Can Policy Curb (or Cure) Loneliness?

TOPICS DISCUSSED

  • The Respect for Marriage Act

  • Loneliness

  • Outside of Politics: Holiday Cards

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EPISODE RESOURCES

THE RESPECT FOR MARRIAGE ACT

LONELINESS

TRANSCRIPT

Sarah [00:00:07] This is Sarah Stewart Holland.  

Beth [00:00:08] And this is Beth Silvers.  

Sarah [00:00:10] Thank you for joining us for Pantsuit Politics. Thank you for joining us for another episode of Pantsuit Politics. Today, we're going to talk about the Respect for Marriage Act that just passed the Senate in the first part of our show. Then we're going to have a conversation around loneliness, demographic trends that are contributing to it and how governments around the world are responding. We're going to close out the show, as we always do, having a conversation Outside Politics. And today we're going to talk about holiday cards.  

Beth [00:00:46] Before we do all of that, we would love to invite you to celebrate this time of year with us on December 15th. If you are a Patreon member, you will see all the information in your feed about that. If you subscribe on Apple Podcasts, please make sure that you shared your email address with us so that you will get access. This is for our premium members. It's a lovely community behind the paywall that we would love for you to be part of. All the information on joining us is in the notes as well.  

Sarah [00:01:12] Next up, we're going to talk about the Respect for Marriage Act. On Tuesday, the United States Senate passed the Respect for Marriage Act. We wanted to spend some time talking about the Respect for Marriage Act. Or as I call it, Clarence Thomas wrote a concurrence and everybody freaked out. So let's go back in time before we get into this legislation. Let's go back to this summer when the Supreme Court overturned Roe v Wade, which is based on a constitutional right to privacy. Now, Justice Alito, in his opinion, he was like, don't worry everybody, this only applies to reproduction. Clarence Thomas, in his concurrence, was like, you know what? Let's apply it more broadly. And so everybody most certainly did worry. There's been and continues to be lots of worrying. So now we have federal legislation that has passed the Senate. It is headed to the House and is expected to be signed by President Biden that would address these concerns. Now, let's talk about what this legislation actually does.  

Beth [00:02:25] So the opinion that is at risk is Obergefell, which said everyone has a legal right to marry regardless of whether they are different sex or same sex couples. The Respect for Marriage Act is not a complete replacement for Obergefell because under Obergefell, states cannot ban same sex couples from marrying. The Respect for Marriage Act says yes they can, but at the federal level we acknowledge marriage is between one man and one woman, as well as marriages between same sex people. Also, if you marry in a state where your union is legal, other states have to respect your marriage whether it would be legal there or not. So this is a repeal of the Defense of Marriage Act, which passed in the nineties on a bipartisan basis. Both Joe Biden and Chuck Schumer voted for it. It was signed into law by a democratic precedent.  

Sarah [00:03:18] Terrible then, terrible now. So happy it's gone.  

Beth [00:03:21] Yes. So that is it explicitly repealed by this act. There is also a religious freedom amendment to this act that says nonprofit religious organizations are not required to provide services, accommodations, advantages, facilities, goods or privileges or the solemnization or celebration of a marriage and cannot be sued for failing to do so. So that is the compromise that brought 12 Republicans to vote with all Democrats in favor of this legislation.  

Sarah [00:03:51] So should this be signed into law, which everyone expects it to be signed into law? A state could still ban gay marriage, so Kentucky could still ban gay marriage. But if two citizens from Kentucky got married in Illinois, where marriage was still legal, Kentucky would be required by federal law to recognize that marriage. And in order to do that, they obviously had to overturn the defense of marriage, which recognized federal marriage as only between a man and a woman. And so now it is allowed regardless of sex, race, ethnicity or national origin. So that is already a compromise. Then we get this amendment, which is a further compromise, and there are many opinions-- as there often are when a compromise is present-- but Congress is a body of compromise and so I am choosing to celebrate this, Beth.  

Beth [00:04:48] I thought The Washington Post editorial board put it well when it called this act an insurance policy, because there is real fear for people in existing marriages that their marriages could somehow be invalidated or threatened by a reversal at the Supreme Court level. And I believe it was CNN that I was reading that said this Supreme Court seems to delight in overturning precedent, and I think that's correct and concerning. And so I celebrate the insurance policy dimension of this. The question that I have is to what extent is this permission or an invitation to the court to now overturn Obergefell in light of Congress having this solution out there? Does this tell them, well, the legislative process did not go as far as our previous precedent, and that in and of itself is evidence that our prior precedent exceeded the scope of our authority. I do have questions about what the effect of this will be.  

Sarah [00:05:49] To me, this is just further evidence that this court's approach to precedent and federalism does and will continue to create all kinds of chaos. For decades, we built a society, a country, an economy (many, many, things) on this very strong approach to federalism with a lot of power centered in the federal government. And they're upending that. And they're giving all this power back to the states, which are run by part time legislators, most of them. And so in this desire to give this power back, to upend this post FDR approach to federalism, they're just creating chaos.This feels unwieldy even in its compromised state because it is. Because it is unwieldy. This approach where we have states that are newly empowered-- but in my personal opinion, not really qualified-- to tackle some of these problems, it's just going to create more and more conflict between states and between the federal government.  

