But holy shit this article is basically just "men are unhappy because men suck. They can be happy again, but only if they decide to stop sucking"
My read of it is that men should focus on their mental health and consider getting therapy if they need it, which I'm pulling from where it says
> Level up your mental health game. That means getting into some individual therapy to address your skills gap.
The skills gap it mentions is where it talks about how women express a desire for partners who "are emotionally available, good communicators, and share their values" - none of that is a value judgement in my reading. Those all seems like fairly reasonable things to want in a partner.
It could be that the men are subject to victim-blaming, and/or that the women are asserting false pretenses because the real reasons are superficial and/or sound bad (i.e. men are too ugly or poor).
Same thing when somebody says "I only want to date a man who's rich, taller than me, conventionally handsome, and will cater to my every whim" - do you meet that criteria? Maybe not, but they've decided that they only want to date exactly one person in the entire world and they're gonna hold out until they find exactly that person, who are you to tell them they're wrong? It's their life.
I agree that it's hard to judge the reasonableness of other people's decisions, but I think that if they either fail to find what they are looking for (i.e. I expect a luxury car for the price of an econo-box, and am persistently disappointed), or expect more than they offer (i.e. I expect a partner who is equal or superior to me in all respects), the expectation may be unreasonable.
> I agree that it's hard to judge the reasonableness of other people's decisions, but I think that if they either fail to find what they are looking for, or expect more than they offer, the expectation may be unreasonable.
Sure, but the article also says that the group of lonely single men is growing so on balance it sounds like the women are finding what they're looking for. Who's got the unreasonable expectations, here?
No matter who you want to "blame" for the underlying situation crap advice is still crap.
"Women want to date men who are emotionally available, good communicators, and who share values" means that your starting point to search for a relationship should be that you are emotionally available, good at communicating, and you have a clear concept of your values so that you can determine whether or not you share them with a potential partner. The advice to get to that state is "focus on mental health, including getting therapy if you need it" - that all seems correct to me.
It's not relevant for getting dates, but getting dates is easy. It's extremely relevant for any stage of a relationship, including the early ones.
Citation needed. I'm sure many here will vehemently disagree.
"That's not a date" Why not?
"My friends are all in relationships" Make more friends.
- "Be more lucky"
So, I take it charitably that you meant "you ask people you know" (not your actual friends/buddies) on dates.
Which is as good as saying "to get a job, just ask for one" to an unemployed person. To which the proper response is "Gee, why didn't I think of that..."
And this isn't the only way to get dates - dating apps certainly try and short-circuit the "be friends" part. But I've been friends with every girl I've dated before we started dating, including the woman I'm now married to. If you're not friends with somebody, even a little bit, why do you want to date them?
edit: And of course, if you're going into friendships with the intention of trying to date the person, that might work out poorly. Meet somebody, be their friend, and if you're both open to something developing, it can happen. Asking them to have lunch is a way to start that.
IDK about your comment about self worth but you're the one who brought it up and it has a slight odor of projection. If you're average looks and average at text based communication getting first dates is not the bottleneck.