Why?
The answer is simple (for cishet males at least).
Profound Alienation
1 As everyone here except the wreckers know, adult life within our competitive hellworld sucks. Workplaces (especially white collar ones) aren't necessarily areas where a human can develop a sense of community and human connection, as one is often pitted against their fellow coworkers in a cold war for a higher paygrade for longer and longer ours. Furthermore, a person is subject to the constant stress of neoliberal management policies, as outlined by Mark Fisher, leaving the individual in a constant state of anxiety both at work and increasingly at home due to the reach of shitty managers on the phone. Due to this, it is exceedingly difficult to create or maintain any meaningful connections with other people before, during, and after work, when the average person is usually too fucking exhausted to do jack shit except sleep due to factors such as long commute times, household chores, family commitments etc. This creates a situation where individuals are isolated from each other irl. (People who for whatever reason have a sense of community within their neighborhood/nearby living area are an exception to this.)
2 Even if one has friends and/or family, the demons of toxic masculinity rear their head. "Weakness", and all of its manifestations (Crying, exhaustion, depression, mental instability, being overwhelmed, a desire of emotional connection, hugging, etc.) are all sinful acts. Thus, expressing "weakness" is often ridiculed, trivialized, and ignored among people. Unfortunately, expressions of all of the above are necessary for psychological wellbeing, and without an outlet, will cause a degree of psychological damage. Men have to be strong workers for the elite, after all.
3 Furthermore, due to the highly competitive, anti-human nature of late capitalist society, it is difficult to develop a strong sense of internal self-worth. The central socioeconomic dogma states that an individual's worth as a human being is determined by how much money they have, how much "value" they add to a company, and how well the conform to social norms especially in the face of other people. All external to what an individual themselves thinks, but all enforced through material ways such as job interviews, rent, means testing, etc. One of the social norms also happens to be having a partner (this isn't has hard-wired as the first two though).
And, often, this is all there is.
As Mark Fisher pointed out, we :joker-gaming: where there is no such thing as society. Neoliberalism has eaten, digested, and shat out with a price of $99.99 any and all forms of resistance and counterhegemony, leaving us all in this "post-ideological" desert, there is no alternative. Therefore, there is no common alternative to other conceptions of self-esteem/self-worth. And, of course, its a shitty, disgusting, anti-human way of measuring one's self-worth.
So, take the three variables outlined above;
- Lack of community.
- Toxic Masculinity.
- Lack of spiritually robust forms of self-worth.
And the picture becomes clearer.
For a socially alienated cishet male subject of neoliberalism, their partner is often the only one who they can be vulnerable around, share tears, laughter, hugs, and talk earnestly with.
As a result, the loss of such a partner is a terrifying thing because:
- It means nobody is there by your side in the desert of social alienation.
- You have nobody else to be vulnerable around.
- You have failed your duties as a man, they are gone off to find someone better, possibly someone richer, shame on you etc. etc.
Thank you for attending my TedX talk, get the blood boy, I demand my complementary adrenochrome for my labors.
Citations:
:zizek: :baby-matt: (we need a mark fisher emote)
Interesting points here. I will provide you with adrenochrome from my firstborn child as payment
People put an idealized version of what they want the relationship to be on their partner and then get mad when they are also an autonomous being. It's a byproduct of our almost purely transactional relationships with one another through capitalism's hold over culture.
I dont remember exactly but there was something about that in an episode of rev left about Alexandra Kollontai.
From what i remember Kollontai's answer was that since we live in a capitalist society and we are alienated from each other, romantic relationships are the only source of genuine human connection, and since they are the only source it leads to possesiveness and jealousy.
I dont remember exactly, you would have to listen to that episode to get exact answerMake way for Winged Eros would be the relevant text. A genuinely historical analysis of love even if she had some dated takes on sex and sex work. Kristen Ghodsee also did a reading on her podcast where she explains it a little more in depth.
