I think this is really a spectrum and they are focusing on some more extreme aspects of it. But it is definitely not just an Asian thing and I believe to some degree this type of social withdrawal has affected perhaps a very significant portion of our society.
I have definitely been socially isolated my entire life to some degree or another. But much more so in adulthood. Again, I suggest that this is relatively common, not something that happens to only a few million people.
One aspect that is being glossed over is the amount of socialization or let's call it "pseudo-social" activity that is happening over the internet for these people.
I'm someone who generally does not have friends, leaves the apartment literally only a handful of times per month to take the garbage out and maybe buy groceries once or twice a month if I am trying to save money versus Instacart.
For me it comes down to money. I have a health issue that makes me fatigued etc. and don't have money for health insurance. I don't have money to go to restaurants or otherwise waste going out. So I stay home.
Because I'm always in a poor health and financial state, I feel uncomfortable trying to do any "real" socialization.
But I have always been trying one way or another to get to a point where I have a "real" online business that allows me to actually thrive. Such as buying a car and a house, getting health insurance and addressing my health issues, or paying taxes.
But what I have managed so far is usually just enough to scrape by. There have been some minor successes here and there but rarely have I ever felt like I had enough to truly meet my basic needs such as the health concerns or financial stability.
Anyway, I think it's easy to get in a position with health and financial challenges, maybe just a series of low-paying contracts, where some degree of social isolation is just practical and realistic.
I think the main thing is the lack of on-ramps. Once you have fallen out of the social circulation, there is basically no way of going back. Unless you are able to stay within an extremely narrow range of behaviours (in terms of not being weird, basically speaking expected thinks in expected tone of voice and body language), nobody wants to associate with you. And since about the only way to learn these things is to be around people who already behave in the "right" way, a vicious circle arises.
It has nothing to do with debt, wealth or earnings. Completely independent things. People had it worse at every time in history in almost every place.
It has nothing to do with social media / internet. It just something people tend to fall into when they withdraw, and have no trouble abandoning as soon as the life outside becomes tenable again.
Social capital follows the same progression as regular capital. If you already have a lot of friends and acquaintances, it's easy to make more. You either get invited to things, or you can organise something and know people will come.
Loneliness is a big problem among recent immigrants. They all struggle to make friends at first, because they have no social capital to build upon. It's hard to break into established circles without being introduced by a member, and few people will show up to a stranger's party unless it's vetted by friends.
There is such a thing as being socially destitute, and the recovery can be quite difficult, especially when you have other things going on in your life.
> Unless you are able to stay within an extremely narrow range of behaviours (in terms of not being weird, basically speaking expected thinks in expected tone of voice and body language), nobody wants to associate with you.
I'll agree on the lack of on-ramps but this is a pretty limiting view. There's all kinds of people, many who will share some of whatever you think your weirdness is. If you only want to associate with a certain slice of society, it is not so weird that only certain slices of society want to associate with you.
I would say it's not just behaviors but isolation causes stress on the body that increases more irrational behaviors and fears.
So that can be crippling when trying to get back to a health state that can handle relationships again. On-ramps to help destress the environment would be helpful too. It's a challenge because we haven't really built many areas where people are welcome to just be, even with 3rd spaces that doesn't those people that are now rewired in their stress state. Some types of maybe community service (clean up, plantings, painting etc) or festivals events might be more helpful here as they can sometimes be lower stress, no required interactions etc. It's a tough thing especially as people have different reasons to isolate though poverty is likely one of the most major ones.
The evidence that it has a lot to do with social media is very strong. See Jonathan Haidt’s work on the effects of personal phones and social media on young people’s mental health.
It isn't that you're failing, they are the hikikomoris, who want to be alone, and the very fact that somebody tries to socialoze with them annoys them. It's just the norm in the west, so that it's you who stands out, and suffers alone.
Sounds like social coaching has all the attributes of an untapped business niche. The question is, if there is just a obvious pain, why there is such a shortage of solutions. I think it could be because of the stigma associated with this issue or because people affect by it lack genuine interest in solutions as people are usually happy to pay for all kinds of self-improvements.
From my personal experience (I also went through a very dark period in my life and just recently climbed out of the hole I dug myself) I guess people are realizing that working hard won't get you anything close to what previous generations had. Once that settles in it's hard to push yourself to do basically anything.
Additionally, I also believe that feeling is compounded by social media where selection bias only shows you cherry picked moments where it seems other people are living the life you won't get.
