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PaperclipPerfector  1yr ago (text post)   30730 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of July 3, 2023

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Out of curiosity, is the picture in your profile you IRL?

Yes, that is me, in India actually. Random museum in Dehli, some back room had that portrait.

I wouldn't wish the curse of male libido on my worst enemy, even if I don't want to remove it (or, I would, if there was an simply, temporary pill without real side effects that did so, instead of the only real options being castration of the physical or chemical nature).

That pill is a low dose SSRI. I've had some mild depression my whole post pubescent life. Never really treated it until I met my wife and was planning to settle down. I thought I always had a low level of background unhappiness because I wasn't getting the amount of sex I wanted, or sex with the type of woman I wanted. Once I had that covered and still felt depressed I realized it was something more. It took me from like 9/10 libido to a 6/10 libido. Which is still higher than my wife who is probably like a 3 or 4. I don't know if it would have been a good idea to take it in highschool.

I still have immense sympathy for incels/average dudes, because I had to deal with raging, all consuming libido for years, and still had dry spells afterwards. I look at the latter, and think "there but for for the grace of God go I". The Chads (and women) simply don't understand what torture that is, how corrosive it can be to your self esteem, even if most of your peers are in similar straits.

I feel the exact same way. By all metrics I am currently successful. But it certainly felt like it took a long ass time to get there and I was pretty miserable that whole time. I think it is quite likely that I was even viewed as one of those "chads" that just effortlessly got women. People mostly stopped saying things like that because I got unexplainably angry at what they thought was a compliment. No! It wasn't effortless, that was a decade of my life I spent getting good at that! And I was miserable the whole time I was learning! (okay that last one is obviously a lie, there were some fun moments of temporary success)

So you were a depressed teenager, had a grueling ten years, and were still depressed after achieving the socially approved goal. Then you got older, took a pill, settled down, and it got better. Isn’t the obvious conclusion that the aggressive pursuit of sex with women (as opposed to jerking off) was a waste of your time/actively harming you?

was a waste of your time/actively harming you?

Yes obviously. But jerking off wasn't an alternative.

And the end result has been nice.

Achieving the socially approved goal may have been necessary but not sufficient for the above poster to overcome his depression.

If you replace ‘achieving frequent sex with various women’ with ‘climbing mount everest’ in the story, I don’t think that points to climbing mount everest being necessary but not sufficient to overcome his depression.

A prediction (‘My depression is the result of my "sexual failure", therefore fixing the latter will fix the the former’) was made, acted upon at great cost, and was falsified.

That pill is a low dose SSRI. I've had some mild depression my whole post pubescent life

Oh boy. I had and have mild to moderate depression since my late teens myself, and SSRIs not only didn't work for me, they gave me ED while not changing my libido. Hell, that probably made my depression worse!

They're not a drug I would in any way recommend for that purpose, as the side effects are too onerous and the effect is too unreliable.

Once I had that covered and still felt depressed I realized it was something more. It took me from like 9/10 libido to a 6/10 libido

I'd say I went from 9/10 to 7/10 simply naturally with age, when getting laid went from a wild fantasy to something important yet mundane. Normalizing something and knowing it's mostly on tap does a great deal to help with the hopeless cravings.

delted

Eh I guess mileage varries.

It was a sudden drop. The more gradual drop from 10 to 9 happened a year before. And now I'd say I'm at like a 5 or 6. So I've seen gradual change.

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