I’ve actually known some monks, and I’m pretty sure they would look askance at your suggestion that they became monks because they are “damaged males”.
I agree, and in fact, I think early struggle can be a gift if it can be worked through. It can open up a whole new world of the mind that monks are able to cultivate that you cannot approach if you are preoccupied with interests in sex and food (and other hedonistic things).
> I think early struggle can be a gift if it can be worked through
That is a gigantic "if."
I think not having to repair one's self and, instead, using said time and resources to better one's self or to work towards one's goals would be a better gift.
You and the previous commenter are right. It is inappropriate for me to call it a gift. I called it a gift because I have tried to view it as such (I also had a traumatic childhood), and because the kindest and wisest people I have known went through a tremendous amount of suffering. I have viewed trauma as a prerequisite for wisdom (and I think it is necessary), but there is obviously a lot of selection bias in my thinking. Most of the people who have been traumatized in childhood have been chewed up by the process.
I did not mean to offend anyone by calling trauma a gift. In retrospect, it seems absurd of me to call something a gift that one has to work so hard to overcome to receive its benefits- and that even with hard work, there is still such a low chance of receiving them.
Although this is unrelated to your comment, thinking about your comment has caused me to reevaluate my original comment. It was downvoted and I think I offended people by comparing monks to incels. I actually think it is liberating to not only understand the research in this article as relating to the drive that some people have to become monks, but also liberating to understand the drive to be a monk as relating to the feeling of being an incel.
I have been lucky in that I had wise people to guide me beyond the trauma. I believe that monasteries, religion and philosophy have done that for many people too. It is my belief that the deep ambivalence and frustration that incels feel is related to the same things, but they are without the guidance that I and others have received to figure out how to process and understand their suffering. Although there is much wisdom in psychology, most therapy still seems shallow and unable to give the guidance that is needed. Our pop culture seems even worse.
The solution is probably not to revive monastic culture, but I don't think our pop culture should revile incels as much as it does. They may say and do hateful things, but they are just humans suffering. I think incels need guidance as much as our pop culture does.
