Humans have always needed a tribe, but the modern world replaced tribe with visibility — followers, views, likes, and digital echoes that mimic connection without ever giving you the anchor of actual human closeness. In practice this means people spend hours performing their lives instead of living them, sharing curated versions of their inner world while receiving shallow signals of approval that never translate into real safety, loyalty, or intimacy. The result is a quiet epidemic of people who feel watched but not held, known but not understood, surrounded but not supported — a form of social malnutrition that keeps everyone hungry for more attention. Men respond by withdrawing and pretending they don’t need anyone; women respond by over-sharing and hoping someone will mirror their depth back to them. The blade cuts deepest when you realize that having an audience is not the same as having a community — and the system prefers audiences, because communities make people strong.