on MGTOW. Looks like you beat me to it!

The appeal is fairly obvious. I read (perhaps here) a quote which I found striking; "marriage is a contract no lawyer would advise you to sign". While the working world may be stacked against women, family law is stacked against fathers and husbands. I think I would like to get married someday but I've also come to enjoy my solitude. The fact that I could be stripped of much of what I've worked hard to attain simply because of my gender is horrifying.

I don't mean to say that women are happy to oust the men once they've got what they want of course but in the average case of both parents being able to offer a decent home, the court will usually side with the mother based on gender alone. Add to this the demonisation of men in society by the media and it makes perfect sense to forgo serious relationships and fatherhood altogether.

Ultimately, if a chap would like to "go his own way" and enjoys his own company and that of his friends then it'd certainly be the safer and more pragmatic. I recognise that there are positives to marriage and children, it'd be daft not to. If I based that most important of decisions on a risk and cost analysis of that path, there's no way I'd walk down it.

Pat Mustard · 08-12-2014 08:19PM

iptba wrote: »

There are also communities on the internet called MGTOW = Men Going Their Own Way.

Sure there are loads of them in rural Ireland, except people just call them old bachelors. By being the one chosen to stay back on the farm, some of these guys kind of 'opted out' whether they knew it or not, and a lot of them ended up remaining single.

In many cases, this may have happened more through inertia than by reasoned decision.

iptba · 08-12-2014 08:40PM

Even if we take the risk, chances are the kids won't be ours.

That's an over-the-top statement: I don't think anyone should think the rate of paternity fraud is as high as 50/50 or even close to it.

Anyway, just to be clear, that's just an extract from a bit of a rant at the start rather than the writer themselves.

Aswerty · 08-12-2014 09:44PM

A lot of what is raised in the article are genuine concerns but the article is just a rant. Also the entire thing is about how the Feminist movement has damaged society in relation to men but then in the last sentence it turns it on it's head and says women are the real victims. It's like the author doesn't actually know what he's trying to say.

And the title is a big fat mix of click bait and hyperbole. They also had an embedded video on autoplay; this means they are the devil incarnate.

tashiusclay · 08-12-2014 11:43PM

Aswerty wrote: »

Also the entire thing is about how the Feminist movement has damaged society in relation to men but then in the last sentence it turns it on it's head and says women are the real victims.

I didn't read the link yet, but I'm familiar with the principles of the 'mgtow' movement, so I've an idea what the general content of the link is. I'd say what is meant by the last sentence, is that feminism may be a victim of its own success in some ways, in that women are being encouraged by feminism to aim to 'have it all', if thats what they want, i.e. both the family and the career, instead of being reliant on men to be the sole providers and the women concentrating on raising the children, but if this precarious race against time fails, between achieving career successes and aims, and beating the biological clock, it can be quite a blow for women, particularly if the aim of starting a family isn't met.

Aswerty · 09-12-2014 12:11AM

Oh I don't doubt that is the angle he's going for. It's just gas that the entire article is on the impact of Feminism on men and the concluding paragraph is that women are the real victims. And I don't believe the author believes that is the case.

Mokuba · 09-12-2014 01:21AM

Heavily based off American culture - some valid points but some utter tripe as well as seems to be the case with most of that kind of stuff.

I do agree that men should be more careful in marriage, even here, and careful because fathers rights are nil. I can also agree that the feminist movement is a bit of a joke at this stage, and a lot of things do irk me like imposed quotas in corporations. But lets not tar all women with the same brush, and lets not get into generalised character assassinations.

Plenty of decent women out there, I just think men need to be more careful when picking one.

Lemming · 09-12-2014 10:05AM

Backspinswerve wrote: »

If so many women weren't on the pill I'd guess around 30% of babies would be the result of an adulterous sexual encounter.

This proves nothing other than that both genders like sex. Which tbh, doesn't tell us anything we don't already know, because we're here ...

... I think someone's been having sex since before we were born.

Wibbs · 09-12-2014 10:52AM

Lemming wrote: »

This proves nothing

I'd have stopped at that point L. 30%? where do figures like that come from? I mean seriously. Let's pull a figure out of our arses. It would be about as valid.