Beth [00:07:04] I'm not sure I'm all the way there with you on the historical and legal foundation, because it is true that throughout our country's history the states have, much more than the federal government, had power over matters of that kin of plenary power of the state that is not concentrated in the federal government, that's not part of the enumerated powers that the federal government has. So in one sense, I could probably build a stronger historic argument to say that, yes, states should have the ability to decide what constitutes a marriage within the state. On the other hand, if I think about the civil rights perspective and also just the reality of modern life and the way people work across state lines constantly, travel across state lines constantly, move across state lines constantly, I think that Congress' decision here to allow states to continue to ban these marriages is-- to borrow from an NBC editorial I read-- a pretty pitiful Band-Aid. I wish that Congress had stepped up to say-- and I'm even okay, I don't love it, but I respect the Religious Freedom Amendment here. I understand that component of this. But I do think Congress should have said governments in this country should not decide that people of the same sex can't marry. I think we're there. The polls say we're there. The polls say a majority of Democrats and Republicans believe that this is outdated and hopefully what the states do will reflect that. But this compromise by Congress around the issue of the states power to ban these marriages to me is like maybe unintentional wink and nod to conservatives on the Supreme Court to go ahead and overturn that precedent, which I think would be a big mistake.  

Sarah [00:08:51] I think it's important, though, when the Supreme Court continues to emphasize the power of the states to not take a lot of comfort in national polls on issues like this, because they're really different depending on what state you're in. The same with abortion rights. I have to remind myself don't get comfortable thinking that 60% of the people you live around feel like this because they don't. And I think that's the hard reality that the Supreme Court is forcing conservatives everywhere to face, both in the United States Senate and at the local level. You see Mike Pence trying to walk that line with in-vitro fertilization. Like, well, you might feel that way, but you're empowering a segment of the population that doesn't. And so I just think it's very difficult. I think it upends more recent 20th century history that's built on that right to privacy. Don't try to walk this line and say we overturn Roe v Wade, but everything else stands. No one believes it. Whether this legislation passes or not, they're going to do what they're going to do. I don't think this is any encouragement to Sam Alito. He already has his agenda. He's not going to be shaken from it. And that agenda is less to me about gay marriage and more about that religious freedom protection, that empowering a religious minority that feels that they are being cut out of American society, or at least elite society, because, again, depending on where you live, that particular portion of the population is very emboldened. I just think they have opened a Pandora's box. Truly. When they take the power away from the federal government, they create these fiefdoms across the United States where people's civil rights vary tremendously. It's a recipe for disaster. And, again, I'm happy they did something. I think compromise is always to be celebrated. I think 12 Republicans stepping forward and saying, this is how I feel about this as a member of my faith community but this is what I think is important as a United States senator, is to be applauded and is important. But, to me, it's just one more reflection of the way they have upended everything with Dobbs. And we're going to continue to see the fallout.  

Beth [00:11:24] I absolutely agree with you that the court has dramatically changed the landscape of what courts will even do throughout the rest of our history. Without a major correction, I think we are in a really different place in that the ramifications of that, as serious as they already are, aren't even foreseeable yet. I agree with you in applauding people who are, from a faith perspective, uncomfortable with defining marriage any way other than one man one woman getting on board here. I was surprised by Cynthia Loomis voting for this legislation. She's a very conservative member of Congress. Definitely not one of my favorites. And I was watching her remarks about her vote this morning. And she said, "I believe marriage is between one man and one woman. And I feel very vilified for having that belief in the country. I wish that we would be more respectful of each other overall, but I wish we would be more respectful of each other over all. And to me, that's why we have to have this legislation." She said, "For us as a nation to survive, we have to make more room for each other."  

Cynthia Loomis [00:12:36] So why have I strayed with such anguish from a path that conforms to my beliefs, my instruction, my faith to vote for the Respect for Marriage Act? These are turbulent times for our nation. Many of us ask ourselves, our nation is so divided when will this end? Just as when our nation was founded, people of diverse faiths, beliefs and backgrounds had to come to terms with each other and had to respect each other's rights even before the Constitution enumerated those rights. They have to tolerate each other in order to survive as a nation.  

Beth [00:13:24] And she used the word tolerate a lot, which I know is a tough word. And I want to say to our listeners, I know that no one wants to just be tolerated. You want to be accepted and celebrated and loved right where you are. And I also know that I can't shame someone into feeling that. And I hope that more people like Cynthia Loomis stepping forward and saying we do have to show each other greater respect is a good step along the long path to more people accepting and loving and celebrating. I know that path is too long and insufferably so for many people. And I just I hope that we're on it and I hope that this is a truly positive step forward. It is nice to compare it to the nineties and see the progress in that amount of time. And I also know that there is a long way to go.  

