It was brought up on my previous post that I had touched on a very critical subject. The destruction of western social life and isolation of modern westerners, especially men. How does this play out overall, what can be done, and to help this fit into this general site's theme, how has this affected gaming?
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Social media has made people very anti-social, particularly in real life.
People are still meeting their partners in closed social groups, at least in their mid-20s and higher, recent data bears that out. But the spaces where individuals and groups mingled has been declining in recent times. COVID-19 lockdowns have been the fatal blow for many places. Whatever is left are slowly being strangled by inflation. Gyms have survived but people don't tend to socialise in those establishments in the same way people don't at their workplace. If you're in your thirties and don't have a social circle, either because you're socially anxious and introverted or your existing social circle has gone because everyone else found partners and started families so everyone has drifted apart, you're in trouble.
In terms of gaming, multi-player gaming and the community aspect of gaming has become a money-maker for the gaming companies. If that dries up as people retreat to single player gaming, I expect access paywalls to expand and maybe even infect PC gaming. Companies have already dipped their toe into this realm with retro and streaming games.
As for solutions, I'm not sure what could be done that isn't authoritarian (ie. socialise or we dock you social credit points/close your bank account) because you can't force people to socialise. But whatever social outlets in real life there are also need to make money and at a cost of living crisis, that's a tough sell because socialising is one of the first things people cut back on when their mortgage payments go up.
I disagree. I think social media is a release valve for the society that was destroying itself with rules and social demands. We weren't having neighborhood barbecues before that point, so how could social media be the problem?
Also, I've met girlfriends and even my wife through social media. It usually involved mutual friends or social groups online.
I think the same people that destroyed social gatherings in real life are doing the same to social media.
Your mileage may vary but I left social media years ago (under a different pseudonym) because I found it had become a wholly negative aspect of life I could do without. From what I know of recent data, people are mostly sticking to social groups of people they know online and offline. It's how they're meeting people, their partners and connecting with others. Meeting strangers is declining, despite what pick-up artists and dating apps may claim and closed socialising is rising.
If you struggle making friends offline, you'll struggle online too. What we likely have is a socialising problem, but how to solve that without going full authoritarian and either controlling people's lives and/or implementing civil or criminal penalties for those who won't comply, I don't know.
Oddly enough, I had a better experience on discussion forums prior to the ones I used being taken over by woke ideologues and those who are drunk with power and increasingly adding more and more banal and vague rules for people to trip up on and earn themselves a permanent ban.
They're narcissists. I've worked with a few, and they work that way for everything. Any authority they can get will be abused. Then they fill the board with all their work so you have to acknowledge them.
The best trick I've learned is to tell jokes. I mostly post memes on Facebook, and no one really knows my politics.
You know, I was watching this episode of an older show called Beastmaster the other day. In it one of the more philosophical characters had pointed out that the one way to counter illusions (IE, illusion magic) was through simple laughter.
There's something about this that seemed... both insightful and prophetic.
"If you struggle making friends offline, you'll struggle online too."
I agree, finding non-NPC people to talk to is hard online and nearly impossible offline. I honestly don't have time for people that constantly go on about leftist talking points. Most of my friends tend to be older men. Men my age either are apathetic about life, like talking to a husk of a person with no opinions or desires of their own or a passionate leftist.
Aye. Even though I've been generally not a fan of social media for a long time, especially with how I'd often seen it used, I've more recently become aware of certain benefits and advantages. Some more practical, others providing some useful incentive and encouragement for people to get out of their comfort zone and interact with the world a lot more.
Just as a small example, while I find selfies to be lame and narcissistic, seeing close friends taking photos and clips of their adventures provides me with a greater interest to go and seek out similar experiences. And it's not because I feel some sense of pressure or obligation, or because I'm trying to match up or compete. I simply feel inspired by what I see and want to enjoy some similar things.
There certainly are downsides of course, and I attribute a lot of this to how people sometimes choose to use or respond to the tools available. I think the trickiest part is the regular instant and on-hand access that smartphones provide, and how distracting and borderline habitual it can be to focus on that instead of putting it aside and enjoying your surroundings.
It's a tool. If you use it correctly, you have an amazing device. I discovered I could do a lot from just my phone and preferred it that way.
But then I see when a friend decides that the world needs to get their new joke about how they caught Trump this time.
Perhaps, but I’d argue that as time goes on modern AAA multiplayer games end up isolating people far more than in the past. With chats being opt in instead of opt out by default, more focus on grind and mtx over community and clans, the almost constant push to make gaming safe spaces where people don’t have to interact to play successfully. At least in the multiplayer games I’ve played in recent years, you don’t make friends as you play.
People socialize in nice gyms.