This is a good point. I am a married man. As a woman, my wife cannot give me guy time - hence I love to hang out with my friends (who are all guys) - and I cannot give her girl time - hence she loves to hang out with her friends (who are all girls). The only women I am happy to be friendly with are colleagues (in a professional manner), family and ladies that my wife and I are friends with.

A lot of people baulk at this sort of arrangement/tolerance - but I bet it's quite common.

I'm sure it's common, but I've always hung around in mixed groups, doing whatever, so I'm puzzled and curious what guy time or girl time even is.

You'll note that most people saying this stuff are being extremely non-specific about what it means. My impression is that a lot of what they want to do would be offensive to lots of guys as well. Essentially they want a space to act in a way that women would feel quite threatened by. Not that mixed groups don't already have that as an issue.

Agreed, and the point I'm overall driving at is is that perceived need, desire, whatever you'd call it is a core structural reason for the male loneliness epidemic.

Like I've had so many discussions (in mixed company and male!) and like, I've talked about wanting to bang women, I've flirted with female friends to their faces in groups, the key is I'm not a fucking creep about it so either they express interest or they express disinterest and I don't take the latter as a personal affront, I'm just like, yeah that's cool, no worries, anyway... and we carry on. I've compared notes on what I like in women with lesbians. I've gotten tips on sex from women for the women I do date. I've joked and laughed with other women about how bad some guys are at sex. These conversations exist, you just need to not be a fucking weirdo and not be strutting around trying to bang everything in sight, and when rejected, completely lose interest and bail if you want to have them.

You couldnt be more wrong in your guessing. The answer lies in games all women play with both men and women constantly, never being truly honest with words, expecting men to pick up meaning between lines, predict their emotions and so on and on. We have enough shit in our lives already, no need to add more.

Its frustrating and tiring experience for all men, thus the need to vent out somewhere else where these dynamics dont play out semi constantly.

I am pretty sure women see it similarly in reverse although details in dynamics are very different.

As a man I don't recognize that game playing as something all women do. It's just not something I've experienced in my relationships platonic or otherwise with women. Maybe it's a Europe vs. America thing (edit: from your other comments, you seem to be in Europe so not that) or something personal to you and your experience but it sounds very 'incel-adjacent'.

Yep, there's always a strong element of "what opinions, motherfucker" goose comic in these discussions. And we always end up at "tell me you're an incel without telling me you're an incel"

You've really never had an attractive member of the opposite sex show up and the girls/guys get all competitive? I'm wondering how that's possible, it happened multiple times a week - a day even - to me in high school and college. I guess always being in mixed groups meant it was always subtly in play.

5 dudes chilling is a different dynamic than 3 guys 2 girls. People who keep insisting it's about some weird need for men to be offensive don't seem to have ever observed basic gender dynamics.(not saying you are, other responders)

Maybe this happened when I was 19.

I haven't observed this sort of thing happening in decades.

Note I mentioned high school and college as the time of these interactions.

That being said it just comes more subtle as people get older or alternatively remove themselves from the dating pool.

What I've learned is that as an outsider, a group is less likely to be a threat to me (I'm male) if there's at least one women there. Maybe that's because attention is then directed inwards, and that, in turn, might cause the relaxed feeling at the inside to diminish.

Idk my bjj school is generally all male. Sometimes women show up and it feels basically the same way whether they are there or not.

This whole sub thread is devoling into some weird incel like comment section though.

Practically every culture on earth (except ours as of 10 minutes ago) had some sort of place for single-sex bonding, which suggests there’s something important to it. Traditional cultures aren’t incel, to the contrary it’s only in modern cultures that mass-scale failures of relations between the sexes seem to arise.

As for bjj, the scenario of the instructor dating a female student and breaking up the gym in the ensuing fallout is a well-deserved trope by now. There are women at my gym and you can make it work if everyone’s bending over backwards to be professional, but it’s obviously Different.

Every culture that treated women equally? Or were there male only spaces because women were seen at 2nd (or 3rd tier people, below the pets?)

