Slashdot Mirror
Is Your Mood a Result of Where You Live?
Ed writes "Apparently, the Centers for Disease Control released a study indicating that geography can have a significant impact on mood. You may not be surprised to learn that Kentucky is more depressing than Hawaii. However, ranking up there with Hawaii are Minnesota, the Dakotas and Wisconsin. Frustratingly, they have not yet published the study on the web, so it is left as an exercise for the reader to find the original study and post a link for the rest of us."
Live in a crappy neighborhood makes for crappy moods? Lemme be the first to tell the CDC: DUUUH!
http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1891465,00.html
Beer is proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy.
As soon as I hear a fucking moron with 5000W of "boom-boom-boom" noise coming my way, my blood pressure goes up.
We got laws against noisy car exhausts but no laws against braindead, anti-social psychopaths who annoy everyone in a 3 miles radius with their loud so-called music.
I'm getting my gun.
and I'm in a shitty mood. Whats your point?
It's here.
...not in post natal PMS Hells-ville, so I don't think the article quite holds.
If you're reading this honey, just kidding! Love you! Let's go shopping for an eternity ring... ;-)
These posts express my own personal views, not those of my employer
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2009-04/ehs-wyl041209.php
I moved FROM Wisconsin to Oregon 5 years ago and I have to say my life is far more diverse now, far more cheery. When I deal with people from "back home" they don't seem to be happy so much as living in willful ignorance.
I guess what I'm saying is my anecdotal experience is that people in the "more depressed" regions are more aware of their true mood and perhaps answer more honestly because of it?
No sig for you!!
Then we get to that ambiguous science, social science, where measurements are never what they seen. In this case there were no measurements, merely self reported data. This is not like an obesity survey in which on can measure a weight, a height, a gender, etc, and use a well know, if controversial, metric to determine a rate of obesity. No, in this case people self reported their state of happiness.
WebMD> which has a report with a list of states clearly indicates the problem with this strategy. The listed quote Participants were asked by phone how many of the previous 30 days their mental health -- including stress, depression, and emotional problems -- was "not good.", clearly indicates the issue.
Imagine being asked "do you feel sad" and you live in Hawaii. Is the peer pressure to say yes or no? If you live in a state that is portrayed negatively in the media, and is always compared negatively with such wonderful places such as Hawaii, is there any incentive to say no. You live in a depressing place, you are told, so you have a right to be depressed.
This of course is why social science is called fake. I am sure the actual report has all the proper caveats, and the report is useful in terms of it indicates where the US might put services to help depressed people, but taking it too seriously, in my mind, would be a mistake. OTOH, I could see using it start a PSA campaign in Hawaii to help people who are depressed, but don't feel empowered to get help.
"She's a scientist and a lesbian. She's not going to let it slide." Orphan Black
I would advise you to read the uplifting comments posted in this thread by Hawaiians, but as they're all outdoors living wonderful lives on the beaches, I am sorry to inform you that the only comments you'll be finding in this thread are from depressed individuals such as yourself. :'(
Way to ommit what happened in the intervening years between the two surveys.
So people were happier before the 2 wars, 9/11, and dot-com bubble bursting than after 9/11, Iraq & Afghanistan, & 5 years of Bush deviciveness. What a shocker. Let me guess, these numbers are further down in surveys taken between 2H'08 & now (particularly in places like NY, Detroit, etc).
These things happen... when your living in a van down by the river!
"I'm going to f***ing bury that guy, I have done it before, and I will do it again. I'm going to f***ing kill Google"
A big factor in emotion is the amount of sunlight you receive daily -- Seasonal Affective Disorder affects people up north a lot more than it does down south, for sure. I used to live in Texas, a full ten degrees of latitude further south than my current residence in Michigan. There is a lot more sunlight in the winter down there than up here. (It doesn't help that it's alway cloudy here, too.)
I have to fight to make it through the long, dark winter.
I had but a simple dream, to destroy all humans.
I live in Florida and this place F'ing sucks.
I live in Southern California. A few years ago I went to stay with some family in Milwaukee. I was there for about a week and one of the things that I noticed was how much more relaxed everyone was. The pace of life was really different. People seemed to take their time getting places and nobody really seemed to be in a big hurry to get anywhere. When waiting in line at places, there wasn't an urgency to get to the front. People took the time to talk to each other. It seemed like for the most part nobody had anything else better to do, and they were all living in the moment.
