Why does r/collapse skew so male?

Could’ve stopped at “I just can’t imagine dudes thinking”. As a man I’m absolutely blown away at the things some guys think are going to work, whatever that looks like.

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IAMALWAYSSHOUTING@reddit

When the willy decides what to want all bets are off

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sloppymoves@reddit

But bro the influencer sigma alpha male sphere tells me I miss every shot I don't take.

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They’re …bizarre. I have photos of myself on my main account and they’ll say something benign to get you to accept the chat and then just drop some banger like “I like the way your hair sits on your boobs” 😑

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jinjaninja96@reddit

Lmao if a dude commented/messaged/said that to my face I’d laugh at them

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birdsy-purplefish@reddit

Spectacular.

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BritaB23@reddit

Lol

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SonicTemp1e@reddit

I won't DM you, but I will say Brita is a cool name.

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But_like_whytho@reddit

Britta’s in this?

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MucilaginusCumberbun@reddit

( ಠ ͜ʖಠ)

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Mehlhunter@reddit

Oh, britta is in this?

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matchapill@reddit

ur trophy of doom 🏆

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fiodorsmama2908@reddit

Me too!

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Strong_Equipment1676@reddit

I want one too

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OctopusIntellect@reddit

~~Female detected, initiate protocol Z-Alpha-B!~~

Hi! Please could you give us any thoughts you have on why you personally find this subreddit of interest?

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matchapill@reddit

im neurodivergent and tend to overthink and catastrophe naturally so that led me here. hope this helps

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MissShirley@reddit

Same. I've always loved learning about the disasters of the world. An internet rabbit hole led me to catastrophic climate change in 2012 and desperation to find others who knew about it led me here.

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Ok-Elderberry-7088@reddit

I honestly feel so alone except for the people here. It's so stupid. Everyone out there makes me feel alone. All of them clueless. All of them just blissfully ignorant. They talk on and on about the plans they have, vacations they're going on, stupid shows they watch, just normal everyday stuff. I can't relate to them at all. Knowing about this is kind of a curse. Unless you use the knowledge to actually do something about it like prepare. But that's honestly so hard and I don't even know if it's realistic at all. Maybe I would have been better off being like them and just enjoying my time, ignoring all of this. I don't really think that. But maybe. Either way, just wanted to say the desperation to find others who know about it is real. I just wish I could find people like this IRL to not be so alone anymore.

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Sizzlersister43@reddit

This is exactly why I don’t talk about it, because most people seem to have no idea anything is wrong, or just don’t care. I know I would just get called a conspiracy theorist by the NPC’s, anyway. They have to wake up on their own.

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matchapill@reddit

agree it can become a rabbit hole and just exacerbate the sense of alienation

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bobbib14@reddit

Me too buddy

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Alienself789@reddit

Those I can talk to about habitat/global degradation, there is really nothing to say. They usually keep up with information/news as do I, so really there are other more pertinent to daily life issues rather than rehash stuff we know. Though I sometimes remind knowers when they start talking long term.

Prepare? I am starting to wonder about the amount of water I keep on hand. Certainly I refresh it time to time, but after 7 years I'm getting fatigued. Food is unhealthy cans but have quite a store just in case as far as that. I see it more for supplying or trade.

Maybe it is just hoping for me, but sans a local or global apocalypse, I think we will continue as the proverbial frog in the pot of water on the burner. In this case it is a gas burner set on low at present and the lid about to be put on the pot. Presently the gas burner will crank up bit by bit, but not exactly now.

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MissShirley@reddit

I completely agree, no one wants to talk about the bad so it just gets ignored, and we get seen as negative for bringing it up.

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Pale-Recognition231@reddit

Why would you ask that? No shit it’s the same reason why you’re here

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GalaxyPatio@reddit

Because it sucks out here and this is the only place that I can talk about that fact at all without being told I'm doom and gloom, overreacting, or exhausting.

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DogFennel2025@reddit

Me, too. Except for the cat, nobody will talk collapse with me. (And sometimes even the cat falls asleep.)

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WhirledPeaze@reddit

My situation as well. My kids don't want to think about it. I'm gearing up to semi retire early so I can use my time for doing things I enjoy before it gets too crazy.

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NotAnotherScientist@reddit

🏆🍪

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Sad_Information6982@reddit

Our prize is being reminded that the femconomy is slowly dismantling what's left of men's uncanny ability to resist capitalistic decline until they are well and truly forked and sporked. :^)

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Traditional_Way1052@reddit

Same

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PHL2287@reddit

I’m just here as a crazy cat lady trying to make sense of it all. I gotta protect my kitty’s.

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AstronautLife5949@reddit

Amen. I have dozens. I would die for them.

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TopSloth@reddit

Cat dad and this is how I feel most of the time reading this sub 🤣

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Livid_Village4044@reddit

I wanted cougar-kitties, but they might eat my neighbor's livestock. Bad kitty!

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TopSloth@reddit

You could always get a Maine coon, pretty big cats but couldn't eat pigs or cows

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nympholeptics@reddit

Thank you for paying the cat tax. They’re adorable 🥹

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TopSloth@reddit

They are lol but they can also be little spider monkeys

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amgirl1@reddit

My chihuahua will DEFINITELY need protecting.

The cats will be fine

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Ready_Reading9693@reddit

Same

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ideknem0ar@reddit

Trying to survive The Crumbles with my feline homies riding shotgun. <= basically where I'm at

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AstronautLife5949@reddit

Female Antinatalist here.

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Berlinesa77@reddit

I’ve just commented this elsewhere, so apologies for the double post, but I’d suggest that you also take the average woman’s mental / work load into account, which often does not allow for all that much time spent leisurely. It’s easy for anyone to look up statistics on that. Personally, in my German/European bubble, I know women who are politically active, but still have to do all sorts of care work, as they/we are mostly socialized and raised to do, which simply doesn’t leave as much time for other interests and hobbies. The collapse-aware scientist may be very well informed and besides her work, active in various organizations, but still has to share the load, with her partner, of raising her kids (which takes A LOT of time and energy) or taking care of her elderly parents or volunteering and so on. Someone has to decide on dinner, shop, cook, supervise children’s homework, then head to the desk and correct students papers, do it all again tomorrow, may not have a lot time left to spend on Reddit. But maybe, after a lot of exhausting mental work, would rather go browse Bluesky or TikTok or read a novel. Again, look at statistics on how housework is distributed even among couples who aren’t parents. And yet, Communities like TwoXPreppers exist.

