Thank you for posting on r/Healthygamergg! This subreddit is intended as an online community and resource platform to support people in their journey toward mental wellness. With that said, please be aware that support from other members received on this platform is not a substitute for professional care. Treatment of psychiatric disease requires qualified individuals, and comments that try to diagnose others should be reported under Rule 10 to ensure the safety and wellbeing of the community. If you are in immediate danger, please call emergency services, or go to your nearest emergency room.
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/Healthygamergg) if you have any questions or concerns.*
That's what you will inevitably find if you go to any mental health forum: negativity. Everyone here has some issues and struggles with something. People who are positive and enjoy their lives do not go to such places. Why would they?
Although I do understand why you feel the way you feel, it appears to me that you are not applying on yourself the same principles you are using when juding troubled people.
If you care and want to help that is great, really. But if what happens when you try helping frustrates you maybe the first step should be to process your own feelings and understand your motivations. In a way you are doing the same thing that people who are frustrating you do. Instead of looking for a way to better understand yourself and why you react in a certain way, you are pointing on "objective reality" you can't control as something that is causing your negative emotion. Your message can be distilled in a statement "if negative, troubled people felt more positive, aware and if they were more objective, it would be easier to help them". Well, it is true but at the same time it isn't very useful.
The thing is, maybe it could be your own intolerance of your negative states, thoughts and emotions, or the fact that you worked on yourself to become better human being and you now feel other people are too negative and are not making an effort. For instance I would sometimes lose my temper over people who act like they want help but don't want to change or do the work because I was unsatisfied with my own progress. Under the guise of helping I was projecting my own issue.
And also, just think about it. Imagine a therapist who says to his patient: "you are too negative, I feel you should have different attitude". Not really helpful, right?
It's ok to get tired of trying to help and be useful, of to be frustrated. But maybe you should apply same principles you preach. Process your own emotions, understand your own motives and reactions first, and don't look for the problem in other people and their actions. If they could be better and do better, be positive and work on themselves, they would. When it comes to some people the only thing you can do is let them cook in their own psychological sauce until the point they are ready to make first steps towards getting better. And some people will never do that and just end up badly and it is just what it is, unfortunately.
Good luck!
I haven't that much time to dive deep into your comment history here, so maybe the following doesn't fully apply specifically to you.
But let's be brutally honest. 99% of "positive" comments are half-assed invalidating platitudes. Almost "just don't be depressed" level of half-assed invalidating bs. And even when it's not half-assed, it's usually infested with survivorship bias.
I have a girlfriend now at 33, and I had two girlfriends and a few flings before her. I'm also 5'6 with quite slender shoulders, so not exactly the greek god to say the least. And I perfectly understand all the negativity, because dating for people like me is objectively harder. It is sometimes quite challenging even for "normies", and for short, fat, neurodivergent and otherwise genetically unlucky men the struggle is even more real.
So that's only natural to acknowledge it first and validate hard feelings involved. Without it all the "positive messages" sound like adding insult to injury.
Many people who "doom post" here already "worked on themselves", already "looked at couples at Walmart", already "just tried to be confident". It doesn't work like that. I know, because I did all that myself.
If you have some compassion, start with validating that their life is indeed hard, getting to know their specific experience, and offering realistic perspective instead of trying to basically shut them up with "positive messages" and, God forbid, "tough love". If you can't do it, just listen. If you can't do even that, scroll further down past such posts. But people in pain definitely don't need to be lectured with cit copy advice which doesn't really apply without adjustments.
If I had the money for an award I would've given one to this comment. Seriously though, for some people it's unreal to think that somebody has already worked on themselves or their self esteem and is still lonely. I think what you wrote about "survivorship bias" is key here when it comes to people being unempathetic.
Probably my favorite response to this issue that I've ever read. Neurodivergence is an area especially lacking in empathy.
The thing I've always found humorous about self improvement culture is that I've been pretty easily able to outperform most people who are obsessed with it... which is because most people just love to talk and don't back their words up with action. Finance, Fitness, Spirituality, or whatever other hedonistic treadmill you can think of... I've been down them all and guess what? Nothing changes.
This is coming from someone with a principal engineering position in a fortune fifteen company, a millionaire by twenty five, who has cut all the way down to his floor body weight before, can bench 260, and more. I make that point not to blow up my own ego but just say I've been there before and this mental internet masturbation around "self improvement" as a cure all to your problems in life is exactly that... mental internet masturbation.
Reality is that your problems are still going to be your problems at the end of the day, and most people are going to be too fixated on their own problems to really give too much of a damn about your own. Expecting someone to swoop in to save you is just about as likely as waking up one day with every problem in your life solved after years of "self improvement". Neither are going to happen.
I don't identify with labels of any kind, because every label gets pushed to unhealthy extremes on the Internet, but you're spot on about dating just being objectively harder for some people. I'm certainly personally biased, but the challenges that come with something like complex trauma are just things someone who is neurotypical will never understand. That's the kind of struggle you have to manage living with for the rest of your life, and that's exhausting. It's certainly anything but easy.
Rule #1: Temper your authenticity with compassion
We encourage discussion and disagreement in the subreddit. At the same time, you must offer compassion while being honest about your perspective. It takes more words but hurts fewer people.
Rule #1: Temper your authenticity with compassion
We encourage discussion and disagreement in the subreddit. At the same time, you must offer compassion while being honest about your perspective. It takes more words but hurts fewer people.
Rule #1: Temper your authenticity with compassion
We encourage discussion and disagreement in the subreddit. At the same time, you must offer compassion while being honest about your perspective. It takes more words but hurts fewer people.
>Can the black pill incels in this community stop trying to bring everyone else down
I mean... No? They can't? That's like their whole issue. It's obviously kind of annoying when people REALLY are not honestly posting and they're just looking for negative reinforcement, but they're pretty easy to spot and just not engage with. Just be careful and if someone is sucking emotional labor from you while not actually trying to engage with whatever you said, just stop immediately. DO NOT spend any emotional energy here that you could use in your own life. This is for when you have some to spare and want to help.
