I agree with a lot of this, but I think the effect has more complex roots. I think there's an economic component to this as well. Housing prices are rising, m

I agree with a lot of this, but I think the effect has more complex roots. I think there's an economic component to this as well. Housing prices are rising, meaning a lot of people are pushed out of their existing community, or that they perceive their community is temporary (until they all get pushed out). It starts to feel pointless to build a community of renters when you don't think it will exist in 5 years. A lot of local shops have been overtaken by corporations, who exist in the community but aren't really part of it. Walmart/Target/Dick's/etc isn't sponsoring the local little league, or throwing a potluck, or creating any kind of space or events to build a community around. Religious service attendance is also down, which is another way people used to build communities, and I haven't seen a lot of secular replacements (not a criticism of anyone, I don't attend myself). I think a lot of people replaced religion with politics, which has created communities more focused on things outside themselves (laws and public opinion) than within themselves. I don't even know that social media is the cause of loss of community. It seems to me that social media was the market responding to the loss of in-person communities; it was responding to an already-established need. It might have accelerated the decline, but I think healthy communities could have withstood social media. We just didn't have many healthy communities left.