"Petromasculinity"? This May Be Why You're Lonely...

 "Online dating is like choosing a proctologist by picking random names out of a hat..." -- The Overlord

Pity the poor Snowflake, for they shall never know Love.

From my own observations of the Younger Set this is primarily due to two factors: the first being the evident self-centeredness and insularity of their lives, the second being their inability to tolerate the slightest discomfort in any form.

I blame the culture, but mostly parents.

On the first factor, the typical 20-something of my acquaintance lives in a self-constructed, but fragile, bubble of faux self-esteem. They've grown up in a world which tells them to prize their self-esteem, but then doesn't tell them how one goes about getting any. Or, rather, EARNING any. That world bestowed self-esteem upon them by virtue of telling them what they wanted to hear, which is to say, "you are the BESTEST EVAH (smiley face, with glitter on it), ad nauseum.

It is a relic of the Goebbel's school of propaganda in which if you repeat a lie, emphatically, and often enough, people will believe it. Children's television in the last two decades (The Overlord has watched much of it, having had nephews) has mostly revolved around inculcating a cult of excessive self-love within children, Purple dinosaurs, goofy hosts and cartoon characters of this period are constant cheerleaders for the concept that, whatever you are or may be, you are the most-fabulously fabulous, -smartest, -cutest, or talented rugrat  that ever fucking lived, and don't you forget it.

A veritable orgy of self-congratulations.

Back in the Caveman Days when all the Overlord had was Mister Rogers and Big Bird, there was a lot of this, too. However, this therapeutic bombardment was interspersed with educational tidbits, for example, how to say your alphabets and count, perhaps learning how to make an ashtray from modeling clay, or why you should never stick your tongue in an electrical outlet, but also with lessons on how to be a decent, well-adjusted human being.

Nowadays, children are subjected to what I refer to as "Oprah-fication", in which their television viewing has been almost completely transformed into 24-hour-a-day self-help infomercial, and if there are any interludes in the constant drumbeat of masturbatory self-idolization, it's something mindless like Spongebob Squarepants (now a Broadway musical for those who wish to relive their youth!). Which, granted, can be funny (a lot of the jokes would fly over a child's head, anyway), but in terms of educational value is about as useful as a unionized schoolteacher.

The point being, none of these programs actually tell a kid what s/he needs to know: self-esteem is earned; it isn't magically bestowed upon anyone by mere claim to it, in much the same way that simply declaring yourself "trans" makes you the opposite gender. You build self-esteem by accomplishment, by doing and succeeding at something, not because you got a certificate for sitting through the puppet show in second grade.

The result, again from observation, is that when the supposed possessor of self-esteem finally comes into contact with reality -- and encounters real adversity for the first time in their lives -- they instantly become "victims", cry a lot, and look for someone to protest and sue. Because they have not had the experience of having to fail in order to succeed, they do not have the inner strength of character to handle a difficult (for them) -- but usually easy-to-handle (for us)-- situation.

The bubble bursts and the person inside just...can't...deal...

And it is easy to see why: they have grown up in a culture that rewards losers often better than it rewards winners.

On the second factor, one gets the impression -- again, from observation -- that few of these overgrown children has much, if anything, resembling a "deep" relationship with their parents, or, given how many are born out-of-wedlock these days, gamete donors.

By this I mean that their parents are either more like friends than they are or were authority figures, or teachers of life lessons; they were simply people who occupied the same house and let the schools, housekeepers, and family therapists do the tough job of raising stable adults, because too busy, or because the kids were seen as little more than status symbols or fashion accessories to the upper-middle-class douchebags who made them.

Suzie's value to Mummy and Daddy was to be an outward reflection of themselves: She was supposed to be Valedictorian, first in her class at (insert name of trendy Liberal Arts school here), and her life was intended to be an unbroken string of major accomplishments that reflected MORE on Mom and Dad than they did on Suzie. I've heard this from couples of my acquaintance with kids for a few decades now -- parents brag to one another about what their kids do, and try to one-up each other, in the process.

You know, Buffy, my Penelope was just accepted at Fancypants Academy.

(This is the fashionable, $50k-a-year pre-school for "gifted" youngsters. The "gift" being a check from Mumsy and Daddy, of course).

Yes, I've heard, Muffy, but did you know that my Ophelia got in, as well, and on scholarship? Seems she has a talent for finger painting. The Dean called her the next gender-neutral Jackson Pollock.

(A third woman enters the fray)

Why, my Jamieson was just enrolled, too, and is the country's first-ever transitioning pre-schooler. Two years early, no less. I knew those French lessons in-utero would pay off.

Doesn't matter -- school, sports, any activity, their kid is so much better than everyone else's (despite any evidence to bolster this belief) and any achievement, any milestone, no matter how minor, is rubbed into another competitive Mom's face with vigor. I've even heard two women get into one of these covert psy-ops over whose kid was potty trained first.

The kid isn't a human being: he's another status symbol, like the BMW in the driveway.

And their school experience is unlikely to foster the creation of physically- and mentally-strong individuals, either.

