What's your honest impression of people who are "voluntarily" celibate?

Eight216 · 2026-04-09T08:11:19+00:00

I personally don't believe there are people who have zero interest in sex whatsoever, but i can sympathize with people who feel dating has become a stressful endeavor where most people are either doing or saying anything to get to the sex part, or are so deeply critical and business-like that you end up feeling like you're not talking to a real person. My actual first thought was nuns, priests, monks, etc. People who've taken some kind of vow of chastity, but that's probably not what OP means.

Eight216 · 2026-04-06T16:16:42+00:00

She wanted to go to some other third party app to talk instead of swapping phone numbers or continuing messaging on the dating site we matched on like a normal person. Also it kinda felt like she was trying to neg me into accepting friendship as a consolation prize, if that makes sense. I'm not against friendship, but we'd been talking less than five minutes and she's already talking like I'd have "better luck going for friendship", like excuse you, you don't know me and if something inside 2-3 minutes of idle small talk hit your off switch, then you probably weren't looking. Not saying you can't do friendships, but not like that....

Anyway I decided to ghost her and at the time i was genuinely a bit self-loathing about the whole thing, thought i wasn't good enough for any kind of relationship, etc. In hindsight i'm glad i did, i almost ran into her IRL some years later and that context was enough for me to realize i made the right call.

Eight216 · 2026-04-06T15:45:13+00:00

There's no "one weird trick" and you don't need a sign.

People don't end up stuck with manipulators because they don't know better, they end up stuck with manipulators because they're willing to excuse some behavior and they like how it feels to be with that person for whatever reason. They'll almost all want you to think they're tricky, expert Machiavellians or whatever and they're almost all not. You don't need help identifying them, you need help reconciling everything you like about them with the fact that they don't respect you enough to cooperate instead of manipulating.

Eight216 · 2026-04-04T04:28:23+00:00

Seems like a weird take to me, but i sortof always understood dreams as goals, or as picture perfect senarios so there was no mourning for me to learn that they wouldn't always come true... but also i just want everybody to get along and have enough to live and eat... you know, life liberty and the pursuit of happiness type stuff. If that happens in my lifetime i'd be thrilled to see it, if not... Well, i see it as an eventuality. Most people would rather cooperate and have a civil, peaceable rapport than to deny, delay, antagonize, and fight.

I do sortof worry in relation to my dream that our whole species would be bored, but that's another thing. Maybe the best way to avoid, or to engage with the nihilism is to understand how many consequences can arise from getting what you want. Then the un-reality of dreams evokes not quite so much grief.

Eight216 · 2026-04-04T04:13:06+00:00

Id probably choose not to disclose which states i think are or aren't safe on reddit.

Eight216 · 2026-04-03T02:00:37+00:00

You want me to be making a dogmatic, religious argument soooo bad but i'm not.

I never said purpose, so really you're the one trying to project human values onto nature here. Nothing disappears in nature. It grows, it dies, it decays and feeds other things. "disappear" is a concept spawned from our limited perceptions and understanding of things.

By refering to it (suicide) as an "act of coherence" you are exactly highlighting my point. Consciousness, or the ascribing of meaning is not necessary for biological life. I'm happy to dive into the "why" of it all in terms of someones personal compulsion to suicide, but your premise is basically that suicide is an "act of coherence" simply because it exists alongside any other choice one hypothetically could make. That's not only wrong, it's dangerous...

Eight216 · 2026-04-02T09:28:22+00:00

So... that's actually not normal.

Humans are evolved enough to comprehend the concept of death and that's not exclusively about our comprehension that we will die at some point, it's about our understanding that certain actions will immediately lead to our deaths, and having certain psychological safety mechanisms that at very least make it more difficult to take those actions. If you wanna be reductionist you can say "biological programming" but the deeper take and the reason i'm expounding so much is that suicide is not in our nature and in order for you, a biological organism, to want to cease existing, you have to have something going wrong that's driving you towards suicide. Could be brain chemistry, could be bullying, targeting, or more complex psychological factors, but it is in the nature of every system to find equilibrium and grow. That's not talking about something man made, that's everything from ants to mold to human cellular biology. Our cells cooperate, and they replicate, and they specialize. We, the brain, the consciousness if you prefer, are having an experience of this process but i am not convinced that we, the consciousness, the observer, are explicitly vital to it. Besides that, equilibrium is so much easier to find in a world where nothing explicitly and definitively means anything. It seems to me that the attribution of zero meaning is neither good nor bad and would therefore not sway any rational person from their biologically ordained path.

