ngl, the "male loneliness epidemic" isn't really about women, that's just the thing people focus on.
It's about the image talked about in the 2000 book title "bowling alone" -- without cultural institutions that bring men together in real life, you see men going through life alone -- not as in they can't find a woman to date, but as in they can't find any person to talk to who isn't in an online message board.
There used to be *something* besides work and home -- the local pub, the church, social clubs, sports leagues, and over the past few decades those things have largely been eroded and so the loneliness epidemic isn't about men not being able to spend time with women per se, but with anyone man or woman.
It isn't a "conservative male loneliness epidemic", it's really part of everyone moving forward into a postmodern civilization that's cut away everything frivolous by pointing out how frivolous it is.
To be honest, women are facing similar pressures because there's a reduced number of opportunities for social gathering for them as well. I've seen it first-hand, women who are just lonely because there aren't many opportunities to meet people if you just moved somewhere. The forces causing this affect men more acutely, but it's a chronic issue for both.
There will need to be a sea change in how people think about their relationship to the world before we see things improve. Something other than the state and the market, a rebuilding of community culture, viewed through a different lens than those two options.
I've written many times about "living in ghost world" -- the fact that I go to the park with my son several days a week and am usually alone there with him. That's not just "no men", it's nobody period.
This weekend was interesting in that it was a vision of what things could be -- parents brought their kids to the park (probably because it's the first really nice day of the year), and both my son and I had positive social interactions that we really didn't see over the past year. If only they'd choose to keep coming to the public commons.
It's about the image talked about in the 2000 book title "bowling alone" -- without cultural institutions that bring men together in real life, you see men going through life alone -- not as in they can't find a woman to date, but as in they can't find any person to talk to who isn't in an online message board.
There used to be *something* besides work and home -- the local pub, the church, social clubs, sports leagues, and over the past few decades those things have largely been eroded and so the loneliness epidemic isn't about men not being able to spend time with women per se, but with anyone man or woman.
It isn't a "conservative male loneliness epidemic", it's really part of everyone moving forward into a postmodern civilization that's cut away everything frivolous by pointing out how frivolous it is.
To be honest, women are facing similar pressures because there's a reduced number of opportunities for social gathering for them as well. I've seen it first-hand, women who are just lonely because there aren't many opportunities to meet people if you just moved somewhere. The forces causing this affect men more acutely, but it's a chronic issue for both.
There will need to be a sea change in how people think about their relationship to the world before we see things improve. Something other than the state and the market, a rebuilding of community culture, viewed through a different lens than those two options.
I've written many times about "living in ghost world" -- the fact that I go to the park with my son several days a week and am usually alone there with him. That's not just "no men", it's nobody period.
This weekend was interesting in that it was a vision of what things could be -- parents brought their kids to the park (probably because it's the first really nice day of the year), and both my son and I had positive social interactions that we really didn't see over the past year. If only they'd choose to keep coming to the public commons.
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