Sexodus- Males In Crisis

[aaron]

Re: Sexodus- Males In Crisis

I probably should just count my blessings and shut up.

You are most certainly lucky and you should definitely count your blessings. 1 in 10 men have a chance at a good marriage.

[aaron]

Re: Sexodus- Males In Crisis

Good post for sure! I am 33 and have een single for over 5yrs. I dated a bunch in my 20's but as that decade ended so did my drive to keep going on first dates! As much as i would like it to be different i do not socialize with women near as much as i would like. I do find that the religious people i know seem to be fairing better than non religious, as stated above they still have the directive from god to procreate where as the rest of us are not under tha same demands.

I can say income has nothing to do with it as i am more successful than most people i know my age. Starting a family, and getting married for me has been a circumstantial choice, not an economic one. If i met a girl and it made sense i would go there no problem. You really are damned if you do and damned if you dont. You either have to be that aggressive predator type who can handle rejection a dozen times a day or you just say fuck it, like i have. I focus on making money and being successful and whatever happens in between this happens. I see it as out of my control!

J4

You made the right choice.

[vt]

Re: Sexodus- Males In Crisis

DC, I agree it would be sad if every guy has to record encounters to protect himself from false charges. But the study Woodsman cites seems to be exaggerated too. At the same time we must stop actual rapes and/or sexual violence.

https://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/nij/182369.pdf

In a different area the use of cameras on police dramatically reduced complaints against the police. I wish they had been used in Ferguson and Cleveland.

http://www.policefoundation.org/cont...lice-use-force

[jiimbergin]

Re: Sexodus- Males In Crisis

I don't know, man. I don't even think a paranoid bastard like Dick Nixon ever recorded his private sessions with Pat. And he recorded everything.

So much of this stuff seems like bullhorn-sensationalized hype to me.

I don't see it in my life. That's for sure. Every day I wake up, say hi to the better half, do some work, run errands, take care of the house, and I manage not to run into a single self-proclaimed radical third-wave feminist or men's right activist or anyone like that.

I go out of my way to trust people I deal with and only deal with people I trust where possible. And the battle of the sexes usually only manifests in terms of an occasional dreaded chore or spat over what to have for dinner. Even then, it's mild and jovial.

And I probably should just count my blessings and shut up.

But I just feel like when people on both sides talk about this stuff they each make it out to be far more prevalent than the day-to-day reality for the vast majority of people. I mean, secret tape recorders for sex!? Really!?

I guess my life was just never that exciting, or MI6, or Jersey Shore, or Hollywood, or whatever adjective is appropriate there.

Give me plain oatmeal and cold showers over this kind of drama any day.

This sounds much like my experience. It may just be where I live but even in my large extended family I do not see any of what the rest of you are talking about. Some of the younger members of our family have married later in life than we did. Some waited until they were close to 30. Those who have not married sure indicate they expect to or are already engaged. There have been no divorces in our extended marriage for more than 25 years. Most of our children met their spouses either in school or at work. It is sad to read that much of our country seems to be different.

[aaron]

Re: Sexodus- Males In Crisis

It means brain drain.

Intelligent men will not marry and will not ambitiously pursue careers working for the "man". There will be virtual sex soon enough, and then there will be no more need to please women. Getting married will be synonymous with religious fundamentalism.

Economically: Invest in bacheler's pads. Invest in hotels that charge by the hour. Invest in Virtual reality gear with USB connected "hardware".

Gay men have a lot of disposable income since they do not have to support a woman and her children. They have been a sought-after demographic for some time now. Single men will probably start to get similar attention from advertisers in the years to come. In regards to housing, I think you underestimate the drive for a man to have his own space. I am surrounded by single men at work who already own their own houses. They have little interest in getting married. I did not understand it all until I read the sites in this thread.

