ser
2mo ago
It's a poor analogy to use for this case but if you really wish to use it, a more accurate version would probably be this: Woman is told to not walk in a skimpy outfit in the bad neighborhood by multiple sources, woman even takes a class on skimpy outfit etiquette where she's told about the bad neighborhood where she has a high chance of getting raped if she decides to go there in a skimpy outfit. The woman has grown up in a skimpy outfit culture and there's many videos on the internet of things going bad for other women that went to the neighborhood while wearing skimpy outfits. There's a big sign that states "WOMEN IN SKIMPY OUTFITS STAY AWAY" at the entrance to the bad neighborhood. She goes there in a skimpy outfit anyway and gets raped.
This situation feels very clearcut and easy to interpret.
Is it? 24+ hours later and there's still multiple narratives being thrown around from 'pigs murdered him in cold blood because they could' to 'his gun malfunctioned and cops got spooked'
ser
2mo ago
I think it's more or less similar, but not entirely. Women are more socially oriented, so it's more likely for them to have a network that would eventually produce some potential candidates. Women's hobbies are also more social and communal compared to men. They are more likely to get approached in the wild (although I heard this is rare these days, I guess it depends on one's attractiveness). Social media is also a strong source - men slide in DMs with zero shame. So there's a chance for a woman to be completely passive in her pursuit of a relationship and still get opportunities. I'm sure there's plenty of women out there that just bedrot after work, women have higher screen time than men after all, which would put them in a very similar predicament as men. But just posting a reel or two on IG would expand her dating opportunities far more than anything an average man could do.
ser
2mo ago
I think big reason is that majority of US immigration is of hispanic origin. They are mostly catholic and traditional, which makes them assimilate rather quick. Look at American politicians and their last names - Rubio, DeSantis, Cruz, Padilla. 1-2 generations and grandkid of Juan Carlos from Mexico works for ICE, deporting illegals without second thought. Now look at Europe, it's a complete 180. Americans see immigrants in Europe the same way they see Somalis in Minnesota.
ser
2mo ago
The fact that there's so little noise about Trump's external political decisions coming from the Blue tribe should be a clear sign to Europeans, Canadians, and others that they can't just weather the storm
ser
2mo ago
If you get your life together as a young man, you will be fine in the dating market, it will very quickly be tilted in your favor and not hers.
I think that sounds correct on paper but it's wrong in reality. These young man that have their life together have marketing/distribution problem. Once you're out of college, and most men don't go to college at all so that opportunity ends for them even earlier when they finish highschool, they are just not naturally exposed to enough women. Their job is probably male dominated, and even if it isn't they are unlikely to make moves on their coworkers anyway. Their hobbies are male dominated too, so chance of meeting someone there is low. Social drinking, going to bars, clubbing is not in anymore, so they don't do that often enough either. So what's left? Dating apps - select for top 10% men by appearance, even if you're decent looking, your failure rate will be high, you need to put effort into your profile, need to have some social skills and understand what you're doing. What else is there? Cold approach? Purposefully seeking out female dominated hobbies? Church (be for real)?
There's a specific type of content that occasionally goes viral on social media. It's a woman posting pictures of her (usually average-to-slightly-above-average in looks) male friend with captions like "Look at my friend MOST_AVERAGE_MALE_NAME. He's such a good person, he is a DECENT_MIDDLE-TO-UPPER_CLASS_JOB, likes to SOCIALLY_APPROVED_MALE_HOBBY, loves traveling, has an adorable CUTE_NONTHREATENING_DOG_BREED named Archie and he's SINGLE AND LOOKING FOR A GIRLFRIEND" and the post goes viral, women are surprised how such a good guy doesn't have a girlfriend and are asking how to get in contact with him. Men that come across such posts often ask why she (the girl that posted this) doesn't get with him and usually he's either in deep friendzone or she already has a boyfriend, but that's besides the point. I don't know the success rate of this type of attempt at matchmaking, but I'm certain it's better than such dude trying his luck on hinge. My point is this - in the current environment, men like this just disappear off the radar unless they actively put in effort to get seen, but it's pretty much a part time job for most unless they get lucky and pair up with someone quick.
ser
2mo ago
Still continue to basically ban foreign competitors of various tech things and then make their own version.
