WHY WE'RE ALL LONLEY | Third Place Theory Explained

I wonder if team sports participation is down? Soccer has always been my third place from the age of 4 on. Getting together with childhood friends, kicking around a ball some days but trying to win a tournament on others.

Have you read the book “Bowling Alone” the author talks about the decrease in civic engagement since the 1950s.

As a young millennial, I never had a third place. But it sounds nice to have one especially as I'm growing older and things are getting more expensive.

I think social media is the worst third place replacement ever, already this generation teens are disconnected from the world ,social media would just worsen up things . I am not saying to stop using it but I am saying that tech has to be used wisely it should be expanding your knowledge rather than destroying it. I don't think this is some random nostalgic idea this needs to be taken care by everyone . They should find their third place replacement .Thank you sister I actually learned about a new thing

U need to improve your thumbnail at least and also want to create a good content structure.

I'm glad you are bringing up this topic. When I was an architect, the third place was something I though was a really important design element. We've lost it. Social media is definitely not a third place replacement.

Can a third place act as a personal individual space? You emphasized so much about collective experiences and interactions, but, I guess, I need some time for myself to be away from my first and second places without the presence of other people to necessarily interact. Of course, sometimes I could bring people over or even meet new people at this place, but it wouldn't be the goal. Am I thinking in a different perspective from the video? Or am I just considering a different approach to the same topic discussed?

I think the value of community has been gradually eroded since the 19th Century when industrial urbanization pushed people away from rural villages into compactified, slummy work-driven cultures and building spaces.
I do think that trend could have been reversed through the 1960s to 70s, but since Thatcher & Reagan's election, our species put such an onus on constant efficiency and information driven business at the expense of connection and community.

In my mind, we can should start to build new cities and spaces that are clean, accessible and mixed use, built with sustainable and local resources.
And we should use technology in a way that helps us interact with the world, such as through Augmented and Mixed Reality networks NOT plastered with ads, or expand technology to include all of our senses rather than only touch and hearing, as Virtual Reality would offer.

If we continue to just keep making the same executive business choices we will dig ourselves into bigger holes. We need to become more aware of how we can influence public discourse and policy making so that our cities start building, developing and growing with people at the center, not profit.

Please post some positive solutions. 😊

Did you have success on meetups

I live in KwaZulu Natal South Africa, we also have the same problem. We dont have any third place, the only place where i can spend time outside my home is at my freind's place. Sometime i just feel like im invading his space😓

As a 32 year old this is exaclty how I feel. From home to work and back again, can't make any friends and the internet is no replacement.

Can we just talk about how terrifying it is that this was all probably planned and done DELIBERATELY FOR YEAR'S?

I'm 50 years old, old I know. I think this problem has been slowly getting worse for decades. Even back in the day, a lot of third places were unhealthy spaces like pubs and clubs (nothing's changed there, except where I live such places have increasingly become mini casinos and no long have live music).

Church attendance has been in decline (in Australia) for decades, even 50 years ago many people didn't attend often, if at all.

But churches were definitely third places then, some church-going people back then were more interested in community than the religious side of it.

For the last twenty or so years, when I've tried joining churches, either the congregation is 20-30 years older than you, or they think you're there to get help (even if you have a good job). It's really very repulsive.

Other community third places have died off, in my opinion because these days couples both have to work full time.

How about this for an idea. People could start inviting strangers into a part of their house for limited hours during some days. People could just walk in and be in the company of other people they've never met; even maybe start up a friendship, or just pass the time of day, say hello.

It would be a good idea to offer maybe some refreshment and perhaps a little food for those who decide to stay a while. How about a little background music? Some visitors might want to partake in some sort of gaming activity such as pool or cards.

If things work out, these places could become a sort of community hub to hold places together - provide cohesion and overcome feelings of isolation? Think it could work? Worth a try, surely?

So, if the proposal is to utilise houses for this purpose, and the idea is to offer invitation to general members of the public; then we might call such places "Public Houses". Sounds a bit stuffy I suppose so maybe we could just shorten that to something a bit more chummy.

Internet Obliterated 3rd places and its also destroying the 1st and 2nd Places.

Front porches of peoples houses used to be a 3rd place. You would talk to neighbors next door or others as they walked by. Kids would hang out and play. Adults would gather and chat about things, maybe have a glass of ice tea or a cup of coffee. The front porch and the front yard was a quasi-public/private space that invited interaction with others.
Today we have lost all that for the most part. No front porches at all, or they are merely decorative, not useable. Kids play in the back yard because of fear of "stranger danger", or are driven to gyms and sports fields for their exercise and play. All the things that used to bring us together as a community have been taken away.

every thing you said is true but its not soo easy to be better when we're this hooked

the third place was the digital playground, now the video game market is not worth the money.

