Episode 24 - The Death of Third Spaces - and What to Do About It

Evan examines the emerging phenomenon of the death of “third spaces” - places where we can go outside of work or home, and simply exist. What are the causes for this? What does this mean for society? And how can we combat this trend? Evan looks at these and other questions during this episode.

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Intro music: Groovy Trip Hop/Marcolaieh/Tribe of Noise

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

More often than not, it is the local level that is going to have a much larger impact on your day-to-day living. Show up to council meetings. Yes, a lot of times they tend to be boring. And I can speak for personal experience. A lot of times when there's a big uh school board meeting with a very contentious issue or problem that a lot of people are going there to attend for, they conveniently stuff that issue at the very end of the meeting because they are trying to wear you down. They are trying to thin out the crowd and make it so that the controversy kind of dies away. They purposefully do this. I am your show host, Evan Buck, and as always, remember that the buck stops right here, because we are looking out for you. Today is an episode focusing on a topic that I've mulled over for a while, and yet due to some side quests, some diversions, and some other episodes that I wanted to record and get out, I haven't been able to tackle this. And this will also be the first episode in a while that I am flying solo. I have greatly enjoyed having some amazing co-hosts and guest hosts on the show over the last couple months, but I figured that it was time to take a break from that for at least an episode. We'll see how far I go back to my roots of this being a solo show. And we'll just take it from here. Today's topic is focusing on the death of third spaces, and what we should do about it as a society. Now, this is a topic that I have seen make the rounds on the news and in various discussion forums over some time. But of course, before we really get into the meat and bones of the issue, it begs the question, what is a third space? And why does that matter to us? Well, I like to think of a third space, put very simply, is a place that you can go when you are not either at work or at home. Hence the name third space. Your home could be seen as your first space, the first space that you primarily go to to relax and decompress and you know be with your family, those sorts of activities. The workplace being your second space, where you, of course, mainly go to work. And the third space, then, is a place that's kind of in between. It's a place that you can go, that is, you can get you out of the house. Often you interact with other people, you see them milling around, you often meet up with your friends there, and it's also a place where you can just relax, kind of kick back, and engage in activities that are inter interesting or entertaining to you. And hence it's kind of a bridge between home and work. Now, why this whole phenomenon of the death of said third spaces is a big deal, is because we have seen a trend over the last few years of a lot of these third spaces disappearing. And to give some examples of third spaces, libraries, public parks, cafes, or coffee shops. These are just a couple of examples of third spaces, very common, very prominent third spaces. And really, I would say that with the rise of work from home or remote work or even hybrid work, the lines have been blurred a lot between the first and second spaces of home and work, to the point where if you work completely remotely, you arguably don't even really have a second space anymore. You really only have your home. And I think the COVID-19 pandemic had a lot to do with uh this overall trend. And far be it from me to say that remote work is all bad, and uh, you know, everybody should have a strict RTO return to office mandate. That's certainly not what I'm arguing. And you know what? That might actually be a very interesting episode to do is to talk about the pros and cons of remote work. I think that'd kind of be an interesting episode. I'll have to make note of that. But be that as it may, I do feel a lot of these trends of the death of third spaces accelerated after the pandemic, but they have really been in the making for quite some time. I feel like there really aren't very many places anymore that one can just exist. One can just kind of let their hair down and be without at least having to pay at minimum ten dollars to be at anymore. Um it's just it's just very difficult to find those spaces. I mean, arguably, if you live in a big city, even supposedly free places like a public park or, you know, downtown areas where you can just walk around or wander around, they're either unsafe for the most part, or you have to pay for public parking. And I remember when Starbucks used to be a pretty cozy place. You'd be able to, you know, buy a cup of coffee, set up a laptop, study to your heart's content or work. You're still able to do that, but I feel like it has been a very conscious decision on Starbucks' part to completely sanitize their stores in a lot of