Sarah [00:14:19] I think it is a first step. It's just a new path. The Supreme Court has set us on a new path and it's going to be difficult. And I think we have to ask ourselves some really hard questions. Like, how do we feel about people whose faith defines marriage as one man and one woman? We are going to have to sort of wrestle with that in a way we haven't before. How do we feel about our fellow citizens who really want abortion to be illegal under any circumstances?  I just think that by pushing this to the states, which fallout in very different ways on these issues, as opposed to when we sweep across the nation in a national poll, what is this going to look like? And I think it's going to be very difficult. And I think that even if Congress had the votes suggest codify Obergefell, that it wouldn't even be that easy because it's going to go to the Supreme Court, it's going to be challenged by a state and then what are they going to do? So I don't think Congress is at this point in the way the Supreme Court has decided these decisions are going to be able to "fix" it if they ever were. And we're going to have to accept these sort of compromises that at least move the ball a little bit further down the field on this new path that the Supreme Court has set before us. So we will continue to follow this legislation as it heads back to the House and is signed by the president. Up next, we are going to talk about loneliness.  

[00:16:13] Over Thanksgiving break, The New York Times reported on the rising number of Americans who are living alone. This has increased dramatically due to demographic changes with baby boomers and Gen Xers. In 1960, just 13% of American households had a single occupant but today it's getting closer to 30%. So we have a huge number of people who are living alone. Now, living alone does not automatically mean someone is lonely, of course. But there is evidence that beyond where we live, how we live is also changing. And that is sparking a lot of conversations about loneliness, about friendship deficits, about just human touch in general. And we wanted to talk about that and talk about the fallout of those changes inside our own lives and in society and what that means as far as government policy. So there's been a lot of riding on this. One of the big sources of data, when we talk about how Americans are spending their time and how they're spending more time alone, is the synthesis time you study. And we have some pretty interesting statistics from that study, particularly when it comes to our social lives and friendships. Before the pandemic, from between 2014 and 2019, the time we spent with friends went down by even more than it did during the pandemic, which is super interesting. And this is across demographics men and women, white and nonwhite, rich, poor, urban, rural, married, unmarried, parents, non-parents, all saw very similar declines when you look at the time they spent with other people in a social setting.  

Beth [00:18:02] And that pattern is also true for people who are working in person and people who are working remotely. I'm sure that we all notice it in our own lives. I was just wrapping gifts last night realizing I bought not a single thing I wrapped in a store, not one. And I thought there's something profoundly wrong about that. It was efficient for me in my life and also those loose social connections-- as Dr. Michelle Gelfand talks about in her work. And we can link a previous episode with her about those tight and loose connections. But those loose social interactions where you just bump into someone you know in a store or you interact briefly with the person working at the store, that's important. And I have totally forgone that this year and I am certain that I'm not alone.  

Sarah [00:18:45] Yes, I do very little shopping in person. I've done a little bit more of this holiday season and I have enjoyed it. But, I mean, also we work from home. We work remotely. So we spend a large amount of time alone. And I think we're not the only ones. There's been a dramatic increase in online shopping and remote work. This is true of all demographics, like we said, but there are a couple groups in particular that bubble up to the top when you see these changes and that fuels the big numbers across the board because their change is so dramatic. One of those groups is teenagers. So you see a dramatic decrease of almost 64% of time teenagers spend with their friends. It's down like 11 hours over the course of a week. Which back to our conversation about teens and mental health, when you cross tabulate, when you lay over top of each other the time spent alone and the increase in depression and anxiety for teenagers, they are very, very, closely aligned.  

Beth [00:19:50] Reading about this gave me such an aha moment this week. My sixth grade daughter is involved in a number of activities, has good friends, but does exhibit signs I think of isolation and loneliness. And something I've noticed lately about her out of school activities and even her teachers at school, she is using the word mean about teachers and coaches more than I've ever heard her say it. That person was really mean. The director was really mean. And as I have probed that with her, what I hear back is this person doesn't allow us any social time. They constantly tell us to stop talking to each other. And I thought, well, that makes perfect sense to me that that is coming to her as meanness, that task orientation. And it makes perfect sense that we have that task orientation because so many of these activities are not run through the school system and so you're paying to do them. And the place is trying to deliver value and you're trying to get value. But it just made me realize as a kid my activities were a source of social time. And they're not for her. They are a source of learning and extracurricular skill and displaying that skill. And it just really helped me get a lot of what's going on with her to look at these statistics and think about that as a layer of loneliness in her life.  