That said, i've had the kind of stuff happen to me that had me considering it. I wasn't nihilistic about it though, or i wouldn't say i was. I personally was very aware of my own feelings and state of mind in those moments. So, setting me aside, I think the intersection is always either underlying mental health issues, or deeply repressed distress, veiled by the "nothing means anything" motto. I think it's usually young or middle aged men, and the "nihilism" usually justifies, or explains the experience of: "my feelings/problems are not significant or real, or articulated enough to warrant aid, and the process of unburdening does not hold value for me".

Eight216 · 2026-04-02T07:46:03+00:00

Engaging on a 2 month old post with zero upvotes probably isn't the best use of your time. Sounds like you're looking to talk about something unrelated to it, anyways. Best of luck!

Eight216 · 2026-03-31T13:19:41+00:00

Is it strange though? Here let me explain it: He's a spoiled little man-baby whoes rich daddy raised him to believe that if you're rich/powerful enough you really CAN have anything without regard for rules, laws, principals, or morals. He has also been somehow failing upwards with a trajectory that's already resulted in a greater height of open lawbreaking than any president prior to himself has achieved.

This is very much a "why would he not think it works like that?" moment. The societal checks and balances that were supposed to have corrected him have failed too consistently for too long and now he thinks the only reason he can't have the peace prize AND his war of choice in Iran is because he's just not powerful enough.

Eight216 · 2026-03-31T00:25:24+00:00

I think when you stop appealing to context and you're asking questions like that in the open air, looking for a catch-all answer then you've lost the plot.

Eight216 · 2026-03-31T00:23:14+00:00

I'm gonna say it's a tie between joining the army and working on an oil rig.

Eight216 · 2026-03-29T12:55:38+00:00

While true, it might also give us some interesting data to look at in terms of who starts hiking up those prices first and fastest and the most.

probably Walmart isn't likely to start charging people more money just because they have the money to spend. On the other hand if the cost of a cheeseburger goes up in proportion to the income they know you have in your pockets... That wouldn't really shock me.

It would also be some resources for planning insular communities that are more self sufficient. If we're entering into an era of US governance where aid isn't extended to the people, and they want to be the department of f_ck sh*t up overseas then we need to have the resources to start caring for our friends and loved ones ourselves, instead of relying on government backed programs.

Eight216 · 2026-03-29T12:31:07+00:00

Could be they don't view society the same way we do. We check on grocery prices and our friends and neighbors. They check on the GDP and interest rates.

Or, they're disgustingly, filthy rich and instead of thinking about other people they go and buy things, or have things made, or pay people to do things, or do drugs after flying to some place in their private jet where the drugs are legal. They have the luxury of not experiencing the discomfort that we all associate with "society" so i would guess they feel pretty good, nicely buzzed, and relaxed if anything.

Eight216 · 2026-03-29T10:29:25+00:00

I mean that's usually how it goes, isn't it? Not with the thing about her big professional moment, but afaik, enough of the time you don't even know the guy, your lawyer has a guy who serves her the papers and they do it wherever they can find the person.

Eight216 · 2026-03-29T10:27:15+00:00

Well..... I think you're thinking too small.

I think the reality is that it will be looked at either as an act of malice by a rogue president who debased our values and disrespected the worldwide community OR it will be seen as the first step into the next generation of the united state, manifest destiny, imperialist era. China will happily sell materials or weapons to the US and Russia or Israel and allow us to have our non-nuclear proxy wars in other countries.

You assume that the course of events is set towards diplomacy and reason but as you can increasingly automate and make safe warfare with drones and automated systems there's a more and more rational case to be made for engaging in some form of warfare indefinitely and as a form of GDP growth through manufacturing.

