I've always felt that we (older millennials) sort of hit a sweet spot technology wise. We pretty naturally straddled that analog to digital world.

Near as I can tell that was still roughly the model on paper if less and less until COVID and lockdown and all that. Something snapped, you can see it walking down the street of any city you knew well before. People never came back outside with the same vigor.

I don't claim to understand the causal structure between all the various factors: the bleak economic prospects, the decline in institutions, the increasingly rapacious and cynical Big Tech cabal, there are a ton of factors.

But COVID before and after, that's when it collectively became too much to easily bounce back from.

Still are! As I post this we're establishing where we meet for beers and at what time on my whatsapp friends group. Ofc, we're old geezers too.

I am extremely lucky though, living by myself in the capital city of my country makes it very easy to go out and do stuff

When I was a teenager, precisely one guy had videoed his teenage self waving around a broomstick like a lightsaber, and had it end up online. Video cameras and editing equipment were rare and expensive. And that one man was a cautionary tale, not to wave a broomstick like a lightsaber anywhere there are video cameras.

Now the video cameras are in everyone's pockets 24/7, and with the internet connection built in. Is it any wonder nobody's waving a broomstick like a lightsaber?

I was actually thinking the other day, I haven’t hit anybody with a boffer in a while, might need to get back to it.

I notice when just out and about other people my age and older still have the familiar vibe. Young people are in another universe and it doesn’t seem like a more pleasant one.

There are exceptions though of course

People are afraid to open up and be honest, because of the fear of local, internet or political rejection.