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Nearly Half of Americans Are Lonely

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Re: Nearly Half of Americans Are Lonely

#301

Post by jplayer01 »

s-shellfish wrote: post #268
pixelperfect wrote: post #260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most women would not consider such an ordinary social interaction to be harassment, but suppose a small fraction do - being perceived or accused of harassment is such a negative thing that it can be a strong deterrent even if there's a low chance of it actually happening.

Most men aren't psychopaths, but a small fraction are. Perceiving all men as such even if there's a low chance of it actually happening...

If you're accused of harassment as a guy, that has huge negative social and career effects that are close to impossible to fight. Everybody turns against you and you're ostracized from your community. It's a big deal.

Re: Nearly Half of Americans Are Lonely

#302

Post by lapaz17 »

mendelsd wrote: post #299

Loneliness, in my experience, can be a symptom rather than a problem in and of itself. I define my past loneliness as: Negative feelings, fed by: - feeling bad in the first instance - feeling powerless to improve my state - feeling that others could improve my state, if only they would show sufficient interest in me Gaining power to work on why I was feeling bad in the first instance (through health and lifestyle int…

How did you achieve it? What were the conditions to change your mental status,opinions?

Re: Nearly Half of Americans Are Lonely

#303

Post by [deleted] »

jplayer01 wrote: post #301
s-shellfish wrote: post #268

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most men aren't psychopaths, but a small fraction are. Perceiving all men as such even if there's a low chance of it actually happening...

If you're accused of harassment as a guy, that has huge negative social and career effects that are close to impossible to fight. Everybody turns against you and you're ostracized from your community. It's a big deal.

[deleted]

Re: Nearly Half of Americans Are Lonely

#304

Post by closeparen »

Fricken wrote: post #112
simmanian wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I do think people tend to engage with strangers a lot less often than they had "back then," but I cannot agree modern society stigmatizes that kind of interaction at all. You can see people interacting with strangers on college campuses, at music events, and at grocery stores all the time.

Modern society doesn't overtly stigmatize social interaction, it encourages social isolation at a structural level. Car dependent suburban sprawl is designed to minimize the number of necessary interactions you need to have with strangers to get through your day. As a society we've gone to great lengths to avoid other people. The miracle of modern civilization is that you no longer need to be a part of a community an…

Car dependent suburban sprawl maximizes the time that members of the same family spend together, at the expense of interaction with strangers. Both have their place in different phases of life. Many parents gladly give up interactions with strangers on public transit in exchange for the extra hours with their children that fast personal transport enables.

It’s a terrible place to live alone when young and single, but that’s not what it’s for.

Re: Nearly Half of Americans Are Lonely

#305

Post by baxtr »

Broken_Hippo wrote: post #147
Rotdhizon wrote: post #9

I think a huge factor is the growing theme of social interaction being unacceptable. Back in the day you could walk up to and make friends with almost anyone, it wasn't weird to interact with strangers, thus making new acquaintances. Modern society stigmatizes that kind of interaction, don't talk to people you don't know if you don't want to be ostracized. You could want to befriend someone in a crowd, but come up wi…

I disagree. I'm 40, and had life pre-internet. Cell phones were still expensive when I was in school. A portion of my friends were too poor to regularly have home telephone service. I'm bisexual, and paid for that bit with a middle school not talking to me most of a school year. I lost friends because I dated folks with a different skin color. I didn't really tell folks I was atheist back then, but it didn't really m…

I’d disagree, too. Like yourself, half of my life was with any internet or devices. It was still very awkward to just walk up to people and starting talking to them. I believe there are two things at play here: these things get measured nowadays, and, people get more picks who to be with. A lot of people are looking/waiting for the perfect partner and don’t want to put too much energy into keeping a relationship, that’s maybe where devices play a larger role than before.

Re: Nearly Half of Americans Are Lonely

#306

Post by ghthor »

15155 wrote: post #142
jschwartzi wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think if you want the world to be this way you should just do what you want to do anyway. Life is too short to care what some random group of strangers at a concert thinks, anyway. You're not hurting anyone and I think you're normalizing good behavior. Nobody is going to call the cops on you for complementing their jacket. I've stopped letting myself be bothered and it's actually done wonders for my social life. An…

I think this hits the nail on the head: who cares? Who cares what these people (who are judging you for meeting someone in public) think? They're very unlikely to be anyone meaningful if they're doing that, since being a good conversationalist is a trait that most successful people possess.

Fuck that yeah, do what you want, fuck what people think about who you are or what you're doing. You'll at least give them a good story to tell about that nut who walked up to that guy on the subway and said, "I dig that jacket, wanna get some coffee together?"

Re: Nearly Half of Americans Are Lonely

#307

Post by jesuslop »

philipodonnell wrote: post #220
jesuslop wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have you tried that meetup thing? How did it went?

I use it all the time, but more because I manage a few groups, people who come out and I talk with are always happy to find there are people who share their interests, even if they never come back.

Interesting!

Re: Nearly Half of Americans Are Lonely

#308

Post by mnm1 »

Do people still wonder why drug abuse is pandemic in America? Compound loneliness with poverty ... Are people still wondering? Why the birth rates are low and mortality so high? Seriously are people still wondering? Why we are such a divided society, full of hate and fear of one another. People can't be that fucking dumb in America. Maybe they are because they're still wondering. Why we fight wars we can't win? Why we fight so hard to prevent our neighbors from getting healthcare or education or help of any kind. No seriously, are people still wondering why our kids shoot themselves in schools and then when they don't do that shoot themselves up with heroin or worse? Are you telling me people are so fucking dumb here that they're still wondering about such things? Yeah, it appears the obvious escapes most people's common sense. Only the truly stupid wonder about such things. It's not just loneliness, it's lack of any kind of connection that drives people to do insane things. Yet people still wonder why that kid shot up his school. Are people here really that stupid? Yes they are.

Re: Nearly Half of Americans Are Lonely

#309

Post by PhantomGremlin »

magduf wrote: post #78
awacs wrote: post #51

The country being so politically polarized isn't helping. It's to the point where most only want to socialize with people in the same "tribe". For better or worse.

It's not great, and I think it shows our society is fracturing and collapsing, but I don't want to socialize much with any Trump voters either. I have enough problems; I don't need someone spouting insane conspiracy theories to me about how 9/11 was "an inside job", Sandy Hook never happened, etc.

I don't want to socialize much with any Trump voters either

There were 62,984,828 "deplorables" that voted for Trump in the last election. You're willing to paint with such a broad brush that you shun the 46.1% of the country who voted for Trump?

Re: Nearly Half of Americans Are Lonely

#310

Post by belorn »

furi wrote: post #289
PopsiclePete wrote: post #271

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

I've said this on here before more or less, but here's the problem for me: If my girlfriend is approached by a man without due cause (such as asking for directions, trying to commission her to work on something, etc.), our immediate reaction is to assume he has sexual intent. The only difference being creepy makes is whether or not it's an assumption or a certainty. I don't like being perceived as though I have sexua…

Those "9/10 times if a guy approaches her without due cause he's got sexual intent" is a actually just a stereotype which if we actually measure it would shrink down to single digit percent. Male sexuality is commonly over exaggerated and part of the expected gender role, with female sexuality in contrast has the opposite expected gender role. Since no one want to perceive a man as being outside his gender role we attach this assumption of "horny man", in the same way we attach "innocent girl" to a woman. When a man approach a woman both gender roles and expectations are applied and thus we get this perceived situation.
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