Seven years ago, in July of 2015, I started an online Facebook group, the Community of Single People, for people who want to discuss every aspect of living single except dating or trying to unsingle themselves. We talk about all sorts of things — our joys and accomplishments, our challenges and frustrations, our observations and our questions, the latest studies, something intriguing or enraging that showed up in our feeds or in the media, and those experiences that sometimes only single people really “get.”
We now include close to 7,000 members from more than 100 nations. We are an engaged group, too. Each day, members contribute an average of 21 new posts. Over the past month, 71 percent of the members have posted, commented, reacted, or viewed posts. (The growth of membership over the years, the ages and genders of the current membership, and the countries and cities with the most members are all described at the end of this article.)
At the Heart of the Group Are People Who Are Happily Single
If you look at the “About” section of the group’s page, the first thing you will see is this important reminder, “This group has nothing to do with dating,” then this:
Welcome to this Community of Single People who want to live their single lives fully, joyfully, and free of stereotyping and stigma.
To me, the heart of the group is single people living their single lives fully and joyfully. Too many people outside of this group buy into the belief that no one really wants to be single – at least not for the long run, and that no one is truly, deeply happy living single. Many of us here in the Community of Single People live in blissful defiance of those backwards ways of thinking.
Substantial numbers of us are Single at Heart – single life is our best life. It is our most authentic, meaningful, and fulfilling life. It is a psychologically rich life. When I say that single life is our best life, I don’t mean that it is better than being in a bad romantic relationship or that it is better to be single than to wish you were. That’s too grudging. I mean that, for the Single at Heart, single life is better, period.
Some people were struggling with being single when they first joined the group and benefited a lot from hearing more affirming perspectives and some constructive suggestions. I’m glad that happens. At the same time, if you only want to complain about being single, or undermine people who are happily single, this is not the group for you.
Communities of Single People Can Help to Create the Change We Want to See
In preparation for writing this annual update, I asked members of the Community of Single People if they wanted to comment. I’m not including their names, but I am grateful for their input. Here’s an example of one of the comments:
I am grateful for this safe, supportive, and inclusive space to …
* raise awareness and share resources
* discuss issues and possible solutions
* commiserate and provide / find support
* celebrate with joy and humour
I think that comment captures a lot of what members appreciate about the group.
Here’s another comment:
I’ve noticed consciousness of single discrimination and couple privilege rises every year. People are much more aware of how laws and social systems are designed to make the lives of single people harder, and are getting justifiably more angry about that. There was a time in the group that you couldn’t go a week discussing structural singlism without someone loudly objecting that we were being mean to married people. Lots of internalized feelings that coupled privilege was the natural order of things and we shouldn’t be complaining about it. You rarely hear that anymore.
I have noticed that, too, and it is a very welcome development.
Occasionally – including in response to my invitation for comments – members object to posts poking fun at coupled people. I have mixed feelings about that. Personally, what I love about being Single at Heart is that it is a positive embrace of single life. I understand the position that we should be kind toward everyone. And yet, there is so much uncensored, unapologetic bashing and pitying of single people outside of this group, including by some coupled people who would never in a million years engage in other forms of bigotry, that I can see the appeal of some humor-based venting in a community comprised mostly of single people. And, I don’t think that any single person should ever be shamed for feeling angry about singlism – it is pervasive, and it can be quite serious.
Here’s another comment:
I like that this group is welcoming to people who practice solo polyamory. Solohood is different from singlehood, but we share many issues & perspectives, and are often impacted by couple privilege and singlism in similar ways.
I agree with this, too. I also think the group has been very good at raising awareness of asexuality and aromanticism.
Not Just a Discussion Group or a Support Group
I’ve always thought of this group as a discussion group, or perhaps a support group. But I think it is also something more – a way of creating social change. It is the kind of change that comes not from marching in the streets or petitioning political leaders (though I am all in favor of those kinds of actions) but from sharing personal stories and insights and experiences and advice. Participants in this group can become aware of single people all around the world who are living their single lives fully and joyfully, from their own first-hand accounts. They can learn to think about single life and coupled life in ways that challenge the conventional wisdom. They get help in figuring out how to deal with other people who believe that single people are just not as worthy as coupled people.
That’s not the same as structural change – changing laws and practices and institutions. But it’s not nothing. In fact, on a personal level, it can be quite powerful.
Singles Helping Singles in Need
When we share our stories and our perspectives, we are changing hearts and minds. But sometimes single people need more concrete forms of help. One of the members of the Community of Single People had the brilliant idea of starting a spin-off group, Singles Helping Singles in Need, specifically for that purpose. Here’s the description of the group from the “About” section:
A place for singles to post when they are stuck and need help; when one person can’t do things alone. An example might be when no one can pick them up from a medical appointment and everyone they know has said NO or is unavailable.. when no one can be hired for help. Here people can ask and help each other.
