I won’t disagree that loneliness is an issue in our society. But I don’t think it is the only “problem”. Anecdotally for me: I wasn’t ready to have sex, a relationship or for dating for a long time. So I’m mostly happy to have taken that time. In previous generations you’d marry and have kids for a while at that point. I think we have a lot more room to grow individually today.
We also have more room to fail individually today. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not proposing that we go back to where western societies were in the 50s, but there are definitely downsides to our current societies that need to be dealt with. Lonely people aren’t just individual people who are having a bad time, they are IMO a huge threat for societal cohesion. e.g. they’re much more likely than non-lonely people to politically radicalize.
I won’t disagree that loneliness is an issue in our society. But I don’t think it is the only “problem”. Anecdotally for me: I wasn’t ready to have sex, a relationship or for dating for a long time. So I’m mostly happy to have taken that time. In previous generations you’d marry and have kids for a while at that point. I think we have a lot more room to grow individually today.
We also have more room to fail individually today. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not proposing that we go back to where western societies were in the 50s, but there are definitely downsides to our current societies that need to be dealt with. Lonely people aren’t just individual people who are having a bad time, they are IMO a huge threat for societal cohesion. e.g. they’re much more likely than non-lonely people to politically radicalize.
i do propose going back to the 50’s, 50 AD