Sarah [00:21:15] Well, it was interesting because the other group that fuels this is men. But what's so fascinating is when you look at the teenage numbers, that is really fueled by girls. Like it's there's a real centrality to girls decreasing their times with their friends. And I thought, wow, I feel that. And I thought about my own kids habits.  They spend a lot more time on screens, which we're going to get into that in a minute. But they spend time on screens with friends. So I don't know how the time you study logs that, but my son spend a lot of time with their friends playing video games. Even in different areas. And I do really try to emphasize face to face contact because I think that something is happening in our mind body connection when we're physically with other people. But I wondered like, oh, I wonder if that's just like the difference in video game usage where boys play with each other and counted as social time and girls don't.  

Beth [00:22:05] Yeah, it could be. I mean, I do see with most of Jane's friends who are girls that they are very programed and they are all doing things that sound like the recipe for a successful, happy kid. And she mostly is. We don't have major problems here. But I think her perception of adults as mean is calling out that these adults are kind of treating me more like a worker than like a kid who is here to bond with friends as much as do the activity.  

Sarah [00:22:37] Yeah, that's really interesting. So the other group that is fueling a lot of these changes is men. There's a New York Times piece a few months ago about men and friendships and how they're struggling to form friendships. And how the transactional nature of men's friendships maybe has been replaced by screen time. If you can go to a sports event basically any time from the comfort of your home on a screen, why would you attend with a friend? If you can watch a tutorial on YouTube to fix or do anything that you want to do, why would you call a friend with that level of expertize? So I think that that is really interesting. And, of course, all of these changes were before the pandemic. But the pandemic, I think, also creates so many of these situational moments in life that can increase loneliness. So it required, obviously, social isolation because of the viral spread, but it led so many to make changes. So if you decided to get divorced or you changed jobs or you moved or you had a baby, these are all life events which on paper-- especially like having a baby or maybe changing jobs, you'll think, well, you'll be around new people, but that can really increase people's loneliness and that doesn't even touch on maybe long COVID or the development of a disability, which of course would increase loneliness. So you have all these different factors. You have demographics, what demographic you fall in, these big life events also that can trigger increased loneliness and sort of trigger that isolation. And so it's this very complex puzzle.  

Beth [00:24:19] It is. And I think it's important to just say we are talking about what social scientists are identifying as averages. I don't live most of these averages. The men in my life are exceptionally good at friendship. I live in a neighborhood where we are exceptionally friendly with each other and social with each other. My connections to people in my life increased over the pandemic because it gave me that kind of zoom out perspective on life and made me realize, like, here's this incredibly hard thing. I must lean in to other people to get through this. But I recognize that that has certainly not been everyone's experience. There are a bunch of pieces of privilege and luck and happiness and personality at play and how that all came together in my life. And I think as you look across the board, especially the impact of long COVID, you just can't state enough. Like it's not just the isolation of it, the fact that you are sitting alone at home, but also the feeling of am I known in this experience? Who around me understands what I am going through, like, deeply understands it? And how can anybody understand me if they don't feel what I'm feeling right now because it is so consuming and overwhelming in my life.  

Sarah [00:25:35] So you touched on personality right there. I want to take a moment. I have a little bit of a spicy take that I hope our audience will give me grace as I work out here on the podcast. So when I saw this time period, obviously there's a lot of developments, the rise of smartphones, because that's the thing. This time with friends was not replaced with hobbies and self-care, it was replaced with screen time. I mean, this is a time you study. Time is a finite resource. We can see where that time was allocated. Maybe even I can see in my own life; whereas, in decades past I would invite friends over and we would watch ER or we would watch Gray's Anatomy or we would watch The Sopranos. And now I have to really focus to have time to watch with my family because we'll just go into our separate places and we'll pull up our screens and we can stream or watch whatever we all differently want to watch on demand and can just dive into our individual interest and needs as opposed to being together. So I think that that's important. I think people hear this and they think some sort of like value judgment where you think this is how but I am doing things that are important to me. Well, and that could be true. Again, we're talking about averages. But what this time you study tells us is that we replace time with people with time with screens. And to the personality factor, the other thing that I want to just put here on the timeline of American history is that Susan Cain's book, Quiet, came out. I looked it up 2012. So two years before you start to see this dramatic change, and I have noticed such a dramatic difference in the way we talk about the personality, particularly around introversion. I know when that book came out, people felt like shy  was like something bad. You didn't want to be shy. And extroverted was the sort of cultural gold standard. But it feels like we have shifted and now it's like extroversion is sort of cringe and introversion it's like there's this defensiveness, like, I'm introverted and that's okay. And I should be able to just follow that down the path. And it's not that I think there's anything wrong. I think part of what I'm scratching out here is I just think the usefulness of these labels has declined because I don't think there's anything in human personality or the diversity of human experience that can be wrapped up in two things. There's always a wider spectrum. And you read in the comments of these articles, like, hell as other people, I should be able to just be alone as much as I want for as long as I want. And, look, I'm an only child. It's not that I don't like to be alone. I do. But I do feel like we've sort of bumped up against the edge of this label and the usefulness of it. And I think you're kind of seeing this in this conversation around loneliness and these time use studies.  