I don't understand how this is bad. Had they not done this, there would just be Google China, Meta China and so on instead of locally grown Tencent and Alibaba. Imagine being a major power and wanting to decouple from America for whatever reason in the future and you basically can't because all government and corporate infra is ran on Microsoft Teams and AWS. You just can't let that happen. This is Europe's reality right now by the way
ser
2mo ago
Impossible, the world is changing but the power of inertia is making Europeans stick to the good old storylines
Someone in the previous comment tree about this incident said that politicians that let people feel like it was okay to interfere with ICE operations are the most to blame for this and this video is clear proof. She's a middle aged mother of multiple children that she just allegedly dropped off, with a dog in her car, and her first thought when seeing ICE is to get right in the middle of everything with a shit eating grin. Zero survival skills, feeling invincible, fueled by propaganda of 'modern day gestapo' disappearing your mexican neighbor for no reason at all. It's just sad
ser
2mo ago
I think it also creates perverse incentives, especially if you're in a position to choose how to resolve the bet. For example, let's say there is a market for whether Canada will send over $1b to the Ukraine between January 1st - April 30th, 2026. If I'm a Canadian MP, especially one of the ruling party, I can choose how to resolve the market - which means if I decide I earned a bonus, I can look at whatever position has a better payout, bet on that, then delay/accelerate sending aid to make my position true.
Orderbook would be thin for a market like this, your senator would be risking his job and reputation for a measly low 5 figure payout.
Well, yes, true, but most people have areas of influence. Not everyone can know whether NVIDIA's new chip will make it to market before Intel - but the employees at NVIDIA could delay, find "faults", etc. in an effort to push the date back.
Majority of nvidia employees are multimillionaires, especially the ones in position to change timelines. Once again - risking a lot for a relatively small payout.
The conversation about effects of prediction markets on our world are valid, but I think most people overestimate how much of an effect they could have. Polymarket double counts their volume, most markets' orderbooks are thin. Insiders will be getting some peanuts payouts here and there (I personally don't care), smart players like funds have another signal to monitor to be ahead of others. That's really it.
ser
3mo ago
AI is telling me that staff to kid ratio in my state and in the kid's age group is 1 to 12, so one staff generates $375/hr. Without looking it up, I know for a fact staff are not taking even third of that in their pocket. I know there's a lot more expenses going into this beyond just paying staff, but it's a home daycare for a few dozens of preschool kids that requires parents to even pack their lunch and its clearing $100k/m+ in revenue from both government and customers. Why are stay-at-home moms not coordinating setting up their own 'private daycares' and rack in thousands from the government? Sounds like an easy solution to the question of whether the mom should quit her job to raise the kid.
ser
3mo ago
I'm confused. I have a friend that put his kid in one of these suburban daycares (it's legit) and as far as I'm aware it's costing him thousands per month. I looked it up and they are also getting thousands per kid from the government. I know childcare is expensive, but it's not double dip into government's pocket and regular person's pocket for something like $5k total per kid expensive, so what's going on?
I'm in agreement with everything stated in that thread. TLDR: Yeah the 1 in ~20 therapist is worth their price in gold and will probably be helpful to majority of patients (given patient puts in effort too), but the rest of them are just a waste of money and time. I'm afraid most don't have the will, energy, money to go through the motions. And even if they do - how the hell would you know you found the one?
ser
3mo ago
Having her dad's wallet as cushion affected her life quite a bit, I imagine the progression would've been a lot more standard if she couldn't rely on it any time she wanted.
Do you believe in therapists? Given my recent realization of how much social anxiety controls my life, the thought of getting a therapist and trying to handle the issue professionally has come up many times. Don't get me wrong, I think practices like CBT are legit, they should definitely work for a lot of people. But when it comes to people that conduct those practices, I'm most certain many of them are not qualified/fit for the job. Each patient is like a unique 1000 piece puzzle that therapist has 1 hour per week to work through. I believe the bare minimum for a therapist is being on top of their life at all times - how many of them are like that? Simply having mold at home would change therapists' brain chemistry, thus affecting their work. How about vitamin deficiencies? Going through personal life problems at home? Not getting enough sleep? That just means that it would take you so much time to find the one that's actually worth your time and money. And at $200-300/hr they are charging, I imagine most won't spend thousands to find the one that works for them.
