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People are avoiding interaction more and more now because everyone feels entitled to know every detail of a person's life due to social media. Why are you people patronizing some random guy's observations?
My hood has changed in the past few years. Neighbors don't want to deal with problems, increasing accidents, noise, weird people who don't live here walking around, new people moving in who don't respect the culture and I have had negative encounters in public places. Men twice my size trying to start something with me. Whatthehell. Not positive connections at all. I told DH I have a feeling something bad might happen this summer, it all just feels wrong. The first few days of warm weather there have been a lot of police sirens.
Growth of an area, a lovely thing (for the pockets of the developers)
That’s an excellent point, but the evidence isn’t there to support rising crime levels as the reason for the burst of survellience technology and alarmist posts to social media. I have been a long-term SAHM and my volunteerism keeps me mostly in the neighborhood. It’s not crime driving these changes. It’s something else. When I first moved here, people were outside all the time. Now, I barely see my neighbors any more, and it’s uncommon to have people just stop by for a chat in the front yard, which used to happen frequently. Nearly all of my immediate neighbors now have cameras on their homes to monitor who is coming and going, even though we’ve lived here for years, and Nextdoor? It’s a **** show of petty arguments. People are markedly uncharitable, even though we all know each other. It’s a good thing I belong to a lovely and welcoming church. There I feel at home among friends, but out on the sidewalk in front of my house, I feel a chill descending over the neighborhood. It’s hard to write that because I’ve loved this place since the day I moved in. All is not lost, though. I’m in the process of nurturing a new group of friends who’ve recently moved here, and maybe that will make a difference.
Prior to civilization, you would have lived in a tribe of about 100-150 people. You would have spent every day of your life with them. And they all would have been your cousins or closer. All of your neighbors would have been your family. And family tends to make stronger and more-altruistic bonds.
Prior to civilization? What the hell are you talking about?
Try 400 years ago.
Up until the 1600s, 90% of the people on Earth lived and died within 5 miles of the exact spot they came out of the womb.
Mobility was anathema to life. 90% of your population, including children, had to work to produce enough food to feed everyone.
The only people with mobility were the greater and lesser nobles, the landed gentry, Free-men, the clergy, soldiers (the professional class not the militia), sailors and merchants.
And while they had the ability to travel, they didn't relocate. Only the merchant-class relocated.
There were social restrictions, too. You never married outside your ethnic group. The greater and lesser nobles would marry outside their ethnic group for political or financial reasons. Irish didn't inter-marry with Normans, and the Norse in Northumbria didn't inter-marry with Angles, Saxons, Picts or Scots. It wasn't until the 1500s and 1600s that they started to inter-marry, but then you didn't marry outside of your religion. Calvinists did not marry Catholics, and Methodists did not marry people in the Church of England.
And you married your 1st Cousin.
Remember, there's only 40 to 120 people in your village, and every one of them is an aunt, uncle or cousin. You could walk 7 miles to the neighboring village, but within 3 or 4 generations, everyone in both villages are related, so no matter what you do, you end up marrying a cousin.
It wasn't until the Colonial Era that you had real movement. Brits, Scandinavians, Dutch, Belgians, Germans, French, Portuguese, Spanish and Italians are coming to the Americas, Brits and French to the Middle East, and Brits, French, Dutch and Portuguese to Asia and the Pacific Islands.
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Originally Posted by Redshadowz
People are merely reacting to the environment they find themselves in. I don't blame the people, I blame the environment.
It's not the environment, it's technology.
A Census Bureau study of census records through 1960 showed 90% of Americans living and dying within 30 miles of where they were born. They stayed in their county, or an adjacent county.
If you looked at the data now, you'd probably find that only 50% to 60% live and die within 30 miles of their birth-place.
A well-developed interstate highway system and everyone having a car let's people go where they will.
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Originally Posted by GoCardinals
Have you watched the movie “Inception”?
Why would you want to?
You can just read about Calhoun's rat paradise. Calhoun built a rat pen where the rat's were free of predators and had all the food and water they wanted without ever having to work for it.
Dominant males became aggressive, some moving in groups, attacking females and the young. Mating behaviors were disrupted. Some became exclusively homosexual. Others became pansexual and hypersexual, attempting to mount any rat they encountered. Mothers neglected their infants, first failing to construct proper nests, and then carelessly abandoning and even attacking their pups. In certain sections of the pens, infant mortality rose as high as 96%, the dead cannibalized by adults. Subordinate animals withdrew psychologically, surviving in a physical sense but at an immense psychological cost. They were the majority in the late phases of growth, existing as a vacant, huddled mass in the center of the pens. Unable to breed, the population plummeted and did not recover. The crowded rodents had lost the ability to co-exist harmoniously, even after the population numbers once again fell to low levels. At a certain density, they had ceased to act like rats and mice, and the change was permanent.
[emphasis mine]
Sources:
Calhoun, J. B. 1963. The Ecology and Sociology of the Norway Rat. Bethesda, MD: U.S. Department of Health, Education & Welfare.
