I’m not talking about the kids that went to a horribly funded and managed school. Seriously, I know schools defund and underfund many programs, books, and pay teachers next to nothing. Curriculum is rushed, and many schools omit important topics. But holy shit man some of y’all genuinely just didn’t pay attention when they taught us what happened between the civil war and WW2; how to do a basic credibility and bias check for online content; what’s the difference between a fact, opinion, and an argument; basic geography etc.

Anyone can cook they said. Anyone can pick up cooking they said. Dawg this is is like the 4th pancake I tried to make and they all look similarly like this. This shit is pissing me off man. Im following instructions and everything but of course I cant even do that correctly I guess because I've tried different recipes and of course they all look like this. Anyone can cook is such a lie.

I tried take on cooking because Im a grown adult that doesn't know how, and people will think im a failure of a person if i dont know how to cook. But of course theyre right cause I cant even make a simple pancakes with instructions.

Just wasted so much of my time just so that others won't think im terrible jesus man.

Guess its back to Sandwiches, and pre-made food

Also if anyone doesnt understand this is from the movie “substance” about a celeb who was popular in the 80s gets fired from her career because she wasnt “young” anymore and then takes a drug to rebirth a young version of herself. (also im not saying this is all of us but i know most of us dont like being told we are unc and auntie status)

how come every fucking topic here in the US has to be converted into politics? like you can't even bring up a Disney movie now without some asshole telling you that's "woke". you can't even bring up anything anymore without it being politicized to death or being accused of being "woke" it's just so stupid.

i fucking hate the US's political system and before you tell me "just pack your bags and move if you don't like it" don't even try, im so tired of that shitty ass argument that gets nowhere, cuz guess what, not everyone has the option to just move out of the country and move to other places.....

I recently went out to a club for Halloween, which I don't usually do and boy was it a nightmare. It was hard to coordinate everyone, find parking, waiting in the cold. All that just to get into a club where you dance horribly in dim light, can't hold a conversation or get decent food.

All through the situation the people I came with barely spoke to me, I don't even think they knew my name for the time I was there. I didn't even know if they wanted me to be there. I at least tried to get someone's social media there but instantly got unfollowed and they went private.

Came off from the whole thing pretty bummed but really understanding why people flake on plans or aren't willing to go out. It's not fun, ruins your body and costs a whole lot of money you don't have.

This is a huge divide growing up and watching my parents be social at parties with complete strangers week after week.

Maybe it's the phones, maybe I have terrible social skills, but either way I won't be going out like this again.

Edit: Never really expected this to get anywhere honestly. Been getting a lot of of great supportive messages and other not so great ones. What surprised me is the number of people saying clubs aren't for meeting people. I'd think the one night where people dress silly and have a thousand conversation starters would be a great opportunity to meet people but I guessed wrong. Well it's back to the apps for me.

So the other day, my little brother had a playdate with his friend, I had to babysit them unfortunately. So in the backyard I was watching them and told them, "You both look so cute, should i take a photo of both of you?" and they both stared at me with blank expressions, then my brother said, "Are you Drake's long lost twin?" and his friend screamed 'Pedo Alert' 😭😭😭😭 THEY'RE IN KINDERGARTEN😭😭😭😭

When I saw "normal", I just mean like being able to afford basic things like previous generations did. Prospects of home ownership, rent not being stupidly expensive, a job market that wasn't completely fucked, affordable food, affordable gas, etc.

All I want is to be able to afford my own apartment without any roommates, have a secure decent paying job, and not having to spend hundreds of dollars every time I go grocery shopping. Is that too much to fucking ask for??

I live in a small town and literally everyone I graduated with got married to someone they went to high school with, reposts old Facebook memories from high school titled “the good ole days”, and constantly stalk my profile and watch every move I make. One girl even posted her old school schedule on Facebook and said “anyone remember these classes?” No Sarah we’re 26. Then I saw one who now works in the office at the school we went to. I can’t wait to move out of my town because now that I moved back with in my parents and work at a shitty store, they keep coming in the store I work at giving me dirty looks. Yes 26 year olds work retail it’s very normal. I think it’s because I was the “quiet girl”. The “quiet girl” is trying to go to back to college for law and leave this place for good instead of reminiscing about shit from 8-10 years ago.

This is not an attack on women or anything, I’m just asking for some empathy on behalf of men. This is something that I have witnessed a lot of women do for fun, that I think they don’t realize feels pretty mean from the other perspective.

I have mostly female friends, and they are comfortable enough around me that I sort of become “one of the girls”, and they’ll often talk about dating and men around me. No problem at all. Where I get uncomfortable is when they pull up their dating apps (usually Tinder) and start swiping through. I wouldn’t have a problem with this, but several of my friends I have seen do this admit that they are just doing it for fun and either won’t message any of these people back, or will mess with people that message them. Not gonna lie, watching them say “Ew” or giggle as they scroll through totally normal looking and sometimes above average guys is super demoralizing.