Finally, among the younger generations there is a lot of climate change dread going around.
For me it was a combination of all these factors and to this day I can't pinpoint exactly what was the trigger, but after COVID lockdowns I simply kept social distancing.
I've recently finished reading "Civilized to Death"[0] and I can't help feel there's some truth to some of the ideas.
One idea that stuck with me is that shit zoos have concrete cages for the monkeys, and they're miserable in them, showing similar signs to modern humans (depression, addition, anger), whereas nice zoos try to keep the monkeys in similar environments to those that they evolved for, where the monkeys are pretty much chill. The author argues that we're constructing concrete zoos for ourselves and in the process making ourselves miserable. We're so far detached from what our bodies and minds evolved for, that it's an alien environment for our species.
If this holds truth, it's really no wonder that the more we pile on and the further we stray from our true species' preferences, the more horrible we will feel, and this hikikomori is a fine illustration of that.
As some comments pointed out 'what about the great depression', 'what about 'nuclear war', "don't you like your electricity"? These are all human patches for human made problems. I don't think the correlation between progress and wellbeing is as clear cut as some would like to see it.
I think even if we lived in a green paradise, there would be those who would measure themselves to others and still find themselves "short" to their more vocally successful peers
I think inequality and toxic competition from an early age demanded by our soceity is a much bigger factor
I'm pretty sure the declining birth rate (or "fertility") is among the consequences of the change you are describing. The difference with past misery is the lack of stories to cover it up, or to give hope that this is temporary and it will get better.
I haven't read the book, but I think "concrete zoos," for humans, is more metaphorical than literal. Humans find comfort in much wider ranges of environment. If it were available, I'm sure many would find spaceships to be comforting environments.
IMO, the problem is that we're at this stage of social development, where capitalism, and the antiquated culture of jobs, management and deadline, is actively incentivized to limit human potential and creativity. Why? Because that's where competition comes from.
I have a job and I don't live alone, so I don't think I fall into the hikikomri definition in any real sense of the word, but I will say that remote work kind of made me adjacent to it. I sort of have a strong distaste to leave my house a lot of the time since 2020.
I still do leave my house, I have a job that requires me to be in the office for two days a week, but it's something I dread every single week for a variety of reasons. There's something bizarrely comforting about just staying in your bedroom all day and pretending the rest of the world doesn't exist, and it's kind of addictive.
Going outside and having a social life is usually worth it, but it's also kind of intimidating; I have to take a shower, get on the train with a bunch of strangers and not do anything too weird because of course I care a tiny bit what these strangers think about me for whatever reason, go into an office with people who are not-quite-strangers and work extra hard to not be too weird or say anything that might upset someone and keep my desk clean and have meetings with managers who could fire you immediately for any reason they want...it's all exhausting.
I still try and make an effort to leave my house sometimes, but I kind of get why hikikomori do it.
Kind of same, except add a wife and a kid under way. There's plenty of us. Most people absolutely do not regularly "go out" if they work and have a family.
We maintain the bare minimum social interaction because we have to but we'd happily skip it in a heartbeat.
> Going outside and having a social life is usually worth it
Doubt.
The biggest reason for me not to attend social events is that 99% of people are useless from my perspective and it's extremely rare for me to come across someone I actually enjoy spending time with.
Yeah. I'm similar too. I guess I was almost a hikikomori at one point. I was basically nocturnal and really afraid of social situations. But I was kinda forced into society by having to get a job and stuff; my parents weren't going to look after me.
I haven't been single for very long at all over the past 15 years, but I have very little social interaction. In the past I would force myself to go out to avoid being single and lonely. But every single time I've been in a relationship I shy away from this. I used to think I should force myself to do it, like how some people force themselves to exercise, but now I think why should I force myself to do something I don't want to do for my whole life? It's clear at this point it's part of my nature and won't change. Who am I trying to impress? I just want to be alone most of the time. It's as simple as that. I work from home 5 days a week and I've never been happier.
It's not that I hate every second of socialising but it's just not how I want to spend my life. I often tell people it's like going into a sauna. Yeah, you'll go in and enjoy it, but the most important thing is getting out. Nobody wants to spend their whole life in a sauna.
In my experience, life-experience increases the self-isolation. To the point that the old-folkshome are often halls of quiet, as everyone knows what horrible behavior perfectly normal people are capable and do not wish to interact. The guy who conspires against everyone at work, that manager that harvests others laurels, the longer you life, the more you understand how many will flip on you in this prisoner dilemma of a society. So they all barricade themselves in suburbia, sniper one another through HOA letters and claim to do it for the family, till its time to inherit and even the core family falls apart.
