[edit: I thank everyone for their comments and time. A lot of very interesting opinions and view points. Unfortunately also a lot of things that went away from the actual answer. So I’m thinking maybe this thread can be closed without deleting it?]
The more I hear people talk about it who aren’t cis-het men, the more I hear criticism about the concept. But so far, I’ve only heard people say that it’s stupid, that it’s not a thing, that it’s men’s own fault etc. But I’ve yet to understand where that criticism comes from. I don’t want to start a discussion on whether or not it’s real or not. I just want to understand where the critics are coming from.
Some is valid. Men aren’t taught how to make and maintain emotionally open friendships, with men or women. It’s seen as weak or weird to cry on front of your bros when you’re sad. This leads to loneliness. This is real.
Some is not valid. Men claiming that they’re not getting laid and it’s women’s fault is bullshit. Or that women have impossibly high standards and are gold diggers. It’s nonsense.
The problem is that the “women hating incels” have coopted the term, and their garbage deserves to be mocked.
Men aren’t taught how to make and maintain emotionally open friendships,
If this was true… Why is this an issue only now?
Or all these men were lonely in the closet?
I would guess it has something to do with the loss of third places.
That’s definitely a factor… Suburban experiment is objective failure on many levels but it has also to do with cost of being out.
Can’t go to bars or restaurants anymore. Shit is too expensive for normal income person to sustain in any meaningful way.
Also, DUIs but that ties into first point.
A lot of social organizations that men had used started dying. I have a friend who runs a freemason lodge and he struggles to get people to join. Other similar social clubs have also fallen by the wayside. Similarly the decline of long term geographic community has been brutal and people are less likely to get to know their neighbors or become regulars at the local bar.
I see a lot of talk about how women’s liberation and the power to leave a bad marriage has been a component, but I suspect otherwise, having grown up with parents in a failing marriage. I strongly suspect that what a lot of these lonely men need is friends and community in a way that even a loving wife won’t cut it, much less a cold and distant wife and resentful children.
It’s easier to not care about a guy’s mental health when he’s married, even if it’s a shitty marriage. How can he be lonely if he has a wife, after all?
I’m happy for divorces. I’m happy for the increase in male loneliness BEING NOTICED. It used to just be the guy would work all day, or drink himself to death silently, to avoid the issue.
But the next step has to be for guys to be open to make emotional friendships.
Yeah as a woman I see a certain portion of men who seem to want to push resolving male loneliness onto women. But like, we genuinely can only help here. If men want advice from women on how to make friends and find community, we can do that, but like, even if the friends a man makes are women we didnt fix his loneliness, he went out and made friends and was vulnerable and supportive and got supported in kind.
And that’s why the incel culture is so popular. Anytime you have a hard problem, and pitch that it’s someone else’s responsibility to fix, people will love that.
Poor people " just need to work harder", immigrants " just need to come in the right way", women " just need to be less picky", and I don’t have to change or help.
It’s not an issue only now. But we’re more isolated than before because we lost our third spaces and communities. Bunch of lonely wolves.
Yep. Robert Putnam’s book “Bowling Alone” turns 25 this year, and it’s as relevant as ever.
Its gotten worse because women are no longer forced to stay in or get into shitty, unfulfilling marriages. Men before had guaranteed companionship in the sense that it was societally and financially expected for a woman to stay in a relationship and provide emotional (and physical) companionship. With women becoming more independent, they’re able to leave abusive situations or to avoid getting into them in the first place.
Therefore, if men are not socialized to maintain friendships and no one is being forced to emotionally support them anymore, then they are lonely.
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When people have created a narrative that “white x y z men” are responsible for all the evil in the world (I’m exagerating, but you get my drift), it creates a very difficult situation when those people are facing some serious difficulties. The intellectually lazy thing to do in that case is to brush it off or minimize it, like in the ways you’ve described. And unfortunately, that’s the route those same people will take, since identity politics are intellectually lazy (and lacking compassion, but that’s another story).
The unfortunate part of it is that the right has taken advantage of that wide open flank, which is one main reasons we’re in this current clusterfuck.
The comment section here speaks for itself.
These idiots are still doing the culture war when we should be fighting the class war.
Blaming a bunch of 20s something losers for “patriarchy” is peak useful idiot behaviour.
