Is Loneliness a Health Epidemic? • Hacker News Board

Re: Is Loneliness a Health Epidemic?

#201

Post by DenisM » Mon, Mar 05, 2018, 9:31 PM UTC

oldcynic wrote: post #52

Interesting. No one has yet mentioned today's lack of community. We don't share a sense of place any more, we move around from job to job, families spread around the country or globe. We rarely share an emotional connection and sense of place with our neighbours that our grandparents would have known. We haven't even kept the sense of virtual community that the BBS's had - social networks amplify dissent and engageme…

FWIW, my gym instructor proposed that the gym could be the new church - a place for people to come together. I don't feel it works out (he he), but it might be an interesting place to start thinking. I posted this list of suggestions earlier: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16425522

Re: Is Loneliness a Health Epidemic?

#202

Post by marnett » Mon, Mar 05, 2018, 9:36 PM UTC

yelloweyes wrote: post #196

marnett wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is. Get off of it. Ask cashiers how they are doing before they talk to you. Smile at strangers. Make small talk when standing around. Eventually you will find someone who is not indoctrinated into these isolation chambers tossed at us by corporations profiting off of our attention. When you do find someone on the same wavelength (perhaps it might be me!) you can enjoy, even if briefly, a real human interaction - e…

If you don't fear being looked at like you have a third eye or people thinking you are a weirdo, then by all means do this.

While you are absolutely correct that people will think you are weird - what does it matter? Having small talk with someone in line at the grocery store is not to create a lifelong friend (although that really is a potential), it is to spread social kindness and communal feeling. The upside, real interaction with individuals who value it, heavily outweighs the downside, a stranger thinking you are weird (you need not do more than dress 'out of style' for this to be the case, really).

My experience is largely against what you describe, however. At least in the major city I live, I have literally been thanked, with a genuine smile - one of those real smiles that begins in the eyes - and gratitude, by cashiers when I ask, before they speak to me, how they themselves are doing. Literally countless times. I see these people quite often, as they work at places I frequent. They remember me and we, over time, learn more about one another. May aim was not to be their friend, or even acquaintance, just to build a sense of community.

Small talk is the fastest way I've bootstrapped myself into outrageously diverse social circles. Plenty of encounters with closed off people uninterested in me? Yes. Plenty of encounters that went well, spread some smiles, with people I've never seen again? Yes. Plenty of people I have sustained contact with, who are now close friends of mine? Not plenty, but a handful that made all the other encounters worth it.

And regardless, what is the alternative? I have to find my friends, acquaintances, strangers interested in similar things, love interests, and mating partners online? No thanks, call me a weirdo please.

Re: Is Loneliness a Health Epidemic?

#203

Post by tdeck » Mon, Mar 05, 2018, 9:38 PM UTC

hliyan wrote: post #59

oldcynic wrote: post #52

Interesting. No one has yet mentioned today's lack of community. We don't share a sense of place any more, we move around from job to job, families spread around the country or globe. We rarely share an emotional connection and sense of place with our neighbours that our grandparents would have known. We haven't even kept the sense of virtual community that the BBS's had - social networks amplify dissent and engageme…

Agreed. Perhaps this is not exactly what you meant, but I do feel that shared spaces are shrinking and private spaces are expanding. I found this particular quote from The Atlantic quite telling: "The United States is in some ways becoming a medieval society, in which people live and work in the modern equivalent of castles--gated communities, apartment buildings with doormen, and office buildings with guards--and tr…

Did most people live and work in castles in the medieval era?

Re: Is Loneliness a Health Epidemic?

#204

Post by hestipod » Mon, Mar 05, 2018, 9:43 PM UTC

marnett wrote: post #200

hestipod wrote: post #193

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm always afraid of the negative attention with such political statements, but I most definitely feel left behind by America and am not a fan of it's priorities. I did what I was "supposed" to, paid into the system, worked hard, and when I needed help it wasn't there and common things available to me before, like medical care/insurance, were suddenly out of reach. I find that incomprehensible in a first world nation…

Thank you for sharing your thoughts, although I didn't intend, specifically, for them to seem political. I think your statements lie at the core of American society. My asking was more a sociological inquiry than a political one, largely because I agree with you, the problem is one that stems from all U.S. institutions with any large amount of power. Unfortunately I think inciting any large scale change is impossible…

I've pretty much been smashed down to a Flatland version of Maslow's bottom levels so the deeper philosophical ideas of how to fix anything seem beyond me. I have no idea what there is left in that regard because even those closest to me who supposedly loved me and have seen what I have suffered have all worn down into that distancing/victim blaming thing that seems to common in long term suffering. Were it not for a few amazing people I have met over my lifetime, only one of which who was family and who is deceased, I would not find it easy to believe anyone really cared about others. I am aware enough to know my views aren't all knowing fact...I just don't see how this country is going to change given how emotionally deep and how ingrained in personal identity the national culture is for so many.

What brings me happiness? All sorts of things. Seeing my cat play. Seeing good people happy and healthy. Being warm and having a lower pain day. A good book. In the past I loved exploring and travel and was very active. Losing physical health was a major blow and I found the greatest happiness I have ever known in a long hike or run, or days wandering through a new city non-stop, where I was able to push myself physically and mentally to exhaustion, yet not suffer lasting pain for it...I miss that vitality so much it hurts. But perhaps what i miss most of all is the belief I had countless options before me, and no matter what life brought it would work out and I would have my loved ones around me. The innocent naivete of youth.

Re: Is Loneliness a Health Epidemic?

