Here’s another twist on dysfunctional personalities—today’s young adult women are complaining that young adult men simply don’t want to grow up. Read this fascinating article in Philadelphia Magazine:
The sorry lives and confusing times of today’s young men
They don’t have jobs. They’re dropping out of college. They play video games all day and watch porn all night. Even their sperm counts are low. Why won’t guys grow up?
Ox Drover
Quote from the article: “They’re not, especially, because we’ve painstakingly taught them never to be judgmental. When the authors of the book Lost in Transition: The Dark Side of Emerging Adulthood polled young adults, 47 percent agreed that “morals are relative, there are not definite rights and wrongs for everybody.” If you want to lie in bed all day and beat up virtual hookers—dude, hey, that’s cool.”
End quote:
This is nothing more than a lack of a moral compass. There is no “right and wrong” or “good or bad” –everything is okay dude!
Near
Hey! I’ll have you know I watch porn all day and play video games all night. How’s that for switching up the formula?! Buh huh! 😛 *runs off to naughty sites while sipping Capri Sun*
In all seriousness, I’m actually doing great in college and psychology was the right choice for my major! ^_^ College has also allowed me to see these dudes in action. Some guys at my school just go for money, and they mess around. They also have kids in order to get more money, too. Not sure how that works…
The girls are just as bad, though. In fact, many of them are worse from what I’ve seen(very little in the grand scope of things).
I also love the mix up in morals. NORMS are relative, depending on the culture and society observed, but many morals are universal. Societies wouldn’t grow otherwise. Fail for my generation. 🙁
clair
I think this type of man has always existed. There are a number of men like this in my family going back generations. They are Puer Aeternus, Latin for ‘eternal boy’. They’re slackers, bums, playboys, peter pans & parasites: other people do the work & they reap the rewards. There is an element of the Spath in this type of man. Perhaps these men have become more acceptable today because the culture has glorified them.
behind_blue_eyes
I don’t know where to begin with this one. How about at the end, with the comment that changing social norms, with more female equality allows men to stay at home — Mr. Mom!
My cousin is in this situation. She works a full-time job and he was always underemployed, generally staying at home and taking care of the children, 3 of 4 who are boys. Effectively, he does little other than play video games, and take the boys to their sporting events.
What is not mentioned is the baby boomer and predecessor generation inheritances supporting this behavior. Without significant inheritances from both sides, my cousin and her husband would not be able to make ends meet…
2shiny
I’d be curious what you all think of this short TED talk – ‘The Demise of Guys’. http://yourbrainonporn.com/philip-zimbardo-the-demise-of-guys-2011 It’s posted on the site of someone who was invited to respond to it, which Gary did two weeks ago at a TEDx event in Glasgow. I look fwd to seeing that one, too, as I have followed his and wife Marnia’s work for over a decade. They started a relationship support site some years ago about our brains on sex (brain chemistry as affected by orgasm) http://www.reuniting.info and soon saw that guys trying to recover from porn addiction were showing up in droves for the science. Now there are quickly multiplying chat rooms and blogs on this subject; some of the more active ones listed on this page: http://yourbrainonporn.com/site-porn-recovery-blogs
Can’t help but think this is all inter-related with the subject of this thread, and narcissism and other disorders in general. Maybe there is a thread or two on this site where this (our brains on sex) is the subject matter – I will look for it at some point.
Ox Drover
2shiny, I can’t look at the videos but yes, sex does release oxytocin which is the bonding hormone. Psychopaths apparently have fewer RECEPTORS for this hormone than “normal” people and thus it is there but it doesn’t effect them as much. So they can have sex but NOT bond, where their partner may BOND normally.
My personal opinion is that they somehow KNOW we are getting SOMETHING out of sex that they are not and they keep going to new partners to seek it but never find it. Since they have no bonding, they can not find this “elusive something” and are forever doomed to just finding new partners and seeking. Never finding.