Why are so many men single

[Winter2028]

I know quite a few single men in their 30s. They all have jobs and their own properties. Their friend groups are also overwhelmingly single men; a single friend of mine who is a civil servant used to live in a houses where where all the men had similar jobs and all struggled to find girlfriends (the flatmates apparently railed a lot against 'feminazis'); another friend of mine (late 30s) socialises with a group of 6 friends where only 2 are in relationships (they are all nearly 40) and the rest are single not through choice.

This creates an impression that its hard to get a girlfriend and its because women have more choices and are more picky today (my friend don't think this is a bad thing but it also means they support things like government sponsored dating!) These men are probably not an anomaly as the rise of the far right is apparently correlated with the rise in single young men. However as a woman my impression is that many poor men are in relationships (my dh was a penniless graduate student when we married in our early 20s and his sisters also married men who were poor in their 30s; one of my SIL even had to share a hotel room with her MIL and baby and DH and she she is planning on having another baby with him). Sadly many abusive men are in relationships.

So what is the reason why so many men are not in relationship when women's expectations are hardly sky high. Is it lack of social opportunities (they do go on dates but my impression is the dates don't go anywhere). Is it lack of charisma (many uncharismatic men I know are also in relationships)?

Yeah. I think the government have a few other things they should be focusing on.

Yes, one wonders whether the friend who's upset about the declining levels of attention he gets in clubs has considered lowering his standards a bit.

They are probably going after women who are ten years plus younger than them. When I was in my 20s a lot of men a decade plus older seemed rather staid and boring to me and we were not in the same phase of life.

I remember several younger male partners (mid 30s) in a law firm I worked for trying to chat me up when I was a pretty young paralegal and about 22. Thinking I would fall into bed with them because of their money and status: I learned after I left several of them had a bet between them on who could get me into bed. They all lost.

This is where your theory goes wrong because people have been complaining about being single and unable to find a girlfriend/boyfriend for at least 50 years. Bridget Jones's Diary back in the 90s revolved around this.

I was happily single in my 20s and felt like an odd one out for not moving heaven and earth to try to find a boyfriend!

These days social media brings people with shared life experiences together so all these incels end up forming a community, of sorts, and the media jumps on it and makes it a trend. But the essential complaint isn't new.

Anyway, do you really need us to explain to you why men who moan about "feminazis" don't have girlfriends?

Men are single for many reasons - bad luck, caring responsibilities, being in a friend group with coupled up friends, mental health.

Then there are those that have an entitled attitude and expect that the should be able to have any woman they want, while offering nothing in return.

It's a mix of unlucky men and incels who feel born in the wrong century. The type that spout shit about women being gold diggers when they themselves are on a low income and feel emasculated hy a woman earning more - six-figure Sally doesn't want your benefits!

I'd venture a guess that a lot of these men have sky high expectations and poor attitudes to women.

I think you’re making a lot of assumptions based on a very small and skewed sample size (these people are friends and tend to have similar outlooks)

This

Your friends might be sexually attracted to women, but they clearly do not like them. Women are generally not attracted to men who dislike women.

Your friends need to let go of the idea that they need to be in a relationship and instead work on building happy and fulfilled lives for themselves.

I'd venture a guess that a lot of these men have sky high expectations and poor attitudes to women.

Indeed. I was a proud "feminazi" by the age of 18/19 faced with the laddish attitudes and lads mags of the 1990s, the objectification of women as babes and ladettes and the pressure to be really thin.

Becuase women don't exist to be "got" by men who want to "get a girlfriend".
They should focus more on developing their interests and social life and perhaps they will meet a partner organically. Women aren't interested in men waiting around for the first one to bite.

I think a lot of men are deluded. They want someone who looks like a model, who can cook, clean, earn a lot, has a toned physique and willingly caters to their every need.

What they don’t do is look in the mirror and see their average reflection or below average and cut their cloth to suit their budget.

My 25 YO DD has split with her long term boyfriend for several reasons, but they both are great, functional young adults. Now she will go out, have a bit of fun but says I just love my independence, I could not be bogged down with someone on a daily basis, having to consider someone else’s needs and preferences.