Maybe some hiki is just more aware of what a lonely hellish life it is to be part of western society. And chooses to opt out. Lay flat. Assumes the party escort position. If he would at least consume drugs in there, but its just ramen and colored light.
I couldn't agree more. I think many of the people who choose to isolate just have more self-awareness and more defining bad experiences that makes them avoid too many social interactions that are not strictly necessary or truly beneficial in an obvious way.
In fact, I believe that the nicer and more honest you are in our modern world the worse it is for you.
At heart I'm a rather social person, I like talking to people and doing stuff with them. Yet, all my life I have been abused both verbally and physically, I got stuff stolen many times (often I was actually trying to help) and I get manipulated/used all the time without getting much in return.
All of this comes from being too different (not weird in a bad way, just different in the way I speak/handle myself) and abusive narcissists parents (one in particular) that destroyed my emotional self, teaching me to avoid all conflit at all cost and not stand-up for myself even though I would be capable.
All this is made worse in our bullshit job world, where every business pretend that they are a family and require you to give a lot of your life (like for example forcing you to eat with coworkers even though it should be a break for yourself) while still not giving any kind of security (you can be fired/discarded regardless of the quality of your work) or a real sense of being part of a larger cohesive group that stick together.
Because at the end of the day, even inside a small business, it's all competition, lies, exploitation, anything is OK to get ahead regardless of consequences on individuals, they are expandable.
That being said, drugs make everything worse in the long term, they are a relief/distraction but if you don't manage to kill yourself with them, they will cause more problems on top of the already existing ones. In a way, you could say that the users of hardcore drugs are somewhat ahead of the curve, because if they manage to OD it is sort of a salvation without having to deal with all the implications of suicide...
When you are a teenager it is so easy to treat your time as if it is unlimited and start sinking 1000s of hours into some MMO or other games that before you know it you are in your 20s with no girlfriend, job, skill or self-confidence.
Then you got Japanese entertainment like Hatsune Miku, idols and visual novels/anime that take advantage of lonely people with make-believe girlfriends.
It may not be accurate to paint large amounts of time spent MMOs and the like as a net negative, though. Speaking personally as someone who grew up in a tiny town where there’s nothing for young people to do, WoW and the small nerdy circle of friends that came with it almost certainly kept me out of serious trouble in my teenage years and I think ultimately helped steer my trajectory in such a way that allowed for a more successful adulthood, even if it was a distraction from shorter term development.
Of course this is something that will vary greatly between individuals, though. For some the depths of obsession are much more deep and destructive.
Lots of visual novels/anime are about shut-ins tremulously venturing out into the world and eventually making friends, usually after a lot of anxiety and misunderstanding. I think they'd probably have an encouraging effect. I remember one where a woman confesses her condition to the person in the next apartment, and is advised to start small by visiting the convenience store. She manages it, and is incredibly proud of herself. Soon she is making lists of convenience stores, and has visited every convenience store in a five-mile radius! And now her problem is to diversify, but, you know, it's a start.
Note: Miku is a vocaloid, basically a voice bank licensed to producers who generate and tune a pre-existing voice with their own lyrics/music. Some of the music produced by these artists are actually amazing and it gets even better when a human singer covers the songs. (See supercell+Ado 恋は戦争)
Yes I know about the Idol part and I couldn’t care less.
It’s the people like you that generalize a whole culture that ruin it.
In all the cases in the article it looks like shame plays a big role. I wonder if hikikomori is caused by a loop of [adverse circumstances that cause the person to feel shame] -> withdrawal to avoid shame -> being ashamed of having withdrawn [loop]
Shame of educational pressure might be causing this, as mentioned in the article. But why do we as society place kids under so much stress? Let kids be kids and learn by exploring.
I know everyone is different, and saying things like "just get a job" or "just go outside" are easy to say and very hard to do when you're stuck in that type of loop. But, I will say, things that I've found will help are having some purpose (work, taking care of someone or a pet, anything), exercise (even walking outdoors), and even just getting your biological clock where you wake up and get exposed to sunlight (vs sleeping all day and staying up all night).
Getting enough activation energy to do any of those things is difficult, but I've found that if you can muster it, it can help break the cycle.
Not to mention that "getting the job" is often far more difficult and/or stressful than doing the job or showing up to work or being seen by others on your commute. No one wants to admit how much talent is wasted due to the job application & interview processes.
