the real reason for male loneliness is that smartphones and social media killed third places. > oldenburg called one's "first place" the home and the people the person lives with. the "second place" is the workplacewhere people may actually spend most of their waking time. third places, then, are "anchors" of community life and facilitate and foster broader, more creative interaction.[1] in other words, "your third place is where you relax in public, where you encounter familiar faces and make new acquaintances." third places used to be community places where anyone could come and socialize freely. when you just arrived in a new city and didn't know anyone, you could just go to bars, cafs, clubs, churches, gyms, etc. and people would be pleased to make your acquaintance. but today? not so much. those places still exist but people only come in groups and socialize within their group. no interaction happens between strangers. why? because smartphones have made it so that you can always keep in touch with your old friends. because you're always in touch with your old friends, you're never alone and you don't need to interact with strangers. smartphones have compartmentalized relationships between friends and non-friends. strangers are non-friends until a friend of yours introduces you to each other. but what happens if you don't have any friend to introduce you to new people? then you're stuck at square 0.  this is exactly what's happened to millions of zoomer men. for one reason or another (didn't make friends in school, lost sight of them, moved to another place...), they ended up being all alone and having no way to get back up.
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