Because in the US for example, research, polls, and even the Surgeon General advisories, says people are connecting less than ever.
And it's not like they're connecting, just without the marriage and kids part: they're not connecting, period.
Of course some always are. Even the majority. But a huge number (not just something like 10%), reports not, and even reports (and is registered) as suffering mental health consequences from this.
Of course they're suffering mental health consequences from loneliness and lack of connection. However, how does it compare to the past, when people suffered in dysfunctional and abusive relationships and couldn't get out? Back in those day, "mental health" wasn't even a known phrase, and no one tracked this at all; people just put up with the misery.
As a divorced person, I'll say from firsthand experience that being single can be very lonely at times, but it's 100 times better than being in an unhappy relationship with the wrong person. And my marriage wasn't even that bad, objectively speaking; I can only imagine the misery some married people have put up with.
I get your angle, and hope you're in a happy place now.
Though I'm not saying people are worse off today in comparison to the fifties or some past where people "suffered in dysfunctional and abusive relationships and couldn't get out" and "mental health" wasn't a thing.
I'm saying that within recent decades, and even within the current decade (not some past where they "couldn't get out"), the trends are worsening. It's no great consolation being "better than the 50s or the 80s" when you're worse than the 00s and 10s and getting worser year by year.
It's also not people being alone because they're getting out of abusive relationships more. It's increasingly that people don't even get into a relationship to begin with. Heck, the statistics show that young people (18-30) even have way less sex.
And they're not happy about it, as if they made a winning choice: they're reporting being more depressed and bitter.
Are they?
Because in the US for example, research, polls, and even the Surgeon General advisories, says people are connecting less than ever.
And it's not like they're connecting, just without the marriage and kids part: they're not connecting, period.
Of course some always are. Even the majority. But a huge number (not just something like 10%), reports not, and even reports (and is registered) as suffering mental health consequences from this.