The cure for male loneliness

It's war and religion

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Last week I talked about how social capital is so important to things like health, income, happiness, and childhood development that we should reorient our lives around it. 

There’s plenty we can do as individuals to form stronger connections. But looking at America as a whole, what’s dramatically increased or decreased social capital over the years?

This week’s newsletter is about how, if we’re honest with American history, just 3 things have really moved the needle on men developing social capital en masse.

• Religion

• War

• Looking at screens

In my opinion, there’s good reason why.

Based Robert Putnam

It’s worth acknowledging that despite one thousand memes about the cure for male loneliness, everyone seems to disagree about how to address it. Robert Putnam, the Harvard sociologist whose work I focused on last newsletter, suggests wonky interventions like urban planning, campaign finance reform, more shared cultural activities, religious adherence, and more social forms of digital media. 

I think Putnam is being too diplomatic here. He’s a tenured professor who needs to seem reasonable. I think based Robert Putnam would admit that, while things like urban planning are helpful, nothing makes or breaks men’s social connectedness like religion, war, or looking at screens. Why? Because social capital peaks when young people, in groups, get hella emotional. 

Here are my receipts.

Religion

Even in 2024, religion plays a dominant role in men creating social capital. The largest men’s group in the US right now, F3 Nation, is a Christian based workout group. This is despite religion currently being in its flop era in America. It used to really dominate. Putnam points to America’s The Great Awakenings as times of peak social capital creation: 

The First Great Awakening (1730 - 1755) birthed evangelism in America. It spawned the largest gatherings of Americans at the time. Benjamin Franklin calculated a speech that the pastor George Whitefield gave at 30,000 people - 100 years before the microphone was a thing. It’s estimated 80% of Americans saw George speak at least once. These are Derek Jeter numbers.

The Great Awakening’s leaders preached that religion was not just about belief, but that it needed to be felt in the heart. For millions of Americans, this was the first time they were asked to analyze and share their feelings. Diaries were written. Church groups were formed. 

The Second Great Awakening (1800 - 1830) had “circuit riders” on the frontier that got audiences in an absolute tizzy about slavery, greed, poverty, and the consumption of alcohol. This was spurred by thousands of small gatherings. Each circuit rider sought to convert 10 - 12 core believers who would reinforce each others’ spiritual energy and eventually form a church. 

These gatherings led directly to the creation of reform societies, which catalyzed movements for abolition, temperance, improving prison conditions, and public school expansion. 

The Third Great Awakening (1850 - 1900) had two main forks:

1. The social gospel movement which spurred a lot of social reforms like ending child labor, breaking up monopolies, health and safety standards, not getting drunk every day, and anti-corruption laws. 

2. The Muscular Christianity movement which focused on sports as a method of self improvement for men. This spawned the YMCA and the Olympics.

My point is America has a tradition of practicing religion in extremely emotional ways. This tradition is wildly successful at inspiring folks to form bonds and advocate for change. 

It’s worth noting though that most converts of the Great Awakenings were women. Men were the preachers and plenty of men took part in them, but women were the majority of Awakening adherents.

Which brings us to the cultural force that is extremely male dominated.

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War

War is destructive, but it also drives a huge amount of social capital creation.

The Revolutionary War created solidarity around yeeting the Brits off our back. This is obvious, but what I think is underappreciated is how it created a class of dudes who remain the absolute GOATs of social capital: the Founding Fathers. 

I don’t have many ways to measure their level of social connectedness, but I do have how many letters they wrote. Alexander Hamilton wrote 12,500 letters during his lifetime, George Washington wrote 18,000, Thomas Jefferson wrote 19,000, and Benjamin Franklin wrote 20,000. John Adams clocked a measly 1,100, and even that would have far exceeded the average American at the time.

In my opinion, beating the Brits was only 50% of the success of the Revolutionary War. The other 50% was creating a bunch of leaders who knew everybody. A young America was able to get stuff done because the Founding Father groupchat could not have been more active. 

The Civil War tore America apart like nothing before or since. It also spurred the greatest spurt of association building in American history. Here’s a chart from Bowling Alone that shows, by decade, the number of associations founded that enrolled 1% or more of the American population. 

Things are steady until the 1860s when we see a jump. As veterans reach their 30s and 40s, the number gets bigger. Political scientist Theda Skocpol calculated that half of organizations that enrolled 1% or more of Americans (e.g. The Boy Scouts, the PTA, NAACP, Red Cross etc) were founded between 1870 and 1920. The spine of American Civil Society rests in this period.

World War II had a similar effect, but on a more democratic scale. As Robert Putnam details in his book, the 1960s were the most social capital rich decade in American history across political participation, group membership, and time simply spent with friends. Why the 1960s? Because those who fought in WWII turned 40, which is when group membership peaks on average for Americans. 

Looking at screens

And then we have the stuff that detracts from social capital creation. TV, and more recently smartphones, are what Robert Putnam has found to be the single most consistent detractor of social capital across everything he’s studied. 

But even Putnam was too optimistic about the role of screens in society. He argued for smarter use of screens to aid social connectedness. What he didn’t anticipate was that being socially connected via screens - aka social media - is even more isolating than no screens at all. Like cigarettes and alcohol, none seems to be better than some.

While the data on high schools that have banned phones is early, anecdotally it’s a huge success. According to various reports, test scores have rebounded to pre-COVID levels, attendance at sporting events is up 50%, and simply having a conversation is becoming more common.

Besides social media being addictive, part of what makes phones so harmful for social capital creation is that it’s numbing. It’s the opposite of religion and war. According to Putnam, time studies have shown that watching TV is as enjoyable as cleaning your home. Social media can’t be too far off from that. 

What do we do with this?

We aren’t drafting people into war (thankfully). And religious anger in 2024 seems to be limited to abortion, which greatly limits it as a cultural force. How do we put social capital back on the map in a big way?

My hot take is that the three ingredients we need for peak social capital are:

1. Young people

2. Forming groups

3. Getting hella emotional together

My great hope is that we figure out how to do this without another world war. 

I’ve spent a lot of time looking at youth spiritual and wellness movements because I think it’s possible to bring back religious revivals. But I haven’t seen anything yet that fits the bill.

The closest thing we have to mainstream religious leaders are podcasters today. The top ones have huge reach and power, but the medium limits them to delivering information, not emotional experiences. 

I think this will change. Too many people want to feel and be connected again. If you have ideas on what that looks like…let me know.

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