[xxxtentachyon]

When people talk about third spaces, they usually mean a place you can casually show up to at 6pm (with or without family members), take a seat, and maybe chat with some familiar faces. As someone who grew up going to church, I feel like my church was neither my parents’ third place nor my own! It was simply a place we went to on Wednesdays and Sundays to worship our God. We would hang out afterwards, but that was limited to 0.2857 of our free afternoons/evenings.

I think the article gets it right in that the collapse of American third places goes beyond just church attendance. Ideal third places are things like guild halls, bars, parks; places where you can show up and no one asks why you’re there or what you did today. The leveling and inclusive aspect is key: you need to be able to bring anyone who might otherwise need a third place, and they must be greeted as just another conversation member.

This is how high school Super Smash Brothers days were at Blaine’s house: unlocked door, say hi

[lolinder]

> We would hang out afterwards, but that was limited to 0.2857 of our free afternoons/evenings.

I fully believe you that church never felt like your third place. That disconnect between generations is a large part of why churches have declined. But speaking as a parent of small children—if your parents were allocating two nights a week to go hang out at church with church friends, that was absolutely a third place for them. Parents simply don't have enough time with other adults to justify hanging out for hours two nights a week with adults that we don't enjoy chatting with.

> The leveling and inclusive aspect is key: you need to be able to bring anyone who might otherwise need a third place, and they must be greeted as just another conversation member.

A month ago I attended a random Protestant denomination with my father-in-law that we'd never been to before in our lives and had no intention of joining. We went to the gathering after the service and were welcomed as part of the group. They had lots of questions for us because we drove across the country to get there, but there wasn't anything weird about it, it was just people hanging out chatting.

I do want to clarify that I'm not saying that there weren't other third spaces that have also declined. But church was the universal third space that almost everyone had and generally assumed that you had. You might also have been a Freemason or a member of the Elks Lodge or have gone to hang out at a coffee shop, but the rest of our third space infrastructure was all built on the assumption that church was already there filling a lot of the needs.

[ghaff]

There used to be a bunch of places at least for working class (especially men): Elks, VFW, etc. Sports leagues after work for both professional and blue collar; my sense is those are a lot less common. We had a bunch where I worked 20+ years ago. My sense is whatever hadn’t petered out pre-Covid is gone now in many cases.

[Spivak]

The extra rare variant is places you can go from 10 PM onward. Everything public closes at sundown which sucks for me who's heat and sun sensitive. Like it's fine, I guess at some point I'll catch a charge for trespassing but it would be nice if it was allowed officially.