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Ruchi - The Male Loneliness Epidemic
33 Plays18 days ago
Loneliness, men, women, community, friendship, politics. Ruchi and I have been friends for a long long time and I always enjoy our talks.
The New York Times Opinion article we discuss.
Thanks for listening!
music - "Lofi & Love" by NottyVonDutch -https://soundcloud.com/nottyvondutch - Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 - http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/
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Transcript
00:00:00
Speaker
Bye.
Introduction: Modern Dating and Loneliness
00:00:17
Speaker
And welcome back to Wish You All The Best, a personal podcast about modern dating. um This episode, I don't know that we're going to talk about dating a whole lot because my guest is my friend of, I want to say like 25 years.
00:00:31
Speaker
How long have we known each other, Ruchi? I think that's about right. Yeah. Long time. And you have not been single since I think like the George W. Bush administration. You've been off the market for quite a while.
00:00:42
Speaker
Obama, but yes. Obama, okay. but and So you you are you are closer to being concerned about dating for your daughters probably than you are for yourself, but we don't talk about that yet. That is true.
00:00:53
Speaker
That is true.
Exploring the Boy Crisis of 2025
00:00:55
Speaker
Okay, so you reached out and you wanted to talk. um you So you read a New York Times article. It was an opinion essay by Robert Putnam and Richard Reeves about the boy crisis of 2025. Sorry, the title is The boy Crisis of Meet the Boy Problem of the nineteen hundreds And these guys kind of go through and talk about um loneliness among um men, specifically among young men.
00:01:18
Speaker
um And we wanted to talk about it. So yeah I don't know. What do you got? Let's get into it.
The Role of Friendships in Socialization
00:01:26
Speaker
I read this article and I immediately thought of you because i will say that I feel like I know a lot of guys. um Obviously, my husband, my girlfriend's husbands and then also my guy friends.
00:01:45
Speaker
And to me, you are the most functional of all of those guys. No, no insult to any of them um meant ah they're all great, but they, a lot of them really rely on women ah to facilitate their socialization.
00:02:07
Speaker
ah sure so a lot of the men that I know, if, you know, like my husband is an example, right? Like, I mean, he has friends and I'm the one who has to be like, Hey, have you planned to see this friend recently?
00:02:20
Speaker
You know, it's a lot, there's a lot of making sure that the men in your life actually have functional social lives that I think, because I think it's really important. My girlfriends are really, really important to me. i you know, yeah they, I, I talk to them every day.
00:02:38
Speaker
spend a lot of time and attention and focus on female friendship. And I actually think that in many ways, I know your podcast is about dating, but I actually think that friendship is, is maybe the most vital relationships we maintain in our lives because it's throughout your
Understanding Male Loneliness
00:02:54
Speaker
life life. Yeah. You know, as kids, you know, as young adults, as adults, as you know, seniors,
00:03:02
Speaker
Friends are are lifeblood, and I think that they are critical to our mental well-being and our yeah and our health. And um it upsets me and worries me that so many guys seem so lonely. And so the reason I reached out to you was to understand how do you do it and why are you different?
Community and Romance: Building Social Networks
00:03:21
Speaker
Okay. um First of all, that's a huge compliment. Thank you. Yeah. I think the short answer is ah got divorced. um But let's let's unpack that.
00:03:32
Speaker
Oh,
00:03:35
Speaker
there's a siren. but It's hot down here. I've got the windows open, so there's going to be some background noise. Sorry. um ah Okay, I do want to step back before before I kind of unpack why I think I am um ah good at socializing, kind of, or good at good at community.
00:03:52
Speaker
um I do want to either well, I want to, I want to go down one rabbit hole real quick. I do think it's related to dating. I do think finding community and building community is critical for finding romance, um especially for men, for two major reasons.
00:04:07
Speaker
ah The first reason is that's how you meet new people. Like that's how you're going to meet someone who might be that person who you're going to spend the rest of your life with that person who you click with, right.
Men's Emotional Needs and Social Structures
00:04:16
Speaker
um And the other piece of the puzzle is That's how you're going to find a relationship where you're not putting everything on your significant other.
00:04:25
Speaker
Right. I think it's critical for men to learn to build social structures and to build community and to build friendship and to have platonic intimacy and for us to normalize men having platonic intimacy.
00:04:37
Speaker
I think that's kind of a journey that we're on right now for men is we're we're sort of adjusting expectations for men to allow them to have more platonic intimacy. um Because i think if you don't have and this is I can't back this up with any data, but like, I think i think essentially, men don't find enough validity don't feel seen don't feel vulnerable enough around our friends.
00:05:01
Speaker
And so when we find a romantic partner, we just put all of that on them. And That's just way too much for most people. um and and And it creates, I think, a lot of a lot of difficulty in what can be a healthy romantic relationship. So I did want to say, i do think it's related. I think it's a great topic.
The Emotional Labor of Women in Relationships
00:05:20
Speaker
um Yeah. How I do it. um Well, let's put it in that. Does any of that, is are you are there any threads to pull on in there? is there anything in there that you're curious about or interested in?
00:05:32
Speaker
No, well, I definitely agree. So my husband and I were actually set up by a mutual friend. And, you know, again, thinking about the female kind of, what do you call it, emotional labor? i don' i don't know if that's actually the word you're supposed to use, but emotional labor involved here.
00:05:52
Speaker
It was, um This friend of mine, she um was married to Dave's college roommate. She's the one who set us up. And she told me, you need to email him.
00:06:05
Speaker
And I said, well, I don't do that. No, don't do that. And she was like, no, you need to email him because he'll never do it. And I was like, fine.
00:06:17
Speaker
So I sent him an email and she meanwhile, like texted him and was like, she's going to email you. And if you don't respond, I'm going to tell your mom.
00:06:28
Speaker
yeah I love that. So, you know, like if it weren't for Dave's friends, yeah like we wouldn't have met.
00:06:39
Speaker
And, you know, not only that, she had to basically like threaten him, you know, to make sure that he responded to me. Right. So like, this is what why, but why is that, you know?
00:06:54
Speaker
Why is what what what? Why is it that he was not going to email you back? Or why why what? mean Well,
Challenges in Male Friendships
00:07:02
Speaker
I don't need to psychoanalyze Dave specifically here. but yeah but oh i mean I think Dave played his cards right. I love Dave here. He's a big he's a hero here.
00:07:11
Speaker
But I just mean like in general, why is it that men, you said earlier that you think that you got good at this because you got divorced.
00:07:22
Speaker
Why is it that so many men rely on women to facilitate their social relationships? Yeah. um I think it's because i think
00:07:40
Speaker
total total shot in the dark half baked theory here. I think men have a hard time forging relationships that are really, really nurturing.
00:07:51
Speaker
I think we have a hard time creating friendships that are really exciting, and then make us feel really, really good. Like, When I get together with my girlfriends who are who I'm close with, and and I assume they're even better at this than they are.
00:08:06
Speaker
I assume this is even more true when it's a friendship with two women, but like we're able to just get vulnerable, just talk about what's going on. it's There's a shield for me that isn't there.
00:08:20
Speaker
with my female friends that is there with my male friends, right? And so oftentimes when I walk away from a one-on-one hang with a girlfriend, I walk away feeling so much better, feeling like seen, feeling like I processed some stuff, feeling like energized.
00:08:35
Speaker
And i love my guy friends. I really, really do. i I think it just takes a little more work. i don't know exactly I don't know exactly what it is, but like even with my guy friends who I do, i think a good job ah being vulnerable with and and I, and i collect them and treasure them and protect those friendships. Right.
00:08:55
Speaker
um ah Even with those friendships. And I, I think these guys would say the same thing. There's like a, there's like an effort to it.