Toxic Hyper-individualism - rise of narcissism, decline of community (collectivism) with cheap third places becoming nonexistent, car centric infrastructure

I'm sure you'll be able to tell my age from my response. All those online "meeting places" cannot and never will be able to replace the physical world in any way. In the real world (remember that?) You would sit down at an agreed spot, with your coffee, along with your buds. You elbow each other in a silly, teasing way and overhear Clyde jawing about his car. Someone opines, "Get a horse!" Laughter ensues. Oh, there's Boris! Hey man! How goes? Siddown, take a load off. Where've you been all summer? Hector pipes up, "I know where he was!" "You keep quiet, dude!" Everybody laughs because they all know where he was... Nobody can tell me that level of chill convo is possible online. I've tried it and it doesn't work. I could go on, but you get my drift.😏😳👈🙄😊 Emojis... gimme a break.

In 1992 I met someone from the city council of Eugene Oregon named Kevin Hornbuckle and he talked to me about urban sprawl. He said that it would be coming in an about 10 to 12 years. I thought at the time he had to be wrong, he is a socialist.

Tom Sisson

So true unfortunately. Even if you happen to go to a 3rd space like say a dog park or gym it's still difficult to build any kind of social connection cause we're all conditioned to be individualistic and keep to ourselves. Technology has made it much worse and it's even harder if you're a guy cause we're further conditioned to act like we don't care about social connections.

Old Gen Xer here. We used to hang out at arcades, malls, and rollerskating rinks. Malls are still around, but man, they're boring af...

I'm so glad you have brought up this subject because I find it hard to explain to people why these spaces are so important.
Hear in the UK the Great British pub is a perfect example, it's a piller of the local community where you go when you want to chat, interact and genuinely escape spaces 1 and 2.
I don't think I have heard such a great explanation... so for this I thank you 😊

Lucky to have a third place as a card shop. Board games, table top and trading card games being the common denominator.

Wow I watched your other video on American suburbs and that
Well done young lass your very clever 😊

I am so glad these still exist in Spain. You go out in the evening and there are thousands of people gathering and meeting in countless third places. In the US, I felt alone, very depressing.

Banning smoking didn't help. Smokers no longer went to the bar. So, their friends didn't go. Soon, nobody went.

This might be unimaginable to others, but growing up in the US with an alcoholic father, I spent an awful lot of time bored in bars while my father enjoyed his Third Place. As a young officer I think my my most significant contribution to National Security was being the designated driver for large groups of soldiers spending their evening in Enlisted clubs. I now have strong negative feelings toward alcohol and pubs in general. The US has never, at least in my lifetime, had a Third Place that was healthy.

Perhaps churches, shopping malls and now online spaces were meant to be Third Places, but to me they feel designed to psychologically manipulate or exploit.

I suspect the wealthy have country clubs like Mar-a-Lago where they can congregate for a fee that prohibits most people, where they can connect and make business deals, and don't care that the rest of us go from home to work and back again forever.

Very interesting video!

A third place is only helpful if you gain meaningful interaction and activities from it. Meeting tons of people in a book club would be torture if you are not into literature. But if you find something meaningful to do other than your housework and your job, then you can find that meaningful "third place," even if it resides entirely online and you interact with only virtual people. It's all about how it stokes your passion and how much you gain in return.

I think it all began with television and putting TV's in social spaces was a terrible idea (flat screens made things even worse).

Pubs, clubbing, parks and shopping are the only third spaces left really, with the occasional library here and there

Even then the nicher pubs, clubs, shops, libraries and even public parks are closing.

Everywhere is just expensive and dangerous, walking to these places is a pain cuz of all the roads, traffic and illegals.

Third places havent completey died here in the uk, but its not looking good...

Our grandparents era had weekly dances as a third place!!!

Few issues:
1) social media, while yes you can create online groups to organize in-person meetings, the fact that there are endless choices, you might not get the same people showing up and higher chances of people flaking out on rsvps

2) clubs; can be great but comes with a monthly or yearly costs so depends on someone’s economic ability to maintain consistency to go

3) there are many third place options in bigger cities (coffee shops, shopping centers, restaurants, bars, etc) but with more options people are tempted to keep trying the ‘new’ place and not repeat places to then see the same people over and over.

Growing up a millennial in a town of 15,000 people and other smaller towns similar around it we had less options but it helped build a community because you would run into the same people and more chance of consistency, and in middle school and high school we could only be on a social media account when we were home because smart phones weren’t around yet

Third places may be the only living room we have left.

The Midwest is in great danger of third places going extinct

QOTD: do you think social media is a sufficient physical third place replacement?