The Feds’ terrifying cure to loneliness

Loneliness is epidemic in America, and one of many problems that cannot be solved by the government but at the hands of a self-governing and responsible people.

The root cause of our loneliness is multifaceted. No part of it, however, is ultimately the government’s fault (or responsibility to cure). It’s our fault.

If, for example, our overuse of social media is contributing to the problem of isolation, we have the power to turn off our phones. Bureaucrats should not have to regulate how much time we spend on Instagram. We should be accountable enough to do so on our own. The fact that so many of us, out of habit, turn to government to correct any imbalance in our public and private lives is proof positive that we have abdicated the responsibilities of self-governance.

This is what John Adams warned about when he said, “Our constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.”

The Founders knew that the success of our constitutionally-limited government was forever predicated on whether or not the people, of their own accord, would behave justly. If (and when) they failed to do this, the need would then arise for the government to intervene, thereby breaking the confines of “limited government.”

Unfortunately, our loneliness is so out of hand, the Feds are now doing just that: stepping in to “help.” That’s why Biden’s Surgeon General, Vivek Murthy’s “Advisory on the Healing Effects of Social Connection and Community” ought to terrify us all.

Stella Morabito, an expert on propaganda and mob psychology and the author of “The Weaponization of Loneliness,” sounded the alarm about Murthy’s proposed “cure” in a point-by-point takedown.

She argued that the “project is potentially so massive in scope, it’s not an overstatement to say it threatens to regulate our freedom of association in shocking ways.”

First, she noted that Murthy's goal to build “social infrastructure” “can only mean that all local communities must answer to the federal bureaucracy.”

“We end up with a massive federal infrastructure that can monitor the levels of social connection and disconnection in every nook and cranny of society,” she wrote. “As described in the report, this would mean every institution, every governmental department, every volunteer association, every locality, every church, every faith community, every organization, every club, every service club, every sports league, and so on, would likely be assessed and “strengthened” to promote social connection.”

She goes on to delineate many additional concerns about the dystopian plan, including proposals to give government the “authority to monitor and mitigate the public health harm caused by policies, products, and services that drive social disconnection,” expand “public health surveillance and interventions,” and develop “pro-connection technologies” (all language pulled directly from the proposal).

If such words unsettle you, you’re not alone. As Ronald Reagan joked, "The nine most terrifying words in the English language are: I'm from the Government, and I'm here to help."

“No one can say for sure where this “Ministry of Loneliness” proposal will end up,” Morabito concluded. “History — particularly recent history — has warned us about such projects. The goals of this advisory may seem unobjectionable, but the concern is about who decides how we connect…. When the “who” is the federal government, we should remember that the pattern of the mass state is always to induce loyalty to the mass state.”

Yes, loneliness is a serious problem, but the government cannot solve it. And for as long as their offers to “help” are couched in Orwellian language, we’d be wise to stay as far away as possible.