00:09:06
Speaker
There's like a shield that like, we kind of have to like exert effort to lower so that we are vulnerable with each other. So we can see each other so we can talk about what's going on. So we can really dig down to the things that like really, really matter.
00:09:20
Speaker
And i don't think every friend needs to be somebody who you like bear your soul to, but I do think you need at least a few of those. I should say, I can speak from my experience. I know that I need at least a few of those.
Structured Activities for Male Vulnerability
00:09:31
Speaker
And i think it's hard, it's hard to really crave that time together when you know that it's going to take a little bit of like lift, you know, and we're all distracted and antisocial these days because we're busy and we're on our screens all that kind of stuff.
00:09:48
Speaker
Um, And so to add on top of that difficulty of like adult schedule Tetris, that you know, you're going to have to like, put in some real effort to go deep with somebody. um or Or you might not at all, like you might go out, I think a lot of guys end up going out, and they out and they get drinks, and they just get a little too intoxicated to really like talk about stuff that matters. Like they they they are able to say things that they might not otherwise say.
00:10:14
Speaker
But I don't think a hang where you're both intoxicated really lets you kind of do real work or get real. get real um and that's that might I might be biased. That's my experience. But um yeah. but So anyway, blah, blah, blah.
00:10:31
Speaker
I think my answer is that my... And i add I'm not a woman, so I don't know. But I would guess that women like really crave seeing each other and really prioritize seeing each other. Because when you have an awesome mike hang with somebody who you know so well and love dearly.
00:10:48
Speaker
It's a, I would, i think it seems to me like it's a really rewarding experience. And I just think that's kind of less true for men. um That's my first shot in the dark guess.
00:11:00
Speaker
Yeah. What you're saying rings true to me. And I think kind of, me it made me think of another component of this, which is like, I think you see a lot of your male friends in, um,
00:11:17
Speaker
kind of, ah I guess, what would I say? Like, kind of like certainly sort of structured ways, which I think can actually be really helpful um because I think that guys,
00:11:30
Speaker
are not because of those shields that you mentioned, right? They don't wanna just like go out and hang and chat for like a couple hours. Like that's not that unstructuredness I think maybe is not ah quite the right format for guys. With guys it's like, you know you need to have like a weekly poker game or something like that. Or like, you know you you you work out with your friends or you like play Dungeons and Dragons with your friends and you have this,
00:11:57
Speaker
time where you're with each other and then you know at some point maybe not every week but and you maybe you don't even need to do it every week but it'll there are moments in there where you can then be real with each other or you know have a side conversation with each other and like that kind of you know, you can let your shield down a little, but it really, it really helps to have this more structured environment, I think.
00:12:24
Speaker
um Or at least that's my hypothesis. buy that. I would say, ah yeah, sorry, go on. Yeah, and I think, but I think that as um as you said, we're all becoming a little more antisocial.
00:12:41
Speaker
Things like having a weekly poker game or a weekly D&D, it takes a lot of work so yeah to start it, to keep it going. yeah And I think that as those sort of structured activities are maybe waning for a lot of guys, that's what's also contributing to that loneliness epidemic.
00:13:02
Speaker
I think that's right. And to be fair, okay, the thing I wanted to say really quickly is like, people often refer to this as like men hang out side by side, women hang out front to front, right? Women are there to like do to interface with each other, women are there expressly to, um you know, painting with a broad brush here, but ah ah many women friendships are about like, we need to go and get brunch, or we need to go somewhere because we need to catch up with each other and get vulnerable. with Guys sort of play video games or go and do a thing or go see a game um or go work out, go play Dungeons and Dragons. You know what mean? like we need to have like something to do um so that we can maybe on the margins have a vulnerable conversation, but it's it's really nice for us to focus on like the thing we want to do.
00:13:43
Speaker
And the thing itself is often fun, right? I'm not taking anything away from that, but I think we tend to we we we don't sort of prioritize the value of like vulnerability and connection that I think women are, i would say socialized to do, right?
00:13:57
Speaker
um Okay, wait. But I don't think there's anything wrong with that, right? Like, I mean, no I don't think that if that is how guys connect, it's an important piece of the puzzle, right? In terms of understanding how to...
00:14:16
Speaker
mitigate this loneliness epidemic to the extent that it's even possible for any of us to to do, you know, um which sort of gets to this article that that, you know, Robert Putnam wrote, he's the author of Bowling bowling Alone. So it's like a similar thing, right? Like, there used to be all these
Shared Experiences and Male Bonding
00:14:34
Speaker
bowling leagues, and now they're gone, right? And I mean, I think,
00:14:39
Speaker
There's nothing wrong with sort of, you know, what I guess what you would call it like parallel play or something like that. There's nothing wrong with that if it's fostering connection and community, which I think it still does for ah for a lot of men if they have it.
00:14:59
Speaker
But it the problem is that a lot of men don't have it. Yeah. i think So I think one of my quibbles with the article is is exactly this point where i think I think those activities are valuable. I mean, they're fun. They're great. If it's good for you because you're being physically active and that's healthy for you, great.
00:15:15
Speaker
But like I think in terms of loneliness, in terms of community, I think those are activities are valuable insofar as they help foster community, right? I think men tend to do things that are less good at fostering community.
00:15:27
Speaker
We socialize men to be excited about things that are less good at fostering community. We socialize women to be excited about things that I think on balance are more, ah lean more into fostering community. Right.
00:15:38
Speaker
um And I think, i think, I think today, and even, even since bowling alone, right. I mean, a lot, a lot has kind of changed since bowling alone. Right. um ah And Richard, so Richard Reeves is ah ah the the other author of the article, and he's been ah kind of making the rounds in the discourse lately, talking a lot about how our structural systems are kind of biased against men, right? ah His influence in the article, I think, if our readers or our listeners read it, um he talks a lot about how there are institutions designed to create community for women and the institutions designed to create community for men have largely become all-gender.
00:16:17
Speaker
Right. So the Boy Scouts of America are now the Scouts or whatever, but the Girl Scouts are still Girl Scouts. Right. That kind of thing. um Yeah, I think i think everyone is more lonely now.
00:16:29
Speaker
um mike Like my argument is that, like, since suburbanization, we have seen an increase in loneliness, I think, in the West. I mean, in America primarily. Right. um We've just we live farther apart from the people we care about. It's just the automobile has made it cool to live 30 minutes away from the city center.
00:16:47
Speaker
And that means living at least 30 minutes away from probably at least 30 minutes away from the people you love. A lot of people do live in multi-generational households. a lot of people do figure out ways to like create community in close neighborhoods.
00:16:59
Speaker
That's awesome. But I think on balance sort of spreading out, I will make this about housing, see, like spreading out um has made it harder to find community. And then i think the internet and social media um ah accelerated that.
00:17:13
Speaker
And then I think ah the shutdown during COVID ah just poured gas on that fire. Right. So I think, okay, so I think it's become much easier to be lonely, that the structural, the slow structural changes, um in which we're all kind of slowly boiling frogs, right, um have put us in a society, put us in a system where it is very easy to be lonely.
00:17:34
Speaker
I think that women are better equipped to fight that than men. But i I don't think they're immune. i do think it's I do think it's hard hard for women. I think women have to work to put in the time to find the time. I think they i think women also, you know to ah to kind of come back to what you were saying, you know men do need to structure time. They do need to make the time to do this kind of thing, but so do women.
00:17:58
Speaker
um And I just think, i like right, because like it's not like women are living in communes and men aren't. It's not like women are seeing each other in unstructured time because it just happens.
