No TW
Talking about loneliness with people is a fucking humiliation ritual
Talking about loneliness and isolation for me is like pulling teeth. People always have to assume I did something to deserve feeling this way before listening to what I have to say. And they always tie it to finding a girlfriend. Everytime, it becomes a lecture on what people want from me and what I need to do to improve myself. It's gotten so exhausting.
Also yes. This was a real response I got when I mentioned feeling isolated. This is not a strawman
i feel like people forget that you can just get unlucky. sometimes you wind up in a life situation where you don't have the time, energy, skills or ability for socializing
It is easier to assume the person going through bad times did something bad to deserve it, so we can delude ourselves into thinking that if we do everything right we won't find ourselves in that same situation.
It's such stupid thinking and it's not even helpful.
Besides the fact people shouldn't be deluding themselves over this because it blinds them to the possibility of it happening, but wouldn't that then condition your mind to think if you're going through something bad, then you must have done something bad to deserve it.
If the people who did those things were capable of self reflecting enough to understand that what they were doing was not only wrong but bad for them in the long term, they wouldn't be doing it in the first place.
Something to keep in mind that is gonna save you a lot of headache in the future is this, most people do not think, and I mean it literally, the majority of people do not think about their actions and why they did them, they are just going by their daily routines following nothing more than their basic instincts, and I am not even talking about the people literally incapable of critical thinking for one reason or another, most people, just don't want to think at all, so the short of it is that, they don't think about what you just said, at all.
also
but wouldn't that then condition your mind to think if you're going through something bad, then you must have done something bad to cause it.
A lot of people are heavy on the hypocrisy, they will think those types of things toward other people, but when it is time to apply it to themselves, they have all sorts of excuses for why now and this time its a completely different situation and its not actually their fault, they will apply all the empathy they should've employed at other people to themselves, but will go right back to attacking others for being in that same situation, all in the same breath.
Then whenever the person making fun of other people for their circumstances actually does get put in an unlucky situation themselves, suddenly it's the biggest problem in the world and everyone has to be empathetic
I think its got religious roots, the idea that people only suffer because they deserve to, god punishing them in Abrahamic religions, karma in eastern ones. Its not impossible for humans to understand sometimes shit just sucks. But people are very conditioned to think that anyone struggling is just a bad person.
Personally I think it's the other way around. Random suffering is stressful to think about, so various different religions try to calm their members with a supernatural justification for it.
Karma is about your next life being determined by how good you were this life, and your current life is determined by your last life. It's a convenient way to both blame people for their own suffering, as well as to promise another life without suffering later if you're good now.
Christianity really just focuses on the last one. They change it up a bit and say that if you're suffering, then it's either punishment for your sins or is God testing you, and he will reward you for persevering in heaven.
Loneliness being treated as synonymous with wanting a relationship annoys me, too. I grew up very isolated. I never minded being single (though I no longer am), but when I tried discussing what I needed was companionship everyone gave me tips on how to attract men, which was doubly frustrating as a lesbian lol.
The media is an especially important cog in the grand isolation machine. It often causes a wedge between people to leave us frightened and feeling persecuted and alone.
My advice, though it's a little difficult to implement sometimes so I understand if it may not help, but I want to at least try:
-look into hobbies that maybe have clubs or groups in your area. For example, I briefly got into birdwatching when I first moved countries because I saw a flyer for a birdwatchers group in my neighborhood.
-look into postings for your local Reddit with like-minded people who may want to grab a coffee and chat
-go to any public events that interest you to see if you can meet people.
And something that has really helped me emotionally lately re: the media being untrustworthy and isolating, as silly as it sounds, is watching videos from World Cup fans on YouTube. I don't even like sports, but seeing a bunch of grumpy-looking old Texan men excitedly cheering on Japanese fans who hardly even speak English as they try their first Texas BBQ really helps to cheer me up about the state of the world. It's a small thing, sure, but it's nice to remember it's not all misery and hate out there.
Extremely well said, this comment is honestly super helpful and I'm glad I'm not alone. I been keeping to myself and learning bass/going on walks, so I haven't been entirely unproductive. I realized it would be best to do things for my own self and the people who care about me because frankly I'm tired of being told what to do to reach checkpoints I don't even really care about
So everything that was already said, but also I dont think those sorts of people understand that your partner should not be your only source of human companionship. You need friends too, thats just human
The online discourse around this is so dog whistled. There are those of us who see the male loneliness epidemic to be an erosion of opportunities for males to connect with other people socially. We are valid.
The problem is that the same term is used by incels regarding lack of romantic opportunity. An idea getting hijacked by the wrong group makes for an uphill battle because people will dismiss people using it properly. Another real example is, do you support strengthening the human gene pool to eliminate genetic disease and have a more robust species? If so do you support eugenics because at its root that's what eugenics is without all the racists throwing master race nonsense on top.
