Yes, this was the point I was trying to make. I see from my reputation comments that a lot of people agree with me too. I'm sorry if I got overly aggressive towards the end because it was really getting tedious to keep on asking the same question and getting an evasive paragraph in response. I realize now that talking to DB is kind of like talking to an ELIZA-ish chat bot. He'll just keep responding until you stop.
But I do agree though, in the competition of viewpoints here there is a place for his. I have never denied that to the best of my knowledge and if I have it was done in error.
Edit: Having slept on it, I feel the exchange between me and DannyBoyy was needless and not at all representative of the kind of quality I seek to have in my posting. This is partly due to DannyBoyy being very persistent in wanting to have the last word in and simultaneously avoiding the question by offering excuses saying it shouldn't matter et.c., when a simple "yes/no" or "I refuse to answer that" would have ended the conversation then and there. Like I said, it's almost like talking to a chat bot at times. Mods you can ban me for saying that but I stand by it. However, over the exchange, particularly from page 15 onwards my responses started devolving into petty insults and non-sequiturs that honestly reflect very poorly on me. I'll leave them where they are and they are preserved in the quotes nevertheless, but I will state for the record that I disassociate from much of the content and that it's not at all the type of posting I aspire to. Some of the statements I made were just logically flawed, like "if you are a virgin you cannot help young men cope with balding".
My original point, which I fear has been watered down in this endless tit-for-tat, was that advice is not made in a vacuum, and that the circumstances of the advice giver and advice receiver
do matter to those evaluating it. For example, imagine you are going to a gym and you have two people actively wanting to give you workout advice. One is an obese man, the other is a fit guy with a six pack and decent-sized guns. Which do you listen to? There isn't a simple answer to this (maybe you yourself are obese and therefore the fit guy's advice is not that applicable in your situation), but you probably picked up from this that their level of fitness gives you very useful context in which to judge the merits of their arguments.
For this reason, when you actively proselytize and preach a certain mindset or type of life advice, giving an honest account of your circumstances is absolutely vital. It gives people context to judge how relevant and applicable the advice is to their lives. With life quality everyone is different and there is no right or wrong. Certainly, a fulfilling life can be had for an individual without sex, material riches or even social interaction. However, it also follows from this that these things can be absolutely necessary for another to attain the same state of fulfillment. This should be respected and honest disclosure is part of showing that respect.
Where context matters a lot, intention by comparison matters very little. Even the most well-meant of advice can turn out seriously damaging depending on the circumstances. This is a tragic lesson from my origin story,
which I outlined in another thread. Throughout my early years, my support system (family and therapists) kept lazily dispensing simple common sense advice of the "just be yourself" and "think positive" type even though this advice was clearly not helpful, arguably even harmful to me. I guess this is part of why I feel so strongly about this topic: I know all too well unfortunately that advice is often followed, and that it can have serious consequences. It's why I always try to couch my recommendations in very careful language.