Gender Differences in Maintaining Friendships
00:18:09
Speaker
I think, and maybe they are, I don't know, i'm I'm definitely open to being wrong there. But like, I think women are just better about prioritizing friend time.
00:18:17
Speaker
They just, they they do it because they do it. and And they're, it's just, it's just easier to say, hey, let's hang on Friday. And that's like all you need. You know, for guys, it's like, what are we doing? Let's make plans. i don't know, for whatever reason, it's ah it's a lot harder to like, herd the cats, I think with guys than it is for women.
00:18:34
Speaker
I could be wrong about that. Maybe that's just my experience. But I think that's kind of where we are. No, I think that's fair. i also think that a couple things we've touched on. So one you know, i think women...
00:18:48
Speaker
are maybe more efficient, as you said, in terms of getting to that vulnerability, right? So like, yeah you don't have to meet for two hours every week to have a like, life bearing conversation, right? You can have dinner, like once every six months, and, and you can be vulnerable with each other and have that have that connection with someone so there's that the second is like you can also i mean i think a lot of a lot of my day-to-day keeping up with the women in my life just honestly happens over text message
00:19:27
Speaker
But again, women feel comfortable sort of having those very intimate conversations, even via text. So I think that those things help.
00:19:39
Speaker
I agree with you that everyone is more lonely. And I think suburbanization is certainly, you know, maybe part of it.
00:19:49
Speaker
Obviously that entertainment is so lonely. easy and all in your house is definitely a big part of it. You know, you don't have to go to the theater. You don't have to go to a concert. You can just get everything in your home all the time. Like that's not good for people.
00:20:09
Speaker
um but I'm curious, what you think of the fact that this is happening most, you know it's verys it's not um it's not happening, the the loneliness epidemic is not happening to all social classes at once at the same rate, right?
00:20:28
Speaker
It's really, ah it's a bigger epidemic among um you know the people who are ah more socioeconomically deprived um working class families. um And, and, you know, people like us who are, you know, college educated and relatively affluent, we're honestly suffering the least.
00:20:55
Speaker
yeah You know, I definitely think that there's still ways that we're suffering, but we're we're definitely suffering less. And curious what you make of that, if anything. My, that's a great question. I think, um,
00:21:10
Speaker
And and i do I do still have the pin on what I think I do and and why I think my divorce made me good at it. But so I don't only forget about that. um What do I make of that?
00:21:20
Speaker
My best guess is that it's just a function of free time. Right. I think we, you know, we live in an era of like massive wealth inequality. And so it's just not that uncommon for people that are struggling to have to work multiple jobs and to have just like a lot of like time consuming logistics that are difficult.
00:21:38
Speaker
um And I think that just makes it harder for you when you're um when you're just struggling to make ends meet.
Social Class, Free Time, and Loneliness
00:21:45
Speaker
Like you're just going to have less time left to build community, find find friendship.
00:21:51
Speaker
um
00:21:55
Speaker
Maybe, I don't know. that But like also I kind of see holes in that argument. I don't know. don't know. Yeah. So this is where I think you and I disagree on the article in terms of ah Richard Reeves kind of points.
00:22:09
Speaker
I think that you're much more skeptical about the... um let me I don't want to put words in your mouth. I get the sense that you're more skeptical about the need for these sort of male-only spaces.
00:22:23
Speaker
ah I am. That's correct. That's correct. Yeah, keep going. yeah keep going Yeah. And I I, you know, reading the article, I'm thinking about these organizations like the Boy Scouts and um the YMCA and these other organizations that were were all really designed to...
00:22:47
Speaker
um to cater to underserved male youth, right? To to cater to this this population that we see that is most affected by the loneliness epidemic and that they are now becoming spaces
Impact of Gender Integration on Male Connections
00:23:03
Speaker
for women. And again,
00:23:04
Speaker
you know again To be clear, I know i know um girls who are in the scouting program. I think they get a lot out of it. I think that there are many great things about that that girls get to access via scouts.
00:23:19
Speaker
At the same time, again, just it's complicated, right? and i do think I do think that when you add women, girls to a space that was male, the vibe changes.
00:23:32
Speaker
And I wonder if that makes it more hard for these boys to forge connections with each other to to let their shields down, to be vulnerable when it's no longer a single sex space.
00:23:50
Speaker
And again, back to the point about how men have to do things more side by side. um I think that things like the scouting and and you know these other organizations for boys were ah designed to allow them that opportunity to do that for a little money. Whereas like I think a lot of the things, like my husband, and he and his friends go skiing together. That's really expensive. like You and your friends like play D&D. Maybe that's not so expensive, but like you need to have a space big enough to have your friends. sure you know I just think
00:24:26
Speaker
that when you said lack of time, it's also maybe lack of money. And these organizations were sort of there to kind of facilitate that. Yeah.
00:24:38
Speaker
I don't know. i so two things there. Yeah. yeah And let's get into single sex education and like single sex organizations, but like, The question of like, what what's driving the... like Why is it worse for for people lower on the so socioeconomic spectrum?
00:24:56
Speaker
um ah I don't know. i i mean, I bet there's a lot in there, right? I bet there are like... I bet there are... I bet there are cultural factors. um you know because i you know I think machismo is an issue here.
00:25:13
Speaker
i think i think i don't think it's i don't think it's I don't think men needing to play side by side. i don't think yeah i don't i don't think the side by side thing for men. I can't back this up. I don't know. Nature versus nurture or whatever. But I don't think that's a...
00:25:29
Speaker
root cause, or i don't think that's a fundamental trait of being a man. I think that's a symptom of us being socialized to not be vulnerable. I think we tell young boys that they're not supposed to cry. And we we and we reinforce those kinds of stories. And we and we, I think talked to women about this about dating all the time, where women like really, really say they want a vulnerable man, they want a man who's in touch with his emotions, they want a man who can cry, they want a man who's emotionally intelligent,
00:25:57
Speaker
But like, I think a lot of the stories we see and a lot of the people that we see being desirable and and also I think there's some superstition here where like, people just don't believe it when someone says that you want someone vulnerable.
00:26:12
Speaker
And we've been taught for so long, we have the superstition that like, boys don't cry that women want someone who is stoic, who is dependable, who is a provider who is tough, right?
00:26:22
Speaker
Even before you get to the the the the so the sort of further out masculine spectrum, where you're talking about like men who are like, capable of violence, which I also think is on the the spectrum of like, what we find masculine, what we find attractive and in men, but I think probably probably less so in cities, probably less so in sort of more lefty circles, right?
00:26:41
Speaker
But i I do think the whole provider thing and the whole like you know dependable, stoic thing um is a strong template that is reinforced in lots of ways for men. So I think, i i mean, and I don't know how to change that. And I could be wrong. It could be nature. Men could by nature just want to be less emotional.
00:27:03
Speaker
i I don't buy that, but I can't pick up the argument. But but i think i think the idea that i think i I would argue with the idea that men are going to be better at being emotionally vulnerable when it's only men.
00:27:17
Speaker
I think women help men to be emotionally vulnerable. And I think men hinder women from being emotionally vulnerable. right so so okay So my take on single sex education. right I went to an all boys high school.
00:27:29
Speaker
um And I think that single sex education, I think single sex education harmed my peers in terms of like social development, because we grew up in an environment where there were no women or there were very, very few women and the women that were there had a terrible time.
00:27:48
Speaker
um And yet my peers who were women who went to all girls schools, I think I saw women who would have shied away from interaction, would
Single-Sex Education and Social Development
00:27:58
Speaker
have shied away from involvement and you know and it would have learned less and and like had less opportunity to try things out, less opportunity to see themselves as someone who is smart, see themselves as someone who is like good at whatever you find out that you're good at in high school. right i think I think I met women, had had friends at all girls schools who, if they were at a co-ed school, would not have thrived as much as they did at all girls school.
