The Walnut Theory: Sex, Marriage & Kids Are Not Worth It

[Philip027]

When you resort to attacking post counts, it's pretty clear you ain't got nothing left to stand on, really.

I'd never treat a female friend the same way as a male friend, unless I absolutely knew for certain they'd be okay with it.

I would wager this is more to do with enforced gender roles making you feel like there's extraneous underlying fundamental differences between men and women, rather than there being any actual extraneous underlying fundamental differences between men and women. Of course, there are some differences, but we are really not SO different as some people here (I won't name names) will claim.

Although I may interact with them differently, I wouldn't say I *treat* female friends any different from male ones. It has never gotten me into any sort of trouble as far as I can tell. In fact, a number of those female friends that I have (which, granted, are the majority of friends that I have) have mentioned, either directly to me or in a group setting, that they appreciated being regarded as equals and/or not being given extra/special attention from the males.

[Thrasymachus]

@Philip027:

You are the one with nothing left to stand on. It is a sheer fact that to amass 5,400 posts on a forum it literally must take over 2,000+ man hours to read, respond and type. You make personal attacks pretending to know me, but I know you have had to spend thousands of hours here with an unhealthy mentality, apparently attacking others for just stating what is happening in the type of society you live in, since pointing out what is happening prevents you from ignoring what is happening(which seems to be your issue). If you are such a ray of sunshine, why are you spending so much time socializing and acting socially online? Shouldn't there be rush of people wanting to know you, unlike me, as you presume?

The only reason I registered here, is because I feel I am an asexual and wanted to discuss with others who feel similar. I don't want to play the type of social sly games you do online. What I wrote in this thread was not my character defect or something I made up, even in the societal mainstream these institutions are becoming ever more oppressive and less palatable. The social basis and support for marriage and raising kids is just not there, young people have less money to start families and less family and social support if they do. I heard even in the 1960's in the USA, not reputed to be a very social country, most of the kids just played outside when not in school. Today parents don't have that luxury and that is why the social science research is showing parenting to be less of bargain. Stop bsing that it is just me, because I attack social cows and point out social reality as it actually exists as opposed to false portrayals from much of the media and entertainment industry.

[Rising Sun]

Disclaimer: I don't really agree with OP at all, but I think everything that I could say in response to them has been said already by others.

Why don't you interact with women the same way you interact with men ? Why should you treat people differently based on their gender ? Don't give me reasons for that please, just think about it. It's absurd.

Seriously? You know, I've been doing this all my life, going by this obvious seeming assumption that there'd be no difference. I didn't really keep any female friends.

There are some obvious reasons why you need to treat most women differently. On average, they have been educated differently, and they have different expectations to their contacts. In my experience they often expect to be coddled more and critizised and disagreed with less than my male friends. They're generally a lot more careful with who they give attention and take much longer to open up and trust.

Most men I know are aware of these differences and greater restrictions in the way you can interact with a woman. Many women, ironically, don't seem to be aware that the men in their lives are going out of their way to respect their feelings and emotional needs, when those men don't do that to the same extent with their male friends.

There are of course exceptions to this, and there are women who are being treated carefully like this when they don't need it. But I think those are pretty rare. I'd never treat a female friend the same way as a male friend, unless I absolutely knew for certain they'd be okay with it.

What i meant was in the specific context of "men can't be friends with women". In the context of friendly conversations and their content, of course it can be a bit different here. It's really the idea that people can't get past the gender of the person they're speaking to and be simply friends with, without any hidden agenda.

Personally, I don't really make any big differences, even in friendly conversations. I enjoy being "one of the guys". It makes life so much easier. When something becomes awkward, it's because people assume that the opposite gender should be treated differently... When I was a student, and when I was a moderator in a large gamers community, both 90% male communities, of course sometimes there were friendly jokes about the fact that I'm a girl but other than that I simply behaved in a way that made it clear that I liked being a "normal" member of the group and as a result, I was much better accepted, it eliminated any possible tension. I largely prefer it this way. Maybe if i were the girly type, it would be much more difficult to do. But I never had to do an effort to be "one of the guys" in the group. As long as there are enough interests in common, I think that it's much easier what people imagine in many cases.