I dunno, I see an awful lot of paranoia within this "sexodus" and MGTOW stuff. I'm not saying it's entirely unwarranted. EG no way would I get hitched if I was a young man in the US for example, but the rest of the world isn't the US. Even in the US well over 60 odd per cent of marriages work. So rather than avoid the whole thing, maybe a better tack is get better at picking the kind of person you want to marry. TL;DR? Don't stick your *ahem* in crazy as the saying goes.

IMH another aspect of this "sexodus" caper is men who have near zero success with women, socially immature/inept/withdrawn men and rather than working on that choose to label their lack of success as an opting out tactic. Having such a label and fellow travelers on such a path is also appealing. Misery loves company and all that. Potentially dangerous though, like that nutcase whose name escapes who went on a killing spree because women didn't want him, but wanted other less "worthy" men(he killed more men than women).

The guy who has success with women, but choses to never commit longterm because of the possible perils of doing so is a different kettle of fish to the above.

Lemming · 09-12-2014 10:56AM

bear in mind as well that the US has a messed up relationship with Christianity; with a much lower generel age of marriage than elsewhere in the western world due (in part at any rate) to the whole "no sex before you're married" thing. So what do young God-fearin' folk do? They get married so they can have sex. QED. Then comes the rest of the QED moment when they realise they're not suited to each other.

Ok, that's an overly simplified take on the matter but you get the idea. I've had more than a few American friends (both sexes) make that observation too btw.

Wibbs · 09-12-2014 11:12AM

Thinking more on it, my worry is those apparently growing section of socially immature/inept/withdrawn men. Is it growing or has it become more noticeable? Hard to say. I'd personally reckon it's growing. The rise of more and more ways to be isolated, from yet at the same time connected to the world is fueling it(and issues like depressive/anxiety spectrum illness). Growing up I knew men who were good with women, men that were bad and the majority were kinda ok as it were. There was an expectation that sooner or later nigh on every straight guy would end up with someone, probably marriage and kids. Previous generations to me it was a near given. Today I'm not so sure. I can see and personally think of quite a number of bachelor men of different ages who are in that position and it's not of their choosing. Naturally that leaves a few women out of the fold too(though a few of them have kids so they have reproduced). Interesting demographic times ahead methinks.

ancapailldorcha · 09-12-2014 11:29AM

Wibbs wrote: »

I dunno, I see an awful lot of paranoia within this "sexodus" and MGTOW stuff. I'm not saying it's entirely unwarranted. EG no way would I get hitched if I was a young man in the US for example, but the rest of the world isn't the US. Even in the US well over 60 odd per cent of marriages work. So rather than avoid the whole thing, maybe a better tack is get better at picking the kind of person you want to marry. TL;DR? Don't stick your *ahem* in crazy as the saying goes.

I suppose it's no surprise that this originate in the US then so. I'd never even heard of it until a few days ago.

Blacktie. · 09-12-2014 11:36AM

Backspinswerve wrote: »

The 30% figure was an estimate based on the evidence I've seen, I stated that.

What evidence?

Wibbs · 09-12-2014 12:12PM

Indeed B, sources would be nice. Even if such a source did exist it would entirely be supposition. For the simple reason that because reliable contraception is around today there is no control group to get such numbers from. Contraception* itself would modify behaviour in a big way.

*reliable contraception. We've always had contraception going waaaay back(The Romans caused the extinction of a plant that had such properties).

Wibbs · 09-12-2014 12:13PM

Backspinswerve wrote: »

Studies and observations.

Personal observations aren't worth jack and links to studies would be nice. I'll hold my breath...

ancapailldorcha · 09-12-2014 12:13PM

Backspinswerve wrote: »

Studies and observations.

Go on...

FactCheck · 09-12-2014 01:32PM

Wibbs wrote: »

Thinking more on it, my worry is those apparently growing section of socially immature/inept/withdrawn men. Is it growing or has it become more noticeable? Hard to say. I'd personally reckon it's growing. The rise of more and more ways to be isolated, from yet at the same time connected to the world is fueling it(and issues like depressive/anxiety spectrum illness). Growing up I knew men who were good with women, men that were bad and the majority were kinda ok as it were. There was an expectation that sooner or later nigh on every straight guy would end up with someone, probably marriage and kids. Previous generations to me it was a near given. Today I'm not so sure. I can see and personally think of quite a number of bachelor men of different ages who are in that position and it's not of their choosing. Naturally that leaves a few women out of the fold too(though a few of them have kids so they have reproduced). Interesting demographic times ahead methinks.