That flank. Sigh. I remember the turn after Occupy. It went from economics to being cool to just broadly bash men. I specifically remember outspoken, angry women at marches and protests and was like wait, where did the economics go? Like 60% of Republicans wanted wealth reform during occupy. It unfortunately coincided with really great–though apparently transitory–improvements in lgbtq rights. It was so weird to me that self-labeling “feminists” were suddenly talking like it was a zero sum game; for women to rise and improve and build and grow, men had to be put down. That is of course the language of someone seeking power, a charlatan, but it became quite normal. Even questioning the broad criticism of men wasn’t appropriate in “liberal” press or circles for a good decade. The whole "yeah but bashing men isn’t right/fair or clumsy” finally started working into the Atlantic, NYT and other large publications in 2023 but the damage had been done.
It of course drove lots of men right to the tall radio, podcasters–and those were young adults then–i can’t imagine what it was like growing up since then as a young person with the normalization of some of this stuff.
It was all intentional. It sounds like a conspiracy theory but these elites have access to how many decades of psychological research (or their employees do at any rate) to be used in marketing to make people think and feel WHATEVER THE POWERFUL WANT to an extent. that’s what marketing is:manipulations. Most of it is used to drive capital upwards. But it can be easily subverted to distract and deflect attention from those at the top. Media would spin pieces about male aggression, algorithms would make sure they get into the right feeds.
It’s all absolutely psychopathic. When done on an entire population, it doesn’t matter if it doesn’t work very well or works great (people are amazingly easy to manipulate) the average will be a noticeable shift in the direction they intend. Over years, we get fascism. Yaaaayyy…
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Good dog
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Ouch you got me
Hell yeah fight that culture war!
As a cis het man, the “male loneliness epidemic” is more a collection of symptoms of multiple problems without one source.
Those who claim a single source usually point to women because they’re a misogynist grifter looking chasing clout or to sell a scam course / supplement.
So without further ado, here’s my non-academic (and probably ill-informed) reckon based on conversations from online and IRL, lived experiences, and perceived societal norms. Have your large pinch of salt on standby.
- Both men and women have been socialised that the only emotions men show is anger or laughter. Men have been socialised that the only emotion they can express in front of other men is anger and laughter. This means the amount of emotional support men can use from their support network is limited, they’re not practiced on how to deal with them, and either have to figure it out by themselves, be lucky enough to have a friend or partner whom they feel emotionally safe to express these feelings, can afford to seek professional help, laugh the problem off with self-depricating humour to repress the emotion, or turn it into anger usually as a result of succumbing to one of the aforementioned grifters.
Understandably, women have been socialised that if a man is showing emotion then that could turn into frustration and anger and so then they either have to risk taking on unpaid emotional labour or remove themselves from the situation. So sometimes you get this scenario where women want men to be more emotionally open but then recoil when they do because subconscious alarm bells start ringing that “you’re in danger” because there’s a decent chance that they could be.
Thankfully this is changing with younger generations, but it will take a generation or two.
- Male support socialisation is centred around problem solving, not listening. Even if a guy has friends he can lean on emotionally, the conversations are usually focused around fixing the problem rather than providing a listening space and reassurance that those emotions are valid.
This is the main reason I pass off an “I’m fine” to friends and family because they’d try and suggest solutions to the problem rather than just listen.
Again, this is changing in society but these kinds of changes are slow.
- Loss of third spaces. This affects everyone, not just men. But these third spaces where people can socialise without being forced to spend money are key for building communities. When people had disposable income or access to lines of credit it didn’t matter that there was an expectation that you had to pay for parking, food, drink, ticket(s) for the activity. Now, that’s less of an option for many people.
This hasn’t improved and will likely only get worse as late stage capitalism squeezes out anything that is unable or refuses to make more and more profit per quarter.
- The lack of third spaces has moved friendships, courtship, and dating online. Whilst this has meant many people have made connections (platonic and romantic) that would have gone missed, the big tech companies have realised that anger and loneliness are good for business.
The social networks get far more engagement from posts that make people angry and therefore their advertising revenues increase.
Similarly, the dating monopoly Match Group, has realised that having more men than women on the platform means these men will spend money on these platforms for a chance at matches. So they purposely profile men who are likely to pay for things like “super likes” etc. and do nothing to make the experience more pleasant for women.
This isn’t anything new by the way, it’s the same reason some clubs make guys pay on the door and women get in for free, and it’s the same reason why there’s more female sex workers than male sex workers.
Men are willing to pay many and women don’t have to, but women have to put up with a lot of entitlement from the men who have paid for matches / to get into the club and be constantly fending off attention from men they don’t wish to reciprocate the attention to.
Without third spaces for general socialising, the only place to interact with potential partners is paid and will therefore skew financially in favour of women at the cost of their peace-of-mind.
