Point 1 : Salon finally figures out that liberals are miserable, and conservatives are happy.
Conservatism makes you happy
Conservatives enjoy life more than liberals. Why left-leaning people should take the “happiness gap” seriously
BY CHRIS MOONEY
In general, political conservatives haven’t been very pleased with a slew of scientific attempts — sometimes dating back well over a decade — to psychoanalyze their beliefs and behavior. Indeed, some on the right wrongly interpret these analyses as implying that conservatives have “bad brains” or a “mental defect.” Yet if psychology-of-politics research is really a veiled attack on the right, then why does it contain so many findings that cast conservatives in a positive light?
Chief among these, perhaps, is the discovery that conservatives, across countries, tend to be just plain happier people than liberals are. That’s not bad news for the right — it’s seriously bad news for the left.
Point 2 : The Dalai Lama says that the purpose of life is to be happy.
Here is the quiz. Vote for one :
How do you know Joe Romm isn’t “happy” when his voice becomes a shrill falsetto and he spits when confronting “deniers”
The reason is they now they would have to actually compete to get what we have, so they get really mad and dont want us to have it
The people making the most noise already have it.
Example: Carol Browner, socialist and former climate czar, made five million bucks as a lobbyist at her husband’s firm when the office was abolished.
The pay is good for this shit.
uh huh…. What about people that are left leaning and successful? Or do you think those people don’t exist? I don’t begrudge people that are successful. Good for them. Unless of course they obtain their success by stepping all over everyone. Cheating… etc….
We have to have a society where people have the mind to succeed. If we didn’t have these people, this country would have been finished along time ago. And I can understand your frustrations with the extreme left wing. If I didn’t, I wouldn’t be here, on a site where I’m in the minority in a lot of ways.
Am I a happy guy? Not overly… But it’s not because I’m not rich or unmarried. I lost a lot of important people in my life. I lost my mother and brother at eight years old, I lost my niece to cancer and my dad was an alcoholic for most of my life. Not that I was ever beaten or anything. There is nothing that can fill these holes. And there will always be an unhappiness because of that.
Brian,
I have been thru a lot of what you have been thru and also been beaten too. The thing you will discover becoming older is that you are free to be whatever you want to be, you can associate with people you genuinely like and don’t have to live to please ones you don’t like. That will make you happier in itself. Also, most of happiness comes from within. If thinking about the past is painful, focus on the present and future. You have a long life and plenty to look forward to.
Andy
I think it’s a shitty article.
For one, I don’t think I would consider this to be very flattering:
“But perhaps most significant, personality research shows that conservatives tend to be less open, exploratory people than liberals are. Indeed, based on a large body of research by University of Maryland social psychologist Arie Kruglanski, conservatives tend to have a higher “need for cognitive closure,” meaning that they are uncomfortable with ambiguity and prefer to seize on and hold fixed beliefs and views. And if you think being more closed-minded makes you less happy … well, think again. Instead, it appears that the relationship runs in the opposite direction.
The need for closure is often interpreted very negatively — understandably so. But if it has an upside, it may well be the happiness and peace of mind that it confers. Conservatives tend to be more assured in their views and confident in them; thus, they have less need to agonizingly question them. They know their place in the world and aren’t troubled over it. “It’s kind of a peaceful bliss, cognitively speaking,” explains Kruglanski.”
Although, I don’t know where this guy got the idea that people think that close minded people are less happy. I surely don’t know anyone that thinks that way.
There are many close minded liberals. The last time we had so many close minded people refusing to compromise was before the Civil War. I hope we don’t end up with a similar result.
I think it’s the “intellectual” liberals that you folks have the most problem with, correct?
The guys that run skeptical science for instance… Although I never posted there, the attitude of those guys pushed me away right way. Haven’t read their site since.
And to clarify… I consider myself a liberal IN PART. I am NOT for illegal immigration, anti guns or a one world government.
I am not for the global warming BS either.
“meaning that they are uncomfortable with ambiguity and prefer to seize on and hold fixed beliefs and views.”
You mean believing the Constitution is NOT an outdated document. Laws should be followed or changed. You can’t spend your way out of debt…….things like this?
Mooney? I find it ironic since he is clueless about conservatives in the first place.
Mooney is a noob.
Will the liberals be more happy under tyranny gov’t? I know conservative/libertarians won’t be as happy…
mooney ? Hey the name fits. As for happiness don’t worry about tommorrow as the day you are in is enough to handle or don’t worry because worrying doesn’t change anything or work to do the things you can and don’t sweat the rest or etc. etc. Liberals can’t be happy because they are haters .
New paper out concerning the GHCN adjustments.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/07/17/new-paper-blames-about-half-of-global-warming-on-weather-station-data-homgenization/#more-67591
Chris Mooney is a professional buffoon. Bet he is happy as a lark.
Some go about the business of living while others go about the business of dying. A greenie biggest worry is that somebody, somewhere might be enjoying life and enjoying it a little too much. They must be made aware that their comfort or pleasures are at the expense of the planet. That’s why Greenpeace is shutting down Shell gas stations in the UK. People use that gas to go about their business of “living” and they can’t have that happen.
And that is a remarkable statement from a guy who has made a career of Republican-bashing and Explicator of Science & Skepticism poseur. Probably has something to do w/ Mooney’s relative youth – he hasn’t yet been fully inculcated with the classic Liberal conceit that happiness is for shallow Pollyanna’s who happily wallow in the crassly materialistic social order, while the deeper, more intelligent, and enlightened Liberal sees the Shallowness & Hypocrasy Of It All (not to mention the planet-wrecking rabid consumerism of the knuckle-draggers), and how could anyone possibly be happy carrying the burden of this knowledge? Occupying the moral high-ground is absolutely essential for most Liberals’ self-image.
As a grouchy Libertarian-leaning centrist, I am not so much offended as amused by the many pseudo-scholarly “scientific” studies lately which purport to plumb the depths of the conservative brain. Like many such studies, they say more about the authors than their putative subjects: The Liberal position is self-evidently correct; any simpleton can see that, therefore there must be something off-kilter with the conservative brain. This moral/intellectual superiority syndrome manifests itself in other ways: AGW is of course real and dangerous, yet the deniers are winning the PR battle, therefore, A), we’re not communicating effectively and need communication coaches like Chris Mooney or Susan Hassol to teach us how to “re-frame” inconvenient questions or dismiss them as “ill-posed,” or B), the deniers must be funded by the Evil Energy Cartel, since it’s inconceivable that a motley band of unpaid volunteers could carry the debate against the intelligent & informed Knowledge Class. The idea that they just might be wrong on such an important issue seems never to enter their minds. Maybe it would be too traumatic.
Goodness; I don’t usually carry on like that. Blame it on sleeplessness. I promise to be more laconic in the future.
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Intellectual: Someone who has been educated beyond his intelligence – H.L. Mencken