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An Epidemic of Loneliness in America?

nytimes.com

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Re: An Epidemic of Loneliness in America?

#101

Post by chrisseaton »

cmrdporcupine wrote: post #99
humanrebar wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I make new friends of all ages all the time. At church. It does provide "proximity; repeated, unplanned interactions; and a setting that encourages people to let their guard down and confide in each other". And not by coincidence. One of the major goals of church is to help people form healthy and significant relationships (that is, friendships).

I grew up in a church and this is basically the only thing I miss. In fact it just makes me angry when I think back -- here we have a warm community in which that friendship and companionship are available only on the condition that you alter your cognition and beliefs to conform to a very precise code. Some serious strings-attached.

You can get the same experience in a lot of collegiate environments.

For example literally being in a college, being in a mess in the military, being in a sports team.

Re: An Epidemic of Loneliness in America?

#103

Post by leibwiht »

johnfn wrote: post #26
smnrchrds wrote: post #10

For me, the most interesting thing about all these loneliness articles is how often they make it to HN's first page. It says more about HN/tech community then America as a whole.

The article says 25% of Americans haven’t discussed any important matters with someone close to them in the last 6 months. Twenty five percent! That’s a huge number, much larger than the number of people in tech.

I almost never discuss anything important with people outside of extremely close and likeminded friends because of the current political climate. I worry about being ostracized/alienated by them for not believing in the same things as them, so it's not at all worth the risk to actually discuss anything meaningful with them if the outcome might be permanently destroying our relationship.

Re: An Epidemic of Loneliness in America?

#104

Post by qnsi »

budadre75 wrote: post #11

I've been seeing this topic in the media for quite a few years now, and I just wonder why there doesn't seem to have any solution either from the private or public sectors. Is it because loneliness is not huge enough, or it's like poverty that has to be dealt by yourself? Those social media and apps trying to help just make loneliness and anxiety worse as many other articles suggest.

Also, this is a very frequent topic here on HN. A lot of people complaining, some suggesting similar things as everywhere on the Internet.

I am really surprised there is this gap here. Maybe it's because anything targeted to fight social isolation is bringing strange people in? It's natural to meet people in college, but meetups are known for bringing creepy people in that only want to hit on women.

Re: An Epidemic of Loneliness in America?

#105

Post by JChase2 »

dash2 wrote: post #88

Offtopic, I followed the link in the last letter to that Senate committee and got: Sorry, a potential security risk was detected in your submitted request. The Webmaster has been alerted. Then I tried https://www.senate.gov/ and got the same thing. Is there a reason for this? I'm in the UK browsing on Firefox.

The senate site has had SSL issues for me for years. It's very weird. If you go to: http://www.senate.gov/senators/leadership.htm and try SSL, it redirects to http. Strange. Like it's not set up recursively or something or that directory has it's own .htaccess or w/e that doesn't use SSL?

Re: An Epidemic of Loneliness in America?

#106

Post by BurningFrog »

Baeocystin wrote: post #51
BurningFrog wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, as an atheist, the weekly unforced meetup you guys have is the one thing I do envy. I wonder how many of the churchgoers secretly have no real faith and are only there for the company...

That's what congregations like the Unitarians are like. I go once a month to the local one, and I've been an atheist my entire life. I'd guess about half the people that there are, too, but no one really seems to mind one way or the other, as long as you're friendly and civil to everyone else. Mostly it's a discussion group, and I quite enjoy it.

So what happens at a Unitarian service?

I've imagined it's a non/cross religious service for any religious/spiritual people, but I honestly have no idea.

Re: An Epidemic of Loneliness in America?

#107

Post by guitarbill »

leibwiht wrote: post #103
johnfn wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The article says 25% of Americans haven’t discussed any important matters with someone close to them in the last 6 months. Twenty five percent! That’s a huge number, much larger than the number of people in tech.

I almost never discuss anything important with people outside of extremely close and likeminded friends because of the current political climate. I worry about being ostracized/alienated by them for not believing in the same things as them, so it's not at all worth the risk to actually discuss anything meaningful with them if the outcome might be permanently destroying our relationship.

Right, at school, you could say some awful stuff, and someone would tell you "that's awful because ", and you'd usually change your mind. Now, even established science is "controversial", and differing opinions aren't exciting, they're somehow personal attacks. What i mean is, opinions seem to have become an important part of their self to people, maybe through social media. I don't mean somebody thinking they're being argumentative/clever/fun when they're just being rude. Some people are socially inept, but that's a too easy cop-out to use in all of these cases, and does nothing to help those people, or show more socially apt people that it's occasionally ok to open up your guard.

Of course, you can't just launch into such topics with new acquaintances, but to a degree the climate makes it hard to go from acquaintance to friend because everything is small talk. At least that's my feeling, which is why a night of drinking seems to be involved at some point when I make new friends.

Re: An Epidemic of Loneliness in America?

#108

Post by KozmoNau7 »

BurningFrog wrote: post #32
humanrebar wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I make new friends of all ages all the time. At church. It does provide "proximity; repeated, unplanned interactions; and a setting that encourages people to let their guard down and confide in each other". And not by coincidence. One of the major goals of church is to help people form healthy and significant relationships (that is, friendships).

Yeah, as an atheist, the weekly unforced meetup you guys have is the one thing I do envy. I wonder how many of the churchgoers secretly have no real faith and are only there for the company...

Go to concerts and chat with people between sets/afterwards. Pub quizzes are good too, see if a team is a member short and if you can join. Get into pen & paper gaming, your local trad games store probably arranges open nights for new people.

Anywhere there's a shared interest, friendships happen.

Re: An Epidemic of Loneliness in America?

#109

Post by JohnL4 »

Baeocystin wrote: post #51
BurningFrog wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, as an atheist, the weekly unforced meetup you guys have is the one thing I do envy. I wonder how many of the churchgoers secretly have no real faith and are only there for the company...

That's what congregations like the Unitarians are like. I go once a month to the local one, and I've been an atheist my entire life. I'd guess about half the people that there are, too, but no one really seems to mind one way or the other, as long as you're friendly and civil to everyone else. Mostly it's a discussion group, and I quite enjoy it.

This is awesome. My first thought was "church" and that's the top comment at the moment.

"Yeah but atheist" was expected and my first thought was U-U, and, bam, there it is.

My work is done here. Time for another Manhattan.

(BTW, I suspect urban Methodists (of which I am one) will also be cool, and will discourage the lunatics a bit more.)

Re: An Epidemic of Loneliness in America?

#110

Post by budadre75 »

castratikron wrote: post #45
budadre75 wrote: post #11

I've been seeing this topic in the media for quite a few years now, and I just wonder why there doesn't seem to have any solution either from the private or public sectors. Is it because loneliness is not huge enough, or it's like poverty that has to be dealt by yourself? Those social media and apps trying to help just make loneliness and anxiety worse as many other articles suggest.

In Japan there are government programs set up to get single people together. Some cities reserve entire bars or areas for singles only. There are government run speed dating services as well: https://www.businessinsider.com/japanese-government-dating-s...

I don't think there's anything in the US for the reasons I mentioned.
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