But anyways, I've got a fun little anecdote about therapists. I recently reconnected with my cousin and learned that she became a family therapist, got the license, her own office - it's legit. Issue is, her personal life situation would tell you she's got no clue about relationships. She's 38, with no kids and a 'hustler' boyfriend that's 10 years older than her. And her dating history is horrible too - in her twenties, she went off to NYC to study and do modeling on the side, sponsored by her dad. There, she lived the high life of being an attractive model in NYC - partying with rappers and finance bros, trips to Hamptons, yadda yadda yadda. Then, after graduating and getting an ultimatum from her dad that he won't be paying for her fun NYC life any longer, she coasted on her modeling gigs and (i'm assuming) help from boyfriends for a few years, ultimately moving back to her home country. Once back, she continued her party lifestyle for a few more years, once again paid for by her father (much cheaper than NYC). In that time, she, still being an attractive and young woman, got hit on quite often. But her main complaint was that the boys hitting on her weren't up to her standard. She set her own dad, a very successful businessman, and the NYC bros that were in her life as her standard, and well, the small town guys weren't that. In her mid to late 20s, she finally decides to lock in and stop depending on her dad by getting a job at a local bank. Focusing on her career, she grinded up to a branch manager by 30. I don't know much about her dating life in that time because my family and hers grew apart in that time, so I stopped overhearing gossip about her. Timeskip half a decade, she's single and decides to quit her job to become a yoga teacher. And finally, timeskip to now - she's a family therapist. Anyway, the reason why I'm saying all that is not to ridicule my cousin about her unfathomable fumble at life - she's not the first and she's not the last, that's just how life is, it's to tell you that this person is now a family therapist with a license that's 'helping' others work out their family issues and charging 10x (I'm not joking) average hourly wage.
ser
3mo ago
It's already cheaper to fly out to other countries for specific procedures in a lot of cases - I'm expecting this trend to continue. Cheap barebones plan at home for bad edge cases and trips over the border for anything else. But 'cheap' plans are also getting expensive. I'm on a $12k deductible plan that runs me $320/m. I'll probably go uninsured once it starts costing $400/m+ in 1-2 years. I can afford it, but it just seems ridiculous to pay this much for something that does nothing for me. I had to see a specialized professional recently - $300/visit, $50/m medication with goodrx coupon, $220 bloodwork (not covered by insurance because not generalized bloodwork). Had to see them for 9 months - almost $4k total. Not a single thing was covered by the insurance I'm paying $320/m for.
ser
3mo ago
While I agree that there may be some positive feedback loops that killed off the appeal of some types of social interactions, I think it's mostly just an excuse for many to continue scrolling. There's other social activities outside of hitting the club or bars that are also cooling off. I believe every possible activity is in competition with scrolling tiktok. The guys on twitter crying about party sluts in the club are just using it as an excuse to why they are not out there getting easy (according to them) women every weekend and are sitting refreshing their feed with 8 hour screen time on a weekend instead. Probably the first time in history when men are complaining about legions of easy women. What's easier? Dress up, get a fresh cut, allocate some cash, get at least one friend to do the same (nobody is going to the club alone) on a weekend or just stay in and scroll your favorite source of dopamine instead? I think it's really that simple. I'm guessing we would be back to early 2000s state of things within a year if our phones just poofed one day. Back to what I said in my original post, 7 to 9 hours of screen time daily, with half of it being off work is truly insane and we all kind of just accept it. As on old zoomer, 4 hours of screen time was my allowance with my xbox 360 on a weekend after a week of good grades. Now everyone, from young to old, has this as their daily baseline. Even Elon Musk, the richest person in the world, is glued to his twitter feed while running 67 companies at the same time. He is able to remain functional (even that is debatable) because of his naturally high agency and a curated cocktail of medications and supplements. An average person doesn't have either. On the bright side, natural selection will probably do its thing pretty quickly and humanity will be back to normal after a generation or two because everyone else will die off glued to their screen and talking to their AI caretaker
ser
3mo ago
A lot of good points under this post, with many of which I agree. But there's something I haven't seen mentioned. Average screen time for Gen Z and Millennials is 7 to 9 hours a day (half of that being at work and other half recreational). After 8 hours of sleep, 8 hours of work, 3 hours of grooming/shitting/pissing/cooking, 1 hour of commute, an average young person has 4 hours of free time per day. I have absolutely no doubt most of that free time is going towards scrolling Tiktok, Instagram or Twitter. As a man, if you're not lucky enough to have some women in your workplace that are your age and single (good luck taking the risk to rizz them up), have a group of friends that's not just made up of other men, or have hobbies that aren't meatfests, you're done for. Even if you're good looking enough (unlikely), meeting women through dating apps is pretty much a second job, for which you don't have free time for because you're scrolling tiktok. And everywhere else in your life, you just don't have an opportunity to mingle with single women. And even if you're lucky enough to have women around you can hit on - that requires effort and time, will you sacrifice your precious screen time for it? Even if you do, the ball is now in woman's court and women spend 1 extra hour scrolling their favorite choice of social media on average.
