ANZ LitLovers LitBlog

This is the session blurb from the AWW website:

Described by The Observer as one of the “world’s leading thinkers”, global economist Noreena Hertz dissects the contemporary epidemic of loneliness in The Lonely Century. This meticulously researched and highly readable book describes how we have become alienated from each other, and analyses the structures, influences and trends that cause and exacerbate our isolation. The Lonely Century is an urgent message about one of the most far-reaching issues of our time.

Streamed from London and Adelaide, this was a most enjoyable session.  Hertz commented (as other international guests have) about how lovely it is to see *people* sitting together outside in the sun.

Why is this the ‘lonely century’? Hertz began being interested in this for three reasons: increasing numbers of university students were approaching her to confide that they were lonely and isolated.  This was something new.  At the same time, her academic research made her interested in right wing populists in office (not just Trump, also e.g. Le Pen &c), and often the supporters of these populists that she spoke to, revealed that they were lonely.  She had also bought an Alexa, and she found herself feeling increasingly affectionate towards it. She was engaging in quasi conversations, greeting it, and being polite to it, with ‘please’ and ‘thank you’ as part of her interactions with it.  She realised there was a whole market full of goods and services to alleviate loneliness that promised a meaningful connection.

Previously research interest had been focussed on the loneliness of the elderly.  Many people in nursing homes never get any visitors*.  Bizarrely, Japanese crime rates are rising for elderly people committing minor crimes in order to be sentenced to prison where they can have contact with other people.  But the data shows that young people are the loneliest, even before the pandemic.  One in five millennials say they don’t have a single friend.

When Hertz herself was visiting Manhattan, she did not have a friend at all.  So she tried out using Rent a Friend: there are 6000 available, from all over the world.  She was a bit dubious about meeting the one she chose (because of the risks) but it turned out to be really just friendship.  She and Brittany had coffee together, they did a bit of shopping.  It was not like an old friendship, but it was like the freshness of a new one, though she realised later that Brittany was laughing at her jokes because she was being paid for it.  C19th British novels are full of paid companions for women, so it’s not a new phenomenon, but when Hertz asked Brittany who mostly used her service, she said it was typically 30-40 year old professionals new to New York who didn’t have time to make friends.  They just wanted some company.

Research during Covid has found a significant rise in loneliness.  In the US, over half the adults feel lonely.  We’re in an acute phase of loneliness, an accelerated trend.  The rise of a contactless existence is part of that.  People are shopping online, ordering take-away online, doing yoga on YouTube… and they are trading off in-person experiences for virtual ones.  Is it just more convenient?  Avoiding the hassle of traffic and crowds etc?  Maybe.  But in the process we’re giving up f2f connection with other people.  Even a 30-second interaction with a barista in a coffee shop can make a huge difference to whether you feel lonely or not, because it makes us feel connected.  If Covid contactlessness persists beyond the pandemic, it will have significant consequences.  Because human beings need moments when we’re physically together, when we practise mindfulness about other people (e.g. not bumping into them in the supermarket, smiling at someone, greeting the checkout operator).  These small social contacts mean that we are also practising inclusive democracy.

Loneliness is part of the story of right-wing populism.  It was during conversations with supporters of right-wing populists across the globe that she started understanding the connection.  Loneliness is a lack of friends and a support network, and she found that Trump supporters, for example, are much more likely to identify being socially isolated and reliant only on themselves.  Some of them miss the brotherhood of the unions after jobs were lost.  (Work brings social opportunities, and many firms used to hold Works Picnics and Christmas parties for the family).  What Trump’s lonely supporters found was a sense of community when they joined in the chanting and wore the same branded gear at his rallies.  Le Pen’s supporters in France found it too when they worked with each other to deliver leaflets, and in Italy, La League would host dinners where people felt connected when they sang traditional songs.

These supporters of right-wing populists mostly feel unseen, disconnected, and unheard by anyone including politicians. They feel abandoned and forsaken. They are the newly lonely, who would have had that brotherhood of unions at work before those jobs were all lost, or would have felt connected at church when everyone went there as part of a community.  This right-wing  community with its nostalgia for a different world is exclusionary e.g. to immigrants, and their attitudes have been weaponised: Populist leaders can do this by exploiting lonely people who often see the world as a hostile place full of outsiders who don’t belong.

Cuddles for Sale is another service you can buy.  Hertz stressed that this service is not sexual, it’s about wanting intimate contact of a different type.  Hertz told the poignant story of a divorced man, very lonely, a software engineer working where it was hard to make friends.  He craved physical touch, and he paid $60 an hour to be cuddled, and this transformed his life.  He was no longer depressed and work became better.  But then he went on to say that he paid for other people to be cuddled because they needed it, and he was paying for it by living in his car.  This is obviously an extreme case, but Hertz tried it herself when she went to a group cuddling session to find out about other users of this service.  She was surprised to find that everyone seemed really normal—and yet they were so desperate for physical contact and intimacy they were prepared to pay to receive it in a safe consensual way.  So there is a real need out there, a problem exacerbated by Covid.

From the questions asked, I got the impression that the book includes a variety of these anecdotes, but the book is also about solutions. I was reminded of Reconnected, a Community Builder’s Handbook, by Andrew Leigh and Nick Terrell which looked at the same problem, from a slightly different angle.