00:28:24
Speaker
So basically, i think single sex education is good for women and bad for men. um And so, but like the the the future state that I would like, that I would hope for is one where we can have these institutions, have them be for boys and for girls, and we can find ways to let boys and girls learn to be vulnerable, see the value in vulnerability and find ways to build those important connections because the system that we have right now just certainly isn't designed to foster those, to create that unstructured time, to have those third spaces where people can just like hang out, right?
00:29:03
Speaker
Does that make sense? Yeah. Yeah, that makes sense. Okay. let's So I feel like that's a good seg into how you how how your divorce taught you to be different.
00:29:17
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, yeah. So ah my divorce, and i you know i don't I don't talk about my ex wife on here too much. She's amazing. She's wonderful. We tried as hard as we could to make it work. ah We did get divorced.
00:29:28
Speaker
um She, I think, like in a lot of partnerships, she was ah the kind of the social driver. um she She is an amazing organizer,
00:29:40
Speaker
host person. She loves throwing a party. She loves bringing friends together. There's a story i would always tell about how she threw ah three surprise parties for me one year. which absolutely destroyed me because I am like such an introvert,
Proactive Friendship Building Post-Divorce
00:29:52
Speaker
like three parties in a row just like destroyed me.
00:29:54
Speaker
But let me tell you, ah great way to throw a surprise party is to throw it right after a surprise party because you never see the second one coming and you never see the third one coming. Like I was surprised. ah But she, but which is to say that she was, she was the planner.
00:30:09
Speaker
Like, you know, she, she really, and and I don't think it's even necessarily because I didn't have good friends or I didn't, have those connections that I prioritized. She was just much more excited about making it happen.
00:30:21
Speaker
And so when she made it happen, like her friends became my friends, right? And the the partners of her friends kind of became my friends. Those were my guy friends for a while. um And that's that's sort of naturally evolved that way, right?
00:30:35
Speaker
um And I I suspect that like some variation of that is, is, I think that's probably not too far from the norm. Right. um So when we, when we split up, when we divorced, um I lost a lot of friends and not because they were mad at me, not because they thought I was horrible, not because of anything really dramatic. It was just like, well,
00:31:00
Speaker
It's kind of awkward to hang out with those people after the divorce. you know um it just doesn't It's different. it doesn't It's hard to get to that place where it's a fulfilling friendship. right um And so I found myself in a place where I was like, well, I'm either going to figure out how to put time and effort into making new friends and nurturing the friendships that I have, or I'm not going to have those. right um And that happened right around shutdown.
00:31:27
Speaker
That happened like right before quarantine. ah So that was really hard. um And I think, yeah, I think I just realized that like, if I didn't figure out how to prioritize that, then it wasn't going to get done for me.
00:31:45
Speaker
um And so i just I just started doing it. I just started figuring it out. i I became the guy that sends Google Calendar invites to my friends, you know. um It's my love language.
00:31:56
Speaker
ah And yeah, it's it's not accidental. Like I do that because if I don't do it, it doesn't happen. And if it doesn't happen, I don't get that community built. And and I'm very intentional about um trying to make time to meet new people, to see if there are new friendships out there that are going to be fulfilling. And I try to make time to ah maintain connection with with the friends that I have, which can be tough because like, you know, some people you're literally 3000 miles away from, or some people you're just on kind of a different wavelength from or different life stage or, you know, all that kind of stuff. But um yeah, anyway, across a wide spectrum of friendships, I guess is what I'm saying.
00:32:36
Speaker
um I find that it's really, really valuable to make sure those things happen. um And I'm not perfect at it. I definitely like when work gets pretty intense, I fall off. um But it's it's kind of these days I put more effort into building it and maintaining community than I do into dating.
00:32:56
Speaker
um And I strongly recommend that approach for anyone that's single and looking for romantic connection, like focus on your platonic connections first um for so many reasons.
00:33:08
Speaker
um Well, for two big reasons, what what we said at the top, A, you might meet somebody, ah romantic connection through friends and B, having friends makes you like need a romantic connection less. It makes you it makes it so that you're not going to overload a romantic connection ah with all the stuff that you need, because we have needs like guys, you need to feel seen, you need to feel loved, you need to feel accepted, you need to feel like part of a tribe.
00:33:32
Speaker
And men, you know, i think I want to get into like, like the capitalism here, you know, like individualism has really gone hard lately, right?
Capitalism, Individualism, and Male Isolation
00:33:45
Speaker
This idea that you don't need other people, this idea that like you are the thing and you your image is important, and what you're doing, what you're achieving is important, um has made us I think more competitive and more isolated.
00:33:56
Speaker
And I think that has hit men much harder over generations than it has hit women, although it's coming for women pretty hard. I think women now, especially young women are are feeling, maybe not, maybe not so much on women, but I think maybe it peaked in like the Sheryl Sandberg lean in phase.
00:34:14
Speaker
Maybe not. I don't know. But, but I do think that has also come for women. I do. I do think individualism has also harmed women. does that make sense? Yeah. Anyway, that's lot. Okay. So I, I, I love a practical podcast.
00:34:27
Speaker
And so I would love to hear more, you know, you moved to l LA, what, yeah two years ago, three years ago. um Wow. Time flies. Yeah. Something like that. I don't remember, but anyway, you moved to LA, you had some existing friends there. yeah um but you've also made you one. So like, like how, how are you making friends? How are you doing it? What are the, your strategies? What are your approaches?
00:34:50
Speaker
thousand but yeah totally um uh meetups like go and find figure out what you like to do um and go and do those things and then pick some things that you're not even that like pumped about doing pick some things that you're like eh i could get into that and get into it like find things to get into like i'm not good at salsa dancing going salsa lessons like group salsa lessons great way to meet people um I do love Dungeons and Dragons. That was a fantastic way to meet people. Yeah.
00:35:24
Speaker
yeah And I, and I made it I made an amazing group of friends through that. um yeah And like, I w I was not like super into beach tennis before I came down here, but like I met somebody, they were like, Hey, there's this thing. It's fun.
00:35:37
Speaker
um And I just went and tried it. And like, You know, I'm not like amazing at it. I don't super love it. It's not like my passion, um but it's a great way to meet people. It's fun. It's it's physical. It's active.
00:35:49
Speaker
um And so I do it like just because it connects me with people. um Yeah, i think I think it's just go out, do stuff and like say yes to more things.
00:36:00
Speaker
Say yes to going out. say yes to Say yes to places where you're going to meet people who you might connect with, who might be friends with.
Introversion and Social Engagement Challenges
00:36:10
Speaker
Where you might make social connections. Yeah.
00:36:11
Speaker
I think the saying yes is is like a really important piece of this and, you know, getting getting back to this loneliness epidemic and, you know, like I said, it's so easy to just stay home these days because you have. Oh yeah.
00:36:27
Speaker
all the entertainment you could ever want at your fingertips, right? So it's just really, really easy. You've had a long week to just be like, it's Friday. I just want to stay at home.
00:36:40
Speaker
And I'm naturally an extrovert. So it doesn't it take too much for me to be like, no, but I'm going to go out and see this friend who I promised I would hang out with, right? Like it's, it's a relatively low barrier for me as an, an extrovert, but I imagine that as an introvert, it can be really challenging to be like, and I'm going to force myself to go out instead of, I'm going to, I'm just going to hang out at home and chill.