I dunno, I think you are being a bit rosy about the past here. Someone above mentioned the bachelor farmers. Thing was, back in the day there was a LOT that could basically rule you out of the relationship market and the gene pool altogether. Bout of childhood polio? Hello lifelong celibacy. Untreated Asperger's, sight problems, inability to perform physical labour, the list goes on and on. It's not like 100 years ago the parish priest rounded up all the socially awkward people and assigned them a mate. If you were a bit weird, you were fecked.

The reality is that between the internet, modern medicine, and universal free education, people have the opportunity to help themselves more than they ever have. And more people than ever are doing so. I mean if you look at the figures - the marriage rate in Ireland is increasing. Divorce rates everywhere are dropping (bit hard to say anything meaningfully about Ireland, since we haven't had divorce for long enough).

And those rates - one of the sneakiest things about this is that comparisons for historic marriage rates usually start post-WWII. Well, the world didn't bloody start in the 1950s! That generation saw a genuinely unprecedented and unique recalibration of family life. If you want to look at marriage rates, look 100 years ago. Totally different story to the USA 50s baby boomers.

Divorce is another crazy misleading one. Sure, the headline rate might be high. But it isn't absolute, there are massive variations within different demographics. If you are over 25, have no children, have at least a bachelor's degree, have lived together, and have never been married before, your chance of divorce is miniscule. (Er, I hope I haven't offended anyone here. Obviously absolutely loads of people do not meet some or all or hell any of these criteria and still have lifelong happy marriages! I'm just saying, there is an element of choice and control and personal responsibility here - it is very possible to significantly reduce your chances of divorce).

But talking about controlling one's own personal circumstances, to go back to the first point - now we have the opportunity to help ourselves. If you're an awkward, scrawny, working class kid, nowadays you grow up, get a decent Leaving, get an IT degree and leave whatever backwater you grew up in. Boom, you have a good job and nobody remembers the awkward teenage years. If you want to get fit or overcome social anxiety, I'm not saying it's easy per se, it isn't, but it is easier than it ever has been.

And that's where I think some of the anger or bitterness is coming from. It's not that there are more men being left behind - on the contrary, we have more social mobility, healthcare, you name it, it has become so easy to get ahead that this is now expected. And so the people who don't want to get onboard with that, not only do they have the old difficulties, they now have the new difficulty which is everyone around them not just looking down on them for being awkward misfits, but judging them for not improving their own circumstances like most others are able to.

Pat Mustard · 09-12-2014 01:37PM

ancapailldorcha wrote: »

Go on...

It's just a common rereg talking nonsense, looking for a reaction.

He didn't have any evidence, his posts have been deleted and now he is permanently sitebanned by Admins, yet again.

ancapailldorcha · 09-12-2014 01:38PM

The Mustard wrote: »

It's just a common rereg talking nonsense, looking for a reaction.

He didn't have any evidence, his posts have been deleted and now he is permanently sitebanned by Admins, yet again.

Thread looks a bit odd now though

.

Pat Mustard · 09-12-2014 01:39PM

ancapailldorcha wrote: »

Thread looks a bit odd now though .

Ah feck it. :pac:

ancapailldorcha · 09-12-2014 01:42PM

The Mustard wrote: »

Ah feck it. :pac:

Sorry, couldn't help myself.

Wibbs · 09-12-2014 04:20PM

FactCheck wrote: »

I dunno, I think you are being a bit rosy about the past here. Someone above mentioned the bachelor farmers. Thing was, back in the day there was a LOT that could basically rule you out of the relationship market and the gene pool altogether. Bout of childhood polio? Hello lifelong celibacy. Untreated Asperger's, sight problems, inability to perform physical labour, the list goes on and on. It's not like 100 years ago the parish priest rounded up all the socially awkward people and assigned them a mate. If you were a bit weird, you were fecked.

Oh I agree FC. I'm certainly not bigging up the past. Indeed our genetics tell this story because more male lines than female have died out in the human genome. IE a group of men were having more kids with more women over time.

It would also depend on culture. Ireland is a peculiar one regarding marriage anyway. In the 1930's 75% of Irish men between 20 and 35 were single, compared to 30% in the UK. Women traditionally tend to migrate/emigrate more than men(which you can often see to this day in small towns) and far more Irish women migrated/emigrated than men, so there was a shortfall of potential mates for Irish men, particularly rural men for much of the 20th century. We also tended to marry much later than the rest of the world(a record we still held until the 90's at least) and had wider age gaps. Again in the 30's nearly half of all marriages in Ireland had a 10 year age gap.

