There will be a day when guys have robot / AI partners who are programmed to sometimes reject their advances and cause arguments... since having an AI girlfriend who is always compliant is not exactly exciting. Chris Williamson alluded to AI OnlyFans "content creators" over a year ago, stipulating that "AI will soon be able to generate hotter than reality women, and ChatGPT will soon be able to do dirty talk better and more attentively than real girls, should we be worried?" Last week, on Instagram Reels, there appeared an AI generated "model", who had an OF account, to my horror, this OF account had 125,000 subscribers to its account. I am someone who believes the access of explicit content does absolutely no good at all for anybody involved in the interaction, whether it be the producer, provider nor consumer. However, the degeneration of this content to the point where real guys are paying real money to see and interact with an AI generated model scares me. It scares me because how disaffected and despondent and lost must you be to fall to this level? How many more boys and men will stop interacting in the dating market and choose to live in these virtual, pseudo-relationships? It almost goes without saying, real life relationships should be prioritised, and guys should not be removing themselves from the gene pool because they feel incapable of forming meaningful relationships with others. My first instinct is to say this should be legislated against and banned - that's how strongly I am against this degeneration. However, I have seen arguments online taking the position, 'what is wrong with this? It's their lives, and so it should be perfectly legal how they enjoy themselves so long as nobody is being harmed.' I query whether these consumers really are enjoying themselves and certainly contend that they're not being harmed. I think we cannot begin to understand the damage this would cause to the users, and to society in the long run. I think this will never be banned, nor even really restricted, and it is coming. The mission now is to really push the importance of two things: First the very real value of REAL relationships, since guys should be aspiring for "marrying a good woman, having children with that good woman, building a family with that good woman, being part of a community with that good woman and your children and building the institutions of society that actually make society flourish and function." Second to push that they are more than capable of achieving the first aim, and to provide them with a decision-making matrix and an education as to how exactly to pull it off.

If you have read the first of these submissions you may be aware that I am working on a journal of lessons I have learned, and the first chapter is dedicated to the key lessons I learned from the people in my family. For example, here is what I wrote for my late grandfather: "Grandad showed me that loving your family is the most important thing a man can do. He taught me the importance of Peace, and of God. Unfortunately, as the person I lost first, he also taught me the necessity of giving your loved ones their flowers whilst they are still with you. The man with a Powerful Spirit." This week my uncle, and sister's Godfather, passed away after a short-lived battle with terminal cancer. He was a good man, who weathered incredibly difficult times. When asked how he's doing, his response was always something along the lines of "I'll be alright." Without delving into the inner workings of my family, I can outline that my uncle's life was difficult. He and my aunt didn't have children and eventually they went separate ways after over 30 years of marriage. It was this event that highlighted to me how difficult life is for a man and this hardship is no excuse for losing your standards and being anything less than a gentleman. When the separation happened, my aunt moved back in with her sister and parents. She was welcomed and supported. My uncle was alone, his parents had passed and he was hundreds of miles away from his childhood hometown and siblings because he had left almost three decades prior to pursue a life with his childhood sweetheart, moving close to my aunt and her family. Post separation, he was alone, his only support financially, emotionally, and mentally was himself. Despite this, my uncle went to work day in, day out. He supported the least fortunate members of society by supplying wheelchairs to them day in, day out. Not only did he carry on contributing to society, and supporting his own livelihood. He also made an effort with my aunt, continuing to pay for her phone bills and the maintenance of her car. He was under no obligations to do this, aside from being bound by those very real obligations which come with unconditional love and selfless attempts to be a gentleman.

Ennui: A feeling. Dissatisfaction or listlessness caused by a lack of occupation or excitement. I learned this word whilst reading The Notes From The Underground by Dostoyevsky. It is a feeling I am all too familiar with, and one that I am sure is not unique to me. I did not know the feeling could be summarised in a word. The feeling of Ennui is like a tiredness with life, it occurs when we're burned out, when we've been trying and trying day in day out, over and over and yet nothing seems to have come from it. The chances are, if you're anything like me, if you sacrifice your time, energy and effort to pursue something "more" then you too have felt this. More extreme forms of ennui, or perhaps natural extensions of it could be characterised as a sort of suicidal ideation: The feeling of "it would be ok if I didn't wake up tomorrow", or perhaps even wishing for that. In Dostoyevsky's work the protagonist turns to nihilism. He does not care for other people, he views his work as above everybody else's, he is superior in every way because he can see the world for how it really is. He is bitter and resentful and entirely unpleasant to be around, doomed to make poor decision after poor decision fighting against any helping hand or act of kindness. If we are not careful, it's not inconceivable that we let ennui degenerate into this sort of outlook and lifestyle ourselves. Ennui, I would argue is natural. However I would presume it is much more prevalent in the modern day than ever before. I removed myself from social media for a year, and upon my return after 1 month I found myself much more susceptible to this feeling. "Comparison is the thief of joy" so the saying goes; it is also the catalyst of dissatisfaction, loss of excitement and utter listlessness. Content of far more successful people foisted upon us each and everyday can easily create the uneasy feeling. The good news is, this is just a feeling and not a chronic disorder. To remedy yourself of this feeling, I borrow the 8-dimensions of success from Peterson: "You need an intimate partner, you need a family, you need some friends, you need a job or a career, you need to use your time outside of work productively and meaningfully, and treat yourself appropriately mentally and physically so you can maintain your health, you need to engage with the broader social community, continually educate yourself and develop your skills."