00:37:09
Speaker
Oh yeah. I, I, I'm, yeah. I don't know. I, I, introvert, extrovert. I think I'm definitely an introvert. You know, when, when your friend flakes on you and you get to stay home, like, you know i definitely sometimes feel that that sigh of relief where it's like great i just get to like eat ice cream and watch to be fair i feel that way too i think we all do that's universal you know even though you don't like someone flakes on me too many times then i'm irritated but like the occasional flake i'm like oh i just got two hours back that i didn't think i was you know gonna have
00:37:43
Speaker
And hey, you know what? that ah That might also be a product of we do we totally overschedule. you know like In the modern economy, we'd sacrifice at least 40 hours of every week just you know and maximizing shareholder value. You know what i mean?
00:37:57
Speaker
It's okay. But one one thing I would expand on there that I think is worth clicking on is like not only – I don't think it's easy to stay home. I think it's hard to not stay home.
00:38:09
Speaker
so So Derek Thompson talks about this and it's like, yeah, um yeah and and we we are becoming actively antisocial. like And I bang this drum so much and I know I'm a cranky old man, but like, I think social media is an issue.
00:38:24
Speaker
I think there are very, very powerful forces behind social media that are trying to find ways to just get you more and more addicted to your screen. Like their competition is not each other.
00:38:36
Speaker
It's not it. Their competition is your free time. Like any time that you're going to spend doing something else, Instagram and TikTok and Facebook are trying to take that away from you. um And there are big, big forces that are fueling that machine and those forces are not going away.
00:38:53
Speaker
Right. So like I. I don't know, I get real cranky about it, but I think social media is real bad. um Yeah. Which is to say, i don't think it's just I don't think it's just easy to stay home. I think there are forces actively trying to get us addicted to our experience to get. sick I mean, I definitely am also on the anti social media bandwagon. um Obviously, still use social media.
00:39:21
Speaker
But, you know, definitely try to limit my my time on it. um But, yeah you know, I think this is... One of the things I will say is that having a kid really does force you to leave your house, even when you don't want to. Right. so that is one of the nice, like you have to drop them at school and then like, there'll be some school event and then you'll, you'll have to take them. You know, I took ran into field hockey or, you know, I'll take pre to gymnastics. And a lot of the time i you know, today i
00:39:58
Speaker
you know, I kind of just walked around the field by myself getting my steps in, you know, so I wasn't, I wasn't super social, but like sometimes you end up, you know, having a conversation with a parent and sometimes that doesn't lead to much. And other times it leads to, you know, a real friendship, you know, especially at the school where you see these parents over and over and over again, it is a way to, to form friendships. So I think, I think that that's, you know,
00:40:26
Speaker
one of the challenges in our society where when you used to sort of naturally be forced out of your house to like get food, go to the grocery store, run errands, you know, ah go go to your job, yeah go to ya go to your job, go to the school, all of these things like they forced you to have this baseline of social interaction, which now a lot of people don't really need to have. They can get their food delivered and their Instacart delivered and they work remotely and then
00:41:00
Speaker
You get rustier and rustier at the social interaction. So becomes much harder to get out and to and to be with people. And I think that that also just creates another real challenge.
00:41:12
Speaker
Yeah. um Yeah. and So that brought brought up something you asked me, like, what practical advice The other thing I would say about finding things that you want to do with other people and like just picking new things to learn with other people is take lots
Finding Meaningful Connections: Social Efforts
00:41:26
Speaker
and lots of swings. You're talking about how like not every parent that you talk to is going to be like an amazing conversation or connection.
00:41:31
Speaker
But i think I think it's important to take lots and lots of lots of lots of at-bats. Try and try and try and try and let it be totally okay. If you go to one of these events and you don't meet anybody and like you don't click with anybody and you just go and do the thing and you go home and you go like, oh, that sucked.
00:41:46
Speaker
Don't let that discourage you. It's totally okay to like not find people that are on your wavelength. It just means that like maybe you need to try a different thing or a different day or something else where you're going to meet different people. um Where I think, as you're saying, like all of the sort of things that you had to do as part of normal life, I don't know, however many years ago we had to do that, those would sort of like force us to take those more time. yeah it's not it's not that long ago um but Yeah, it's not. It's not that long But yeah, before everybody was working remote. I mean, so meeting your partner at work ah used to be a pretty common way that people met their significant other, right?
00:42:22
Speaker
um And that's just one of the big, everything but meeting online is like on decline now. To be fair, that one seems like such a minefield now. I don't even know how you would even approach that.
00:42:35
Speaker
Yeah, but I mean, that's a whole conversation, right? That's a whole rabbit hole because like, i do think it's a great way to meet somebody. Like being being around people and understanding how they operate and understanding what they do day to day, that's a really important like understanding to have of someone who you want to spend your life with, right? The minefield is, you know,
00:42:57
Speaker
power imbalance or like kind of like shitting where you eat right like a breakup that means you have to like go back to work with your ex or something like that yeah that's complicated and um but you know i i i do think you want to do things where you're gonna meet new people and just get to hang out with them um on the podcast about dating ah i don't know how ah how long it's been since i've talked about this but like one of my big things is like i think cold approach is really really stupid Cold Approach is where you just like see someone cute and you walk up and say, hey, I'm Scott. i I really hate to interrupt you, but I just, I noticed your red hair was amazing and you were over here talking about Dungeons and Dragons.
00:43:32
Speaker
I love Dungeons Dragons. i I just wanted to come over and give you my number. Like, give me a call sometime if you want to hang out. Like, that that kind of thing. It's like like a pickup artist. Not a pickup artist thing, but like, really, even politely, even kindly going up to someone who you know almost nothing about and saying, here's my number.
00:43:48
Speaker
I think it's really stupid because like, you know nothing about that person. Like, you have no idea if you're going to be compatible with them. You just know that you think they're cute, you know? And like, I think doing things where you get to understand more people, where you get to see more people and understand, get to know just like how they, how they do their thing is really, really important.
The Limitations of AI in Combating Loneliness
00:44:07
Speaker
And like, I think now, right, we spend a lot of time scrolling. We spend a lot of time on social media, understanding people who we're never going to meet. We get all these sort of like Paris micro parasocial relationships um with our phones. Right.
00:44:20
Speaker
Does it make sense? Yeah, that does. And I think that's it's an interesting point, right? Like that these parasocial relationships are supplanting actual real replace relationships and community.
00:44:35
Speaker
Yeah. And a I think to take another slight turn here, all these companies are going to start trying to sell ai as a replaced as as a solution for loneliness.
00:44:46
Speaker
And they say solution for loneliness, but they mean is an opportunity for further engagement, right? Like there are all these people who are craving someone to talk to. And it's, I mean, it's already happening. You're already seeing people getting like forming, forming bonds with with AI, romantic or platonic, or a lot of people like using it for therapy.
00:45:07
Speaker
All of this, I think is a terrible idea, um but they're going to do it. All right, I have what another practical question for you. you talked a lot about vulnerability and how it's important to kind of enable guys to be vulnerable, right? Yeah. So if you think about your listeners who are parents boys,
00:45:30
Speaker
see your listeners who are parents of boy Do you have any advice for them in terms of how they can foster vulnerability in their in their kids?
Modeling Vulnerability for Children
00:45:44
Speaker
i I would never, ever, ever give my friends parenting advice. All of my friends who are parents, I respect them so, so much. And I think they all do a great job and everybody does a little different. um
00:45:57
Speaker
That's a really good question. My best guess is... it's important for the parents to model those values, right?
00:46:08
Speaker
I mean, I think it's true. I think kids don't do what they're taught. They do what they see, right? They're so smart and they pick up so fast on what you're doing. And I think I did this with my parents. I think I modeled so much of my life in ways that I didn't even really realize until much later how much I had modeled myself on my parents because they were kind of ah the big adults in my life.