I think it’s a little sad but also understand where she is coming from.

As the birth rate is 50/50 then being single is the same for both parties.

Woman don’t need men anymore they can manage perfectly well on their own.

Having a man to many is a luxury item who should bring something to the table.

I wouldn’t upset the balance if I was single and had my own home or kids to look after.

My nans generation was married or in the work house. No choice.

Besides the government support many woman with kids they don’t need a man to do it.

I know more single women than single men. I think a lot more people are single in general nowadays, not just men.

Probably because these men think that their job and property is all they need to bring to the table.

This is the nail on the head. This was my ex’s attitude and seems to be the general one. For all progress there seems to have been for women, it’s so easy for us to be dragged back into ‘traditional expectations’. And the more women say no and expect men to cook/clean/take care of themselves at a basic level, the more the Tate/Incel movement seems to grow.

Genuinely wondering whether this will unravel at some point- maybe when one falls head over heels.

If it was a group of women that age I'd think they have properly considered and dismissed the settling down thing and knew what they were doing. That might be the case for these fellas , or it might be a kind of group reinforced Peter pan delusion! I predict a mass mid life crisis coming down the track!

Edit: my quote from @hazelnutvanillalatte disappeared so this makes little sense as a standalone!

@Winter2028 where are you from? Not only 1 per cent of women went to uni in the early 90s!!!!

Are there more heterosexual men than women? If there’s broadly the same number then surely there aren’t more single men than single women?

What I’ve realised now that I’m in my 50’s is that women need other women more than anything else. When you are at your lowest, it’ll be another woman who will step up to help you in most cases; your mum, sister, aunt, granny, school mums, female friends and workmates. You should cultivate a good network of women to support you. There will be the odd nice man, but they are mostly useless in a crisis.

I know a few women who have been thrown under a bus by their DH and in all cases I saw women, friends and acquaintances step up and support them to a point where they are better off now than before.

This. I'm in a walking group. Most of the members are aged 50 to early 60s so obviously older than Ops demographic and well out of the looking for a 'father for babies' years of our younger lives. The men are just....a bit pathetic. Scruffy and dull with sad little lives and jobs that they go on and on about. The single women in the group seem to have so much more about them. I'm married. If I found myself single I can't imagine bothering with dating if this is the sort of pool I'd be choosing from.

Well yeah maybe because he and his friends are 22

I really feel sorry for that mum. She probably thinks she's failed when in fact he's been radicalised by dangerous and addictive propaganda. It's no different to a cult.

You have to first discount a degree of bias. Single people tend to have single friends, just as child-free couples tend to for child-free couple friendship groups, etc. Like socialises with like, for a variety of reasons.

Social groups inherently look for confirmation bias and externalise blame. I'm single, you're single, we're all single, there must be a problem with everyone else. In this case if they're a group of single heterosexual males, the problem must be with the women. Because it couldn't possibly be something that's wrong with all of us because we're so different. Then add in a confirmatory dose of toxic masculinity from all the wrong people (Tate, Musk, Farage, etc.), a self-referencing circle-jerk of social media, and they're into the death spiral of Incel Pride.

By the way, when the Toxic Masculine Incels are talking about things that might sound to you like government sponsored dating, it's not subsidised tea dances and a light supper. What they have in mind is closer to a state-run brothel alongside a virgin matchmaking service.

Relationships are transient now with very little commitment on both sides.
It's sharing bodily fluids and a home for a while then off to the next one.
Some don't even bother with the home part.

As a result of this, the birth rate is collapsing.

This doesn’t chime with my experience at all. I’ve never been in a social circle where there were lots of eligible single men. Whereas there were often women who were nice, attractive and successful but single. Although I’ve heard from my DP that it’s worse on the dating apps for men than women. So I don’t know really.

the flatmates apparently railed a lot against 'feminazis'

I think this might be why they are single - they are bitter misogynists. Who would want a relationship with someone like that?

That’s cool, immigration will sort it in the short term and none of us will be here in the long term so I wouldn’t sweat it.