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gtmattz@reddit

My wife is very collapse aware and is a redditor. She finds this sub to be too depressing and a place where people fear monger and agitate too much. She also has the opinion that there is a lot of disinformation here.

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earthkincollective@reddit

A lot of women find reality too depressing, in my experience. (I'm a woman). I wish women had more emotional fortitude, frankly.

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Berlinesa77@reddit

I’m astonished why you would think that other women lack emotional fortitude. Internalized misogyny much?

Perhaps something for you to keep in mind: in many societies, women are socialized (not born!) to do a lot of care work, starting when they are really young, lasting into old age. You might know the statistics, hopefully. Physically and mentally. That takes away a lot of time and energy that might otherwise be channeled into political work, for instance. As for issues around the polycrisis and collapse: This isn’t a sub where people talk a whole lot about “collapsing early”, prepping for the last decades of their/our lives, although there are definitely collapse-aware preppers here. They do exist, ans if you’d like to see what fortitude and resilience looks like, perhaps you’ve never visited https://www.reddit.com/r/TwoXPreppers/

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alvinccisum101@reddit

But shouldn't we be more aware of that? i really think that if we don't act now the world is going to shit, and is very depressing to know that the real people that should be blamed don't care and we as people can't do much, but i hope that i am wrong and your wife is right, i'm young, and all i want is my future to not be doomed...

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kupo_moogle@reddit

I’m the one wanting to start a survival garden and my husband wants to grow roses lol

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Rosieforthewin@reddit

There are dozens of us!

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CreatureOfTheFull@reddit

When I’ve participated in this sub, everyone has assumed that I am male. “My bro, my man, my dude” and male pronouns. I don’t discourage them because what use does being perceived as a female grant me? Male is the default and means my thoughts can be taken for their merit. I love being online for that reason, although lately I’ve been more open and looking for more female dominated spaces.

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VolitionReceptacle@reddit

fwiw growing up around a lot of guys I always figured dude was gender neutral

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Potential_Being_7226@reddit

That’s a name no one would self-apply where I come from.

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VolitionReceptacle@reddit

ok

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gentian_red@reddit

yea being seen as female on reddit is just targeting you to be harassed, pmed with shit and doxxed. i say this as a male (sorry)

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earthkincollective@reddit

I get that too, but to be fair I definitely communicate in a more commonly masculine way online.

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Sizzlersister43@reddit

Same, also female here. I wonder if it has to do with looking at things through a more logical lens, like men do. Most women tend to be more emotional and that can be construed through text, so I would assume that logic and rationality can also be construed through text, and therefore the algorithms think some of us are men. Just a guess…

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the_elephant_stan@reddit

Reddit in general skews male anyway

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VolitionReceptacle@reddit

the boring but probably accurate truth

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squeezymarmite@reddit

My first thought as well. Or at least everyone assumes you are male if you don't indicate otherwise.

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GargoyleHoe@reddit

Am a male despite my username

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run_free_orla_kitty@reddit

I've met gargoyle hoes who are men too! You're not alone.

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Potential_Being_7226@reddit

everyone assumes you are male if you don't indicate otherwise

This absolutely happens. I’m a (cis)woman but get referred to as “he” or addressed as “bro.” I think it’s pretty entertaining and tells me a a lot about the person commenting.

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KrankyKong28@reddit

I think this is the actual reason for sure.

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lavapig_love@reddit

Hey collapseniks. Just a reminder that any creepy PMs sent to anyone identifying as a woman, and then sent to us as proof, will result in your permanent and irreversible ban from Collapse, along with a mute for three and a half years. Or posts or doxxing attempts or anything like it.

I mean we'll do the same for anyone getting harassed, but women too.

Mahalo for your time.

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SonicTemp1e@reddit

3 and a half years seems oddly specific. How was that number arrived at?

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lavapig_love@reddit

Calculate A, the amount of this sub receives on a daily basis times B, the number of posts we remove for Rule 1 times C, the average length of a ban against a poster for repeated rule violations.

A times B times C equals X. If X is more than the amount of my patience, you get muted.

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blodo_@reddit

Nice Fight Club reference

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z00dle12@reddit

Mahalo! Are you Hawaiian? Just cool to see my language on here.

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Ursa89@reddit

The women I'm close to in my life are aware of impending catastrophe, want to prepare for it, are supportive of me taking steps to prepare for it... But don't really want to hear about it very often and become agitated if I talk about it for more than a few minutes. By contrast the men I'm close to in my life won't shut up about it.

I know the personal experience isn't indicative of wider things but I genuinely think this might be the answer

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kalkutta2much@reddit

have u considered they just don’t want to talk to you about it?

i’m a woman and i talk constantly about it, with both men & women, but not with men i feel are way more sexist than they themselves realize

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Sizzlersister43@reddit

This makes sense.

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Douf_Ocus@reddit

I think you can change your gender in your profile anyway you want right? Hence I don't really think it reflects anything. A female user might just select "male" to avoid any kind of potential harassment.

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CountySufficient2586@reddit

Idk men get murdered twice the rate of women.

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Humanist_2020@reddit

Cause reddit is 75% white male

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BerrsanArslan@reddit

Interesting to see no one has an answer, this is my take:

Wether you admit it or not when things like this are discussed many men fantasize about it happening, testing themselves, being the hero, living through chaos. And I think this is a male thing simply because of biology. Challenge, danger, and proving yourself in extreme situations is primarily a male biological desire, so collapse talk scratches that itch in a in interesting way.