00:46:27
Speaker
Was your dad vulnerable in front of you?
00:46:33
Speaker
I would say no. i I love my dad so much. He's amazing. And I think our relationship has grown and deepened as we've both gotten older. um But I think when I was young, he was loving, um but he he in many ways, he was kind of that patriarchal.
00:46:50
Speaker
I don't want to use patriarchal in like the kind of derogatory way, but like he he he was the he was the breadwinner. He saw his role as being the provider. I mean, he was like, you know, an 80s parent.
00:47:01
Speaker
It's so, you know. Yeah. Right. Yeah, he got this job where i said they said were going to make these things called computers and they were going to be a big deal. And he was like, sure. And they paid him enough money to like, you know, get a mortgage and a car. And um he worked a lot.
00:47:16
Speaker
i i I remember when I was i remember when I was young um having to go to bed before my dad got home. And that was always kind of sad because I loved him, you know, um but I don't know.
00:47:32
Speaker
That's a good question. and That's a, that I see my dad be vulnerable.
00:47:40
Speaker
I don't know the answer to that. And I guess what I'm going to is like, i wonder who like modeled vulnerability to me when I was young. I think, i think in some ways I'm kind of a weirdo because I was a very sensitive child.
00:47:52
Speaker
I was, my poor mom had to deal with me being, i was trouble. I was, i was a high, uh, ah i was I was a high touch child. You needed a lot of attention to deal with Scott because I was just like, little things would just kind of, know, dysregulate me very easily.
00:48:13
Speaker
And I think maybe maybe that's, maybe some of that is, well, who knows what that is. I mean, yeah, it's tough, right? Like I want to believe that there is
00:48:24
Speaker
there is a controllable aspect of this, that it's not all like
Therapy and Emotional Intelligence
00:48:30
Speaker
nature, right? Like I really wanna believe that. If I think about the guys, like my husband's also very emotionally vulnerable.
00:48:36
Speaker
What you said, i think yeah yeah I think is true about that a lot of women claim that they want someone vulnerable, but they they don't actually. um But you know like I think what really attracted me to Dave is how emotionally vulnerable he is how, you know, he he will watch a movie and cry. Like, he is very...
00:48:59
Speaker
ah He is also very, I would say emotionally, like, I don't it sounds kind of cheesy, but like in touch with his feelings, right? Totally. I think exactly right. And if I think about the other guys I know who are more emotionally vulnerable, like, I don't really know that I see a through line between them in terms of like, oh, well, their parents were like this or like, you know, it just like seems kind of random.
00:49:29
Speaker
Yeah. ah I don't know. i don't know if it's i don't know if it's hardwired or nature and nurture. I don't know. i think, okay, what do I think? How did I get this way?
00:49:40
Speaker
I think that i was kind of a weirdo when I was a kid. I was a very, very sensitive kid. I mean, I think I've always been a very sensitive person, but as a kid, that was like problematic.
00:49:55
Speaker
um And some things that happened in my life made me eventually figure out that it was really important that I go to therapy. And been going to therapy for a long, long time.
00:50:06
Speaker
I don't think everybody has to go to therapy. I'm a big fan of therapy. But like I think something that lets you sort of do that self-work and understand kind of the inner your inner workings or whatever you want to call it.
00:50:21
Speaker
Because I think a lot of that stuff previously for me was opaque. like Until I learned to do that work, there were things that were influencing my actions and my feelings and my emotions that that i just couldn't see and for me therapy and and i wouldn't say it has to be therapy but like some kind of self-work that lets you better understand that lets you see those things lets you name them identify them recognize them i think that's really really valuable right because i think i think i think what we kind of mean when we say we like emotionally vulnerable people are we like emotionally intelligent people a lot of women
00:50:55
Speaker
are not emotionally intelligent. or i would not I would say there are many women who are not emotionally intelligent. But like what you're looking for is someone who can identify what they're feeling, who can communicate to you what's going on to them emotionally, tell you what they need, um ah and kind of manage their responses, right? So that a response of um you know someone who isn't just sort of like ruled by emotions or inner mechanisms that are opaque to them right like you want that in a relationship because it's like it just means that it's less likely that someone is going to like cheat on you out of nowhere or become violent with you or hurt your feelings or um you know do something that would that would they would hurt you right um they're going to be more able to do the delicate work of maintaining an intimate relationship um
00:51:49
Speaker
All that to say, and i'm i'm really just buying time because I don't know the answer. Like, I don't know. I think, I think we model it. I think we try to model it. And I don't know if that just means watching more Pedro Pascal shows. I'm not even sure Pedro Pascal is actually, I don't know.
00:52:02
Speaker
um Do you, do you think that um your sisters had anything to do with it at all?
00:52:18
Speaker
Yes.
00:52:21
Speaker
In my adult life. I mean, so you mean, well, okay, to answer specifically, in my adult life, um my, so I'm very close with my sisters, they're really wonderful.
00:52:32
Speaker
um They are women, I think they are kind of, want to stereotypical women, but like, like a lot of women, they, they are able to go deep, they are able to get vulnerable, they are able to like, hold space and like, let you vent or, or, you know,
00:52:48
Speaker
they are able to create a space for vulnerability. um And as an adult, I've learned to do that with them. um My younger sister is ah is a psychologist, so she's really, really good with this stuff. It's her job.
00:53:01
Speaker
um
00:53:05
Speaker
And I think to an extent, having them helped me kind of on that journey.
Sensitivity as a Strength in Emotional Connections
00:53:10
Speaker
like helped me sort of like suss out a lot of the stuff that I needed to suss out. And also because we shared a lot of similar childhood stuff that was significant for how we, the kind of adults we became.
00:53:23
Speaker
um I don't think that they,
00:53:31
Speaker
um
00:53:35
Speaker
i do think I do think I'm kind of a weirdo. And I'm not not trying to be like vain here, be like I'm special or I'm like the chosen one. i do think one of the reasons that I like have a podcast about dating or like one of the reasons I'm one of those guys is that like, I do think I was because of stuff that we don't have to talk about that happened when I was a kid or because of how I was hardwired or whatever.
00:53:56
Speaker
i do think I've always just been like a very sensitive person, like an emotionally sensitive person, you know? And the downside to that is especially when I was younger, before I knew how to deal with it, it was very easy for me to become dysregulated.
00:54:11
Speaker
And that's bad because nobody wants to be friends with somebody who's like crying all the time for no reason. That's a challenge, right? um But once I sort of figured out how to manage that stuff,
00:54:23
Speaker
it became like a superpower because being able to be sensitive to what other people are feeling, being able to figure out, you know what mean? And maybe the key is, and I think that this is often true with parenting, is like there's a lot of things that are out of your control.
00:54:37
Speaker
And you what Dave always says is you can't really Like your, your kids good qualities are really just their own good qualities, you know? yeah But like as parents, what you can do is screw them up. And I think like, it's what, what, what that says to me is like, your, your parents helped you work through how to manage your feelings without, without,
00:55:02
Speaker
you feeling like you had to stifle them and like extinguish them. And that seems really great. Like what they did is they allowed you to somehow, or they, I don't know how much it was them and how much it was other society, but somehow you learned as an and as as you grew to manage your feelings, but not completely squelch them, which I think a lot of boys are, who are sensitive,
00:55:32
Speaker
yeah are taught to squelch those feelings rather than to learn how to manage them. Yeah. If I had to, don't have a time machine and maybe people who knew me when I was younger would, would, would say something different, but like, I suspect that my trajectory was, i was just so hypersensitive and so that kind of out there on that spectrum that they were on unscultable.
