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Psychologist: Porn and Video Game Addiction Are Leading To 'Masculinity Crisis'
HughPickens.com writes: Philip Zimbardo is a prominent psychologist from Stanford, most notable for leading the notorious Stanford prison experiment. He has published new research findings based on the lives of 20,000 young men, and his conclusion is stark: there is a developing "masculinity crisis" caused by addiction to video games and pornography. "Our focus is on young men who play video games to excess, and do it in social isolation — they are alone in their room," says Zimbardo. "It begins to change brain function. It begins to change the reward center of the brain, and produces a kind of excitement and addiction. What I'm saying is — boys' brains are becoming digitally rewired."
As an example, Zimbardo uses this quote from one young man: "When I'm in class, I'll wish I was playing World of Warcraft. When I'm with a girl, I'll wish I was watching pornography, because I'll never get rejected." Zimbardo doesn't think there's a specific time threshold at which playing video games goes from being acceptable to excessive. He says it varies by individual, and is more based on a "psychological change in mindset." To fight the problem, he suggest families need to track how much time is being spent on video games compared to other activities. "He also called for better sex education in schools — which should focus not only on biology and safety, but also on emotions, physical contact and romantic relationships."
As an example, Zimbardo uses this quote from one young man: "When I'm in class, I'll wish I was playing World of Warcraft. When I'm with a girl, I'll wish I was watching pornography, because I'll never get rejected." Zimbardo doesn't think there's a specific time threshold at which playing video games goes from being acceptable to excessive. He says it varies by individual, and is more based on a "psychological change in mindset." To fight the problem, he suggest families need to track how much time is being spent on video games compared to other activities. "He also called for better sex education in schools — which should focus not only on biology and safety, but also on emotions, physical contact and romantic relationships."
Yes. Being male is a pathology. We need medicating to stop us engaging in these detestable, quite normal male behaviours.
It has to be said though, WoW is addictive. People moan when someone tries to help women with their problems, and here is one that mainly affects men do let's try and deal with it.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
On OkCupid, every woman of even average looks under 40 is a rock star receiving dozens of solicitations a day, and subtle and not so subtle offers of cock come through her text messaging apps at all hours of the day and night. It's a new game out there, and for some men who have physical or social difficulties, relationships will now be an endless uphill struggle for limited reward. It may be better for them just to not compete.
It's pussification of society. The feminist movements and PC movements have gone too far and young guys don't know any better.
We need more, real, male role models who openly don't give a fuck about social acceptance. Not faggy pussy role models.
Society needs to go back to how things were in the 1950s.
Bullying is a part of life.
We can drop all these "shaming" terms. You look like a fat fuck and it is your problem, not mine.
Haters can suck it because you know I'm right.
Porn doesn't invent tests to see if you really love them. Porn doesn't create drama. Porn doesn't leave dirty dishes in the sink. Porn is whatever you want it to be. You want a blonde with big tits today and a redhead with little tits tomorrow? No problem.
The birth control pill created the sexual revolution by liberating women from the need to hitch themselves to a man to care for them and their child. Now instant access to vast libraries or pornography is liberating men from the need to hitch themselves to a woman for sexual satisfaction. The main difference is that when women were "liberated" from men it was called progress, but when men are liberated from women it is labeled a mental defect.
I think the masculinity crisis might be in this guys pants. I mean shit, insert replace WoW with golf, and porn with expensive prostitute, and you have the macho alpha bro shark that is supposed to be the goal of the man.
They have it backwards.
The masculinity crisis leads to porn and video game addiction.
"When I'm in class, I'll wish I was playing World of Warcraft."
So would it be better if he said "When I'm in class, I wish I was playing baseball" or "fishing" or "out working on my car"?
Being a 47-year old man myself, I'm not so old that I can't remember that wishing I wasn't doing whatever crappy thing I had to be doing isn't pretty much the ground-state of any adolescent.
"When I'm with a girl, I'll wish I was watching pornography, because I'll never get rejected."
Meh, I think porn is a symptom, not the cause. I'd say what he's observing is a thing, but is a transient result of a (historically) momentary discontinuity between sexualism and sexual availability.
We live in a society where womens' sexualization is complete: it's a (pardon the term) naked commodity, and in which its use as a lever for commercial exploitation is constant. The primal urge for sex in young men is, I suspect, unchanged from history, yet now they're like starving men walking down a street of bakeries, candy shops, and restaurants all taunting them with what they want. At the same time, REAL women (as opposed to the ones flaunting themselves for commercial gain - you don't think those girls in the Axe commercial are doing that because they really feel that way, do you?) are more empowered than ever to demand a level of respect and consideration in the relationship making the sexual negotiation ever more complex for a stupid, single-minded, priapistically-driven young man. Porn and masturbation are the only sexuality he can control, is it any wonder that sometimes he wishes it was as simple as the movies make it seem?
