The politics of loneliness is totalitarian
Metadata
Highlights
- Human beings are social, communal creatures. We seek out connection with others of our kind and especially enjoy engaging in common enterprises and the emotional intimacy that can follow from such experiences. The standard way for people to have these kinds of collective experiences is out in the world β in extended family, local community, religious organizations, work, unions, clubs, and politics.
- These virtual communities are more like collective groups of topic-specific pen pals than real-world friendships. The latter are marked both by physical closeness (involving handshakes, hugs, backslaps, shared meals and drinks, and all the intimacy that accompanies them) and the possibility of holistic self-exposure beyond the specific endeavor that initially brought the friends together.
- A nation of increasingly lonely, friendless citizens given outlets to find collective, communal fulfillment online will be a nation spawning a range of radical political factions, groups, or movements defined by and drawing the bulk of their cohesion from their loathing of other factions, groups, or movements.