[aaron]

Re: Sexodus- Males In Crisis

This sounds much like my experience. It may just be where I live but even in my large extended family I do not see any of what the rest of you are talking about. Some of the younger members of our family have married later in life than we did. Some waited until they were close to 30. Those who have not married sure indicate they expect to or are already engaged. There have been no divorces in our extended marriage for more than 25 years. Most of our children met their spouses either in school or at work. It is sad to read that much of our country seems to be different.

Do not worry, Yankee misery will spread South. We have a plan.

[verdo]

Re: Sexodus- Males In Crisis

As a guy in my early 20's, I can tell you folks the exact reason why myself, and a lot of my 20-something friends are skeptical about marriage. Some of you think the cost of having a kid is what concerns myself and others, but that is like the last thing that I think about. A lot of guys would love to be raising one or two of their own. Also, for those of you who don't experience any sort of battle between the sexes in your daily life, it may be because you are too old to notice. Women of the older generations aren't nearly as annoying to be around as those in my generation, believe me. If you want to see what entitlement looks like, look no further than women of the millennial generation

The problem is that the way laws are designed today, men get screwed over big time if the marriage goes sour. Custody seems to favour the mother in most cases, and you have to pay alimony, which I honestly find ridiculous in todays day and age. Made sense perhaps 30 years ago, when women were treated like absolute dog-crap when it came to getting an education and finding a job. Today you have more women graduating college than men in a lot of areas, and they can get a good paying job just like any man can. To work so hard all your life, only to have yourself financially devastated by a divorce...I just couldn't imagine having to go through that. I've seen some fathers go through it, and they literally went from being well off to living pay cheque to pay cheque, barely surviving. Close to 50% of marriages end in divorce, and the majority of them are initiated by women. That doesn't surprise me, because the goodie basket waiting for women (especially if they had kids with the guy) is much too tempting. Even if they cheated on you, they can still get a divorce and everything that comes with it. I have nothing against women personally, but with the economy going down the tubes, I just don't trust most women enough to sign that sort of legal document with them. The laws are so skewed to favour women in divorce that it becomes a huge temptation for women to opt for in the moment of any sort of disagreement. I have no doubt that if things were reversed and the laws favoured men, men would be doing the same thing. So believe me, I don't think women are inherently any worse than men, but its human nature to take advantage of things like this, and as a young guy trying to save what little I have, myself and others just don't feel like rolling the dice. Despite what you hear all the time, people do change, just as ones looks changes over time. People can change for the better or the worse, depending on what sort of situations life throws at them, and the specific temperament of the person. There are some things you just can't screen for when you finally decide to marry, and normally I would be okay with that, if the divorce laws were fairer.

Then you've got all the feminist over-reach these days that is quite frankly annoying. For instance, the recent gang rape story that the rolling stone covered which is increasingly looking like it was not quite accurate. Now, i can accept a media network to get stuff wrong sometimes, but its really the response by feminists that have me scratching my head. Here's one for example, titled " No matter what Jackie [the alleged victim] said, we should generally believe rape claims" . Uhmmmm no? How about...No matter what the accused says, we should look at the evidence provided before jumping to conclusions. Why should I completely believe any claim from someone I know nothing about? It makes the assumption that women are incapable of being mistaken, inaccurate, or lying. The truth is that we have no idea how many rape claims are false, and as such, the most prudent thing to do in cases like this is to treat it just as we do any other case where a heinous act may have transpired...which is to gather what evidence we can before labelling someone as a criminal. But try explaining this to a young 20-something year old feminist today. The moment you argue against a woman today on issues like this, the automatic assumption is that you are pro-rape, anti-women, and a whole bunch of nasty things, when in reality, I want to be as fair as possible when incidents like this arise. I don't want to be like the feminists who refuse to practise what our court systems practise on a daily basis, which is to hear both sides of the story. Nor do I want to be like the individuals who think women only lie about these things. When I hear a rape accusation, I neither believe nor disbelieve what the accuser says. I'm rather neutral about it, as it is a person I have never met before, and thus have no reason to trust them completely.