ways. There's very little comfortable furniture anymore. Uh, it's just very sterile environments, and I also feel that they purposely blare music way too loud. I feel like this whole idea of a coffee shop being a place where the community can congregate and meet up with each other and you know hang out, talk about cool ideas and all those sorts of things, and you just happen to run into people naturally that you would probably never meet at any other point. I I feel like that's kind of being lost in a lot of these big corporate coffee shops. And in all fairness, Starbucks in a lot of locations, especially in the downtown inner city areas, dealt with a lot of homeless people, dealt with a lot of um, you know, just really uh tough situations. So I can understand why they made this move, but it is pretty sad to me, it is pretty tragic that a few bad apples can, you know, spoil the whole bunch. You know, people who aren't able to, you know, abide by certain common sense rules and standards of decency ruin the experience for the rest of us. Now, there are quite a few reasons, I would say, that third spaces are dying out, and are there there's definitely fewer of them, and the ones that exist still are um, you know, fewer and far between, harder to find, and usually have some degree or element of having to pay in order to be at them. So let's talk about a few of these uh factors. One big factor, I would say, is rising rental rates. Um I feel like, especially again in urban areas, the just inflation and the K-shaped economy, you know, economic recovery, like those two factors alone, I think just do a lot to, you know, drive out smaller businesses, make it a lot more difficult for them. And this in turn, of course, makes third spaces that a lot of times are free or low-cost sort of endeavors, makes it a lot more difficult for them to stick around and you know, be able to be even be feasible. Hostile urban design, I would say, is another big factor, especially in the United States, where a lot of cities now are being designed with very big, sprawling, generic suburban areas and downtown city urban areas that aren't very distinctive or have natural places for people to congregate and meet up and those sorts of things. Social media, I would also say, is another big deal. You used to have to, especially as a teenager, like you would be able to meet up with your friends at the mall. The mall used to be a huge third space. And with the rise of online shopping and Amazon and social media, a lot of these sorts of places aren't able to sustain themselves anymore. Or if they do exist, there's a lot of heavy integration of social media and online shopping with them as well. I would say also the gig economy and the previously mentioned remote work, these are factors that negatively impact third spaces. If you have a gig economy sort of job, if you're and if you fully work remotely, then you're probably more inclined to stay in your home as opposed to going out for a fresh change of scenery. I know for myself, with a couple of my jobs, I would sometimes every once in a while go to a coffee shop again for a fresh change of scenery. But with the rise of the gig economy, I would say that's another big factor for third spaces becoming less and less of a prominent feature in our lives. Another factor I've also mentioned, but I would like to highlight here as well, is the pandemic. With the COVID-19 pandemic, with a lot of, you know, fear about enclosed spaces and everybody having to wear masks and space, you know, twelve feet apart, all those things, it just made these sorts of public gathering spaces a lot less of a prominent feature in people's lives for a long time. So then when the doors were thrown open and we were all able to get back to a semblance of normal living, only for things to be closed down again, and this heavily, of course, depended on the state that you lived in or the country that you lived in, but the COVID-19 pandemic was such a weird time. And I feel like, especially if you lived in a state like California or New York, which outright closed a lot of these third spaces down and shut them down or threatened to shut them down, you know, you you you how you force the churches to close, but you keep open the marijuana dispensaries and the strip clubs. You know? That's one of the craziest things I ever saw during the pandemic. It's like, I guess the p the COVID-19 is not going to spread in those other places, but oh, it's the churches, it's the evil churches that are gonna be the breeding grounds for this disease. Like, it just makes no sense to me. Anyway, I digress. I think when we came back from the COVID-19 pandemic, you know, one would imagine that there would be a big desire for these sorts of third spaces again, and I think to a certain degree there might have been, but I also think a lot of us got pretty comfortable with the idea of living from home, working from home, and if you merge your first and second spaces together, you can kind of live a fairly decent existence and life without having a third place factor prominently into what you're doing. I also mentioned online shopping as being a big factor as well. If you can order almost