Tuesday, May 08, 2007

Life

I was interested in this comment by weboy over at Chez Klein Le Bon:

In reality, people are more isolated than ever before, finding it harder to make social connections...


I guess I'm curious about why this is, if so. You certainly see this kind of sentiment a lot, both casually and in books like Putnam's Bowling Alone, but I'm a bit puzzled by it nonetheless. There are certain institutional, economic, cultural, and legal frameworks which do encourage the kind of neighborhood development which is often listed as a partial cause of this, but ultimately people are making their own lifestyle choices, though of course these choices are subject to the various constraints they face.