[Tarfeather]

I'd never treat a female friend the same way as a male friend, unless I absolutely knew for certain they'd be okay with it.

I would wager this is more to do with enforced gender roles making you feel like there's extraneous underlying fundamental differences between men and women, rather than there being any actual extraneous underlying fundamental differences between men and women. Of course, there are some differences, but we are really not SO different as some people here (I won't name names) will claim.

Although I may interact with them differently, I wouldn't say I *treat* female friends any different from male ones. It has never gotten me into any sort of trouble as far as I can tell. In fact, a number of those female friends that I have (which, granted, are the majority of friends that I have) have mentioned, either directly to me or in a group setting, that they appreciated being regarded as equals and/or not being given extra/special attention from the males.

And I think that lately we are overestimating the effect of gender roles. For instance, I don't believe that if we remove gender roles altogether, we'd see a 50/50% gender split in computer science. There are very real differences between the average man and the average woman, and to me personally, these differences happen to matter a lot. The male friends I have, people with personalities, ways of thinking, etc. like that would be significantly rarer and harder to find among the female population. So what it boils down to is that the female friends I have are "less compatible" to me, and I need to approach them differently from what I've learned with my male friends. Since you seem to be more compatible with typical female personalities to begin with, you simply haven't encountered this problem.

[Philip027]

The fact you keep viewing everything that everyone has said to you as "personal attacks" regardless of how nicely it was said says more than enough about your ability to relate to and interact with others -- namely that you lack it.

That's all that really can be said here, because at this point I and everyone else here may as well be conversing with a wall.

I'm personally through with responding to you unless you decide to impress me somehow, grow a backbone, and admit that maybe some of this is on you. I'm not counting on it, but amazingly enough, I have been wrong before.

And I think that lately we are overestimating the effect of gender roles.

I personally think it's the opposite. If you ever really look into the whole matter, it's kind of shocking how early they get imprinted onto you and how ingrained they become. Gender roles are pushed onto most people before they even leave the womb. For most of these people their behavior has already been influenced well before they even know what gender roles are. Even much later on in life, they might not even realize all the impacts that this has had on them. I'd wager that they've even had some effect on you that you aren't even aware of.

In an amusing meta sort of way, I also think that if it weren't for gender roles, this thread wouldn't have been created for us to be talking about gender roles in.

[Tarfeather]

b

What i meant was in the specific context of "men can't be friends with women". In the context of friendly conversations and their content, of course it can be a bit different here. It's really the idea that people can't get past the gender of the person they're speaking to and be simply friends with, without any hidden agenda.

Well.. Thing is, if I didn't make at least a little bit of an extra investment into my female friends, they'd just drop out of my life in favor of the male friends I have, who are more compatible. So my only "hidden agenda" is having platonic friends of the opposite sex, which I think does me a whole lot of good in widening my horizon, and I simply do notice that I need to treat these friends somewhat differently from my male ones. There always seems to be an expectation of "politeness" and "empathy" involved that doesn't matter to such an extent to my male friends. I can insult my male friend and they'll know I'm just teasing them. If I were to insult one of my female friends, they're generally rather offended by it.

Personally, I don't really make any big differences, even in friendly conversations. I enjoy being "one of the guys". It makes life so much easier. When something becomes awkward, it's because people assume that the opposite gender should be treated differently... When I was a student, and when I was a moderator in a large gamers community, of course sometimes there were friendly jokes about the fact that I'm a girl but other than that I simply behaved in a way that made it clear that I liked being a "normal" member of the group and as a result, I was much better accepted, it eliminated any possible tension. I largely prefer it this way. Maybe if i were the girly type, it would be much more difficult to do. But I never had to do an effort to be "one of the guys" in the group. As long as there are enough interests in common, I think that it's much easier what people imagine in many cases.

The very fact that you're replying calmly and rationally already tells me that what I said doesn't apply to you. :P But, I don't think people like you are all that common.

[Rising Sun]

There always seems to be an expectation of "politeness" and "empathy" involved that doesn't matter to such an extent to my male friends. I can insult my male friend and they'll know I'm just teasing them. If I were to insult one of my female friends, they're generally rather offended by it.