anything your heart desires, whether that be food or coffee or you know, whatever goods are being sold on Amazon, which is basically almost anything, that's gonna significantly reduce organic in-person interactions at these sort of different third spaces. You don't have to interact with anyone to get what you want. Well, you're gonna take the path of least resistance. That's just natural human nature. One more final factor that I personally see is relationships are messy. Relationships take time, they take effort and energy, intentionality, and conscious scheduling. You have probably encountered this if you are on a group chat and you are trying to figure out plans that will work for everyone in your group chat. It is nearly impossible today to be able to lock in a time that everyone in the group is able to meet. So you either make a sacrifice and have one or two or three people who are unable to make it, and then the most of the group are able to go, or it just doesn't end up happening because it can't work for everyone at the same time. A busier, more online, more interconnected world, again, one would think it would lead to more interactions and more social uh interactions with other people. But, I mean, we see this in study after study. Technology and social media seem to really be isolating people and making them feel more lonely, as opposed to me feeling more interconnected. And so, with how much busier everyone seems to be these days, and how difficult it is, seemingly, to have the time to maintain these relationships, it makes by proxy third spaces somewhat go to the wayside. I actually somewhat lied. I said that was the last factor, but I will say a big third space that I haven't mentioned yet, and this is of course a component that I always like to include in my shows because I really think that this is the root cause for a lot of society's ills and issues, is the third space of the church. And with the relative decline of spirituality and the importance of religion and a relationship with the one true living God, or even just any God in general, um, you know, just becoming less and less of a focal point in a lot of Americans' lives, then I think there is less concern for your fellow man. There is less um, you know, real need or desire to be actively involved with others, especially in America with the very individualistic, you know, Western ethos. So I think a decline in spirituality is also something that has led to a big decline in third spaces. I'm speaking in relative terms, of course, because one could argue that the boomer generation has become decidedly less spiritual over time, and Generation Z millennials, but uh much more so generation Z have become a lot more spiritual and a lot more interested in the things of the Lord, or just any kind of spirituality in general. But I'm just kind of looking at it from a high-level historical overview. So this these are some of the factors for why I think third spaces are are declining in our society today. I think there's a lot of other tangential issues that we can touch upon that is that can be, you can I guess you can kind of see them as symptoms of the same overall disease or just interrelated, interconnected issues. But I think things like declining spirituality, single-parent homes, political polarization, I think is a huge one. Um dating apps as well, again, speaking to technology, um, warping the date the dating market, uh, rise of crime, rise of homelessness, all of these issues, you can kind of make pose the question to yourself: is the death of third spaces the result of these problems, or are these problems the result of the death of third spaces? Like you can kind of make a chicken versus egg sort of argument. And I think with some of these factors, you can maybe see that there's an interrelationship between the two, but the death of third spaces might actually be causing some of these issues. To wit, I think a big part of why politics are so polarized these days is because a lot of us are not interacting regularly and just bumping into people in these third spaces that do share different opinions, that do disagree with us. It is so easy for us nowadays to curate for ourselves a complete echo chamber ecosystem where we can completely shut out any and all voices that disagree with us and just completely have a drip feed, if not a torrent, of content that affirms you and affirms your worldview and belief system. That didn't used to exist. Far from it. We used to only have, like I'm sounding like a boomer right now, but we only had like five channels on TV. Everybody listened to Walter Cronkite. Even though Walter Cronkite was a fairly liberal guy, he at least tried to have this semblance of being fair and balanced in his presentation of the news. That's why everybody likes him, and everybody, you know, likes to reminisce about those days. Even though he was decidedly biased. He at least tried to come across as unbiased, and a lot of the country listened to him. Because we had to. There was very limited options. So one can argue, and I don't really think it's necessarily worthwhile to spend a lot of time on this show, you know, going through each of these factors and, you