We were quite the outlier in cultural terms. I'm just positing that maybe we'll see similar again. Women migrating is still in play. The average woman is better educated and higher earning than the average man and that gap is widening. The increase in mental illness including social anxiety is increasing in men(interestingly or no, maybe we have previous here too. At the height of the gender disparity in Ireland we had a very high rate of admission to asylums for mental illness) which will reduce their chances of getting hitched/into a longtermer. Maybe what might happen is somewhat of a return to an "Irish past"?

Divorce is another crazy misleading one. Sure, the headline rate might be high. But it isn't absolute, there are massive variations within different demographics.

+1 and again cultures. Ireland has a very low divirce rate, lowest in the EU IIRC. Maybe because we tend to marry later on average so make better choices. Even in the US where these paranoid figures and reactions to them come from, nigh on two thirds of marriages don't fail. Even among second marriages which are usually trotted out as disasters half don't fail. In a culture where first marriages tend to be young it's not too surprising to hear of failures and second goes at the cherry.

But talking about controlling one's own personal circumstances, to go back to the first point - now we have the opportunity to help ourselves. If you're an awkward, scrawny, working class kid, nowadays you grow up, get a decent Leaving, get an IT degree and leave whatever backwater you grew up in. Boom, you have a good job and nobody remembers the awkward teenage years. If you want to get fit or overcome social anxiety, I'm not saying it's easy per se, it isn't, but it is easier than it ever has been.

And that's where I think some of the anger or bitterness is coming from. It's not that there are more men being left behind - on the contrary, we have more social mobility, healthcare, you name it, it has become so easy to get ahead that this is now expected. And so the people who don't want to get onboard with that, not only do they have the old difficulties, they now have the new difficulty which is everyone around them not just looking down on them for being awkward misfits, but judging them for not improving their own circumstances like most others are able to.

Interesting angle on it FC.

lazybones32 · 09-12-2014 04:23PM

The Japanese 'herbivores' are reacting to extremely strong societal pressure and it's not fair to link them to the examples posted in that blog (I only read about half before having enough). Such pressures do not exist here and cannot be used as a legitimate argument for abandoning society. (How many 'herbivores' are attractive, charismatic young men, I wonder?)

If a young man genuinely believes that every woman is a golddigger; wants you to provide for her other-sired children or only wants to be with you in order to manipulate you, marry you, cheat with the neighbours on you and then divorce you while she keeps everything, then that young man is not ready to be in a relationship. I would say he is in need of psychological help.

Maybe a lot of the MGTOW is because the 'adherents' are unsuccessful in their interactions with females - if they even have the confidence to talk to them? - or perceive within themselves flaws and weakness and this is a form of 'rejecting them before they reject me'? I've had on-line interactions with MGTOW subscribers and I've yet to hear from one who wasn't motivated by bitterness or fear of women.

Wibbs · 09-12-2014 04:29PM

OSI wrote: »

This reminds me of a thread I read yesterday by an American Asian who was freaking out because a guy she had been seeing for around a year hadn't proposed to her yet, when they weren't even living together. US movies and TV are full of couples jumping into a marriage after just 6 months together, what do they expect.

A mate of mine went off to live in the states in his early 20's and he come home one time with his American(southern type) fiance at the time and she was gobsmacked that at 30 I wasn't married, hadn't been married, wasn't engaged and had no intention of wifing up my current girlfriend anytime soon. Like really suspish of me. She was too fond of the whole "Gawd" vibe for comfort so maybe that was it. But yep gobsmacked. Me being me I wound her up like a toy over it.

Then again from very early on in my youth I was never the I want to get married type. Never appealed to me TBH. Girlfriends great, even living together but not marriage and all that. I was defo the outlier in this though. Even the fact I was conscious of it in the first place(beyond the common enough 2 odd year old bloke swearing he'd never get hitched. Often the first to do so). Most men I knew and know ended up married, save for the ones who to put it bluntly just couldn't attract a woman.

ancapailldorcha · 09-12-2014 04:35PM

To be honest, the first image this MGTOW thing conjured up in my head was a group of intelligent men in their late twenties and onwards who'd decided that the penalties of a failed marriage outweight the rewards of a successful one. For some reason, it never occurred to me that it would attract misogynists, bitter virgins and the like...

