Are People Just More Boring Now? "My Primary Hobby Is Sending TikToks To My Roommate"
Has modern life killed our creativity?
Keshaun Slevinsky | Unsplash Conversations about how no one has hobbies anymore can easily veer into trite territory, especially of the generational vs. generational variety, i.e., “These people don’t have hobbies because all they do is scroll TikTok!”
That’s part of the equation, and this pretty decent article about hobbies and their decline opens with a recent college graduate saying that her primary hobby was sending TikToks to her roommates, who were sitting in the same room as her. While that’s no doubt depressing and could signal a “decline of society” take, I will do my best to avoid that. Instead, I'll just come out and say it:
Are people just more boring now?
I had been thinking about this topic for a second, but I most recently thought of it after watching this video about how people used to be interesting. I think most logical people understand why hobbies have become less relevant to many. The big culprits, of course, would be:
- Life feels exhausting and expensive
- Mindless brain rot feels like a break
- Who has friends to do stuff with?
- Hobbies are also expensive — ever tried just randomly “picking up” hockey?
voronaman / Shutterstock
While the specific framing of the documentary Join Or Die, based on Robert Putnam's book Bowling Alone, which came out seemingly forever ago, was about “the decline of civic community,” you can also argue that it is about a decline in hobbies and shared connection.
I don’t necessarily think society's decline of hobbies is a moral panic.
It would be nice if more people were bird-watchers or stamp collectors or supported Michael's by crafting, etc, etc. But if people lack hobbies and their main role in life is to be a good son/daughter, maybe produce a son/daughter, and love neighbors and friends equally, well, it’s cool if you didn’t pick up the guitar to learn “Patience” by GNR.
That said, the lack of hobbies puts you on the Late Stage Capitalism Death Train, where you wake up some morning and think, “All I do is work and think about what to eat and then watch something that is streaming.”
Most people over 35, and many people younger than 35, have had that realization over 100 times by now. If you live in a place that has an explicit hot/cold season, you may feel it even more during those seasons, because “doing things outside that could end up expensive” feels like a non-starter.
The Late Stage Capitalism Death Train + ideology + algorithms + what remains of cable news is a bad intersection, because it makes people feel like they’re lost, and the enemy is something on “the other side.”
If you feel like your entire life is helping a rich guy make more money and then streaming so a few other rich people can make more money, you are a prime target to feel like someone else did this to you. Ironically, most young adults lack resilience because they weren’t parented well, and often they weren’t parented well because we made parenting into an exhausting Olympic sport.
Burnout is upstream of many issues, including not having time for hobbies.
I don’t make a huge amount of money off writing these days, so perhaps even this is a “hobby,” even though I had years when it was loosely a career.
I play chess. I bike a lot. I swim. I am trying to get into woodworking. I drink beer and talk to homebrew guys about that a lot. I have a Friday night dinner group that is probably more of a “recurring activity,” but I guess “hobby” might suffice there.
I do find myself on the Late Stage Capitalism Death Train now and again, of course. I don’t think personally that the decline in hobbies is a moral failing, but I agree it’s tied to bigger-picture issues swirling around us.
Ted Bauer is a writer and editor. Originally from New York City, he is now based in Fort Worth and has written for publications including HBR, Fast Company, and more.
