T0rrent01

Chris Murphy, CT: "Today I’m introducing a groundbreaking bill - the National Strategy for Social Connection Act."

https://lemmy.world/post/1800437

Chris Murphy, CT: "Today I’m introducing a groundbreaking bill - the National Strategy for Social Connection Act." - Lemmy.world

> Today I’m introducing a groundbreaking bill - the National Strategy for Social Connection Act. > It creates a federal office to combat the growing epidemic of American loneliness, develops anti-loneliness strategies, and fosters best practices to promote social connection. https://twitter.com/ChrisMurphyCT/status/1681350024200962053 [https://twitter.com/ChrisMurphyCT/status/1681350024200962053]

Jul 19, 2023 at 9:43pmWeb
Show threadDaleJul 19, 2023
People don’t realize how important this is. Loneliness and the fear of it is one of the biggest reasons why people fall into tribal thinking and extremism. Gangs, neo nazis, even flat earth groups survive because lonely people can find a sense of community in them. People don’t wear maga hats because they look good, they do it to make new friends.
Show threadnekat_emanresuJul 19, 2023
I completely agree, but this type of response to it is snake oil. Many anti-capitalists view our social alienation as a required part to keep capitalism functioning, and any superficial attempt to fix it such as this post shows, is just to make it look like they are trying to fix it. See regulatory bodies allowing … everything bad.
Marx's theory of alienation - Wikipedia

Show threadT0rrent01Jul 19, 2023
And disallowing… everything good.
Show threadJungleJimJul 19, 2023
Any attempt at fixing things is just a whitewash job? Whatever. We might as well all march I to the sea, huh?
Show threadkmkz_ninjaJul 20, 2023
They literally said “this type pf response”, not “every response”.
Show threadJungleJimJul 20, 2023
So talking about it, getting it on the radar of our leaders, maybe allocating some resources, that’s nothing-burger first step response?
Show threadnekat_emanresuJul 21, 2023

I didn’t bother defending myself against your bad faith rubbish. Maybe you should properly read what I first said?

You also aren’t giving clear instructions on what to do, but unlike you, I gave a strong initial direction. Our isolation is intentionally manufactured by the same people you are defending.

Show threadEnsign_CrabJul 21, 2023

Gangs, neo nazis, even flat earth groups survive because lonely people can find a sense of community in them.

Which is why conservatives are preemptively shrieking about this. They don’t want recruitment to go down.

Show threadImplyingImplicationsJul 19, 2023
Japan recently created a Minister of Loneliness and Isolation and I wouldn’t be surprised if more advanced nations follow suit. We’ve created a society that puts productivity, growth, and competition above all else. I hope we’re slowly moving towards a society that realizes we can still be productive with less work and more free time.
Show threadnekat_emanresuJul 19, 2023
Our oligarchs know that it’s more productive to control us less intensely and give us more time off work etc. The common mistake is to think they care about profit, when that’s more of a secondary feature. The truly rich care about power, and maintaining it. They will demoralise their staff to prevent unions even if that costs them heavily, even if the unions will only lose them a million at worst, they would sacrifice 5 million to prevent slaves rebelling.
Show threadT0rrent01Jul 19, 2023
“Landed gentry”, remember?
Show threadFedizenJul 20, 2023
if these actually work they will be dismantled immediately
Show threadSinningStromgaldJul 19, 2023
This honestly just reads like a way to make some cushy DC jobs for the bastard morons of some mega donors.
Show threadErtebolleJul 19, 2023
Yeah, I don't doubt Murphy's heart is in the right place - he's been a big advocate of mental health legislation since his House days, and he was the congressman for Newtown when Sandy Hook happened - but I'm skeptical that the sorts of techniques we use to combat smoking or obesity would work on loneliness; it's more of a symptom of a larger problem than a problem in its own right.
Show threadBloodSlutJul 19, 2023
These are all actually pretty good things. The issue is getting other politicians and the public to take it seriously and engaging in it competently.
Show threadMomoTimeToDieJul 20, 2023
What’s remotely good about it? All it’s s going to do is further expand government reach into personal matters and waste tax dollars.
Show threadconditional_soupJul 20, 2023

This is a good thing, but I have a free suggestion: it’s the cars, stupid.