Also don’t wanna get political, but I’d say compared to women men lost their natural edge a lot more. Masculine roles aren’t as prevalent anymore, or just not as appreciated, and men are bored/feel useless. If there was a collapse situation we go back to the basics, the man would have to step up and help “his people” survive, which is currently just a fantasy.

So overall even if not a concious thought, I think it’s a subconscious fantasy stemming from male biology.

(Please don’t come at me about gender roles. Doesn’t mean some women can’t have these desires, I’m just trying to analyse the situation logically through human nature).

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Sizzlersister43@reddit

I’m a female (age 47) that has many of these same fantasies/desires but I agree with your assessment. I’m not sure why I have these desires (saving the world, being a hero/heroine, etc.) but I guess it may be partly because I have overcome a lot of things (severe mental illness and being poor, mostly) and also because I prefer to work manual labor jobs, and I also strongly prefer to be alone/in solitude. All things that usually are more applicable to masculinity. I also prefer to problem-solve on my own (as often as I can, I’m not one of those delusional women who think they can do everything men can do). 🤣 I’m also a regular on the conspiracy sub, if that tells you anything. But this is very interesting to think about.

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BitchfulThinking@reddit

I'm a lady but all of my collapse aware friends irl are male (but gentlemen!). There are women who are aware in feminist spaces, as they're politically aware and read extensively in general, but the topics focus more on the current political threats affecting us. For women, collapse and change generally means we get murdered and raped even more than usual.

Men don't have to worry about carrying a warlord rapist's baby and dying in labor, so we keep that talk on our subs to not get attacked and stalked. They still send all of us plenty of horrific threats, which reddit allows while banning the rest of us every other day...

In my day to day life, I tend to get more pushback from other women, because they're usually the ones doing all of the childcare, so the thought of the horrors their child will experience can be too paralyzing, when they're already exhausted. I don't have children.

Our lives already involve so much prepping to just exist (eg. "Fuck it" funds and go bags to escape abuse, not planning a snorkeling trip during menstruation), so that part of it isn't anything new. I think more women are aware out there, but we're also more likely to be gaslit and called "hysterical" for our observations, which leads to more of us just not saying anything, to not become even more of a target. I'm just a touch masochistic, I suppose lol

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ultramarine_moon@reddit

Brilliant post and bang on. As a woman you learn not to express extreme views because the pile-ons become, quite frankly, boring.

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cydril@reddit

I think the real answer is that women are less likely to comment here and just lurk. Based on a lot of the replies to this thread you can probably understand why.

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GalaxyPatio@reddit

Plenty of us comment here on a regular basis and are just assumed to be men

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kylerae@reddit

Yeah I saw a comment above that explained how the tool works and it looks for keywords in the subreddit it is scanning. When I comment on r/collapse I very rarely mention my gender because it typically isn't pertinent to the conversation, so I wonder if it is likely that female users on here just don't mention their gender often because it doesn't really impact what they are saying.

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miss_sarah_jane@reddit

So it's a load of shite then. My take on the explanation of how the (apparently not AI even though it is literally a form of AI) tool works is that, if it can't identify you as being female from your Reddit activity, then your profile is deemed male.

I have only been in this sub for a year or so, but in that time I don't think I have come across a discussion where mentioning one's gender is necessary or relevant. Maybe something around what's happening in the USA with the roll back of women's rights would call for it, but even then I dunno.

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intergalactictactoe@reddit

Yeah, if it's only scanning user comments in this sub, it makes more sense. Unless I specifically made a mention to my gender, which has little relevance to the subject, I'm just assumed to be a man. That's just pretty typical of the internet, though, tbh.

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Mercurial891@reddit

“Ah, the internet! Where the men are men, and the women are also men, and the kids are cops.”

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SleepsInAlkaline@reddit

You said it, bro

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johnthomaslumsden@reddit

My man!

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Mercurial891@reddit

Bruh!😎

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Sullyville@reddit

yeah my dude

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clovis_227@reddit

The "generic masculine" applies to more things than just grammar, after all

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pugyoulongtime@reddit

Yeah people always assume I’m a dude. Idk why.

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bristlybits@reddit

less likely to do a survey as well

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winterbird@reddit

It's just the default assumption. Despite having what I think is more likely to be a feminine username and a profile picture which looks to be a woman, I'm most often referred to as a "he" on reddit. I don't bother to correct it because I'd have to keep repeating myself so often, but it's interesting how the assumption overrides even what's right before people's eyes.

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szai@reddit

I only bring up gender when it is directly relevant to the discussion, which is rare. I also lurk in most of the hundreds of subs I have joined over the years.

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LemonyFresh108@reddit

If I hear Nate Hagans ask one more of his female guests this same question, I swear to god! Why does he make them speculate on this and speak for their whole gender!? How is it different from him asking a certain race of guest why there are so few ___xxx people in the collapse space?

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SunnySummerFarm@reddit

I’m poking in a day behind, but I will say, if I was a touch more sensitive I wouldn’t still be here. I am a woman who talks about woman things here from time to time, very specifically having a child, and people can get kinda rowdy about it response. There’s been more than one removed comment. I’ve been banned from another subreddit because I dared to be more pro child than pro something else.

Reddit isn’t a woman-leaning friendly space, and I navigate it very very carefully being aware of that. And prepared to take the absolutely going to happen flack that comes with it. I grew up with lots of boys, used to work in tech/start up, so I am prepared for it. But I take breaks because it can really get under my skin.

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FerociousTailWagging@reddit

It's extra interesting because in my experience of actually working in environmental campaigns/ policy, it's a majority female sector.

Maybe men feel more comfortable in airing their opinions online? Maybe men tend to focus more on the survivalism side of things? And I do think men are more likely to have a bit of a individualist collapse fetish where women are more likely to be out in the community doing stuff.

Having said that, as a woman, I love this reddit 😂

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The-Unmentionable@reddit

How does it know the users gender? I often am mistake for male and do not correct them. Well the nondualist in me really feels I am no gender, or all genders. But that's a whole other conversation I 100% present as a feminine cis gendered woman irl.