I had an interesting experience when I got back to LA. After I got off of the plane, I was walking through the airport at Wisconson speed and seemed like people were hurrying by me. None the less, my mind was still in vacation mode and I was enjoying the tranquil feeling that was still with me. I got my car out of the parking lot and proceeded to drive home. As soon as I had to merge onto the freeway, I felt the rush of the rest of the world catch up with me. All of a sudden my brain kicked into high gear. It was like a survival mechanism. There was no way I could deal with the 405 freeway while in the Wisconson mindset.
Conversely, I know people who have grown up in Southern California who then leave and hate where they end up. Almost universally, those who leave and miss California all say almost the same thing. "Everything here is too slow. There isn't enough to do." Personally, I can't wait to get out of here. I think the pace of life here sucks.
I moved from Seattle to Portland. One of my reasons was the better weather. People in Oregon laugh, but the weather really IS better than in Seattle; as a result, winters down here are a lot more tolerable than they ever were back home. Still waiting to see if that's going to last, but so far it's made a huge impact on my life.
I lived in North Dakota, it did not make me happy.
*DrugCheese rants*
I can attest to this. I've lived in Vancouver most of my life, and while I love this city, my personality shifts completley downwards during the fall & winter here (my doctor reckons it's S.A.D.).
I spent a year living in Australia, and talk about night and day.... a year whole spent feeling upbeat and positive. Then straight back to the same old ways when moving back to Van.
It's a shame, because I'm seriously considering permanently moving to a warmer/brighter climate next year, leaving behind the friends and family. It seems like a huge sacrifice, but man, I just can't hack these winters anymore.
Say shhhhhh......
I'm from the Internet. How do I fare in this survey?
Is there a bigger one? It is making me sad (from CA). :P
Ant(Dude) @ Quality Foraged Links (AQFL.net) & The Ant Farm (antfarm.ma.cx / antfarm.home.dhs.org).
Anyone have a link to the alleged cdc map? Took a quick look at the cdc site and don't see anything. Time magazine map is too small to see individual counties.
If you live in your parents's basement you will have a crappy mood.
I am from Seattle and it is common knowledge here that weather has a relation to feelings. At one point the city was #1 for depression and it has been shown that this is because of the constant overcast weather. People have taken to sticking their heads in light boxes to relieve the depression.
Anyway, the point of all this is that the article was poorly written and is common sense. Also, it is sunny in Seattle right now and there are probably people who still have their head in a box.
Utinam me logica falsa tuam philosophiam totam suffodiant.
Climate impacts mood, mood impacts culture, culture impacts economics.
That this isn't a universally known theory causes some concern.
Does, in fact, suck. ...
Suck the life and will to live right out of you, in fact.
We needed a scientific study for this? How about an episode of COPS instead?
I grew up in southern Ohio and moved to the west coast. When I first got here I was really surprised how friendly everyone is. Appalachian people are generally pretty tough to get along with.
"Lonely people back in town. I saw it in the supermarket and at the Laundromat and when we checked out from the motel. These pickup campers through the redwoods, full of lonely retired people looking at trees on their way to look at the ocean. You catch it in the first fraction of a glance from a new face...that searching look...then it's gone.
We see much more of this loneliness now. It's paradoxical that where people are the most closely crowded, in the big coastal cities in the East and West, the loneliness is the greatest. Back where people were so spread out in western Oregon and Idaho and Montana and the Dakotas you'd think the loneliness would have been greater, but we didn't see it so much.
The explanation, I suppose, is that the physical distance between people has nothing to do with loneliness. It's psychic distance, and in Montana and Idaho the physical distances are big but the psychic distances between people are small, and here it's reversed.
It's the primary America we're in. It hit the night before last in Prineville Junction and it's been with us ever since. There's this primary America of freeways and jet flights and TV and movie spectaculars. And people caught up in this primary America seem to go through huge portions of their lives without much consciousness of what's immediately around them. The media have convinced them that what's right around them is unimportant. And that's why they're lonely. You see it in their faces. First the little flicker of searching, and then when they look at you, you're just a kind of an object. You don't count. You're not what they're looking for. You're not on TV.