Wibbs · 09-12-2014 04:37PM

lazybones32 wrote: »

Maybe a lot of the MGTOW is because the 'adherents' are unsuccessful in their interactions with females - if they even have the confidence to talk to them? - or perceive within themselves flaws and weakness and this is a form of 'rejecting them before they reject me'? I've had on-line interactions with MGTOW subscribers and I've yet to hear from one who wasn't motivated by bitterness or fear of women.

Yep. TBH I can understand the older guys who got really fecked over in nasty divorces. I can see why they then preselect the worldview that all "Women are bitches(tm)". Divorce hits men particularly hard mentally and emotionally(and financially in many cases). The rate of suicide for men going through a divorce is three times higher than background for their age, whereas women's suicide rate doesn't change. I can understand where their fears come from and why they lash out.

What I don't see are why young men who haven't gone through that mill are coming out with the same stuff and your explanation that many are unsuccessful with women drives this rings true for me. They're rejected so they get in there first. There would be another group, the PUA types who learn how to be and become successful with a certain demographic of women and view all women through that demographic and mix up those three and you get much of what the MGTOW movement is all about. Though I would see your MGTOW and PUA/redpill types as different, the latter are at least proactive.

ancapailldorcha · 09-12-2014 05:01PM

Wibbs wrote: »

What I don't see are why young men who haven't gone through that mill are coming out with the same stuff and your explanation that many are unsuccessful with women drives this rings true for me. They're rejected so they get in there first. There would be another group, the PUA types who learn how to be and become successful with a certain demographic of women and view all women through that demographic and mix up those three and you get much of what the MGTOW movement is all about. Though I would see your MGTOW and PUA/redpill types as different, the latter are at least proactive.

If I'd to guess, I'd put it down to frustration. A lot of these chaps don't fancy the PUA tripe and haven't the time/cash/inclination to sort themselves out so they just give up and go it alone.

09-12-2014 06:05PM

I guess it can only be a reflection on how out of touch I am.

If you read an article that told you little red imps had taken over the world and were running amok on the streets and destroying everything - and then you removed your mind from cyberspace and walked it outside to meat space - only to find everything working as normal - cars meandering along slowly on their way home - people walking glass eyed in every direction to their respective trains and buses - and life going on as normal - you would feel like I felt coming out of reading the article cited.

Because - just like that - as soon as I withdrew my mind from the article - and all the images and realities it conjured up in my imagination - and pulled myself back into the here and now - and looked at the world around me - both literally and in the sense of my mind wandering the social circles I move in - the groups I work with - the people I know - the experiences I have had - I could simply not map any of my experiences onto the majority of the claims of the article.

I would not normally think of myself as being that out of touch - especially given the extent of my social circles and work in society that puts me in contact with people of all ages and sexualities - but I genuinely can not map the majority of that articles onto the reality I know and experience both directly and vicariously.

How much of it is real? How much hyperbole and exaggeration? How much of it location based specifically (where the blog appears based) - and not mappable onto Ireland? And so forth? Or am I really simply somehow that out of touch and this article is a true and genuine representation of the male-female dynamic in the world today? I draw some consolation from a few comments on the thread that indicate they may be at least partially baffled as I am.

From the opening claims such as "Women have given up on monogamy" I am having trouble parsing and mapping much of the article onto the reality I experience. In fact so far is the disparity that I can not even find my way to the formation of an agreement OR a rebuttal to much of what is in it. It is like the description of an alien world.

Not that there is no truth at all in it I am sure. I imagine responses pointing out some X Y and Z that are true in the article - asking me how I can not relate to the article given things like that. And the X Y and Z that response might pick I fully expect will likely be entirely true.

But I refer to the article *as a whole* and as I keep saying I must be (either reading the article wrong or) entirely out of touch with reality in every way because I am just not seeing the world it describes reflected too acutely in the world around me - or around those around me.

Or perhaps it is not meant to? Perhaps this is the kind of article written for the people who have - as wibbs put it - partaken of some of the modern ways of self-isolation and they read the article and nod sagely at it without withdrawing to check if it maps on to any actual reality in the way I did when I finished it. A kind of textual "hug in" that allows people in that world to construct an explanation of their perceived place in that world.