I trained at a gym where that scenario happened, people were already leaving because the teacher was an ass in general, played favorites with the male students and created at cliquey environment.

There really isn't anything women can't handle in front of men. Thinking you have some dark thing that cant be said in front of women or that you need to change how you behave is odd and exclusive to you.

No culture treats men and women equally-- they differ in how they treat men and women differently. Just today in my progressive coastal startup, for example, there was a proposal to set up a dedicated ERG for the women employees. In a company where people are routinely pulling 60-80 hour weeks, it was considered a plausible priority to take time aside to especially ensure that the women were feeling comfortable.

Whether or not this proposal is a good idea is not even the point: the point is that it was considered plausible, and hence that not even coastal progressives actually think it desirable to treat men and women equally.

I'm not making any claims about what anyone can or can't handle. I'm simply observing that just about every mixed group ends up adopting female norms of communication. I'm not even saying that's necessarily a bad thing for a mixed group, I think it's to some extent natural and healthy in social settings. In fact taboos that proscribe the ways men may speak in the presence of women are also quite common cross-culturally. But the fact that there is a difference remains.

Maybe men would be less lonely if they learned to socialize when a member of half of the world's population is present. Would probably help broaden the situations in which they're comfortable socializing significantly.

Like I'm being a bit of a contrarian dick here but at the same time, men are putting these strange rules and requirements on their own selves. If you lose the ability to be a normal person whenever, and I can't stress this enough, one in two living humans is present: I don't think that's a society issue. I think that's a you issue.

> If you lose the ability to be a normal person whenever

That depends on what "normal" is, and I don't think you or I get to define it.

I mostly hang out in mixed-gender groups, but I absolutely have seen the difference in vibe others in this thread have noted, when I'm hanging out with a group of just other men. Especially when compared to a mixed group that has both single men and single women.

> men are putting these strange rules and requirements on their own selves

I wouldn't call it a "rule" so much as a "phenomenon". It just seems to kinda happen. Not always, and not in every mixed-gender group, but it does happen. I don't think anyone is making up or following any kind of "rules", and I can't control group dynamics or behavior on my own.

> I don't think that's a society issue. I think that's a you issue.

I think this discussion would be more productive without thinly-veiled ad hominem attacks.

> I think this discussion would be more productive without thinly-veiled ad hominem attacks.

It's not ad hominem because you feel attacked. Ad hominem would be calling you a dickhead and then not engaging at all with the topic of the discussion, and I didn't do that. My point is that any man's inability to socialize with men in the presence of women in such a way that isn't offensive to them is... weird? Very weird. And is probably a solid contributing factor to the loneliness epidemic which the thread is about.

> That depends on what "normal" is, and I don't think you or I get to define it.

It's wild that people keep going to this line of argument despite the fact that the purpose of these "men's only" socialization spaces is ostensibly so men can be "normal" with one another, which no one has yet defined either, but props to you, you've at least tried.

> I mostly hang out in mixed-gender groups, but I absolutely have seen the difference in vibe others in this thread have noted, when I'm hanging out with a group of just other men. Especially when compared to a mixed group that has both single men and single women.

And it seems to be what you're pointing at is what I would call peacocking. Men see pretty women they want to date (or just bang) and they turn into ogres, trying to one up and bully one another to demonstrate social status. The problem is the vast majority of women think this is stupid as fuck, and men who are not seeking such relations at that time for whichever reason you might put it down for also find it cringe and annoying. Because it is.

And I suspect that same reason is why most men are dancing around discussing it in any great detail, because I too have witnessed it, but if I came into this thread saying "yeah a lot of men become insufferable morons in the presence of pretty girls and it's cringe as shit," I've gotten even more down-votes than I already have. And, more to the point, I don't think the solution to that is men's only spaces. I think the solution to that is men need to stop having it signaled to them that behaving in this way is acceptable. We are not animals in nature, we are social, intelligent beings capable of empathy.

> The problem is the vast majority of women think this is stupid as fuck

Who are you to speak for “the vast majority of women”?