And I do the same to all my friends regardless of gender. I simply let those who can't stand my horrible humor run away :P

[Thrasymachus]

@Philip027:

That is hilarious, you think I have to impress you and agree this "on me"? I created a post with just a small portion of the evidence that the deal with the institutions mentioned, is not as good as it once was and you replied with a bunch of lame personal attacks, including suggesting it was just my family that doesn't have many examples of successful marriage, that maybe it is just me that is horrible, etc. Obviously the real reason was as the great Henrik Ibsen suggested, when you take away people's life lies, you take their happiness, so they will attack you.

I find it funny that someone living in amazing Hawaii with year round summer who still has not much to do but politic here, surrogate socialize and write anti-intellectual drivel and lame personal attacks is acting like he is the one who needs to be impressed!

I agree it is on me. Further here is a confession, I forced forced some British journalists to observe this about Britain and Japan:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/men/thinking-man/11362306/Why-dont-Japanese-men-like-having-sex.html

...

The Japan Family Planning Association interviewed 3,000 subjects about their sex lives (both men and women). The study revealed that nearly 50 per cent of those quizzed didn’t have sex in the month previous to the interview. 48.3 per cent of men had not had sex for a month (an increase in 5 per cent from 2012).
Most startling of all, however, was that 20 per cent of men aged between 25 and 29 – the period of a man’s life usually dedicated to the spreading of wild oats – expressed little interest in sex at all.

...

He also says that "sexlessness is not specific to Japan," citing the most recent British NATSAL survey, which reported a decline in sexual activity since 2000. (About 15pc of men and about 35pc of women weren't interested in sex at all and about 40pc had not had sex in the last four weeks. You know who you are.)

...

To impress you even more: I am so L33T.

[Anthracite_Impreza]

I have a question. Regardless of your personal beliefs and the results of surveys, why does it bother you that other people who have no impact on your life are getting married, having kids, getting divorced and being miserable? Were you just informing us or trying to 'convert' us? Cos, personally, I don't care what other people do unless they bother me or my crew.

[Hooded_Crow]

"I could go on but I think I made my point. Unlike most people I am more cerebral, inward focused, live in my own head more; I analyze to death every small decision. I cannot just go with the herd. The walnut of sex is probably not worth the effort of much more people to open, they just can never know it because they live a simple life of imitating their peers, conforming to parental and societal expectations. They are too intellectually incurious and invested in distracted and pursuing entertainment industry to come across or ponder the type of sources I cited why in atomized capitalist society, sex, marriage and kids, is as they say perhaps obsolete or a bad deal for the adults involved."

You attacked me long before I attacked you, dude. So you're not part of the commoners like us who want to form relationships, huh? You're more cerebral, you're smarter, you're more logical, huh? And us, we're just dumb herd animals, are we? We just imitate and conform and we can't use our own minds, huh?

Does that not sound like a personal attack to you? Because it sure as hell sounds like that to me.

Assuming you have got the higher truth of things and we are just too dumb to see it is presumptuous and patronising.

You waltz in here and vomit a bunch of statistics at us and that is supposed to get us all on board? No. Statistics are generalisations and generalisations are often misleading. Besides, numbers mean nothing when it comes to the individual.

"Look guy I don't know who you are and don't care. I live in one of the most ethnically diverse places in the world, the outer suburbs of NYC in Northern NJ. I have about 30+ co-workers from all over the world. I get along with just about everyone. Am I friends with everyone of course not. Neither are you and you were such a fine specimen, why are you playing such harsh games pretending to know me personally?"

Phil is not playing games, you are! The only one not advancing the debate here is you! And don't you pretend like you're being the bigger man here, you are guilty of the exact thing you are accusing him of. You're pretending to know us personally by putting us all in the same bag and you above. That is beyond contemptible.

"Drop the crap. The type of shenanigans and drama fit for soap operas in this thread is I why I don't want to interact with most of the population. I seriously hope you don't pretend to be slighted by the cultural mainstream for not fitting in real life, when you just use the internet to become a pathetic sort of cyberbully. How do I know all these people with thousands of posts personally attacking me are not online friends with each other, I can see this board has a chat feature even? There is also IRC, PM and email for such people using this place for surrogate socialization and drama to spread drama dust, form cliques and attack the "enemy"."

