Isolation

Sebastian Mallaby wrote an op-ed in the WP today about the increase in loneliness in American society. Mallaby rightly lists several results of loneliness and nibbles on the edges regarding some of the causes of loneliness and individual isolationism (it's ironic to me that those who spurn a foreign policy of 'isolationism' or 'go-it-aloneism' are often the first to embrace such an approach as a personal lifestyle). But while Mallaby's article is good, it doesn't really get into the fundamental and comprehensive nature of the issue. So I wrote a predictably long-winded response to Mallaby today in which I offered the following:

Mr. Mallaby,

I'm Jason Foster, and I appreciated your article today regarding subject. Many of the issues you touch on are valid, but there are underlying issues that you did not really touch on that drive most of the problems you raise.

There are reasons why much of the world looks upon the United States with great confusion, and it's not really about politics. Our way of life is confusing. In most of the world, close community is simply a given, because it is a necessity for economic reasons if nothing else. With great wealth comes great access to all the tools we need to isolate ourselves from other people. Technology in particular allows us to embrace casual rather than committed relationships, which reenforces the uniquely individualistic outlook this country has always had. Individualism these days is no longer about promoting individual rights, but living isolated lives as individuals. It's mind-boggling to think of the everyday 'givens' in our society that, one way or the other, promote individual isolation and discourage face-to-face relationship (the garage door-opener, cable TV, delivered food, email, etc). Democracy and technology intensify each other, and the result is a society that considers individualism to be the supreme value because it has become an inviolable principle of the American experience. Authentic community inevitably gets sacrificed in this equation, and loneliness is one of the results.

Neil Postman and others have written on this to some degree in discussing how Americans are trying desperately to entertain themselves to death, in part, as a really bad substitute for the hard work of close relationships. This is true in all aspects of society, from the workplace, to the meet-market, to religious practice.

So I applaud your article. I would urge you, however, to consider just how comprehensive and pervasive the issue is. You appropriately deal with some consequences, but it would be helpful to deal with the societal 'givens' of individualism and technology that have come to dominate an increasing amount of the American lifestyle.

In kind regards, I remain

Sincerely,
Jason Foster

It used to be that TV was a tool of isolation, and it no doubt is. But TV, even today, still has the ability to draw a crowd, so that actual people do tend to congregate together, even if it's only to watch the television. But with the internet now usurping TV as the essential piece of technology that most of us can't do without, isolation through technology has become even more pronounced. Yes, we can communicate with others through the internet, but only virtually. People congregate at the world wide web, but not together. More than ever, the internet provides a filter, a buffer, a go-between, that separates people from each other and isolates them even while bringing them together in a virtual way.

As ever-smaller families move into ever-bigger houses, isolation even within the family unit can increase exponentially. Gone are the days when middle-income American families would sit around the one TV the family had in a very modest-sized home. It used to be that the size of our homes brought us together because there just wasn't a lot of room to spread out. But as the homes have gotten bigger, with almost every room wired for internet and cable, even family units can break off and do their own thing. And in most homes, that is what many members of the family prefer to do. Would this be true to this degree if technology didn't foster such radical individualism and isolationism?

We really need to consider how technology has changed us and changed how we live and perceive life, not to mention our value systems. We increasingly prefer to isolate ourselves and either web-surf or channel-surf with nobody else around. We build homes and buy technology that feed this desire. This is a large part of the reason why we become irate when our technology doesn't work the way it should. When our cable is out, or when the internet connection isn't working, it feels like a direct assault on our basic way of life, and it unnerves us. Technology, and the isolating lifestyle it often brings, has become the latest 'staple' of American life, and to go without it is often as unbearable as finding the food shelves empty on the other side of a pre-blizzard panic. What does this say about us? Is this what progress looks like?

We have to realize that this phenomenon is not the way it has always been, and it certainly is not the way things currently are in much of the rest of the world. This is something new, at least to the extent that it has been mainstreamed within a large societal milieu. We don't want to be lonely. We tend to want authentic relationships, and many of us sincerely believe we're willing and ready to work hard in cultivating such relationships. Yet, we build fences around our homes, have our food delivered to our own door, and live in houses that are ridiculously big in proportion to the family unit they house because their function is the ability to spread out and isolate. It's a great paradox of our society that Mallaby properly highlights as a paradox that has consequences that aren't that great. While his somewhat tongue-in-cheek proposal of relationship through car pooling is one answer, the much better answer is a sober look at our society as a whole and where it's headed under the guise of technological advancement and progress. It doesn't feel like progress in the souls of many these days.