The second element of British resilience was intense social connection. People were forced together every night in tightly packed group or family shelters. They sat shoulder to shoulder and lay in crowded bunks with heads touching heads. They coped with hardship together. Some of the shelters created little newspapers to record the personal news of those who slept there.

The pressure of the situation induced people to be frenetically social. Singers offered free concerts, which were packed. Larson reports that young women would set up dates for every night, planning weeks in advance, so as to never be alone. The histories and novels from the period talk about the rampant sexuality that prevailed. People had sex multiple times a day, for release, comfort, and fun. Graham Greene’s novel The End of the Affair is just one of the many cultural examples from the time depicting how strictures on adultery were temporarily loosened