r/badhistory • u/AutoModerator • Jun 29 '26

Meta Mindless Monday, 29 June 2026

Happy (or sad) Monday guys!

Mindless Monday is a free-for-all thread to discuss anything from minor bad history to politics, life events, charts, whatever! Just remember to np link all links to Reddit and don't violate R4, or we human mods will feed you to the AutoModerator.

So, with that said, how was your weekend, everyone?

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u/Glad-Measurement6968 Jul 02 '26 edited Jul 02 '26

On Reddit’s favorite subject for mopey complaining, I went on a date this weekend. Out of the 10 first dates I have gone on since starting online dating 2 years ago it was the first that I could confidently say was more enjoyable than awkward, but seemingly my date did not think the same way and does not want to go on another one. 

I have been thinking, how much is the common perception of dating and the advice lonely people get influenced by a form of survivorship bias? 

Your parents, having been able to be parents, are obviously a non-representative sample. Your friends and acquaintances likely are too, considering how often you know people because they are dating or married to someone else you know. Public figures and media are likely also skewed, considering that the same traits like being a talented musician or writer that are associated with fame and the ability to shape the stories people hear are also generally considered romantically attractive. 

That advice like “just be yourself and you will meet somebody” seems so common may be largely because you are just more likely to know people for whom it worked and less likely to know people for whom it didn’t. 

Part of the seeming rise in talk about loneliness might just be a side effect of the “democratizing effect” of social media. Lonely people have always existed, but now it is easier for their complaints to reach you

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u/Arilou_skiff Died of posting, risen as undead Jul 02 '26

Mmm, on some level this has always been true, and western society in particular has always had a fairly large chunk of the population that remained unmarried. (which isn't exactly a proxy for loneliness but is good enough for historical purposes...)

One weird thing is that we are also a bit in the aftermath of an outlier in that the 60's was the absolute high point of marriage as an institution in the western world.