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The decline of the family has unleashed an epidemic of loneliness
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Re: The decline of the family has unleashed an epidemic of loneliness
#22I would argue that the decline of the family is directly linked to feminism, or better stated, the liberation of women from the home and from conservative sexual values. The two forces behind that are birth control and women entering the work force. These two are magnified by online dating and social media. I am not saying at all that these are bad things, just that we have yet to see the true effects of feminism on…
By the way, this might seem revolutionary, but there are plenty of societies ( in history) that didn't have rule by Men and an awakening of feminism. The studies I'm familiar with didn't mention loneliness, but rather the social responsibility.
I have heard this argument before, and think it is extremely overstated. Our current version of feminism has expanded across almost all of the west. Technologies like birth control and economies/technologies that allow for women to be in the workforce at mass scale were simply impossible in the past. It's really an apples to oranges comparison, and is an intellectually dishonest one at that.
Re: The decline of the family has unleashed an epidemic of loneliness
#23I would argue that the decline of the family is directly linked to feminism, or better stated, the liberation of women from the home and from conservative sexual values. The two forces behind that are birth control and women entering the work force. These two are magnified by online dating and social media. I am not saying at all that these are bad things, just that we have yet to see the true effects of feminism on…
Not feminism, the establishment of the discrete nuclear family as a social and labor unit divorced from kinship groups. When you've already pared down the web of fundamental relations to 2-5 person cells, your already only a step away from complete individual social collapse.
That doesn't even touch on the breakdown of community organizations (churches, fraternal orders, what have you).
Re: The decline of the family has unleashed an epidemic of loneliness
#24My suggestion is to keep a few close friends for these times. I don't find it hard, but I genuinely enjoy my friends.
Similarly, if you don't have bread, my suggestion is to eat cake.
Re: The decline of the family has unleashed an epidemic of loneliness
#25I would argue that the decline of the family is directly linked to feminism, or better stated, the liberation of women from the home and from conservative sexual values. The two forces behind that are birth control and women entering the work force. These two are magnified by online dating and social media. I am not saying at all that these are bad things, just that we have yet to see the true effects of feminism on…
By the way, this might seem revolutionary, but there are plenty of societies ( in history) that didn't have rule by Men and an awakening of feminism. The studies I'm familiar with didn't mention loneliness, but rather the social responsibility.
Can you please provide examples. Birth control has only been available for a short period of history, so its not obvious to most of us what societies you are talking about and how their liberation of women actually affected the society.
Re: The decline of the family has unleashed an epidemic of loneliness
#26I felt loneliness acutely this week. I live alone, spend most evenings alone, and on top, work's coding and research has been slow for 2 weeks. Collaborators are at conferences and on vacation, so I had much less work and much less face-to-face contact than usual. Given that I code on my own, distribute analyses via email, and occasionally meet if people are around, I barely talked to people some days this week. Goin…
I'm a lot like you - work from home, spend most of my time interacting with people through non-physical mediums, get very lonely often.
I've found biking to be an exceptional way to meet new people and break out of the lonliness funk I fell into after moving to a new city where I knew no one. Most shops organize group rides at all skill levels, and most cities have bike groups. It's a wildly social sport, and most rides end at cafes or breweries. It gets me out of the house and there's an instant camaraderie that comes with sweating with a group of people for a couple hours on a long ride.
Re: The decline of the family has unleashed an epidemic of loneliness
#27I would argue that the decline of the family is directly linked to feminism, or better stated, the liberation of women from the home and from conservative sexual values. The two forces behind that are birth control and women entering the work force. These two are magnified by online dating and social media. I am not saying at all that these are bad things, just that we have yet to see the true effects of feminism on…
I would surmise that we can solve the loneliness problem without going back to having larger families which would only place more stress on the environment hastening our eventual extinction. The crux of the matter is having opportunities for meaningful social interactions daily. While this may have been provided by family in the past, there is no reason this has to be so as far as I can tell. If we can't solve the problem I would still rather have people able to choose their own paths in the world rather than have some arbitrary and oppressive system imposed upon them.
Re: The decline of the family has unleashed an epidemic of loneliness
#28I would argue that the decline of the family is directly linked to feminism, or better stated, the liberation of women from the home and from conservative sexual values. The two forces behind that are birth control and women entering the work force. These two are magnified by online dating and social media. I am not saying at all that these are bad things, just that we have yet to see the true effects of feminism on…
Could you be reversing the roles? It could just as well be the case that it's the "liberation of men from the home and from conservative sexual values" that is the explanation. There's not a lot of real data on what people actually want in terms of relationships. But some attitudes have been quite stable over the last 50 years. For example, women's ideal number of kids has been stable at about 2.5 since the 1970s: https://ifstudies.org/blog/how-many-kids-do-women-want. Anecdotally, it seems like it's usually men that are less interested in settling down, not women.
Re: The decline of the family has unleashed an epidemic of loneliness
#29I felt loneliness acutely this week. I live alone, spend most evenings alone, and on top, work's coding and research has been slow for 2 weeks. Collaborators are at conferences and on vacation, so I had much less work and much less face-to-face contact than usual. Given that I code on my own, distribute analyses via email, and occasionally meet if people are around, I barely talked to people some days this week. Goin…
I can relate to every sentence you wrote, minus certain details.
I like and enjoy my coworkers but our respective interests are too dissimilar. The interactions at work never go deeper than the current objective or niceties. This is completely fine (for now) but in the future I would love to be on a true team.
Going home is indeed meh. As much as it feels nice to unwind, I'd much rather unwind with my gang.
I used to be on a sports team and lived morning, day, and night with my boys. Even though life was chaotic, it was incredible to have a gang. One thing I know for certain is that I could do more to gain that back. Short-term I plan on (1) joining an adult sports league and (2) hit up the super interesting people I've met since moving.
But long-term I believe lifestyle redesign is the only solution to our highly atomized world. I look to the past for ideas.
Re: The decline of the family has unleashed an epidemic of loneliness
#30I felt loneliness acutely this week. I live alone, spend most evenings alone, and on top, work's coding and research has been slow for 2 weeks. Collaborators are at conferences and on vacation, so I had much less work and much less face-to-face contact than usual. Given that I code on my own, distribute analyses via email, and occasionally meet if people are around, I barely talked to people some days this week. Goin…
There are different kinds of loneliness. I suppose the worst is when all apply.
You lack family, you have coworkers, you have random humans in the area, you didn't mention any sort of buddy. So have 2 or 3 out of those 4.
I'm bummed about spending the last quarter century without a buddy. Family and coworkers and random humans do not substitute. Maybe I have no time for it, but I also think it takes a certain kind of environment. The shared environment of an Internet-free childhood neighborhood and school created the right conditions.