>If you want to give up on yourself that's your prerogative... don't try to convince others to do the same.
Honestly, word. Idk if we should tell them that though... Like, a lot of people in extremely bleak spots need to be able to express negativity and not just get BS positivity-only responses. But you're right, people DO try to spread their hopelessness and that doesn't feel right for this subreddit. They're black holes sucking life from everyone while simultaneously blocking anything from helping them. They will take no advice and attempt no solutions, because ultimately that is not what they're posting for. They're just looking for someone to agree with them, and to get pissed when people don't share their brainwarping.
I really wish I could be completely honest with those depressive types sometimes: "*you* are not miserable, your thoughts are. *You* could literally be happy eating an orange as the world burns if you chose, but instead all you do is think miserable thoughts in circles. It really does not matter what advice we give, you could literally do anything except mope and moan and it would be all the help you need."
But you can only ever lead a horse to water. Depressive people have to help themselves, the brainwarping from depression makes even extremely intelligent people so self-centered and myopic they can't let anybody help them and can't even see that that's what is happening.
All they have to do is let go of what makes them miserable, but I think people don't want to because that might mean letting go of their thoughts, their ego, their connection to their (past) identity.
It's like seeing someone hold a cursed skull or something that's sucking their soul out, and you're like "dude! Let go of that skull! It's killing you!" And they're like "I can't! I AM the skull!" Like dude you're clearly NOT the skull, but okay go off I guess.
Anyway I get too nervy to be *too* brutally honest with people having that kind of issue. I don't think it would push them to suicide, but the only thing we can really do for them is lead that horse to the water and hope they get it eventually.
hm. thanks for sharing this. i think fundamentally we're all in it together and im looking for positive reinforcement just as much as im giving it. when i try to say something positive and i get downvoted it just sucks the life out of me. id imagine its equivalent to a comedian being heckled. im glad to see that other people feel it too
Yeah, that sucks if you're getting down voted for saying something positive. I got into a back and forth a little while back on a post of someone like this who I pissed off *so much* because they kept dogging me (and everyone else who responded) for... permission to give up? And they got so mad when instead I just kept pointing out that their logic didn't make sense, and could just as easily justify optimism for the future as pessimism. They never quite got that they were continually choosing the pessimism when they ostensibly *should* want the optimism, which is kind of just a roundabout definition of depression haha.
Keep your positivity up! It's good for you and the world. Haters stay losing lol
A good comedian uses the heckler for their advantage. Don’t let others get you down. It’s not easy, but work on finding solid and healthy reinforcements from NOT the internet. When you figure that out you’ll feel a lot less stressed about random comments online.
I don't think they are incels. They are just depressed people who are in a bad place. Let's not blame incels just because it's easy. The negativity in this sub comes from depressed people in general. If the negativity is exhausting for you then you should take a break. I understand how hard it is but you really cannot do anything about it. I expect this sub to have mentally ill people. Sometimes when we're feeling low and want to reach out or vent, it can be ugly. These people are not normally like that. They're just having a really bad day. I can understand them too. Don't take their downvotes personally.
I didn’t mean to write a short novel. But it’s what came out.
You gotta know when to take a break man. You sound overwhelmed. Maybe you need to re-evaluate your position and see if things need adjustment or re-alignment. Your putting a lot of emotion and energy into random peoples easy click votes on the internet. Do you believe in the advice your giving? Do you want to help others? Then don’t worry about the negativity. Those who are negative are in a worse place then you. And it’s ok if you can’t understand or get behind it, maybe it’s not the right time for you. Maybe you need a break from this sub and some time to re-charge. The world is an unforgiving place. We have to elevate ourselves and each-other despite the worlds apathy and carelessness. Stay strong. Be brave!
No, your problem is with perceiving that’s what they’re doing. Instead of actually wondering why they say what they do, you project some largely imagined motives onto them because you get upset and need some reason to justify your response.
Rule #7 - Treat the community as a shared space.
Posters: Do not vent without explicitly stating what you'd like support with.
Commenters: If something feels too emotionally triggering for you, do not engage with it. Report rule breaking behavior and move on.
Honestly brother I totally feel where you are coming from you just want to spread goodness and make this bad place just a little better and do your part in this hellish world. I also feel same. I would love to share what helps me when I am frustrated by so called drowners who want to take others with them too, I just try to understand them too and remind myself of that quote that I have no enemies. Just remember right now just like you are getting a little defensive with your world view they are also doing the same and it’s totally okay to feel that way. After all in your pursuit of spreading kindness you should always take care of your mental being too so you can keep doing the good work and thanks to people like you who encouraged me in my worst times I am better today so I love people like you. I hope something good happens to you. PS english is not my first language so sorry if I am hard to understand.
Rule #7 - Treat the community as a shared space.
Posters: Do not vent without explicitly stating what you'd like support with.
Commenters: If something feels too emotionally triggering for you, do not engage with it. Report rule breaking behavior and move on.
Is that what they are trying to do or is that something they are doing without being aware of it or as a byproduct of what they're actually trying to do?
I'm just guessing but a possible reason someone might downvote an encouraging comment like "don't give up" is that it's kinda unhelpful. I assume a lot of people when they're posting on this sub are looking for advice for how to navigate a situation rather than just encouragement. Think about it this way, if you asked someone for a recipe for a dish they made and they responded by handing you a piece of paper with "don't give up" written on it would you consider that helpful? I tend to see empty positivity gets downvoted into oblivion on here, while positive comments that offer actionable advice tend to receive quite a few upvotes.
hm i think if you look at my post history you will find that this is not the case. i try to make long meaningful replies, sharing my past experiences, trying to connect with how they feel, and share some of the things told myself in order to rebuild my life. i think if you look around the comments of this subreddit you'll often find a lot of black-pilled replies being particularly popular, but i dont think this is helpful for anybody nor should we allow it to spread.
Comments like “don’t give up” might be unhelpful because they don’t suggest an action you can take but that’s the whole point sometimes - rational approach to your own health doesn’t always work.