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hairy_ass_truman@reddit

It isn't a dating sub so to me other's gender doesn't matter in most cases. I suppose I could open profiles and try to determine gender, but I don't.

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The-Unmentionable@reddit

Right, who tf cares lol

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catterson46@reddit

It’s an interesting question. Perhaps women are socialized to look for the good and make the best of bad situations. I have my theories why this might be so. Such as historically women dealing with patriarchal oppression might use denial to cope.

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Tuggerfub@reddit

because you're on reddit

this place is a sausage party that normalizes jailbait and other things that are off-putting to women

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victorious_lemon@reddit

Most females are not concerned about politics, resource management and society in general, even if they pretend to be.

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mikerbt@reddit

Just get out and don’t come back.

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victorious_lemon@reddit

I'm really sorry if that upsets you... it's just how things are (on average).

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collapse-ModTeam@reddit

Rule 1: In addition to enforcing Reddit's content policy, we will also remove comments and content that is abusive or predatory in nature. You may attack each other's ideas, not each other.

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mikerbt@reddit

It doesn’t upset me but it probably upsets the many women who are interested in politics on this sub, partially because it’s spectacularly incorrect and supported by zero evidence other than your own vibes and experiences.

Also this isn’t really about “politics”, you may be a lost redditor.

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collapse-ModTeam@reddit

Rule 1: In addition to enforcing Reddit's content policy, we will also remove comments and content that is abusive or predatory in nature. You may attack each other's ideas, not each other.

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SprayingOrange@reddit

ITT: OP gets all the Women of /r/collapse to expose themselves and starts /r/collapsedating

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saad_al_din@reddit

Gigabrain tactics.

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diedlikeCambyses@reddit

Lol

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dinah-fire@reddit

Has this subreddit ever done a demographic survey? I'm skeptical of this tool but would be curious what active users self-report in a poll.

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l_am_a_Potato@reddit (OP)

Oh, I missed that! Thank you. The poll is probably more representative than the tool, I assume.

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dinah-fire@reddit

I would definitely trust the survey over an AI tool! That said, it's still a lower percentage of women than the Reddit userbase over all, if the split of the site is 60/40, so the question is still valid.

They did one in 2021 and 2023, I feel like we're due for another in 2025 - mods?

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poop-machines@reddit

Nah a survey is less reliable than the study. Women may be more likely to answer a survey than men on this sub.

It's not an "AI tool", it analysed all the users for their gender, and didn't guess. It looked through their comments to find specific phrases of gender. From as simple as "I'm a woman", "as a girl" to talking about private things, gender specific stuff, to posts where they say "25F" or something.

It searched for specific terms.

It's not like it was an AI making guesses, it was formulaic.

The error bar was 10% , so I would say it's 17% or under.

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dinah-fire@reddit

It did the analyzing using NLP, which if you prefer the term 'machine learning', fine, but that seems to be used pretty interchangeably with 'AI' these days.

That strategy may work well in subs where people are mostly talking about themselves, but in a sub like this one, that strategy is obviously going to cause underreporting. No one in this sub is going to go around saying, "I, a 23 year old woman, think that the tariffs are going to cause major disruption in the food supply that demonstrates collapse because..." < and by putting that example in here, the tool is now going to think I'm a 23 year old woman, another flaw in the methodology.

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l_am_a_Potato@reddit (OP)

Yeah, I'd also be interested in a new survey :) Do you have any theories regarding the split?

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dinah-fire@reddit

Not sure.. I am one of that 27% and obviously I use it, so I'm not going to have much insight into women who don't. r/TwoXPreppers has almost 200k users, so it's not like women aren't thinking about these topics or prepping (not that r/collapse is prepping, but there is crossover.)

You'd probably get more interesting answers if you went to a different subreddit that is adjacent to r/collapse and probably have women in it who are interested in collapse topics, and ask them how they feel about r/collapse. But I wouldn't actually do that because I don't think the other subreddit would like it much.

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Demonicmeadow@reddit

Also im a female who’s been in this sub a long time and never seen this poll.

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Lucyschmoocy@reddit

Same.

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minderbinder49@reddit

Thirded

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Alarmed-Soup-5591@reddit

4th

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stillnotarussian@reddit

Cinco

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diedlikeCambyses@reddit

The support sub is more female.

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Xtrems876@reddit

By having a quick look at the map it seems that women tend to keep to their own subreddits.

There's a couple of clusters which are nearly 100% female. I would wager that in the online world where everyone assumes you are a male if you don't specify otherwise, and some people are really gross if you do specify otherwise, women will prefer to spend time in subreddits where people assume you're a woman, purpose-built for that.

But that is only my assumption, and I'm not a woman nor a scholar on this subject.

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Short_King_13@reddit

So who the fuck cares besides you bringing gender war bullshit?

There's a fuckton of subs where the majority is females and no one bats an eye.

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JASHIKO_@reddit

Males are:

More likely to take action against threats. Men feel they have a responsibility to be providers. Most of the prepping role models are men thus inspiring men. Men like to be in control as much as possible.

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Just_a_Marmoset@reddit

I consider #1 and #2 to be absolute nonsense. For #3, it completely depends on the type of prepping you're talking about. I'll give you #4.

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JASHIKO_@reddit

For the record, this isn't my opinion. I saw a video over on YouTube a long time back discussing this topic after a few prepper channels compared their YouTube analytics which showed 98% male audience's.

Now that could be because youtube is more male oriented and women prefer other sources but they were throwing around these ideas.

I do think there is substance to 2 and 3 though how heavily weighted no idea.

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gwladosetlepida@reddit

All sexist question of sexist sources and you will get a sexist answer every time.

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gwladosetlepida@reddit

I can't even make it through all these bigoted gender essential answers.

Women don't stay here bc the dudes here all think like this, comment like this, and have zero issue putting their personal bias out there as fact.

I lurk this sub to read the posts, the comments are garbage. Useful comments are in twoxpreppers. I used to engage here but got tired of all the head pats about how my brain just can't get it bc collapse is something only men grasp.