know, identifying which is the chicken versus the egg, which one comes first. But I do think that it's just important to contemplate as we think about the death of Third Spaces. Now, something that I think is also important to mention is is this distinctly an American phenomenon? I've mainly been speaking from that perspective, because I am, of course, proud to be an American. And yet I do think it's interesting to see and track if there are these sorts of things happening in other countries as well. And in the brief research that I've done, I can safely say that this isn't just an American phenomenon. Two countries I'll cite as examples are the United Kingdom and Japan. The United Kingdom has seen, in particular, they've suffered a lot of pub closures over the last couple of decades. Really, you can say the last few decades. And the pub is a very central part, I would argue, of British culture, a meeting place, to the exchange of ideas and and debate, and you know, keeping it real, just being able to engage in various alcohol-fueled activities and stupidity. Um but it's like a central part of that culture and an Irish culture. And so due to various economic pressures, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, a lot of these pubs have been forced to close, and thus a central third place is disappearing from many, many small hamlets and towns in the realm of the United Kingdom. Uh, youth clubs are also a third space, especially for troubled youth. And due to, you know, budget cuts and again economic pressures, a lot of these are being disbanded. Uh, youth sports, um, I'm bringing it back to America, but it's something that I think is happening across the world as well. Again, economic pressures making it very difficult for a lot of countries and a lot of states and cities and school districts in the United States to maintain these clubs. And, you know, even if they're able to be maintained, a lot of parents are pinching pennies and feeling the squeeze, and it's harder to justify having little Timmy go participate in Pop Warner or Little League if it costs them an arm and a leg to do so. Might as well just, you know, have your dad throw catch with little Timmy in the backyard and take him to the diamond and you know, every once in a while at the park and, you know, teach him how to run, teach him how to hit the baseball, whatever. Uh I would say the economy is a big part of that as well. Japan has seen a lot of their social life move into digital anonymity. A lot of internet cafes have kind of been closed down and replaced out with solo work pods, making social interaction a lot less likely. And I would also say that, especially in Japan, uh, the word and the phenomenon seems to be mainly a Japanese thing, but I'm sure it also happens with a lot of people across the world, is more and more young people becoming Hikikamori, which I forget what that directly translates to, but just this idea of a social recluse that kind of locks themselves in their room, never comes out, you know, they just watch anime or play video games or do whatever they want in their room with very, very, very limited contact with the outside world, um, in the real world. Of course, they're on the internet a lot. Um But I would say again, if you have the merging of your first space and your second space, then just the human psyche kind of goes with the path of least resistance. And thus third spaces become a big casualty of that. One other story I want to mention before I head into some of the negative effects of the death of third spaces, is if you want to talk about hostile urban design, or even just like hostile people in general, um again, kind of a boomer thing, a lot of boomers are like, those darn kids, and you know, get off my lawn and nimby, not in my backyard, and um you know. Teenagers, a lot of times, yeah, they can be dumb, they can be stupid, they can cause trouble. But they need to go somewhere, especially when they are off from school in the summer. Where are they going to go? And there have been a lot of news stories lately this year, about roving gangs of teenagers on electric bikes or electric scooters, and you might have heard of the phrase teen takeovers. These are essentially juvenile delinquents a lot of the time, who lack direction, lack a place to be, because of hostile urban design and a lot of people just not wanting to have these teenagers around. Maybe, you know, not buying anything at their stores or driving away customers, whatever, by their presence. So it kind of only ends up making the situation worse. It kind of backfires because they end up wreaking havoc, causing mayhem wherever they decide to go, wherever they choose to ransack or whatever happens. Um it's become a real issue. It's become a real problem. And the lack of inclusive third spaces for these teenagers, I think, is a big part of contributing to these sorts of teen takeover events. Certainly far from the only factor, but I would say it's a pretty big one. So, we've looked at what third spaces are and some of the factors that have led to the death of third spaces. What are some issues that arise when third spaces slowly or quickly disappear? Well, I would