Beth [00:28:32] I have a bunch of thoughts on this, so I want to start with my agreement with you. I fundamentally agree that especially what I'm going to call like memeification of personality typing is not serving us. Well, and it doesn't matter what tool it is. I like a lot of these tools, but to constantly scroll through carousels of this is what it means that you're a two or an IEFNJ or an introvert or whatever, I think that's been very damaging. Because to your point, there is not a typing system that captures everything that we are and can be and aspire to be and is good and helpful to us. So I totally agree with that. And I think introversion was maybe the first of those to take that to a place that isn't super helpful. It is valuable to me to know that as much as I love spending time with people, I need to recharge from that. I think that's probably valuable to extroverts, too. I think that's probably valuable to everyone. I think what Susan Kane did was a version of an experience I had with my piano teacher this week, who I'm just getting to know. She is a delight. But we had this very surprising conversation about how we are both very slow to recover from illness. And we talked a little bit about why that is. And, again, I don't know this woman well at all, but she so succinctly described exactly what I feel when I'm coming out of an illness. That it was like I could just feel the cells in my body, like, appreciate that being understood. And it was so nice. And I don't want to spend a bunch of time in my life reflecting on the difficult parts of having a chronic condition. I'm not into that. But that being known is super valuable to me. I also felt it when we both talked about how cold we are all winter and then just laughing through that feeling in your bones of being cold that a lot of people don't understand. And I think that's what Susan Kane did. She did more than that. But I think that some of the grabbing on and the reason that we memefy these personality attributes is because we for a second feel like, oh, I am not alone. There are others who feel this too. And that is a powerful, wonderful feeling until we use it to separate ourselves from others who don't feel that.  

Sarah [00:30:54] Yeah. Well, and I'm not mad at Susan Kane. I hear her new book is fabulous and I plan to read it. But it feels like it became when we put language and everybody went, yes, that sometimes people zap my energy and I need to replenish; then we lost the other part of the conversation which is, yes, but sometimes people give us energy.  

Beth [00:31:13] A hundred percent.  

Sarah [00:31:14] We're all plants. We all need water. Everybody needs a different amount. Even air plants, they don't survive on air. You got to mist them. Some of us are tropical and we need a lot of water. And some of us are succulents and we don't need that much water, but we all need it. And I feel like the conversation became some of the people only take from some of us, and that's not true. I think that that's not true of any human being that people only take. We all need each other to some extent.  

Beth [00:31:40] It's both at the same time always. I am always energized by time with people in some dimension and have a recovery from that in another dimension. It's always both, though. I got this really kind direct message about someone who saw me in public with her family and her mom and sister really wanted to come say hi, but then weren't sure like what the rules were around that. She said, "Can you just tell me what the rules are?" And it was so lovely. It was the loveliest message. And I said I love meeting people who listen to our show. I love it. In any setting, under any circumstance, please say hello. I want to know you are not bothering me. I love meeting people. And I think people hear I'm an introvert on the show and know that I'm a bit more reserved and assume that that is an intrusion. And I promise you it's not. I adore people and enjoy them. And if we do a big event with a line afterward where we're meeting lots of people, I love every minute of that and I don't want to go out to dinner afterward. Like, that's my bit of it. And I think and this is kind of far afield of loneliness maybe, but what I would say is valuing time alone has nothing to do with the phenomenon of loneliness that leads to all of these negative outcomes for people.  Valuing time alone, I think, is part of a healthy existence, but valuing time with other people is too.  

Sarah [00:33:05] Well, and I think we're just using loneliness as this catch off phrase to just get at the problem of modernity. It's not about valuing time alone, but there is-- I see it in my own family-- a momentum to alone when all you are doing is meeting your own needs and following your own interests. And that momentum can be dangerous. That status quo can be damaging because there is an increased cost the longer we're away from other people. It is hard. That's why you see all these articles about it's hard to go out and make friends. It's hard to catch up with people. Or if you feel like you're out of people's lives, it's awkward, it's vulnerable. And so people can follow that momentum of alone until it's this sort of vicious cycle, right, where you're feeling lonely and then you expect or predict or perceive other people's behavior as unfriendly because you've been out of it so long, and then you pull back even more then your social anxiety increase. And then we're in the cycle. And I think that there's a lot of people stuck in that cycle. And we've all heard that the United Kingdom has like a ministry of loneliness. And I like their definition of loneliness. It says, "A subjective, unwelcome feeling of lack or loss of companionship. It happens when we have a mismatch between the quantity and quality of social relationships that we have and those that we want." And I think the problem is that it feels like how it is instead of something that can be changed and improved upon.  