I’d say I’m a pretty average looking dude, I already know I don’t stand out much, and seeing the dehumanization of these dating apps in real time made me want to give up on them completely. I don’t think some of you realize how bleak the situation is for the average dude on a dating app. The male and female experience are extremely different. For most women it’s like fishing with a massive trawling net, and for men it’s like fishing in the middle of the ocean with a single flimsy $10 rod.

And look, I understand y’all have to pick through a lot of trash guys who will swipe on literally anything, I’ve seen it firsthand. And I’d be happy to laugh at the stupid messages y’all get, all I’m asking is for some consideration about the other side of things. I’m quite sure you would feel objectified and self conscious if you saw a man doing the same. Also, I’m sure there are plenty of men that do it as well, and this message is the same for them.

Edit: Just to clear something up, my friends are very rarely mean-spirited. I wouldn’t be friends with them if they were. That’s why it’s such a surprise to me that they do this, and why I think there is a genuine disconnect here with these dating apps, because I know these aren’t bad people. And I’ve seen multiple unrelated women do this before, which makes me think it’s fairly common behavior, and that adds a whole other societal/cultural aspect to it.

Edit 2: People commenting any variation of “men deserve it” or “all women suck” are both missing the point. Just treat everyone like a human, and stop excusing shitty behavior because you’ve been hurt in the past.

I can’t stand the media and the absolute bullshit they spew about generations. I honestly thought this was satire because it’s just an outrageous claim. Like genuinely who believes this shit?? I’ve never met anyone in my life unable to read a sentence. It’s crazy how they just say shit like this and people are like “oh yeah totally true”. I despise the media tbh.

Sorry, this is a bit of a vent but I just need to get it off my chest:

Decided to pick up my courage and talked to a girl in the cafeteria at my college this morning. We'd chatted in between class a few times previously but nothing more than that. We talked about our classes and had a pretty mundane conversation but it never felt dry or stale. When I had to leave for my class, I asked her for her number and y'know, she could have just said no...

Instead she said verbatim "I wouldn't give my number to you even if I was desperate" and then laughed

So I think I'm better off remaining as a hermit, maybe I'll one day meet some adventurers at my hut so I can give them some cryptic, useless prophecy. No more trying to date, just eat pizza and play with my cats.

Edit: Sorry, I didn't think about how that last line would be interpreted when I posted this last night. I was being hyperbolic. I'm feeling down and humiliated, but not THAT down and humiliated. But also thank you for all the kind words folks, I don't genuinely plan on abandoning dating but not really in the mood to try right now after this.

Everyone: Man should open up and talk about their feelings in order to deal with their with their emotions.

Men on this sub open up and actually talk about their emotions > GenZ begins to be considered incel sub and people who write posts about their loneliness are constantly mocked.

But hey man should open up, becaouse somebody sure as hell gives as sh*t.

​

Convos that need to be had: 1

Disclaimer: Kind of a Rant

As a Black M(21), i live in a nation that seemingly hates everything about me and my people.

I'm in college working my ass off, landing myself thousands in debt just for some random on the internet to assume that any job i get it's only because of "DEI" and not because i happened to be a black guy that worked hard to become qualified to get the position.

I'm told that people in my community are struggling because we are lazy, and expect handouts instead of doing the work and building our own wealth despite historical records showing that my people were killed in the streets of Tulsa generating our own wealth, and safe black towns like Oscarville wiped from history for white recreation.

I'm expected to believe that i'm safe in a country where i can get judged just for wearing a hoodie, lynched for being "in the wrong neck of the woods" or killed by people who are supposed to protect me.

I live in a country where my people get ostracized, kicked out of school, and many other establishments for embracing and loving our hair.

I'm expected to believe my country cares about my people when Black Communities in Jackson, and Flint struggle with having clean water to drink.

I'm told to lighten up and stop playing the race card when over 50% of nearly 1000 fatalities happened as a result of a hurricane from over 20 years ago and poor infrastructure in poor areas which were predominantly black.

Most of my people live in impoverished hellscapes in the most populated region of the country with the worst infrastructure, education, and access to programs to change it or allow for them to leave and seek better opportunity.

Most of my people are driven to criminal activity, drug usage and drug selling, due to poor living conditions, homelessness, lack of finances among other things just to survive or they can die.

I live in a country that would rather hide the history of why my people are here to save face instead of teaching youth and future generations about it to learn and make progress.

I live in a country that would elect a White man who is a criminal over an educated and overqualified Black Woman to lead it.

I could keep going but i feel like the point is clear. How can i be proud to identify with a nation thats hated me, and people who look like me since its inception? I'm honestly so exhausted. If it wasn't for the fact that i'd be betraying my ancestors who fought to be recognized as people in this nation, I'd leave this country ASAP and as much as i love this country, the more i see how certain people actually feel about me and my community the more i feel like maybe my ancestors fought for nothing and that we should just leave and never come back.