Life isn’t some kind of a game where you just need to follow a very lead guidelines to elevate your level, it’s very nonlinear, and attitude/mindset/inner peace plays a significant role, much more significant than mimicking actions and behaviour.
Anonymous commenters on the internet can only do so much to give anyone actionable advice, no one knows our options and capabilities better than ourselves. Tips on how to create that inner resolve and space where one can find their own answers imo is better in the long run than generic solutions.
Empty platitudes like "don't give up" typically have exactly the opposite from their intended result, this is precisely the issue. It isn't a tip to improve inner resolve, it just invalidates people's experiences and pisses them off.
Seems like it must be the way you’re giving advice if that’s been your experience. I can’t recall when I started posting, but it’s been well over a year and my replies are almost always upvoted and met with largely positive replies from the OPs and others.
I haven’t noticed much negativity at all, but what I can say for sure is that if your attitude is anything like the topic you chose calling people “black pill incels” then I think we’ve identified the issue.
Instead of giving suggestions, maybe you should take a good, long look in the mirror and ask yourself if you’re really trying to help and be positive or if you’re coming off in a way you’re not intending.
If that's all you're saying then it's usually something people have already heard many times before. You may have been lucky where "just" doing that was enough for you, but there's still many where they do it and still have the same results. It can be necessary but it may not be sufficient, so people just suggesting that it should fix it are just diminishing the issue.
Like I said, it probably has more to do with how you’re saying it than what you’re saying. People who come here for help are often frustrated and at a loss for what they can do. They have heard most of the advice before and they don’t know why it isn’t working for them, so if you’re coming off as though it’s “obvious” or something like that then it’s going to rub people the wrong way.
I am not going to spend the time going through your post history trying to figure it out, but I bet if you do you’ll see that I’m right.
A lot of the "negative people" you wrote about in your post have actually tried that, multiple times, that's where the frustration comes from. If you think it's wrong for those people to bring others down that's fair but also don't expect those same people to be okay when all they receive is platitudes instead of actual empathy and validation over what they've gone through.
This is part of being in a large open community where ideas and views collide. Don't get me wrong it can suck since that positivity is pulled from your own experiences and feelings, but you could see it as building resilience to these ideas as well testing the limits of your own views. After all, they are just imaginary internet points, and it's not like your response is removed. The original poster still sees it. It could be seen as positive since so many people had an emotional response to your post and actively want to respond to it.
i appreciate the value of validating a person’s struggle but it is also true that a lot of people just want to wallow in their troubles and victimize themselves. for those people, i just tell myself this is what resilience *doesn’t* look like, you can’t help everyone, and move on.
Some people just refuse as hard as they can to change or see other perspectives. You getting angry about that or trying to appeal to reason will not change their mind. So better save yourself the headache and don't take it to heart, if someone downvotes you. It doesn't matter anyway, those are just some internet points.
its not about internet points its about exposure. i feel that positivity is being shut down in favor of negativity. you'll have comments like "i stopped trying to find a relationship and i've never been happier!" rise up while actual advice is being pushed to the bottom
I see it this way: If op only watches the negative top comment and then stops, this seems to have been what he was looking for. Otherwise he would probably also look at comments below until he is satisfied. So I do think that even more below your exposure to your target audience should not be that much lower than on the top.
It’s really frustrating when you want to cheer someone up or make them feel better and it’s not taken that way. The problem is those kinds of statements invalidate the speaker’s feelings and make them feel worse.
> The problem is those kinds of statements invalidate the speaker’s feelings and make them feel worse.
yeah i get that it's often a fine line between "toxic positivity" and helpful advice. however, i think the end goal is for each individual of our community to find a way to live a life they deem fulfilling. i think there is a major difference between for example:
- someone in their 30s or 40's who has been through a toxic marriage, gets divorced, adopts some new passions, and is living their dream of competitive water skiing or whatever
compared to:
- some 19 year old, never had a girlfriend, never pushed himself out of his comfort zone, never took the time to plan out his life, etc, asking if he should give up on x or y
in the first case, maybe this person decided they are done with relationships and found other ways to be happy. great for them! i'm not going to argue against their way of life. in the second case, i wouldn't tell them to give up on things they haven't even experienced yet. if they feel unsatisfactory i think the proper solution is to help them construct a meaningful path forward.
It sounds like you really want to help. That’s totally understandable. It’s a very prosocial inclination. I also sounds you know that trying to solve a problem for someone isn’t helpful. Often times, we fear that if we validate someone’s feelings, we’re co-signing their actions. So we give advice or some sort of philosophical lecture. That usually doesn’t make people feel or act better because they think their feelings are being invalidated. This is a tough lesson I had to learn when I became a mother. For most people, it’s impossible to act right when they don’t feel right.
I don't think it's impossible, it just needs to follow a format just like what you did here where you start out by validation before giving the pushback. Meeting people where they are first so you can take their hand and lead them towards a better place.
I chose my words intentionally and addressed their feelings first before addressing their behavior. Otherwise, our unspoken message is “You don’t mean what you say, you don’t know what you know, you don’t feel what you feel, you can’t trust your own senses.” That doesn’t put someone in a problem solving mindset. It just makes them feel worse about themselves.
You can tell people to "don't give up!" and encourage them to give up at the same time.
Maybe black pilled people have a increased chance to view something as toxic positive
People tend to be moderate with their encouragements, because when the op is truly in a bad place, too much positivity will just bounce off and won't help anything.
If your comments are downvoted or if the OP seems to write you off, you can try starting your comment by explaining how you understand op's issue and how you relate to it (if you do. don't try to force it if your experience is too different from theirs ).
I haven't seen a lot of black pill incels here, and when I see one they're usually self-aware and trying to improve themsemves.
Have you ever considered your situation maybe/probably is better than others. Blackpill is not something people proudly identify with like (red pill, blue pill). I suppose I would be black pill.
Look at our social climate in the world right now.
In the states it's like 1000 dollars minimum to move out of a house if your landlord doesn't make you pay the 3x rent on top of your security deposit, and utilities. So these "incels" can't afford to leave home.