Beth [00:34:48] So I read a critique of the UK's approach from a feminist perspective that we'll link here in the notes. And the critique of this definition is that it individualizes loneliness instead of looking at it as a social phenomenon. If the answer for every person is shore up your own relationships, we are missing a big picture of what contributes to loneliness. And if the government is going to work on this, shouldn't the government work on the systemic forces instead of the individual forces? Now, I don't know exactly what I think of that because to me-- and I'm not a math person so this may be a terrible metaphor-- I totally agree with you by saying we're using loneliness as a catchall to solve the problem of modern living. And so I think that's like an equation where we're solving for a bunch of different variables. So we have to work both sides of the equation at the same time. We do have to think about our individual relationships and connections, and also we have to look at social issues like the betrayal that racism represents. Like the the continuous betrayal in the United States of indigenous tribes. There are lots of places where we have broken the social fabric. Those aren't all public issues either. I would describe a lot of the messages we receive from listeners about their relationship with their churches as loneliness, as feeling like this mismatch between my expectations of belonging in this space and the reality of being in this space. I think that that gets a little bit at that tension around the word tolerance we talked about in the first segment. Tolerance is not what anybody wants. Tolerance doesn't lead to happiness and connection and belonging. And so I just thought the paper was interesting in saying if you are going to use a national resource, then look at the big issues and don't go around telling us all, well, like you really need to spend more time with your grandma. We could, and still not be getting at the heart of some of the factors that put us here.  

Sarah [00:36:51] Well, listen, I spent a lot of time with this ministry in the UK on their websites and in their reports and why the definition might feel like that. Let me tell you, what they're doing does not good. It does not feel individualized to me. They have these three prongs. One thing is they really want to improve the evidence base. They want to study, they want to get numbers, they want to have a baseline and they're just continuingly chipping away at that. Then they have this sort of we embed this consideration which I think they really talk about connection. They're really talking about not just your individual feelings but this connection within the society. And so they embed that across government policy. So they talk about community led housing. They talk about transportation options. It might be great if you individually want to see more people, but if you can't get anywhere, what does it matter? And they talk a lot about community partners and they give all these grants to these communities on the ground in their geographic area, trying to chip away at some of the barriers in their towns or wherever. And I was very impressed. And then, of course, they also have an awareness component, which is not you do it individually, but just to just to create some idea that you're not the only one suffering if you feel this way and there are resources. Because there's this really interesting thing that happens that loneliness  is that  self-feeding, self-perpetuating, that people feel embarrassed and it makes them feel even more lonely to say that they don't feel lonely.  

[00:38:15] And so they do have all these awareness campaigns. There's this Armchair Adventures Podcast that got a grant to really give some people art and texture in their lives and be able to connect with the community around the podcast. So I was very impressed. And they do a report every year based on what they're trying to do and what they're trying to improve. I also didn't know that this is the Jo Cox Commission who's the MP who was sadly murdered. And so I think that this is a lovely way in which her legacy lives on. But I was kind of impressed that it wasn't just everybody try harder. Because that's what people bristle. And I get it. I get the the frustration because you hear people say, well, it's expensive to make friends. It's hard to go out. Like, there are all these barriers. So it feels like there's just one way you're telling me that I'm not doing a good enough job. And literally no one in modern day society needs to hear that they're not trying hard enough or not doing a good job. That's just  not a message that humans like to hear. It's not a message humans often need to hear. So I get that. And also I don't think that screen time is a good replacement for time with other human beings, and that's what we're replacing it with. So I do think that there's sort of this technology component. I don't think it's technology's fault. I don't think that if we pay people to go off Facebook or Instagram or TikTok it would just fix it all, but I do think that it's definitely a component of all this and it's all worth paying attention to.  

Beth [00:39:46] I learned that Japan also has a minister dedicated to loneliness. I could not find much about what's happened. That's a recent development. So if you have information about the Ministry of Loneliness in Japan or how that's working, I would love to hear about it. I read that South Korea is considering appointing someone at a government level to look at loneliness because of how many people die alone and how high the suicide rate is. That also seemed to be at the root of Japan's decision, like, so many people dying alone. And I think that's something that we really need to think about in the United States as we think about the status of health care in general, which is something we're going to be talking more about in the new year. There's a fascinating piece in The New Yorker about hospice and where hospice has been a godsend and where it has gone very, very, wrong as a business model. I just think there are so many components to this that if you can have someone whose job is to say across the board in everything we do, how are we thinking about connecting people to one another more meaningfully? That seems like a great use of the cabinet. It's almost like diversity and justice work. You don't really need it to be like its own standalone thing. You need to say how do we make this a priority in every part of how we do business? And I think that's what I would be looking for from a policy perspective here.  

Sarah [00:41:11] Yeah, that's definitely the part of the UK's approach that impressed me the most. And I think back to the original article we started this conversation with, is we have increasing number of aging Americans. This is not just an individual problem. This is going to be an area that affects everyone, whether you have someone aging in your family or not, or whether you are the person aging or not. This is going to be an increasingly politically relevant issue. And, look, we didn't even touch on some of the other areas in which this comes up. I mean, we just had the Oath Keeper trial where people came and testified, like, I lost my job, I got divorced, I sat in my garage by myself and fell down this rabbit hole into this group and found belonging inside this domestic terror organization. So the tentacles of this problem are so far reaching. And I think back to our conversation on Tuesday, what are we doing here? And I think the question is, well, how important is togetherness when we talk about what we're doing here?  