What I stated above is just one example, but this happens on a regular basis, and a lot of women around my age think this way, and its this kind of thinking that is really incompatible with me. It's an almost instant turn-off. I have yet to meet a single woman in my age group who approaches these situations in an unbiased manner...and by these situation, im talking about more than just rape cases...im talking about a lot of the hot topics that the genders fight about today (like the wage gap for instance). No matter what the issue, many of the women im in contact with support whatever stance benefits women the most without a second thought. It leads me to think that if i were to marry one of these women, she would treat our marriage the very same way over time (ie. she would only do things that did not inconvenience her or things that brought her the most fulfilment even if it hurt me.) I've talked about this with other guys im my age range, and these things that I've mentioned are always the points mentioned. it has nothing to do with not wanting the responsibility of having a family and raising kids. I trust women enough to lead the country, do my taxes, manage my money, and pretty much everything you can think of except one thing...which is to love me in a marriage just as much as she loves herself or as much as I would love her. The problem is that when I'm committed to someone, I'm deeply committed, which means that I can be very loyal and steadfast, but when my heart is broken, it pretty much devastates me...and I've experience heartbreak on a couple occasions in my short life. I'd hate to see what would become of me in the instance where I experienced the heartbreak + the added financial lashings from divorce court.

I'd love to marry an older woman honestly, because they seem much more trustworthy when it comes to matters of the heart for me. But my generation of women scares me

[jpetr48]

Re: Sexodus- Males In Crisis

Also, for those of you who don't experience any sort of battle between the sexes in your daily life, it may be because you are too old to notice. Women of the older generations aren't nearly as annoying to be around as those in my generation, believe me. If you want to see what entitlement looks like, look no further than women of the baby boomer generation.

I am one of those old clueless guys, 58 years old.
Seriously, you are right i don't hang around with 20's something girls and my wife and I like it that way too.
So i can't say i feel your pain and am not going to try.

The symptoms of what you are speaking to transcend generations,age, gender and are probably more acute now because opportunity for college graduates is less today than when i graduated.

But economics is one symptom compounding the fear of divorce and costly lawyers alimony etc. And our slow growth economy is a more acute symptom of being strapped financially now than when i got married 31 years ago.

Economics aside, two of the top reasons divorces occur is adultery and money problems. These causes have not changed and they will not for reasons beyond the scope of this thread. When you look at the drivers behind adultery and money problems it all boils down to self interests or selfishness no matter what gender. Selfishness entitlement is non-discriminatory for both men and women and has been around in different forms for thousands of years.

From my experience, there is rarely compromise or sacrifice in 1 out of 2 marriages. I was married for 16 before i truly understood what a sacrificial love meant. Yet go to any marriage at a church and they will cite marriage vows and 1 Corinthians 13:4-7. What a newly married couple says with their hands on a bible is much different than what they live.

It sounds like by your commitment and loyalty you understand what vows and these verses in1 Corinthians mean. I dare most men to apply them though. It is impossible in most situations to apply because no matter how good you think you are, you will never be good enough for any one. The problem is the object of our confidence, which is each other is the wrong target. We are all imperfect. I dealt with my imperfections by realizing the created (me) had a perfect Creator. So my confidence and expectations shifted from people to my Creator. This is one of the reasons why so many people are depressed today. Their confidence is on a horizontal plane rather than vertical.

Second, most newly married couple know nothing about handling money. And i have found few have a budget nor have they taught their children not just how to save but how to give to others- another cause leading to the entitlement issue you raise which is poor parenting.

Last, related to this last point of poor parenting, its sad to say but many ought not to get married until they go thru a counseling session together, present a budget and understand the costs of being married. My wife and i did not do any of these things. And i almost single handled wrecked our marriage in the early years. But 31 years later i can tell you the lessons learned about not sweating the small stuff, compromise, sacrifice, living by a budget and no debt have shaped our marriage into something far greater than i could envision.

