Atomized people without knowledge of the past are easier to govern badly. If there are no reference points how things were better (in addition to worse), people will not demand it.
Atomized people lack social cohesion required for mass movements or revolutions. Every man forges his own fortune. Every woman is equal to man. The weak will get trampled in an increasingly predatory environment that used to be a society. As even family units are eliminated in gender wars and intergenerational conflict, it is no wonder that birthrates fall when atomized people concentrate on their own day to day survival.
I suspect that the loss of culture and traditions are a result of loss of intergenerational connection. When I was a child, we celebrated Christmas. The tree, the feast, the carols, the gifts (brought by some version of Santa or an elf, this was not all Westernized Coca Cola festival for us), the reading of Bible. Christmas was fun for children. Even in Soviet Union, where Christianity was suppressed, the powers that be had to bring back Father Winter and an associated winter festival, set to be the New Year’s Eve.
The world’s biggest shopping day is now the newly invented Singles’ Day from China, which began as a student response against Valentine’s Day but quickly ballooned into a massive hit, not only domestically but expanding globally, even having arrived into Finland. If you are lonely, why not have a day and buy something for yourself since the couples are having a day too? The popularity of the Singles’ Day is probably a troubling portent for future demographics and survival of the traditions, and by extension, history.
By the way, despite the lack of material manifestations of the culture and the breaking of social structures, there still remains an option for inner life – learn things and live your ideals. Become the culture you want to be.
P.S. Soon it will be Midsummer Festival / St. John’s Day / Summer Solstice time. I will not have a bonfire, nor will I go to a lakeside cabin to drown in a drunken boat accident. As cultural traditions go, I am neutral about bonfires, but against drunken boat accidents. Not all traditions need to be maintained.
PlanktonPunkt 