But only nowadays. Until very recently it was always assumed the opposite. The terms “old maid", “spinster", “fuss budget", “prude", “red periwinkle", whatever. We both know the list of vernacular slurs to refer to single by choice women is both long and predictably demeaning.

The list for single men though? Celibate, unattached, available, stag, single person. Yes, those are shockingly vulgar. Okay maybe celibate is, but only in the minds of men.

Women changed the narrative for themselves because men created the one for them that, in fact, made gender based slurs out of what in essence is as much a result of opportunity and circumstance (especially historically) as anything.

So first off, let’s not pretend like all this came from the same place. It didn’t. Unmarried women got tired of being the “whipping girl", the sacrificial lamb, for society’s scorn so they pushed back, revelling in their singleness, the way a bachelor always could, and claiming the right to be happy despite all the miserably marrieds derision that even if their marriage is a living hell at least they’re not an old maid. Of which there was always aplenty. Loud and proud about being happy while unattached for the first time ever.

The desperate lost souls you ran across, both male and female, are people who have allowed themselves to be brainwashed by influencer culture. They’re not capable of original thought. That’s why everything they’re saying is so repetitive. They’re part of a hive mind and don’t even know it.

But they’re also not part of the embrace of singleness for women, many of whom never really dated in the first place, others just found they didn’t michlike being in a relationship. They’re just latching on to the phrases of the push back because, as I said, they really can’t think for themselves.