To Epicurus, one of the most important ingredients of a full and happy life was friendship. But he had it easy compared with us. In ancient Greece (ancient anywhere) the population was small, sparse and local. It stayed put, more or less. One grew up with a small number of people and knew them well, like them or not. Friendships could be maintained throughout one’s life. One knew what one was getting in a friend. You probably drank with him, harvested with him and went to war with him. Since then a lot of people have become like ships in the night, there today and gone to tomorrow. One just gets to know someone and they promptly move to Singapore or New York.
What some people call friends are in reality acquaintances. A blizzard of e-mails, the phone calls, the extra work put upon us by the companies who formerly served us, all distract us constantly. You can be in touch with people on the web 24/7, but to be a real friend takes commitment, work, attention – and time.
It is now more than ever important for us to choose carefully people with whom we are psychically comfortable. Amid all the modern services offered by entrepreneurs I’m surprised no one has thought of offering a Friendship Organiser. (“You haven’t had a drink with Joe for three weeks. Shall I draft a text message? How are you placed for Wednesday?) This latter idea was old hat at one time. The Friendship Organiser was called a “Secretary”,a position now defunct.
Come to think of it, lack of jobs and less mobility inrecent years has had the effect in America of forcing people to stay put for longer. In the old days it was usual for families to up-sticks and move where the work was. Even in transitory cities like Washington DC or London more people are moving in and seem to be staying. So there is in fact more chance of getting to know acquaintances over a longer period – in this respect, at least, the economics work.
This is just a theory (correct me if I’m wrong), but I think that one of the reasons why it is harder to make friends nowadays is because people have less in common. Take for a random example, a Welsh mining village in the 1950s. Everyone worked at the same place (the mine), went to the same schools, the same church, the same pubs. In short, everyone knew each other because they had everything in common.
But especially since the eighties, communities like that hypothetical Welsh mining village have become increasingly rare, and have lost population. I live in Crawley, a fairly average town of 100 000. But like most towns of its size, its very divided. My friendship group for instance, is like me: middle class, white, fairly quiet, interest in the same things, etc… I’m certain its in no way socially representative of the town as a whole, and why should it? I don’t have anything in common with most people in my town, and believe me, I’ve tried to get to know some of them. Thanks to increasing income inequality, the internet, the ease of travelling, mass immigration, and persistent de facto social segregation, there’s never been a time where people are more divided, and so make friends with those that they have in common. This is especially true in London, which is more impersonal, more divided and more modern than the rest of the UK.
Excellent post! Thank you, Owen. I think you’re right, although it has probably always been the case that people with like interests get together. My wife has a cousin who is an excellent bridge player, for instance, and mostly she knows and associates with other serious bridge players. But it’s true that the sense of community is on life support. In a city like Washington social life is additionally fractured by education, race and politics, aside from anything else. Democrats don’t socialize with Republicans very much because the rift is so large that you are on tenterhooks, fearful of an unnecessary and stressful argument about things you shouldn’t have to argue about. White, middle class people don’t socialize too much either with African Americans and Latino immigrants , not because they are not good people but because there is a mutual presumption that they have litlle in common. Life is so frenetic that few people go outside their areas of comfort.