Honestly, my dog is my savior. I take her to the park every evening. This gets me out into the evening sun, walking, and around like-minded people. The fact that I can interact with a group of people without scheduling an "event" is great. We just show up. For me it's mostly the other dogs (puppy therapy), but it's nice to exchange a few words and talk to someone about their day while the dogs run around.
The two mile walk to the lake is also key. I find a morning stretch and kettle bell routine, and an evening walk keeps me mentally and physically in tune. And it's practically free, unlike modern healthcare.
Yeah, it's much easier for me to leave the house when it's a situation in which I don't need to care about the potential of other people's opinions. Running quick errands, walking the dog, etc.
For some reason taking out the recycling is a heavier lift for me mentally due to the risk of chaos with the bins, potential for bags breaking, bins being full, etc. even though there is less social interaction than grocery shopping.
I think what's missed in a lot of these discussions is your upbringing. Our society changed very quickly in the last 30 years and parents may not be providing the proper "foundation" for their children since they didn't grow up with all this stuff. Even if you had shitty parents before, you'd probably do alright since all of society in past times was based on in-person interactions and there wasn't endless media consumption at your fingertips.
Personally, my parents were very immature, divorced, and generally didn't set me up for a healthy/balanced social life. I haven't completely given up; I work, maintain loose contact with a few friends, and basically just "doing my time" until I die.
our baseline entertainments are better than the long tail of negative interactions one persists through to get to the great ones. in doomscrolling vs. disappointment, more people are picking doomscrolling.
older than the examples, but I have done this. live alone on a large rural property, walden style, tech comp no family, have online interactions for remote work, old irc channels, take some sport, fitness, and music training as kind of weekly rhythm, family lives in other time zones. it was an ideal I thought I could achieve and then have it to share with others. relationships and friendships with any personal connection or intimacy still manage to fail, lots of reasons but I'm the constant. only way to sustain anything is to keep it at a polite distance with no expectations.
issue i suspect is that meaning comes from the cohering and persistence of relationships, and without that persistent mutual understanding, meaning just seeps away and leaves a flat state of inertia. no advice other than to avoid this example. I sympathize with these young people, it's as though they don't see a present or future in which there is meaning for them, or in which they are a participant, and so they are just withdrawing and waiting for the next life instead of engaging this one. it's a unique and recently invented trap, avoid it as best you can.
I think a lot of black sheep personalities feel like this, pretty safe and smug in calling all the patterns we see in others that make them not right for us. And we know too much of ourselves will try their patience too, which makes us resent their love as a thin weak thing.
>lots of reasons but I'm the constant
Sad face. I don’t know if admitting this helps or hurts, but a long while ago when I kept seeing your username on so many of my favorite comments i thought about emailing you to flirt, but the more I kept reading thru to look for hints (to confirm that ur straight, not married, etc ) the more I psyched myself out… In sober assessment, I likely wouldn’t meet your standards of, like… spiritual vigor, agency, having ones adult shit together, strength of character in a flailing sham society, etc. You already seemed too complete an image on your own. It creates admiration for sure, but in a way that challenges me to get to your level rather than come closer…
Resonating with someone’s deep judgements of the world also means I can’t fall short or claim ignorance later, there’s less room to play. “I agree with everything this guy finds virtuous yet i lack these qualities even after all this time… sigh, better just go work on becoming my best self…“
Catch22, if I already was my ideal self would I still be attracted to philosophical types on hn? (I kinda hate this place ngl)
Not sure if any of us with these dispositions really want another human up close or if that ‘trying’ is just part of the aesthetic if I’m honest with myself.
Anyway, if u want to talk to a misanthropic fangirl, my username is LimeOregano on Telegram, and when you’re in the woods and very lonely, you can feel free to send me ponderous voice notes without overthinking this polite distance that you’re obliged to maintain with real friends. We can ghost each other if the long tail of negative interaction proves too much!
(Afterall, if you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the results of getting your hopes up 100 times lol)
Regardless, i hope youre flattered to know that some strangers like you based on the quality of your thoughts alone
> He dare not come in company, for fear he should be misused, disgraced, overshoot himself in gesture or speeches, or be sick; he thinks every man observes him, aims at him derides him, owes hint malice.
Several adults in my friendship circle (retired or semi-retired) have evolved to spending nearly their entire waking lives online. They're able socialize normally, but they don't make the time to do that as often as in the past. This is tantamount to hikkormoridom.