> Like I'm being a bit of a contrarian dick

This is the only thing you've said that I agree with

> If you lose the ability to be a normal person

What is normal for a group of men is different than what is normal for the same group of men when a woman is present

It's not rocket science here.

Why?

And why gender, but not race?

Homies that want to smash change to chad mode and suddenly don't want to talk that gay homie shit around the girls. You'd be threatening each other with sloppy toppy, a girl will join and 1-2 guys will instantly turn into businessmen to impress her.

Why would race matter in this context? This is clearly about socio-sexual dynamics. Genders are the key differentiator.

Why aren't there also socio-racial dynamics?

Yes, what is this vibe change? So far I'm picking up:

* Single men don't feel compelled to be horndogs and show off and compete.

* Married men are tired of always doing everything with their wives.

* Possible gay interest?

* Something about model trains, apparently women ruin model trains?

Men in men-only spaces can be honest and open about their experiences with women, which includes being critical of women, without being shamed for it.

This is impossible in spaces where women are also present.

I guess that's true. Seems like loneliness is increased by people's habits of seeking sex, and seeking to talk about sex, and their expectations that others will do that.

I don't think race matters but clearly culture does. Ukranian or Somali spaces would not be what they are if just anyone could go. Even having to speak English or explain things to outsiders changes the dynamics entirely.

The person you're replying to seems to have constructed this elaborate scenario in their head where they're "one of the good ones" and is somewhere between unwilling and incapable of imagining men wanting to spend time with just other men some of the time. Apparently someone wanting this must be lonely, incapable of socializing with women, and offensive to others as a default.

This says a lot about that person, that they can't imagine men socializing any other way. I think they're making excuses for their own bad behavior.

No. It’s a human issue. Some women with a female version of the you problem make the male you problem worse. Why some places can’t be man-free or woman-free to get biology and game theory out of the way?

This.

Nobody said anything like this. I love hanging out in mixed groups.

However, and this may shock you, I also love hanging out in non mixed groups. And they are not the same.

Actually OP started this thread as a description of a solution to the male loneliness problem.

„Just don’t comply with social expectations“ is an advice that is often given but seldomly followed.

You're completely missing the point.

A mixed group works different socially than a male only group.

That's not because the men are socially incompetent. It's because it's a fundamentally different social situation. Even when everyone is an elite socializer.

I'm afraid you may be the one who needs to learn more about socializing.

> When a group of men is hanging out they are more relaxed. The moment a woman is in the space the vibe changes

A bit heteronormative, don't you think?

It's broadly true though. It doesn't apply to all of us but as a group it's a thing.

Personally it's not for me, I'm a heterosexual male but I get on far better with women and find men's spaces intimidating.

I used to feel the same way as you but then I discovered I was wasn't really getting on well in female dominated groups after-all. It's all smiles and pleasantries on the surface but you're not one of them and aren't part of their gossip, but can quickly become the subject of it. If they really are trusting you with their gossip and speculations about other members then perhaps you truly can assimilate. There's also talking about sex which women do with each other far more readily than with men.

With my current close friends I get included in far more gossip than I care to be and know the intimate details of past partners, kinks, fantasies etc.

Maybe because heterosexuality is still the norm?

No, because homosexual men tend not to compete with men for women’s attention.

Precisely. So a group of men, some or all of whom are gay, will react differently to the arrival of a woman than one in which all are straight.

Sigh. Perhaps it's sometimes ok to discount <6% of the male population for the sake of conversational brevity? Are you implying that homosexual men are suffering by not having women at the clubs? They have other reasons to not have women in their spaces. What does your little snarky comment add to the conversation?

Yes, that's true. But I don't know that you're actually scoring a point here, because I do believe that if you take a group of all gay men, and introduce a woman, the group dynamic will change. Not the same change as when you have a group of straight men, or a group of mixed straight and gay men, but it'll change.

And on top of that, I've heard some gay men complain about straight women in their spaces. That's just another example of this phenomenon.

Yes, is that bad?

>I cannot be the only person who has noticed this

The US marine corps noticed this and it was a huge point of contention (kind of still is).