Thursday's Most Active Threads

Yesterday's most active thread was titled, "Start to feel suicidal when I’m alone with kids for multiple days and not getting out" and posted in the "Health and Medicine" forum. The original poster says that her husband is away on a business trip and she has been stuck inside with sick children for multiple days and feels trapped. She explains that while she rationally wouldn't commit suicide, she has been considering it as a way out of the situation. Posters writing that they are considering suicide is not an uncommon thing on DCUM. Frequently when such threads are started, posters ask if I can use the poster's internet protocol (IP) address to identify them and alert authorities. IP addresses don't provide that level of identification and several levels of intervention by authorities would be required to identify the poster. Many times, including in this case, the poster doesn't appear to be located anywhere near the DC metro area, meaning that I wouldn't even know which authorities to contact. As such, there is not really anything I can do that would be effective. DCUM posters are good about offering support to suicidal individuals and providing references to the suicide hot line. That was the case in this thread. One somewhat unique aspect of this thread is that many posters reported that such feelings in the type of situation the original poster described are normal. Other posters strongly disputed this notion. Another issue of dispute in this thread which, frankly, was unnecessarily distracting, was whether the original poster was "situationally suicidal" — meaning it could be relieved by correcting the situation. Some posters argued that this was a situational case and could be addressed by her husband coming home or getting other types of support. Opponents of this suggestion argued that the original poster was suffering a mental health crisis which should be addressed by therapy and possibly medication. Moreover, a situational response such as having her husband return early from his trip would not resolve the underlying issues and is not a practical solution. Intermixed between these two debates were suggestions for less dramatic ways the original poster could improve her mood such as listening to music or letting her kids watch TV while she took a break from them.

The second most active thread yesterday was originally posted in the "Off-Topic" forum but I just moved it to the "Relationship Discussion (non-explicit)" forum for which it is more appropriate. Titled, "New observation: Men now want high earning women", the original poster writes that she has noticed that men these days are seeking women with high-earning potential rather than "hot" women who will stay at home. There are responses both supporting and disagreeing with this notion. One of the more perceptive responses said that men have always sought wealth through marriage, though traditionally it came through a dowry or a business that could be inherited. The thread fairly quickly turned into a version of stay at home moms vs work out of the house moms with all the well-worn talking points of that traditional DCUM hot button topic. Inexplicably, there is a debate over the attributes of Italian women compared to Scandinavian women. With a few exceptions, the main goal for posters in this thread seems to have been creating the most cliched post imaginable. We have the "nannies raising your kids" posts, the "men don't want to do housework" posts, the "men want women who are attractive and fit" posts, and so on. There is also quite a bit of discussion of "assortative dating" which, as far as I can tell, is simply a fancy way of saying that wealthy men are unlikely to marry baristas.

A thread titled, "What do you think is wrong with the way we live?" and posted in the "Off-Topic" was the third most active yesterday. The original poster says that a high percentage of Americans suffer from mental health issues and there is an increase in suicides and depression. She asks what is wrong with the way we live and what should we do differently. Some posters suggest that a lack of religion is the cause and that Americans need more God in their lives. This is disputed by posters that point out the many terrible things done in the name of religion. Quite a few posters place the blame on social media while others point more broadly to our over-connected society in which many are attached to their phones all day. The lack of community or human interaction is blamed by several posters. Others point to the economy as the culprit, whether in the personal sense in that people are less financially secure or the larger sense in which capitalism itself is the root problem. Related to this, according to some posters, is a lack of a safety net. One poster claims that there is just as many mental health problems in European countries but there are services available to address them. Posters find various ways to say that Americans generally lack meaning or direction in their lives, some blaming this on the modern work environment. In some ways this thread is a general airing of grievances, sort of a DCUM version of Festivus. A poster who is angry at teachers blamed teachers. One poster blamed cars. Another poster said the problem was "virtue signaling". I would love to know how a sign saying that "Hate is Not Welcome Here" or a Ukrainian flag on your Twitter profile leads to suicide, but the poster didn't explain. Several posters blamed our food, but since they didn't delve into details, it wasn't clear exactly why. On the one hand, a lack of medical resources was suggested as a part of the problem while, on the other hand, "Big Pharma" and an over-reliance on pharmaceuticals were blamed. There were several posts that I thought made solid points, but those clearly reflected my own personal biases. So, I'm just as guilty as everyone else of viewing this subjectively. Though, in my defense, I am not sure how it could be analyzed objectively, especially on a simple Internet discussion forum.

The last thread at which I'll look was posted in the "Relationship Discussion (non-explicit)" forum. I'm starting to see a trend that relationship topics ware focused on money. This is the second today and there have been a few more among the most active topics I've written about. This one was titled, "Could you commit long term to a guy who is kind but cheap?". The original poster is very concise in her post, which in its entirely was, "He makes a decent salary ($300K); he’s just in his 60s and cheap." In a later post, the original poster clarifies that by "cheap" she means that he "Gives few and modest gifts, goes Dutch on vacations, cooks at home while I take him out to eat, chooses the cheap hotel, looks for free concerts." Many of those responding resisted making judgements about the man, but simply told the original poster that he probably wasn't the right guy for her. Others weighed in on whether he was simply frugal — several agreed with this — or "cheap" as the original poster claimed. Quite a few of those responding went with "cheap", but some went further and suggested this was a sign of larger issues such as the man not really being interested in the original poster. The guy's restaurant-ordering habits were analyzed down to the last detail in order to divine whether he was simply cost-conscious or a tightwad. Like almost every thread in the relationship forum these days, this one eventually came around to arguing that men don't like to do housework. As true as that might be, I struggle to see what it has to do with a guy not spending a lot of money on his date. There is also quite a bit of discussion of transitioning gender roles, the impact of online dating, and what men desire in a woman. This is all well and good, but I suspect that this guy's behavior is rooted in very personal issues and not exactly a part of a larger paradigm of gender relations. Many of the posts in this thread have little to do with the original topic and the discussion is indistinguishable from many others in the relationship forum. I removed several posts from a poster who was determined to hijack the thread in order to revel us all in tales of her own dating habits that involved a strange obsession with garters. While perhaps suited for a tame version of Penthouse Forum, the posts were not really relevant to the thread.