- This is more of a personal sentiment but others might empathise: I don’t want to feel like I’m harassing women.
I’m not cold approaching anyone when I go out because I don’t want to interrupt their precious free time they get in between the grind of life. I don’t want to interrupt them socialising with their friends or be creepy on the dancefloor by getting in their personal space, or even glancing over too much.
So I stay at arms length, avoid eye contact, and only approach or get close if I’m getting multiple very strong signals large enough to land an Airbus A380.
- This is definitely just applies to me, but I have exceedingly low self-confidence, self-esteem, and low opinion of myself from a deep rooted depression. That’s a straight-up non-starter for trying to be with anyone else because nobody, man or woman, likes an emotional anchor dragging their mood down. I’m working on it but without paying a lot of money for therapy (the NHS waiting list is a joke), I’m stuck trying to work it out myself (see points 1 & 2).
So until I’m fit for socialising in that way, I’m purposely isolating myself in that regard.
Oh and for added flavour, I don’t want to be around watching society collapse as the world continues to burn not can I distract myself (or be ignorant enough) to not pay attention to it.
To be honest, right now my mind is telling just to wait for my mother to pass away then withdraw all my money, disappear abroad, burn through it in pure hedonism then off myself once the cash has run out. At least this way I can enjoy a shorter life rather than suffer a longer one.
I’ll be your friend; you can actually discuss things well 💜
There is one source.
I recommend reading nurturing our humanity. Primates have two observable social systems. And they both exist in all societies along a spectrum.
Domination and partnership.
The more domination based a society, the more everybody suffers. Including those higher in the social hierarchy.
Working class men, they are in a strange place because they have hierarchical status based on gender but not based on economic class. This makes it difficult for them to find solidarity with women. And thus more lonely in a system of loneliness.
Communists would blame capitalism of course, and they’re not exactly wrong because capitalism is a domination-based system. Marx called this phenomena alienation.
Feminists would blame patriarchy, and again they are not wrong it is a domination-based system.
So on and so forth, but we can take a step back and look at ourselves as apes and see domination is the problem. The will to power.
Buddhism calls this energy Mara, and would call the partnership energy Buddha nature.
It’s all the same thing, it’s a strategy apes use to relate to each other and survive. Partnership is a better strategy. Assuming your goal is the health of society and the planet rather than personal gain.
It has very large implications on society, many of which in contradiction with established progressive policy.
So it’s easier to ridicule and/or downplay, than to apply compassion, and change course.
I feel like that’s a easy statement for people to upvote. But I don’t really see an answer to the question. What is the course? Change what? And what established progressive policy?
Not trying to antagonise you at all. Just trying to dig deeper
From the feminist side, there’s a lack of empathy towards men because “they did it to themselves” and from most other camps it’s “men are supposed to be tough, stop being a pussy”.
though a sizable amount of feminists instead characterize men as also victims of the patriarchy, a system they didn’t choose to be part of
I can’t say I’ve encountered that. I don’t doubt there are reasonable feminists out there but the ones I’ve encountered have been the “all men are trash” type.
In feminist scholarship it tends more towards the “we are all victims of patriarchy” stance. Most my friends are academics so they tend to lean the same direction, though not always.
You might not be identifying reasonable feminists then, because the “men are trash” ones are more visible. You’re probably surrounded by feminists and encountering them all the time, but unless you’re asking them their stance about reproductive rights or equality in parental leave or something else in conversation you wouldn’t know it.
It’s worth emphasising that concerns about male mental health in large part comes from feminism. Feminism is not inherently man hating, and research of gender dynamics through the lense of feminism is what made it possible to observe how patriarchal structures in society harm not only women, but also men.
It’s kinda like how a marxist will tell you that even rich people are happier in egalitarian societies: Capitalism hurts everyone, including the ones seemingly profiting from it. In the same way, feminism gave way to the insight that patriarchy hurts everyone, including men.
That said, you’re not wrong that here is a (perhaps more popular rather than scholarly) feminist critique of male grievances. Feminism is a bunch of different things, and there’s a bunch of contradictions between different understandings of feminism.
Not too weird then that people end up hating the whole issue. Some feminists hate it because it’s sympathising with the oppressor or whatever, while anti-feminists hate it because they see it as soft feminist bullshit or whatever. Having a nuanced opinion about anything these days is difficult.
Very true. I realise I should have picked my wording better in my original post that was meant to be little more than a quick summary. When I said ‘feminist side’ I did not wish to refer to all feminists but specifically the new generation type otherwise known as the ‘feminazi’ or ‘those loud unempathetic bitches you see on Tiktok’.