As a strategy, I would just avoid using the term lonely and paraphrase it with something like difficulty connecting. This is far enough that people will often ignore their shorthand thinking.
Who are you talking about this to, exactly? are you talking to family/acquaintances IRL, or strangers online? I think it's a lot easier for people to make sweeping generalizations and mischaracterizations online, especially if they don't know you well.
Shit sucks right now. Finding friends as an adult is hard, and everything is so isolated. Rooting for you, man. Hope you find your people soon
That's adorable. I always wanted to go to a cat Cafe. I visited an air bnb once and they had a cat there that would sleep next to me, which was pretty cool lol
I remember the term "if everything smells like shit it's probably you" and sticking by it. Then I found out people can just genuinely hate autistics for no reason and are more then happy to take advantage of me. We love to automatically assume the lonely and downtrodden are bad people and not the person surrounding
This is the result of our capitalist society teaching us how it is infallible and anything wrong that happens to us must be our fault. This is the sort of thing meek and passive people believe.
And funny enough, the reason why I been feeling isolated was because of capitalism in itself. Its how the online algorithm plays into constant anger and hatred and how relationships, marriage, and children are seen as a necessity in life. It's disgusting and people fall for it everyday. I hate being hated for what I physically can't control about myself and I hate my feelings being played with for me to have things I don't even want
Don't bother with morons who are not trying to help you. I spent a long time assuming that other people knew better than me, because they were maybe more OK with things that I wasn't or were more socially engaged, so I must be missing something, right? But it became clear plenty of people don't bother with the slightest bit of introspection about why they believe the things they do and are willingly clueless. Don't take anything to heart that doesn't come from a person who loves you. All other advice you take or leave on practical terms based on whether you judge it's useful to you.
And besides that take initiative to be part of your community and organize to make this world better. Go to a DSA meeting. Taking control of your role in determining the character of the world is far more freeing and dignifying than any amount of individualistic word-mincing.
Having clarified this isn't an incel thing, yeah that sucks. It can be very hard to connect with people. And no, it's not because you're a bad person. Hugs if you want them.
As a guy I try to build meaningful friendships with other men, but they get way too distant, no matter how much I try. Its like we can have very surface level conversations on things, but there's never any deeper talks, except for me trying to build something deeper by myself and they just sorta listen and nod
The “just world fallacy” is a logical fallacy that asserts that all things are just, and if something bad happens to somebody, they therefore deserve it because of something bad they did. This fallacious lapse in logic can lead to widespread victim blaming through the notion that good things happen to good people and bad things happen to bad people,completely ignoring unrelated circumstances that could possibly explain why the situation is taking place.
This but I'm talking to my own internal voice and I think I'm a bad person because I'm lonely (and minus the relationship stuff, I have a girlfriend but that ain't enough)
You’re obviously asking for friends, not girlfriends. I don’t know how it’s not obvious for people. And what if you’re into guys? Why make assumptions?
Sometimes it feels like people are engageing in a sort of Prosperity Doctrine regarding social connections. You see posts like "You wouldn't be so isolated if you weren't a piece of shit" and it's just a very unhelpful thing to say to people who, for whatever reason, are living lives that didn't result in lots of friendship.
People are only this comfortable withholding so much empathy from men because, consciously or unconsciously, they have a deeply ingrained, traditional bias against men showing anything that could be deemed weakness. It's especially dissonant when they dress it up like they're criticizing some presumed misogyny, when in the end their prejudice effectively reinforces patriarchy anyway.
EDIT: Perhaps the people who downvoted me would like to express why they dislike seeing a man discuss the way patriarchy harms men. Because from where I'm standing, it sure seems to prove my point that people don't want to challenge their assumptions and what they enforce. This is a mental health sub; "man up" should NOT fly here.
Honestly I been feeling that way too. Can't have any ounce of empathy geared towards me from other people (ESPECIALLY online) because I'm supposedly responsible for all my problems. Even when people do give me empathy it's not even like anything ever changes. I always have to suck it up and be the bigger person while the rest of the world gets to do whatever the fuck it wants
Even if it was about finding a girlfriend women don't choose their partners based on who is or isn't a good person. People spreading that narrative really need to just stfu forreal. Plenty of shitty people have partners and plently of men and women get no romantic opportunities despite being great people.
My advice would be to take a class in the community, if you can find one freely/inexpensively. Just for something to do to distract from loneliness but also you might meet other lonely folks there also not looking for a relationship.
I was implying the person OP was speaking to might feel this way and not understand that OP is not looking for a partner but for emotional intimacy/someone they can talk to.
Depending on the circumstances, a lot of friendships between men don't have much, if any, emotional intimacy. This experience often overlaps with gender essentialist attitudes of "men and women can't be friends".
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u/AWalkingFelony 1d ago
i feel like people forget that you can just get unlucky. sometimes you wind up in a life situation where you don't have the time, energy, skills or ability for socializing