Hi, stumbled across this blog and I absolutely get why somebody would dislike Martin and certain framing (or lack thereof) of his actions but the take on the lonely as a filler/boring fear is a bit confusing to me. And I can’t really tell if you’re being serious or doing it for the bit

This might just be me tho because of my own (unhealthy) coping mechanism and how i have seen isolation and being disconnected from your peers affect others and myself but I understand it as a much more layered fear than it is often characterized

You were talking about how the extinction has a certain inherent humanity to it and I think the lonely does aswell but in a much more social regard. As humans we consistently navigate social settings and also require emotional connections and relationships, now imagine these being taken away or, what is often worse, never developing them in the first place. It’s not necessarily the being alone in a room that is terrifying but much more the social isolation and the from that resulting disconnect from your own emotions and the unbreachable wall that is build by repeated rejection and social missteps.

You said that things about the lonely can often be attributed to other fears, I disagree but I would really be interested in what exactly you mean by that and your further thoughts on the lonely as a fear

im sort of exaggerating for the bit but most of my takes on the lonely are at least semi-serious

i sort of don’t care about the reason you project onto The Lonely as i can kind of assume its because you were lonely at some point. that’s typically the reason.

i think that yeah most of the fears are rooted in humanity, (with the exception of the flesh/the hunt which is what makes them interesting) so i don’t see that as a reason necessarily for it to be an especially interesting fear. i also think the being disconnected from people is kind of well-covered area within the fears (as a very core part of the stranger and the spiral maybe and really most of them to some extent if you twist it right) which is my main problem with it. it sort of just does one thing and it’s not a niche enough thing to be interesting and is also something that could be covered by other fears.

Just a couple examples off the top of my head:

Loneliness due to existentialism and there being loads of people out there making it easy to be lost in a crowd = the Vast

Loneliness due to feeling disconnected from others and feeling alienated or like you’re intrinsically different = the Stranger

Loneliness through grief or loss = the End

Loneliness through bad relationships = typically the Web or potentially the Stranger again / another fear depending on the situation

(there are probably more but i can’t think of them right now). Therefore I just feel like it is kinda the weakest fear, and wouldn’t be such an important part of the podcast if it wasn’t turning so relationship-centered and needed the conflict created from The Lonely to act as a catalyst and conflict for this