The US has been building it’s spaces in a cars-first fashion for over seventy years now. Many Americans don’t even know what it’s like to live in a world where walking and biking is the norm. In the rest of the world, in urban and suburban areas, community third spaces are easily (and by easy, I mean convenient and safe) accessible by bike or foot. In the US, there’s almost nothing that’s a safe, enjoyable walk from my home, and that’s a pretty typical suburban experience by design. If I want to go do something or be somewhere where other people are, I practically have to drive. I hate driving, so I try to avoid it if I can. That usually just translates into not going out. I think that’s how it is for a lot of people; being outside in the US’ built environments just kinda sucks.

On the other hand, I’ve had a few exchange students from Europe and Japan, and consistently the biggest culture shock for them is how car dependent (and isolated) we are. The kids really feel the difference because they can’t drive, and they go from being able to use bikes and mass transit to go places and hang out to being fully dependent on being driven around to go anywhere. As for Third spaces serve the important role of being the space set aside just for socializing. I’m sure everyone has seen/heard the grievances between the genders of how women can’t work/shop/exist without being approached romantically, and men begging the question of when they can approach women, then. I am confident this is largely a US phenomenon, because we have pitifully few third spaces, where romantic approaches generally tend to be more acceptable. You want to fix loneliness? Start by making our cities not suck for humans, and start adding more third spaces like parks and stuff.

Show threadJordan LundJul 20, 2023

The problem in Portland is that we decriminalized most drugs, so now potential third spaces are over-run with homeless tents and drug use.

From my house I have either a 1/4 mile uphill walk to a major busline, or a 3/4 mile downhill walk to one. Either way isn’t particularly safe, and the bus lines themselves aren’t particularly safe.

koin.com/…/passenger-violence-increasing-at-trime…

Passenger violence increasing at TriMet during severe staffing shortage

On the same day TriMet announced they’re facing its worst hiring issues and staff shortages in its history, one of its drivers was assaulted on the 75 Bus Route near Hawthorne and Cesear Chavez boulevards.

KOIN.com
Show threadtallwookieJul 20, 2023
yep, same up here in Seattle, many green spaces are fenced off - now no one can enjoy the parks because the local authorities wont do anything about the homeless trash smoking fentanyl in the streets. every time I have to go downtown I have to plot a route from the bus stop through the zombies. it’s ridiculous.
Show threadMomoTimeToDieJul 20, 2023

Many Americans don’t even know what it’s like to live in a world where walking and biking is the norm

Been there, done that, and it fucking sucks. I’ll take having to drive any day over it.

Show threadconditional_soupJul 20, 2023
I guess? I’ve lived in places where US style zoning didn’t exist and you had little shops in the neighborhoods. It was so nice to be able to just pop down the block and buy some milk or bread or whatever basic thing you needed from the little neighborhood store. Driving sucks, though. You’re free to do a lot more while you’re walking or biking than driving, not to mention that it brings you into contact with a lot more folks. Basically the only thing you can do while driving is drive and listen to some podcasts, I guess, and the only people who want to talk to you while you’re driving want to say things like “nice turn signal, asshole!”, Or “Sir, did you realize you were doing 70 in a school zone?”
Show threadMomoTimeToDieJul 20, 2023
I mean yeah, no shit, if I shared your distaste for driving, I’d probably agree with you.
Show threadRagingNerdoholicJul 20, 2023

I’m not arguing for car dependency, and it is component to the loneliness epidemic, but it’s not the sole cause. More than 1 in 10 Europeans are lonely, so car dependency can’t the sole factor.

This widespread loneliness has really only hit its stride in earnest in the last decade or so. And what hit the scene about 10 years ago? Social media, ironically. The thing that is ostensibly designed to connect us has pushed us apart.

We can’t have an honest conversation about this without identifying who it affects the most: young men. As a crude metric, /r/ForeverAlone has literally an order of magnitude more users than /r/ForeverAloneWomen. Not to put too fine a point on it, but the latter subreddit literally banned male users because the female users were getting asked out on dates.

Which brings me to dating apps. They have insanely lopsided demographics that make half of all men who is them persona non grata. They have a greater matching inequality than the economic inequality of Venezuela. This is not a comfortable conversation to have, but ignoring it won’t help solve the problem.

Speaking of the economy, that sure isn’t helping either. What limited opportunities for real-world social interaction still exist are becoming less and less accessible when more and more people have to spend more of their time earning piss-all income just to scrape by.

The loneliness epidemic is a coalescence of these, and other factors, that have been accumulating over decades of consolidating organic social opportunities into overorganized spaces with inherent barriers to entry.

