Personally, I find modern technology makes it easier to maintain them. 25 years ago my friendships around the world would have been relegated to 'penpalships' because of the cost of long distance calls and the lack of face time.
Loneliness is a big topic now due to the pandemic, and the lingering trends from stay/work-at-home mandates.
They probably aren't the friends people are thinking of when referring to things like this. The benefit of friends isn't just that you have someone fun to talk to, it's that you're building out a social support circle. Your discord friends can't come over and help you clean up after a flood, or watch your dogs while you're away on a sudden emergency, or cook you a meal when you're grieving a loss, or help you get an interview at a job shortly after you're fired (or at least, not one local to you).
Loneliness is a big topic now, imo, because people are losing helpful human friends and relying on middling digital friends. Just like how looking at pictures of a forest is nowhere near as healthy as actually going to a forest.
Most of those things seem like services rather than friends. I want a friend to talk to, not to cook me food or watch my dog, anyone can do those other things. And talking to a friend many times is as good as a video call. In fact because of the internet I can get conversations and opinions from friends all over the world quite quickly.
This is an interesting argument, as by the first definition, I have more close friends than ever. If I need someone to make me food, I don't have a friend who is either nearby or has time for that.
On the other hand, I can buy all those services on an app for the most part. People I enjoy talking to for hours on end aren't available for $20 anywhere.
Your discord friends can't come over and help you clean up after a flood, or watch your dogs while you're away on a sudden emergency, or cook you a meal when you're grieving a loss
I'll make the counter argument that -- although I value those things and try to provide them to friends in need -- all of those can be addressed by hiring someone.
On the other hand, I've recently received fantastic emotional support from a friend who moved away a few years ago. We've seen each other in person only a handful of times since then, but of all my friends, she happened to be the one with the experience and attitude to help me.
Incidentally, I'll add that I'm the type of person to provide those types of support to others, but the vast majority of my friends are not. That doesn't make them bad friends, it just means that I have a service disposition while they don't. I think there's a vast range of qualities that people seek and experience from friends and you're going to have a hard time objectively rating them on any sort of scale.
Yeah and you can rent a truck every time you need to haul something, but it's nice when your friend lets you borrow his - and his manpower/time. And yeah, you can hire an emergency remediation company, or chef, or psychologist for your friends, but that seems... impersonal to me?
I'm not trying to say there's no value to Discord friends, but I do think it's substantially less valuable to the human condition than real, in-person friends.
I mean, to be blunt, it sounds to me like you value people for what services they can provide to you rather than what friendship they provide.
Again, friendship takes many forms and there are countless ways to express it. You're judging others for valuing these expressions differently than you do.
This is how I can tell you don’t get it. It’s not about the value of your friends doing those things for you which you can hire someone for, it’s the value YOU get out of doing those things for your friends.
You’re right that the net can be used that way but I’m not sure everyone does.
Also the loneliness epidemic has been growing worse since the 1990s. There’s a well known book about it called Bowling Alone. COVID made it worse of course but it didn’t start the trend.
Loneliness pandemic is a topic because one author wrote a book on it and is pushing and agenda to generate sales for his book.
The biggest article about the loneliness pandemic was one in the New York times and oh just to happened to mention said book. Countless articles followed on from there. If the book were sound, it would be less sad, but the studies it cites have problems so this is all built on a huge heaping of confirmation bias.
Loneliness is a big topic now due to the pandemic, and the lingering trends from stay/work-at-home mandates.