If you don't want to interact with most of the population, then what are you doing here telling us we're too stupid to be interacted with? Don't come here and insult our intelligence and our capacity to think for ourselves and then cast yourself as the martyr when we protest.

"I have never fit in my whole life and don't want to. I am vegan, straight edge, an anti-materialist and am car-free. I get alot of shit, but deep down even though I am nothing like them my co-workers and few friends respect me because they know I am loyal, and don't pretend to be something I am not to fit in. It would be hard, almost impossible for someone like me to get a mate, even if the walnut only had one shell so to say. Logistically as a vegan with no car, most women live too far and don't share my values anyway. I would end up trapped juggling balls and likely end up one of the elderly couples in the AARP study who while married for decades still felt their spouse as a stranger."

Lots of us here have spent their lives not fitting in anywhere. You'd think we'd have something in common with you but nope. The difference? You think you're better than other people because you don't fit in. By the way, I know lots of vegan, straight edge, anti-materialist and car-free people. They don't get a lot of shit. Know why? Because they don't go around treating everyone else like they're dumb commoners.

If you don't want a partner and children, then don't have them! But that is your personal choice. It is in no way more logical than the choice of someone who wants a partner and children.

"There is no respite. Is the walnut of sex even worth opening even for people who don't consider themselves asexual? It seems our predicament has its virtues."

This sounds dangerously elitist. Be careful. We are not better than sexual people and you are not better than those of us who want a family.

[poindexter]

Well.. As an aro/ace, I can certainly relate, even if I don't share your rather misanthropic flair. I'm pretty much constantly baffled as to how people work up the energy to tackle the walnut of relationships. I assume that they have found some kind of motivation to do so that I don't possess, otherwise I'm certain they wouldn't bother.

[Hooded_Crow]

See? If you had expressed your sentiment in the same way Poindexter just did, I would have no qualms with you.

[Thrasymachus]

@Hooded_Crow:

I should have noticed longer ago that you are from Hawaii like Philip. Sadly I have been on incel forums, depression forums, loneliness forums, hikikomori forums, and I notice the same behavior over and over again. People who use the internet for surrogate socialization tend to be toxic on web forums. I didn't notice because I didn't click the link because he never contributed a serious argument, but after noticing you are posting from Hawaii I followed the link listed in this post of Philip where he mentions he is in a relationship with you:

http://www.asexuality.org/en/topic/134796-the-walnut-theory-sex-marriage-kids-are-not-worth-it/#entry1061644101

So basically that is your problem with me. And you like pointdexter's way of expressing the issue because it is solely the realm of opinion and not piecing together recent stats from various sources showing the institutions I am talking about are failing and not a very good deal any longer. That is why Philip is attacking me and you are backing him up.

Sadly this is what happens often on forums with people with issues that have posting cultures that encourage people to log on and post as much as possible, even to play posting games. It is good for the ego of the person running the site maybe in a sense, we are at 20 million posts! But it does not engender quality or healthy behavior.

Actually even mothers and fathers put the same type pressure on their unmarried and childless kids that you are in your personal attacks, angry that they cannot have grandchildren. They often try to insinuate their is something wrong with their own kids, for not procreating or wanting to procreate.

@poindexter:

It would have sufficed to say you related as a person, not as an ontological category. Also it is not really misanthropy, it is reality and actually reflects trends in Western behavior. People are more and more hesitant to marry and have kids for various reasons, and marrying later, divorcing more and having less kids.

[Snao Cone]

I don't mind the idea of miserable people forming their own isolated communities where they talk to each other instead of other people, no matter what they call themselves or what they say about the rest of the population. Go ahead and create your own separate world.