It's the old conundrum between offense and defense. At this time, one side has all the advantages, is it any wonder that sometimes the other side doesn't want to play as much?
-Styopa
"Phillip Zimbardo says his study into the lives of 20,000 young men and their relationships with video games and pornography demonstrates that this relatively new phenomenon is affecting the minds of young men. " I see no links to a scientific publication nor any in the independent link. Where is this apparent study actually published? Instead we just seem to have a book for a popular audience.
since it isn't a hereditary trait in the first place.
You are saying there's no hereditary trait that influences brain development and addiction levels to games and porn ?
This isn't insightful, it's the opposite in fact. That's one selected quote from summary. I know it's not fashionable to RTFA or the study itself but trying to criticise it based on that one line is beyond ridiculous.
Obviously it's part of a wider pattern of behaviour, selected (badly) to illustrate it.
Slashdot used to provide insight. Now people who knee-jerk react to one line in the summary get modded up. I think the lower readership now has made the race to comment first worse as the period where stuff gets modded much is shorter.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
Then you're dating the wrong women. My wife isn't that way. She doesn't have a real diamond engagement ring (and she know it - she'd have killed me for spending $ 2+K on a ring.)
Ditto here. Married 13 years now with a $100 cubic zirconia ring.
Date a shallow woman, Get a shallow woman. Date an interesting woman, Get an interesting woman.
You forgot the most important bit: be an interesting man, be able to date an interesting woman.
If your life revolves around video games, by definition you're a shallow person. I might be interested in a brief conversation with a person about the latest games, but if that's the extent of your interests then it's going to be a short conversation. Mix porn into the conversation, and I'm looking for a fast out.
Wish I could mod this up. But it's falling on fallow ground here. Most of the commenters will reject it because they approach interactions with the opposite gender with a negative bias. The notion of a loving relationship with another person is just beyond their ability to comprehend.
Easy Online Role Playing Campaign Management
>Actually, the golden rule is, 'Treat others the way you would want to be treated yourself'.
If you think the average hormonal teenager would have any problem with a horde of women drooling all over him, you are completely out of your mind. What the hell is your point?
In fact, the asymmetry in reproductive drive is the core of the whole goddamned problem.
Wrong. Women would rather share a high-ranking male than lower their standards to a lower-ranking one. Which is why through human history the majority of men didn't reproduce.
captcha: stroke, looool
In particular with regards to gender roles.
So, time was women were for making babies and raising said babies. Men were for protecting and providing for the women. That was the roles society prescribed and there wasn't a lot of deviation from it. You did see outliers that didn't conform, but by and large that's how things were basically due to necessity. You notice many animals follow a similar structure. It is what is needed for the survival of the species.
Well that all changed, of course. We now have the problem of too many humans, not too few. Also many of the household tasks that used to take a ton of time are now automated (try washing clothes by hand, it is a full time job almost). So society changed. Women didn't need to place their worth in their offspring anymore. They could choose to be what the wanted, do what they wanted, and still be valuable. It wasn't about popping out babies.
Well, this is the other side of that: Men's value now no longer needs to be in providing for a family. They can have a family, or not, they work, they can stay at home, etc, etc. For some men, that means staying single.
However, some people, like this dude, have a problem with that. They think that men should be required to be providers to be considered "real men", should be required to fill a particular role in society.
Isn't that what this really boils down, not some bullshit about masculinity? Women watch soap operas because it's more exciting than their boring life, men play video games so we can be greater than the insignificant little peons that we are. And in porn the most beautiful women will perform for you even if you're fatter than the marshmallow man and uglier than a troll. We have immersive enough solutions that the body is fooled to play out almost all its chemical registry with endorphin, adrenaline, dopamine and so on letting you fake all the excitement and rewards as you slay imaginary dragons.
The problem is that it's addictive and desensitizing, if you're on a constant rush of awards and achievements and level-ups and whatnot then real life is a real downer. Not entirely unlike how I hear people on drugs describe coming off their high or how fat people act when they come off a sugar rush. So through a combination of actual reality check, batting outside your league because of failed self-perception and being poor at handling disinterest or rejection the result is often a painful face-plant. Once bitten, twice shy so you rather watch porn and play video games than try again.
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
Seems that's what a lot of men are doing and it results in people like Zimbardo going "Hey, you're not allowed to just be single!"
While the guys with Neanderthal brains are out at bars trying to get laid, I'm living a comfortable, safe, and happy life. While they're getting exposed to STDs, drugs, accidental pregnancies, rough divorce settlements, paying child support, spouse abuse (either as the perpetrator or the victim), defaulting on their home because their spouse talked them into living above their means, etc. etc. etc..... I am living in a small single-bed apartment alone, making good money, playing video games (mostly MMOs) for social interaction, and listening to music to tame my biological cravings.
