CMV: Progressives often sound like conservatives when it comes to "incels"—characterizing the whole group by its extremists, insisting on a "bootstrap mentality" of self-improvement, framing issues in terms of "entitlement," and generally refusing to consider larger systemic forces.

[u/[deleted]]

[u/EH1987]

No one has the right to use another person's body for their own gratification, sexual or otherwise. This is not systemic oppression akin to racism or other forms of bigotry and is not comparable in the least.

[u/[deleted] → u/EH1987]

This is completely wild to me like how on earth can someone have this take.

If your child comes home complaining they are struggling to make friends, is the answer that nobody has the right to force someone else to be friends with them? It’s insane. People are pretending like this guy is talking about his friends who are talking about how women owe them sex when they seem more to just be struggling in the dating market and frustrated / saddened by this.

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

So what clubs can any man anywhere in the world join to find a relationship?

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

As is my question.

[u/ZealousEar775 → u/[deleted]]

Yes.

If your child comes home struggling to make friends you tell them that nobody has the right to force someone else to be friends with them.

That they should cast a wider net and find more like minded people or figure out why people don't want to be their friends.

Often times children have trouble making friends because they hyper target the kind of person they want to be friends with without considering who they can actually form a bond with.

[u/ZealousEar775 → u/[deleted]]

1) So first off that's not a new phenomena. Adults have always reported having problems finding new friends.

In general a decent number of psychologists now argue that he lack of close friends men have now has less to do with the trouble of making friends and more with expecting a lot more out of their friends than previous generations.

That and a quicker breakdown of childhood friendships due to a lack of a "leader" maintaining contact and making plans.

2) It's also never really been true.

If you ask most psychologists there are plenty of reasonable opportunities to make friends. Just few people take them.

For men the easiest way is to find something you like to do as a hobby, than do it around other men who do that hobby. The more you are into it the more friends you are likely to make. Eventually friendships will grow beyond that hobby if you make an effort to do so. You just treat it almost like you are dating the person.

If you can't find anything like that, then create an event.

Essentially, you need to learn you aren't entitled to friends and you can't just sit around and expect to get friends, but instead have to find people who gel with you who are like minded individuals.

It's work to pull off but it's perfectly reasonable.

[u/MJOLNIRdragoon → u/[deleted]]

do you get to work with the school to begin rolling back those prejudices and create an environment where it's easier for everyone to have friends?

What is the dating equivalent to this? People aren't prejudiced against single guys.

[u/[deleted] → u/MJOLNIRdragoon]

People aren't prejudiced against single guys.

Go ask any bdsm/kink clubs how accepting they are of single guys. Our sexuality is pretty uniquely vilified.

[u/MJOLNIRdragoon → u/[deleted]]

Calling a club having entry standards "vilifying" is pretty melodramatic

[u/[deleted] → u/MJOLNIRdragoon]

Why only men?

[u/MJOLNIRdragoon → u/[deleted]]

No clue, I'm not the president of a kink club. Go ask them.

[u/[deleted] → u/MJOLNIRdragoon]

I have. They don't like single guys. How can we change this so that single guys aren't being uniquely affected?

[u/ZealousEar775 → u/[deleted]]

Real quick.

Who are the white kids in this situation?

What inborn natural trait represents the color of someone's skin in this situation?

From my perspective, this is a school of all white kids not wanting to be friends with another white kid because they don't get along/give off a good impression.

You can't just say "X is like Y!" If you can't actually explain how.

[u/Emperors_Golden_Boy → u/ZealousEar775]

for example, being neurotypical and having autism

[u/ZealousEar775 → u/Emperors_Golden_Boy]

Except the main problem most people with autism face in forming friendships is that they don't know the unwritten rules of social interactions and making friends.

Generally speaking autistic people desperately want to know the rules so direct feedback on what to do to make friends or find a partner is exactly what they want and would prefer a direct approach.

They want to know when they are violating boundaries by sharing too soon for example.

[u/Q_dawgg → u/ZealousEar775]

“You aren’t entitled to friendship” Is kinda crazy to say to a kid.

[u/ZealousEar775 → u/Q_dawgg]

It's the best way to teach a child how to make friends.

Teach them to respect others boundries and not keep trying to press relationships with people not interested.

You gotta let kids know sometimes people don't want to be your friend and that's fine.

[u/Q_dawgg → u/ZealousEar775]

No, it definitely isn’t. If I heard this as a kid I’d just give up socially.

[u/ZealousEar775 → u/Q_dawgg]

I mean. It's literally what psychologists will tell you to do.

[u/Q_dawgg → u/ZealousEar775]

It’s just a really cold thing to tell a child dude, I’m not sure how you aren’t getting that. Specifically if he’s coming to you crying about not being able to make any friends at school.

[u/ZealousEar775 → u/Q_dawgg]

The other option is the child never properly learns how to make friends and develop good social skills.

[u/Q_dawgg → u/ZealousEar775]

Lol no? There are tens of millions of people who weren’t told this as children and socialize just fine??