But in the secondary America we've been through, of back roads, and Chinaman's ditches, and Appaloosa horses, and sweeping mountain ranges, and meditative thoughts, and kids with pinecones and bumblebees and open sky above us mile after mile after mile, all through that, what was real, what was around us dominated. And so there wasn't much feeling of loneliness. That's the way it must have been a hundred or two hundred years ago. Hardly any people and hardly any loneliness. I'm undoubtedly over-generalizing, but if the proper qualifications were introduced it would be true..."
Tweet, tweet.
...this space unintentionally left unblank...
"Slow down, Cowboy! It has been 3 years, 7 months and 26 days since you last successfully posted a comment."
...income, wealth etc. stupid?
The Appalachian Mountains may look pretty, but a large survey from the Centers for Disease Control found those who live around them tend to be more prone to emotional problems.
Looks aren't everything. You know why Nebraska is the happiest state? It isn't because you can throw a rock and hit an ear of corn, or drive outside of the Omaha/Lincoln areas and see nothing but flat fields for miles on end. This place is uglier than sin for the most part (save for a few choice spots like the Black Elk-Neihardt Park on top of the hill in Blair, for example), and the weather ranges from stupidly hot in July to inhospitably cold in January.
But you know what? The economy is stable. Nobody's given up their football tickets. Companies are gonna need call centers. It doesn't cost an arm and a leg to live in the city. The most crime-ridden spots in Omaha are a fucking day care center compared to other cities. It doesn't surprise me at all when TFA says that Midwestern states are ranked up there with Hawaii.
...is a result of my wifes bitchy mood swings and my damn kids. Other than that, I'm LIVING THE DREAM, BABY! ;-)
"Klaatu, verada, necktie!" -Ash
Winter here is extremely cold and summer extremely hot.
What I've noticed is that summer just feels unbearable some years (temperature doesn't always matter) and it makes me so much more agitated, and tires me out a lot faster. Right now it's 14C in the afternoon outside and I'm having trouble keeping cool, and it just makes me angrier for some reason.
Global climate warming changes mood to fearful. Fearful mood generates its own cult culture. Cult culture forces large expenditures of money for little gain. Everybody knows this.
The Three R's of Portland
or
Why Portland Sucks
"Latte Town" was coined a few years back and is the most appropriate term for the City of Portland that I have ever heard. A Latte town consists of mostly white, educated baby boomers and young single people. The inhabitants of the town are usually newcomers who have priced out all the original inhabitants. These towns are usually expensive, pretentious, abound in natural fibers and are laid back on the surface. Latte towns like Portland pride themselves on their most cherished concepts of diversity and inclusiveness. Most Portlanders accept this myth as Gospel but upon close examination Portland's dirty little secret is revealed. Portland is an overwhelmingly white, non-ethnic city. It is as vanilla as it gets so it makes one wonder what all the celebrating of diversity is all about. Drive through any neighborhood surrounding the downtown area and the impression that you get is that Portland is nothing more than a series of elitist ghettos compromised of rich white homosexuals, rich white yuppies, rich white hippies, rich white trust funders, and rich white kids from the suburbs pretending to be street people. Where's the diversity? Well it doesn't exist but the average Portlander likes the concept and in their eyes the different shades of rich whites all constituent diversity. In a series of articles I will attempt to breakdown and explain these subtle distinctions between the various factions of lily white, latte people that make Portland what it is.
The Artist-Intellectual
The visitor or newcomer to Portland is bound to be struck by the sheer numbers that belong to this group. They seem to be everywhere and are in fact everywhere. They are the reason that all the coffee shops have tables and chairs. The artist-intellectual fancies himself as a poet, a writer, a musician, a filmmaker, etc. You get the drift. They spend most of their days idling around the coffee establishments that one finds every 10 feet. They are usually equipped with a notebook that they use for their poems, journals or their artwork. No one ever gets to see the contents of these notebooks. More often than not they have a beaten and weathered paper back copy of some book authored by Kafka or William S. Boroughs. They love to discuss their favorite subject, themselves. Given the opportunity they will prattle on for hours about their poems, art work or the film they are making. You never get to actually see any of their work but you do get to hear about it. Their lives are like one never ending semester in grad school. Initially I believed these losers but then got to thinking. What would an aspiring actor, artist, musician, filmmaker being doing in Portland Oregon, a latte town? Why wouldn't they be in NYC or LA? Because they're phonies, that's why. Here's how it works with these clowns. They flunk out of college in New Jersey so their parents send them to Reed College in Portland in hopes that they will get their act together. They drop out of Reed but stay in Portland while still on Daddy's tab or some trust find. One Saturday Josh or Seth drifts down to one of the hundreds of hippie craft markets downtown. Some hippie is selling didgeridoos that he made I between bong reps. Josh buy one and takes it home where he proceeds to get baked after which he blows a few sour notes into the didgeridoo. The next day he's a musician. Not really but that's what he's telling everyone at the coffee house and pretending is good enough for a Portland artist-intellectual, in fact it's everything. In three months he will switch his designation from musician to filmmaker and then onto to something else 3 months later. As long as it sounds cool he will keep this charade up and no one in his circles will call him on it because they are doing the same thing.