Cola-theques (sp?) in Japan are like discotheques, where elderly people dance (and there are matchmakers who introduce those who are shy).  These dances have moved outside during Covid, which is important when touch has been toxified. We are creatures of togetherness, and being with others is fundamental to being human.  (Cica also commented about how happy people were to be at the festival… they always are, but it’s especially so at the moment.)

The Neo-Liberal world we’ve been living in for so long has made connectedness seem optional, but it’s not. Economic ideas from Reagan and Thatcher in the 1980s led to attitudes signalling that greed is good, and dog-eat-dog  behaviour is ok.  This era brought increasing individualism and society valorised hyper-competitiveness—at the expense of care, compassion and community. Pop songs even showed this shift as lyrics supplanted ‘We, Us, Ourselves’ with ‘I, Me Myself.’  The pandemic has seen a new appreciation and valorisation of health workers, and also the celebration of people doing things for each others.

Loneliness is bad for both mental health and physical health, and this is provable by measuring levels of cortisol and adrenalin in the body.  Loneliness is as bad for our health as obesity and smoking, and it reduces life expectancy.  It also increases the risk of dementia, stroke and heart attack.

Places that nurture and anchor us can be informal like cafés and libraries**.  In places round the world cafés and restaurants and yoga centres have not survived the economic shock of Covid yet these places are very important to our communities, and we need to do more to ensure they survive.  When we support our local stores and eateries, instead of trading off for convenience, it speaks to the importance of physical spaces where we can gather.  Governments also have a role to play in funding libraries, parks and other public places where we can come together.  But we also need to support these places ourselves.

Part of the book is a call to restore the kinds of government action that were routine not so long ago.  Hertz proposes a ‘New Deal’ somewhat like Roosevelt’s after the Depression.  Changes should include a living wage, health standards, government services, funding of community infrastructure, public art works, funding of the arts to bring people together and so on.  There could even a favourable tax status for businesses that take on a role in the community.  In Belgium there’s an empty store tax that incentivises lower rents so that stores don’t stay desolate and empty.

What is the role of social media in all this?  Hertz is blunt: Social media companies are the tobacco companies of our age and there is much that they should be doing and they should be regulated, especially to protect children.

She began her research into the role of social media as ‘agnostic’ but is now convinced that our use of social media has contributed to loneliness. Yes, it’s brilliant during the pandemic, and her ‘presence’ digitally at the festival is good, but not as good as being there in person.  The problem is that screens are displacing f2f communication.  Young people are often in a room together, but they’re on their phones.  And this can lead to some of them lacking interpersonal social skills.  Some universities have had to run a remedial workshop of ‘how to read a face’.  Nursery schools are finding that little kids lack basic social skills because their parents spend so much time on their phones and the children spend so much time on screens.  Of course there are cases where social media is really valuable, for example, an LGBTIQ child in a small community can connect digitally when there isn’t anyone local to interact with.  OTOH people feel lonely because they think everyone has more friends than they do, plus there’s an epidemic of cyber bullying among women.  Social media can be very exclusionary and what’s new now is that this exclusion is broadcast amongst all the peer group.  Often parents and teachers don’t see this because so much social life has migrated to the phone.  The research is clear: these devices are contributing to loneliness.

*This is, sadly, very true.  When my music teacher was still alive and in aged care, I visited her weekly.  When The Spouse and I were about to go overseas for six weeks, I approached people who were supposed to be her friends, but none of them were willing to visit in my absence.  Distraught, I went to the Sister-in Charge to ask if she could help me organise a visitor from an organisation such as Do-Care, which helps people isolated in their homes.  It was inconceivable to me that my dear old friend was to have no visitors for such a long time.  The Sister set me straight: she said that Valda did not realise how lucky she was.  Most of the people in that facility had no visitors, ever, not even on their birthdays or at Christmas.  My behaviour changed after that: I made a point of having a brief conversation with all the old people I encountered as I made my way to where Valda sat in her favourite spot.  (And I made sure that I sent a postcard to her in every city that we visited so that she knew she was not forgotten.)

**Contrary to what was said about libraries in Australia in this session, libraries in my city are thriving, and one of them famously has enhanced its community credentials by ringing every single one of its borrowers during the pandemic to see if they are OK. I belong to four libraries.  My local is in walking distance. All its other six branches, like the other libraries I belong to, are within half an hour’s drive and I visit them all for books, research and bookish events.  All these libraries were active throughout the pandemic, offering author and artist talks by Zoom but also lots of other activities ranging from art and craft workshops to cooking with kids and more.   They offered Digital Story Time for little kids and bigger ones, You Tube book reviews, and chatty newsletters sharing information about all sorts of things.  In normal times these libraries are not just for book nerds like me.  They offer computer access;  story times for children of all ages; book clubs and book chat meetings; community gatherings; community noticeboards; home delivery of books to the housebound; and talks and demonstrations about everything from gardening to cooking with bush foods.  They are places where students gather to study, and some folks come to read newspapers and magazines.  So I would  say to anyone who’s lonely, that a visit to your local library is a good starting point.  Even if the topic is not to your taste, you can chat to other people and make yourself known to the librarian.