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There’s something not quite right with society today — the way we interact with each other, the way we come together or don’t come together as a community. Pretty much everyone seems to feel this way – that there’s been a surge in anti-social behaviour — regardless of where they sit on the political spectrum or even if they don’t sit on it at all.

There are the progressives who caution an uptick in things like white supremacy and rampant #MeToo misogyny. There are conservative voices sounding the alarm about radical Islamists and authoritarian leftists.

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Then there are the regular folks in the middle — like the many parents who are worried about how their kids have way too much screen time, exposing them to problems ranging from online bullying to rising obesity rates.

Canada’s social fabric is changing, fraying perhaps, ever so slightly. Charitable donations, volunteerism and membership in community associations are slowly but steadily on the decline. This is all part of what the British historian Niall Ferguson refers to as “the great degeneration,” a troubling erosion of civil society.