Under the bourgeois system such a division of the inner emotional world involves inevitable suffering. For thousands of years human culture, which is based on the institution of property, has been teaching people that love is linked with the principles of property. Bourgeois ideology has insisted that love, mutual love, gives the right to the absolute and indivisible possession of the beloved person Such exclusiveness was the natural consequence of the established form of pair marriage and of the ideal of “all-embracing love” between husband and wife. But can such an ideal correspond to the interests of the working class? Surely it is important and desirable from the proletariat’s point of view that people’s emotions should develop a wider and richer range? And surely the complexity of the human psyche and the many-sidedness of emotional experience should assist in the growth of the emotional and intellectual bonds between people which make the collective stronger? The more numerous these inner threads drawing people together, the firmer the sense of solidarity and the simpler the realization of the working-class ideal of comradeship and unity.
I don't think there is only one answer to this question as everyone has different experiences in their lives that molds them. Personally for me was being abandoned as a child from my father and internalizing it as it was my fault he left. Instead of being paranoid i would avoid my partners and say to myself they will leave me if i open myself. Lucky for me I got help and am improving.
Yeah, any proposed single answer would be reductive. I'm glad you have improved though
I don't know exactly what you mean by wingnut, but if you are in a relationship, especially if you have children, you are also responsible for their well-being. You can't go around [REDACTED] because even if you don't value your own life, feds have never shied away from threatening and harming your family. In that situation people will go conservative out of self-preservation.
To be fair there's also no shortage of assholes who are like "My man can not even be in the same building as another woman" types of paranoid people.
Conservative relationships are often legitimately having to give up every single friend of yours who isn't the same gender.
Thats a good argument against having kids in certain cases I suppose
If it’s any consolation it’s not always the case. In 2016 I was single and an active supporter of the libs. Now I am reading WEB Du Bois John Brown biography to my 4 month old.
I think... People, due to the alienation mentioned by u/replaceabe, are so disconnected from themselves that they end up searching for and then placing their own value and worth in a romantic partner. If that partner values them and sees their worth (since no one else does), then they can feel valuable and worthy within themselves. The thing is, that partner, another person is inherently their own agent and not under their partner's control. So it becomes a situation where one person wraps all their value and worth up in something (someone) they have no control over. So a lot of people will then try to maintain that control over their partner as a way of maintaing that control over their own sense of self-worth, which can manifest all sorts of ways, usually not good ones of course, things that involve coercion or manipulation. It's also possible to let go of that control and find peace in trusting a partner to always value them.
Imo the ideal way to go is not to wrap one's value and worth up in someone else in the first place. But that's easier said than done, especially in such an alienating culture that devalues everyone and makes them think their worth is external to themselves. Could be, anyway, that's my guess.
Totally disagree. A person can and should feel they have value, if only to their own self completely independent of anyone else.
Who said anything about existing independently of anyone else? Whether you're around other people or not, you as an individual human being, a conscious and sentient entity that experiences existence, have inherent value. And that value is not dependent upon those around you.
People are already paranoid wingnuts. Being close to them just reveals that
In a monogamous, nuclear family setting, you have two big things that make partners anxious about each other.
The first is that you typically rely on your partner for most things. They're your first, and often only, contact or communication on just about everything. There's a pressure on each person to play every role for their partner, and when they can't, this causes tension and disappointment.
The second is that knowing you can only have one partner, pursuing one comes at the expense of pursuing any/all others. It's an opportunity cost: if they're not the Right One, then any investment you've made in them is something that could have been better allocated to finding or being with the Right One.
Feeling like you're stuck with a person who's your whole social life gives rise to the love/hate dynamics that make a plurality of marriages fail, and a large part of the "stable" ones end up loveless.
Our culture pushes us to both idealize and smother our partners until either it becomes untenable, or we end up living in deep persistent denial. And this happens between parents and children, too. It's been quipped that The Satanic Death Cult Is Real.
The solution is to have communities that are balanced and more evenly linked, rather than just a vaguely grouped collection of obligate pair-bonds. Take the all-or-nothing pressure off the individuals, and they'll appreciate their partners more.