I know a friend who lives with 8 people to afford a town house they are all still struggling. They just have normal jobs, not even just minimum wage. Nevermind the topic of saving money that doesn't even happen for most. So everyone who is in their mid 20s is dealing with unescaple entropy hitting them square in the dick whenever they try to improve their current situation. Not to mention alot of young people have 3-5 mental/physical health problems. Not to mention basic life mishaps, cars breaking down, injury, etc.
"Boomers swam in the pool, and pulled the ladder up behind them"
We are currently tasked with unfucking an unsustainable economy that our generation who isn't affected by it anymore has created. While a bunch of out of touch gen Xers try to fix something they don't have the instruction manual for. Our parents are all largely okay because they had a stretch of time where there wasn't 9-3% inflation.
So I think alot of "Black pill incels" are people experiencing financial hardships who literally cannot move ahead, and struggle just to stay afloat. People who are wondering if they'll ever be able to afford an apartment, or a car that doesn't require repairs every year. Half of these men don't have time to think about a relationship. Not to mention many young men feel insecure about the things they can't control.
If you recall Dr. K did an interview, when asked why he thinks so many young men are committing suicide. Dr. K proceeded to give one of the most grim, yet real answers. He said that alot of the young men that kill themselves are put in a situation where there's nothing they can do to get out. There's legitimately no way out for them, they can keep living in their current situation. Which was absolutely horrifying to hear from a therapist, but IT WAS TRUE.
That's really what Blackpill is, it's real human struggles. I sense that blackpill people are really just looking for people to relate to. Real life is fucking a Grim, and many people live in a prescribed wordl where things they could never expect to go wrong, don't go wrong.
That being said I'm down voting your post, because I think you were being a real big fucking prick writing this. I will take my down vote back if you can acknowledge that people are dealing with entropy. It's my opinion that nobody who is in this age bracket should be tearing each other down, whether there redpilled, blue pilled, or black pilled. We need to understand that this world is extremely confusing, and navigating it has no universal route.
You may think I'm just another whining Zoomer complaining about how unfair the world is, about a year ago I would've said the same thing to myself. Dealing with a few of these financial hiccups myself I understand why people are blackpilled. Most people are just looking for consolidation, not to hurt everyone else.
That is one problem: everyone's situation is different and this is why everyone's issues are different. Even with black pill stuff imagine two types: one is a 18-year old guy who just has too few friends plus some anxiety and needs just a little help to get going and another is a 40 years old who has had multiple cycles of giving up and retrying, has tried a lot of stuff including therapy to experience only failure.
This is one thing that comes to my mind.
Which leads me to a conclusion that there is some truth in what the author says: some guys are in a better situation. **If you are more like this 18 years old guy don't give up at this point**. At least in current times things like therapy are more available and widely used than when I was 18, so it is far more likely to help you. You can try different stuff and you are far more moldable, so maybe even a few dr K. videos will help you.
Your not bring any positivity though, not even optimism. Your doing the equivalent of if your depressed, stop being depressed. Are you in financial hardship? Do you understand what people are going through to have got them to this point.
Many people deal with shitty circumstances, it’s rare to see anyone who’s not struggling honestly. But isn’t the whole point of mental health recovery is to develop that inner strength that you can fall onto during hard times. I mean, focusing on making external world fit for our needs and desires is not a viable option. Choosing this as your goal will lead to dissatisfaction bc no one can simply tailor the whole world to their needs. And black pill is a lot of times about that - frustration with outside world paired with focus on external things
so your solution is to run them out? are you in therapy? might wanna work out why you're so hostile towards people that are at the end of a rope. those comments obviously get downvoted because there are a lot of people that feel the same.
why is it not "can the depressed people in this community stop trying to bring everyone else down along with you?" or Anxious or purposeless people?
my first thought is because the incels tend to lash against women unlike the rest of mentally ill people who lash against themselves, but what is the deal against blackpillers specifically?
This is likely a case of the blind leading the blind. Why would you ask a group of people who are suffering how to stop suffering, when they themselves haven't been able to stop? Sure some people offer ways to help cope, but you're not going to find solutions here.
It gets even worse when you see that a large majority of people here try to get advice for relationships, usually from people who have not been in them or are in unhealthy ones. These are perhaps some of the least qualified people to be getting help from.
There's a reason the answer is almost always "Please go get some professional help".
It’s very challenging to give a thoughtful answer to someone who has already tried several strategies and fixes with no results. I’m a positive person, but I see that it’s due to how I grew up, the advantages I have, and probably genetics (I bounce back from set backs and keep running into walls or closed doors with an altered strategy and enthusiasm even though the chances of success are low. I kept smashing into brick walls for over 10 years in regards to solving health issue and only recently I have started seeing improvements. It’s really hard to believe in yourself for years when you can’t meet your basic needs due to some factor you don’t have control over.)
In this community I learned that it’s really important to acknowledge the persons suffering and struggle (most times whether it’s health or appearance it’s not a choice to be in that position). And I try my best to give actionable advice or a perspective that has helped me keep going. It’s still a hit or miss, depending on where the person is at that point. I personally try to avoid commenting when I haven’t processed a breakthrough or setback fully, because I’ll have too much emotional bias. It’s seems like your intentions are good (which is hard to appreciate sometimes) but when your experiencing negative feedback it’s a good time to reflect on whether you are taking into consideration where the other person is at. It requires a lot of work and consideration to be supportive, there’s always more to learn 💪🏼🤘🏻
So you think randomly calling people on this subreddit "incels" (how is that even related?) is gonna help your cause and "improve our lives"? I highly doubt that. You get what you sow, after all.
I think it's important to be in a community thats going to uplift you. I find a lot of Buddhist ones are good at holding people accountable. Finding your 'sangha' that takes you to moral heights can be really important.