00:56:05
Speaker
Like it wasn't because I learned that it was okay. It was because I just didn't, I couldn't man up. Like I certainly, I'm sure I know I tried. I know I tried. I know I tried at times to to suppress stuff and I'm sure i succeeded sometimes.
00:56:24
Speaker
Um, I think it was I think it was like into adult life. I think honestly, I think it was like when I started therapy that I really sort of started being able to manage it and like starting started to feel and you know, I i will always be on this journey, right? I'm always going to be working on it. But like, I think that I was like, I think it was therapy. I was in my like, late 20s, early 30s.
00:56:46
Speaker
um and And like, I can't think of an example. So you you knew me during that time, I can't think of an example when we were very, very young, when you might have seen me be very dysregulated. But I'm sure that there were times when I, I'm sure there were times, maybe not when I was around you, around the friend group,
00:57:01
Speaker
um
00:57:04
Speaker
that I was still going through that stuff. I don't know. I don't know. but But like the question of like, how do we how do we make it better for our young boys? I think it's so hard, right? Because again, like kids, they don't do what you tell them to do.
00:57:19
Speaker
They do what they see and they learn from all over the place, you know? And we're all, yeah. We're all victims of the the water we swim in, right? yeah So this is the cultural water.
00:57:30
Speaker
um And so it's really, really, really hard to break free of the water, the air we breathe. That's just, it's, there's so much that we take as fixed because that's the society we live in.
00:57:49
Speaker
And so I agree. Well, um so we didn't, We didn't solve the loneliness epidemic. We did not. But maybe, maybe we had at least some useful insights.
00:58:02
Speaker
yeah Okay. My take, my, my takeaway on the like loneliness epidemic for men is it's not just men. but My take is that we solve loneliness for men by solving loneliness for everyone.
00:58:17
Speaker
I think, I think, friendships between men and women. i i think our friend group has a ah lot of those and it's wonderful. And i mean I think maybe there's an extent to which we're outliers there. um i think I think more and more people should have strong inter... always wonder, it's so hard to know, right? Like how much are are we and our friends outliers and how much are we... The norm.
00:58:41
Speaker
Yeah, the norm. yeah I think we're outliers and that makes it also really tough to somehow...
00:58:50
Speaker
see things with a more objective lens as well. Yeah. and And, you know, okay. I mean, yeah, I think, yeah, I think, I think in general, I think we want to let boys and girls be good people, be good, connected, functional humans.
00:59:08
Speaker
And I think, I think what makes a good, functional, healthy human is very, very similar for a little boy and a little girl a little trans boy, a little trans girl, a non-binary child. I think whoever you are, if you're so if you're a human, like going through the chaotic, insane, intense process of like growing up and trying to become a functional human, um you know, what we can do to make them safe, to make them feel connected, to make them feel loved, to make them feel supported and to like let them become who they're going to become,
00:59:46
Speaker
I think it's largely the same for boys. And I don't have nothing to back this up. I have no expertise. I have no training. But my gut is that it's the same for boys and for girls. And like, i think I think the things that we do, I guess I kind of agree with Richard Reeves here a little bit.
01:00:01
Speaker
I think the things that we do to make special spaces for girls and tell them that they're going do it the special girl way. And this is a girly thing that you do. and This is a color that girls wear. i don't think there's any way to do that.
01:00:13
Speaker
without also saying this is something that boys don't do. Right? Like the girls aren't the only ones who are hearing that message. Right? And like, it is important for us to like, the the they are more vulnerable for, I think some of like some really gross reasons, right?
01:00:31
Speaker
It is important to protect girls, right? um Which is a whole different conversation. um But you know, so so so we' so are boys, right? In different ways, but like,
01:00:43
Speaker
I don't know. I think
01:00:46
Speaker
i don't know the answer. And like, you know, we're not going to disband the Girl Scouts anytime soon, right? Like the Thin Mints will stop that from happening.
Universal Desire for Connection
01:00:55
Speaker
But you know, like, I i don't know, I in in dating, which is what I spend a lot of time thinking about, i often come around to the the the the conclusion or like the the fundamental, what I think is kind of fundamentally true is that like men and women are not that different.
01:01:18
Speaker
Like so in some ways the timelines are different, but like ultimately I think what everybody really wants is to be in a loving relationship where they feel safe and they feel seen and they feel vulnerable.
01:01:30
Speaker
They feel like they can be themselves and they feel like they have someone who's going to be there with them. And it's a connection that's going to grow and change. And you're going to spend the rest of your life doing it. And it's going to be different for everybody because everybody's different.
01:01:40
Speaker
But I think fundamentally, everybody wants that. And asterisk, some of those people want to make humans, won't want to have kids, right? And that's a complicating factor. And but I don't even think it's that complicating. You know, like, I think women are having children older and older.
01:01:57
Speaker
um And a lot of people are choosing not to have children. And like, I don't know, I think I think what we all want is kind of pretty similar regardless of our chromosomes.
01:02:08
Speaker
We all want community. We all want community. We all need community. Yeah. Right. Yeah. um
01:02:17
Speaker
Yeah. And I think, and I think right now to to bring it back to the podcast, talk about dating some more, we are going through this period in adults where we are kind of retuning what we expect and allow for men.
Redefining Men's Roles in Society
01:02:31
Speaker
I think, I think feminism has done a lot of, really awesome, really amazing, big supporter, yeah big fan of feminism. We've done a lot of work re-imagining what women are allowed to be, what women what women are expected to be, and what what women can be.
01:02:45
Speaker
But we haven't really done the corresponding work for men yet. um And a lot of A lot of our templates for what it is to be a man are really built on this system where men are going to be providers, earn money, and where someone else, AKA you know their partner, their wife, is going to come in and take care a lot of their their emotional needs, take care of community, take care of friendships, take care of intimacy, right?
01:03:12
Speaker
And now that women are, and correctly so, able to be providers for themselves, men are in this situation, and i think this is I think this is the root of why a lot of men are freaking out, I think this is the root of why a lot of young men are swinging to the right, to to conservative voting, conservative politics, is that men like haven't really been given another option.
01:03:34
Speaker
like there's no they They are still trying to be yeah i providers, high status, desirable, and that women have like they're not seeing anything desirable or high status because they can do the jobs they can they can make their own way.
01:03:50
Speaker
um Yeah, and so okay, so all that to say for like adults, like for for kids like but you know, like kids early on kids start to understand romance kids start to like have those feelings wake up and then whenever they do, you know, um i don' I don't know when it starts. i I know it's different for everybody. But like, I think that starts to Not to like freak out the mom of two girls, right? But like, i think I think that stuff starts to matter. You know, I can't remember when it was that I started caring about whether or not girls thought I was attractive, whether or not girls thought girls were interested in me the way that I was discovering I was interested in them, right?
01:04:32
Speaker
um But that's an important factor. It's just puberty. Like, you know, you're freaking drowning in hormones, you know? And like the the messages we send about like, here's how to manage that desire to have another person who you're attracted to in this way that you maybe don't understand. Maybe the first time you've felt this way about another human, like the messages they get about like, here's how to manage that. Here's what to do. Here's what you want to be.
01:04:56
Speaker
If you want this person to like you, or even on the other side, like, here's what that person should be. If you do for you to like them, like if you feel attracted to someone who is not X, Y, or Z, that's wrong.
01:05:09
Speaker
You know, not even to get into the whole, you know, queer community thing where, you know, you might be attracted to somebody who you feel like you're not supposed to be. But even in, i think, that sort of heterosexual um desires, right, for you for you to feel attracted to something who there are messages out there telling you this is what an attractive person looks like.
01:05:29
Speaker
This is what an attractive person says or does or wears or whatever that you. And we internalize that stuff. Anyway, I can ramble about this for way too long. I'm sorry. ah um But I think it's a big deal.
