Why 'Community' Fails: Everyone Wants a Village, Nobody Wants to Be a Villager with Nora Bateson, Jonathan Goldsmith & Lucas Jackson | RR 26

About this episode

The episode explores the challenges of building meaningful community and the importance of genuine human connection.

Many of us lack meaningful community in our lives, either from a complete absence of relationships or simply the sense of disconnection from those around us. In response, a growing number of people attempt to cultivate community based on shared values and interests, which inadvertently reproduces the very labeling that keeps real connection forming. The systemic forces that created this separation are real, but what if the deeper problem is that most of us have never actually learned how to commune with each other in the first place? In this episode, Nate is joined by Nora Bateson, creator of Warm Data Labs, alongside her colleagues Jonathan Goldsmith and Lucas Jackson, for a rich conversation about what it actually takes to build community and why so many of our attempts fail. Drawing on Nora's concept of "communing" as the necessary precursor to community, the group explores how genuine human connection is being undermined by algorithmic fragmentation, scripted discourse, and cultures rooted in transaction and individualism. Rather than offering a formula for community-building, they make the case for something older: practices of mutual learning, radical hospitality, and a way…

People in this episode

Host: Nate Hagens

Guests: Nora Bateson, Jonathan Goldsmith, Lucas Jackson

Topics covered

• community
• human connection
• mutual learning
• algorithmic fragmentation
• individualism
• hospitality

Keywords

• community building
• human connection
• algorithmic fragmentation
• mutual learning
• radical hospitality
• individualism

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: Warm Data Labs

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