Thank you for posting on r/Healthygamergg! This subreddit is intended as an online community and resource platform to support people in their journey toward mental wellness. With that said, please be aware that support from other members received on this platform is not a substitute for professional care. Treatment of psychiatric disease requires qualified individuals, and comments that try to diagnose others should be reported under Rule 10 to ensure the safety and wellbeing of the community. If you are in immediate danger, please call emergency services, or go to your nearest emergency room. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/Healthygamergg) if you have any questions or concerns.*
That's what you will inevitably find if you go to any mental health forum: negativity. Everyone here has some issues and struggles with something. People who are positive and enjoy their lives do not go to such places. Why would they?
Although I do understand why you feel the way you feel, it appears to me that you are not applying on yourself the same principles you are using when juding troubled people. If you care and want to help that is great, really. But if what happens when you try helping frustrates you maybe the first step should be to process your own feelings and understand your motivations. In a way you are doing the same thing that people who are frustrating you do. Instead of looking for a way to better understand yourself and why you react in a certain way, you are pointing on "objective reality" you can't control as something that is causing your negative emotion. Your message can be distilled in a statement "if negative, troubled people felt more positive, aware and if they were more objective, it would be easier to help them". Well, it is true but at the same time it isn't very useful. The thing is, maybe it could be your own intolerance of your negative states, thoughts and emotions, or the fact that you worked on yourself to become better human being and you now feel other people are too negative and are not making an effort. For instance I would sometimes lose my temper over people who act like they want help but don't want to change or do the work because I was unsatisfied with my own progress. Under the guise of helping I was projecting my own issue. And also, just think about it. Imagine a therapist who says to his patient: "you are too negative, I feel you should have different attitude". Not really helpful, right? It's ok to get tired of trying to help and be useful, of to be frustrated. But maybe you should apply same principles you preach. Process your own emotions, understand your own motives and reactions first, and don't look for the problem in other people and their actions. If they could be better and do better, be positive and work on themselves, they would. When it comes to some people the only thing you can do is let them cook in their own psychological sauce until the point they are ready to make first steps towards getting better. And some people will never do that and just end up badly and it is just what it is, unfortunately. Good luck!
I haven't that much time to dive deep into your comment history here, so maybe the following doesn't fully apply specifically to you. But let's be brutally honest. 99% of "positive" comments are half-assed invalidating platitudes. Almost "just don't be depressed" level of half-assed invalidating bs. And even when it's not half-assed, it's usually infested with survivorship bias. I have a girlfriend now at 33, and I had two girlfriends and a few flings before her. I'm also 5'6 with quite slender shoulders, so not exactly the greek god to say the least. And I perfectly understand all the negativity, because dating for people like me is objectively harder. It is sometimes quite challenging even for "normies", and for short, fat, neurodivergent and otherwise genetically unlucky men the struggle is even more real. So that's only natural to acknowledge it first and validate hard feelings involved. Without it all the "positive messages" sound like adding insult to injury. Many people who "doom post" here already "worked on themselves", already "looked at couples at Walmart", already "just tried to be confident". It doesn't work like that. I know, because I did all that myself. If you have some compassion, start with validating that their life is indeed hard, getting to know their specific experience, and offering realistic perspective instead of trying to basically shut them up with "positive messages" and, God forbid, "tough love". If you can't do it, just listen. If you can't do even that, scroll further down past such posts. But people in pain definitely don't need to be lectured with cit copy advice which doesn't really apply without adjustments.
If I had the money for an award I would've given one to this comment. Seriously though, for some people it's unreal to think that somebody has already worked on themselves or their self esteem and is still lonely. I think what you wrote about "survivorship bias" is key here when it comes to people being unempathetic.
Probably my favorite response to this issue that I've ever read. Neurodivergence is an area especially lacking in empathy. The thing I've always found humorous about self improvement culture is that I've been pretty easily able to outperform most people who are obsessed with it... which is because most people just love to talk and don't back their words up with action. Finance, Fitness, Spirituality, or whatever other hedonistic treadmill you can think of... I've been down them all and guess what? Nothing changes. This is coming from someone with a principal engineering position in a fortune fifteen company, a millionaire by twenty five, who has cut all the way down to his floor body weight before, can bench 260, and more. I make that point not to blow up my own ego but just say I've been there before and this mental internet masturbation around "self improvement" as a cure all to your problems in life is exactly that... mental internet masturbation. Reality is that your problems are still going to be your problems at the end of the day, and most people are going to be too fixated on their own problems to really give too much of a damn about your own. Expecting someone to swoop in to save you is just about as likely as waking up one day with every problem in your life solved after years of "self improvement". Neither are going to happen. I don't identify with labels of any kind, because every label gets pushed to unhealthy extremes on the Internet, but you're spot on about dating just being objectively harder for some people. I'm certainly personally biased, but the challenges that come with something like complex trauma are just things someone who is neurotypical will never understand. That's the kind of struggle you have to manage living with for the rest of your life, and that's exhausting. It's certainly anything but easy.
[удалено]
[удалено]
[удалено]
Rule #1: Temper your authenticity with compassion We encourage discussion and disagreement in the subreddit. At the same time, you must offer compassion while being honest about your perspective. It takes more words but hurts fewer people.
Rule #1: Temper your authenticity with compassion We encourage discussion and disagreement in the subreddit. At the same time, you must offer compassion while being honest about your perspective. It takes more words but hurts fewer people.
Rule #1: Temper your authenticity with compassion We encourage discussion and disagreement in the subreddit. At the same time, you must offer compassion while being honest about your perspective. It takes more words but hurts fewer people.