One friend went to visit two other friends who live together in New Mexico. He imagined they'd be out and about doing stuff during his visit, but the hosts remained preoccupied by their online activities. The visitor could have stayed home and texted.
It’s fun to watch mass media inflict so much harm on people with irresponsible reporting designed to terrify, outrage, and misinform you for profit, and then turn around and report on the fallout.
A lot of discussion in this thread assumes that hikikomori are a very new phenomenon. I see that they appear in the psychiatric literature as early as 1978. I also see that the number of hikikomori in Japan varies by survey, and is hard to measure, but still seems to be roughly the same as it was in 2010, if not a little lower.
What to make of that? Because the most obvious and most common explanations for them seems to be the internet, smartphones, and anxiety about the future (global warming, the economy, etc.). But if those were the reasons for hikikomori, I'd assume that the number of hikokomori would have increased significantly in the last 15 years, not stayed roughly the same, as it has. The gravity of the internet in our culture feels like it has increased exponentially. Climate fear doesn't feel exponentially higher, but subjectively it still feels a lot more widespread to me. Why not commensurately more people living as hikikomori, if the phenomenon supposedly tracks these factors?
Hmm, no one is talking about the enabler for this - modern wealth. In the not so distant past, refusing to get up and face the world would result in starvation. Survival required people to be more social.
As a parent of two adult children who are both working, I can't imagine enabling this (even though I could.) Sure, if my kids were truly disabled that would be another story, but it seems the hikikomori are just unhappy with the world. Enabling them to spend their lives doomscrolling or playing games is actively harmful.
Modern wealth is potentially a double-edged sword.
There's enough of it that "hikikomori" is a viable strategy to stay alive.
Yet, "modern wealth" is also the reason many things previous generations took for granted such as housing are effectively unreachable for many people nowadays, plus inflation/cost of living.
This makes "hikikomori" the rational strategy for some people. Enough money to scrape by and live online, but not enough to actually climb out of the hole.
In South America it's become common to hear about adolescents and young people (mostly men) who spend all their time on video games and neither work nor study.
I imagine this to be a very different phenomenon from Japan, because the culture is so different. In South America I think it is just general disengagement and disillusion with society and work environments in general. For most people life is having a bad job that pays very little and you have to spend hours on a crowded bus to get to a pretty horrible part of town. Living in the virtual world is much more comfortable and pleasant.
In Australia there is a pretty good welfare system, but they will basically give you a job to work while you keep applying for a real one. Usually it’s something like sorting clothes in a charity store. I imagine it helps to keep people engaged in society somewhat.
People aren't stupid. What we have in the world in general (not just Asia) is a crisis in hopelessness.
People are facing crippling student debt (depending on your country), one bad medical incident away from being homeless, crippling housing costs and wages that barely cover costs such that you need 1-2 "side hustles" just to make ends meet.
It's really no wonder people are checking out. It's also no wonder that people aren't having children either. They simply can't afford to.
One common counterargument to this is that consumer spending is up but that really makes my point: people are spending now instead of saving because they have no future.
[+] [-] neonate|1 year ago|reply
https://archive.ph/lt04t
[+] [-] ilaksh|1 year ago|reply
I have definitely been socially isolated my entire life to some degree or another. But much more so in adulthood. Again, I suggest that this is relatively common, not something that happens to only a few million people.
One aspect that is being glossed over is the amount of socialization or let's call it "pseudo-social" activity that is happening over the internet for these people.
I'm someone who generally does not have friends, leaves the apartment literally only a handful of times per month to take the garbage out and maybe buy groceries once or twice a month if I am trying to save money versus Instacart.
For me it comes down to money. I have a health issue that makes me fatigued etc. and don't have money for health insurance. I don't have money to go to restaurants or otherwise waste going out. So I stay home.
Because I'm always in a poor health and financial state, I feel uncomfortable trying to do any "real" socialization.
But I have always been trying one way or another to get to a point where I have a "real" online business that allows me to actually thrive. Such as buying a car and a house, getting health insurance and addressing my health issues, or paying taxes.
But what I have managed so far is usually just enough to scrape by. There have been some minor successes here and there but rarely have I ever felt like I had enough to truly meet my basic needs such as the health concerns or financial stability.
Anyway, I think it's easy to get in a position with health and financial challenges, maybe just a series of low-paying contracts, where some degree of social isolation is just practical and realistic.
