• _number8_@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    i wonder if this is correlated with the loneliness increase / the loneliness gap. if you’re a guy, lonely, prone to depression, in a crumbling post-capitalist society that’s getting more malignant by the day…how much will to live can you have

    • EssentialCoffee@midwest.social
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      1 year ago

      Nah, the older men I know either won’t go to a doctor because they didn’t need them when they were younger, are scared of them, can man up through whatever pain they have, whatever. These are folks with Medicare, so at least access to doctors. These are all married men with kids. They don’t go until they’re literally forced to and by then, it’s already too late and they just die.

      • intensely_human@lemm.ee
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        1 year ago

        I won’t go to a doctor because my experience with doctors is they tell me I’m imagining it, refuse to order any tests, then send me a bill for hundreds of dollars for the privilege of hearing them gaslight me about my symptoms.

        I won’t open up emotionally to people for similar reasons: experience of it going wrong.

      • Corkyskog@sh.itjust.works
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        1 year ago

        Sounds all too familiar. I blame the pain pendulum swinging too far the other way. Doctors do a he’ll of a lot more then manage pain… but to a patient pain is usually the number one reason they are in front of the doctor. When the doctor will not even write the smallest script to alleviate their pain, or even worse accuses them of being a drug seeker either directly or with their indirect language (that we can all read through) men tend to give up. If you can’t even help me with the easiest part, or are going to become adversarial about it then what’s the point of going to the doctor? Obviously that question is rhetorical…

        They really need to loosen their grip on low level pain meds and really start diverting people into pain management programs when necessary. This opioid backlash has only hurt the general public. Pain doesn’t just disappear if you don’t treat it, this just leads more people into buying diverted scripts, becoming their own doctor and then eventually using fentanyl pills or just “heroin”.

        • lightnsfw@reddthat.com
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          1 year ago

          I don’t go to the doctor because even with insurance it’s too expensive. The whole billing system is complicated as fuck and makes it impossible to predict how much an appointment will cost. Then on top of that if you need more tests or specialists that’s a huge pain in the ass. My mom got to the point that managing my grandparents healthcare shit was basically a full time job. Nooo thanks I’ll just off myself if I get to that point.

          • Corkyskog@sh.itjust.works
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            1 year ago

            That’s a whole nother layer, and is also why I have a decade gap in my medical history. Then the doctors and nurse practitioners have the gall to gasp that I haven’t seen a doctor regularly in 10 years…

            One protip is if you don’t own anything, you can just let those bills go to the void of collections. Collections will run a hard game at first, just trying to recoup the 2% it paid for the debt. But after awhile they give up… can’t draw blood from a stone.

        • MajesticSloth@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          I think as men get older, we also tend to have less close friends than women. Or at least it sure seems to be that way for many. Saw it with my dad before we lost him last year. I see it with my brother and myself. It has brought me and my brother somewhat closer in that we text and talk more than we used to despite not living close and being pretty different personalizes.

          I have a few close friends, but not male ones. I had to stop working at a young age and I feel that is when I stopped having a connection to any sort of male bonding.

          But I agree, that it still seems unacceptable to open up, share feelings, and be vulnerable as a man. Probably why I have mostly had women as close friends most of my adult life.

        • intensely_human@lemm.ee
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          1 year ago

          So when my woman gets less attracted to me as a result of me opening up, that’s toxic masculinity at work?

      • cynar@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        Men and women seem to make friends differently. Men have more of a tendency to make friends through work. The change in work culture can cause these to collapse more easily. It’s particularly harsh at retirement. They not only lose their day-to-day reason to go on, but the friendship net that should help them.

        By comparison, women tend to make friends independently of work. This makes their friendships more tolerant to changing jobs, or leaving work. Women also seem to be better at maintaining friendships at a distance.

        Lastly, there is the (slightly controversial) glass floor. It’s the inverse of the glass ceiling. Both men and women have a bias to help women in distress over men. This makes it a lot more likely that someone will step in to help, before the downward spiral gets too deep. This is partially why men make up a large proportion of the homeless.

          • credit crazy@lemmy.world
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            1 year ago

            In terms of making friend stats I don’t know of any study’s but I do find it extremely believable from my life. My dad is probably the only man I know of to have a friend group and even then it’s just him and one other guy. Meanwhile I walk around and see women walking around exclusively in groups. I suppose it really doesn’t help that in the place I’m from socializing with coworkers is considered lazy and generally shushed.

      • ParsnipWitch@feddit.de
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        1 year ago

        It isn’t. When you look at studies they reveal that loneliness is very prevalent in multiple groups of people and in general. In some studies older women are the most lonely group.

        Gender and Age Differences in Loneliness: Evidence for People without and with Disabilities

        Gender Differences in Loneliness Over Time: A 15-Year Longitudinal Study of Men and Women in the Second Part of Life

        There is much activity by anti-feminists in particular to push the narrative that men are the most lonely group and that of course the reason are women. This is heavily pushed by media because people seemingly like that idea more than that gender stereotypes targeting men are potentially more at fault.

        • Katana314@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          I mean, gender stereotypes still tend to be sourced by a person. It makes sense the most stretched stereotypes would come from people that don’t actually fall into the demographic themselves. You wouldn’t hear Mexicans claim “Oy mijo, we are all so lazy!”

        • I_hate_you_welcome@feddit.nl
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          1 year ago

          Of course, because if men ever have it bad, it’s their own fault and of course women actually have it worse. And now you know why mortality for men is so high.

      • pahlimur@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        Women are better at expressing that are lonely. From what I understand it’s unclear who is more lonely because men don’t admit to being lonely. It’s probably more important to not argue about and just be aware that old people are often very lonely.

        • ParsnipWitch@feddit.de
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          1 year ago

          I agree. But I think to increase life expectancy in men it’s important to look into the diverse causes instead of letting the discussion being guided by anti-feminists who really do not seem to put men’s health and happiness first but rather their ideology.

          Harping on one potentially non-deciding factor and leaving those factors that are known to be important behind because they don’t fit their ideology is not helping men.

          • pahlimur@lemmy.world
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            1 year ago

            Yep and going around arguing that women are more lonely doesn’t add much to the discussion IMO. It’s not a competition and the output of dying younger is the primary fact we know about gender health differences.

            It is a complicated discussion with a lot more inputs than just loneliness though. The anti feminist angle is kind of strange, never thought much of it.

    • PsychedSy@sh.itjust.works
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      1 year ago

      I want to kill myself because I hate myself, not because of capitalism. This kind of doomer shit doesn’t fucking help anyone. The absolute hopeless outlook of people on social media is pathological at this point.

      You’re all loved. You’re valid. We’re not gonna let anyone murder you en masse. Things will get better. It might be slower than we’d like at times, but nobody has been able to stop progress yet.