If you're a boy (but then again, I'm no biologist) you will enter a female-dominated institution run by dingbats and subjected to a constant stream of criticism for having the audacity to be born with the wrong set of genitalia. You will be labeled a potential rapist on Day One; your propensity for action and need for engagement will be considered a mental disorder or learning disability, and you may be subjected to a regime of personality-altering drugs to "cure" you. You will get less attention from instructors who don't know how to deal with you because they've been taught you're a rape just waiting to happen, too, and pumped full of feminist dipshit to the point where your very presence is, if not a mere irritant, constitutes a deadly threat to everyone else.

If you also happen to be White and show no signs of early-onset homosexuality, it gets infinitely worse for you.

You will grow up uncertain of yourself and who you are, and wary of women, unable to even approach one with any sense of confidence and expecting to be immediately judged on sight.

If you're a girl (though far be it from me to misgender anyone) barriers to your "success" and sense of "empowerment" will be artificially removed. You will be treated like an endangered species. You will receive inordinate amounts of attention from teachers and administrators (also nominally female) who will be taking great pains to ensure their "sisters" get all the benefits and protections, so as to destroy the invisible Patriarchy. Nothing you do -- no matter how egregious -- will be held against you. There will be no consequences for misbehavior, only excuses made to save you from them.

If you happen to be non-White and show every sign of being eager to take your place in the Carpetmuncher's Guild, you will be celebrated for your "bravery" and encouraged to "fight the power" by a mob of nasty, angry, unfulfilled hellions at your back and probably a battalion of lawyers, too. Your gender (and the definition of this will change as circumstances arise and permit) will grant you dispensations and rewards you haven't earned, because vagina.

You will grow up viewing every male as shit on your shoes, a disgusting, violent, irrational potential rapist and mass shooter who has nothing on his mind but to get at your Ladyparts so as to "oppress" you.

This means you will grow up not knowing how to deal with Men, in general, or anyone who happens to thwart you fair and square, disagree with you, or who otherwise becomes an obstacle between you and whatever shiny object you're chasing today. You will grow up with unrealistic expectations (and demands!) about...everything...let alone dating.

We wonder why kids would rather sit at home and text one another than to go out on a date?

The entire enterprise is simply fraught with all sorts of peril.

You have to be careful about what you say, so as to not bruise anyone's tender sensibilities.

You have to get permission forms signed in triplicate before you even ask someone to hold their hand or give them a kiss, because to do otherwise may be considered sexual assault.

It is difficult to even talk, face-to-face, to someone you can't figure out. To someone your education has told you is your enemy (if female) or your superior (if male).

Social media, of course, makes this worse: no one develops the social skills that are so useful in later later life, like how to read a room, how to listen, how to argue effectively, how to interpret facial expressions and body language, how to present one's self without sounding like a pompous dick, primarily because everyone's anonymous and that anonymity gives everyone the ability to present to the world something different than what exists in reality.

So that by the time you're out of school and into The World, and you find yourself so desperately lonely to find someone to either share your loneliness or to mash squishy bits with that you will resort to anything but learning how to date and deal with the pitfalls of for-reelz social interaction.

Hence, online dating sites, where the object is not so much to pick a suitable mate as it is a suitable playmate. Because (mentally) children.

The result, is, sadly, predictable, for when politically-indoctrinated, super-entitled vagina seeks out browbeaten-introverted-involuntary incel, this is what you get.

In the interests of full disclosure, your would-be Galactic Dictator took a spin or two on the Internet dating wheel, and the experiences resulted in the following (list has been shortened in the interests of brevity):

* 2 Mental cases. The first being a high-functioning autistic with absolutely no feelings that could be described as "human" and off-the-scale OCD, the second being a 4-time-divorcee with multiple children by multiple fathers, and a raging case of Munchhausen-by-Proxy Syndrome (although the nymphomania was an unexpected bonus).

* Several identifying-as-female blobs of oatmeal, who resembled their profiles or photographs in no way, shape or form (but mostly shape). This is common: people lie about themselves all the time, especially when they're trying to sell themselves like used furniture. I would learn this lesson early on in the experience, and would be shocked to find that, of all people, George Orwell remarked upon this phenomenon a long time ago (scroll down to the part about matrimonial papers, May 26th, 1944).

* A bewildering array of neurotics, drunks, addicts, hypochondriacs. If they weren't sick, they had personal habits or qualities that made them unwanted in very short order -- whiners, complainers, gold diggers, poor hygiene, lack of manners or taste.

* God knows how many cockteases.

* Above all, someone exceedingly desperate to accomplish some goal for a really bad reason -- to be married by a certain age, to have x number of children, because everyone else is doing something, to get their mother off their backs, to find someone else to shoulder the burden of supporting their fat, stupid, lazy asses (and children).

That was but 20 years ago. We've now "progressed" to your political opinions being a necessary pre-condition to a relationship, undertaken by people who, for the most part, have very few interpersonal skills, to begin with.

Well, if you're worried about the environment and the precarious state of Mother Gaia, fret no more: your inability to find that custom fit in an off-the-rack world will ensure that you shall not breed future carbon footprints, and your unwillingness to compromise or exercise something resembling tolerance, will result in same.

Good for you! You're doing your part!

So perhaps you're wasting your time on OK Cupid in the first place?