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Overcoming the friendship recession

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Re: Overcoming the friendship recession

#91

Post by robocat »

hrdwdmrbl wrote: post #2

Unfortunately many people now strongly dislike receiving unexpected phone calls. You may (i have) genuinely upset some people by calling them. Yes, I’m rolling my eyes too, but that’s how they feel

So what?

There are also heaps of people that love getting phonecalls, or love to get a nice voice message.

There's a whole other world of people that call and enjoy calling!!!!

Why let a subset of people rule your behaviour towards others not in that subset?

When people call, I try to encourage that. Unless I'm busy or they're too needy, so I don't answer.

I am especially encouraging towards anyone that struggles with text messages (one of my oldest friends was illiterate, and I've got other friends that would call themselves dyslexic).

I undermine that by messaging when I should call, because I like the written word.

Re: Overcoming the friendship recession

#92

Post by AussieWog93 »

johnnyanmac wrote: post #73
obscurette wrote: post #19

Yes, managing relationships needs time, but there is another problem I see nowadays. When I was young (I'm in my sixties), it was normal to have friends who could be very different from you. They might have had qualities you didn't like at all, but you could still be very good friends. If I look my students (highschool and college level) now, they are extremely intolerant for differences compared to what I remember f…

[flagged]

You're absolutely right! Nobody in the 60s or 70s thought that the police should terrorise minorities or that women were beneath them. These are entirely new problems that have only arisen since 2020 or so.

Re: Overcoming the friendship recession

#93

Post by seu »

I think there should be less "how to solve friendship" posts, which see our social interactions as "problems" to be solved, and more reflection about how this is a consequence of a market oriented, inequality driving system. If the problem is that friendships need time, we should demand less working time and more free time to establish friendships.

Re: Overcoming the friendship recession

#94

Post by acdha »

sph wrote: post #45
Zealotux wrote: post #25

I live in Barcelona, and during last year’s blackout I wandered through the city. As I passed by the Baix Guinardó gardens, I came across something that felt like a "A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte" brought to life: the park was full of families socialising the old way, children running everywhere, the whole place buzzing with chatter and energy. Later that day, walking home through darkened stree…

Have you ever seen those videos filming London streets in the 1970s? They are absolutely packed with groups of two or three people, not going places, but just standing there, chatting, as if they have nowhere else to be. It is something most of us have never experienced in any form and the change has happened over long enough timescales that we are used to our streets of strangers just going about their lives, the ex…

I think a lot of it comes back to cars: many people traded longer commutes for suburban houses, which has advantages but comes at the cost of not having much to do without driving somewhere and less free time around other people. This is especially bad for parents when they don’t feel comfortable letting their kids walk / bike around the neighborhood since that means more time spent playing chauffeur.

Re: Overcoming the friendship recession

#95

Post by AussieWog93 »

hrdwdmrbl wrote: post #2

Unfortunately many people now strongly dislike receiving unexpected phone calls. You may (i have) genuinely upset some people by calling them. Yes, I’m rolling my eyes too, but that’s how they feel

N=1 here but I love getting out of the blue phone calls from the couple of friends that do it. If I can't pick up, or am too busy to chat, I just swipe up on of the prebaked "sorry, can't chat now" SMS responses.

It's them who initiate 90% of the calls too, and nobody cares.

Re: Overcoming the friendship recession

#96

Post by johnnyanmac »

AussieWog93 wrote: post #92
johnnyanmac wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

You're absolutely right! Nobody in the 60s or 70s thought that the police should terrorise minorities or that women were beneath them. These are entirely new problems that have only arisen since 2020 or so.

They knew not to say the quiet part out loud back then. That decorum is gone now.

Or in many cases (not mine since I don't use them), there wasn't the world's largest bathroom wall to go sound off on... Except you sign every message off with your name. The kind of stuff people post in their real name that I would take to my grave is insane.

Re: Overcoming the friendship recession

#97

Post by momentary »

I'm surprised that this article that has so much of an AI smell gets such a positive reception.

I thought HN didn't go in for AI slop? I suspect that this kind of thing has people feeling more alienated than ever, what with even the articles online lacking any level of human connection.

Re: Overcoming the friendship recession

#98

Post by teaearlgraycold »

Here’s what I do: Spend time at my local marker space. It’s easy to bond with people when you have such similar interests. It’s really amazing how exactly aligned I am with a set of the people there. Being in SF already biases people towards certain interests. But going beyond that to the inner circle of tech obsessed nerds, makers from all over the world that moved here with a purpose, gives me a form fitting community that probably only exists in a handful of locations on Earth. Play social deduction/deception games. I have a free social club of 100+ people that meets at least once per week. We all practice lying to each other and reading each other. Yeah it’s only a couple hours per week but it’s highly focused on social muscles we often only exercise infrequently elsewhere. No social media. Pretty much no long distance friendships (outside of stints where I play a lot of video games with someone). I genuinely do not give a damn what’s happening to people I haven’t seen in years even if I could know everything by looking at their feed. If I want to catch up I’ll make plans to have them visit me or I will visit them. There are people I do this for on a regular basis, but it’s a short list. I do not comprehend the appeal of social media. All of my social brain is exercised on face to face interactions. I think the biggest factors here are living in a city (I was pretty isolated when I lived in the suburbs) and having enough free time.

Re: Overcoming the friendship recession

#99

Post by billfor »

sph wrote: post #45
Zealotux wrote: post #25

I live in Barcelona, and during last year’s blackout I wandered through the city. As I passed by the Baix Guinardó gardens, I came across something that felt like a "A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte" brought to life: the park was full of families socialising the old way, children running everywhere, the whole place buzzing with chatter and energy. Later that day, walking home through darkened stree…

Have you ever seen those videos filming London streets in the 1970s? They are absolutely packed with groups of two or three people, not going places, but just standing there, chatting, as if they have nowhere else to be. It is something most of us have never experienced in any form and the change has happened over long enough timescales that we are used to our streets of strangers just going about their lives, the ex…

[flagged]

Re: Overcoming the friendship recession

#100

Post by m463 »

Zealotux wrote: post #25

I live in Barcelona, and during last year’s blackout I wandered through the city. As I passed by the Baix Guinardó gardens, I came across something that felt like a "A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte" brought to life: the park was full of families socialising the old way, children running everywhere, the whole place buzzing with chatter and energy. Later that day, walking home through darkened stree…

Your story reminds me of working pre-pandemic, and going on an afternoon walk with a coworker. He was into pokemon go and he wanted to attend an event (raid?) before we walked. I followed him down the street where he stood at a certain deserted spot and waited. All of a sudden, people just started appearing, some from cars, some coming from between the bushes, some walking down the street.

the raid started, they all silently stared at their phones, and at some point they all looked up, looked around and walked away.

all mostly in complete silence.

who knew this was a precursor to more of the same, maybe throughout society.

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