Some recent things we enjoyed recently.
"Loneliness and me" by Claire Bushey—
Rather horribly, the isolation the pandemic has imposed this year is not that different from my normal life. I live alone, I work alone, I’m hundreds of miles from my family. There’s no real difference between not making plans (because of a virus) and not having plans (because last-minute cancellation is now socially acceptable). All of which feels shameful — these admissions leave me frantic to declare that I am hilarious, smart and quite fun to have a drink with.
Jill Lepore's "History of Loneliness"—
Modern loneliness, in Alberti’s view, is the child of capitalism and secularism. “Many of the divisions and hierarchies that have developed since the eighteenth century—between self and world, individual and community, public and private—have been naturalized through the politics and philosophy of individualism,” she writes. “Is it any coincidence that a language of loneliness emerged at the same time?” It is not a coincidence. The rise of privacy, itself a product of market capitalism—privacy being something that you buy—is a driver of loneliness. So is individualism, which you also have to pay for.
Best of all was Former Surgeon General Vivek Murthy talking about loneliness and public health on the Ezra Klein show.
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