say one of the biggest issues that arises is a more polarized, less connected society. The little micro interactions and surface-level acquaintances that you might have at one of these third spaces actually contributes a lot more to your quality of life than you might realize. Now, that's a lot of words, and um and you might be like, okay, Evan, what are you saying? What I'm saying is this. You know, let's say, for example, you have a very regular time you go into a local bookstore, and you see an old man there, well we'll just call him Bill, and he sits in the same place in the same corner, and he always reads the same kind of books, and maybe you didn't notice him at first, but every time you've been at the bookstore at that particular time, he's there. And eventually you strike up a conversation with him and you ask him about what he's reading, and you start learning about him, a little bit about him and his life, and his story. But you're not best friends. You're you might not ever go to his home and he might ever visit yours. But he's someone that you can always kind of count on to be there, someone that you can talk to. And maybe you only talk one, two, five, ten minutes at most at a time. You know, maybe at a coffee shop you run into the same person a lot, and you don't really ever say much, you maybe even hardly remember or know their name. But they're a constant, they're a factor in your life that significantly contributes to your overall sense of well-being. And you might not even know it. So if you have these third spaces where you meet different people that you would normally probably never meet, and you interact with them regularly, and now they are no longer there because the third space is not there, well, that can lead to more isolation, and that can lead to even I would say, especially you without you knowing it, becoming less of a well-rounded person. And it's kind of a scary thing because it's so subliminal and it's very hard to know what you are losing if you don't, in fact, know that you're losing it. And yet Yeah, I would say it's a pretty hugely damaging thing for all of us to grapple with, for all for all of us to think about and ponder. Another issue that I see resulting from the death of third spaces is a lot of economic harm. It's interesting because a lot of these third spaces are dying, primarily because the economics don't make sense for a lot of these third spaces, or public funding is not where it is anymore, not where it used to be. I would, of course, argue that a lot of public funding for certain institutions could probably be better handled by the the private market, but that's another issue in another discussion for another time, and I digress on that point. But really, there are a lot of factors that might not show up in national GDP figures, but are issues that over time will slowly erode at a country's or a society's economic viability or strength. For example, if libraries are either not well maintained or closed altogether, places that a lot of people are able to go and search for and apply for jobs are gone. Places that you're able to print out a resume or able to check out and educate yourself and read and learn different things. Well, even though that information is broadly available a lot of times on the internet, not everything is, and you know, especially for lower income people who maybe don't have a computer at home or don't have a phone, uh, you know, an iPhone or smartphone or whatever, well, that can be very damaging for their ability to move up and climb the you know, the social ladder to be able to make it into higher economic strata. I would also say that a damaging effect of the decline of third spaces. And this one I would say is one of the most insidious and perhaps one of the most damaging is fake connection and really loneliness actually being disguised as connection. A lot of even the third spaces that exist still now still have, you know, are and are really starting to create these elements of gathering and so like mimicking what a third space does, but it's not really actually social anymore. Um, especially if you have like, you know, for example, the rise of like Instagram-centric restaurants or cafes. Well, the focus is going to be mainly on the phone and mainly on getting pictures of whatever you're drinking or whatever you're eating, or even if you're out with friends, the focus is not on actually getting to meet new people naturally. Instead, you take the photos first, and interaction is last and falls by the wayside. Or co-working offices, you know, mobile offices sorts of things. Well, you're not really interacting a lot with strangers when you're just you yourself running your business from your laptop. And so, much like I think social media has been so damaging to society because it packages connection and it sells us on a model of being able to cure boredom and loneliness, but really instead, in a perverse way, they actually end up accentuating the very things that they promise they will help us with. Killing third spaces and making the ones that are left a lot less social, a lot less dynamic, a lot less interactive with strangers and with other people. Well, ultimately