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The Blindness of Social Wealth

nytimes.com

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Re: The Blindness of Social Wealth

#41

Post by twoquestions »

Jtsummers wrote: post #36
daodedickinson wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Quitting Facebook doesn't cure the social bankruptcy, though. The only cures seem to be joining cults and gangs and militaries and other groups with high costs and low standards.

You develop social capital by fostering relationships with other people. By being responsible, and having positive interactions. You'll develop that capital not just with them, but also with the people around you and them. If you have a positive relationship with someone, and they think well of you, then their friends and family and colleagues will accept their voucher (assuming they have a positive relationship with…

This is some of the best advice I've read wrt repairing one's social circle. Most advice begins and ends at "Go to church" or if you get lucky "Find a sport or club" which is of profoundly limited value if you're not a member of the dominant religion and/or don't know the area well.

I had to go through a similar process starting from nearly zero, and it was not easy. I did it by running D&D, as everyone around wants to play a game, but nobody wants to go through the effort of running one. All of the above advice applies.

Re: The Blindness of Social Wealth

#43

Post by dang »

LandoCalrissian wrote: post #5

David Brooks is the worst.

Maybe so, but could you please stop posting unsubstantive comments to HN?

The site guidelines ask you a bunch of things in this department—here's one: "Please don't post shallow dismissals, especially of other people's work. A good critical comment teaches us something."

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Re: The Blindness of Social Wealth

#44

Post by AnimalMuppet »

chongli wrote: post #10
malvosenior wrote: post #4

"I was really struck by this last week, when Mark Zuckerberg came through Washington. Most of the questions he faced at the congressional hearings and most of the analysis in the press were about Facebook’s failure to protect privacy. That’s the sort of thing that may be uppermost on your mind if you are socially wealthy, if, like most successful politicians and analysts, you live within a thick web of connection and…

If it's not the role of government to solve problems that are tearing apart the fabric of society, then whose role is it? Who is going to do it? Maybe no one. Maybe we're all screwed.

The US is a country that tries to have a limited government. In that view, not all problems are the government's to solve.

Re: The Blindness of Social Wealth

#45

Post by Lionsion »

jotux wrote: post #40
thisisit wrote: post #7

There is a growing culture of reaction videos on YT. People watch other people watching and reacting to stuff. That never sat well with me. And I always wondered - are people so alone or insecure that they need to watch other people's "reaction" to feel better? Given the rise of reaction channels on YT, I guess the answer is resounding - Yes.

This isn't really new, right? Laugh tracks and live audiences have been used in radio/tv since the 50s for the same purpose.

The point of a laugh track is to make the show itself appear funnier; the laugh track is in the background, invisible. I think what he's describing is different, more like focusing on the laugh track itself and ignoring the show.

Re: The Blindness of Social Wealth

#46

Post by rdiddly »

asherwebb wrote: post #34

There certainly is a crisis that social media and greedy online platforms (greedy for your time and ad dollars) prey upon. And yes the breakdown of social relationships with family, community and neighbors is certainly a big part of this. But consider historical factors in the USA. The breakdown of church - this was the de facto center of many communities for generations up until the post-vietnam era and the culture…

You touch on an important factor: land-use and transportation policy. The lack of "walkability" in the typical suburban neighborhood is certainly not helping. I don't mean the ability to go out and take a walk for the exercise, I mean being in a place where walking is the best way to get to useful places and do things... the grocery, the doctor, the hardware store, and ideally, your job. Dense cities have this, to some degree. Rural areas don't, but they usually have a small town nearby with a main street (if Walmart hasn't decimated it). But in the suburbs you're generally inside a car to get anywhere at all, and how much incidental, accidental contact are you going to have with your neighbors from behind a glass pane at 25 MPH?

Re: The Blindness of Social Wealth

#47

Post by bitwize »

rdiddly wrote: post #46
asherwebb wrote: post #34

There certainly is a crisis that social media and greedy online platforms (greedy for your time and ad dollars) prey upon. And yes the breakdown of social relationships with family, community and neighbors is certainly a big part of this. But consider historical factors in the USA. The breakdown of church - this was the de facto center of many communities for generations up until the post-vietnam era and the culture…

You touch on an important factor: land-use and transportation policy. The lack of "walkability" in the typical suburban neighborhood is certainly not helping. I don't mean the ability to go out and take a walk for the exercise, I mean being in a place where walking is the best way to get to useful places and do things... the grocery, the doctor, the hardware store, and ideally, your job. Dense cities have this, to so…

I used to live in some of the burbiest burbs imaginable. I lived a bit out of the way but many of my schoolmates were right in the thick of it: tract homes, manicured lawns, the whole bit.

Back then -- I don't know about today -- going to the store may have been a chore that required a car, but visiting your neighbors was easy. You were bound to see some of them as you went out to get the paper or water the lawn. Car traffic was so light that kids would play in the street -- basketball, hockey, frisbee, racing go-karts or RC cars, whatever. All the kids in a neighborhood all seemed to know one another really well.

There's a lot to dislike about suburbs, but by themselves they're not some sort of dark magic socially isolating force.

Re: The Blindness of Social Wealth

#48

Post by pmoriarty »

rdiddly wrote: post #46
asherwebb wrote: post #34

There certainly is a crisis that social media and greedy online platforms (greedy for your time and ad dollars) prey upon. And yes the breakdown of social relationships with family, community and neighbors is certainly a big part of this. But consider historical factors in the USA. The breakdown of church - this was the de facto center of many communities for generations up until the post-vietnam era and the culture…

You touch on an important factor: land-use and transportation policy. The lack of "walkability" in the typical suburban neighborhood is certainly not helping. I don't mean the ability to go out and take a walk for the exercise, I mean being in a place where walking is the best way to get to useful places and do things... the grocery, the doctor, the hardware store, and ideally, your job. Dense cities have this, to so…

For me it's not just the walkability of the suburbs that's the problem, but the lack of places to go... other than stores, bars, and restaurants. It's a cultural wasteland. I'd just much rather stay inside, and often do.

Cities are not much better for me, as most of places there are to go and things to do tend to cater towards the lowest common denominator.

Re: The Blindness of Social Wealth

#50

Post by velp »

seem_2211 wrote: post #38

In modern Western culture we've killed God and I think we're learning what the consequences of that mean.

Source connecting the two? I think most here would argue the the decline in magical thinking (at least as it influences policy and society on the whole) is a good thing
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