01:05:42
Speaker
i think i think this stuff is all connected. I do think it veers into the political. i think, you know, I think Richard Reeves is like definitely having a moment right now. I do think to an extent, I do have cribbles with him in general, not specifically in this article, which I'll link in the show notes if our listeners want to read it.
01:05:59
Speaker
In other spaces, the ideas that he has, i think I haven't really done like a thorough review of it, but like I do think to an extent Richard Reeves is getting a lot of attention um in these discussions because like he is saying things that kind of resonate with the right because the right thinks that traditional gender values are good. And I think they're just sort of afraid of change, afraid of non-traditional gender values, gender roles, and that resonate on the on the left.
01:06:35
Speaker
because the left is like freaking out right now about like why young men are voting for Trump by like 20 points or whatever. um So his his takes are very they they they do well, you know what i mean They get clicks.
01:06:49
Speaker
um But I don't think i don't always buy
01:06:55
Speaker
a lot of what he's kind of putting together. I don't always buy that like a lot of this stuff has a narrative of like we are we are unintentionally victimizing boys. Like, like, it's, it's, um, which I i don't think I buy.
01:07:11
Speaker
i think, I think like, I think we just need to sort of like do the work that we did with feminism for men.
01:07:22
Speaker
No, I think I, I don't know that he would disagree with that. I mean, I think going back to this article, what, yeah something that I thought was really poignant was that They noted the share of college degrees going to men has fallen to 41% lower than the women's share in 1970.
01:07:44
Speaker
And then, and then they write one in 10 men aged 20 to 24 is effectively doing nothing, neither enrolled in school nor working. That's twice the rate 1990. I mean,
01:07:59
Speaker
like a pretty massive crisis. it Yeah. I don't see how you can look at those, look at that and just not, not feel that way. And so, yeah.
01:08:13
Speaker
I guess I hear what you're saying in terms of he's getting a lot of you know sort of attention because what he says appeals to sort of the right and then also to the left that's in their own crisis mode.
01:08:27
Speaker
But I think it's because hes the reason he's resonating is because he's putting these these pieces together that are really problematic.
01:08:38
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah.
01:08:41
Speaker
Yeah. No, that's, that's a hundred percent fair. I, I, yeah. I mean, I, you know, I think, yeah, I don't know.
01:08:52
Speaker
i I don't, so like, you know, one of the things he talks about is like, we should have more male mentors, more men should be mentors, more men should be teachers, more men should be involved in some aspect of like early child childhood education.
01:09:06
Speaker
Yeah. um ah Uh,
01:09:11
Speaker
Yeah, and and like i I guess in my head, i think, like,
01:09:18
Speaker
would I have been different if I had more male teachers? I don't know. I mean, i also, maybe this gets back to what you were saying about you were very sensitive and you were maybe not representative of the average dude.
01:09:38
Speaker
Yeah, I'm weirdo, yeah. And if you think about a guy who is a kid who is maybe less sensitive, but still sensitive, you know, yeah not, not, but more in a normal sense, right? He's just a normal kid and he has normal kid sensitivity. Yeah. and you know, it would probably be helpful for him to see a male teacher who was also sensitive sensitive, but not necessarily overly sensitive, right? Like, I mean, he's a teacher, he's an adult, he can manage his feelings, but like kind of models, to your point about modeling, models that sort of, ah yeah you know, sensitive,
01:10:27
Speaker
but fine with it, dudeness that yeah that I think kids need to see, you know? yeah and hat and in And the fewer male, to get back to, you know, what you said about dating, where you said that women, then, you know, basically you're putting all the brunt on that one person, right? Like raising kids takes a whole society.
01:10:48
Speaker
And if you, if a kid's main role model is their dad, that's putting a whole lot of emphasis on that, person who may be fantastic, but is still a human being, right? yeah And so that's why you want your kids to have a plethora of role models, male and female, yeah you know, from different backgrounds, different cultures, you know, like you want them to be able to see the gamut of human beings, you know, as as adults, like, you know, so in their lives, you know, that's, I think, to me, the ideal.
01:11:23
Speaker
yeah And because, again, for many social and cultural reasons, it's it's harder ah to to get, see many of those role models, you know, being male.
01:11:38
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. No, I can't argue with that. ah You know, yeah, right. Because like, We see, i bet i bet young I bet young girls see women who aren't their mothers all the time be impacted by something and manage it, right?
01:11:55
Speaker
Like have something go on, have something happen and to see them manage their emotions well. And I think if I had to guess, I'd say a lot of young boys see something hard happen for a man and most of the men they see stifle it.
01:12:11
Speaker
Most of the men they see man up, don't cry. Don't be impacted. Just be tough. And I think, yeah, I think maybe you're totally right. Maybe I'm agreeing with Richard Reeves now. like Maybe if there were just more men involved, if if we had more men in the village that it takes to raise a kid, your odds of like being around a man who is going to be able to model the kind of behaviors that might be appropriate for you for whatever kind of kid you are as you're growing up, your odds are higher of like having seeing somebody who you're like, okay, I can model myself on that.
01:12:42
Speaker
That makes a lot of sense. That makes a ton of sense. Maybe you need to start your youth D and D league up again. my God. Yeah, maybe. I don't know. i don't know.
01:12:54
Speaker
um but People do that. Like it's a thing. Yeah. Yeah.
01:13:00
Speaker
Be the role model you want to see in the world. Yeah. ah Maybe I should. That's kind of, okay, well, we'll see.
01:13:13
Speaker
um Richie, was there anything else in here? Yeah, yeah, yeah. no unpack i No, I think we did not solve the loneliness epidemic, but I think we made some progress in maybe understanding it.
01:13:26
Speaker
I think this was, it was helpful for me. I hope it is helpful for anyone listening. Yeah. um And yeah, thank you for listening. And thank you for your, you know, and whenever we get to chat, and you have like insights on dating and stuff, it's always, it's always fun to talk to you about about this thought privilege, because it's interesting, you know, like this is it is it is changing fast. And it's interesting.
01:13:47
Speaker
um Just trying to navigate all this stuff, you know, and and understanding the environment that we're in is the first step towards understanding what any individual should do to try and like,
01:13:58
Speaker
forge to the life that you're trying to forge. And so I really appreciate your insight and intelligence and wisdom. So thank you for coming on. Come back anytime. You can, i don't know, ask questions about whatever you want. We can talk dating, we can talk.
01:14:11
Speaker
i do I do think this is related to dating. i think um I think as a part of this project, something that does motivate me about this project is I do think modern dating Like i I am kind of like this whole thing about, you know, the left figuring out like how to talk to men. Like it was it was pilloried and ridiculed. Right. Like the the Democrats spent like 20 million dollars or whatever, hiring some consulting firm to figure out like how to talk to young men.
01:14:34
Speaker
And everyone's just like, well, they're never going to figure that out. um But it is an issue. Like i do think like. if we want if this project of making a better society is something we're taking seriously, we need to find a way to make space for people who are men, because there's a lot of them.
01:14:52
Speaker
Yeah, for sure. Anyway, awesome. Okay. Thank you, Ruchi, for making the time to chat. Come back anytime.
01:15:02
Speaker
It's super fun to chat with you. good to catch up. Good to catch up. Yeah. Listeners, as always, thank you for tuning in and all the standard end-to-s episode stuff.
01:15:13
Speaker
You should be able to find this on Wish You All the Best Pod on Instagram. You email me at WishYouAllTheBestPod at Gmail. Um... I can't reach out if you have thoughts or want to come on or whatever.
01:15:27
Speaker
Okay, that's what I got. Okay, until next time, bye-bye.