Pines, M. 1971. “How the social organization of animal communities can lead to a population crisis which destroys them,” in Julius Segal (ed.) National Institute of Mental Health; Mental Health Reports – 5; U.S. Department of Health Education & Welfare.
That’s an excellent point, but the evidence isn’t there to support rising crime levels as the reason for the burst of survellience technology and alarmist posts to social media. I have been a long-term SAHM and my volunteerism keeps me mostly in the neighborhood. It’s not crime driving these changes. It’s something else. When I first moved here, people were outside all the time. Now, I barely see my neighbors any more, and it’s uncommon to have people just stop by for a chat in the front yard, which used to happen frequently. Nearly all of my immediate neighbors now have cameras on their homes to monitor who is coming and going, even though we’ve lived here for years, and Nextdoor? It’s a **** show of petty arguments. People are markedly uncharitable, even though we all know each other. It’s a good thing I belong to a lovely and welcoming church. There I feel at home among friends, but out on the sidewalk in front of my house, I feel a chill descending over the neighborhood. It’s hard to write that because I’ve loved this place since the day I moved in. All is not lost, though. I’m in the process of nurturing a new group of friends who’ve recently moved here, and maybe that will make a difference.
That is too bad. I think I'm dealing with that plus growth related changes. People are insulated in their own little bubbles. Good luck with the new folks, it's nice to have a good group of local friends.
Mobility was anathema to life. 90% of your population, including children, had to work to produce enough food to feed everyone.
The only people with mobility were the greater and lesser nobles, the landed gentry, Free-men, the clergy, soldiers (the professional class not the militia), sailors and merchants.
I referred to precivilization for the same reason Rousseau and others did. Precivilization actually required less-labor than civilization on the part of the "producing classes", and there was effectively absolute-equality. Which is why the natives were never keen on being "assimilated".
But ironically, it was the fact that farming was so productive which ultimately enslaved the vast-majority of the people. Peasants had to give away something like 1/3rd of their goods and other production to pay rent, taxes, and tithes to maintain the nobles, soldiers, and clergy.
But even still, the peasants didn't labor as much as you think. Because farming is a seasonal affair. You work really hard during plowing and harvesting, then the rest of the year, not so much. So the medieval peasant actually had more days off work than we did. Which is why they had so many festivals and other celebrations.
And the natives worked even less. And their "work" is often what we modern humans do for fun. Such as hunting and fishing.
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Originally Posted by Mircea
You never married outside your ethnic group. And you married your 1st Cousin.
It certainly "could" have been your first cousin, but the average familial distance of a tribe is probably more like second-cousins. The most-distant relative would likely be third-cousins, maybe fourth-cousins.
As for not marrying outside your ethnic group. While I think people should be "free" to marry anyone they want. The reason people marry outside their ethnic group today has little to do with freedom, and more to do with how the modern economy effectively forces you to move far away from your family for work, school, or just so you can afford to live.
While the leftists complain incessantly about the lack of community. Community is not something governments can create. Community is always limited in-scale, and requires people to basically be neighbors over a long period of time. And the best community of all would be people who have lived together their whole lives, are related, and believe the same things.
The moment people leave their communities, and the moment they marry outside of them, they destroy them. And all you are left with is a world where no one knows their neighbors, and families don't talk to each other.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Mircea
It's not the environment, it's technology.
I agree. And while it is true that people often still die within 30 miles of where they were born, in those 30 miles there are usually hundreds of thousands of other people, if not millions.
While technology "gives people more options", it also "forces their hand".
For instance, one of the leftist criticisms of libertarianism is, "Who would build the roads?" But why do liberals want roads anyway? They want people to walk more, they want people to buy locally, to live closer to work, they want community, and to stop urban-sprawl. The best way to achieve all of things, would be to get rid of roads altogether.
But since roads exist, it is difficult to live without a car. And because tractors exist, a farmer must buy one. If automation exists, all of our industries must use it. If immigrants provide cheap labor, we must bring them into this country.
As technology has improved, people were at first thrown off the land, pushed into cities, where they have to travel to work, if not relocate themselves to different states or even different countries, and as soon as they get settled wherever they are, industries change and they are forced to find new work, where they will again be working for some faceless corporation so they won't be thrown out onto the streets.
And all of this we call "progress". Which it is in a way. We couldn't have all this nice stuff without it. But it comes at a cost.
I thought Tucker Carlson did a pretty good job of explaining the problem in this video. But he doesn't seem to define his "limiting-principle". He wants to be pro-capitalism and a luddite at the same time.
People are merely reacting to the environment they find themselves in. I don't blame the people, I blame the environment.
While you could argue that the people created the environment, I don't think that is fair. Because if you think of the past 5,000 years of "human civilization", only in the past couple-hundred could anyone even vote(and we could debate whether voting even changes anything). Society has always been top-down, thrust on us by "leaders" who sell their souls for money.
