301–310 of 396 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
SF Bay Area
In the city or the vast suburbs of the peninsula / South Bay?
I would put this down to a growing part of the population feels financially insecure. As you grow older, spending quality time with people also requires spending $. If you are barely making some savings, you probably won't feel comfortable in scaling up your social life. It is surprising that the author recognizes the time period/age group... > These new habits are startling — and a striking departure from the past.…
My friend group is pretty economically diverse and also cost-conscious, and most of our social activities are free or nearly-free. We hang out in public parks, get together in each other's homes, and go hiking, camping, or to beaches. Optionally, you can put out some cheese and crackers and a cheap bottle of wine, and now you're all having a nice time together for $20. I'm well-off these days, but I still enjoy doing…
Not being lonely used to be automatic as society forced you to interact and meet with lots of people just to function. Religion might force you to church where you meet most of the community regularly. It goes far beyond just the purpose of religion. You'll know about every life event of every member, learn about businesses in the community, might meet new friends or even a spouse. The only social institute that come…
You have to work at it (though to be fair, it seems every religious group will have the person who will start conversations with anyone) - but you have to work at it anywhere.
One recommendations I'd make is don't look for "age group" things - because this will often overlap with people looking for dating partners, and that can be all sorts of confusing and messy. Be open to joining or working with groups that contain people older, younger, or of all ages.
I live in a big city, but I'm terribly lonely. - I live alone. - I work hybrid, but when I go into the office, it's more or less empty and I spend all my time on zoom calls. - My family lives far away. - I'm single. Most weeks, my only social interaction is at the local bar, where I'm a regular, or various dates from apps. Excesses of both of these is unhealthy in different ways. I've been pushing myself to go to mee…
You're not. All human society worldwide is optimized for isolation.
Compartmentalized. Even the more communal cultures (like Middle-Eastern or Asian with extended families living in the same household for multiple generations).
We have distinct "spheres" that may sometimes overlap a little but with almost no interfaces to mingle between them: Work, home, civilian, government, policing, shops, services, online, offline...
The Unabomber was right.
The fundamental force behind this is individualism. Every single technological innovation has made it easier for the individual to function better alone. Every societal change has emphasized the individual right over the (real or perceived) benefit of the collective. This trend seems to accelerate and absolutely nothing that is happening in western society even remotely suggests a possible turnaround. You can take ac…
Marrying? Fuck that; pun intended. Friends? I can count the number of true friends I've ever had with one hand. Co-workers and comrades? Ultimately, we're just there to make ends meet. Societal collective (eg: neighborhoods, villages, towns)? Well, we're here talking about this because such things have become pieces of history.
I crave solitude, even if in practice that solitude relies on a handful of people and organizations that enable it (eg: supermarkets, gas stations, power company). Interacting with people fucking sucks balls, the less of it the better I say. I'd sooner deal with machines or our fellow animal peers.
The way I see it, back in the old days people tolerated being around each other because that was a hard requirement to long-term survival. But that is no longer the case, and given that relinquishment and freedom, I for one am going to take full advantage of that freedom and enjoy something my ancestors couldn't.
Of course, this also means I won't have any descendants to enjoy what I enjoy (or enjoy what I couldn't), but that's none of my concern because I don't care about leaving behind offspring in the first place. Individualism baby, everyone including Mother Nature can go pound sand.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> makes everything bland, homogeneous and fungible. which is what makes it cheap and available. If you ran your own farm stand, the goods you produce would be some 2-5x more expensive than a factory farm could've sold for. The modern wealth is predicated on such specialization and scaling. It's why artisanal products are so expensive.
Artisanal products are so expensive because we make them so. By default if you buy something in a store, add 5% to the value by improving it and want to sell it on eBay, they'll charge sales tax on the full sale price even though you already paid sales tax on 95% of that. To avoid the double taxation you have to file paperwork, which most people don't know how to do, and pay filing fees, which eat into your already-m…
Maybe familiarity has bred contempt? We have more insights - accurate or not - into each other. The internet has placed us all closer together and more visible to one another where previously we could stay in our social bubbles and communities. Part of why it was easier to get along with people even less than a decade ago was there was a social distance, where that we were different made us more open to one another,…
I literally know one or two people who treat others with essential kindness and strive to make their lives meaningful. I wish I had more ways of giving back, because if it wasn't for being able to talk with them once in a while, I'd seriously be doubting my sanity right now. At the same time, it's just not right to lean too much on them - there's only so much anyone can do for your existential problems. So once in a while we share a moment of "yeah bro, I see it too, things are going downhill in a profound and horrifying way, but it's OK, we know we won't let it get to us and we'll figure it out eventually". And that's about as much relating to people that I do these days.
Could I choose to "unjudge" the people who I've held to what apparently these days is an unrealistically high standard? Easy, I've had many opportunities to try it! People can be quite forgiving of past misunderstandings, the problem is that they don't seem to learn from their mistakes a whole lot. I'm like, "okay, this person might not really be so great, but they're not a horrible person either, so let's give myself a chance to share some sort of meaningful experience with them!". It goes alright for a while, then I end up having to unilaterally struggle to maintain a basic mutual comfort zone while trying to dissuade poor attempts at gaslighting. (Apparently, it's considered "toxic" to tell others when their behavior is causing harm or distress?)
Somehow it's becoming very difficult these days to be a decent person - as defined by the bare minimum of not engaging in violence or manipulative behavior because you treat others like human beings - and be social at the same time. I remember when the Internet used to provide opportunities for just that. Right now it's doing the opposite; who would've thought that a marriage of mass media and the Cold War military-industrial complex would naturally act to set people apart. People are bombarded with so much emotionally charged but otherwise completely nonsensical information which has nothing to do with real life, that if you somehow fall through the cracks of that whole shared hallucination, you're effectively a pariah.
He goes from war, to loneliness, to very low birth rates in society to rising same sex unions, to interesting alternative unions -- all designed by the governments of the time to support the martial future society.
A fascinating pair of books to read that speculate on the future.
(Please don't downvote me for talking about the damn books)
The fundamental force behind this is individualism. Every single technological innovation has made it easier for the individual to function better alone. Every societal change has emphasized the individual right over the (real or perceived) benefit of the collective. This trend seems to accelerate and absolutely nothing that is happening in western society even remotely suggests a possible turnaround. You can take ac…
I feel like it's the opposite. This was caused by the destruction of individualism. When people are individuals, you know the name of your butcher and which farm your wheat came from. Now it all comes from the collective and you can't participate in the process without being a drone. Working for Walmart is not the same as operating your own farm stand. You lack autonomy because decisions are made collectively by corp…
We are alone and not special. I'm trying to explore the advantages of that. I certainly find myself in less drama in a community I can readily disconnect from.
As an anecdote: I had a friend in high school who regularly said he wanted 'to be remembered', that his greatest goal in life was to have his name be recorded in history. I thought he was somewhat arrogant, but he truly wanted to become an Alexander the Great figure.
I'm considering it my own goal to be someone forgettable. I want to find comfort/success without recognition.