I hope if it meant to be you find someone who shares your values and dream of what marriage can be.

[vt]

Re: Sexodus- Males In Crisis

+1 Great wisdom and lessons in this post

[dcarrigg]

Re: Sexodus- Males In Crisis

Do not worry, Yankee misery will spread South. We have a plan.

FWIW, I'm broadcasting live from the heart of Yankeedom. Unless you fish lobsters off Acadia or eat cheddar on apple pie for breakfast in the Green Mountains, it'd be awful hard to get more Yankee than where I'm at now.

I think some of the maps might look different than you'd expect. This one, for instance (and sorry for the terrible coloring and needless interjection of politics, but it's the only county map I could find on quick notice):



One of the strangest things is that the south tends to have the highest divorce rates (outside of Alaska), except in South Carolina where the rates are below average today and have been falling for a while now. The west also has higher divorce rates. The Hoosiers are real outliers too - they've had high divorce rates for years compared to their neighbors. Not sure exactly what's happening there. But it's kind of interesting to think about.

Here, this map is old, and isn't as detailed, but it's colored a lot better and doesn't pull the same political games:

[dcarrigg]

Re: Sexodus- Males In Crisis

You are most certainly lucky and you should definitely count your blessings.

Aye. Thought that. Almost didn't hit submit. Then I did. Just thought it might provide a small bit of balance to the discussion. At least another view anyways.

1 in 10 men have a chance at a good marriage.

I'd like to think the numbers are better than that. I guess it always depends on how each of us thinks about what 'good' means.

[dcarrigg]

Re: Sexodus- Males In Crisis

It's funny vt, I was chatting with a friend tonight about the police camera thing. He was advocating it too. My reaction was, "It didn't make a difference in New York, why would it have in Ferguson?" He didn't have a good response to that one. Of course, he's quite a bit more left than I am, so he was coming at it from the other angle. But I tend to think that more documentation and more footage probably isn't going to change the facts on the ground or the outcomes of the legal system as much as many people do. The way I think about it is: Work to change the statutes if you want a different outcome. Adding paperwork and surveillance probably won't make a too much of difference in the end game. Many people disagree. But I suspect that it's just another fool's errand.

[Forrest]

Re: Sexodus- Males In Crisis

Also, for those of you who don't experience any sort of battle between the sexes in your daily life, it may be because you are too old to notice. Women of the older generations aren't nearly as annoying to be around as those in my generation, believe me. If you want to see what entitlement looks like, look no further than women of the baby boomer generation.

Surely you mean the daughters of the Baby Boomers? The BB women have been up against the feminist rhetoric of needing to be all a man can be, plus have the kids, and cater to the man, because they were still being brought up to be people-pleasers, nurturer's, and moms. They didn't do well at any of it because so many of the conflicting voices of how they were to behave hobbled them emotionally. Their daughters, and grand-daughters, on the other hand, were taught that the battle for equality was won, and that their little girls should have everything, no matter what. Those girls have gone for the gusto at the expense of any type of meaningful relationship, while the men involved, if not the super macho raping kind, were taught to give way to the girls...as if that would make up for 6 thousand years of male dominated civilization. Consequently, any pretty young thing in her twenties/thirties who doesn't have kids and a bad divorce behind her isn't even grown up yet, and everything is mostly about her, and what she wants...not about a relationship of equals.

Now, those men in their twenties and thirties (and yes, I know quite a few of both sexes) want a relationship, and want kids, but a past bad marriage and the attendant children are getting in the way of many women's personal plans. So if the man is not going to be her consort/slave/drone, and do as much mothering as fathering for their children, she would rather move on, and do it all herself.

