The Study of Why Men Stay Single: What No One Is Telling You by B. DePaulo
According to DePaulo, aspects of this study are very victim-blaming and tell single men, ‘the reason you’re still single is that you are a big, fat, loser.’ (This is the sort of rhetoric that single women usually receive.)
(Link): The Study of Why Men Stay Single: What No One Is Telling You by B. DePaulo
Excerpts:
… If you are not familiar with Reddit, take a look at Andrew Marantz’s New Yorker (Link): article. He notes, for example, that on Google, three of the top auto-completions for Reddit are “toxic,” “cancer,” and “hot garbage.”
Presumably not all the Reddit threads are terrible, but the one in which users answered the question, “Guys, why are you single?”, drew comments such as:
-“Jesus titty-fucking Christ, this whole thread is depressing as fuck. If you like being single you can stop reading.”
-“This thread is Reddit at it’s finest.” [sic]
…The answer he expected to find came from his evolutionary perspective: In the past, marriages were arranged, so men did not have to have any social skills to have a mate.
Now, however, “men who have difficulty flirting or are unable to impress the opposite sex may remain single because their (Link): social skills have not evolved to meet today’s societal demands.”
Also important to Apostolou’s perspective is the assumption that men generally do not want to be single.
The entire empirical test of those ideas was that one Reddit thread [that asked men of that site why they think they are single].
In what strikes me as a very poor decision, the journal Evolutionary Psychological Science published Apostolou’s article. The title is, “Why men stay single? Evidence from Reddit.”
…I kept looking at the list. Another category [the study lists as to why men are single] is “different priorities,” meaning that the men cared more about other goals such as establishing their careeror getting good grades.
At least for the moment, they are not trying to become unsingle. If we add them to the 662, we would have 858 responses, and all of a sudden, the number 1 reason for being single would be that the men want to be single.
…Apostolou [the researcher who is behind the study] found that plenty of men want to be single, but I don’t think he wants you to notice that.
…The author’s view of single men is harsh and unsupported by many other studies of single people.
…Apostolou seems to be pointing the finger of blame at single men, using their own words to suggest things like: You’re fat. You’re bald. You have a tiny penis. You don’t know how to flirt. You have no social skills.
…But sometimes the cause of things, including staying single, is not personal, it’s situational. Or it is structural. Except for mentioning in passing (and not until the last section of the article) that some men said that “they lived in small villages with no available women, or that they were employed in a male-dominated sector,” Apostolou never acknowledges many of the kinds of factors that are out of a man’s personal control (such as sex ratios and other relevant demographics of the place where they live).
They are factors that can make it challenging even for the most attractive, socially skilled man who is good at flirting and has a big penis to find a mate.
Read more of that on (Link): Psychology Today
Related Posts:
(Link): ‘Why Are You Single’ Lists That Do Not Pathologize Singles
(Link): The Reason Why Men Marry Some Women And Not Others by D. Brennan
(Link): What Happens to Men Who Stay Bachelors Forever, According To Science by L. Vinopal
(Link): Another Obnoxious ‘Why You’re Not Married Yet‘ Article
(Link): A Long Time Single Responds to a ‘Why You’re Not Married’ Article
(Link): Myths About Never Married Adults Over Age 40
(Link): Slut? Selfish? Sad? No, just a single woman (editorial)
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