Yeah, I got what you meant - it’s a word that takes on a billion different meanings. I just find it to be important to push back against the strawman whenever I see it, as I’m not gonna let a bunch of dumb kids raised by a social media algorithm ruin feminism for me. Get off my lawn etc.
But I don’t really see an answer to the question
That question being:
I just want to understand where the critics are coming from.
To repeat my answer: It comes from a lack of empathy, as it’s easier to downplay a problem than to take it seriously.
Whenever a statistic isn’t fair towards a group, be it income, housing, … corrective measures are being implemented. Unless that group is men, such as the homelessness, suicide, incarceration, lower education, … Then it’s seen as “normal” due to “toxic men”.
Very much that. Didn’t answer you at all.
To actually answer your question, people who don’t believe in the Male Loneliness Epidemic (MLE) think a lot of the “epidemic” is just shitty men complaining that nobody wants to be around them instead of doing any self-reflecting and changing their own shittiness. It’s tied to the incel movement (which is why you’re getting a lot of very snippy responses imo lol).
Plus, a lot of the champions of the MLE are insufferable dudes who maybe are lonely not because of some societal epidemic but maybe because they’re just fucking assholes?
Personally, I have no idea if there’s truly a MLE. I think a lot of it really could be asshole men online complaining that nobody likes them without recognizing that it’s their own actions causing their own loneliness. I also think it could just be the internet is ruining any sense of community and togetherness, and men are being vocal about it and tying this loss of community to men specifically, but idk, I feel like there isn’t some special issue of loneliness targeting men rn.
Do you think people are born as “fucking assholes”, or shaped that way by their environment?
Wealth redistribution would fix pretty much all social and economic issues
That’s the course if people want a clear one to an equal society
I’ve seen three sides to it.
Side 1: “boo hoo nobody will fuck me because I don’t think other people should have rights”
Side 2: not having strong friendships/relationships because our society is built around capitalism, cars, and social media (this obviously applies across genders, this side therefore is a generalized loneliness epidemic, not a male gendered one)
Side 3: men get socially punished for being vulnerable
In my mind only the second & third side is worth listening to.
Side 2 has not actual relevance to the problem itself. These societal tropes are not why men are having a hard time finding women. It’s just a societal trope posing as an explanation.
Side 3 is the only relevant issue. Men are constantly told they need to be more vulnerable or their masculinity is toxic, and yet when they express themselves vulnerably, they’re punished for it.
The issue, as I see it, is that some advocates of the “toxic masculinity” narrative often don’t fully acknowledge the ways in which women can also reinforce those same patterns.
A deeper concern is that many feminists present themselves as speaking on behalf of all women, when in reality most women don’t identify as feminists. As a result, what’s being represented is more of a particular set of progressive gender beliefs than the broader experiences of women in general.
To be clear, I actually agree with many feminist perspectives overall. However, I find that the movement’s messaging is often counterproductive—it can come across as unnecessarily divisive and, at times, dismissive of men. Because of this, even when the arguments are largely valid, they struggle to gain wider support.
Side 2 is very relevant. If you are lonely you get easily into very terrible sides of society and mindsets. I speak from experience. If you dont have a sense of belonging you also have no sense of self, but then come people that tell you to have a part in their group because of race, religion, nationality, or any other extremist reason.
Fair enough, I should have been clearer. I recognize that social isolation has deleterious effects on people. The part I was dismissing was the attribution to capitalism. Capitalism does not cause this effect. Other factors are responsible.
Capitalism does though. Atleast to an extend. Car centered city though that kills social connections a lot!
No. That is not an effect of capitalism. That is just a fact of rural living. God, Lemmings love to blame capitalism for everything.
What made the car industry big? What convinced them to tear down everything and make everything cardepended? Why does the oil and car industry lobby so hard and spread missinfo about public transport and closer living together?
Dude, seriously, calm down and connect with reality a bit more. Not everything is a conspiracy.
feminist has never been a coherent set of beliefs of messages. it’s a clusterfuck of viewpoints. many of which are contradictory.
especially 3rd/4th wave stuff that is mostly about social norms. earlier feminist was focused on political goals.
Cis man here.
It’s an issue. It comes in lots of different colors and flavors but it all stems from social issues.
There’s lots of reasons, some men were never taught about social relationships, men tend to generally be less interested in social interaction thus giving them less experience, some men are ostracized when talking about their social struggles, and these are on top of preexisting environmental factors and preexisting mental conditions.
