now that we have endocrine disrupting chemicals being dumped into the environment.
The decline in teenage sex is very recent (last couple of decades) whereas endocrine disrupting chemicals have been dumped for decades and decades prior to that.
This seems like realllllllly motivated reasoning on your part.
Never thought about it like that! It’s probably just like how so many under 30s living with their parents these days isn’t a sign of distress, they probably just love their parents more than every other generation!
What fascinating insights you have.
Absolutely, there’s definitely folks who were already not good at socializing turning to video games. Buuut, I think the cheapness, ubiquity and quality have all improved so much that it has become a much easier alternative than it was in the past.
Like, if you lower the price of cigarettes, many who smoke those cheaper smokes would have smoked anyway. But as the price drops, it’s easier for those marginal smokers to continue to do so and for new ones to start. (You had to be pretty dedicated to suffer through Ultima VI etc.)
And the timing also kind of makes sense; for the last couple of decades there’s been a marked decrease in teenagers and young adults having sex. I assume part is the ubiquity of porn but I can’t imagine teenagers are just getting less horny…
Manosphere is a huge part. I just think that the impressive improvements in video games have increased the pool of lonely young men on whom the manosphere preys.
As a crude example, I had surgery and finished Persona 5 while recovering. Mentioned that to a coworker when I returned and he was stoked and talked about his multiple playthroughs on that and his experience with the others in the series. With a full time job, that’s so very many weeks worth of time just devoted to a video game instead of meeting people, socializing, finding a partner etc.
Probably going to be an unpopular take online but… A lot of the most chronically single people I know are very into videogames. Not sure which way the causation runs or maybe it’s a self reinforcing cycle but there does seem to be a relationship.
The folks I know tend not to be the angry incel type but I could very easily see a pathway that goes something like: video games are cheaper and easier than putting yourself out there, thus you isolate, but isolation kind of sucks and no one likes to blame themselves, so the “manosphere” and it’s precursors are there to tell you it’s actually women/wokeness/the Libs that are responsible for your angry singledom…" To me, I see them at least partially a factor in the hard gender split in politics these days.
The timing also kind of maps out. Video games have moved from niche to one of the most lucrative entertainment industries. The generation of young men raised by really quality games was coming to electoral age just about 2016 and boy, did things start going g off the rails.
I’m not blaming everything on videogames and do play some myself but I do wonder if they’ve contributed to the problem.
Do you read as much as you game? Do you really think most people find books and video games equally appealing?
You’re conflating fertility and teens having sex.
The drop off in teen sex is way more recent than either of those, started in the last decade or two.
This really seems like ever more frantic motivated reasoning.