Comment by JohnFen
14 days ago
I'm using "local community" as a convenient placeholder for all the various things that count as community-based activities and groups.
> When there's a loneliness epidemic that is especially pronounced with young people, it seems really silly to act like local community is a general institution
One of the reasons for the loneliness epidemic is that people have stopped seeking out and participating in things that get them face-to-face with neighbors. That's a thing only those people can fix for themselves. As a light example, you said
> I am nothing like my neighbors, never have been, and have never known very much about them in any of the places I've lived.
Where in the same breath you both claim that you have nothing in common with your neighbors, and that you have never known very much about them. However, you can't know if you have anything in common with them or not unless you get to know them. A first step toward finding what community exists around you is as simple as making it a point to get to know your neighbors.
I am fairly confident that people's agency is pretty low on the list of reasons why loneliness had reached epidemic proportions. There are very obvious cultural and geographic (and ultimately economic) factors at work that none of us as individuals ever really chose, but which have been decided for us. Anomie is not something that can be overcome through sheer force of will.
I know enough about my neighbors based on small glimpses of their lifestyle to know I will never want to or need to know them. I don't make friends with child abusers. And the reality is that those sorts of value conflicts are commonplace in contemporary American life.