[+] [-] admissionsguy|1 year ago|reply
It has nothing to do with debt, wealth or earnings. Completely independent things. People had it worse at every time in history in almost every place.
It has nothing to do with social media / internet. It just something people tend to fall into when they withdraw, and have no trouble abandoning as soon as the life outside becomes tenable again.
[+] [-] nicbou|1 year ago|reply
Loneliness is a big problem among recent immigrants. They all struggle to make friends at first, because they have no social capital to build upon. It's hard to break into established circles without being introduced by a member, and few people will show up to a stranger's party unless it's vetted by friends.
There is such a thing as being socially destitute, and the recovery can be quite difficult, especially when you have other things going on in your life.
[+] [-] dj_mc_merlin|1 year ago|reply
I'll agree on the lack of on-ramps but this is a pretty limiting view. There's all kinds of people, many who will share some of whatever you think your weirdness is. If you only want to associate with a certain slice of society, it is not so weird that only certain slices of society want to associate with you.
[+] [-] softsound|1 year ago|reply
So that can be crippling when trying to get back to a health state that can handle relationships again. On-ramps to help destress the environment would be helpful too. It's a challenge because we haven't really built many areas where people are welcome to just be, even with 3rd spaces that doesn't those people that are now rewired in their stress state. Some types of maybe community service (clean up, plantings, painting etc) or festivals events might be more helpful here as they can sometimes be lower stress, no required interactions etc. It's a tough thing especially as people have different reasons to isolate though poverty is likely one of the most major ones.
[+] [-] jimbokun|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] tetris11|1 year ago|reply
Easily the most stressful and financially unstable moment in my life.
It was only two months, but I genuinely thought I'd never recover my social standing, or confidence ever again
[+] [-] Anotheroneagain|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] biql|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|1 year ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] marcyb5st|1 year ago|reply
Additionally, I also believe that feeling is compounded by social media where selection bias only shows you cherry picked moments where it seems other people are living the life you won't get.
Finally, among the younger generations there is a lot of climate change dread going around.
For me it was a combination of all these factors and to this day I can't pinpoint exactly what was the trigger, but after COVID lockdowns I simply kept social distancing.
[+] [-] ThalesX|1 year ago|reply
One idea that stuck with me is that shit zoos have concrete cages for the monkeys, and they're miserable in them, showing similar signs to modern humans (depression, addition, anger), whereas nice zoos try to keep the monkeys in similar environments to those that they evolved for, where the monkeys are pretty much chill. The author argues that we're constructing concrete zoos for ourselves and in the process making ourselves miserable. We're so far detached from what our bodies and minds evolved for, that it's an alien environment for our species.
If this holds truth, it's really no wonder that the more we pile on and the further we stray from our true species' preferences, the more horrible we will feel, and this hikikomori is a fine illustration of that.
As some comments pointed out 'what about the great depression', 'what about 'nuclear war', "don't you like your electricity"? These are all human patches for human made problems. I don't think the correlation between progress and wellbeing is as clear cut as some would like to see it.
[0] https://www.amazon.com/Civilized-Death-What-Lost-Modernity/d...
[+] [-] tetris11|1 year ago|reply
I think inequality and toxic competition from an early age demanded by our soceity is a much bigger factor
[+] [-] navane|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] ppqqrr|1 year ago|reply
IMO, the problem is that we're at this stage of social development, where capitalism, and the antiquated culture of jobs, management and deadline, is actively incentivized to limit human potential and creativity. Why? Because that's where competition comes from.
[+] [-] tombert|1 year ago|reply
I still do leave my house, I have a job that requires me to be in the office for two days a week, but it's something I dread every single week for a variety of reasons. There's something bizarrely comforting about just staying in your bedroom all day and pretending the rest of the world doesn't exist, and it's kind of addictive.
Going outside and having a social life is usually worth it, but it's also kind of intimidating; I have to take a shower, get on the train with a bunch of strangers and not do anything too weird because of course I care a tiny bit what these strangers think about me for whatever reason, go into an office with people who are not-quite-strangers and work extra hard to not be too weird or say anything that might upset someone and keep my desk clean and have meetings with managers who could fire you immediately for any reason they want...it's all exhausting.
I still try and make an effort to leave my house sometimes, but I kind of get why hikikomori do it.
[+] [-] amonith|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] anal_reactor|1 year ago|reply
Doubt.
The biggest reason for me not to attend social events is that 99% of people are useless from my perspective and it's extremely rare for me to come across someone I actually enjoy spending time with.
