Technology

I mean, to a certain degree this is broadly true.

Like we have the numbers, younger generations are waaaay less likely to have had a relationship or sexual encounter by the same age/stage in their life as compared to previous generations, way more people just are relationship inexperienced.

This goes for both genders/sexes, though it is more prominent with younger men than women.

The overwhelming problem is that in the US, so much in person socialization is expensive, basically pay-gated, paywalled.

There are very few third places you can just hang out at for no cost. Public transit sucks or is non existant, cars are super unaffordable due to collapsing economy, and all our cities are designed for using cars to drive from place to place... so very few places are actually walk-navigable...

Everyone is increasingly overweight and overworked (or over homeworked, for students) and overstressed, so they can't or don't engage in group meet up hobbies or sports as much as they used to... and ironically even religiosity levels overall trending down means less people are going to church... all the traditional methods of getting socialization and expanding out a friend network in real life are withering.

So, the easier path is to get your socialization, of all kinds, primarily digitally.

But all those most common and popular ways of doing that are also massively manipulative with algos intentionally feeding you whatever ragebait slop appeals to you, personally.

It is very ironic that, as basically a 90s kid myself, very early tech adopter... my view of the vast majority of social media now is that it is basically a mentally harmful and addictive drug that people need to detox from... but when I tell younger people that, they say things like 'its not that deep bro, everybody has a (whatever) profile'.

There are lots of studies that show that very common levels of social media app usage... do actually reduce attention spans, spread dangerous misinformation, lower academic performance, cause negative self esteem by way of unrealistic standards, of beauty, lifestyle, wealth... brainrot is real, basically.

Like, I am all for the TikTok ban for kids. But also ban all short form video content for kids. Instagram, Youtube shorts, whatever.

This shit is melting peoples brains, it needs to be treated the same way you'd treat a drug epidemic.

We are now at the point where kids give so little of a fuck, have such tiny attention spans and need for constant, rapid fire stimulation... that half of adult Americans read below a 6th grade level, 20-30% of them read below a 2nd grade level, making them functionally illiterate... and thats just with Gen Z now mostly being in those young adult numbers, its gonna be even worse when Gen Alpha graduates and starts trying to enter society/the workforce.

EDIT:

This isn't even broadly unprecedented.

Look at Japan.

Hikkikomori.

The stagnant economy becomes overly financialized and corporatized and impossibly demanding... so people just drop out of it, or worse, kill themselves from the stress of trying to live up to its expectations...

And well then yeah, in person socializing broadly drops, relationship dynamics become strained and morph, birth rate plummets.

Give it 5 or 10 years and we'll have something resembling rent a boyfriend/girlfriend services and maid / stud cafes as well, as the stereotypified fascimile of socialization and having a real relstionship becomes a marketable product, and then industry.

Maybe a few areas will even properly legalize and regulate prostitution.

Granted, that'll be in any areas that remain even kind of blue.

The red areas will just go full theocrat and send you to jail for masturbating, but also re-legalize child marriage, and rework marriage laws into 'covenant marriage', where basically the woman functionally cannot divorce the husband.

In summary: cyberpunk hypercapitalism is in fact very very bad for healthy human relationship dynamics.