I think plenty of people fulfill their sexual needs through online means these days, which is a shame because real life experiences are much more emotionally enriching, with the added benefit that if you repeatedly engage sexually with a person you really like, it could form the basis of a relationship. Whereas in the digital space, one gets no long term return on the time invested/wasted.
I would challenge this and probably flag it as the core problem.
Most interactions with the opposite sex are emotionally draining and insipid and our digital interactions are almost always more rewarding.
The problem is that you have to wade through a ton of mud to get to the gold nugget that is someone you genuinely like to interact with.
Indeed, but this can be successfully counteracted to some degree by proper socialization, and by participating in social activities alongside a group of friends, which by virtue of creating social contexts, will lower the barriers to social interactions.
People spend too much time indoors in the company of their screens, and without adequate social training, anxiety will surely present itself when one is placed in the company of real people, especially of the opposite sex.
> The problem is that you have to wade through a ton of mud to get to the gold nugget that is someone you genuinely like to interact with.
Anything meaningful in life requires some level of effort. There's no way around it.