[Sally]

I don't mind the idea of miserable people forming their own isolated communities where they talk to each other instead of other people, no matter what they call themselves or what they say about the rest of the population. Go ahead and create your own separate world.

pretty much says it all. :cake:

[Sally]

...except for this, my personal experience: I had no myths. My parents were divorced; my mother was then divorced again from her second husband. My sister was divorced. I was divorced. But I was divorced not because my husband and I didn't enjoy marriage; I enjoyed it immensely, and I had two children, both of whom I love even though neither were expected or planned for. My daughter is severely handicapped; that didn't cause me to not love her. I have enjoyed my very long partnership with another man immensely, even though he was sexual and I'm not. I still love him very much, and we are glad to be able to still have a relationship.

None of that was anything that society taught me would be ideal. However, since I have a very good brain, I didn't really listen to what society said; I just felt what I felt. Nothing was a "game". Games have rules; life doesn't.

When I hear someone using the word "game" so often, I hear extreme bitterness. Unfortunately, we can't help you with your bitterness.

[Thrasymachus]

@Snowcone:

The issue is when the miserable people on web forums play petty psychological games, form IRC cliques, email cliques, chat cliques meet up in real life and unknowing third parties who want discussion, who are less initiated and not invested in surrogate socialization(a healthier attitude on a discussion forum), get bushwacked by such cliques of people that often incidentally pretend to whine about slights from mainstream society only to just turn into pathetic cyberbullies.

[Hooded_Crow]

Aaaand now you think you know me after exchanging a few messages.

Your last message is nothing more than a passive aggressive personal attack. You must have noticed, right? Because you're SO smart and observant.

Yes, I am in a relationship with Phil. No, I am not posting from Hawaii, I am posting from France. And no, I do not see what that has to do with the fact that I don't agree with you that those institutions you talk about are inherently flawed. They are what you make of it. Nothing more and nothing less.

I also see you often say that love is a societal construct. This is simply not true. I think you mean that marriage is a social construct. Because love is most certainly something that is found in nature. Many other animals display loving feelings.

Additionally. For someone who hates forums, you seem to frequent them a lot. I wonder what's up with that.

And finally, this is exactly why I like what Poindexter said. Because he states his opinion instead of force feeding us numbers and forcing extreme conclusions on me.

How about you get off your little cloud and try being a tiny bit humble for a while. Because for now, this is what the thread looks like:

You - guys, I have this theory that relationships aren't worth the trouble.

Us - well, I can relate to this feeling but they clearly are worth it for some people so this is not a universal thing.

You - of course it's universal! Look, numbers!

Us - well no, some people are happy in relationships.

You - you're toxic. It's sad.

Us - ... What?

[Anthracite_Impreza]

Are you gonna answer my question (several posts up)? I'm genuinely curious nosy.

[Hooded_Crow]

PS. It fills me with horror to think of you spewing out your bitterness on vulnerable depressed people who seek support online.

[Thrasymachus]

@Anthracite_Impreza:

I was just extending my walnut analogy to even normal heterosexual, not asexual couples, with most of my seeding post. Of course we don't live in the type of society to conduct this type of research but with outright divorce, the huge number of married couples who feel lonely in their marriage and the huge number of people who are married but unhappily so to not drop the balls they are juggling(career, house, kids), it is not such a good deal anymore to get married or start a family. I would like to see all of those factors used to research into the true number of "successful" marriages, which we can anyway discern as being very small. Further the youth in the West are impoverished as the elderly tend to hold most the wealth and they cannot rely on their kids free roaming the neighborhoods at a certain age for relief. These trends will become even worse as the youth lose even more income relative to the older generations. Further as Charles Eisenstein lamented(paraphrasing from memory): "I cannot exactly my kids to go outside and play, because there are no longer other kids outside to play with so they are inside more." Meaning the parents get little break time from their kids, making parenting a worse deal as time passes.

One thing most modern people don't know because they are too busy distracting and entertaining themselves in their free time:

Back when marriage was "successful" in the sense that almost no divorces occurred in the Western tradition: that was because you mostly couldn't get a divorce or only with grave difficulty and even if you did it meant especially if you were a women, you ceased to exist as a social being, except as a pariah.