All the sexual dynamics aside - I do genuinely think we have become a more insular world and our human relationships complicated by this - made awkward by it. We lock our selves in our house. Go to work locked in that bubble of isolation we call a car. Sit at desks. Then do it all again in reverse. Perhaps if there genuinely is a problem - even if not the depths described in the article - it is to be found not in the dynamics between the sexes - but generally in the dynamic of human interaction across all of our society. I think only of last weekend when I walked past a group of lads walking along the road together - each with their own phone and headphones. Physically together - but functionally entirely alone. And I think of some of the people who come before me through things like my meditation classes - and other things I do putting myself "out there" - and I do find isolation and loneliness *in general* to either be a recurring problem that comes before me - or a furling cause of the problem with which they come before me such as addictions and depressions and even anger issues.

Clearly there are problems - but I also clearly can not wrap my head around the kind of articles that feed those problems into a pre-existing framework or dynamic - of some kind of -ism or other like feminism - in order to parse them. Even when parsing them through that particular frame work makes little sense.

strobe · 09-12-2014 06:20PM

[Deleted User] wrote: »

I guess it can only be a reflection on how out of touch I am.

If you read an article that told you little red imps had taken over the world and were running amok on the streets and destroying everything - and then you removed your mind from cyberspace and walked it outside to meat space - only to find everything working as normal - cars meandering along slowly on their way home - people walking glass eyed in every direction to their respective trains and buses - and life going on as normal - you would feel like I felt coming out of reading the article cited.

Because - just like that - as soon as I withdrew my mind from the article - and all the images and realities it conjured up in my imagination - and pulled myself back into the here and now - and looked at the world around me - both literally and in the sense of my mind wandering the social circles I move in - the groups I work with - the people I know - the experiences I have had - I could simply not map any of my experiences onto the majority of the claims of the article.

I would not normally think of myself as being that out of touch - especially given the extent of my social circles and work in society that puts me in contact with people of all ages and sexualities - but I genuinely can not map the majority of that articles onto the reality I know and experience both directly and vicariously.

How much of it is real? How much hyperbole and exaggeration? How much of it location based specifically (where the blog appears based) - and not mappable onto Ireland? And so forth? Or am I really simply somehow that out of touch and this article is a true and genuine representation of the male-female dynamic in the world today? I draw some consolation from a few comments on the thread that indicate they may be at least partially baffled as I am.

From the opening claims such as "Women have given up on monogamy" I am having trouble parsing and mapping much of the article onto the reality I experience. In fact so far is the disparity that I can not even find my way to the formation of an agreement OR a rebuttal to much of what is in it. It is like the description of an alien world.

Not that there is no truth at all in it I am sure. I imagine responses pointing out some X Y and Z that are true in the article - asking me how I can not relate to the article given things like that. And the X Y and Z that response might pick I fully expect will likely be entirely true.

But I refer to the article *as a whole* and as I keep saying I must be (either reading the article wrong or) entirely out of touch with reality in every way because I am just not seeing the world it describes reflected too acutely in the world around me - or around those around me.

Or perhaps it is not meant to? Perhaps this is the kind of article written for the people who have - as wibbs put it - partaken of some of the modern ways of self-isolation and they read the article and nod sagely at it without withdrawing to check if it maps on to any actual reality in the way I did when I finished it. A kind of textual "hug in" that allows people in that world to construct an explanation of their perceived place in that world.

All the sexual dynamics aside - I do genuinely think we have become a more insular world and our human relationships complicated by this - made awkward by it. We lock our selves in our house. Go to work locked in that bubble of isolation we call a car. Sit at desks. Then do it all again in reverse. Perhaps if there genuinely is a problem - even if not the depths described in the article - it is to be found not in the dynamics between the sexes - but generally in the dynamic of human interaction across all of our society. I think only of last weekend when I walked past a group of lads walking along the road together - each with their own phone and headphones. Physically together - but functionally entirely alone. And I think of some of the people who come before me through things like my meditation classes - and other things I do putting myself "out there" - and I do find isolation and loneliness *in general* to either be a recurring problem that comes before me - or a furling cause of the problem with which they come before me such as addictions and depressions and even anger issues.

Clearly there are problems - but I also clearly can not wrap my head around the kind of articles that feed those problems into a pre-existing framework or dynamic - of some kind of -ism or other like feminism - in order to parse them. Even when parsing them through that particular frame work makes little sense.

This.

(sorry, couldn't resist, good post.)

"The Sexodus: The Men Giving Up On Women And Checking Out Of Society"

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