Loneliness

We live in the time of an epidemic.

Not Covid19 which has rippled around the world for the last nine months. The epidemic I am talking about has been growing for decades and slowly infecting country after country. It is a silent epidemic but one that many will recognise but will never talk about. I am talking about the epidemic of loneliness and meaning. 

Study after study shows we are more lonely than at any time in our history. It is a loneliness and isolation which seems to correlate with modernity and affluence. The closer countries get to western levels of economic development the more depressed and sad their people become. We appear to have traded in deeper ties for bigger houses and faster cars ironically both of which further isolate us from our fellow human beings. No more close knit neighbourhoods where people know each other or share public transport. No, now we drive to and from the office or factory before returning home where we warehouse ourselves on our time off. 

Modern life has shattered many of our connections that we used to have. Few even know their own neighbours let alone share time with them. More and more move away from their hometowns for university or for work. Now generations can be spread across the country or the world completely isolated from each other. Even when you do live near economic reality gets in the way of a fulfilling life. Working ever longer hours to afford houses which continuously shoot up in price, no let up for those struggling - throw in the commute and time soon slips away. 

Time was you could afford a house on an average salary allowing one parent to stay home with the kids if they wanted. Now that is next to impossible. The increase in mortgage payments means two must work if the house is to be paid for. This has been matched by a relentless drive to get women back into work after childbirth. An entire tax and credit system which rewards work not parenting. The message is clear, family and parenting comes a distance second to earning money and paying taxes. 

The results have been easy to see - family breakdown and children running wild. These are facts born out of statistics over the last 30 years. But others are harder to quantify - who is reading to the children or teaching them to cook, who is imbuing them with a moral code. Perhaps before the elite classes wring their hands about low education attainment or childhood obesity they should look at the broader system and society we have created. 

If we can’t keep our families together how can we expect to form stable communities. Time spent at work means less time with family, less time with friends, clubs, the school PTA, getting involved in politics - these are the ties that pull us together. They create the web of cross dependencies and connections which give life meaning and keep that loneliness at bay. 

We live in a society which lionises freedom above everything but in reality most people crave connection. We want freedom to choose up but only up until a certain point, beyond that point choice becomes intolerable. We struggle to sift through the options and choose - it gives no further satisfaction. At a personal level the ties that satisfy are the ties that bind. A good marriage provides love and support for a lifetime, you will put down deep and meaningful roots which will grow until death and yet marriage is a continuous compromise between two people's needs and wishes. More commitment means more love which is the opposite to what liberalism has taught for decades. 

Again and again you see humans creating connection and meaning via binding ties which limit their freedom. Children, pets, friends, political parties, clubs, religions and so much more. It is via these commitments and love that we create the meaning that we crave because humans are social animals  - genetically driven to socialise and cooperate with others. 

Cities are proof of this need, millions of people living cheek to jowl and for the most part getting along with little need for law or regulation. Few need to be told to clear their rubbish up or turn the music down. The cities exist because of that need to socialise and cooperate - sure there are laws but few actually know them except at a very basic level. Don’t steal, don’t kill - these don’t need to be codified for most. 

The Covid19 lockdowns have demonstrated how the physical needs of much of the population can be sustained via technological advancements like home delivery. Food and goods delivered straight to the door with minimal or no human contact required. What it has also shown is that technology can’t replace our innate need to socialise, to touch, to speak in person. Most have felt the mental anguish of not being able to see the people we care about. Modern technology was supposed to connect us to the world and it has but it can’t replace those connections. The capacity to pick up your phone and connect to billions can’t replace those basic human needs.

The mass social reactions we are seeing now are a response to our collapsed meaningful connections, people are turning to technology to keep the loneliness and lack of meaning at bay. But real communities are formed with time, shared memories and interactions, they are about encouraging others to join in. Social media drives the emergence of tribes, groups of people who are driven by single goals. They are exclusionary by nature and intolerant of those who don’t agree with them - the most basic form of “them and us” and one which only leads to anger and aggression not to connection and community.

This all being played out in our politics and media now. Politicians and journalists have realised that playing to these techno-enabled tribes keeps us locked onto them - reading their bilge or listening to their speeches. It is always the other side is the whispered refrain. But the more they work to divide us the less our communities will renew. Maybe that's the plan -  keep us shouting at each other so we can’t demand meaningful change. I hope not but time and age has made me ever more cynical. 

However it happens change will come - too many are disconnected and unhappy with the current system. We've seen the first waves with Trump and Brexit - both of which were driven by a wish to recreate a sense of national community and solidarity. They are minor events compared to what will happen as people begin to push back against a system which no longer provides social succour. But whatever happens next, more TV’s and bigger houses are not enough anymore.