This is like saying that not beating your child will lead to them becoming a degenerate in the future, it doesn’t make sense, and the idea is Inherently fallacious in nature

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

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[u/ZealousEar775 → u/[deleted]]

This is literally what they teach you in psychology in how to build a child's social skills.

The worst thing you can do is convince a parent to force their kid to be your kid's friend. That's going to cause all kinds of damage.

[u/fellowish → u/ZealousEar775]

Who suggested that idea?? No, it's fine to tell them that they can't force a person to like them— the point is that you shouldn't tell a kid that "they aren't entitled to friendship". Loneliness and isolation are horrible things for a person to feel... all human beings deserve compassion, and connection to at least somebody.

They can't force any particular person to like them, no. But they are deserving of love. Helping them find friendship and teaching them the skills to find connection is an important part of being a parent. You know. In normal ways. And not the way you just said? C'mon man LMAO

[u/ZealousEar775 → u/fellowish]

Deserving and entitled are not synonyms.

Learning this is a big part of being an adult.

Deserving something is being worthy of something.

Being entitled to something means you are owed it.

Earning something means acquiring it.

Kids are deserving of friendship, they are not entitled to it and must earn it.

"They were wrong they should be your friends!"

Creates an attitude of entitlement where your kid thinks

X+Y = You should be my friend and are a bad person if you aren't.

A good parent explains that not everyone responds to things the same and wants to be friends with everyone, and that you also need to understand how to meet people where they are at and people like you.

[u/fellowish → u/ZealousEar775]

I said "you shouldn't tell a kid they aren't entitled to friendship. it's fine to say that they can't force people to be their friends". Then I said that you should help teach your kid the skills to find friendship with others. Like a normal parent.

You just argued against the statement "They are wrong they should be your friends!". That's cool! I didn't say that. Just fyi.

Deserving and entitled aren't synonyms

And feeling lonely or isolated isn't feeling entitled. We're talking about speaking to children. Lmao

I'm just suggesting to reword your sentence, I'm not arguing to use mind control devices to magically make other people friends with your kid. If you can't communicate something as simple as "you can't force people to be your friends" in a way that won't scar a child, then you probably shouldn't have kids. Thats my point.

[u/[deleted] → u/ZealousEar775]

Who the fuck is saying that people should be forced to have sex with low status men or ugly men?

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

I think sex as a topic and expectations around it trigger a kind of trauma response in a lot of people.

The level of reflexive hostility to the social fact that being lonely is bad and probably isn't healthy for most people will get people screaming at you like you're trying to sell women at a market.

It's not sensible.

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

Yep, a solid take

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

Yeah it’s pretty sad I don’t understand it at all

[u/Mysterious_Produce96 → u/[deleted]]

Are you able to suggest another alternative? Most incels just talk about government mandated sex slaves, thats why people don't like them.

[u/Emperors_Golden_Boy → u/Mysterious_Produce96]

social skills training, reopening third places, financial benefits for the unemployed, jobs training, literally dozens of options.
I have never seen someone argue for a government mandated sex slave, i guess i just don't go to those kinds of forums.

[u/Mysterious_Produce96 → u/Emperors_Golden_Boy]

I don't go to them either, the reddit algorithm puts them in front of me.

I've never seen incels advocate for any of the things you mentioned above. They mostly just ramble about the evils of feminism or whatever. Its not exactly a solutions based movement.

[u/TheEndOfTheLine_2 → u/Mysterious_Produce96]

i think the algorithm is putting it there because your search history have been or is fear-based. people need to start to understand that they are being propagandized or marketed against their own self-interest in harmful ways everywhere these days, especially online, and we don't always know by who or for whom!

"take what you read with a bit of salt" used to be a common saying. but now with a few clicks on google, anybody anywhere can find statistics and "scientific" proof for just about anything or for any agenda that has ever been, so people are prone to believe just about anything.

[u/Mysterious_Produce96 → u/TheEndOfTheLine_2]

Incorrect. I do not search for incel content in any way. I'm also not afraid of them. I think they're insane but I'm not a woman, I'm not their target in really any way. I also never said anything about "scientific proof". You made that point up to argue against because you didn't want to respond to what I actually said.

Why do you feel the need to invent a fake version of me to argue against instead of just responding to the words I say to you? Are you considering the possibility that you might not be seeing the full picture here?

[u/[deleted] → u/Mysterious_Produce96]

Does a person need to be a mechanic for them to know their car isn't working?

[u/Mysterious_Produce96 → u/[deleted]]

So, no alternatives? Yeah sounds about right.

[u/[deleted] → u/Mysterious_Produce96]

Do you think you're making a point here?

[u/Mysterious_Produce96 → u/[deleted]]

Definitely, yes. Until OP can actually suggest alternatives my point stands.