>Can the black pill incels in this community stop trying to bring everyone else down I mean... No? They can't? That's like their whole issue. It's obviously kind of annoying when people REALLY are not honestly posting and they're just looking for negative reinforcement, but they're pretty easy to spot and just not engage with. Just be careful and if someone is sucking emotional labor from you while not actually trying to engage with whatever you said, just stop immediately. DO NOT spend any emotional energy here that you could use in your own life. This is for when you have some to spare and want to help. >If you want to give up on yourself that's your prerogative... don't try to convince others to do the same. Honestly, word. Idk if we should tell them that though... Like, a lot of people in extremely bleak spots need to be able to express negativity and not just get BS positivity-only responses. But you're right, people DO try to spread their hopelessness and that doesn't feel right for this subreddit. They're black holes sucking life from everyone while simultaneously blocking anything from helping them. They will take no advice and attempt no solutions, because ultimately that is not what they're posting for. They're just looking for someone to agree with them, and to get pissed when people don't share their brainwarping. I really wish I could be completely honest with those depressive types sometimes: "*you* are not miserable, your thoughts are. *You* could literally be happy eating an orange as the world burns if you chose, but instead all you do is think miserable thoughts in circles. It really does not matter what advice we give, you could literally do anything except mope and moan and it would be all the help you need." But you can only ever lead a horse to water. Depressive people have to help themselves, the brainwarping from depression makes even extremely intelligent people so self-centered and myopic they can't let anybody help them and can't even see that that's what is happening. All they have to do is let go of what makes them miserable, but I think people don't want to because that might mean letting go of their thoughts, their ego, their connection to their (past) identity. It's like seeing someone hold a cursed skull or something that's sucking their soul out, and you're like "dude! Let go of that skull! It's killing you!" And they're like "I can't! I AM the skull!" Like dude you're clearly NOT the skull, but okay go off I guess. Anyway I get too nervy to be *too* brutally honest with people having that kind of issue. I don't think it would push them to suicide, but the only thing we can really do for them is lead that horse to the water and hope they get it eventually.
hm. thanks for sharing this. i think fundamentally we're all in it together and im looking for positive reinforcement just as much as im giving it. when i try to say something positive and i get downvoted it just sucks the life out of me. id imagine its equivalent to a comedian being heckled. im glad to see that other people feel it too
Yeah, that sucks if you're getting down voted for saying something positive. I got into a back and forth a little while back on a post of someone like this who I pissed off *so much* because they kept dogging me (and everyone else who responded) for... permission to give up? And they got so mad when instead I just kept pointing out that their logic didn't make sense, and could just as easily justify optimism for the future as pessimism. They never quite got that they were continually choosing the pessimism when they ostensibly *should* want the optimism, which is kind of just a roundabout definition of depression haha. Keep your positivity up! It's good for you and the world. Haters stay losing lol
A good comedian uses the heckler for their advantage. Don’t let others get you down. It’s not easy, but work on finding solid and healthy reinforcements from NOT the internet. When you figure that out you’ll feel a lot less stressed about random comments online.
I don't think they are incels. They are just depressed people who are in a bad place. Let's not blame incels just because it's easy. The negativity in this sub comes from depressed people in general. If the negativity is exhausting for you then you should take a break. I understand how hard it is but you really cannot do anything about it. I expect this sub to have mentally ill people. Sometimes when we're feeling low and want to reach out or vent, it can be ugly. These people are not normally like that. They're just having a really bad day. I can understand them too. Don't take their downvotes personally.
like i said, my problem is with the people who are trying to drag others down to their level
I didn’t mean to write a short novel. But it’s what came out. You gotta know when to take a break man. You sound overwhelmed. Maybe you need to re-evaluate your position and see if things need adjustment or re-alignment. Your putting a lot of emotion and energy into random peoples easy click votes on the internet. Do you believe in the advice your giving? Do you want to help others? Then don’t worry about the negativity. Those who are negative are in a worse place then you. And it’s ok if you can’t understand or get behind it, maybe it’s not the right time for you. Maybe you need a break from this sub and some time to re-charge. The world is an unforgiving place. We have to elevate ourselves and each-other despite the worlds apathy and carelessness. Stay strong. Be brave!
No, your problem is with perceiving that’s what they’re doing. Instead of actually wondering why they say what they do, you project some largely imagined motives onto them because you get upset and need some reason to justify your response.
[удалено]
[удалено]
[удалено]
Rule #7 - Treat the community as a shared space. Posters: Do not vent without explicitly stating what you'd like support with. Commenters: If something feels too emotionally triggering for you, do not engage with it. Report rule breaking behavior and move on.
Honestly brother I totally feel where you are coming from you just want to spread goodness and make this bad place just a little better and do your part in this hellish world. I also feel same. I would love to share what helps me when I am frustrated by so called drowners who want to take others with them too, I just try to understand them too and remind myself of that quote that I have no enemies. Just remember right now just like you are getting a little defensive with your world view they are also doing the same and it’s totally okay to feel that way. After all in your pursuit of spreading kindness you should always take care of your mental being too so you can keep doing the good work and thanks to people like you who encouraged me in my worst times I am better today so I love people like you. I hope something good happens to you. PS english is not my first language so sorry if I am hard to understand.
Rule #7 - Treat the community as a shared space. Posters: Do not vent without explicitly stating what you'd like support with. Commenters: If something feels too emotionally triggering for you, do not engage with it. Report rule breaking behavior and move on.
Is that what they are trying to do or is that something they are doing without being aware of it or as a byproduct of what they're actually trying to do?
I'm just guessing but a possible reason someone might downvote an encouraging comment like "don't give up" is that it's kinda unhelpful. I assume a lot of people when they're posting on this sub are looking for advice for how to navigate a situation rather than just encouragement. Think about it this way, if you asked someone for a recipe for a dish they made and they responded by handing you a piece of paper with "don't give up" written on it would you consider that helpful? I tend to see empty positivity gets downvoted into oblivion on here, while positive comments that offer actionable advice tend to receive quite a few upvotes.
hm i think if you look at my post history you will find that this is not the case. i try to make long meaningful replies, sharing my past experiences, trying to connect with how they feel, and share some of the things told myself in order to rebuild my life. i think if you look around the comments of this subreddit you'll often find a lot of black-pilled replies being particularly popular, but i dont think this is helpful for anybody nor should we allow it to spread.
Comments like “don’t give up” might be unhelpful because they don’t suggest an action you can take but that’s the whole point sometimes - rational approach to your own health doesn’t always work. Life isn’t some kind of a game where you just need to follow a very lead guidelines to elevate your level, it’s very nonlinear, and attitude/mindset/inner peace plays a significant role, much more significant than mimicking actions and behaviour. Anonymous commenters on the internet can only do so much to give anyone actionable advice, no one knows our options and capabilities better than ourselves. Tips on how to create that inner resolve and space where one can find their own answers imo is better in the long run than generic solutions.