[+] [-] globular-toast|1 year ago|reply
I haven't been single for very long at all over the past 15 years, but I have very little social interaction. In the past I would force myself to go out to avoid being single and lonely. But every single time I've been in a relationship I shy away from this. I used to think I should force myself to do it, like how some people force themselves to exercise, but now I think why should I force myself to do something I don't want to do for my whole life? It's clear at this point it's part of my nature and won't change. Who am I trying to impress? I just want to be alone most of the time. It's as simple as that. I work from home 5 days a week and I've never been happier.
It's not that I hate every second of socialising but it's just not how I want to spend my life. I often tell people it's like going into a sauna. Yeah, you'll go in and enjoy it, but the most important thing is getting out. Nobody wants to spend their whole life in a sauna.
[+] [-] ItCouldBeWorse|1 year ago|reply
Maybe some hiki is just more aware of what a lonely hellish life it is to be part of western society. And chooses to opt out. Lay flat. Assumes the party escort position. If he would at least consume drugs in there, but its just ramen and colored light.
[+] [-] seec|1 year ago|reply
At heart I'm a rather social person, I like talking to people and doing stuff with them. Yet, all my life I have been abused both verbally and physically, I got stuff stolen many times (often I was actually trying to help) and I get manipulated/used all the time without getting much in return. All of this comes from being too different (not weird in a bad way, just different in the way I speak/handle myself) and abusive narcissists parents (one in particular) that destroyed my emotional self, teaching me to avoid all conflit at all cost and not stand-up for myself even though I would be capable.
All this is made worse in our bullshit job world, where every business pretend that they are a family and require you to give a lot of your life (like for example forcing you to eat with coworkers even though it should be a break for yourself) while still not giving any kind of security (you can be fired/discarded regardless of the quality of your work) or a real sense of being part of a larger cohesive group that stick together. Because at the end of the day, even inside a small business, it's all competition, lies, exploitation, anything is OK to get ahead regardless of consequences on individuals, they are expandable.
That being said, drugs make everything worse in the long term, they are a relief/distraction but if you don't manage to kill yourself with them, they will cause more problems on top of the already existing ones. In a way, you could say that the users of hardcore drugs are somewhat ahead of the curve, because if they manage to OD it is sort of a salvation without having to deal with all the implications of suicide...
[+] [-] random9749832|1 year ago|reply
Then you got Japanese entertainment like Hatsune Miku, idols and visual novels/anime that take advantage of lonely people with make-believe girlfriends.
[+] [-] jwells89|1 year ago|reply
Of course this is something that will vary greatly between individuals, though. For some the depths of obsession are much more deep and destructive.
[+] [-] card_zero|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] acheong08|1 year ago|reply
It’s the people like you that generalize a whole culture that ruin it.
[+] [-] RoboTeddy|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] enceladus06|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] HPsquared|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] Ozzie_osman|1 year ago|reply
Getting enough activation energy to do any of those things is difficult, but I've found that if you can muster it, it can help break the cycle.
[+] [-] BeFlatXIII|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] nanomonkey|1 year ago|reply
The two mile walk to the lake is also key. I find a morning stretch and kettle bell routine, and an evening walk keeps me mentally and physically in tune. And it's practically free, unlike modern healthcare.
[+] [-] HPsquared|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] itronitron|1 year ago|reply
For some reason taking out the recycling is a heavier lift for me mentally due to the risk of chaos with the bins, potential for bags breaking, bins being full, etc. even though there is less social interaction than grocery shopping.
[+] [-] hypeatei|1 year ago|reply
Personally, my parents were very immature, divorced, and generally didn't set me up for a healthy/balanced social life. I haven't completely given up; I work, maintain loose contact with a few friends, and basically just "doing my time" until I die.
[+] [-] twojobsoneboss|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] motohagiography|1 year ago|reply
older than the examples, but I have done this. live alone on a large rural property, walden style, tech comp no family, have online interactions for remote work, old irc channels, take some sport, fitness, and music training as kind of weekly rhythm, family lives in other time zones. it was an ideal I thought I could achieve and then have it to share with others. relationships and friendships with any personal connection or intimacy still manage to fail, lots of reasons but I'm the constant. only way to sustain anything is to keep it at a polite distance with no expectations.
issue i suspect is that meaning comes from the cohering and persistence of relationships, and without that persistent mutual understanding, meaning just seeps away and leaves a flat state of inertia. no advice other than to avoid this example. I sympathize with these young people, it's as though they don't see a present or future in which there is meaning for them, or in which they are a participant, and so they are just withdrawing and waiting for the next life instead of engaging this one. it's a unique and recently invented trap, avoid it as best you can.