At this point it’s important to say: it’s not a contest for genders. Trans people have it hard, nb people have it hard women have it hard. It’s just that this is one of the rare times men’s struggles are not addressed properly.
I can tell you I probably have about 50 men in my life that I ko and wo are nice but if I had to talk to a man about my struggles socially, there are 2 men.
Now couple this with the fact 90% of men I had deeper conversations with told me they are struggling with depression and some of them having suicidal ideations, it is fair to assume we have a problem.
For me, the depression is always exacerbated by social isolation. It makes sense - not getting some feedback from other people can get you into crazy headspaces and there are thinking patterms that literally make you hurt yourself just to make it stop.
There’s another aspect: we are social creatures and as soon as you don’t get enough “social exposure” it’s harder to learn social cues and “get the vibe”, and other people notice. So the more you isolate, the harder preceding social interaction become and the harder it is, which in turn incentivizes isolating. A vicious cycle.
Now not everyone has these issues and I would never say that it’s the most important issue in our current society but every time I hear suicide statistics by gender it really puts into perspective that we should get to know those people who we have failed.
One thing I also wanna address is the idea that “men are never taught how to socialize”, because I think it implies a lot of things. First, I’m sure a lot of men are not, but a good number of men are. I was for example. It didn’t help, but that was never the issue for me. Second, it implies men want to be taught. I spoke to a group of 2 men and 2 women with mental disabilities about if they ever considered complete social isolation. The men said yes and the women said no. I think this is really significant and can give insight into why this is affecting men more than other genders. I would infer from this that women always see the benefit in social interaction, and men pursue social interactions rather as a means to an end. This might be a stretch but this supported by other observations of friends and family.
This topic is really important and I hope it gets talked about more - for the benefit of everyone who wants to see people become happier. The men affected by loneliness, as well as the people who deal with them.
men tend to generally be less interested in social interaction
Is that the case, because they are men, or because they are afraid?
Piggybacking on this comment: it’s incredibly rare for men to get approached, it’s incredibly common for women to get approached.
Both of these situations have downsides, but right now we are talking about men, so let’s ignore the downsides for women right now.
If you are the one who has to approach somebody if you want to start up any kind of relationship (from casual acquaintance to friend, to romantic relationship), that means you will be on the receiving end of rejection, by definition. If you are in the “approaching” role, and you’d reject somebody, you just don’t approach them. So by definition, it’s quite rare when being approached that you are rejected by the person who approached you.
So while women have to reject a lot of approaches they don’t want, men get rejected quite often. A socially inept woman is a wallflower, a socially inept man is a creep.
If you have been rejected too often (and maybe too harshly), this might easily turn into a sour grapes situation (“I can’t do social interaction, so I don’t want social interaction”) due to fear of rejection.
What you are raising is a very delicate subject but let’s call it what it is: dating sucks. No matter your gender, there’s hurdles, it’s just really hard to find someone who’s putting effort in. If you’re a woman, it’s because lots of people matching you will be absolute garbage. A friend showed me who was writing her and most of it was weird and creepy. If you’re a man, it’s hard to find someone who wants to write with you period. And any other genders deal with an equally limited dating pool.
It makes sense, it’s statistics, mathematically plausible, but damn it sucks. Unfortunately I think we are at the point where these conversation are bound to get eroded by inflammatory rhetoric. So these nuanced discussions are things for the future.
Totally, dating sucks for all genders, no question about that. The issues are just different and pretty much mirrored.
A friend showed me who was writing her and most of it was weird and creepy. If you’re a man, it’s hard to find someone who wants to write with you period.
Yeah, that’s exactly it.
Unfortunately I think we are at the point where these conversation are bound to get eroded by inflammatory rhetoric.
That’s also not wrong.
Tbh, I think the most important thing (not only in regards to dating but in regards to society at large) is to counter the individualization trend. It just makes people very lonely in general. It separates young men from resources needed to develop into more socially acceptable people, it separates people from their support groups in general and it just makes things really hard for everyone who’s not perfectly well adjusted for the individualist life style.
men can be very social and still get nothing but negative feedback from others.
a big part of this is that men are rarely given positive feedback in life from anyone. with maybe the exception of your work where your ‘feedback’ is your pay raises/promotions.
personally in my life, when good stuff happens… people arne’t happy for me. They are often jealous or hostile. Most of my exes would downplay my successes. “oh you got a $5000 raise, why wasn’t it 10,000” etc. It really sucks the joy out of life to be around that type of thing. it’s also why i’m way happier being single and limiting my socialization… because i’ve stopped getting constantly negative feedback from other people even when it should be positive. i’ve also had so much more success the past few years due to that.
and frankly, most of the ‘social cues’ and ‘vibe’ that i’ve dealt with in my social groups is all negative crap. i’d rather remain ignorant of it than join some group where we circlejerk how great we are and complain about how awful everyone else is. i used to do a lot of volunteering and a lot of that stuff just devolves into people who want to do nothing and virtue signal.