Beth [00:42:15] Togetherness seems like a good transition to our Outside of Politics topic, which is about a way that we bring ourselves through those tight and loose social connections during the month of December.  

Sarah [00:42:36] Outside of Politics today we're going to talk about Christmas cards. I love Christmas cards. Beth, let me tell you my most favorite moment as I decorate my house is when I pull out from my fireproof safe-- I'm not even kidding-- the envelope of every Christmas card Nicholas and I have sent from our first year of marriage. I have all-- I guess, would this be 20 or 19? I don't know. I have a lot. And it brings me such joy to flip through all our photo Christmas cards all the way when we were just a little baby newlyweds with just our little puppy in D.C. up till now. I just I love them. I love a photo Christmas card so much.  

Beth [00:43:22] I know that we were just decrying, leaning too heavily on personality constructs, but I do feel that the way you feel about Christmas cards is like the ultimate manifestation of everything I know about your personality assessment tools.  

Sarah [00:43:36] Yes. I love a complete list. I love a complete set. I love a photo. I love an experience. I also like to be the first Christmas card in everybody's mailbox. When my friends are like first and they text me a picture, my heart just sinks. I can't help it. I just can't help myself. I love to be the first Christmas card.  

Beth [00:43:56] Well, you are my first Christmas card this year, so congratulations.  

Sarah [00:43:59] Thanks goodness.  

Beth [00:43:59] It was a lovely card. You put a lot of time into your cards, too. I remember proofreading your card for you this year because it had a lot of copy on it.  

Sarah [00:44:06] Yeah, I did. It was hard. It's not that it has a lot of copy. Is that the copy you have you're very tightly limited to your characters. And so I had to fit in everybody's little vignette about their year in this teeny, tiny little box. But I did it. I do like it when the Christmas card contains like sort of a yearly rundown of what the family did or what the person did. The truth is I honestly don't have a preference. Any at all, I do prefer photo Christmas card, but I don't really care. Make it a joke. Put a whole letter in there about everything you did. Leave it blank, make the card funny, make the photo funny, make it a prank or make it like you in formal clothing. I really don't care. I don't care. Single people Christmas cards, bring them. Retired people christmas cards, bring them. I want all of them.  

Beth [00:44:53] I probably enjoy the cards from single and retired people more, even the family cards because it's like here is something that is outside of my present experience. It makes me think about other phases of life, whether I have previously enjoyed them or will enjoy them again. And I jus lov the way that people choose to represent themselves this way. I also do not think for a single, solitary second, when I don't receive a Christmas card from someone.  

Sarah [00:45:20] I don't either.  

Beth [00:45:23] This is just pure enjoyment for me and I want it to be pure enjoyment for the sender and I do not care otherwise.  

Sarah [00:45:31] Yeah, that's exactly how I feel about it. I think they get this reputation that's like everybody's showing off. And so the more people push back against that, I'm like, no, I'm not. I just like doing it. I just think it's fun to send a picture of myself and let everybody else celebrate my life, celebrate my presence in their life. I just love it. I hang ribbons from the banister on my stairway and I clip them all and they usually fill the entire banister by the time the holidays over. I also really love the people who send like New Year's and Valentine's Day because then I can justify keeping all the cards out longer. So if somebody wants to just give me a heads up and be like I'll be sending an Easter card, I'll be like, oh, cool, I'll just leave all these up till Easter. I just love them. And the best tip I got one year is to take a picture of the photo card and make it that person's contact photo.  

Beth [00:46:20] That's fun. I love that.  

Sarah [00:46:20]  Isn't that so fun?  

Beth [00:46:22] That's really fun.  

Sarah [00:46:23] Then they're living on your phone all year long. They're just pure joy. They're pure joy, I love them so, so, much.  

Beth [00:46:30] And I don't judge if it's a professional photo or a candid photo. I love it when somebody sends a non photo card because I like to see people's signatures. I think people's handwriting is endlessly fascinating. I love mail, first of all.  

Sarah [00:46:45] I do love mail. Absolutely.  

Beth [00:46:47] And I love touching something that someone sent to us and just the connection of that. Like, I just think this is a lovely tradition. I don't mind getting an email Christmas card. That's fine too. I just like that we thought about each other. We said, hello, you. My list is dumb. My list is has not evolved enough with my life and there's something I sort of like about that too. That there are lots of things on my list where I'm, like, this is really incomplete as to the people in my life right now. And some of these folks I haven't spoken to in years, but I do still want to put their address on this envelope and send it to them. The clunkiness of it kind of makes it special, too.  

Sarah [00:47:24] Yeah, I love it. I love that Barbara Bush energy, you just always keep adding you just keep adding people to that Christmas card list.  I have friends that basically our only interaction is the Christmas card. You know what? Fine with me, I don't even care. Fine with me. Now, I do want to ask this question and it is controversial. Do you keep the Christmas cards?  