The Activist
This group is usually comprised of people that used to be part of the artist-intellectual group in Portland. They have gotten a little older and may have finally, after 12 years, obtained a liberal arts degree from Portlan
I guess its not just 'where', but who you live with. A lot of posters have said that living in picture-perfect, tranquil, warm, less-populated places would give them better moods. Living with a bitchy/unreasonable spouse and noisy kids, like what a poster said a few comments up will make all the difference regardless of where you live. Given a choice between an unpleasant place with nice people and the other way around, I'd almost certainly choose the latter.
The phenomenon is well know and described here among other places. Try living at 55N and above (where I was born) and you realize how geography can affect mental well-being.
Enlightenment? It's just a flush in the pan.
I've lived in Minnesota, South Dakota (western & eastern), and Arizona, and it never ceases to amaze me how different lifestyles are from place to place. I think a lot of people's happiness issues could be solved by moving to a culture more suited to their personality.
I have SAD, and in MN/eastern SD I had horrible winter time depression. Just moving to western SD where the sun shines through most of the winter made an incredible difference!!! I really liked the winter time there, at least as compared to Minnesota. The culture there also suited my tastes better. SD has a very low population density, which makes a difference, and like another poster mentioned earlier about Wisconsin, the pace of life is much slower and more relaxed. People there were always friendly, you could easily strike up a conversation with the guy next to you in line, and random folks would look out for you if you were in a bind. That's amazing.
However, even though SD is sunny, my ancestry is from the middle-east and I am physically designed for a warm climate. Moving to Arizona was the ultimate realization of my American-continent destiny. :) I have never been happier.
In the end, what I'm trying to say is, listen to what your body and mind are telling you. If you don't like where you're at, think hard about WHY you don't like it, and try to find a place that suits you better. If you don't like it, you can always go back.
The Three R's of Portland
or
Why Portland Sucks
"Latte Town" was coined a few years back and is the most appropriate term for the City of Portland that I have ever heard. A Latte town consists of mostly white, educated baby boomers and young single people. The inhabitants of the town are usually newcomers who have priced out all the original inhabitants. These towns are usually expensive, pretentious, abound in natural fibers and are laid back on the surface. Latte towns like Portland pride themselves on their most cherished concepts of diversity and inclusiveness. Most Portlanders accept this myth as Gospel but upon close examination Portland's dirty little secret is revealed. Portland is an overwhelmingly white, non-ethnic city. It is as vanilla as it gets so it makes one wonder what all the celebrating of diversity is all about. Drive through any neighborhood surrounding the downtown area and the impression that you get is that Portland is nothing more than a series of elitist ghettos compromised of rich white homosexuals, rich white yuppies, rich white hippies, rich white trust funders, and rich white kids from the suburbs pretending to be street people. Where's the diversity? Well it doesn't exist but the average Portlander likes the concept and in their eyes the different shades of rich whites all constituent diversity. In a series of articles I will attempt to breakdown and explain these subtle distinctions between the various factions of lily white, latte people that make Portland what it is.
