{"text":[[{"start":5.8,"text":"America: land of the free, home of the brave, habitat of the socially isolated. A country where heightened political polarisation and the relentless quest for personal “freedom” have given rise to a situation in which more than half of the population reports feeling cut off from society and almost two-thirds describe societal divisions as a significant source of stress in their lives."}],[{"start":29.62,"text":"It goes without saying that a loss of a sense of community and an increase in feelings of loneliness are not uniquely American phenomena — a study last year found that half of all Brits feel disconnected from society. Indeed, much of the developed world struggles with such problems. But the issue is particularly acute in the US. Americans came bottom of a 2023 Pew survey of 24 nations in terms of feeling close to their fellow countrymen; when it came to feeling close to their local community, they came second last (pipped to the post by South Korea). Some 20 per cent of Americans reported feeling lonely the previous day in the most recent Gallup survey (it’s more like 7 per cent in the UK)."}],[{"start":71.34,"text":"It seems the pioneers of city-sized shopping malls, pavement-free roads and anything-you-can-dream-of drive-thrus have, somewhere along the line, forgotten the crucial importance of fostering a sense of community. And as we all hurtle towards the AI future, it would be easy to lose hope that it is even possible at this point for a country like the US to reverse course and avoid the inexorable descent into a ghastly, Metaverse-esque, socially atomised dystopia."}],[{"start":97.88,"text":"And yet, having watched the midterms in America (and, yes, being an incorrigible optimist), I see some grounds for hope."}],[{"start":105.04,"text":"Many of the candidates who did well in Tuesday’s elections were those who talked explicitly about the need for closer communal ties, and who are particularly rooted in their local constituencies. Look at the man who even $225mn of Elon Musk’s money could not prevent from winning a historic victory: Texas senator-elect James Talarico, a former public school teacher and local faith leader who frequently emphasises the importance of community. In his official campaign message he talked about the importance of neighbourly love because “there is no love of God without love of neighbour”."}],[{"start":139.12,"text":"Despite its reputation for hyper-individualism, America does community and real-world interaction like nobody else. Take the traditional diner, one of my favourite features of American life (and not just because of the bottomless coffees). I started writing this column from one such place in southern Florida as an experiment to see if I could get into the writing zone there. Despite the fact that I was being rather antisocial by having my laptop out, this was not any kind of barrier to interaction. I had a lovely time chatting away to the divorcee next to me. And as I suspected, I barely managed to write a word."}],[{"start":173.8,"text":"I had a similar experience last week as I attempted to read a book in a café in Savannah, Georgia. More broadly, it feels like there is a desire among Americans — a craving, even — for more human interaction. And the data bears this out: the 2025 “Heart of America” annual survey by the National Collaborative for Health Equity found 89 per cent of Americans were “actively seeking deeper human connection and trust”, an 11-percentage-point increase from 2023."}],[{"start":202.2,"text":"While in Savannah, I was also struck by the prevalence of people sitting out on their front porches — an architectural feature that is virtually non-existent in southern Florida, where back porches are the norm. In 1975, the historian Richard H Thomas wrote a famous essay arguing the move away from building homes with front porches and towards back patios was representative of, and contributing to, a cultural shift away from community towards privacy and separation."}],[{"start":228.76,"text":"Thomas didn’t provide any statistics for this trend, using photos instead, but by the 1990s, the proportion of American homes being built with front porches had dwindled to 42 per cent. You might imagine this figure has since fallen even further. But you’d be wrong: as of the end of 2024, it had bounced back to more than 67 per cent according to the National Association of Home Builders, amid a desire for a closer connection to neighbours."}],[{"start":255.96,"text":"It can be tempting to over-interpret the results of any given election, and clearly this one was as much a referendum on Donald Trump as anything else. But there is clearly an appetite for a different way of life in America, one that seems to have been suffocated by the unstoppable forces of “innovation”. It should be remembered that the illusory “online community” is one of the most pernicious misnomers out there."}],[{"start":278.68,"text":""}]],"url":"https://audio.ftcn.net.cn/album/a_1794195973_3235.mp3"}