Not to mention, my choice not to reproduce helps the population problem -- at least in the span of a few decades, if not the long term. There is not a single problem that humankind has that can be solved by making more people. In fact, making more people does exactly the opposite for nearly all of our problems; it makes them more severe and reduces the length of time we have until those problems erupt into global catastrophes.
I don't *want or need* a woman. I don't *want or need* a romantic relationship with anyone. I don't want kids. I don't want any of the associated problems that come with either. It's been completely wired out of me.
I am basically an exact description of the type of person the study was about. And yet, I am not unhappy; I am not unsuccessful; I am not a loser. I am an environmentally-conscious, socially-reponsible citizen, supporter of my community, dedicated employee, educated voter and participant in the political process, and I have my fair share of social interaction, too, on the order of 6 to 8 hours per day on MMOs. Just because I don't touch the people I socialize with doesn't somehow make me diseased. I am a very social person. I am "socially intelligent". I can pick up on body language cues, implied meaning in conversation, the intent behind vocal intonation, the significance of a touch. I deal with people in meatspace for eight hours a day, and people in virtual space for another 6 to 8.
Medicine and academia has a tendency to call anything abnormal a disease, or a problem to be solved. Sometimes change is for the better. Sometimes the status quo is the worse of the two worlds.
In short: I would prefer to continue to be who I am, in the situaton I am in, rather than be the epitome of "masculinity" as this researcher thinks I need to be, even if I had the means to become that. And quite honestly, I'm pretty sure I do have the means to become that, if I put my mind to it. I don't put my mind to it because *it's not how I want to live my life.* Who the fuck is Philip Zimbardo to tell me that my life choices are wrong, especially when, by all the objective measurements that his ilk thrive on, I am of a far greater net benefit to society than many of the so-called "masculine" men he thinks I should be?
As a father of two young girls, I'm rather conflicted.
Anyone has to admit that for most of recorded human history, women have been suppressed (as they continue to be in many parts of the world). At the moment, women are occasionally getting the upper-hand, and not always because of merit. What men are seeing now is how it feels to be the under-served, and men don't like it.
Someday we can hope the world will become a true meritocracy where people are only judged on their actions and merits, and the pendulum will stop swinging. Until then men are going to be eating the shit sandwich we've been serving for quite a while. That may be great for my girls, but not necessarily for me.
"Who are you?" "No one of consequence." "I must know." "Get used to disappointment."
Are you saying men haven't suffered any pain at any point? Forced conscription for one. I recommend The Myth of Male Power for the other side of the feminist "men as oppressors" narrative.
You're making interesting points. I'm not saying it's fair play, but it is what is happening.
It drives me nuts that in the eyes of extremists all men are assumed to be a potential child molesters if they were to hug a child that's not their own, we are all assumed potential rapists, and we are all evil oppressors of women.
What got us this way is that some very few men were, and now all of us are paying the price for it.
Re your second point. What I wonder is how much of it is related to parenting. Are the parents of the disinterested young men letting the games babysit for them instead of them interacting with them? I know kids are stubborn, but if you take away the game and force them to play, they will eventually do it. Parents need to show them the media stories are exaggerated, life is not inherently stacked against them, and that having meaningful relationships is healthy.
A lot of what you mentioned in your last paragraph is spot on, and I worry about that. I'd love for my girls to have a career and family too, my wife and I started in our mid-30s and while I don't think either of us settled, waiting could have led us to do so. The problems now and in the future will be different than what they were then, hopefully they won't be getting fondled at work for a chance at a promotion.
"Who are you?" "No one of consequence." "I must know." "Get used to disappointment."
From the studies I've seen, most men are financially as well off within 2 years of divorce as they were before, whereas most women at significantly behind where they were for a decade or more after divorce - and that's after getting the house and the kids.
Most 'stay-at-home-moms' have no retirement savings, they aren't qualified for well paying jobs, they still have the upkeep on the house and kids to cover, the support payments men complain about so often generally don't cover 100% of those costs (I'm not saying it should).
People don't get divorced for the fun of it and it is extremely rarely for financial gain. Sure, we see the odd story of some super wealthy guy who marries a gold digger who takes him for millions - but that's not the norm.
That's like people who think teenagers get pregnant for the increase in benefit payments - the costs generally exceed any increase in welfare payment - it's not a profit making option.
Marriage should be like a tattoo - don't get one unless you plan to keep it forever. But if you really need to, there should be an option for getting rid of it. It's better than going through the rest of your days miserable.
Sara
Designer, Gamer, Macgrrl in an XP World