The Artist-Intellectual
The visitor or newcomer to Portland is bound to be struck by the sheer numbers that belong to this group. They seem to be everywhere and are in fact everywhere. They are the reason that all the coffee shops have tables and chairs. The artist-intellectual fancies himself as a poet, a writer, a musician, a filmmaker, etc. You get the drift. They spend most of their days idling around the coffee establishments that one finds every 10 feet. They are usually equipped with a notebook that they use for their poems, journals or their artwork. No one ever gets to see the contents of these notebooks. More often than not they have a beaten and weathered paper back copy of some book authored by Kafka or William S. Boroughs. They love to discuss their favorite subject, themselves. Given the opportunity they will prattle on for hours about their poems, art work or the film they are making. You never get to actually see any of their work but you do get to hear about it. Their lives are like one never ending semester in grad school. Initially I believed these losers but then got to thinking. What would an aspiring actor, artist, musician, filmmaker being doing in Portland Oregon, a latte town? Why wouldn't they be in NYC or LA? Because they're phonies, that's why. Here's how it works with these clowns. They flunk out of college in New Jersey so their parents send them to Reed College in Portland in hopes that they will get their act together. They drop out of Reed but stay in Portland while still on Daddy's tab or some trust find. One Saturday Josh or Seth drifts down to one of the hundreds of hippie craft markets downtown. Some hippie is selling didgeridoos that he made I between bong reps. Josh buy one and takes it home where he proceeds to get baked after which he blows a few sour notes into the didgeridoo. The next day he's a musician. Not really but that's what he's telling everyone at the coffee house and pretending is good enough for a Portland artist-intellectual, in fact it's everything. In three months he will switch his designation from musician to filmmaker and then onto to something else 3 months later. As long as it sounds cool he will keep this charade up and no one in his circles will call him on it because they are doing the same thing.
The Activist
This group is usually comprised of people that used to be part of the artist-intellectual group in Portland. They have gotten a little older and may have finally, after 12 years, obtained a liberal arts degree from Portlan
It depends, yes where you live.But it doesn't give excuse not to be calm or relax it's your insight that what's really matter
My US geography is pretty shakey, but the reference to Hawaii makes me wonder if this is related to the relative amount of sunlight people get in different places. People who don't get enough can suffer from Seasonal Affective Disorder (ironically spelling SAD), which I understand is a kind of depression typically during winter months. Perhaps all year around the variation in sunlight between places, based on latitude and weather patterns, makes a difference...
Folks from the states, is this one possible interpretation of the data?
Not possible: everyone else living here is blissfully ignorant and happy, but I'm not. Has nothing to do with geography, it has to do with intelligence, education, and degree of awareness.
I'd like to quote a certain William Feather:
"One of the indictments of civilization is that happiness and intelligence are so rarely found in the same person."
They say that ignorance is bliss.
That might explain why so many people I've met from the south seem so happy.
There is a lesson to learn from that... seems as though you have learned it.
Posting as AC - have already moderated this thread before I saw your post. Sanat #702
You know, there could be a *LOT* of reasons people are more depressed in one area than another. Some could be cultural (does everyone complain a lot, is the "outlook" bleak, aversion to anti-depressants and therapy, etc.), some could be realted to weather (Seattle is supposed to be a very depressed place because of so few sunny days). I don't think it's as simple as living in a crappy place. ;)
My thought when reading about Minnesota was that we are pretty big on therapy here, so depression probably gets treated more here than other places. That and our women are HOT AS HELL!
It's tempting from an elitist Northern perspective to say that Kentucky is populated with depressed, beaten-down white trash, but South Dakota is a pretty red state, North Dakota is a nominally red state, as is rural Minnesota and Minnesota is no model of social equality.
"Great Gatsby syndrome"? We people out here in the upper Midwest still believe the American dream can come true? Whether that's noble or we just haven't gotten the news yet is another question.
Maybe it's the Norwegian, Swedish, German heritage? I've been quite taken by the book "Deer Hunting with Jesus" and he emphasizes the point that a lot of the "underclass" of America are Scotch-Irish and they have a unique heritage.
Thanks. I have "Lila" on the nightstand, waiting to be (re)started. (It's been that way for some considerable time.) Your post is a reminder to go back and revisit the earlier work -- it's been years, but I remember being consumed one summer and cramming the margins with notes and my own observations.
And I'd say that's probably true. On average the mood of a person here seems pretty A-OK.
One of the things to remember though is that mood is often reciprocal. Maybe the climate starts off people being happier, but being around other happy people causes you to be happier even moreso. The fact that Hawaii is a happy state makes it a happy state. Combine that with the fact that prejudice and racism here is really toned down, and we don't even have specific groups that are skewing our numbers.
As for why tropical Florida is depressed, I'd say that's because of all the retired folks skewing the numbers.
Sounds like the cause of mindset behind the American revolution of independence.
I think you'd get sick of a place after a decade or so. Maybe it's just the continual moving about and variations in sensual stimulation that makes for happier people. Variety is the spice of life and all that, you know?
