If you’ve used Airbnb or Uber or any other “sharing economy” service lately, you may be surprised to learn that you were not a consumer but a foot-soldier in a movement. And like any self-respecting movement, this one has a set of core principles that must periodically be affirmed and elaborated—in this case, at a slickly-produced conference called “Share” back in May.

So it was that Natalie Foster, the former Obama campaign organizer directing the San Francisco assemblage, enthused that the sharing economy was really one big exercise in community-building. Whenever we crash in a stranger’s guestroom or rent out their car, we aren’t taking advantage of a cheap, convenient service. We’re recreating the virtues of small-town America. “We are rejecting the idea that stuff makes us happier,” Foster said, “that ownership is better than access, that we should all live in isolation.”

The insistence that the sharing economy has tapped into a deep yearning for social interaction is both the most idealistic and least questioned assumption among its boosters. “People are both hungrier for human contact and more tolerant of easy-come-easy-go fluid relationships,” David Brooks wrote in a recent mash note to Airbnb. In a Wired story this spring, John Zimmer, the co-founder of the Uber competitor Lyft, invoked a stint on the Oglala Sioux reservation to summarize his feelings. “Their sense of community, of connection to each other and to their land, made me feel more happy and alive than I’ve ever felt,” he said. “We now have the opportunity to use technology to help us get there.”

That's one way of putting it. Another way to put it: For-profit “sharing” represents by far the fastest-growing source of un- and under-regulated commercial activity in the country. Calling it the modern equivalent of an ancient tribal custom is a rather ingenious rationale for keeping it that way. After all, if you’re a regulator, it’s easy to crack down on the commercial use of improperly zoned and insured property. But what kind of knuckle-dragger would crack down on making friends?

Make no mistake—the big sharing-economy companies are flexing an enormous amount of marketing muscle, from dodgy front groups to dodgy numbers. Peers, the organization that sponsored the Share conference (and which Natalie Foster runs), was co-founded by one of Airbnb’s top marketing executives. When I asked a Peers press aide for evidence that the appetite for community-building is what’s driving demand for these services, she directed me to a poll showing that 72 percent of Americans believe “sharing builds friendships and relationships.” But the poll offered no definition of “sharing”—the only context was a previous question about sharing “tools and other household items”—and it made no mention of any companies being involved. If I said my startup was part of the “loving economy,” there’s a good chance I could find a poll showing that people are pro-love, but it wouldn’t establish anything about my company.