I can only suggest reading some of “The Way We Never Were”. It’s a look at society and how it actually was vs the manufactured versions people today use to weaponize the whitewashed past as some sort of ideal. It’s not a psychological book or a deep analysis of society at all, but one of the things that struck me about it that relate to social circles and how it applies to men in particular is the loss of “the village” and the damage “self reliance” - the isolation of the American Family Unit by making it the Family Vs The World - has done to society and the ability of people to form steady social groups outside of work. This, and the need to constantly change jobs to move ahead financially also keeps people on unsteady ground with relationships.
Good, succinct explanation. There are some people dropping their life stories in this post, which should be a barometer for just how lonely everyone really is.
But yes, this. It’s all socio-economic. It’s capitalism ruining our world by forcing us to serve the system instead of having a system that serves us. It has been like this a long time, but if unmanaged, allowed to grow and consolidate beyond just the interests of a few companies here and there and allowed to turn into an all-consuming monster that takes away our politics, our social lives, our hopes and dreams, you end up with a very miserable population.
Yes, it’s “divide and conquer” on a grand scale. Because we don’t have groups we’re never strong enough to rebel.
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The only thing essentialist about us (and the only other explanations are essentialist) is that we’re highly social creatures, the point that we literally die without social contact like a goddamn lovebird or guinea pig.
The primary thing that’s gotten in the way of our social life of the past is the rampant increase in “luxuries” such as single-family homes, personal cars, computers that keep us inside, and the vast array of conveniences that let us survive with clicks and phone calls with strangers.
At its heart, it’s not complex. We buy things that are sold to us to give us the illusion of comfort, but comfort is not good for us, having community is what’s good for us and makes happier and have more balanced perspectives, and we’re suffering massively and experiencing national divisions because we don’t have a sense of community broadly.
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communist regimes
Already lost me there.
There hasn’t been a real “communist regime” there have just been a lot of dictators and despots using the label, and if you know history you should know this, otherwise it’s weird that you think the only alternative to life-destroying capitalism run amuck is straight up cartoonish, hollywood-invented, jump-suits and tank-parades-communism.
However I have traveled the actual REAL world and there are many, many countries where people do not prioritize throwing money at corporations and care about their communities and each other and they are much, much happier with less distractions, less luxuries, fewer stressors and more social engagement, and in many of those places they also have free healthcare and public transportation. You know, socialist policies that help people not have to struggle so hard to survive every day so they can spend time with their friends and family.
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No, that’s a dumb fucking reply. I am saying that people were not happier under dictators, that’s not exactly gymnastics. Meanwhile, there are countries here and now on earth that have higher happiness levels who are more focused on community and culture and have social safety nets to back it up. That’s my point.
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I do think it’s fair to describe it as a men’s issue. Because its usually describing loneliness caused by a disconnect with the image of masculinity you’ve been taught, and that which you actually exhibit. Everyone struggles with loneliness, but this is a specific kind of loneliness that is worth discussing in isolation.
My main issue with it is how a lot of men seem to think its referring to women not wanting them. It’s a very easy term to feed their persecution complex.
Ah that last part makes sense as a criticism. Yes, I guess incels have taken this term to defend their sexism
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I disagree with the sentiment that it can’t be a useful term simply because you haven’t found a peer reviewed study describing the phenomenon. I would like to see more research be done, but that doesn’t change the fact that I’m seeing the issue directly in front of my eyes.
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Do you think it’s because the are conditioned from birth that being married, or having many successful relationships with woman will make them wealthy and happy?
I think it’s important to note the incels often mean “the women I think are hot won’t fuck me”
They could find a girlfriend if they improved their personality or lowered their standards but they don’t want to do that.
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I’m a recovering drug addict. Nobody wanted to help me, rejected by everyone who wasn’t a recovering drug addict.
I got out of the loop.
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“It’s actually good to not receive help as an addict”
That’s… silly lol. Where did you pull that idea from?
It’s different because physical addiction is harder to deal with, you can die lol
I was also homeschooled in the Texas countryside as a kid… I understand being lonely… addiction is harder.
