Our Individual Role in Community

Everyone says there’s no community anymore and it’s a big problem in our society. Everything is expensive, no socially subsidized third spaces, and no time to do work that doesn’t generate a profit for shareholders. Yet a community is not something that exists in a vacuum. Individuals have to come together to build a community.

One of the promises of the Internet was that we could build community without requiring physical space. But was this promise a poison pill by big tech executives hoping to cash in good will for venture capital?

What is our individual role in building a community? Have we been outsourcing our individual responsibilities to “someone else”? How much do we have to pour in before we receive something in return? And if “nobody owes anyone anything”, what do we owe to our third spaces and community organizing?