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Comment by jl2718 | Hacker News Reader

This article sort of pokes weakly from all angles at an idea that something is wrong without really pinning it down. And it works because we all see that indeed there is something wrong.

I would posit that workplace health is like all other longevity studies. The strength and long-term stability of social connections is by far the dominant factor in longevity, health, and life satisfaction. Isolation kills.

In today’s workplace, social connection is anathematic. Teams are physically distributed. Career progress happens only by leaving. Layoffs are preferred to re-tasking. Homophily is discrimination. Talking about your life with coworkers is a liability. Telling a joke or asking someone out on a date can get you fired. Set off the twitter rage machine and not only is your career over, but the company has a PR nightmare. There are no such things as friendships at work.

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Couldn't agree more. Years ago I used to work for a small dev shop of about 6 people. We were super tight-knit and over time became like family. I'm still friends with some of them today. I've since gone on to work at BigCo's, and damn do they feel cold and impersonal by comparison.

> Homophily is discrimination

I think you are onto an interesting point here. I do not dispute the importance of diversity/inclusiveness/fairness, but there is an uncomfortable truth that these things directly conflict with the factors that facilitate close bonding in groups. When you force an environment to be absolutely non-exclusive in every possible way, it becomes rather sterile somehow. I don't doubt that the homogeneity of my old company was one of the reasons we were able to become so close. I'm not necessarily suggesting companies should become more exclusionary, just reflecting on the tradeoffs involved.

I worked at a BigCo and my best friends are still there. Same department but different teams.

A workplace by definition satisfies homophily because everyone is there to do the work of the same company; you all have at least that in common when you walk in the door. Emphasizing other factors of homophily like gender, ethnic background, etc. is far more corrosive to workplace social connections than almost anything else you list.

Why? Because those are involuntary attributes. If ethnic homophily (for example) is a precondition of social connections then you immediately destroy or prevent any existing connections that cross ethnic boundaries. And I should emphasize that there is absolutely no research that homophily along involuntary attributes is necessary for forging social bonds, either at work or in general.

If your idea of workplace homophily is that everyone at work should be just like you, then yes, that is discrimination and it's counterproductive to the idea that people should feel safe and supported at work.

That's a pretty clumsy segue from the healthcare crisis and our eroding rights and value as workers into a tirade against PC culture there. I think isolation has lots of causes, but I don't think it's fear of those gat-derned ess jay dubyoos on twitter that is driving it.

I think it is true that there's less camaraderie among coworkers nowadays compared to a couple decades ago. I personally think it's because of different modes of communication making our immediate surroundings and company more distant by comparison, plus a little of the stress mentioned in this article--if you're anxious about your job, if you have long hours, if you have tons of other comorbid problems, you don't want to see your coworkers at the bar at five thirty. Or seven. Or whenever the hell we get out of work in 2018.

Not true in other countries.

I heard that especially in Israel your workplace is like your family. Is it still the case/ can it be confirmed?

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