Loneliness prevalence in the EU

The first ever EU-wide survey on loneliness finds that on average, 13% of respondents report feeling lonely most or all of the time over the past four weeks

EU Science Hub
Show threadButt PirateJul 21, 2023

You know what’s wild? they know this and vote for car centric policies anyway.

My dad bleeds maga, and I was talking to him about US rail. He said we used to have great rail until Standard Oil lobbied hard against public transit like rail and now we’re all stuck with cars for everything. I was honestly flabbergasted. Like… that’s actually correct? I tried to explain how nationalized rail would solve the profitability problem and then I lost him to maga again. But it was nice for him to have a brief moment of lucidity.

Show threadflossdailyJul 20, 2023
A huge part of the problem is that people just don’t have enough money to go out and do things.
Show threadJordan LundJul 20, 2023

The problem in Portland is that we decriminalized most drugs, so now potential third spaces are over-run with homeless tents and drug use.

From my house I have either a 1/4 mile uphill walk to a major busline, or a 3/4 mile downhill walk to one. Either way isn’t particularly safe, and the bus lines themselves aren’t particularly safe.

koin.com/…/passenger-violence-increasing-at-trime…

Passenger violence increasing at TriMet during severe staffing shortage

On the same day TriMet announced they’re facing its worst hiring issues and staff shortages in its history, one of its drivers was assaulted on the 75 Bus Route near Hawthorne and Cesear Chavez boulevards.

KOIN.com
Show threadTauZeroJul 20, 2023
Crazy idea: if drugs are decriminalized, what if we had two versions of public spaces: one that disallows use of drugs, and one where drugs were allowed and handed out for free? Like if you were a drug addict, would you really want to go to that boring “sober” library where you might get hassled when you could get unlimited drugs at the library across the street?
Show threadMomoTimeToDieJul 20, 2023
Why would I want my tax money going to buy drugs for junkies?
Show threadTauZeroJul 20, 2023
Drugs are fucking cheap if you control the means of production. For less than $10 a day you can keep homeless drug addicts off your buses, out of your train stations, out of your libraries and playgrounds and out of tent cities in middle of town, simply by luring them to a no-strings-attached watering hole out of your line of sight.
Show threadMomoTimeToDieJul 20, 2023
$10/day adds up over time and area.
Show threadTauZeroJul 20, 2023
Cheaper than paying police and paying staff to clean up the buses and paying insurance and inconvenience for all the petty break-ins and smashed car windows.
Show threadMomoTimeToDieJul 20, 2023
It would be cheaper to just work all the criminals until they pay off their damages
Show threadTauZeroJul 20, 2023
We can’t get them to comply with relatively basic requests like “don’t block sidewalks”, what makes you think you’d be able to force them to do useful work? Overseers with whips cost money, how do you expect to do it cheaply enough to turn a profit and pay off damages?
Show threadMomoTimeToDieJul 20, 2023
A guy on a car walk with an m16 can oversee a lot of people at once.
Show threadTauZeroJul 20, 2023
Not profitably.
Show threadEnsign_CrabJul 20, 2023
And does this guy shoot them if they sit down and refuse to work?
Show threadMomoTimeToDieJul 20, 2023
If necessary
Show threadEnsign_CrabJul 20, 2023
Do you support murdering people you don’t like in all contexts, or just if you can’t extract labor from them at gunpoint?
Show threadMomoTimeToDieJul 20, 2023
If you could be bothered to notice that this is a conversation about a specific topic, you wouldn’t need to ask disingenuous questions
Show threadAdmiralRobJul 20, 2023

I think it’s a sincere question. Your comments so far have suggested that you support the idea that execution is an acceptable punishment for people who abuse drugs and then disobey orders from authority. I believe it’s fair to question whether there are lower levels of nuisance that you also believe the death penalty should apply to.

As for the argument as a whole, taking into consideration the cost of training and wages for the prison guards/riflemen/executioners necessary to employ this scheme and the logistical cost of moving these incarcerated laborers to potential work sites, as well as the low quality of the labor they could provide while going through withdrawals, I still think the $10 per day would be cheaper.

Show threadMomoTimeToDieJul 21, 2023

Apologies for not spelling every single detail out to the letter. I forgot that everyone here takes the absolute least generous interpretation of everything they read.

So to be specific, this comment chain started under a top level comment (or at least a comment directly copied in multiple places, I don’t remember which copy we’re under) that talked about how a major problem with public transportation is that there’s a increasing risk to passengers of being assaulted or otherwise victimized by this crowd of druggies.

