this post was submitted on 30 Jul 2025
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FOSS Android Recs per u/m_f@discuss.online: 1 , 2
Don't be mean. I promise to do my best to judge that fairly.
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Genuinely, who keeps posting shit like this on here? I keep seeing posts such as this one and it's honestly pushing me away from Lemmy. Why spend time on a platform that hates me? If being a man who didn't date (because of social anxiety, btw, not that you'd care, since clearly men are by default fascists, according to some comments here) is a sin, let us know on the front page, so that me and others like myself can avoid this place.
A lot of comments are, thankfully, calling this shitty behaviour out. But then I look at the post itself, which has 696 upvotes and 166 downvotes, and I'm like... I'm not wanted here.
If you are male and lonely but it is because of social anxiety, why do you feel attacked by this? You have a different, external reason for being lonely than the broad swath of the criticism.
Why do you feel attacked by this if it is advocating for circumstances (men improving their interelational dynamics to build deeper friendships) that would likely improve your opportunities to comfortably challenge your social anxiety?
If you feel attacked, is it because your attitude is the problem being criticized? That rather than seeing your social anxiety as your burden to overcome, you instead see it as a reason that society owes you access to the company of women you find attractive - that at the heart of it, you feel aggreived that women don't have to pick you?
Because these posts lump all men without relationships together. Does the Tumblr user above make any mention of exceptions? Nope. The post boils down to men who didn't date didn't succeed because "skill issue". This would imply that regardless of any other possible causes, I am deserving of ridicule because I don't live life like you.
You yourself make assumptions about me. I was right to say "because of social anxiety, btw, not that you'd care", because immediately here's a reply that implies my social anxiety is not real, or it is but it's not relevant. You assume the worst of me because I dare not have a girlfriend. This is precisely the issue. I've long since moved on from pursuing dating. I don't care if I never have a girlfriend anymore. However, what I do care is if people assume I'm a horrible piece of shit because of it.
Long story short, your comment is case in point: It does not matter what I say. My reply to you is useless. I never had a girlfriend and therefore anything I say is discarded because I have to be an asshole in order for that to be the case.
I want to discuss the first statement in your last reply - about "lumping all single men together".
That is just how quantification of anything works. If we were talking about unemployment, or number of people with blue cars, or days with rain - if there is an increase, you mark on the sum increase over the previous baseline, and discuss potential reasons for the new influx.
If you think you are part of the previous baseline - guys who would have been single in past generations, then the discussion doesn't apply to you. Even if no one goes through and specifically excludes you. Because the influx is what is being discussed - not the baseline.
But I don't think you are actually upset at being lumped in with the influx. I think you are upset because the guys in the influx are being rediculed and you desperately want to find a reason to both be mad about that and to say those criticisms don't apply to you.
You say you don't want to be assumed to be a PoS bc you don't have a gf.
If you really are not trying to date, I don't think you run the risk of that.
The criticism in the top post is directed at guys who are obsessed with their dating status - but see it as a game they are losing, and women as objects to be manipulated into what they want.
If you are trying to date but see women as hostile opponents to be 'managed', you are going to act like a PoS.
What determines your PoS status isn't your dating status - it's whether you see and treat women as fully equal people with the same expectations to dignity and respect as your guy friends, or if you see women as alien beings on an opposing team - targets to potentially be manipulated to get what you long for, or targets of resentment for withholding or being inaccessable for what you long for.
If you are truly single and don't have any resentments towards women about it, you are unlikely to come off as a PoS.
But honestly, that isnt how your comments are coming off