Thread 24839592

Read this and lets talk about it. It's about gooning.

https://harpers.org/archive/2025/11/the-goon-squad-daniel-kolitz-porn-masturbation-loneliness/

>>24839592 (OP)
I liked the article but I think the dude got too interested in deep diving into this subculture and missed the forest for the trees. One mistake I think he makes is assuming that everyone is referring to the same thing when they use the word "goon." I would say that 99% of people just use it as a substitute for masturbating or edging, just like people use the word "incel" to refer to misogynists, losers, ugly people they don't like, etc. The people he discusses in this article are a very very small subset of gooners imo. So, it's a good anthropological study of these extreme gooners but he doesn't address the majority of porn addicts/coomer type of people.

Also, I think he doesn't get as deep into the why of it. The headline reads " Loneliness, porn’s next frontier, and the dream of endless masturbation" but he doesn't really give loneliness and the other drivers of this behavior much time. He does touch on it in that section where he says increasingly harsh economic conditions may have driven some people to this lifestyle and how they would've been regular people with a house, a wife, and a job 30 years ago but it's not enough imo. Basically, he gets too deep into this sick gooner culture and gets lost in the sauce.

>>24839619
Ya, I just finished reading it and I'm not impressed. I thought it would be more interesting. I rescind my invitation for discussion. However, I would like to read something interesting about gooning and porn, if it exists somewhere on substack or something.

>>24839592 (OP)
GO BACK

>>24839653
It's an article from the magazine that has published the likes of Melville and Updike. I think it belongs on /lit/. People on /r9k/ can't even read.

>>24839592 (OP)
I gave it a skim. Fairly interesting article. I believe that social media in all of its forms is now a gateway drug to porn.

>>24839592 (OP)
>The gooner goons to reach the “goonstate”: a supposed zone of total ego death or bliss that some liken to advanced meditation
this reminded me of Addiction by Design, an anthropology book on slot machines in Vegas. zen-like ego death is exactly how the gambling addicts describe the experience of sitting in front the screen and watching your savings drain away.

>>24839872
So is this phenomenon the reason behind porn/masturbation addicts becoming subhumans?

>>24839872
same thing happens sitting on 4chan hitting refresh waiting for a (you) so don't act holier than thou

>>24839619
I don't think framing things in terms of loneliness and material conditions would even do justice to explain why this transhumanist horror is unfolding before our eyes. What does it even mean to be lonely if a perverted man's suicide with which the article begins on was married and had kids?

>>24839592 (OP)
Did you know that the media is just allowed to lie to us? They can just make shit up and present it to us as if it's the truth.

>>24840067
>What does it even mean to be lonely if a perverted man's suicide with which the article begins on was married and had kids?
huh?

>>24840075
What does it even mean to be lonely if the man, whose suicide the article focuses on at the outset, was married and had kids? In other words, are material conditions really to blame as the title of the article insinuates?

>>24839872
That's insane, i would never describe that kind of compulsive wireheading state that way. When i doomscroll or play a mindlessly addictive video game it feels like your brain is getting directly jerked around by stimuli and like it's soaked in some mildly electric or acidic brine. It's not pleasant.

>>24840082
Well, he didn't have community. He probably lived in some soulless suburb or apartment. His next smallest circle of belonging was basically the entire country, since we all have indistinguishable material lifestyles and live within very short distances of each other, instantly by phone and at most a matter of hours by transport.

I goon sometimes. I'll downloaded gigabytes of adult visual novels and spend the weekend jerking off to them and various other forms of pornography while smoking lots of weed and using stimulants like caffeine and tadalafil. I'll go to work the next week with bloodshot eyes and aching muscles in my pelvis, lower back, chest, and arms (I masturbate ambidextrously).
Afterwards, I will delete everything and go into a state of recovery and abstinence. I won't masturbate, smoke, or drink. I will severely restrict my eating, often going two days without consuming a calorie, eating one meal, followed by more extensive fasting. I will start to feel clear headed and sharp, but inevitably I will fall again, usually just as my pelvic floor is recovering. I certainly have experienced the goonstate describe in the article.

>>24840138
>His next smallest circle of belonging was basically the entire country, since we all have indistinguishable material lifestyles and live within very short distances of each other, instantly by phone and at most a matter of hours by transport.
Reminds me of this
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZtiJQZTqu9M

>>24839592 (OP)
Grueling physical ordeals and fanaticism aren't new or unusual things in anthropology. The somewhat stunned tone this guy takes is because he, like many other people, hasn't yet accepted that the digital world isn't separated from the physical world. All that's changed is that the fanatics of the internet age have new gods - the pornosexual wanking cult is just as valid and respectable as any other ascetics, flagellants, or hermits. There is something inherently noble and admirable about forsaking normality, comfort and life itself in service of a goal that most people find ridiculous or fictional. I think there's a very real chance that some branch of goonerism could grow and change into a genuine porn-based religion as we progress through the 21st century - clearly, there is a void in the soul of so many of these young men, and something will fill it.