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Can you describe what you mean by “disconnect with the image of masculinity you’ve been taught”
That is a very interesting statement but does not align with how it’s been described to me which is men can’t get laid and are horny and give up on women and just watch porn
Gay dude here, it seems to be. We have the loneliness epidemic here too, but we’re actually organizing and fighting it, because we’re used to do that. Our cishet counterparts are definitely not equipped to do that. Women are socalized much earlier than boys, and they’re taught that the social order is theirs for keeping. Girls are simply raised to be better at this. By the time men realize what’s happened with the natural funneling of friends through the parenting years - usually those late 20s and early 30s where it suddenly starts to become really difficult to overcome the friendship hump.
I can’t comment on the whole incels taking hold of this concept, because it’s something I’ve just had explained to me in the past week. I can definitely see the gender/sexuality lines on this in real life tho (I started and run a nonprofit to create community for GBT+ men in my state).
Most of the criticism of it I’ve seen is about how the concept’s been warped to mean women aren’t putting out enough for specific men. Other people will also point out that modern society is isolating in general. People who aren’t men who are experiencing loneliness might have some skepticism about the idea it’s a man specific issue.
There’s also some wariness because topics about issues men face can translate for some men into a violent rage towards women. As seen with the involuntarily celibate movement.
People of all types can take genuine grievances and find a target to take it out on. Like income inequality translating to hatred of immigrants. And violence towards them. When you’re the mistaken target of those grievances, it can be simplest to want to get away from the conversation unless the person starting it is clear they aren’t targeting you.
Those are my guesses as to why people are skeptical.
https://www.npr.org/transcripts/1263527043 Some discussion in here about the topic, but also criticisms of the topic.
https://trinitonian.com/2025/02/14/unpacking-the-myth-of-the-male-loneliness-epidemic/ This opinion article criticizes how influencers drive the conversation, to its detriment.
https://www.fridaythings.com/recent-posts/male-lonliness-crisis-incel-men-friendship-mental-health This person brings up the idea that women are wary of the idea because it seems like they’ll be expected to individually solve it regardless of their own wants and needs.
I had to scroll too far to find this answer.
Most of the criticism of it I’ve seen is about how the concept’s been warped to mean women aren’t putting out enough for specific men.
this is it in a nutshell. Men clearly experience loneliness, what’s problematic is the way “male loneliness” has been weaponized against women, as if it’s not a byproduct of patriarchy but actually a result of women’s neglect (or worse, an insidious assumption that women have an obligation to date men because they are lonely).
Thanks! There’s not that many answers here to my question, just a lot of comments on the thing itself not about the criticism. So thanks for those sources.
It’s difficult to discuss this issue, because loneliness is so personal. This all is.
I’m glad you asked the question and are trying to genuinely understand where critics are coming from. All of this (like, society) is a mess and we’ve all been hurt and it makes doing better a struggle because, how do you see anything past the pain from your own wounds?
When I was very young, my father would hit me for crying, so when I was a little older, hearing that little boys weren’t supposed to cry just made me go “me neither.” But (without justifying my father) understanding that he did it because society and his own parents fucked him up on this issue, and his parents were fucked up by their parents, makes it possible to envision a way things could be different.
Not everyone gets past that hurt, though. Like a young man abused by his mother dismissing the idea of misogyny. The statistics are just statistics. The memories of that pain are visceral and real.
I think its pretty hypocritical for anyone who isnt a male to have an opinion on the validity of an experience they cant possibly have unless they transitioned.
Its like me having an opinion on have a period.
Particularly when so many trans men who have lived as women previously have come forward to validate how much more isolated men feel.
I’ll disagree a little here.
My wife’s had surgeries from men that know waaaaaay more about her period than she does.
That being said, they went to school for a decade and have another decade of experience learning specifically about a topic. They aren’t just some random business student that dropped out 2 weeks into semester one and writes their theses via comments.
Small but important caveat. Otherwise 100% agreed. I have no ideas on periods because I’m not a woman or a Dr.
Yeah I also disagreed, I’ve read some very compassionate takes on men’s situation written by academic feminists.
Bell hooks the will to change for example. Women can be experts on gender, and how systems of domination effect everyone. Men included.
On the other hand, belle hooks’, The Will to Change, is one of the most compassionate and understanding takes on the subject.
So she has an opinion on the validity of the experience, and it is that capitalism and patriarchy is alienating for men, just like it is for others. Especially working class men.
Nurturing Our Humanity, co-written by a female author, uses system science and primatology to validate what men experience in domination based societies.