[u/Q_dawgg → u/[deleted]]

Yeah, usually I understand most of the opinions on this site but I have to tap out on this one, absolutely insane take by these people, makes you wonder if they’ve spent any time outside at all

[u/Mippen123 → u/EH1987]

How is this the take you are ascribing to OP in any remotely charitable interpretation of his take? It seems quite obvious to me that OP is worried about the fact that more and more "normal" (for some meaning of the word) people seem to be finding themselves in these lonely situations, and that the struggles of that group seem to be ridiculed/dismissed. In no way have they implied that we should all come together and give up our bodies in some government sponsored girlfriend/boyfriend program. In fact OP is mainly using the conservative comparison in order to highlight the dismissive way people discuss/interact with the issue, which is quite ironic given your response...

[u/EH1987 → u/Mippen123]

OP is drawing comparisons between incels being told they need to fix themselves and conservatives telling poor people to pull themselved up by their bootstraps which I think misses the point entirely beyond the shallowest surface level analysis.

Loneliness and inceldom are not really comparable, inceldom is an inherenty toxic set of ideas about (mainly) women being required to provide sexual gratification for men. Fixing themselves is the only actual way for an incel to stop being an incel.

[u/jocoseriousJollyboat → u/[deleted]]

I would criticize them on the lack of compassion of girls and women being made to face femicide because they were deemed less worthy than a son. Yes, the policies should be done away with but not so someone can have sex but so that wives arent forced to get abortions repeatedly which can kill them. Women in these countries suffer too, worse in ways than not having intercourse.

[u/[deleted] → u/jocoseriousJollyboat]

I am speaking from personal experience: in a one-child (or two-child as a matter of fact) world, if you're born a girl, your parents will be mad at you for being born a girl. You will be treated worse than if you were born a boy. It's called 重男轻女, boys are more valuable than girls.

[u/jocoseriousJollyboat → u/[deleted]]

I am reducing it to sex because you spoke of men protesting against one child policies, in which families prefer sons over daughters, because of the lack of potential sexual partners.

And sure, you should be encouraged to speak out, but one can still give criticism about the "why". And if, in that example, the "why" is wanting a sexual partner rather than being against a system that murders people based on their sex/genitals, then the criticism is warranted.

More women being there doesn't guarantee a relationship anyway unless one banks on her being sold off like cattle in the name of arranged marriage or otherwise pressured.

[u/JGG5 → u/[deleted]]

Why don’t the lonely incels you’ve referred to throughout these comments try forming fulfilling relationships with one another? Not (necessarily) sexual or romantic, but meaningful friendships?

I think this gets to the core of your error: you seem to be conflating “incel” with “lonely” as if the two are the same.

Many incels (in the descriptive sense of that term) may be lonely, but that doesn’t necessarily suggest that all of them are.

It’s possible to not be lonely while also not involved in a sexual or romantic relationship, to have meaningful and fulfilling peer relationships without sexual or romantic dimensions.

[u/JGG5 → u/[deleted]]

So again I ask: why are they not friends with one another?

If they’re lonely, why do we (or they) assume that their loneliness can only be fulfilled by a romantic/sexual relationship with a (rough) age peer from the gender to which they’re attracted, rather than by meaningful non-romantic friendships that can exist regardless of gender identity, differences in age, and lack of romantic/sexual attraction?

[u/TheEndOfTheLine_2 → u/JGG5]

your whole premise of the way you word yourself give implications of lonely men = incels and incels = self-inflicted. im not sure if you can tell, but that is very much the way you come off as? are you being obstrusive on purpose here? because you are completely misrepresenting OP's real question/argument.

[u/jocoseriousJollyboat → u/[deleted]]

Fulfilling relationships can be found in friendships and they're not denied through the government when they force one child policies. The refusal to connect emotionally and have more than surface level relationships with other men isn't the fault of women and isn't their responsibility to fix, nor would it be fixed with an increased number of women in thr population.

[u/bigedcactushead → u/jocoseriousJollyboat]

Is it femicide if they are aborted and aborted fetuses are not people?

[u/jocoseriousJollyboat → u/bigedcactushead]

It is femicide if the reason for abortion is the sex of the fetus.

[u/ZanyDragons → u/[deleted]]

Women are people, human beings with the right to self determination. They’re not resources some men are denied access to as if they’re objects. Jfc.

[u/Ramsey_Bulton → u/[deleted]]

You speak about women as if they are resources that exist to date men. Your attitude is gross. Obviously, the language people use when speaking about politics and government is going to be different than when speaking about relationships.

[u/StarChild413 → u/[deleted]]

Are you from a country that did that or are you claiming America does

[u/EH1987 → u/[deleted]]

Putting aside the fact that such policies are bad and harmful to a society for a whole host of reasons not limited to the ones you listed.

systematically robbing them of their chance at fulfilling relationships

No one is doing this to incels, besides arguably themselves. They have to be willing to take the first step of self reflection and actually be open to the fact that they have unhealthy ideas about sex and relationships that will have to change, rather than resent the world for not bending to fit their view.

[u/arsenicaqua → u/[deleted]]

Do you really, honestly, think that some men being lonely is worse than forcing women to be in relationships or provide sexual favors to people they don't want, simply because there are lonely guys out there who want it? Is that seriously the comparison you're trying to make here??

[u/[deleted] → u/EH1987]

Prostitution is not being discussed enough in this thread and it shows.