But then that means bums should be the happiest people on earth...
your thin skin doesn't make me a troll
It was like moving from a 200 mile wide bedroom community to a city of like-minded people, where everyone is incredibly relaxed most of the time in their attitudes, and people are genuinely nice, that I have met.
If you Google around, also, all the nonsense about the "Seattle Chill" from natives is bullshit. I've never encountered it or personally known anyone who has. It's always, "A friend of a friend..."
Dude, where's my packet?
The roots of this correlation likely have little to do with literal geography and more to do with socio-economic groupings, local prices, and so on.
I don't know where you live, but chances are that there in fact are laws against that. Since audio pollution (for want of a better term) is inescapable and triggers some rather nasty instinctive reactions (it's quite probable that your heightened blood pressure has nothing to do with your actual psychological mood, except possibly for making it worse) exposing the general public (or your neighbours, etc.) to high sound levels is a crime in most jurisdictions. The actual allowed dB values vary according to time of day etc., but if you suspect they're in breach, jot down their license plate. Normally the police will just file the report and do nothing about it, but when I reported something like this it turned out the guy had a file and the police, who were very understanding about the complaint, took action. /. to calm down a bit. Nothing like typing a few paragraphs on everyday matters to dull the senses a tad.
That said, even if you live in the best neighbourhood imaginable (I live in the historical city centre, which is horrible in most cities, but where I live it's great due to the kind natured people here and a governmental inner city renovation program) there are still other things that can sour your mood. I'm currently watching a documentary called "Deliver us from Evil" and about 3/4 in I had to pause, my blood pressure and heart rate had gone up to unhealthy levels, I was crying, overcome by sadness and anger. Which is why I'm posting on
I live in Detroit, How does that affect my mood?
Story Length: 86 words
Slashdot Summary: 111 words
While I agree that the rest of Wisconsin is quite nice and beautiful, the city of Milwaukee is actually very depressing. Right now a lot of people around here are having a difficult time finding a decent job, the public school system needs drastic restructuring and updating, and more than 26% of the people live below the poverty line. It's also highly segregated between the black and white and mexican communities. Madison, WI is a very nice college town with a lot to offer, and the northern area of WI has a lot of beautiful and clean lakes and forests. If you're considering moving to Milwaukee, WI, I would think again and consider Chicago, IL.
Montesqieu 1740 (http://www.constitution.org/cm/sol.txt) wrote many unexpected things on climate and temper. Here is one from the link above:
Effects arising from the Climate of England. In a nation so distempered by the climate as to have a disrelish of everything, nay, even of life, it is plain that the government most suitable to the inhabitants is that in which they cannot lay their uneasiness to any single person's charge, and in which, being under the direction rather of the laws than of the prince, it is impossible for them to change the government without subverting the laws themselves.
And if this nation has likewise derived from the climate a certain impatience of temper, which renders them incapable of bearing the same train of things for any long continuance, it is obvious that the government above mentioned is the fittest for them.
There are lot more fun to read in this English translation from the French language version.
Please don't move here.
For an introvert like me, it is easier to make friends in a group of 8 than in a group of 80. In the former, everyone knows everyone else, you can all go out for coffee or dinner, and each person feels like an important part of the group. In the group of 80, you can't really bond with everyone, so you have to pick and choose-- a difficult task for me, and I become overwhelmed by the number of choices and end up alone and anonymous.
I don't think cities and towns work in precisely the same way-- even Lake Wobegon is too large for you to get to know *everyone* quickly, so we all have to find our own cliques-- but there are similarities, no doubt.
Wow, your attitude towards your elders sure sucks.
My be a drag to be you.
I can't wait until you're old and have to deal with callow assholes like you are.
Oh wait, I'll be loooong dead, but I just know you'll get the same crap back.
I've been around long enough to see it happen in others with your immature attitude.
Bitch.
A related article is from Forbes: America's Most Livable Cities. They rate the Portland, Maine metropolitan statistical area as the most livable city based on income growth, cost of living, crime, leisure, and unemployment.
Elder or not, you're still a whiny bitch.
Take that Colbert! America's assburg isn't such a bad place now, is it?
Disclaimer: Technically I live 30mi north of America's assburg. Maybe that's why I'm happy.
This must be true, I live in wichita and I'm usually really fucking bored
That "secondary America" you're talking about is the sort of place that produced Sarah Palin. I'd be very careful about romanticizing it - it's a quite dangerous place, and not suitable for decent people.
Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
It works on a smaller scale too. When I'm at work, I'm uptight, frustrated and borderline homicidal (posting AC for obvious reasons). At home I'm mostly relaxed and chilled-out.
http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/series/sr_10/sr10_212.pdf
Pages 50-58 of PDF.
> so it is left as an exercise for the reader to find the original study and post a link for the rest of us.
Wonder how depressing it is wherever the study lives.
Bark less. Wag more.
I read this Blog regularly and noticed it the other day. If you get stats, it is interesting. Their search engine is not that great but if you add it to your RSS feeder, you'll notice very interesting stuff go by a few times a week.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/04/090414084220.htm
Funny that they rate Wisconsin as happy, coming from Minnesota, theres a distinct mindset of people here who, especially in customer service, are extremely grumpy and unsocial. Many times where help is abundant in Minnesota, no one will even bother looking up from their desk to help, greet, or in general, do their job here. Though I would agree, after hours, people are very happy, due to the Beer, Beer, and some more Beer.
BEER!
I read this Blog regularly and noticed it the other day. If you get stats, it is interesting.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/04/090414084220.htm
Sorry if this is a repeat post, I am a noob Slashdot poster. I saw this article on the web a few days ago, before the article you linked to and found it interesting. I believe it is what you are looking for and also lists the journal study in the bibliography. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/04/090414084220.htm
Also known in the last election as "real America".
On the other hand, looks can be deceiving. In my big city suburb we have book clubs, craft and sports clubs, coffee houses and restaurants that have regulars that see each other all the time and so are practically private social clubs, voluntary service organizations, a volunteer symphony orchestra, amateur theater, churches, synagogues ... the list goes on. And guess what? The people in these groups are friends.
You can disappear into anonymous loneliness in the big city, and nobody notices. That's probably the difference. In a small town, a loner sticks out. But you don't have to be a loner just because you have to be.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
I live in one of those big coastal cities - Washington, D.C. The reason that people look at each other as objects is that they see each other once and never again. If I walk up to the store I'll pass a hundred people I've never seen before and only a handful I have: the homeless guy, the restaurant owner, the cashier, and maybe one of the six people I recognize from my apartment building.
Many people are visiting for just a few days or living here for only a year or two. It would be exhausting for an introvert to invest in meeting those hundred new people every day. There probably are some people who have lived near me for years but I don't recognize. Maybe they're below the threshold of perception since there are so many other distractions around.
Palin is likely one of the most benign things to come from that "secondary america"
If you can't see the value in jet powered ants you should turn in your nerd card. - Dunbal (464142)
Isn't this like asking if your diet has something to do with what you eat?
Be gone from my sight or prepare to feel my flaming wraith!
Seems to me your attitude could be the problem.
Guess which word I mis-read the first time through that sentence which made it funny.
-FL
Of course we're happy in Wisconsin. Have you seen how many microbreweries we've got?
You jerk.
Another book I have to go read now...
I'm pretty sure if I "lived" with Evangeline Lilly, Jennifer Aniston, Jessica Biel, Gisele Bundchen, Kate Beckinsale, or Katie Holmes (pre-lobotomy), I would be in a MUCH better mood.
That "secondary America" you're talking about is the sort of place that produced Sarah Palin. I'd be very careful about romanticizing it - it's a quite dangerous place, and not suitable for decent people.
Palin is likely one of the most benign things to come from that "secondary america"
Wow, bigoted much? "If you're from out in the country, or not from a big, dense, liberal city, you're an undeducated redneck barbarian?"
"Palin is from a rural area, and she's a bitch. Therefore, everyone from such places is as bad as she is".
I don't like the woman either. But what the hell does she have to do with the subject at hand, and how the hell do you generalize from her lone (poor) example to all the rest of us who aren't from your big "primary America" cities?
The meek may inherit the earth, but the strong shall take the stars.
I live in Minnesota, and I will say that in the spring and summer, especially when I'm outside, my mood is lifted considerably. There's nothing like summer in Minnesota; it's heavenly. The winters can be brutal, though.
but: if you have bad job, you can change jobs. Slavery has been abolished. The same thing goes for your friends (find/make new ones) or your location. If your full of shit yourself, you perceive everything else as shitty. If you drive away your worthwhile friends because you treat them like shit, you will be left with the ones that treat you like shit too.
