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Hypothesis: few people actually *want* a full-blown community past about 25. They just think they do. It’s a lot of time and work to be involved in “community” in the sense of shared beyond-family communal daily life (meals etc) and weekly parties, seeing friends everyday etc.
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Most people are introverts and just want a trusted emergency contact or two within driving distance, and the occasional lunch with friends you see once every few weeks at most. At most a weekly tennis or running buddy. Anything more is for extroverts stuck in college-headspace.
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I do know people who hang out with friends beyond family for hours everyday (not counting work), but it’s surprisingly rare and in older people is often a sign of unhealthy codependency etc.
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Kids do seem to enforce minimum-viable-communality constraints, but I don’t see most parents doing any more kid-catalyzed social/community stuff than they have to. 🤔
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Replying to @vgr
I don't know that this hypothesis holds up as well when said people have school-age children.
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I suspect after age 22 people next want community only at like 66, Ie heading into retirement. I see retirees being almost as social as kids.
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Most coworkers suck. People want quality communities and default to being more introverted when quality people can't be found
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I think this is key here. In vacuum people would prefer "community + no work", but only acting on part 1 is realistic for most.