what I would say is maybe we're still gathering together as people, but we're not really actually connecting anymore. And that to me is very dangerous, and as you zoom out on a broad societal level, definitely fractures people, like I've mentioned several times. Polarization is at an all-time high, especially in the West in the United States. And I think a big reason for that is there's a lack of things like town halls, or if there are town halls, they're virtual or online, or you can tune into them online. There isn't really a sense of communal understanding, or as you know, you can see this like with polls a lot of times, with a decline in general patriotism in America and being proud of one's country. I think that a big part of that is because of declining spirituality, declining focus on the values and principles that made this country great, thus, again, leading to this behavior or this decline of third spaces, and having that robust debate with someone that you actually see, with someone that you actually know as a neighbor. Because you can get on Facebook and argue with someone for five hours. But has anybody actually ever felt like they accomplished something positive in the world by arguing with someone on social media? Both of you just end up usually not having changed each other's minds and being more angry than when you first started the conversation. I'm sure there's exceptions. I'm sure there's times when you might have helped change someone's opinion or someone's point of view. But I think the overriding sense that I get from a lot of people, myself included, is that it usually just ends up being a waste of time. So those are some of the negative effects that I see from the death of third spaces. Economic impacts, local small businesses struggling, political polarization makes it easy for uh politicians to set up pit us against each other and to control us, and you know, cultural costs. Um, I would say a lack of creativity, you know, is a big thing as well. A lot of, you know, music composition or uh literature or whatever, those a lot of times would take place, or even art, art itself being painted, you know, a lot of times those are depicting daily activities or things that are going on in these public third spaces. Without these third spaces, and with the rise of a lot of you know new technological tools, a lot of that is kind of fading away. So, what can we do about it? I think a lot of this episode so far has been fairly negative, I would say. Fairly doom and gloom, and I want to flip that on its head. I want to talk about some simple positive ways that we can not only bring back third spaces, but be intentional with going beyond our comfort zones and helping to re-establish a sense of belonging in community and a sense of common purpose and understanding that has in a lot of ways fallen by the wayside. So, what are some things that we can do about it? First of all, I would say that recognizing that it all starts with us and it all starts with me as an individual, taking personal accountability and personal ownership for the problem and how to possibly fix it is I think a great way to think about tackling the issue head on. Maybe take some time to get a group of friends together and help volunteer to refurbish a public park or a space that has been worn down over the years. Just take it upon yourself to go ahead and do that. Be the change that you want to see in the world, I think as Mahatma Gandhi would say. Another way that we can help this issue is to host get-togethers or events at the third spaces that still do exist, and maybe make them focused on limiting social media use or even being no phones get-togethers, no phones sorts of meetups. I know that there are some very popular apps and things of that nature, you know, online events, or events rather that are advertised online that I've seen, but they do focus on putting the phone away and actually pairing you up with or meeting different strangers or people that you'll be able to learn, get to interact with, get to know them better. And I love that idea. I love that concept. I think that's something that's really, especially with, you know, just technology and artificial intelligence taking over a lot of people's lives or a lot of aspects of people's lives, there really is this big craving for analog, for old school, and old-fashioned get-togethers, an old-fashioned real interaction with people. I feel like a lot of the themes of this episode run in parallel with the Is It Smart to Be Dumb or Is It Smart to Go Dumb episode that I recorded a while back with uh Julian Fuhrer. Um I'll put that link in the show notes. I think I think that was a pretty interesting show, and like I said, a lot of the themes that we expounded upon there do run in tandem with this show. The third main thing that I would say that we can do is let's make decisions, let's make choices which align with creating healthier spaces for a community. What do I mean by that? Well, I think as much as you can, maybe try consider cutting down reliance on online retail shopping. Maybe consider shopping less from Amazon or online retailers or ordering food from Uber Eats or DoorDash. Convenience, you