Until you change the environment, and so long as the issues I raised continue to worsen, nothing can get better. And complaining about "individuals" is a waste of time, you have to change the system.
but see changing the environment means changing the people, since the people were the ones that created our current environment. we decided that we needed to meld our tribes with others for defensive purposes, so we created cities. we then decided to meld those cities into states, and eventually nations. then as we improved the mobility of people, we expanded those cities, and we started moving around more.
and with each addition to modern technology, we have lost a little more of ourselves, telephones made it easier to talk to people across long distances. the radio made it easier for us to hear music and ideas from more diverse people, television did the same thing, and expanded that further. then came cell phones, now we could talk to people while we were on the move.
then came the internet, we could now sit in our houses and talk to people without ever leaving the house. we could even buy the things we need to make that happen if we choose..
then came the smart phone. now we can take the internet with us. after that it was facebook and twitter, and other social media, to allow us to so engross ourselves in our phones, that we fail to see the people right around us.
so it was us people that changed the environment, and only us people can change it back.
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Originally Posted by Nickchick
As an introvert I hate groups but in desperation of seeking advice (and thinking it would be cool to find kindred spirits) I have tried smaller ones that had promise and had the same experience. One locally even had someone said something I said was offensive and the group leader cut me off not even giving me a chance to explain myself. Another local one (which unfortunately costed 10 dollars each too) seemed like even more my type of people but I still felt like the black sheep and there was no helpful advice when I tried to engage. I even tried a local neurodivergent group. They were not insightful either. I also tried an online group. I was out of place there too. There was one person where it seemed like we were connecting and she implied she would help me so I messaged her on FB she never answered. There was another I didn't even get to join. I demonstrated I wanted to join the group chat they never let me in.
These are all groups where I should fit in but I never do.
Family is BS. I literally just have my mom and we butt heads a lot. I mean of course I have my animals. They are my closest family members but they can't really give me input because they don't speak English.
I have no use for friends bc it's all superficial. I prefer kindred spirits but they are difficult to find.
I personally hate talking on the phone. My best description for it is "yuck!" so I'd rather have a conversation in person than on the phone but on the other hand emailing/texting is better for me because I get more out of what I want to say. I'm not as much of a verbal speaker. I tend to search for words and I have a sort of lisp at times. The lisp is not as bad as it was when I was growing up but it creeps up on me every now and then so I'll get the odd person going "what?! I thought you said ___" which would have been an entirely different conversation if they hadn't been able to hear me correctly the second time. A lot of social media is just as superficial as real life interactions but at the very least a lot of it is anonymous so I can say more there than I can say IRL.
you have hit the iceberg in the ocean. these days people dont take the time to get to know others, and all too often when they do try, the run into people that only want to be around others that think exactly like they do. they want someone to agree with everything they believe.
if they say i hate turmp, they want you to also hate trump. i they love trump they also want you to love trump. if you dont then they dont want anything to do with you even if you are everything else they want.
they claim to like diversity, but only is everyone is of the same mind. they want everyone to conform, to follow their leaders blindly so they can be free.
one more thing, these days people have gotten far too thin skinned. people are too easily offended by words. make a joke these days and a lot of people want to string you up by your toes and let you hang there.
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Originally Posted by Three Wolves In Snow
And:
Nailed it - especially the second part. There are no "tribes" anymore. And that is very much a part of the problem.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Redshadowz
But when I try to explain this to people, it just sounds crazy. How can something true sound so crazy?
because people today have lost touch with the people around them. and they have been told diversity is our strength, but they are not told that we need to accept diversity into our tribe in order for it to be a strength.
then came the internet, we could now sit in our houses and talk to people without ever leaving the house. we could even buy the things we need to make that happen if we choose..
then came the smart phone. now we can take the internet with us. after that it was facebook and twitter, and other social media, to allow us to so engross ourselves in our phones, that we fail to see the people right around us.
I'd be dead without the internet. As someone on disability without a set iof wheels, it keeps me connected to the outside world. I have joked before that Facebook is a great anti-social site. But it keeps me connected to a whole lot of people I would not ordinarily be connected with. I literally have friends all over the world, some of whom I never would have et without social media.
Y'all blame social media for a lot of eevils it had nothing to do with. I credit it as being a life saver.
I'd be dead without the internet. As someone on disability without a set iof wheels, it keeps me connected to the outside world. I have joked before that Facebook is a great anti-social site. But it keeps me connected to a whole lot of people I would not ordinarily be connected with. I literally have friends all over the world, some of whom I never would have et without social media.
Y'all blame social media for a lot of eevils it had nothing to do with. I credit it as being a life saver.
i get that there are exceptions, and that you are one of those exceptions. my reference though was for the average person who should be out and about and making contacts with average people instead of hiding behind their keyboard.
social media connections are an illusion though, and we must remember that. for example, we talk on this board all the time, but the truth is that we do not know each other. we are connected, sort of. but that connection is an illusion in that we dont really know anything about each other, and this goes for everyone on the board as well.we can get an idea of each others political beliefs, again to a point, but without the in person connection, we really cant tell when someone is joking, ro when they are being serious, though e like to believe otherwise.
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