I know your point was more long the lines of critics shouldn’t criticize things that they don’t understand, but there are a lot of feminists that do understand and have an informed opinion, because they study how these systems of domination affect everyone, not just women.
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I’m more of a comma or interrobang kind of guy‽
And yet, your sentence ends with…
duly noted, fixed!
but I know who I am (or at least so I think) so now it just looks weird to me.
As a male who grew up around males, men are men’s worst enemy.
Wait until you find out how young women interact with each other 🤭
This is not a gender issue, it is a maturity thing
Not arguing anything otherwise, I completely agree, but women aren’t the reason men are suffering.
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In a greater context sure, but no, men are the reason.
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That’s a different conversation entirely.
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Yeah, there are psychopaths in the world, that’s not a male centric thing, it’s an always has and always will be thing, but it doesn’t account for every problem men inflict upon men and if they didn’t exist this issue would still be prevalent, you don’t have to be a fucking psychopath to fall victim to toxic masculinity and false expectations of media and society. Again, that’s an entirely different conversation.
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I think there is definitely a male loneliness epidemic but I think there is also an equally bad female loneliness epidemic that nobody talks about enough
Modern online incel and radfem movements were created to pit them against each other and prevent them from uniting and creating positive social change.
Created by whom? I’m actually curious.
themselves
I think what’s happening is:
40% of men are good people
40% of women are good people
The remaining 20% are pieces of shit that demonize and demean the other sex, which has caused the 80% to become scared and reclusive.
Social media makes it seem like the percentages are flipped but they are not!
The numbers are made up but you get my point.
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they both exist. but the male one makes people angry so it gets more engagement. it’s also framed as ‘men are losers who need to do better in life’
the female one is often framed as ‘women are too successful for men’.
the truth is there is a huge gender disparity emerging in certain demographics. my own included. most single women I meet in my 30s/40s are living radically different lives than the men. and frankly i haven’t had a relationship in half a decade because none of the women I meet anymore have anything in common with me, and often they view our differences in a very negative light. 10 years ago those differences were seen as positive.
there are also no common spacers for us to mingle anymore. esp not as equals.
I felt all bitter like you did but I met a girl recently who completely stole my heart, they do exist for sure
Very good point about common spaces. The best we got in north america is basically just the mall at this point
Also there are no safe spaces for men outside of wilderness and AA meetings hahaha
Am I bitter that we are entering a recession? Or is it just a fact of the world?
I think a lot of it comes from the fact that in incel spaces, it’s a lot of grievance and blame by men who were raised believing the world owed them certain things. And now they’re finding out that it’s really hard so rather than look inward at how they can be better and work within the circumstances they’re in, they blame wokeism and women’s empowerment for denying them their entitlement.
Dark Brandon on youtube has been doing an awesome series on incels that’s definitely worth watching. I recommend this video not just for anyone interested in incel culture, but literally anyone interested in WTF has happened to the world in the last 40 years - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OBAX4Wi1iNM&list=WL&index=16
Imo the whole incel thing is a symptom, not the cause. Many men feel lonely, lost, and useless in today’s society. Without a proper support network and raised to hide away our emotions, many of us don’t have the proper tools to tackle this monster. Then, conveniently, there are these people who tell you that none of it is your fault. That it’s not you who needs to change or improve yourself, but society that went wrong. That it’s the “woke people” who paint you as a villain, that it’s the women who deny you the “right” to a relationship .
Many men are looking for answers. And the whole incel alt-right pipeline gives easy answers. It blames everyone else. And when you’re already in a dark place, tired and lost, it can be hard to resist. Not that I want to excuse incels in any way, they’re dangerous and we have every right to vilify them. But imo they’re not the cause, just a symptom of the broader issue. And to prevent more incels from appearing, I think it’s time they men’s mental health is taken a bit more seriously. Society needs to adapt, starting from how boys are raised.
You’ve put the carriage before the horse. Incels become incels because they’re lonely/can’t speak to girls/etc. They blame the girls for this rather than try to understand why girls ignore/avoid them, usually because they are the stereotypical incel.
Also the “incel-to-trans pipeline” has too much smoke to not be a fire. It’s a “legit” path for many deluded incels.
On a related note, I wish we would acknowledge that men socialize different and that guys doing stuff together is therapeutic. Ruminating on emotions can have a negative effect in men, while work therapy can be much effective that talk therapy.
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that would be acknowledging that men and women are different and that’s bad in 2025, apparently.
Cis men have been, and mostly continue to be, the most privileged group in western society. So it’s easy to dismiss anything negative that affects them.