know, while it's great, there are a lot of ways that we as a society, I think, are paying for that convenience that we don't often think about or consider. And it's hard to see because these are downstream effects that maybe aren't immediately noticeable, but over time, the sum impact of all of these individual decisions end up contributing to a more polarized, less connected world. So maybe start small. Maybe instead of buying from Amazon, take the time to go and make that in-person purchase or in-person uh activity of some kind, whatever that might be. And maybe it just starts with one, one a week. Then over time, you kind of reintegrate these decisions that can help fight back against this trend over time. A fourth way that we can help to fight this trend is to invest in individuals, to invest in people. Invest in maybe a struggling teen or a group of people that really need guidance. Consider, in fact, possibly and prayerfully, opening up your own home to being a third space in a certain sense, for people who need it. And maybe if that's a step too far for you, consider having your home maybe be even a neighborhood third space. And I know that's somewhat ironic to suggest because I spent a lot of time in this episode harping on the disappearance of the third space, the first space being home and the second space being work, and really if you work from home a lot of the time, maybe you don't even have a second space. But think about these sorts of community gatherings and activities in your neighborhood, which over time can be replicated by your neighbors, and their homes will might become a third space for you in the long run. So, we've come full circle, and really maybe our homes can become third spaces for people. A fifth way that we can help to combat this trend is consider investing in your local church, synagogue, temple, mosque, whatever. As I've touched upon during this show, a lack of religiosity, a lack of belief in a higher power, a lack of belief that our actions really mean something outside of the course of our lifetimes, a lack of a belief in the divine, I would argue, leads to more loneliness, leads to more despair, leads to less of a true north, a sense of shared purpose, a sense of individual purpose. If we all believe we're just clumps of cells and bags of chemicals that have just randomly come about, then we are going to by necessity view emotions and view compassion and these sorts of deeper values through a more skeptical lens. Altruism, for example, a lot of times, in the animal kingdom, in the natural world, would not really have much of any purpose for an individual survival, an individual animal survival. And yet, we still see examples of that in the animal kingdom, or these ideas of, you know, very strong communal living. And yet in human culture, in human society, again, maybe altruism isn't always something that is going to produce personal benefit, but you see how it pays off in the long run. And I would argue, do unto others as you would have them do unto you, and you know, the golden rule and this idea of, you know, as Jesus would talk about, doing unto the least of these really is actually helping to glorify him and to really serve him. So I would say, you know, especially. Especially for my listeners who may be less inclined to be religious, less inclined to believe in some sort of higher power or some sort of uh uh guiding overarching principles that uh uh guide in an un you can say in an unseeing way our lives, I would encourage you to think about how your own attitudes and your own belief systems may in fact be contributing towards this sense of societal disintegration. Those are some heavy words, but it's a challenge that I want to issue, especially, like I said, to the m less religious or the irreligious among us. And the last way that I can think about to help combat this lack of third spaces or the death of third spaces, is local politics. Local politics very much matter, and I would argue tend to matter way more than the federal elections and the state elections that get such a huge amount of our attention and is what the news cycles tend to always be focused on and driving. But I would say on a day-to-day basis, more often than not, it is the local level that is going to have a much larger impact on your day-to-day living. Show up to council meetings. Yes, a lot of times they tend to be boring. And I can speak for personal experience. A lot of times when there's a big uh school board meeting with a very contentious issue or problem that a lot of people are going there to attend for, they conveniently stuff that issue at the very end of the meeting because they are trying to wear you down. They are trying to thin out the crowd and make it so that the controversy kind of dies away. They purposefully do this. But regardless, take that time. As cliche as it is to say, call your local uh, you know, state officials or your well, your local local officials. Um, show up to the council meetings, like I said, and become an advocate for more open, inclusive urban planning. Especially with healthy public spaces being at the center of these sorts of plans. Show up and protest AI data centers, which