[+] [-] waythrowa|1 year ago|reply
>lots of reasons but I'm the constant
Sad face. I don’t know if admitting this helps or hurts, but a long while ago when I kept seeing your username on so many of my favorite comments i thought about emailing you to flirt, but the more I kept reading thru to look for hints (to confirm that ur straight, not married, etc ) the more I psyched myself out… In sober assessment, I likely wouldn’t meet your standards of, like… spiritual vigor, agency, having ones adult shit together, strength of character in a flailing sham society, etc. You already seemed too complete an image on your own. It creates admiration for sure, but in a way that challenges me to get to your level rather than come closer…
Resonating with someone’s deep judgements of the world also means I can’t fall short or claim ignorance later, there’s less room to play. “I agree with everything this guy finds virtuous yet i lack these qualities even after all this time… sigh, better just go work on becoming my best self…“
Catch22, if I already was my ideal self would I still be attracted to philosophical types on hn? (I kinda hate this place ngl)
Not sure if any of us with these dispositions really want another human up close or if that ‘trying’ is just part of the aesthetic if I’m honest with myself.
Anyway, if u want to talk to a misanthropic fangirl, my username is LimeOregano on Telegram, and when you’re in the woods and very lonely, you can feel free to send me ponderous voice notes without overthinking this polite distance that you’re obliged to maintain with real friends. We can ghost each other if the long tail of negative interaction proves too much!
(Afterall, if you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the results of getting your hopes up 100 times lol)
Regardless, i hope youre flattered to know that some strangers like you based on the quality of your thoughts alone
[+] [-] MathMonkeyMan|1 year ago|reply
- Hippocrates?[1]
[1]: https://old.reddit.com/r/AskLiteraryStudies/comments/68zg38/...
[+] [-] getpost|1 year ago|reply
One friend went to visit two other friends who live together in New Mexico. He imagined they'd be out and about doing stuff during his visit, but the hosts remained preoccupied by their online activities. The visitor could have stayed home and texted.
[+] [-] billy99k|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] BaculumMeumEst|1 year ago|reply
Maybe fun isn’t the right word.
[+] [-] karaterobot|1 year ago|reply
What to make of that? Because the most obvious and most common explanations for them seems to be the internet, smartphones, and anxiety about the future (global warming, the economy, etc.). But if those were the reasons for hikikomori, I'd assume that the number of hikokomori would have increased significantly in the last 15 years, not stayed roughly the same, as it has. The gravity of the internet in our culture feels like it has increased exponentially. Climate fear doesn't feel exponentially higher, but subjectively it still feels a lot more widespread to me. Why not commensurately more people living as hikikomori, if the phenomenon supposedly tracks these factors?
[+] [-] GlibMonkeyDeath|1 year ago|reply
As a parent of two adult children who are both working, I can't imagine enabling this (even though I could.) Sure, if my kids were truly disabled that would be another story, but it seems the hikikomori are just unhappy with the world. Enabling them to spend their lives doomscrolling or playing games is actively harmful.
[+] [-] Nextgrid|1 year ago|reply
There's enough of it that "hikikomori" is a viable strategy to stay alive.
Yet, "modern wealth" is also the reason many things previous generations took for granted such as housing are effectively unreachable for many people nowadays, plus inflation/cost of living.
This makes "hikikomori" the rational strategy for some people. Enough money to scrape by and live online, but not enough to actually climb out of the hole.
[+] [-] AIorNot|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] forinti|1 year ago|reply
I imagine this to be a very different phenomenon from Japan, because the culture is so different. In South America I think it is just general disengagement and disillusion with society and work environments in general. For most people life is having a bad job that pays very little and you have to spend hours on a crowded bus to get to a pretty horrible part of town. Living in the virtual world is much more comfortable and pleasant.
[+] [-] Gigachad|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|1 year ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] jmyeet|1 year ago|reply
People are facing crippling student debt (depending on your country), one bad medical incident away from being homeless, crippling housing costs and wages that barely cover costs such that you need 1-2 "side hustles" just to make ends meet.
It's really no wonder people are checking out. It's also no wonder that people aren't having children either. They simply can't afford to.
One common counterargument to this is that consumer spending is up but that really makes my point: people are spending now instead of saving because they have no future.