Beth [00:47:44] Yes, I do.  

Sarah [00:47:46] I do, too.  

Beth [00:47:47] Well, you taught me to do this. And so I follow your tradition now of hhole punching them, putting a strain around them, keeping them year to year.  

Sarah [00:47:56] Yeah. Listen, I have a holiday open house, and pulling out the Christmas card books is so fun. I've also been a literal hero to people when they've lost one. I'm, like, don't worry, baby. I got your Christmas card, I'll send to you. Now, I love it. I save them all and I bind them up in these little books. And they're so fun to look at and see people's babies and now they're all grown up. I do feel like the Christmas card situation sort of revived because I think they sort of faded. I don't remember a ton of Christmas cards growing up, but I think they faded. And then the photo Christmas card like created this revival of the Christmas card tradition. And now it just keeps getting bigger and bigger because the photo Christmas cards keep getting bigger. Also, here's my other hot tip. I always have professional pictures taken on my vacation, which both does the job of documenting the vacation and then having the photo already done in time for Christmas cards.  

Beth [00:48:55] That's a good tip. We usually use a candid photo from a baseball game as our Christmas card. This year, my friend Jen [Sp] took some photos of our family that were so lovely that I used one of those. But usually it's a baseball photo and I think that's kind of fun that that's our thing, you know.  

Sarah [00:49:11] I love it. Yeah. You had a baseball themed card one year. That was very fun.  

Beth [00:49:14]  I did and it was very cute.  

Sarah [00:49:15]  Listen, I just love them. And we're saying Christmas cards, but I just want to say that my cards are holiday cards. I never use the word Christmas and I have special non Christmas stamps for my friends that don't celebrate. So my card tradition is very inclusive, purposefully.  

Beth [00:49:33] Yes, I am really in my head this year around like how to not in a gross like box checking I'm being inclusive way being inclusive, but also like recognizing this is our tradition. We go hard at it in December and I wish so much love for everyone who doesn't and who has their own traditions or not at this time of year. This is how I feel about the Christmas cards. I don't care or want everyone do them, and that's how I feel about all of the month of December. And I find that increasingly hard to express in a way that doesn't feel like gross corporate. I'm just being inclusive to have the status of inclusion when in my heart I mean it, you know.  

Sarah [00:50:16] Yeah, I do have a criticism for the U.S. postal system. They do a sort of objectively holiday stamp because the Christmas one is elfs. I'm not going to put an elf stamp on my friends who are Jewish on a holiday card. So they did this like snow one and the snow with the berries I enjoy, but the rest of them are dumb. I don't want to put a daffodil covered in snow on my a holiday card. I don't know who is in charge of that, but you should have just made them all the berries in the snow. Those are lovely. The other flowers are dumb.  I just need to get that off my chest.  

Beth [00:50:48] There's aesthetic decisions around stamps I think are always very challenging.  

Sarah [00:50:51] Fascinating.   

Beth [00:50:53] Trying to please an awful lot of people with this.  

Sarah [00:50:57] But we just wanted to say happy holidays, everybody. We hope that you are getting the joy every time you go to your mailbox and pull out another holiday card. Because if you're not, don't worry, we're getting enough joy for the entire human race as evidenced by this conversation.  

Beth [00:51:14] That's right.  

Sarah [00:51:14] Thank you for listening to another episode of Pantsuit Politics. We hope our show helps you feel a little less alone in the world. We have this incredibly beautiful community and we are so thankful that you are a part of it. And we would love to see you at our holiday party on December 15th on our premium channels. If you're not already a premium member, now is a great time to sign up. We will be back in your ears on Tuesday. And until then, keep it nuanced y'all. 

Beth [00:51:58] Pantsuit Politics is produced by Studio D Podcast Production. Alise Napp is our managing director.  

Sarah [00:52:03] Maggie Penton is our community engagement manager. Dante Lima is the composer and performer of our theme music.  

Beth [00:52:09] Our show is listener-supported. Special thanks to our executive producers.  

Executive Producers (Read their own names) [00:52:13] Martha Bronitski. Allie Edwards. Janice Elliott. Sarah Greenup. Julie Heller. Helen Handley. Tiffany Hasler. Emily Holliday. Katie Johnson, Katina Zugenalis Kasling. Barry Kaufman. Molly Kohrs. Katherine Vollmer. Laurie LaDow. Lilly McClure. Linda Daniel. Emily Neesley. The Pentons. Tawni Peterson. Tracy Puthoff. Sarah Ralph. Jeremy Sequoia. Katie Stiggers. Karen True. Onica Ulveling. Nick and Alysa Vilelli. Amy Whited. Emily Helen Olson. Lee Shay McDonough.  

Beth [00:52:50] Jeff Davis. Melinda Johnston. Michelle Wood. Joshua Allen. Morgan mcCue. Nicole Berklas. Paula Bremer and Tim Miller.  

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