take a lot of natural resources, a lot of money, a lot of time, and what do we have to show for it? That I believe is a is going to become one of the defining is issues of our time. Are these local communities that are bravely standing up and declaring no to these massive data-hungry, power hungry, resource hungry AI companies. They're saying no. If you install that here, it will destroy our community, it will destroy our sense of belonging, it will destroy what makes us unique. Kudos to those small communities and kudos to those places who are saying no. Heck, I would say if we want a new massive data center to be built, let's start with the billionaires' backyards. Let's see if they like having a taste of their own medicine and all the negative effects that these data centers are going to have. But of course that's never gonna happen. We know why. It's because they're protected. It's because they are buying off our politicians as we speak. But I digress. I'm gonna end off by summarizing this point like this. Local politics are important. Keep your finger on the pulse of the neighborhood, on the pulse of what is going on. If you hear about a new data center proposal or a new urban planning proposal that does not include open third spaces, show up. Have a counter proposal. Discuss why including these third places matters to the community. Anyway, that's about all that I have to say on the subject. I am going to have a lot of articles in the show notes on this issue. I didn't want the show to simply merely be a regurgitation of a lot of ink that has already been spilled on the subject. I kind of wanted to just go with thoughts that I personally had on the issue. But these articles did comprise some of the research that I did, and have some other thoughts that I think are very much worth discussing and examining. The last thing I'm going to mention is an issue that's tangential and one that I may actually do another episode on, but one that I think it is worth briefly mentioning, and that is with third places disappearing, I think there indirectly becomes a bigger desire for paid places, paid third spaces, such as, one could argue, theme parks or Disney World. And with inflation, again, I mentioned the K-shaped economy, the economic recovery, um, you know, there's an article that I'll link into the show notes that talks about Disney adults. And the title is rather provocative to me is Are Disney Adults the Happiest Debtors on Earth? Goes in depth, it goes into a lot of detail about how a lot of Disney adults, people who maybe were introduced to Disney as a child and remain Disney fans into adulthood, or they started as fans in their adulthood, they are going into four-figure debt, maybe even five-figures of debt in certain instances, to satiate their desire to go to Disneyland or Disney World or whatever, in this attempt to chase after this high, chase after this sense of feeling, of belonging, of wow, I love being at Disney World and I love going on the rides, and I love buying stuff and all these things, consumer hyper-consumerism. Well, I do think part of that, a small slice of that, not not a huge part, not a huge motivating factor, but I do think a small part of that does stem from a hyper-individualistic culture cure being able to curate your own entertainment for yourself, then sort of leading to this idea of, okay, if I can't find meaning and fulfillment in these other third spaces that don't really exist anymore, I'm gonna shell out hundreds or thousands of dollars to go to a theme park instead to help to fill that void, to help fill and satiate that sense of belonging and that sense of happiness and joy that they maybe aren't getting in a lot of other areas in their life. Just food for thought. Something that I think is an interesting parting thought as I bring this show to a close. What do you think about this topic? Why are Third Spaces dying? What can we do about it? Is it a problem? Or do you think maybe society is simply just evolving into a different sense of third spaces? And there really isn't that much of an issue. We were gonna be alright in the end, and we're just in the midst of a great transition period right now. You might disagree with what I have to say on this show, and I would love to hear from you, whether you agree or whether you disagree. So feel free to join our community discord. Sound off on what you think. Feel free also if you'd like to support the show. I have links where you're able to do that. And you can also text me privately. That's a feature that I think gets undercovered on the show, but is one that I like to throw in as well. You can anonymously text me, and I will definitely read your comment. I don't know if I'll maybe shout it out on the show or not, but if I find it humorous enough, maybe I will. But anyway, thank you all so much for tuning in and listening to this episode of Evan Extemporaneous, where we discuss the pertinent issues of the day. Hopefully, you found this entertaining, enlightening, and interesting. Pass along my show to someone if you think it has been. Thank you so much for tuning in, and always remember, the buck stops right here, because we are looking out for you.