I (39M) used to be "incel" like

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When I was 20 or so, the term did not exist. But, I can say in hindsight I was exhibiting incel like behavor.

I am married now, with 4 kids and one on the way.

When I was 20, I had just been dumped by my first love, and my brother died the year before. I started a downward trend in mental state that took a few years to reverse. When you go down that route, all people tend to avoid you. If you are into women, you tend to take the "women don't like me" harder than just "guys don't like me either."

I didn't date from age 20 to about age 28.

If I could now, I would go back and tell my past self to enjoy the quiet more. Biology has us all programmed to want to have kids and once that happens your life is f_cked.

Guys, remember that to women, sex means the chance of having a baby and they worry about the guy not helping take care of things. Thats why women want guys with their sh_t together. You would too. It makes sense.

Lotta guys <25 on here that are worried about getting laid for the first time but that doesn't matter. What matters is you get your sh_t together. Thats all.

Women want different things. Sex means different things to different people. Not everyone wants to have children. (One was enough for me.) With that being said, being proactive and finding ways to grow and develop as a person certainly wouldn’t hurt. Having goals and/or interests one is passionate about can make a person interesting.

People on disability often find someone, so a successful career isn’t a requirement.

I don’t have my s**t together and wouldn’t have different expectations for someone else. I didn’t care about that when I was younger, either. What matters to me is compatibility, kindness, and decency. I want someone I can laugh with, cry with, and experience life with - someone who views me as an equally valid and autonomous person, not an object or plaything to fill some void.

Maybe it depends on how you define “having your act together.”

Most people I know offline have partners whether they have a successful career or not. Many individuals here are not going to achieve financial success and security. That is the reality.

I was "incel like" when I was single but that term didn't exist then either. I was called a Misogynist a bit thou. I've also been accused of being a potential rapist at least a few times online & I was not even seeking sex nor complaining about not getting sex. I'd much rather have a sexless romantic relationship than an FBW thing or random casual sex. I think the issue for me is that I hated being single & I said & posted things when I was upset that were not worded very well. People quite often misunderstood me & put words in my mouth Like ProfessorJohn mentioned, I would notice abusers easily getting romantic relationships & it didn't make sense nor seem fair why I struggled so majorly to get any. While I knew I was autistic, I was a lot less knowledgeable about how autism hinders relationships or how autism causes me to interpret things others say & do at face value while most NTs are very different. I would tell my 21 year-old self to research autism a lot more & try to think of ways I might could better compensate for that & my other issues.

I guess I was kind of Incel-adjacent?

I didn't hate women. I didn't associate with any other people who were Incels or Incel-like so no echo chambers. But I was a "nice guy" and described myself as such at the time.

I went through that extended phase of not understanding why women often dated the types of guys they did. Then I finally realized what it really boils down to is assertiveness. Modern society is hugely destructive to girl's and women's self-esteem and self-image. Most of them lack confidence and are not sure of themselves. Their insecurities attract them to guys who are assertive and seem sure of themselves. "Bad boys" and narcissists are very assertive, for the wrong reasons. They're also manipulative so play on the insecurities of those girls and women. But there are also guys who aren't jerks that are also confident and assertive.

Something that contributed to being a "nice guy" is that, while I was never ugly I was also never anything remarkable in the looks department. Kind of plain. I was clean and reasonably neat, but not fashionable. I did not have a look that garnered any attention. Nothing about me made an exciting first impression. So it was only by getting to know me that I might show my qualities. I also did not have the Incel nice guy "give niceness, expect sex in return" mindset. Unlike most guys in high school and college, sex wasn't a priority to me. I could have happily been in a romantic relationship during that time of my life without any sex for years. (I often felt like I was a man out of time who could have done far better at courting girls and young women had I been born in the 1950s or earlier.)

I was also not the kind of a guy who took one look at a girl and was instantly smitten, or blown away by looks; I was attracted after starting to get to know certain girls. Once girl I fell hard for only after knowing her for more than a year. When I did finally work up the courage later to let her know she told me she had a crush on me when she first met me, but got over it! I never had the slightest idea, and nobody ever told me flat out. If any mutual friends tried to hint at it they did so poorly. (We're still good friends to this day.)

I should also point out I was never a "Oh, you've rejected me? Now I hate you and am going to talk nasty about you." I remained friends with a number of girls who rebuffed my interests. But definitely some long-term pining away, and a lot of giving more of myself in the manner you might expect of a "nice guy."

What do you call someone who voluntarily celibate?

I'm starting to prefer the company of Alexa over actual humans. Don't worry, things are strictly platonic between us.