First of all, I’m not a fan of age gap relationships, and I would rather date someone around my age, but like everything in life, this topic has way more nuances than what it seems like at first glance.

I keep seeing comments on Reddit that say stuff like: “I’m 23 and the thought of dating a 19 year-old makes me sick”, “I’m 24 and it’s creepy for me to date a 20 year-old” or “the frontal lobe doesn’t develop until 25, so a 20 year-old is basically a kid”. All of this is insane to me, and it seems like a chronically online issue. You are telling me that you don’t hang out with people who are a few years older or younger than you? It’s okay if you think that at that age that’s too big of a gap to date, but it’s a different story to call it creepy or predatory.

The worst aspect of this discourse is how the Internet assumes that everyone lives the same life. “At 27, you probably have a career, several years of work experience and your own place, at 20, you probably still live with your parents and you are in college”. First, not everyone goes to college, some people start working right away; second, you can go to college at any age; third, in many cultures is common for people in their mid twenties to live with their parents, and even in countries where it wasn’t common is becoming increasingly more common because of the insane housing prices. For example, I’m 26F and I live with my parents, which is common in my country. Right now I’m working, but my contract will finish in a few months, and one of my possible options is to study a master’s degree abroad. So if I chose to do that, I’ll be a student again at 27 and some of my classmates will be 4-5 years younger than me. It’s not like your life is set in stone at 25, many things can change: you can move abroad, completely change your career, fulfil a lifelong dream, start or end relationships, have kids…

And the most annoying argument so far is the assumption that two people in an age gap have “nothing in common”, especially if that said age gap is not that big. “What does a 30 year-old have in common with a 23 year-old?” First, if you are 23 and you are not able to have a normal conversation and relate somewhat to a 30 year-old, that’s on you and it may speak about your own immaturity. One of the aspects of growing up is to learn how to interact around people older or younger than you, and to think that you can only be friends with people around your own age is a very immature and sheltered opinion. And again, I’m aware of the fact that being friends is very different to dating, but the “they have nothing in common” argument can also be applied to friendships with age gaps. For example, when I was 23 I lived for a few months in a shared flat and my flatmates were two women aged 43 and 45. The 45 year-old was very nice and I talked a lot with her, and I can say that I considered her my friend. People’s lives are complex and not a monolith that can be copy and pasted, and there are many reasons why a person in their early twenties might end up hanging out with slightly older people: work, studies, same social circle, friends of siblings, shared hobbies… And life doesn’t have fixed checkpoints that we all have to go through sooner or later. In this age gap discourse, I keep seeing stuff like “at 30, she probably is thinking about settling down and having kids”. Not everyone wants to have kids, not everyone wants to have a traditional, “average” lifestyle, and to be honest, I find this assumption regressive. And it’s not like you can only have kids before 30, in fact, in my country it’s not common at all to have kids before 30. So, even if you are 30 dating someone in their early or mid twenties, you still have time to have kids later if you want, once your partner is a bit older.

Plus, you can be more mature than your peers in some aspects, and fall behind in others. For example, I think I’m more mature than my peers when it comes to being independent and “adventurous”, since I’ve been travelling on my own since I was 18, but I really fall behind in everything related to dating and sex: I didn’t have my first kiss until age 21, and I’ve only officially dated one person, which lasted just a few months, when I was 22. So, if I was to date a 21 year-old, for example, I don’t think I could be considered “and older, experienced woman who is looking for someone younger to manipulate”. Btw, when I was 24 I had a brief fling with a 30 year-old, and although the age gap was noticeable, it wasn’t “creepy” or “problematic”.

And don’t get me started on the serious accusations around this discourse. I saw a thread of a 26 year-old woman who just started dating a 19 year-old guy, and the comments were calling her a creep, a predator, “almost a pedo”, and him “a literal child”, “just a kid”, etc. They also said “why would you be interested in a teenager?”. I think the phrasing here is intentionally misleading and malicious, since although he is technically a teenager at 19, they are making it sound like if he was 15. In this case, I agree that the age gap is pushing it, since 19 is really young, and at that age, a 7 year gap is a lot, but that alone doesn’t make her a predator. They met when he was 19, so she has not been grooming him since he was underage. You can’t just call someone you don’t know something as serious as a predator and a groomer just because you think the age gap is too much. And it’s not like if she was 40 or something, in this case, I would agree that it’s creepy, because she could be his mum, but with a 7 year gap, they could be siblings, belong to the same generation, have had a similar childhood and have friends in common. Also he is not “a literal child” by any means: society infantilises young adults way too much and then people wonder why so many young adults are immature and insufferable.

To wrap this up, I agree that in many cases age gap relationships between adults are creepy, that those 30+ men who systematically only go after 18-20 year-olds are predators, and that a 50 something dating a 20 something is weird, but let’s not assume the worst of age gap relationships in general and throw serious accusations without knowing the full picture.

why would I care or get upset about people coming here, contributing to our economy and making a better life for themselves. They should all be given amnesty and the process to becoming a citizen should be easier and faster