To think there's an off/bad vibe out there?

[ARichSeamToMine]

Does the world feel "off"?
Sorry if this seems ranty, I'm really interested in the vote though.

I'm feeling like there's a weird vibe out there.

I live in London, meet a lot of people through work and am not just judging by my circle.

I've been struggling to articulate this.

I'm late 40s and have seen recessions etc before.

Was out in the City tonight and I would say bar and restaurant were busy for a Monday night, so good there. The street I was on had several completely closed offices, pubs and two gyms, which was sad.

I understand that changes in social habits have been affected by working patterns etc.

I just feel there is something else at play

I increasingly find that people are a bit...strange? We saw groups in the bar, who presumably went out together from choice, just gazing at their phones. I was never anti tech but I'm starting to wonder if there is something in the idea that it affects communication skills.

my friend is worried about her dad because he constantly watches videos of fights - this is a TV show in the US now I hear.

I know a lot of people in my age group feel very "meh" and have little enthusiasm for things, but it's not just middle age. I don't think so anyway.

I'm happy if people are happy, but starting to wonder if they are happy. I meet a lot of people who don't want to go out, are up at 5am walking a dog, they take care of themselves with a good diet, often vegan, don't drink alcohol.

I'm not saying any of these things are bad. I can see if the City is reasonably busy on a Monday night, hospitality must be recovering, which is great.

But something out in the world feels off...like people aren't interested in much.

My online creative writing group has almost no posts. The tutor is regularly cancelling workshops and looking to do online only.

I'm in touch with a couple of exes and we are staying friends but they seem to do nothing but gaming. One in particular has no friends and is not bothered.

I might get flamed but I do wonder if men are particularly prone to doing less stuff if they are single.

Again, that is fine if they are happy. But I get this sense that people aren't happy.

Social anxiety seems very much on the rise.

Just curious to know if others get this vibe.

YABU - people are fine and just living life as usual

YANBU - people are losing communication skills and becoming unhappy

I also think the way people dress on a night has changed too. All very casual now.

My MIL - who goes out a lot - been complaining about that at least a decade before covid - all the nice dresses and tops she feels over dressed wearing if she goes out in them as everyone is so casual - I think she facies a cruise where she could dress up but FIL won't have that.

We would go out more for meals but since covid we've been turned away as not pre-booked or have pre-booked and had really poor service - it's put us off a lot to point we try and avoid - take-out in front of streaming service is at least guaranteed to be relaxing.

I was listening to a radio show last night playing 80s songs. A local band were singing and the lyrics included the line "Everybody's talking about World War Three" - so this is nothing new.

I don't recognise this doom and gloom at all where I live. Yes, people are struggling, but in my town people still smile and talk, and seem busy. Not many people WFH here (I'm not in a city), and while there are closed shops there are still plenty open, and we have several new cafes and restaurants, plus a new library, and most of the schools have new buildings. I do agree that there seem to be a lot of people with poor mental health, but I'm only aware of that because of where I work.

My son is in his 40's and scarred by a bad relationship. He was always a little introverted but is now more so. I don't think he meets new people at all and I wonder how many other people his age will be living solitary lives. He's not a gamer though.

SM is a class A drug.

Interesting observation.

Ive been thinking this for nearly a year but thought it was me. I'm normally a positive type but lately, I've had a feeling that something has changed.

If I had to articulate it, I'd say that everyone is subdued, lacking enthusiasm for anything and more prone to anxiety or outbursts of emotion.

I think it's a combination of things; Pandemic hangover, increasing isolation, screen violence, current affairs, climate doom and cost of living.

I'm hoping we have a nice summer to at least give some relief.

I do think that your own perception colours how you view the world: even when listing things as you have. I think they call it confirmation bias as well as the half empty / half full thing.

I work in Central London in Events and love how vibrant London feels at night with lots of people (mostly tourists, I'd guess) spilling out of bars and restaurants having a good time. Mayfair, Soho, Covent Garden are all buzzing!

Sure, we are on the brink of a recession, but London still feels pretty vibrant with some great exhibitions and events lined up. Those bloody 'immersive experiences' are springing up everywhere like mushrooms and they are not cheap! There must be demand for them.

There's also the uncertainty of a pending war but that's often fuelled by the media, like the articles a few weeks ago reporting conscription that had everyone in a tizz.

I've found switching off the news has done wonders for my mental health!

I'm probably annoyingly Pollyanna-ish and tend to look for the silver lining - like seeing the first signs of cherry blossom and all the daffodils springing up... I'm 57 and just want my last few years / decades to be as pleasurable as I can make them.

I still think 99% of people are nice and the twats are the 1% minority. If you read this and think 'God! What a stupid cow!' it probably still says more about you and your state of mind, than me.

People are miserable and it’s totally understandable. We have an inept government, prices for basics and everything else have spiralled, people are working more for way less so lack of work life balance, more people have mental health issues, kids are out of control, poorly run services and infrastructure and the more recent, retirement age could go up plus Covid. As a result we have folk holed up at home on tech and speaking to other via headsets, social skills lost and they run the risk of becoming more self absorbed and lose their awareness or ability to think outside the box. Lots going on in the world and people are spooked and fed up. I feel for my kids growing up in such a place. It’s so far away from my childhood which I loved. I know times change and change should be embraced but this is heading the wrong way.

