Loneliness is pervasive and rising, particularly among the young • Hacker News Board

Re: Loneliness is pervasive and rising, particularly among the young

#231

Post by tcbawo » Tue, Sep 04, 2018, 3:48 AM UTC

iamcasen wrote: post #113

androidgirl wrote: post #109

This all hits home, and I agree with a lot of the points on social media. Unfortunately, it's not as easy as just quitting. When I stopped using Facebook at the start of this year, my loneliness got much higher. There's less ways to meet people outside of the internet now. For awhile, I was visiting a hacker-space outside of $WORK, but everyone is already involved with everyone else and it's tough to break into a soc…

I feel this really acutely right now. I'm finding that it takes about 3 years of conscious, dedicated, effort to build a small circle of friends as an adult. It feels like all forces are against you in the process because there is nothing tying anyone to anyone else. Everyone is free to just change course, leave town, get into a new hobby. So keeping a group of 10 folks together? Be ready for some monumental effort!

If you have children, it seems that many parents make friends with similar ages to their own. Once those groups are baked in, though, it's harder to crack. People seem to be more open to new friends with their first child than last.

Re: Loneliness is pervasive and rising, particularly among the young

#232

Post by gnulinux » Tue, Sep 04, 2018, 4:52 PM UTC

bscphil wrote: post #207

gnulinux wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think this is a cultural thing. I grew up somewhere around Europe and random people talking to me on the street would be a big nono, I would run for my life; would definitely at least give a weird look and increase my speed. When I moved into the Bay Area for undergrad I saw this is completely normal here. So, I started talking to randoms too, and it usually feels very much when you feel lonely and at the supermark…

That's really fascinating to me. I live in LA (for over 3 years now) and literally no one on the street, in a restaurant, or a store has ever just started talking to me. I would be startled and probably expect you to ask me for money if you did that to me here. Is the Bay really that different?

Never lived in LA (been there for a few hours once), so I don't know. In Bay Area I lived in Berkeley for about 4 years and occasionally visited San Francisco and the the South Bay for entertainment etc, I would say the cultural atmosphere is similar. As I said I was talked to by strangers on the street (and especially in a market e.g. Trader Joe's, Safeway, The Dollar Tree etc...) on multiple occasions.

Currently living in Boston, MA. It's definitely not as usual as the Bay Area, people are significantly "colder" (for the lack of a better word) but I wouldn't say talking, or smiling to a stranger would be as weird as in Europe. Maybe LA is different than both the Bay Area and Boston area (although Boston being in itself significantly different than the Bay Area in the first place)

Re: Loneliness is pervasive and rising, particularly among the young

#233

Post by P_I_Staker » Tue, Sep 04, 2018, 10:07 PM UTC

bscphil wrote: post #207

gnulinux wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think this is a cultural thing. I grew up somewhere around Europe and random people talking to me on the street would be a big nono, I would run for my life; would definitely at least give a weird look and increase my speed. When I moved into the Bay Area for undergrad I saw this is completely normal here. So, I started talking to randoms too, and it usually feels very much when you feel lonely and at the supermark…

That's really fascinating to me. I live in LA (for over 3 years now) and literally no one on the street, in a restaurant, or a store has ever just started talking to me. I would be startled and probably expect you to ask me for money if you did that to me here. Is the Bay really that different?

No offense, but it might have to do with the way you seem to strangers. You get a sense of a person and sometimes you feel that you can talk to randoms; that they're interested and/or you're on the same mental wavelength. These senses are important, because even in the USA, where talking to randoms is common, you still want to avoid "bothering" people. So there is still risk of inconveniencing someone with an unwanted conversation, or making them feel uncomfortable, and this is still a big social no-no.

Re: Loneliness is pervasive and rising, particularly among the young

#234

Post by travisjungroth » Thu, Sep 06, 2018, 3:56 AM UTC

ada1981 wrote: post #169

travisjungroth wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think they were going for an absolute number, not a percent.

0.

I thought the comment above asked how many founders, not how many non founders. Thank you for your simple answer to by dumb comment.