’BATERS AIN’T DATERS

Dudes prefer porn

They’re not getting jerked around by dating anymore. New Pew Research Center data has found that nowadays, 63% of men under 30 are electively single, up from 51% in 2019, and experts blame erotic alone time online as a major culprit.

“[Young men] are watching a lot of social media, they’re watching a lot of porn and I think they’re getting a lot of their needs met without having to go out,” psychologist Fred Rabinowitz told the Hill.

“I think that’s starting to be a habit.”

The new, post-COVID numbers back up previous research that the pandemic has made men prefer an evening alone instead of actually meeting a partner.

Just half of single men as a whole responded that they are “looking for a committed relationship and/or casual dates,” a decrease compared with 61% four years ago.

But these statistics tell a sadder truth about this generation of men, NYU psychology professor Niobe Way told the Hill.

“We’re in a crisis of connection,” Way said. “Disconnection from ourselves and disconnection from each other. And it’s getting worse.”

The male numbers come sharply juxtaposed to the 34% of women under 30 who now say they’re single — which has seen only a slight pandemic rise in that age group.

Also, no friends

Another factor at play might be the interests of women changing — especially as suitors of the same age are becoming less desirable, experts said.

“[Women would] rather go to brunch with friends than have a horrible date,” LA couples and family psychologist Greg Matos said.

The expectations of American men are also rising in the minds of women, according to masculinity expert and University of Akron professor Ronald Levant, who added that “unfortunately so many men don’t have more to give.”

But perhaps the largest issue now with young men — one highly impacting their social abilities — is that they are, as a whole, more lonely people than women, a recent study showed.

In the early 1990s, 55% of men were reported to have six or more close friends. That statistic dwindled to 27% in 2021, according to the American Perspectives Survey. Meanwhile, 15% of men now say they have no close friends, data compiled by the Survey Center on American Life found.

“Women form friendships with each other that are emotionally intimate, whereas men do not,” said Levant.