Having a female presenting name basically means that whatever you say will be dismissed. It's quite observably a place where females aren't welcome. If it was it would look more like twoxpreppers. Subs like that exist so women can have real conversations about real things without men derailing the conversation.

Fucking downvote or ban me or whatever, it wouldn't the first time I've been banned for answering this question honestly.

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cool_waterz@reddit

Is there a reason why it matters to OP what gender anyone might be when discussing a topic that affects absolutely everyone?

Honestly, what's the purpose here?

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l_am_a_Potato@reddit (OP)

To me as an enby person it's always interesting how gender influences how receptive people are to different topics and frames. The purpose, for me, is to understand what those gendered attributes contribute to the imbalance in this case.

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cool_waterz@reddit

You are setting yourself up to some serious misappropriation here.

As I'm sure you know very well, correlation isn't the same as causation. In other words; whatever the actual distribution here, it's a massive and baseless leap to assume that gender measurably informes how receptive people are to the topics discussed here.

I find your attempt to "genderize" participation in this sub mildly disturbing.

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l_am_a_Potato@reddit (OP)

I am not suggesting that the gender identity itself has to be the cause for the discrepancy. It just jumped out to me, reading some of the collapsology scholarship, that even they self conciously noticed how many male scholars there are in the field. Now with the survey results on this subreddit, the difference doesn't seem to be as large in the community at least, compared to reddit users overall.

Do you think gender plays no role, or why do you find my question disturbing?

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cool_waterz@reddit

I think gender plays no special or significant role here; certainly no more than in general on Reddit. I find your inquiry somewhat disturbing because if there has ever been a great equaliser, then collapse certainly is, and suggesting a gender-based division in the face of existential threat has rather sinister echoes.

Will you explain why this is important for you?

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earthkincollective@reddit

I fail to see why it's inherently sinister, at all. And in my experience it's a simple fact that women seem more squeamish and reluctant to talk about the grim reality of collapse than men - I personally feel like a dramatic exception.

Perhaps it's because women are enculturated to be "positive" and "happy", so there's a slight gender preference towards that and away from topics that are very much the opposite. I don't know.

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bleenken@reddit

“Disturbing” seems like quite a stretch. OP’s question seems like a normal curiosity. Noticing a data point and asking if anyone has thoughts on why it is, doesn’t have “sinister echos”.

It might not have an interesting answer, but it’s not sinister to ask the question.

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darkpsychicenergy@reddit

“Highly suspect” might be a better description, especially given the OP’s very anti-collapse, Wall Street/Abundance bro user history.

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obscure_predation@reddit

It’s because they’re a bigot, there are zero differences between men and birthing people

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ohyeahwell@reddit

My wife locks up thinking about her death, our children being harmed etc. /r/collapse is a death cult.

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badgirlmonkey@reddit

idk if i ever said my gender to reddit or this sub?

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bakerfaceman@reddit

Because women have no time due to all the domestic labor they get stuck with.

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IAMALWAYSSHOUTING@reddit

Cynicism is easily afforded by the privileged. Women have enough to worry about just walking in public

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VinniPuh10@reddit

I assumed it wad 50/50 (I'm female)

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nothanksihaveasthma@reddit

I have a theory(?) and it’s going to make people mad. It’s also going to sound like I am insane.

Let’s start off with the objective fact that we currently live in a largely patriarchal society yes? At least if we draw facts from the people alive today, their lived experiences, the majority of women can identify some way that patriarchal systems have affected them.

So, what does this socially do to women, over several decades? Maybe we could see trends go back even further. What we do know is that women have been affected at both large and small scales. A few examples:

-suffrage! -beauty standards -societal expectations including but not limited to running a household and having children -staying seen and not heard

Now what comes from the above? Especially if you’re a woman who refuses to buy into the social norms?

Women who buy into the life script outlined above, they use up all their attention and time making sure they adhere to the rules. They do not have time or space to think freely.
Woman who opt out, more often than not, get caught in the many pitfalls of being “on the fringe”.

More examples: 1. I am a woman following the life script. Between running my household, rearing my children, working, keeping up with trends, consuming, stressing, consuming some more…I never introspect. No thoughts, head empty. I also lack emotional depth and the tools and skills it would take to find myself after I’ve built my entire identity on what society wants me to be. I’m going to have a few mental breakdowns throughout my life, learn nothing from them, and continue that way till I die, leaving nothing behind except my massive carbon footprint and actual carbon copies of myself- more mindless consumers for the machine to eat.

I am a woman who didn’t want to buy into the life script. I have to prove my worth, I have to be somebody, I have to show everyone why I’m special, different. This often manifests into women getting into weird hobbies, “finding themselves”, becoming misandrists and/or internalized misogynists. Consumerism is a big part of it, lack of community is a part of it. No time to think about real-life because I am lost in an endless jungle of trying to “find myself” within a world I perceive is against me at all times.

People, everyone, not just women…we are pulled every which way at all times. There’s not a lot of space or time to just stop and look around. And if you did, you’re probably blinded by a bunch of ego fueled bullshit to see that the world is dying, the self doesn’t fucking matter, and the real issue is that someday your entire way of life won’t exist.

I mean just look at the fucking neo-hippy types. They think they’re living off the land in a commune and doing something that matters. But in reality it’s like 7 women, and 3 men, everyone’s crusty. Everyone’s fucking each other and doing drugs, polluting because they failed to set up proper waste disposal and they burn their fucking garbage on their “organic farm”. They have no idea that the “ayahuasca retreats” they do contribute to deforestation and endangerment of a sacred plant. Nor do they give a fuck about the deeply harmful cultural appropriation in the name of “being one with the earth”. Wake up honey, you’re in a pseudo-cult and the guys you’re around aren’t special, they aren’t gurus, they’re just trying to get laid. You haven’t found yourself, you’ve entirely lost the plot.

Don’t get me wrong, I do not place the faults of women on men. We all have free will, the fault is mostly consumerism, media, and the billionaires that created the machine.

