Some people be complaining about the lack of social skills other have, how no one wants to connect anymore, always looking at phone etc

There is a palpable difference in social engagement between people my age in their twenties and people who are in their forties and fifties. It's not a safety thing. I live in a very safe area, and it happens with men and women alike. You try to make small talk with a guy in his 20's and it's like, they give one word answers until you stop bothering, and then you talk to a woman in her 60s who's alone on the elevator and she won't shut the fuck up about her kids or her birdfeeder or the weather or whatever.

We live in one of the safest eras of human history in terms of crime, statistically speaking, and people are more reclusive, more scared of one another, more lonely. There are legitimate situations where it's not safe to talk to someone obviously, but everyone being standoffish and distant like this doesn't make communities safer. People are safest when they know the people around them and can use each other as a resource for help and support when things are going wrong. I'm not great about this either, but it is a massive societal problem and it's only getting worse.