People who join the group state their geographical location and often mention the kinds of help they would be willing to offer. The effectiveness of the group will increase as more people join, particularly if multiple people join who are from nearby areas.
Singles Helping Singles in Need is not a discussion group – that’s what the Community of Single People is for. It is also not about the ways in which single people are treated unfairly – we have Fairness for Single People for that. And none of the groups are places to try to find dates!
Gratitude
I am so very grateful to the administrators of all of these groups who work so tirelessly and so generously to keep the groups going. For the Community of Single People, they are Barbara, Chazz, Kelly, Kemi, Lesley, Marcia, Melissa, and Sylvia. For Singles Helping Singles in Need, they are Laura, Doug, and Karen, and I have Kendra to thank for Fairness for Single People.
In Memoriam
I have no way of knowing how many members of the Community of Single People have died in the seven years it has been in existence, but I do know of one very special person. Carol Hynson joined this group just a month after it first started in 2015 and was an active and valued member. She was a joyfully single person with great insights, humor, generosity, and talent (especially musically). When I gave some talks in London in 2018, she greeted me at the airport with warmth and goodies and made sure I made my way to a hotel (not a small thing, since the first hotel lost my reservation). We had already had an email friendship which continued right up to the time when, early in 2022, she was told that there was nothing more that could be done for her, medically. We talked on the phone at that time, and she encouraged me to share her stories in my Single at Heart book.
For now, I will tell you my favorite one. It was the last email I ever got from her. Her support staff, knowing that she was dying, asked if she wanted to talk to a psychologist.
“I said I would, but I didn’t think I needed to. Afterwards, she [the psychologist] said that I didn’t need to. After we spoke, she agreed and said that I was a fully self-actualised person. I was thrilled. That was my goal in life, and I have achieved it.”
What a great tribute to Carol, and to what it can mean to live the Single at Heart life. Rest in peace, Carol Hynson. Thank you for all you have contributed to the Community of Single People, and for what you mean to me.
This Is Who We Are
The Community of Single People now includes more than 6,900 people from more than 100 nations. Growth has been steady. Within five months of when I started this group in July 2015, we had 600 members. The numbers since then have been:
2016: 1,170
2107: 1,946
2018: 2,000+
2019: 3,433
2020: 4,541
2021: 5,847
2022: 6,958
Eighty percent of the members are women, but we also include 1,260 men, and some of them are among the most active participants. There are 112 members who selected one of the “custom genders” on Facebook’s list of options.
Single people of all ages are in our group. Here are the numbers Facebook provided to me. They only include the people whose ages Facebook could figure out.
18–24: 281
25–34: 1,204
35–44: 1,510
45–54: 1,295
55–64: 848
65+: 510
More than half of our members come from the U.S., but more than 100 other nations are represented as well. Here are the nations with at least 20 members:
- United States: 4,059
- United Kingdom: 547
- Canada: 351
- Australia: 306
- India: 264
- Philippines: 158
- South Africa: 125
- Kenya: 80
- Nigeria: 46
- Netherlands: 44
- New Zealand: 43
- Israel: 39
- Mexico: 39
- Ireland: 34
- Germany: 32
- Indonesia: 31
- Spain: 27
- Singapore: 26
- Malaysia: 24
- Poland: 23
- Italy: 23
- Egypt: 22
- Sweden: 21
- Romania: 21
- Belgium: 21
Our members come from hundreds of different cities. Here are the ones with at least 20 members:
- New York, NY: 167
- London, UK: 95
- Los Angeles, CA: 87
- Sydney, NSW, Australia: 74
- Melbourne, VIC, Australia: 72
- Chicago, IL: 59
- Nairobi, Kenya: 53
- Washington, DC: 47
- Toronto, ON, Canada: 39
- Seattle, WA: 38
- Denver, CO: 35
- San Francisco, CA: 34
- Phoenix, AZ: 32
- Houston, TX: 32
- Brisbane, QLD, Australia: 32
- Portland, OR: 31
- Philadelphia, PA: 30
- Ottawa, Canada: 30
- Mumbai, India: 29
- San Diego, CA: 29
- Singapore: 26
- Cape Town, South Africa: 25
- Austin, TX: 24
- Kolkata, India: 23
- Montreal, Canada: 23
- Oakland, CA: 22
- Dublin, Ireland: 21
- Vancouver, Canada: 21
- Delhi, India: 21
- Indianapolis, IN: 21
- Bangalore, India: 21
- Boston, MA: 21
- Auckland, New Zealand: 21
- Calgary, Canada 20
[Notes: (1) The opinions expressed here do not represent the official positions of Unmarried Equality. (2) I’ll post all these blog posts at the UE Facebook page; please join our discussions there. (3) For links to previous columns, click here.]
About Bella DePaulo