Alright that’s all I got for today, thanks for reading. Feel free to add or whatever.

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NNovis@reddit

I don't know if asking a bunch of guys is going to tell you why a bunch of women don't go here, you know? The info you're going to be receiving is going to be skewed.

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retrosenescent@reddit

It would be skewed either way.

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NNovis@reddit

No? I mean, the question IS "why aren't women coming and staying here?" I would think that, in order to get to the core of the issue(s), you'd ask women's opinions on the whys.

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retrosenescent@reddit

In either scenario, you'd be asking people who are here, why people are not here. Either way, you'd get sampling bias.

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l_am_a_Potato@reddit (OP)

That's true. I still think the responses might be interesting and illuminating, seeing what peoples theories are.

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NNovis@reddit

Well, alright. I'll give my thoughts:
Women tend to try to uplift each other more than men and this subreddit doesn't really allow for much "uplifting" since it's pretty dire news a lot of the time

Men like to spiral into negative emotions a lot, and there are a lot of people here that will rant in a doomerism-way

Just in general, the topics here are pretty dire so you're just not going to see a lot of people wishing to enter this space in general.

Touching back on the "uplifting" stuff, women WILL coordinate to accomplish a task. Men aren't really taught to work within groups that well and this subreddit doesn't really push actionable things (nor does it have to, sometimes getting info out is good enough).

With how much Reddit has been pushing AI stuff and crypto stuff, and blockchain BS, I kinda have to question how many users are actually legit people.

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bleenken@reddit

Exactly this. I’ll often see the same articles posted here and in r/TwoXPreppers. The conversation below it can be quite different. But then there are a lot more practical posts in TXP, giving and asking for advice around collapse. Collaboration on actionable things. Report backs of experiences of collapse events (like extreme weather events).

I don’t think there is a gender split on the interest in collapse topics, there’s just a gender split here because of how this sub is set up to function.

And I could be remembering this wrong, but I vaguely recall that this mod team skews male as well? Feel free to correct me on that though.

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thekbob@reddit

And I could be remembering this wrong, but I vaguely recall that this mod team skews male as well? Feel free to correct me on that though.

Yes, but to no fault of our own from what I can tell. Just who applies; perhaps predominantly men have desire to be unpaid internet janitors? Dunno.

Most of us seem to also follow /r/TwoXPreppers, though.

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AwakeGroundhog@reddit

I would assume Reddit in general skews male?

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LetItAllGo33@reddit

I think because they are more sheltered from the cradle, women are far more subject to the just world fallacy as well as blind optimism, the idea that everything will be fine if we just do what we're "supposed" to be doing.

They're more rule following, because modern rules skew their way.

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BlueAndYellowTowels@reddit

My theory is, men in the US and Canada (Australia as well) fetishize “frontier culture”. We fetishize the “rugged individual” in all our media.

There are men who unironically wish they could live in a Zombie apocalypse.

That’s one aspect. It’s a form of “freedom”.

The other aspect is women fundamentally understand the world around them very differently than men. Simple thought: women have children and by default means they have to think of the future and caring for their children and providing for them. This demands a somewhat optimistic future. You have to believe that a better tomorrow exists because your children need it. It makes perfect sense and honestly, it a better approach.

Reminder here, many men see the idea of dying in a blaze of glory as something desirable. Women don’t have this limitation because they tend to be community builders and mothers. They’re fundamentally, builders of social structures. Men are very bad at this. Most men have little to no friends. They’re focused on mechanical problems.

I would also add… I would bet there is a racial split too. I don’t think American Black folks would be as desperate and White Americans. They come from a culture born out of hardship.

My wife for example, Haitian (she’s not even American in this context). The idea of collapse is very real to her. But her position is “We must survive.”. Haiti has been the target of embargoes, invasions and additional violence. My wife has literally been shot at and watched friends and family be murdered. In her mind “some burning trees” isn’t something to worry about. She has experienced extreme fear and violence. Her mindset is “Survive and move forwards.”

So, it tracks differently for different cultures. There’s many layers to collapse awareness. Some people just see it as another struggle to overcome. In their minds, there’s always a tomorrow. If there is no tomorrow, why worry then? Just keep going until something stops it.

I admire that approach. Despair is not a helpful emotion.

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grinning5kull@reddit

Not all women have or want children

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victoriaisme2@reddit

That's true, but does the fact that they don't have or want children affect what is understood here to be an instinctive drive to endure a better future for other people's children?

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grinning5kull@reddit

How about assuming that women don’t want anyone to suffer the consequences of collapse, wether they are children or not.

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aubreypizza@reddit

For many of us yes. Because we’ve done the work thinking about the ethics of bringing a new human life onto this planet. Many of us have taken where the planet is going into consideration as part of that decision. Now whether that translates to trying to do something or doomerism is a case by case depending on other factors.

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birdsy-purplefish@reddit

Yep. Look at how heavily the childfree subreddit skews female.

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obscure_predation@reddit

Umm sorry sweaty, there are zero differences between men and birthing people

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Banned4Truth10@reddit

Why does it matter?

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MiseryisCompany@reddit

55 y/o female here. Obviously I can't speak for anyone else, but I struggle to follow the sub sometimes because of Mom guilt. I really get into my own head about what a hard time my kids are going to have. I know dads love their kids just as much, but they might process the traumatic future differently. I don't think this is THE answer (I'd be stunned if all followers were parents) but it might be a piece.

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aubreypizza@reddit

Reddit as a whole skews male.

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ian23_@reddit

I’m AMAB but identify as non-binary / agender, and grew up in a very socially conservative midwestern social space, so I have spent a lot of time contemplating gender like an anthropologist, since for my own safety I needed to figure out its rules and cosplay it effectively, despite it having virtually no intuitive meaning or value for me.

