4 ms·

Send these miserable, privileged people to Africa to dig latrines for a year. They'll be a lot happier when they return. Deprivation is a necessary dimension o

Send these miserable, privileged people to Africa to dig latrines for a year. They'll be a lot happier when they return. Deprivation is a necessary dimension of human experience. I was looking at setting up one-month trips for snowflakes through Canadian muskeg guided by special forces veterans, but it turns out that only the government can legally form a meeting of minds sufficient to conclude a contract where one party agrees to what amounts to boot camp. Empathizing with people whose only problem is that their experience does not include overcoming adversity is a challenge that I think is best met with tough love. More of the same clearly is not going to do any good.

michaelmrose 7y ago
The fact that somewhere other people have it worse has never been a valid or meaningful response to suffering. It is so facile it works on almost any level of horror. You could fallaciously say I'm sorry you had your legs eaten by bears but did you hear about joe, joe was eaten alive by ants! Your anecdote regarding your would be boot camp is probably off topic but allowing people to abrogate basic human rights so you can have a camping trip seems like an atrocious idea. It would be the worst idea I'd heard this week but I just conversed with a guy planning to deliberately make chlorine gas to go to war with the weeds in his garden.
- ehvatum 7y ago
  It is not facile to ask if experiencing deprivation is a necessary condition for experiencing happiness. Consider that strength training develops muscles. Does facing genuine adversity develop emotional response such that people become capable of enjoying a world of plenty?
  - michaelmrose 7y ago
    I think the proximity and ultimate fact of death first around us and then ultimately happening to us is sufficient deprivation to appreciate life. Suffering is more likely to stunt then enrich.
    - ehvatum 7y ago
      Suffering that does not respond to effort is definitely stunting. The thesis motivating my muskeg boot-camp concept is that participants exit the wilderness under their own power and therefore develop agency. My perspective on this is somewhat unusual; I chose to canoe across Manitoba because I felt like I was a weakling who had never truly confronted necessity. It took three weeks, and I remember thinking, many times, "this absolutely and completely sucks, but I'm going to remember this as a great experience." Sure enough, that is the case. There is a lot of masochism in my life because I depend on it to keep depression away. It is for my spirit what gravity is for my body - in the sense that long term zero-G exposure is unhealthy. I can't help but think a persevering experience would help these folks, whose lives are apparently so unchallenged that the mundane necessities of day-to-day existence grow untenable. That's a result of my perspective, which is the perspective of a masochist. I am aware that pain and pleasure are linked for me to an unusual degree. I feel like it should be that way for everyone, and they're really missing out! I guess I'd be a pretty terrible therapist. If only we all had suffering as an immediate consequence of not living up to our potential, you know? It would be better. So I'm prescribing shock collar controlled by an iOS/Android app that monitors subject behavior... It could really help these people realize that they were correct to think that they ought to be happy with their non-shock-collar lives! And they would be!
  - watwut 7y ago
    Maybe, but also groups who experienced serious deprivation have on average worst outcomes. They take drugs more often, they are more violent, they have all kinds of mental problems. Veterans, former political prisoners, post-war countries, poor social classes etc have a lot of mental health and depression related problems. They may enjoy world of plenty the way we don't, but they have issues we don't.
  - belorn 7y ago
    I have a hard time believing that people who experience war are happier on average than those that don't. People who have trained in suffering and deprivation might overcome it in despite such experience, but I would not bet on the average.

michaelmrose 7y ago

The fact that somewhere other people have it worse has never been a valid or meaningful response to suffering. It is so facile it works on almost any level of horror. You could fallaciously say I'm sorry you had your legs eaten by bears but did you hear about joe, joe was eaten alive by ants! Your anecdote regarding your would be boot camp is probably off topic but allowing people to abrogate basic human rights so you can have a camping trip seems like an atrocious idea. It would be the worst idea I'd heard this week but I just conversed with a guy planning to deliberately make chlorine gas to go to war with the weeds in his garden.

ehvatum 7y ago
It is not facile to ask if experiencing deprivation is a necessary condition for experiencing happiness. Consider that strength training develops muscles. Does facing genuine adversity develop emotional response such that people become capable of enjoying a world of plenty?
- michaelmrose 7y ago
  I think the proximity and ultimate fact of death first around us and then ultimately happening to us is sufficient deprivation to appreciate life. Suffering is more likely to stunt then enrich.
  - ehvatum 7y ago
    Suffering that does not respond to effort is definitely stunting. The thesis motivating my muskeg boot-camp concept is that participants exit the wilderness under their own power and therefore develop agency. My perspective on this is somewhat unusual; I chose to canoe across Manitoba because I felt like I was a weakling who had never truly confronted necessity. It took three weeks, and I remember thinking, many times, "this absolutely and completely sucks, but I'm going to remember this as a great experience." Sure enough, that is the case. There is a lot of masochism in my life because I depend on it to keep depression away. It is for my spirit what gravity is for my body - in the sense that long term zero-G exposure is unhealthy. I can't help but think a persevering experience would help these folks, whose lives are apparently so unchallenged that the mundane necessities of day-to-day existence grow untenable. That's a result of my perspective, which is the perspective of a masochist. I am aware that pain and pleasure are linked for me to an unusual degree. I feel like it should be that way for everyone, and they're really missing out! I guess I'd be a pretty terrible therapist. If only we all had suffering as an immediate consequence of not living up to our potential, you know? It would be better. So I'm prescribing shock collar controlled by an iOS/Android app that monitors subject behavior... It could really help these people realize that they were correct to think that they ought to be happy with their non-shock-collar lives! And they would be!
- watwut 7y ago
  Maybe, but also groups who experienced serious deprivation have on average worst outcomes. They take drugs more often, they are more violent, they have all kinds of mental problems. Veterans, former political prisoners, post-war countries, poor social classes etc have a lot of mental health and depression related problems. They may enjoy world of plenty the way we don't, but they have issues we don't.
- belorn 7y ago
  I have a hard time believing that people who experience war are happier on average than those that don't. People who have trained in suffering and deprivation might overcome it in despite such experience, but I would not bet on the average.