I've noticed with myself that if I ever have to wait for anything e.g. 1 minute wait in line to get a coffee, the kids 1 hour clubs,. I'm often just getting my phone out and scrolling social media and the trouble with this is the algorithms will just show you things aimed at you and your preferences which means a very one sided view of life. I've become very anti social so instead of chatting to others in a queue or when waiting when the kids are at their clubs talking together parents for example, I will happily sit in my car and just watch a film or scroll on the phone. I hybrid work, so I barely talk to anyone as we're not in the office at the same time and there are now lots of different faces every day with people from lots of different areas of the business hot desking and with their headsets on having their own meetings...I'm now trying to limit the phkne use, but here I am on mumsnet...

I don’t think this is down to SM or technology. It’s the aftermath of the pandemic, a lot of immigrants relocated to Europe in the aftermath of Brexit, and cost of living. Also attitudes are generally more polarised, so people are being more careful with who they spend time with.

I’ve noticed it’s definitely picking back up though. Recently I’ve felt London feels fun again.

I agree with this observation about London. My DH works in London and I took DD up for the shops in Neal street where I used to go as a teen and the place is really buzzing. I used to work in London so pointed it out to her and the corresponding pubs we went to after work are still spilling out in to the side roads as they are too busy to get a seat inside. I really miss it and I felt much better commuting and reading my books than I do in my current job working predominantly at home!

I thought that too. Also how much the cost of living is affecting everyone too. My family live in the north and always used to be out as everything has always been a bit cheaper up there, however now things are so expensive that they socialise at home much more.

We came through a pandemic to a cost of living crisis, and things do not look like they are going to get better.
We still socialise and enjoy ourselves, but I miss the sense of hope that the future will get better. I am not convinced it will.
Climate change is hitting home as well and scares me.

Also the centre of many Cities now shocks me. So many are so run down.

We are in the 4th turning. It’s a cycle that is repeated over and over again. History repeats itself, people forget about history. History repeats itself, people forget about history. You know what comes next…

we get to witness the crescendo

This is the post pandemic world. I would attribute most of this to that! I don’t think people realise how much it has impacted us.

I definitely think London is fun! I tend to stick to the City though, I find the tourists overwhelming otherwise. When I worked in Covent Garden, the team took turns to do the lunch run in summer because we found it such a mission! 😂

I hadn't heard of the Fourth Turning.

A trainee told me today that Gen Z is ageing faster. I think he's really feeling all the news etc. I didn't tell him I mostly ignore it.

I can't remember if I posted another response about this - MN keeps telling me to rotate my device and generally annoying me so I won't say more about Gen Z in case I said it already, but I can't face scrolling back to check!

how are other cities doing then...Bristol, Manchester, Edinburgh? Everything certainly seems busy and lively in London.

Well, this thread has had me thinking for days. And I think what’s missing is unity. In the 70’s, most people were struggling financially, (or so it seemed to me where I grew up), people knew their neighbours and helped each other out. In the 80’s we had music, glamour, discos and TV shows like Dallas. In the 90’s we had rave.

I mean, this is just my life and my experience but if I really think about it, I just don’t feel united to others as a whole, in the way I once did and that’s particularly true since the lockdowns. A really cynical part of me wonders if ‘divide to rule’ is behind this but that sounds rather conspiratorial. Smart phones also perhaps divide rather than unite us. Just my thoughts. I haven’t RTWT so apologies if this theory/feeling has already been postulated!

Thank you OP for articulating something I absolutely have felt.

Oh my word, yes.
The centre of my town looks like a ghost town. Boarded up shops, homelessness and on the street drug use has exploded.
I work in a secondary school and parents will think nothing of coming in and demanding to see staff. Threatening to call the police if they don’t get what they want. I’ve had parents come in in pyjamas and battering each other in the playground over their kids’ issues. It’s like people don’t know how to behave in the outside world anymore. Or they do but they just don’t care. Most scarily, I don’t think that some of them see me and my colleagues as people. I know that sounds weird but it’s be sometimes wondered if some people’s behaviour is just for a social media post or an Instagram story like they’ve forgotten that what they are doing and saying is to a real person and they are just thinking about how it’s going to look when they post it on social media.

Oooh, also. ‘Why You Can’t Pay Attention’ by Johan Hari is a great book for delving into this.

@Ribenaberry12 bloody hell. That sounds scary.

@Ribenaberry12 where do you live?

I agree about Gen Z and ageing. I'm a Xennial and we don't seem to age either mentally or physically. I'm now seeing a generation that seems older than its years in both senses.

I think the town/city centre issue, of the boarded up shops, large homeless population and also the alcohol-oriented culture on evenings and weekends has made a big difference to people's sense of living in a community. I certainly rush through certain parts of town, and pass over the bit where someone was murdered, and try not to hang round the bus station and so on. It's a shame as there's lots of lovely places, I noticed in Europe (or the places I've been) that there's more people out on the streets at night, like families, kids, and couples, whereas here I tend to avoid it or go in a group. It's not relaxing somehow. Civic life isn't very civilised.

Where do you live?

I think London is less like this, there's enough money and people for that seedier side of life to appear less prominent, even though it's obviously there if you look for it. I love evenings walking about in London, going for a drink. Where I live, I tend to drive to the place, get out, drink a Coke or two there and drive home. I wouldn't stroll through town. Partly age, but fewer opportunities just to socialise in a nice way in the evenings.