Anyway, my answers:

Lack of time and “spoons” of energy. Childrearing and household tasks disproportionately fall on women, which leaves less energy and time for staying caught up on climate science, geopolitical trends, and so on. Also, increases the need to just “shut off” one’s brain during the very few minutes of peace and alone time one gets.
Cognitive dissonance. I would bet even among that 7%, a high proportion are childfree. If you already have kids, and you’re their primary caregiver / nurturer, you really really don’t want it to be true that they face a bleak future.
Gender programming / culture / peer pressure. Especially in socially conservative spaces, part of ‘toxic feminity’ is to use thought-terminating cliches like “Oh well it’s out of our hands” or “Worry is interest paid on a debt that never comes due” whenever the most-collapse-aware woman in the space tentatively raises these topics. If you don’t have anyone to explore the ideas with, it’s harder to develop a clear set of beliefs for oneself. (I’ve noticed that I’m often the last AMAB in a group of women at a social gathering, as I don’t have the software that says, “whoops, they’re talking about girl stuff now, time to see myself out and watch sportsball” so I hear more of these conversations than most people who like I do would.)
More gender programming. Men pride themselves on stoicism / stuffing down their emotions. This is terrible for society overall, but in this particular case it lets you get further down the awareness rabbit hole before you just stop reading and start sobbing.

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appropriate_pangolin@reddit

It says it’s using data patterns from 2019? I would be skeptical.

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JB153@reddit

Sub was much smaller pre 2019 so different data, sample sizes, etc. Fuck I've been here a while lol.

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l_am_a_Potato@reddit (OP)

Yea, that's a huge caveat. I think it might have changed substantially since then, but I couldn't find any other source with more recent datasets, because of reddits API changes, I think.

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leisurechef@reddit

These days AI can scrape online comments to profile you, safer to not identify or to identify incorrectly

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HardNut420@reddit

I doubt that reddit is only 58% male there is so much missogany on r/all

it could be just right wing bots though and that's probably true considering the recent drama with twitch where like a quarter of the user base were bots I'm sure reddit has the same problem maybe even worse

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CreatureOfTheFull@reddit

Gender war gets the most engagement, it give karma to bots and the like, and it is specifically used by certain actors to sow division, similar to Russia doing so with BLM in 2020.

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Additional-Friend993@reddit

It's very much bots. I check every inflammatory profile and a lot of the commenters seem to have never been born (profile is 2 days old, it only comments the same repeated stock phrasing on a thousand different subreddits, it has generic "just trolling it's not serious" type profile descriptions, usually zero or negative -1,000 karma just in two days, etc...) These profiles usually pop up hours after a particularly controversial piece of news makes the newspage and only make talking points about those trending things. Sometimes they brigade subs for a few hours or days, and then disappear into the ether.

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Mostest_Importantest@reddit

I think the Internet overall is a place where women simply don't engage as much, with males being what they are, online.

The Greater Fuckwad Theory of the Internet has been active for longer than most users have been alive.

Plus, with the internet mostly dead in today's world, well...decency has always been in short supply online.

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mikerbt@reddit

Today I learned there’s something called the Great Fuckwad Theory.

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Mostest_Importantest@reddit

Ah, wonderful! You get to be one of the 10,000 today.

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victoriaisme2@reddit

Love that!

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Additional-Friend993@reddit

Maybe online it might skew male(not sure how to verify this data but let's pretend), but in real life, where activism and real life discussions are taking place(like the circles I run in which involve ecology, climate science, climate cafes, conservation, nature education and stewardship, other related forms of activism and the crossover of the intersectionality of that(so lots of lgbt people, disabled people, people of colour), it largely tends to skew toward being dominated by women. There's some areas where you'll see an uptick in men(when we do tree plantings, or it's usually older retired guys who have the time on their hands to muck about watching birds), but on the ground where the actual work is happening, Im almost always surrounded by women. Women are used to carrying the active burden, to the planning and the effort and care and nurturance(and the ground experience of how it affects people being that more women live in poverty and some they're largely part of other marginalised groups, many of them have seen it first hand and it's not a hypothetical to peer into from the outside on the internet dooms rolling) that goes into having to care about the collapse. I've only heard women speak about it in offline physical spaces.

It could be that the type of person who happens to be on Reddit might just still be able to look at it from the outside and consider it in a philosophical, hypothetical sense, and then choose to discuss in text.

That is, if that data is correct, which we don't actually know as of yet.

Also, I think the other presuppositions about gender in the comments are foolishness, minus a few tangential talking points that require extra nuance.

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EmergencySushi@reddit

Somehow I always suspected that AI would be reduced to a dick-detection algorithm. 🙄

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alloyed39@reddit

TBF, Facebook has had that on lock for a while now.

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cool_waterz@reddit

Grok is. :)

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CutsAPromo@reddit

Males are more socially isolated and have more time to think about this

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Ok_Role_6215@reddit

I guess, we're all gay, is that were you were going with this?

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karabeckian@reddit

https://www.statista.com/statistics/1255182/distribution-of-users-on-reddit-worldwide-gender/

Next question.

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l_am_a_Potato@reddit (OP)

I mean I mentioned that stat in the OP. as another commenter said, there was a user survey where 7% of respondents identified as female and 4% identified as non-binary on this sub. That's still a discrepancy of 12% compared to the general reddit user population. I still wonder why that is!

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darkpsychicenergy@reddit

The distribution is even wider for those who use Reddit for things like news.

https://www.pewresearch.org/journalism/fact-sheet/social-media-and-news-fact-sheet/pj_2024-09-17_social-media-news-fact-sheet_0-02/

When you have a disparate distribution like this in the general populace I would expect that disparity to become even more pronounced on a much more niche, generally unpopular subreddit, since it narrows down the user base even more.

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karabeckian@reddit

Women are generally nurturing.

Collapse is antithetical to that.

There's no mystery here...

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erstwhileinfidel@reddit

Reddit skews male and young. By a lot.

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ExcitementWrong3360@reddit

Most women who post online work diligently are remaining gender neutral due to the level of misogynist comments directed towards identified women. I would suspect your data is flawed.

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darkpsychicenergy@reddit

People frequently assume I’m male and I put no effort into that whatsoever, I’m just me. But Reddit does have a heavily majority male user base.