>>24840263
Maybe it isn't over bros...

>>24839592 (OP)
>Nautica Malone
He a good boy he dindu nuffin.

>The gooner goons to reach the "goonstate": a supposed state of total ego death or bliss that some liken to advanced meditation, the attainment of which compels them to masturbate for hours, or even days, at a time.
>...increasingly beginning to feel like a movement, a homegrown zoomer Tea Party that might one day produce its own gooner congressmen, gooner news networks, extremist gooner terror attacks.
https://harpers.org/archive/2025/11/the-goon-squad-daniel-kolitz-porn-masturbation-loneliness/
______________
What the fuck is this timeline?

This is how ethnic people must feel reading an ethnic studies textbook. I am looking in an inaccurate mirror

>>24840311
Don't knock it till you try it, unc

I jack off 5 times a day and I had never heard of all this. people are really amazing

>>24839872
>>24840055
The author makes a similar point towards the end of the article.
>Nor can I so neatly separate the gooners as a whole from the rest of us. Think about it for a second: What are these gooners actually doing? Wasting hours each day consuming short-form video content. Chasing intensities of sensation across platforms. Parasocially fixating on microcelebrities who want their money. Broadcasting their love for those microcelebrities in public forums. Conducting bizarre self-experiments because someone on the internet told them to. In general, abjuring connective, other-directed pleasures for the comfort of staring at screens alone. Does any of this sound familiar? Do you maybe know some folks who get up to stuff like this? It’s true that gooners are masturbating while they engage in these behaviors. You could say that only makes them more honest.

>Granted, day-in-the-life TikToks or unboxing videos won’t poison your soul to precisely the same degree as gooner porn. But it’s hard not to see goonerism as just an intensification, almost a burlesque, of prevailing cultural trends. Pornosexuals are clearly not the only people out there in the process of retreating from life. It’s probably more useful to think of a company like Aylo—the owner of Pornhub and most of the other major tube sites, as well as most of the name-brand porn studios—as just another large tech-entertainment giant, like Meta, Netflix, or FanDuel. From these companies’ perspective, the ideal consumer would do literally nothing but goon, lose at gambling, and maybe watch other people play video games. You can try to fight this. You can read a book, pet a dog, buy a stupid box to lock away your phone. You can make a joke about the box, about the absurdity of your need for it. What do these companies care? They’ve won. If they have their way—and they usually do—in time we will all be gooners, of a kind.

>>24840377
Why are you lying?

>>24840390
lying about what? I get all my stuff from sadpanda and pornolab and the people described in the article most definitely don't hang out there

>>24839619
>One mistake I think he makes is assuming that everyone is referring to the same thing when they use the word "goon." I would say that 99% of people just use it as a substitute for masturbating or edging
The story is focused on the subculture, not the slang term.
>but it's not enough imo.
I disagree; it was enough. The story is long, and readers don't want to spend paragraphs reading what is already understood.

>>24840070
Take your meds.

>>24839592 (OP)
I read the story, and my biggest takeaway is we need to ban Discord.

>>24841512
>The story is focused on the subculture, not the slang term.
It's a pretty big error. He conflates the slang term with the subculture and as a result, he overstates the prevalence of the subculture. They're a very small minority within a minority but he treats them like a large group because he places anyone who uses the term "gooning" within the subculture.

>>24839592 (OP)
"This past January, "
I stopped here, whilst sitting naked and ruining my chair. The instructions specifically state the pleather shouldn't get wet.

Know this stupid article was not, in fact, going to help me goon.

>>24840311
>What the fuck is this timeline?
The timeline where these "writers" are ripping off bits from youtubers.
What a HACK.

>>24842000
fucking pathetic what passes for journalism anymore. Goon as a term entered frankly normiesphere consciousness at least like three years ago by now.

I hate these hacks who regurgitate what anyone with an internet connection already knows like they're making a contribution to the discussion. Vice does the same shit constantly. Pathetic.

>>24839704
What's Updike

>>24839872
gooning for boomers

>>24839653
>dork ass
We don't talk like niggers here.

>>24842000
You didn't read the article and likely feel personally attacked as a chronic masturbater.

>>24843174
Maybe 10 years ago, 90% of zoomer posts are incomprehensible niggerbabble.

>>24842394
It's what you do when you see a really good post and want to show your appreciation to the poster. Otherwise you can Downdike it if you don't like it