A good life is as simple as this: You’re born crying in a room full of happy loved ones welcoming you to the world; you die happy in a room full of crying loved ones upset to see you go. Sickness, death and grief have been recurring themes in my family for a while now. It seems there is no shortage of terminal illness or flat out death. In all of this there is an important lesson which we may take for granted. You can quite literally see the measure of impact an individual has had in their life by the number of people who rush to their bedside when their time is dwindling or passed. Some of my relatives have visitors from across the country, across the world even just to spend precious moments together, to hear untold stories and share some final moments of laughter and joy. Other relatives were not so fortunate, not so popular, ultimately could not have felt as loved. The approach I have taken in recent years, since loosing my grandad, is to give your loved ones their flowers whilst they are still with you. I think it was Andrew Garfield who said that the feeling of grief is just all of the unreleased love you didn’t get to show that person when they were alive. I take this very literally and it terrifies me so I spend as much time as I can with my nans, listening to their stories and their wisdom, taking interest and making an effort. I try to do this whilst they are in relatively good health now because I don’t want to feel the sudden burden of panic to rush to the bedside when illness hits, to cram in some memories in the short time they may have left. I want to cherish these people whilst I have them, and they have their health. Until recently, I had been prioritising my nans because they are the eldest members of my immediate family, and I assumed that their time would be the shortest. I learned the hard way that this is simply untrue and instead now I endeavour to make the most of the time I have with all of my family members. For a lot of us, we’re so keen to “start” a family, we’re in such a rush to extend our family with our own children that we forget that we can care for, and provide for the family we already have, those who have already been caring for us. Proverbs 11:25 tells us “A generous person will prosper; whoever refreshes others will be refreshed.” I take this to mean that the true, genuine, unconditional love you show to your family and loved ones will be returned to you when your days are numbered and your own health dwindles.

"Here's something that's weird but true, in the day to day trenches of adult life: There is actually no such thing as atheism. There is no such thing as not worshipping. Everybody worships. The only choice we get is what we worship, and a compelling reason for choosing (God) is that pretty much anything else you worship will eat you alive (Wallace, D.F. 2005)" - "If you worship money and things, if they are where you tap real meaning in life, then you will never have enough. Never feel you have enough." - "Worship your own body, and beauty and sexual allure and you will always feel ugly, and when time and age start showing, you will die a million deaths before they finally plant you." On one level, we all know this stuff already. - "Worship power, and you will end up feeling weak and afraid, and you will need ever more power over others to numb you of your own fear." - "Worship your intellect, being seen as smart, you will end up feeling stupid, a fraud, always on the verge of being found out." - Worship feeling loved, and you will always feel anxious, isolated and alone. "The insidious thing about these forms of worship, is not that they are evil or sinful, it is that they are unconscious, they are default settings. They are the kind of worship that you gradually slip into, getting gradually more selective about what you see and how you measure value without ever being fully aware that, that is what you do. The so called 'real world' will not discourage you from acting on your default settings, because the so called 'real world' of men, and money, and power runs aptly along on the fear, and anger and frustration, and craving, and worship of self (Wallace, D.F. 2005)." When you worship money and things, your body and beauty, power and fame, your intellect or piety, when these are the things you orient towards, the things you worship. When they are the axioms that govern your choices, 'freedom' and life: You are setting yourself up for a horrid ride. Not only is the journey towards these things a tumultuous one, filled with inadequacy and insecurity the entire way; The destination is boundless. You can never have enough. Worse still, is that you run the risk of these axioms shattering - and they will shatter. And as "the unbearable glow of truth blinds you, you will recognise the falsities for what they are (Dostoyevsky, 1849)." If your life has been governed by falsities then the uncovering of truth will be catastrophic.