Is Loneliness a Health Epidemic?

Don't put the blame on the victims. Modern society doesn't discuss and give relevance to the problems of individual men in the way it does to women's problems.

If you have no in-person interaction that you know you need, are you just never going to go find it? Where do other people get it in your area? Church, probably, since you're rural. I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that you aren't interested in religion, absolutely hate where you're at, and probably the people, too, but I beg you to call local churches until you find one that can help you attend and where you feel welcomed.

I think that about sums up the "loneliness epidemic". Loneliness and social disconnection are exactly the results of seeking to loosen our need for society. Our society (regardless of where you live, the global monoculture is still there), is sick and we see it largely in Western post-industrial nations like the U.K. and U.S.A.

As more an more people realize the problems inherent to a postmodern, secular, capitalistic worldview, the more they intentionally disconnect to seek shelter from the onslaught of mixed messages, targeted advertising, disinformation campaigns, etc. , the more they realize that cutting themselves off is the only way out. I don't say this to explicitly bash capitalism or postmodernism - I see these statements as social facts that we're all stuck with for the time being. Despite U.S.'s place near the top of the list of social ills amongst industrialized nations (drug addiction, depression, obesity, bad Gini coeff, low life span, bad healthcare, etc.), it's worth saying that these and other problems still exist to some degree in other post-industrial nations. As we've steadily chipped away at traditional life, people have struggled to find replacements for family, religion, social outings, dating/marriage, work and play. While some people find success, other still are in limbo - raised in a world that no longer exists and unsure of how to bridge the gap into a world that offers fewer and fewer opportunities for an "analog" life.

Since modern life is primarily digital, the only escape from it is by intentionally seeking an analog existence. We can all see that excessive social media use, excessive email-checking, and constant connectivity cause social and emotional problems: addiction, feelings of inferiority, feeling drained, overall dissatisfaction. But the alternative is to purposely cut yourself off and suffer the other loneliness, where no one ever messages you, your crush never likes your photos, you never beat that person in a political argument on FB, you never see that cute picture of your friend's children or dog. At the cost of these things, you may gain back fun interactions with strangers, better catch-up conversations when you run into old friends who haven't been able to stalk you on social media, a more romantic first date when you finally talk to that person you've been seeing at the grocery store... At the risk of injecting my own experiences into this rant, the loss of social media in my life has precipitated a person who is more social when it comes time to be social and more at peace when it's time to be alone.

The solution to the broader problems though, of a society we feel we need to disconnect from, it would seem, is to start by fostering societies that we don't see as inherently problematic. Truly healthy societies don't breed drop outs, rebels, "lone wolves"... they breed people who want to get along and can at least stand each other enough to share some notion of the public good. How we do that is beyond me, though.

Also when you do meet others in bad situations that have overcome there is a strong survivor bias thing going on around them which leads to people being upset/confused when it doesnt work for you. You must simply be doing it wrong, right? People seem to often to get bothered/angry/offended with you if their advice doesn't work or isn't applicable. I understand the psychological root of this, but it's still disheartening and kills me when I see people feel like people like me simply don't want to be happy or have lives. I didn't post begging for a friend to cure my lonliness. I have far more pressing issues. I posted because it's relevant to my life and cant do much else atm.

You have mentioned church a couple of times and I am not ignoring it...I just don't know how to respond without offending you or someone else. It's just not my thing...I have tried it more than once. I don't want to debate or upset anyone. I probably worry too much about what others think of me...but it does make me feel worse to spread any bad feeling. I didn't downvote you either and always worry people will think I am giving them a "SCREW YOU WRONG" karma mark when I see their posts greyed. Sort of wish downvotes weren't a thing honestly.