So I get what you are saying...
A few possibilities:
- Covid and the pandemic fundamentally changed how people interact and relate
I know this is strange, but pre-covid, people grew up in a world in which dating and to some extent working required a social life. People met at bars, through friends, at parties, doing common activities. Then dating Apps and hookup Apps came along, but bars still existed, social scenes still existed, people still had parties.
Work also had to be a physical social thing: you needed to show up, there was a more social aspect to interacting with people, and people were more likely to socialize outside of work. Some remote work happened, but not a lot.
Then covid happened. All of work changed so that the infrastructure existed for most people to work without needing to be in person. No one could party, no one could go to bars, no one could do things. There also used to be a large social stigma to staying at home. If you were at home on a Friday, you were a loser, uncool, not invited to things, and it bothered people, and felt like social exclusion.
With covid, everyone stayed at home. There was no social exclusion by being at home. People worked at home. And suddenly, being social in person was so much less important. You could get a job by applying online and it didn't require a social network quite the same way, or that network could be online. You could meet someone, date, and procreate online without needing a social network at all. The main thing that mattered, in order to procreate, was whether someone had a stable job and was employable.
Even post-covid, I feel like we've had a shift. There are still parties, there are still clubs, there are still bars. They are less required or needed part of society. Not only that, we've gone into more of an era of have and have nots, and some people desperate, some people scamming others, and so there are more risks in going out of meeting someone who is problematic. It's why people prefer driverless robotaxis over regular lyfts and ubers, even when it costs more: it's not that the driver interaction is bad, it's that social interactions entail risk and if you are employed and can date using Apps, or have a partner, it's sometimes simple to avoid that.
Technology is now much more addictive. So many people, myself included, think it's emotionally healthy to go out and be around people. In the same way I know broccoli is better than candy, I know that people are better than the Internet. But when I am stressed, when I'm annoyed, when life is frustrating, what do I want? I want the Internet and candy, not hanging out and meeting new people.
possibility 2
- People have become much more classist as inequality has increasingly risen, partly because perception of being in a lower class carries risk. When the class itself it what causes wealth to increase, people become hyper-aware of perceptions.
It's possible your friends make more money now and see themselves as better because of their careers and specifically are less responsive because of that. Should that matter in a friendship? No, but does it? Sadly, many people are extraordinarily superficial and cruel and evil. Almost all of us (that use Lemmy) use devices that contain rare earth minerals mined by the ultra-ultra poor who are essentially there in a forced labor situation because no one else will hire them and if they don't mine rare earth minerals they will die. The conditions are brutal and evil, there could even be actual slavery involved in some cases, and the supply chain is confusing enough that no one knows which devices involve slavery. That's evil. We are all evil. To those people, we're the monsters... and they aren't wrong.
So given that most people are selfish and evil and just care about their own interest, it should not be surprising that these people, if their wealth has increased, don't care about you anymore. Much like people don't stop using devices despite slavery involved in the supply chains because fundamentally people choose evil when it's easier most of the time, you shouldn't expect people making more money to want to stay in contact with you, because sadly, the only thing that matters in our corrupt evil society is money, apparently.
possibility 3
- People are so exhausted from work that they just don't have time.
Working 40 hours a week is hard as hell. It used to be for most men they worked 40 hours, but also had a full-time assistant at home who cooked, cleaned, shopped, and did other things.
Now if someone wants a family, often both people are working, and more people are single. Wages have not kept up with inflation, so that means if you are single, you often can't afford a cleaner, a personal shopper, meals being delivered, etc.
The result is chronic exhaustion. Working Mon-Friday, being tired as hell trying to be more and more efficient, because companies have demanded more efficiency to avoid being fired without paying more, and then on your off time, you either scroll Internet to try to decompress, Saturday you just sleep nearly all day and finally have a moment to be exhausted and miserable, and Sunday you catch up on cleaning, shopping, and worry about money, and then Monday the hell starts all over again.
Your friends may be dealing with that, the whole barely treading water thing, and it's awful.
possibility 4
- post covid issues, long covid
A lot of people who got covid developed health issues, and some aren't obvious. Some are things like, you don't quite have full on long covid, but you are just more tired all the time. You don't have chronic fatigue, but your health isn't as good. It just impacts people. People with such issues aren't quite disabled, but they aren't totally functional either. And I bet there are a ton more people like this than say so, because it's not easy to talk about, there aren't government benefits for being chronically tired after getting covid if you need to work and it's not totally debilitating, etc.
I think it's more likely Possibility 1 and 2. People are going out and partying less (no data to support this, just from going out myself and seeing bars and clubs with fewer people) and people are more classist and drop people who have less money these day. I wouldn't block these people, but don't spend any more time on them. Go completely no contact on your end. If they reach out, great, if not, who cares. They will likely not reach out and it will feel like giving up a soda you really like and you'll get cravings to reach out, but don't. A month of no contact later, you'll realize it's best to not interact with them anymore. The second month will be easier, and by the third you won't miss them much at all. Force yourself to be uncomfortable and then you'll be more likely to use meetup.com, go out to bars, do things where you are more likely to interact with new people who will be worth the time.
Literally nothing in it is AI. It's not even an AI writing style. Where are the dashes? Where is the quirky rhetoric like "It's not a (one thing), it's a (other thing)." AI has a style, it's not this. Just because I'm verbose doesn't mean I'm an AI.