[Anthracite_Impreza]

@Anthracite_Impreza:

I was just extending my walnut analogy to even normal heterosexual, not asexual couples, with most of my seeding post. Of course we don't live in the type of society to conduct this type of research but with outright divorce, the huge number of married couples who feel lonely in their marriage and the huge number of people who are married but unhappily so to not drop the balls they are juggling(career, house, kids), it is not such a good deal anymore to get married or start a family. I would like to see all of those factors used to research into the true number of "successful" marriages, which we can anyway discern as being very small. Further the youth in the West are impoverished as the elderly tend to hold most the wealth and they cannot rely on their kids free roaming the neighborhoods at a certain age for relief. These trends will become even worse as the youth lose even more income relative to the older generations. Further as Charles Eisenstein lamented(paraphrasing from memory): "I cannot exactly my kids to go outside and play, because there are no longer other kids outside to play with so they are inside more." Meaning the parents get little break time from their kids, making parenting a worse deal as time passes.

One thing most modern people don't know because they are too busy distracting and entertaining themselves in their free time:

Back when marriage was "successful" in the sense that almost no divorces occurred in the Western tradition: that was because you mostly couldn't get a divorce or only with grave difficulty and even if you did it meant especially if you were a women, you ceased to exist as a social being, except as a pariah.

So if I'm reading you correctly, you're concerned that society is going to "collapse", for lack of a better word, due to the modern state of marriage and child-rearing? That everyone would be better off without making anything beyond casual acquaintances (except family)? I'll definitely agree with you that the modern world sucks spectacularly in many ways, including over-working leading to lack of time for family and immense stress, but is that not a problem caused by freewheeling capitalist society more than marriage itself?

[Sally]

@Snowcone:

The issue is when the miserable people on web forums play petty psychological games, form IRC cliques, email cliques, chat cliques meet up in real life and unknowing third parties who want discussion, who are less initiated and not invested in surrogate socialization(a healthier attitude on a discussion forum), get bushwacked by such cliques of people that often incidentally pretend to whine about slights from mainstream society only to just turn into pathetic cyberbullies.

TLDR: someone hurt my feelings on the interwebs.

[Thrasymachus]

I am not concerned that our society is going into collapse, I would welcome or love it. Our society is disgusting and has no right to continuity, far as it concerns me. I don't think American society is anywhere near the point of demographic pressure though, sadly. However unlike most people I just don't look at what those around me do and mimic them blindly. So I spend alot of time mulling over and considering such social constructs instead of taking them as true belief.

I will just say one thing:

People would be better off if they instead of aping entertainment industry and other fantasies where you find fanciful, unhealthy, not realistic depictions of people who cannot keep their hands off of each other, who are best friends, ravenous lovers, etc., rolled into one and took a more realistic stance and asked themselves in life:

What partner can I tolerate for over 20 years and what partner would support me and a possible family for the same time period?

My grandmother and grandfather had an arranged marriage, they were vetted by both their families and deemed compatible. In Greek arranged marriages at the time, they got to meet beforehand and I believe the women or man could refuse the proposed partner. Today however, we have a hedonistic youth hooking up at parties, bars and even though it allegedly involves more free choice, it is actually a worse system because it is about hedonism and "having a good time" more than about searching for someone that is stable and that you could tolerate. Further sometimes both members of such hookup, or bar crawling initiated families cannot "keep house" and if you don't have the discipline to cook, clean, wash dishes, etc. how will you find the greater discipline to raise kids?

[Sally]

Thras, you're not really listening to any of us, are you? So why are you here, just to make statements?

[Anthracite_Impreza]

I can't say I disagree with you on many of your points, they do make logical sense. There are many people who 'follow the crowd' (something I find peculiar, but then I am probably autistic and don't feel that same 'pressure') instead of taking time to think about things, but then I'm no better. I diverged from the mainstream but I still follow my natural instincts to increase enjoyment, rather than think (practically) for the future. My thought is I might get hit by a bus tomorrow, might as well live for the now.

Arranged marriages do also make sense but ours are free countries and I believe they should remain so. The governments impose enough restrictions as it is.

I will say this though, while society at large may appear insane most individuals have far more autonomy than you're giving them credit for. We're all just scared of being outed, rocking the boat and exiled, because most of us don't have a good enough safety net to catch us. It sucks, and it's far from just a marital problem. Kids today are growing up in a really crappy world, less people having them is a good thing.

[Guest]

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