By the time the modern Ms. has learned her mistake, and grown up to the realities around her, she has 1-3 kids, and 1-2 marriages hampering her romantic outlook, (and marital chances because of her baggage), where she has finally realized that just once she would like not to have to make all the decisions, or solve all the problems, yet the pride of survival on her own as a lioness with cubs makes her ignore anything but her own desires in the few short minutes between working, and mothering.

The problem is that the way laws are designed today, men get screwed over big time if the marriage goes sour. Custody seems to favour the mother in most cases, and you have to pay alimony, which I honestly find ridiculous in todays day and age. Made sense perhaps 30 years ago, when women were treated like absolute dog-crap when it came to getting an education and finding a job. Today you have more women graduating college than men in a lot of areas, and they can get a good paying job just like any man can. To work so hard all your life, only to have yourself financially devastated by a divorce...I just couldn't imagine having to go through that. I've seen some fathers go through it, and they literally went from being well off to living pay cheque to pay cheque, barely surviving. Close to 50% of marriages end in divorce, and the majority of them are initiated by women. That doesn't surprise me, because the goodie basket waiting for women (especially if they had kids with the guy) is much too tempting. Even if they cheated on you, they can still get a divorce and everything that comes with it. I have nothing against women personally, but with the economy going down the tubes, I just don't trust most women enough to sign that sort of legal document with them. The laws are so skewed to favour women in divorce that it becomes a huge temptation for women to opt for in the moment of any sort of disagreement. I have no doubt that if things were reversed and the laws favoured men, men would be doing the same thing. So believe me, I don't think women are inherently any worse than men, but its human nature to take advantage of things like this, and as a young guy trying to save what little I have, myself and others just don't feel like rolling the dice. Despite what you hear all the time, people do change, just as ones looks changes over time. People can change for the better or the worse, depending on what sort of situations life throws at them, and the specific temperament of the person. There are some things you just can't screen for when you finally decide to marry, and normally I would be okay with that, if the divorce laws were fairer.

Which is why a ketubeh, a wedding contract is necessary. It always was, it just wasn't always written down, and now, not knowing each other's rules of life can make real problems. So you go into the relationship on the first date with some expectations that you spell out, gently, as you each discuss the difficutlies of the mating dance.

It's not just about divorce, it's about the marriage, and how you will do it together. If you don't talk about it, and set it in stone from the get go, you will never be on the same wavelength.

That's not to say you will actually meet a female that is reasonable enough to talk about these issues on the first marital adventure. All the younger men out there should be looking for a female with a little experience behind her, and the baggage mostly worked out, and just take for granted that she'll have children to complicate matters. And if the children don't like you after a reasonable time, they never will.

Then you've got all the feminist over-reach these days that is quite frankly annoying. For instance, the recent gang rape story that the rolling stone covered which is increasingly looking like it was not quite accurate. Now, i can accept a media network to get stuff wrong sometimes, but its really the response by feminists that have me scratching my head. Here's one for example, titled " No matter what Jackie [the alleged victim] said, we should generally believe rape claims" . Uhmmmm no? How about...No matter what the accused says, we should look at the evidence provided before jumping to conclusions. Why should I completely believe any claim from someone I know nothing about? It makes the assumption that women are incapable of being mistaken, inaccurate, or lying. The truth is that we have no idea how many rape claims are false, and as such, the most prudent thing to do in cases like this is to treat it just as we do any other case where a heinous act may have transpired...which is to gather what evidence we can before labelling someone as a criminal. But try explaining this to a young 20-something year old feminist today. The moment you argue against a woman today on issues like this, the automatic assumption is that you are pro-rape, anti-women, and a whole bunch of nasty things, when in reality, I want to be as fair as possible when incidents like this arise. I don't want to be like the feminists who refuse to practise what our court systems practise on a daily basis, which is to hear both sides of the story. Nor do I want to be like the individuals who think women only lie about these things. When I hear a rape accusation, I neither believe nor disbelieve what the accuser says. I'm rather neutral about it, as it is a person I have never met before, and thus have no reason to trust them completely.


