Why Loneliness Is Rising in the Age of Social Justice - and What Needs to Happen Next
Over the past decade, we have witnessed powerful social movements that have brought long-ignored injustices into public consciousness. Movements such as #MeToo, Trans Rights, and Black Lives Matter have helped expose systemic oppression, interpersonal violence, and entrenched discrimination.
These movements matter deeply. They have shifted public discourse, policy, and psychological understanding.
From a mental health perspective, this shift has been essential. For decades, psychology focused heavily on the individual—on thoughts, behaviours, personality, and trauma histories—without fully acknowledging the role of social systems. Now, we are beginning to understand how racism, sexism, transphobia, economic inequality, and cultural narratives shape people’s mental health, relationships, and sense of safety in the world.
Research consistently shows that experiences of discrimination are strongly linked to depression, anxiety, and emotional dysregulation across multiple marginalised groups. Recognising systemic oppression was therefore not just politically important—it was psychologically necessary.
This integration of systemic awareness into psychological practice is vital. It is also still unfolding.
The backlash and the rise in loneliness
Alongside these important social shifts, we are also seeing a cultural backlash. This is reflected in trends such as the rise of conservative political movements, “tradwife” content, incel communities, discussions of a male loneliness epidemic, and the popularity of figures like Andrew Tate.
Many people—particularly young men—are searching for ways to feel understood, valued, and powerful in the face of shame, rejection, and loneliness. Long-held worldviews are being challenged, and for some, the cultural conversation has felt less like an invitation into awareness and more like an accusation.
This is an important point to acknowledge: part of the backlash is not only about the ideas themselves or what they have revealed about social systems. It is also about how these conversations have been delivered and received.
Anger and othering
The process of recognising systemic oppression has rightfully brought anger to the surface. Much of this anger is necessary and valid. It comes from real experiences of harm, marginalisation, and exclusion.
But as many psychologists understand, when a message is delivered in anger, it is often not received in a way that allows people to reflect, connect, and take accountability.
There is another layer that shapes how these messages land. In some spaces, this anger has also been expressed through processes of “othering.” Certain groups—particularly cisgender, heterosexual, white men—have sometimes been positioned not just as participants in a system, but as the system itself. As the problem. As the enemy. As the ones responsible for everything.
To be clear: many individuals have engaged, and continue to engage, in violent, discriminatory, and degrading behaviour. These harms must be named, challenged, and prevented.
Movements such as “Not All Men” attempted—sometimes clumsily—to express an important psychological reality: even if an individual man has not personally harmed someone, he may still represent a system that has caused harm, and may not yet have reflected on his social positioning or privilege.
But when entire groups of people are reduced to a set of characteristics and positioned as inherently oppressive, something complex happens.
We begin to replicate the very psychological processes that underlie discrimination in the first place:
Simplifying people into categories
Assigning moral value based on identity alone
Treating people as symbols rather than as complex individuals
Replacing curiosity with certainty
Replacing connection with blame
When this occurs, we move from systemic awareness into interpersonal division.
Political psychologists describe this shift as affective polarisation—a process in which people develop strong emotional hostility toward other social groups, not just different opinions. This kind of division erodes trust and increases social isolation.
And division breeds loneliness.
The psychological cost of polarisation
Humans are wired for connection. We need belonging, understanding, and relational safety.
When social narratives become highly polarised—when people feel they must either defend themselves or accuse others—it becomes harder to form authentic connections. People become more guarded, more ashamed, and more afraid of saying the wrong thing.
Research suggests that awareness of systemic oppression alone does not automatically improve wellbeing. In fact, it has been linked to higher depression and anxiety when it is not accompanied by meaningful collective or relational engagement.
This helps explain why, at the same time as social awareness has increased, many countries are also experiencing a sharp rise in loneliness. Loneliness is not only an individual experience; it is shaped by cultural values, levels of social trust, and broader social conditions. Declines in trust have been closely linked to rising political polarisation and social fragmentation.
Studies of online communities further show that people increasingly cluster into ideological “echo chambers,” where emotional tone becomes more negative over time and hostility toward out-groups intensifies.
For example, some young men report feeling that any confusion or mistake in conversations about gender or race could lead to public shaming. At the same time, many women and minority groups feel exhausted from having to explain their experiences or defend their humanity. Both groups can end up feeling misunderstood, defensive, and alone—even while talking about justice.
We have gained awareness.
But in some ways, we have lost connection.
The next chapter: compassion, complexity, and connection
The next phase of this cultural shift cannot simply be about naming harm. We have already begun that work, and it must continue.
But the next chapter requires something more difficult: compassion, complexity, and connection.
This does not mean ignoring oppression.
It does not mean bypassing accountability.
It does not mean minimising harm or silencing anger.
Accountability is essential.
Truth-telling is essential.
Systemic awareness is essential.
But if we want a healthier, more connected society, we must also:
See people as more than their demographic categories
Understand how systems shape everyone, including those with privilege
Recognise the limits, fears, and conditioning that shape human behaviour
Create pathways for repair, not just punishment
Invite people into awareness, rather than only calling them out
In psychological terms, we must move from shame-based social regulation to connection-based social transformation.
Shame tends to isolate, polarise, and entrench defensiveness. Connection, curiosity, and compassion create the conditions for real change.
A more integrated path forward
The next stage of social progress is not about abandoning the insights of these movements. It is about integrating them more fully.
We must be able to:
Hold the reality of harm
Acknowledge systemic oppression
Maintain accountability
And still recognise each other’s humanity
This requires emotional maturity at a collective level.
It requires us to tolerate complexity:
People can benefit from systems they did not create.
People can cause harm and still be capable of growth.
People can hold privilege in some areas and marginalisation in others.
Social change requires both truth and relationship.
If the last decade was about naming injustice, the next decade must be about rebuilding connection across difference. Awareness without connection leads to fragmentation, but awareness with compassion has the potential to transform both individuals and systems.
References
Aartsen, M. (2025). Societal influences on loneliness. In Loneliness Re-Examined. Springer.
Desmarais, A., & Christophe, N. K. (2024). Political engagement and wellbeing among college students: The role of critical consciousness. Journal of Youth and Adolescence.
Stewart, A. J., Plotkin, J. B., & McCarty, N. (2021). Inequality, identity, and affective polarisation. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Williams, M. T., et al. (2023). The psychological impact of oppression: A meta-analysis. Journal of Anxiety Disorders.
World Happiness Report. (2025). Trusting others: How unhappiness and social distrust explain populism.