ser
3mo ago
lowering the quality of elder care
clankers teleoperated by third worlders coming near you
ser
3mo ago
Nope as far as I'm aware. I got mine off ebay, found a seller with lots of recent sales and went with it.
ser
3mo ago
Yep, it is Russian and has been around since 1980s, but a lot of other peptides these days come from China and India. I'm assuming USA isn't interested in regulating stuff like that because it's so cheap so can't make much money off it. I also bought mine as 'research chemical' and had to mix it myself.
ser
3mo ago
B12 during periods of less animal product consumption.
I've tried it long time ago, unfortunately gave me really bad hormonal acne (went away after I stopped taking it)
I'm intrigued by this Selank thing. First time I've seen it. How did you hear about it?
It's been around for a long time, I've first read about it 10+ years ago when I was briefly interested in biohacking, but never got around to trying it. There's a 'chinese' peptide craze right now among techies and finance bros, I've finally decided to do a deep dive and try the one that I thought would benefit me most and it turned out pretty good so far.
ser
3mo ago
Anyone wanna share their peptides/supplements stack that actually does something? My current stack (aside from very basic stuff like Vitamin D):
- Omega-3 for skin, inflammation, cognition - made a difference for my skin, not sure about anything else, make sure to get high quality one
- Magnesium Glycinate for sleep - makes it easier to fall asleep, and helps with not feeling dead on wake up on nights when I don't get enough sleep
- Selank: for anxiety, mood regulation, depression - genuinely makes me feel more happy and stable. I've been going through cycles of rumination, depression and mild panic attacks at night and they've pretty much stopped. I still get negative thoughts at night here and there, but instead of automatically falling into a negative feedback loop I can just observe the thought and move on. This is my first cycle of selank, so not sure how it's gonna go in the future but I'm very surprised to see such noticeable changes, usually with stuff like this changes are marginal.
- Creatine: had to stop this one for now, but it's great for the gym. I've been reading research on 10gr dose providing visible cognitive benefits, so I will try that instead of 5gr to see if it makes a difference next time I can hop on it.
ser
4mo ago
but you're never too old for a spontaneous trip with friends!
of course you're never too old, but like you mentioned, responsibilities get in the way. Not on my end, I'm as free as one can be. My friends, not so much. It could be one of the reasons why I'm feeling a sense of urgency to fix my social anxiety - it will only get worse as I get older. In my college years, there was something going on every other day and I would reject almost every opportunity. Now, it takes 8 months of planning, praying, coordinating to organize a 2 week trip. I need to be able to go out of my comfort zone, meet new people and feel comfortable with spontaneity.
ser
4mo ago
Appreciate you taking the time to respond. I'm really 50/50 on hostels, a friend has told me it's the best way to meet new people when traveling, but just like you I'm not too keen on sleeping in a shared room. Sounds like an easy way to not get good sleep and potentially get your valuables yoinked if you're not attentive enough.
All great advice, I definitely gotta get into soccer, especially with world cup coming to US soon. That would be an easy way to bond with someone.
This sounds crazy, but I did a meditation retreat recently, and their recommendation to learn to get past the 'shock reflex' is to step into a cold shower, feel the shock, and then try to breathe normally, wait under it to acclimatize and feel the water on your skin as just water rather than as shock and danger. I found it quite helpful with some of the meditation stuff that hits that brain impulse to instantly react rather than relax.
I've done cold showers in the past, but for no particular reason and without a particular goal. Now that I've identified what to work on, perhaps I'll find it more useful.
I have a small friend group in Germany and it's not too different from USA. One lucky guy, that found his match in university, proposed at 27 and is on track for decent family life. The rest are a mix of being completely given up on dating (not actively looking) to perpetually being in short term relationships. One difference from Americans is disdain for dating apps. My german friends see use of them as a signal of promiscuity, so women on there are completely discarded from being long term relationship candidates (short term is fine though). I don't know if this view is unique to just the people I know, but it's an interesting distinction.
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