Without friends, no one would choose to live, even if they had all the other assets.
~ Aristotle ~
Our country has lately been locked in a fierce fight of us against them. We are right and they are wrong. We have good intentions and theirs are bad. I’ve been wondering for a while how we got to this point and what to do about it. The title and advertisements about this book suggested that it might be helpful in addressing this confrontation.
Sasse divides his book into three parts: how we got there, how it affects our society, and what to do about it. What interested me the most was the third part, but I thought that preparing the problem and understanding our current situation might be helpful first. So I dug deep with anticipation and hope despite my doubts about hope for our society.
The author begins with a memory of the “hometown gym on a Friday night feeling.” She remembers a time when families in the community came together to spend time together supporting their children’s activities. In my experience, this is not just a remote memory. I have attended basketball, football, and volleyball games for the past several years and have felt the feelings he describes.
At the beginning of the book, Sasse suggests that we have lost our sense of being grounded and have descended into loneliness. Describe three ways Americans live. First it is ingrained in the family and the neighborhood and living with the same people throughout life. He sees this as a memory rather than a current reality. Other people are mobile and leave their communities for educational and work reasons and never stay in one place for long again. They leave their roots behind. The third group are those who are trapped in oppressive life situations due to lack of skills, poverty and discrimination.
The author sees the main problem as loneliness and lack of belonging. Many of us have become “hyper-connected” through our electronics. We are often connected with people we will never meet and with whom, at best, we have superficial connections rather than real relationships with the people around us. Describe Twitter as a forum for smoke signals rather than rehearsals. We have largely lost our old sense of community.
Point out that sharing a common cause brings people together. In the past, we trusted natural tribes, including family, friends, co-workers, and neighbors. As we have abandoned these sources of support, we have become attached to the “antitribes” by focusing on the gulf between us and them and expressing our contempt for the other side rather than what we have in common. In the process, we have lost the sense of working together for the common good. Now the challenge is how to “channel conflict into words instead of swords.”
Sasse sees us as addicted to distraction (television and social media) rather than focusing on how we can help each other live our real lives. Our smart electronics have led to increased loneliness and “moving to escape,” as well as seeing people on television living scripted lives rather than focusing on our own lives in our communities. We are so focused on what is happening right now that we lose sight of the context provided by an awareness of our past and plans for the future. We have lost our sense of humility and self-control provided by awareness of our past and future context.
When I finally got to the section on what to do with all this, I found curiosities for the future, but also a constant retreat for further discussion of the problems we face. As I approached the last pages, I began to feel misled by the original promise of the book. Sasse suggests learning to reject “anti-identities” by putting politics in its proper place and learning to live locally again, rejoining natural communities.
I think Sasse does a good job of explaining at least part of the problem we are facing. However, he made two statements that seemed contradictory to me. At one point, he said that no one can deal with these problems alone. At another point, list the things that each of us can do to make a difference. What I see missing is a plan for how this will all come together for the American community as a whole. But at least this book gives us a good idea of what we have lost and what we need to find again.