When I was referring to criminals, those people specifically were who I was talking about. That instead of spending taxpayer dollars to essentially bribe people not to commit crimes, effectively making polite society subsidize criminals, we put the criminals to work and wring them for every last penny they can produce such that they’re repaying not only their debt to specific victims, but also not living on taxpayer dollars.

And finally, generous interpretation or not, it seems entirely reasonable from my point of view to take offense at someone insinuating that my actual goal is to enslave and kill “certain” people, or whatever their specific wording was. I have him blocked for obvious reasons so I can’t just quote it directly. Because fucking obviously I consider that to be a pretty sizable attack on my honor and not the type of interaction I want to have here

Show threadAdmiralRobJul 21, 2023

Ah, I apologize, it seems I misinterpreted the top comment. I reread the thread, and now I see the link to an article about increased violence. I was looking at the thread by the context of the top comment’s text alone, so I was interpreting your comments as being about homeless people and drug addicts in general. I still don’t like the idea of prison labor as a solution, but your opinion makes a lot more sense when taken as a response to violent crime. I wonder if the other commenter in this chain made the same mistake.

Apologies again for the misunderstanding.

Show threadMomoTimeToDieJul 21, 2023
Yeah, I can see that happening. Main thing imo is that you dint jump out the gate swinging with incredibly awful accusations about hidden motives and actually made a reasonable and level-headed comment, whereas the other guy did.
Show threadEnsign_CrabJul 21, 2023

I’m asking about your barbaric suggestion for punishment for people unfortunate enough to be targeted by selective drug enforcement. Your suggestion is forced labor at gunpoint.

I asked questions about just how barbaric you were willing to take this. I got my answer.

You’re willing to enslave and murder people for being addicted.

Show threadEnsign_CrabJul 20, 2023

Right, first pick a crime that is disproportionately enforced towards one minority, then make them do forced unpaid labor as a condition of their sentences.

The extra steps don’t change what that sounds like.

Show threadMomoTimeToDieJul 20, 2023
So we shouldn’t go after criminals because you think it looks bad?
Show threadEnsign_CrabJul 20, 2023
We shouldn’t be using slave labor just because you fantasize about it.
Show threadJordan LundJul 20, 2023

Because people who are out of their minds on drugs typically aren’t aware of any sorts of public restrictions. That’s currently the problem in Portland:

apnews.com/…/portland-ada-lawsuit-homeless-tents-…

We can’t get them to comply with relatively basic requests like “don’t block sidewalks”. You honestly think they’ll stick to “keep your drugs in the beer garden”?

Portland, Oregon, to clear sidewalk tents to settle suit with people with disabilities

PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — Portland will remove tents blocking sidewalks under a tentative settlement announced Thursday in a lawsuit brought by people with disabilities who said sprawling homeless encampments prevent them from navigating Oregon's most populous city.

AP News
Show threadTauZeroJul 20, 2023
No no, you don’t tell them to keep out, you tell them “there are unlimited free drugs in the beer garden over there”
Show threadJordan LundJul 20, 2023

Unfortunately, meth use is not conducive to staying in one place. Frequent Portland problem:

www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/…/620174/

A New, Cheaper Form of Meth Is Wreaking Havoc on America

Different chemically than it was a decade ago, the drug is creating a wave of severe mental illness and worsening America’s homelessness problem.

The Atlantic
Show threadTauZeroJul 20, 2023
Oh wow! Ok then, free heroin at the Beer-and-Heroin Garden, free meth at the center of the Great Nature (and Meth) Preserve - swim up a waterfall, wrestle a bear, whatever. Free (one-way) weed shuttle bus provided.
Show threadtallwookieJul 20, 2023
if all drugs get decriminalized, society will fall apart even more rapidly than it is now. better to exile all of the addicts to somewhere no one wants to go (wyoming) and fence them in - then let them inject/inhale to their hearts content.
Show threadEnsign_CrabJul 20, 2023
Concentration camps, huh? When this doesn’t solve the ills of society you think it will, who’s next on the “then they came for” list?
Show threadtallwookieJul 21, 2023
perhaps you should welcome the heroin zombies into your home, if you care for them so much?
Show threadEnsign_CrabJul 21, 2023
Perhaps you shouldn’t advocate for concentration camps.
Show threadMomoTimeToDieJul 20, 2023
Holy fuck thars a lot of government overreach. Hope this hack gets voted out of office soon
Show threadrandon31415Jul 21, 2023
Just as long as being an introvert isn’t made illegal.