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Sometimes_Wright@reddit

Wife and I were talking about if something happened the other day and she said "eh you'll figure it out." From her perspective she doesn't want to think about that kind of struggle.

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ExcitementWrong3360@reddit

Just curious, but why does it really matter the percentage of females that read and post on this blog?? What difference does it make?

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oxero@reddit

That tool on mobile is ass, so I can't properly see what you saw at this time.

If what you found is correct, it doesn't really surprise me all too much. The vibe I always got is most women don't really ever go out of their way to look at depressing topics, I think it hits them harder emotionally. Estrogen in particular has been noted by those who transition to be particularly powerful at making them feel emotions more intensely as well.

Anecdotal section: I've even noticed women in my life take and process difficult/stressful information differently as if it takes a harder toll on them. I'm particularly very empathetic of those around me and I've always found it extremely difficult to bring up even remotely depressing topics around a lot of women. It starts a positive feedback of emotions which makes the situation worse off. I've had a lot of potential relationships fall apart because of this as apparently being emotional as a male isn't what many women want, apparently crying over stuff even once is an absolute no-no. It's an awful gender dichotomy in my opinion, I don't think bottling up stress and pretending to keep a straight stoic emotional facade 24/7 is healthy at all.

Anyway, I digressed. So under the assumption hormones can really change how you perceive stressful topics, women basically have a magnifying glass on stressful topics.

Collapse talk in particular is extremely rough on the psyche, I read stuff here throughout the years I don't even discuss with close friends, I mean we are talking about the fall of everything we know and love here. I personally get very depressed over some topics I read like how insects are vanishing at alarming rates and how wild animal life is all but slowly going silent. If my hypothesis is somewhat correct, that would feel even worse if it was being magnified by hormones, I don't think I personally could stomach much of the content here if that is true. So under this assumption, it makes sense why women would be less inclined to read and interact here.

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l_am_a_Potato@reddit (OP)

That's an interesting theory which rings somewhat true for me. I would have to look into how estrogen affects emotional processing more so I could evaluate it better :)

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GalaxyPatio@reddit

This whole comment section has been unbelievably reductive and really spotlights how men seem to view women almost as a separate species.

The majority of cases come down to the difference in how women and men are socialized and conditioned. I keep seeing it mentioned that women are more nurturing or collaborative or whatever but if any of these people spent any meaningful time around women that felt that they could trust them they'd learn that a bunch of what they "know" is a performance and a facade, just like it often is for men.

Plenty of us feel the exact same type of dread and fear and discomfort around collapse and want to openly and freely talk about it but because we get pigeonholed into the "inherent nurturer" and "uplifting" camps because of our gender we get shut down, reduced, dismissed, ignored, whatever for "bringing the vibe down" and then later don't engage as much when the men doing the dismissing want to turn around and vent about it because it's fucking exhausting to carry the emotional burden of it all, all the time, without being able to sometimes hand it off.

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High-Newt@reddit

Hear, hear

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l_am_a_Potato@reddit (OP)

I agree with your second paragraph, this was certainly the first thing I thought about when I started to think about the subject. It's a very difficult thing to navigate, because just by invoking the topic you risk provoking stereotyping from others, which can lead to the opposite of what I want to accomplish obviously. I am more interested in how those conditionings can lead to pidgeonholing in people, and how that might play a role around the freedom people feel in discussing collapse as a topic. In a way some of the more reductive responses you mentioned are a useful indicator for me how the gender does affect discussion on here.

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oxero@reddit

It's not really a theory as it's not well established, but there have been studies which often point towards hormones playing different roles in observing and processing stress.

The crazy thing with humans is that no single person reacts or handles stuff the same way, so it's very hard to pin down everything as a just cause. We are so diverse, so this would only be one piece of a grander puzzle why this trend is perhaps observed.

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ExcitementWrong3360@reddit

Education, think higher level math and science. Pragmatic critical thinking skills, not referring to ability but in the sense of applying and experience with those skills in dealing with complex problems . Spare time......

I am a retired engineer, older than dirt... when I graduated from university I was one of 3 women. The cognitive dissonance that comes from understanding the science and realistic probability of how this will unfold AND giving birth and raising children is, to describe it in a understated manner, "difficult to come to terms with". The only thing I can compare it to is deep soul ripping grieving.

That being said, I have two grand daughters that I just shake my head at and mumble under my breath, "kid you got some unpleasant surprises coming.....". To say they are "ungrounded, unrealistic, neurotic etc" is an understatement, However, IMO this is a direct consequence of how they were raised by their parents... the values instilled in them and the behaviors tolerated by society and parents.

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sam81452667@reddit

any information what your click and zoom graphics use as datasource?

if my interests, browsing history / search patterns and more look male, and i don't subscribe to feminism, how would your tool know i might be female? i doubt you models analyze my comments yet...

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masterofn0n3@reddit

Hot take: we all want to be Crusoe's, but were really all LaMOs

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LegitimateVirus3@reddit

Everyone knows there are no women on reddit.

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XI_Vanquish_IX@reddit

I assume it’s a 2:1 male to female ratio. And based on some of the polling, that appears to be the case. Not exactly surprising. Some say it’s closer 60% male and 40% female than 66% to 33%

Reddit itself is a 60/40 male to female breakdown. So this Reddit doesn’t exactly deviate from the general population statistic of the platform at all. Definitely not in any skewing that would overcome a question of typical data error.

In other words, the male to female ratio of this subreddit is no different than the population ratios of the entire Reddit platform itself. When you are doing statistics you need to have a lot of discipline and don’t jump to conclusions

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Potential_Being_7226@reddit

I have no idea. I’m a woman. I tend to be more attuned to climate/environment/current events than most people, regardless of gender.

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Speckhen@reddit

Why do you think this tool is accurate?

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l_am_a_Potato@reddit (OP)

I got it from this preprint, and as far as I can tell, it is the most up to date effort to try to estimate gender that has this subreddit included in its dataset.

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-Calm_Skin-@reddit

Sounds like bunk