What I stated above is just one example, but this happens on a regular basis, and a lot of women around my age think this way, and its this kind of thinking that is really incompatible with me. It's an almost instant turn-off. I have yet to meet a single woman in my age group who approaches these situations in an unbiased manner...and by these situation, im talking about more than just rape cases...im talking about a lot of the hot topics that the genders fight about today (like the wage gap for instance). No matter what the issue, many of the women im in contact with support whatever stance benefits women the most without a second thought. It leads me to think that if i were to marry one of these women, she would treat our marriage the very same way over time (ie. she would only do things that did not inconvenience her or things that brought her the most fulfilment even if it hurt me.) I've talked about this with other guys im my age range, and these things that I've mentioned are always the points mentioned. it has nothing to do with not wanting the responsibility of having a family and raising kids. I trust women enough to lead the country, do my taxes, manage my money, and pretty much everything you can think of except one thing...which is to love me in a marriage just as much as she loves herself or as much as I would love her. The problem is that when I'm committed to someone, I'm deeply committed, which means that I can be very loyal and steadfast, but when my heart is broken, it pretty much devastates me...and I've experience heartbreak on a couple occasions in my short life. I'd hate to see what would become of me in the instance where I experienced the heartbreak + the added financial lashings from divorce court.

I'd love to marry an older woman honestly, because they seem much more trustworthy when it comes to matters of the heart for me. But my generation of women scares me

You are going to need to. You'll find the more balanced ones in a church setting, because it's good for her kids, and she does not have other ways to meet people that are looking for a friendship/dating/relationship/marriage progression. And people who go to church at all, most not being terribly religious, are all about having safe relationships within a community.

If you can't handle a G-d based relationship, try a yoga or defensive martial arts class...their way of life is based on balance, and after you limber up a bit, they'll probably talk to you. Neither opportunities for friendships will take you seriously until you can understand why they are there (Church or yoga class, or martial arts)...they are stressed to the max trying to control a life that is not controllable, and hoping for a knight on a white horse to come along and offer them something beyond a hookup.


By the way, I thank G-d I am nearly 60, and not having to deal with the relationship obstacle course you face. All my nieces and nephews, friend's children, and acquaintances in their twenties and thirties give me enough evidence to state that dating these days is a minefield, and marriage not for the faint hearted.

[verdo]

Re: Sexodus- Males In Crisis

yeah sorry...in my post i had meant to say the millennial generation, not baby boomer generation. The baby boomer generation of women are those who I think are generally better. But yeah, i'm just so cautious about this whole marriage and dating thing today. Quite frankly, I've become more cautious about even expressing romantic interest in women of my generation, because it seems like these days, any sort of advance is seen as inappropriate, me objectifying her, or whatever else. So at this point, I do know if i really will ever be married. I am 24 so there's still a long way to go but im not holding my breath. A church girl would be alright, but ive seen stats which suggest that divorce rates amongst bible believers are even worse than they are amongst atheist women. So I don't know man, im just cautious on every front these days. I have to take every women I encounter on a case by case basis. I'm honestly just kinda hoping that I'll get lucky one day, because luck seems to be my only saving grace at this point

[jpetr48]

Re: Sexodus- Males In Crisis

A church girl would be alright, but ive seen stats which suggest that divorce rates amongst bible believers are even worse than they are amongst atheist women. So I don't know man, im just cautious on every front these days.

Yes you are very astute and aware. I compliment your knowledge of facts and how you do your homework
But you missed my point. It makes no difference if it is a church girl, amazon girl or the girl next door you grew up with- no one is perfect here on earth. (suggest maybe reading that section again so this does turn into a theology/bible thread).

I did not marry a church girl either and that may not be your path too. However together my wife and I learned and acted upon the fact that we are both imperfect.
And I am still learning today how to love sacrificially -it is a day by day learning and growth experience. And the pruning becomes far less and far less painful than in our early years