It is very easy to blame everything on something external, but you will not get ahead with such an attitude. You are an adult (supposedly) so you are the one responsible to take care of yourself, not someone else. If you sit tight and blame the world, very little will change in your world.
So in your shitty case: find a good therapist and a good plumber, and just talk about your problems and your feelings. Just that thing alone eases your suffering, and after a while you will find the right thing to do with your life. Like moving to North Dakota.
This space is intentionally staring blankly at you
Ok, I'm from Wisconsin. It's miserable here for 4 months during Winter.
However, there are liquor stores and small neighborhood bars everywhere. When you're drunk, you don't notice that it's 20 below zero outside nor do you remember you decision to walk home to save gas.
By the time your hangove clears up, it's April and the tulips are busting through the ground.
So, you see, we are happy here!
Eh. Problem with that book is like many books in its genre. It seems really insightful until you think about the exceptions. And then you realize that there are so many exceptions to its "wisdom" that its not really that wise at all.
Any 'exceptions' you have discovered to ZMM's wisdom, I would bet, were derived based on contrivances of your making induced by the filtration your natural human senses have processed your experience with. That being said, if you understood the core of what ZMM was addressing, the general scheme it was introducing, you would realize that it is this filtration, and the inevitable contrivances thus developed by the human experience, that limit the perception of the true power of what was being discussed. That is, of quality. Please reread the book and start looking at the universe, at reality in general, from the top-down theme that it introduces, and you may find that so many of your so-called exceptions are entirely irrelevant, not to mention as I stated above, contrived based on your personal experience.
Motorcycles, Robots, Space Gossip and More!
How about how much money is present in the geography studied? And also about one's relative wealth: 'keeping up with the Joneses'. And the amount of average debt of people in the location? I'd imagine that these two factors definitely play a leading role in people's mood!
Alas, I cannot mod this "funny" because I already posted under this article.
I grew up in the country, asshole.
I think I'm qualified to comment.
If you can't see the value in jet powered ants you should turn in your nerd card. - Dunbal (464142)
I live in Minnesota and I am happier in the summer when i can look outside and see green leaves. The winter can be ugly in the city.
The Official Site of 1337 Pwnage
Although not completely without merit at times, this is one of the most disturbing and thickening bigoted PoS I read in quite a while...
The psychiatrist that all Slashdotters know...
( :
try it: categorically renounce some particular dimension of materialism/consumerism, and then hammer that into your friends/associates, give them ZERO feedback when they push such mind-eating garbage into your awareness, and their lack of feedback-loop will kill that "pleasure" from them, and they'll give you the space for heart-worth you want!
Blessings,
-a miscellaneous buddhist
Small psychic distance between people has its problems as well as benefits, I think that's true. But I also think the idea that the secondary America fits the political stereotypical rural-urban dichotomy is problematic, and while Palin was able to manipulate a certain identity, I especially think that the idea that Sarah Palin accurately represents it is false. For one thing, there were no shortage of people from Wasilla who were ready to criticize her. That may be different from how the rest of the country responded to their idea with her, but the responses through the rest of the country were as much an artifact of the primary America media filters as anything else. There's also considerable indication that Palin had been living herself inside the primary America narrative herself for a while -- accounts of her run for mayor strongly suggest that she abandoned local policy-focused politics and instead brought in the national culture war narratives.
Tweet, tweet.
http://www.nmha.org/go/state-ranking
I live in Nevada ranked #47 on the list. I don't feel depressed but I play with Dune Buggies all day.
"The Most Fun Possible on 4 wheels" is at SunBuggy in Las Vegas
So you're a self-hating Jew? That sure is better than some random guy who hates Jews.
Your post was twice as insightful as the original, but I have no mod points.
I support the Slashcott and will not be reading or commenting from 2/10/14 to 2/17/14. Beta is steaming pile of dog shit
Condescending I may be, but your 'shitty job shitty friends, it's not my fault' post gave very little to look up too, IMHO. That projected quite a bad image of you to which I reacted. It is up to you to realize and do something about that.
Good luck.
This space is intentionally staring blankly at you
That sounds about right.
I am usually happy, except when I drive on the highway.
For example, currently I'm in a building with low Room, and obviously my mood is going into the red. Strangely, my Bladder is going up quickly in here too.
At home, I have high Room, and my mood is usually quite green.
I'm a leaf on the wind, watch how I soar...
-Lucy-