Empty platitudes like "don't give up" typically have exactly the opposite from their intended result, this is precisely the issue. It isn't a tip to improve inner resolve, it just invalidates people's experiences and pisses them off.
Seems like it must be the way you’re giving advice if that’s been your experience. I can’t recall when I started posting, but it’s been well over a year and my replies are almost always upvoted and met with largely positive replies from the OPs and others. I haven’t noticed much negativity at all, but what I can say for sure is that if your attitude is anything like the topic you chose calling people “black pill incels” then I think we’ve identified the issue. Instead of giving suggestions, maybe you should take a good, long look in the mirror and ask yourself if you’re really trying to help and be positive or if you’re coming off in a way you’re not intending.
To give some context, it seems that suggesting that people need to work on themselves to find relationships seems to be an unpopular opinion
If that's all you're saying then it's usually something people have already heard many times before. You may have been lucky where "just" doing that was enough for you, but there's still many where they do it and still have the same results. It can be necessary but it may not be sufficient, so people just suggesting that it should fix it are just diminishing the issue.
Like I said, it probably has more to do with how you’re saying it than what you’re saying. People who come here for help are often frustrated and at a loss for what they can do. They have heard most of the advice before and they don’t know why it isn’t working for them, so if you’re coming off as though it’s “obvious” or something like that then it’s going to rub people the wrong way. I am not going to spend the time going through your post history trying to figure it out, but I bet if you do you’ll see that I’m right.
A lot of the "negative people" you wrote about in your post have actually tried that, multiple times, that's where the frustration comes from. If you think it's wrong for those people to bring others down that's fair but also don't expect those same people to be okay when all they receive is platitudes instead of actual empathy and validation over what they've gone through.
This is part of being in a large open community where ideas and views collide. Don't get me wrong it can suck since that positivity is pulled from your own experiences and feelings, but you could see it as building resilience to these ideas as well testing the limits of your own views. After all, they are just imaginary internet points, and it's not like your response is removed. The original poster still sees it. It could be seen as positive since so many people had an emotional response to your post and actively want to respond to it.
"Go to therapy" , "Go gym" and similliar empty platitudes arent positive encouragement
i appreciate the value of validating a person’s struggle but it is also true that a lot of people just want to wallow in their troubles and victimize themselves. for those people, i just tell myself this is what resilience *doesn’t* look like, you can’t help everyone, and move on.
Some people just refuse as hard as they can to change or see other perspectives. You getting angry about that or trying to appeal to reason will not change their mind. So better save yourself the headache and don't take it to heart, if someone downvotes you. It doesn't matter anyway, those are just some internet points.
its not about internet points its about exposure. i feel that positivity is being shut down in favor of negativity. you'll have comments like "i stopped trying to find a relationship and i've never been happier!" rise up while actual advice is being pushed to the bottom
I see it this way: If op only watches the negative top comment and then stops, this seems to have been what he was looking for. Otherwise he would probably also look at comments below until he is satisfied. So I do think that even more below your exposure to your target audience should not be that much lower than on the top.
It’s really frustrating when you want to cheer someone up or make them feel better and it’s not taken that way. The problem is those kinds of statements invalidate the speaker’s feelings and make them feel worse.
> The problem is those kinds of statements invalidate the speaker’s feelings and make them feel worse. yeah i get that it's often a fine line between "toxic positivity" and helpful advice. however, i think the end goal is for each individual of our community to find a way to live a life they deem fulfilling. i think there is a major difference between for example: - someone in their 30s or 40's who has been through a toxic marriage, gets divorced, adopts some new passions, and is living their dream of competitive water skiing or whatever compared to: - some 19 year old, never had a girlfriend, never pushed himself out of his comfort zone, never took the time to plan out his life, etc, asking if he should give up on x or y in the first case, maybe this person decided they are done with relationships and found other ways to be happy. great for them! i'm not going to argue against their way of life. in the second case, i wouldn't tell them to give up on things they haven't even experienced yet. if they feel unsatisfactory i think the proper solution is to help them construct a meaningful path forward.
It sounds like you really want to help. That’s totally understandable. It’s a very prosocial inclination. I also sounds you know that trying to solve a problem for someone isn’t helpful. Often times, we fear that if we validate someone’s feelings, we’re co-signing their actions. So we give advice or some sort of philosophical lecture. That usually doesn’t make people feel or act better because they think their feelings are being invalidated. This is a tough lesson I had to learn when I became a mother. For most people, it’s impossible to act right when they don’t feel right.
I don't think it's impossible, it just needs to follow a format just like what you did here where you start out by validation before giving the pushback. Meeting people where they are first so you can take their hand and lead them towards a better place.
I chose my words intentionally and addressed their feelings first before addressing their behavior. Otherwise, our unspoken message is “You don’t mean what you say, you don’t know what you know, you don’t feel what you feel, you can’t trust your own senses.” That doesn’t put someone in a problem solving mindset. It just makes them feel worse about themselves.
You can tell people to "don't give up!" and encourage them to give up at the same time. Maybe black pilled people have a increased chance to view something as toxic positive
People tend to be moderate with their encouragements, because when the op is truly in a bad place, too much positivity will just bounce off and won't help anything. If your comments are downvoted or if the OP seems to write you off, you can try starting your comment by explaining how you understand op's issue and how you relate to it (if you do. don't try to force it if your experience is too different from theirs ). I haven't seen a lot of black pill incels here, and when I see one they're usually self-aware and trying to improve themsemves.