#205

Post by adjunctme » Mon, Mar 05, 2018, 9:46 PM UTC

vtange wrote: post #45

_m8fo wrote: post #9

Loneliness might be the logical conclusion to a society going more and more towards metrics. Likes, dislikes, upvotes, downvotes. Dissenters are punished, perfection is idolized. Research is pretty conclusive that to have tight friendships you need vulnerability to some degree, yet if people want perfection that implies invulnerability . If you accept these premises to be true, then it seems loneliness is inevitable.…

>I also think income inequality might lead to more loneliness. I'd say poverty just amplifies the feeling of loneliness. Japan has the same problem of loneliness [0] and they have a pretty good Gini coefficient compared to the rest of the OECD.[1] [0] https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/30/world/asia/japan-lonely-d... [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_income_eq...

I would say it is the opposite. Impoverished people have more need to interact with people in their immediate community in order to survive and for tribal knowledge. They also are more likely to stay within the same geographic location and less likely to be able to afford vacations away from their home (so they just chill at their neighborhood and welcome people over in their free time).

Educated, upper middle class people pay others to take care of things, buys everything online and searches the internet for information. They are more likely to move to a new city (so local relationships have less value since they may move in the future) and have expensive vacations or hobbies outside of the local neighborhood.

Re: Is Loneliness a Health Epidemic?

#206

Post by taoistextremist » Mon, Mar 05, 2018, 9:50 PM UTC

pmoriarty wrote: post #150

I've been going to a lot of meetups (from meetup.com) in the past year, and sadly I've come away pretty disappointed, for a number of reasons: 1 - I'm just not in the least bit interested in the overwhelming majority of meetups out there. So there really aren't a lot of interesting meetups for me to choose from. 2 - Way too many of the meetups are actually businesses in disguise. They're looking to sell you a class o…

I guess it depends on your interests, but I'd suggest going to meetups centered around activities that necessitate or strongly encourage socializing. I go to meetups to speak a different language, and I tend to make pretty good friends at those since the meetups typically revolve around just getting a meal and talking with everybody about life.

Aside from that, maybe you could try taking up a hobby you didn't think you'd be interested in? Pretty much any reasonably sized city seems to have meetups for learning how to salsa dance, for example, which is inherently a very social scene where people all get to know each other.

Re: Is Loneliness a Health Epidemic?

#207

Post by revscat » Mon, Mar 05, 2018, 9:56 PM UTC

atomical wrote: post #106

doughj3 wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The church may be looking for those things; the churchgoers, however, not so much.

Q: Would you like to become a member? A: No thank you. I'm an atheist who is just here for the social interaction and community. How does this end well?

Unitarian-Universalist churches have a lot of atheists.

Re: Is Loneliness a Health Epidemic?

#208

Post by tischler » Mon, Mar 05, 2018, 10:02 PM UTC

oldcynic wrote: post #52

Interesting. No one has yet mentioned today's lack of community. We don't share a sense of place any more, we move around from job to job, families spread around the country or globe. We rarely share an emotional connection and sense of place with our neighbours that our grandparents would have known. We haven't even kept the sense of virtual community that the BBS's had - social networks amplify dissent and engageme…

.

Re: Is Loneliness a Health Epidemic?

#209

Post by stcredzero » Mon, Mar 05, 2018, 10:02 PM UTC

oldcynic wrote: post #52

Interesting. No one has yet mentioned today's lack of community. We don't share a sense of place any more, we move around from job to job, families spread around the country or globe. We rarely share an emotional connection and sense of place with our neighbours that our grandparents would have known. We haven't even kept the sense of virtual community that the BBS's had - social networks amplify dissent and engageme…

No one has yet mentioned today's lack of community...We rarely share an emotional connection and sense of place with our neighbours that our grandparents would have known.

A big part of this is the degree to which people in their 20's and 30's are willing to unperson someone in public spaces -- even in person -- just for the suspicion of holding to the wrong ideological viewpoint, or even just for being from the "wrong tribe." It's so common to encounter some sort of unfounded imputation of hidden unsavory motivations. This sort of thing manifested itself in the 80's as a bigoted/snap judgement questioning of one's religious affiliation or sexual orientation.

It was back in the 80's and 90's when I started to develop my information-flow technique for evaluating people: I would watch how they would evaluate me, and gauge what information they used to jump to which conclusions. Bigots often jump to wildly inaccurate conclusions quickly on scant information. Bigots often impute under-the surface motivations without justifiable evidence. I've seen such jumping/imputation in rural South Carolina and from people in poor white neighborhoods in Ohio. What's surprising to me, is the remarkable frequency with which I've seen essentially the same jumping/imputation in the Bay Area.

If you want community, start by exercising the Principle of Charity. Allow for a Loyal Opposition. The vast majority of people have well-meaning (as well as self serving) reasons for their positions. If you want community, let people speak and listen to them. If you want to destroy community, then silence people and impute dark motives.

Re: Is Loneliness a Health Epidemic?

#210

Post by fern12 » Mon, Mar 05, 2018, 10:07 PM UTC

hestipod wrote: post #21

I am incredibly lonely. Health and financial circumstances pushed me into the worst possible social situation...isolated in rural unconnected America where the only two people I regularly see resent me and it has had a severely negative effect on my already miserable health over the years. Being middle aged it magnifies the issue as it's harder to connect as you age anyway due to life's progression. I saw huge number…

I'm also a middle-aged introvert. Outside of work, the only people I really talk to are my sisters, neither of whom live nearby. One thing that's helped me is fostering rescue dogs with a local organization. I only foster for a few days here and there, but it really makes a difference to feel some life around my apartment.