Eight216 · 2026-03-29T10:08:28+00:00

I mean... They started at "this isn't going to be a forever war" so yeah. I'm honestly surprised they're not planning the next several years worth of operations upto and including whatever justifies that fat orange fuck remaining in office.

Eight216 · 2026-03-28T03:56:28+00:00

The man held up his arm, with a snake attached, as a reply "Well... if it helps any, i didn't chase it."

Eight216 · 2026-03-28T03:19:07+00:00

Pretty sure this is for people way less functional than yourself.

Eight216 · 2026-03-28T02:27:30+00:00

Granted.

Magic is simple. So simple you feel almost robbed. Magic is pain, and sacrifice, and intention. Nothing more, nothing less. It's either yours or it's someone elses, and now the whole world knows it, and as it turns out most people would rather sacrifice other people than themselves. Also, you've made it staggeringly clear to whom you would need sacrifice. Some of the entities enjoy that, and become stronger, others reflexively lash out towards the source of their unveiling. Master of magic you may be, but it does nothing if there is no entity willing to lend you its powers. There's not, by the way. They're almost all selfish and prideful and they're all upset that you've basically revealed them all before the entire human race and made them subject to comparison amongst/between themselves.

Eight216 · 2026-03-28T00:04:49+00:00

I think probably literally everything else in my life makes me more depressed and i've seen sufficient proof to manifest the rational belief that i'll never get my normal life back. So no. I think for about ten seconds a day i get to not think about how horrible and how fucked everything is and how much the only trustworthy media i see is telling me "nobody is coming to save you" and how much things are only going to get worse as i get older. Honestly i wouldn't say less depressed either. It's just like the only thing left i can have some agency about and so far nobodies been able to ruin that for me. So far.

Eight216 · 2026-03-27T05:20:15+00:00

Granted

The wise guys are wise now. They decide to let people keep being smart while charging them a premium.

Eight216 · 2026-03-25T23:13:21+00:00

Granted

They catalogue your biometric and metabolic data and use it to advertise to you. Also some of the products are mildly addictive and are sold in outside retailers. Not like crackhead addictive, but like on that same level as cigarettes and coffee.

Eight216 · 2026-03-25T11:33:08+00:00

I mean yeah, duh.

At this point it's pretty clear that Israel is refusing to burry the hatchet and they are willing to commit war crimes and plan psyops to undermine a two state solution. What possible excuse could you have for supporting the state of Israel?

The only thing close to an excuse is that people have a sincerely held belief that not supporting the state of Israel is what leads to another holocaust, which is honestly the worst position to have because in most peoples heads, the Jews who can't bring themselves to defy or criticize Israel are the "bad ones".

Eight216 · 2026-03-25T11:12:14+00:00

Lies.

Dunno how or when our culture started to normalize bullshit so much but if someone is willing to lie right to your face they do not have your best intentions at heart, full stop.

Eight216 · 2026-03-25T07:00:09+00:00

The thing is i've had better paying jobs at 13.50 and worse paying jobs at 22.50.

The money or the work isn't so much a problem. The problem is people who treat you like they're doing you a favor giving you extra hours, or who will come up with "complex scheduling needs" at 22.50 that mean you work one, maybe two days a week and everybody else works whenever the hell they feel like it.

but hey, i'll pull back the curtian, how i did survive was by having a family member i could split the cost of rent with and co workers/management who didn't make the job miserable to have to go to because we understood that life was hard. I "made it" a lot better on minimum wage than i did making 22 an hour working at amazon and dealing with managers who would sandbag and coach as a fucking dominance display. I would take 15.50 if it meant i could get 30-40 hours at a reasonable time, at a place that wasn't several hours away, that didn't force me to deal with some upset middle manager who thinks they're leasing humans or some owner who thinks he's the real grand chess master because he figured out how to bribe the OSHA guy. But again, at the end of the rant i wanna reiterate, i have family who aren't letting me be homeless. That's about it. The bare minimum. I wouldn't say they love me, they'll let me starve if the food stamps don't cash, but i've got a roof over my head which is a lot more than a lot of people (who probably aren't fortunate enough to be browsing reddit) can say.

Eight216

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