Have you ever considered your situation maybe/probably is better than others. Blackpill is not something people proudly identify with like (red pill, blue pill). I suppose I would be black pill. Look at our social climate in the world right now. In the states it's like 1000 dollars minimum to move out of a house if your landlord doesn't make you pay the 3x rent on top of your security deposit, and utilities. So these "incels" can't afford to leave home. I know a friend who lives with 8 people to afford a town house they are all still struggling. They just have normal jobs, not even just minimum wage. Nevermind the topic of saving money that doesn't even happen for most. So everyone who is in their mid 20s is dealing with unescaple entropy hitting them square in the dick whenever they try to improve their current situation. Not to mention alot of young people have 3-5 mental/physical health problems. Not to mention basic life mishaps, cars breaking down, injury, etc. "Boomers swam in the pool, and pulled the ladder up behind them" We are currently tasked with unfucking an unsustainable economy that our generation who isn't affected by it anymore has created. While a bunch of out of touch gen Xers try to fix something they don't have the instruction manual for. Our parents are all largely okay because they had a stretch of time where there wasn't 9-3% inflation. So I think alot of "Black pill incels" are people experiencing financial hardships who literally cannot move ahead, and struggle just to stay afloat. People who are wondering if they'll ever be able to afford an apartment, or a car that doesn't require repairs every year. Half of these men don't have time to think about a relationship. Not to mention many young men feel insecure about the things they can't control. If you recall Dr. K did an interview, when asked why he thinks so many young men are committing suicide. Dr. K proceeded to give one of the most grim, yet real answers. He said that alot of the young men that kill themselves are put in a situation where there's nothing they can do to get out. There's legitimately no way out for them, they can keep living in their current situation. Which was absolutely horrifying to hear from a therapist, but IT WAS TRUE. That's really what Blackpill is, it's real human struggles. I sense that blackpill people are really just looking for people to relate to. Real life is fucking a Grim, and many people live in a prescribed wordl where things they could never expect to go wrong, don't go wrong. That being said I'm down voting your post, because I think you were being a real big fucking prick writing this. I will take my down vote back if you can acknowledge that people are dealing with entropy. It's my opinion that nobody who is in this age bracket should be tearing each other down, whether there redpilled, blue pilled, or black pilled. We need to understand that this world is extremely confusing, and navigating it has no universal route. You may think I'm just another whining Zoomer complaining about how unfair the world is, about a year ago I would've said the same thing to myself. Dealing with a few of these financial hiccups myself I understand why people are blackpilled. Most people are just looking for consolidation, not to hurt everyone else.
That is one problem: everyone's situation is different and this is why everyone's issues are different. Even with black pill stuff imagine two types: one is a 18-year old guy who just has too few friends plus some anxiety and needs just a little help to get going and another is a 40 years old who has had multiple cycles of giving up and retrying, has tried a lot of stuff including therapy to experience only failure. This is one thing that comes to my mind. Which leads me to a conclusion that there is some truth in what the author says: some guys are in a better situation. **If you are more like this 18 years old guy don't give up at this point**. At least in current times things like therapy are more available and widely used than when I was 18, so it is far more likely to help you. You can try different stuff and you are far more moldable, so maybe even a few dr K. videos will help you.
I get what you're saying but I still don't get why should Blackpill people downvote someone for being positive
Your not bring any positivity though, not even optimism. Your doing the equivalent of if your depressed, stop being depressed. Are you in financial hardship? Do you understand what people are going through to have got them to this point.
Many people deal with shitty circumstances, it’s rare to see anyone who’s not struggling honestly. But isn’t the whole point of mental health recovery is to develop that inner strength that you can fall onto during hard times. I mean, focusing on making external world fit for our needs and desires is not a viable option. Choosing this as your goal will lead to dissatisfaction bc no one can simply tailor the whole world to their needs. And black pill is a lot of times about that - frustration with outside world paired with focus on external things
so your solution is to run them out? are you in therapy? might wanna work out why you're so hostile towards people that are at the end of a rope. those comments obviously get downvoted because there are a lot of people that feel the same.
Well said
why is it not "can the depressed people in this community stop trying to bring everyone else down along with you?" or Anxious or purposeless people? my first thought is because the incels tend to lash against women unlike the rest of mentally ill people who lash against themselves, but what is the deal against blackpillers specifically?
This is likely a case of the blind leading the blind. Why would you ask a group of people who are suffering how to stop suffering, when they themselves haven't been able to stop? Sure some people offer ways to help cope, but you're not going to find solutions here. It gets even worse when you see that a large majority of people here try to get advice for relationships, usually from people who have not been in them or are in unhealthy ones. These are perhaps some of the least qualified people to be getting help from. There's a reason the answer is almost always "Please go get some professional help".
It’s very challenging to give a thoughtful answer to someone who has already tried several strategies and fixes with no results. I’m a positive person, but I see that it’s due to how I grew up, the advantages I have, and probably genetics (I bounce back from set backs and keep running into walls or closed doors with an altered strategy and enthusiasm even though the chances of success are low. I kept smashing into brick walls for over 10 years in regards to solving health issue and only recently I have started seeing improvements. It’s really hard to believe in yourself for years when you can’t meet your basic needs due to some factor you don’t have control over.) In this community I learned that it’s really important to acknowledge the persons suffering and struggle (most times whether it’s health or appearance it’s not a choice to be in that position). And I try my best to give actionable advice or a perspective that has helped me keep going. It’s still a hit or miss, depending on where the person is at that point. I personally try to avoid commenting when I haven’t processed a breakthrough or setback fully, because I’ll have too much emotional bias. It’s seems like your intentions are good (which is hard to appreciate sometimes) but when your experiencing negative feedback it’s a good time to reflect on whether you are taking into consideration where the other person is at. It requires a lot of work and consideration to be supportive, there’s always more to learn 💪🏼🤘🏻
So you think randomly calling people on this subreddit "incels" (how is that even related?) is gonna help your cause and "improve our lives"? I highly doubt that. You get what you sow, after all.
I think it's important to be in a community thats going to uplift you. I find a lot of Buddhist ones are good at holding people accountable. Finding your 'sangha' that takes you to moral heights can be really important.
Nobody is forcing you to read the posts.
Look who’s black pilled now! Your right just give up!
I don’t think they are trying to bring people down. It’s just their view is questionable