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What gives anyone the right to be unhappy when there always someone worse off?

/DG/

silentigata ano (profile)
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There is many a time when people say that you have no right to feel unhappy because of the "starving children in Africa" or something similar.

This raises an interesting point, though.
 

UniqueMixture

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Happiness and unhappiness are at least to some degree biological processes. When a person is depressed it is often because they are under a lot of stress then their brain releases adrenaline and cortisol for a period of time. If the period of time is sufficiently long (between 3 and 6 months for most adults) the high cortisol levels lead to feelings of fatigue and sadness and a sense of powerlessness. The person literally functions differently. This is what gives people the right to be depressed (ie the reality that feelings to some extent are not chosen they HAPPEN).
 

Z Buck McFate

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While there's a good point in there to consider- because a lot of times unhappiness can be the result of taking things for granted, and reflecting on that which we have in abundance but forget to appreciate can indeed help us be happier- it's not like realizing that will instantly mean all our own needs are being met. Pointing out that there are people somewhere who don’t have food isn’t going to help someone whose primary problem is an inability to connect with others directly around them.
 

dala

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Does this also mean that if I haven't eaten for the past day I shouldn't be hungry, because someone in Africa hasn't eaten in the last week?
 

JivinJeffJones

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What gives anyone the right to be happy when there's always someone better off?
 

skylights

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People who say those sorts of things are usually well-meaning but unhelpful.
 

Siúil a Rúin

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I've always been confused when people say you have no right to be unhappy because others are suffering. Oh, others are suffering and starving... that reminds me to be happy?

I think we are much more reactionary than we'd like to think. It feels better to assume we have unlimited free-will to control our lives and outcomes, but there is no proof of this assumption. When there is unhappiness, it seems more productive to look for the root causes and correct these. Is it a chemical imbalance? Psychological issue? Poor nutrition? Mind games have never worked for me. I can't fool myself into feeling something, and have found the problem solving approach to be much more efficient.
 

Night

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Emotions are transient. They happen in the moment and change with the stimuli in our environment. Barring biochemical defects, it's unusual to not experience most every emotion at some point during your daily/weekly life. Emotions serve as warning signals that we need to pay attention to something happening around us. The circumstance - and how we see it - then determines the emotion and the depth we feel it.

To your question, why do people feel sadness at personal circumstance despite greater problems elsewhere is an interesting one. You'd think folks could reason away their typical frustrations when considering starving children or abused, oppressed peoples abroad, but we don't take perceptual account that way. By default, most favor their needs first and can easily justify being angry or upset - even after thinking about how hard other people have it.

Emotions are all relative and don't scale to an absolute metric. So, it's not wrong to overvalue your problems even when they really don't matter when weighed against egregious problems others face; you're just taking care of yourself in the moment.

Having patience with this makes you less prone to erratically move into a negative emotional state, but it won't prevent its recurrence at some point or another.
 

Salomé

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I've always been confused when people say you have no right to be unhappy because others are suffering. Oh, others are suffering and starving... that reminds me to be happy?
I've always held the belief that to manage to be happy when others around you are not (and I mean this in a global sense) is an indication of something lacking in one's character.

Also, I think questions of "rights" don't apply when it comes to internal states. No one can legislate for those. Even the US constitution only offers the right to the pursuit of happiness. If pursuing happiness is every person's right, then the fact that so many are denied that right is going to occasionally put a damper on your day. Unless you're entirely egocentric, that is.
 

Little_Sticks

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I suppose if you base yourself off of others a lot, this would help, because you would have direct reason to feel better.

Consider a marathon, where runners train long and hard. Let's say the deviation between the fastest and slowest runner is 5 seconds and there are 100 runners. The slowest runner may realize that he didn't do much differently than the others and feel happy with his/her accomplishments. But on the other hand, he/she may only see the strict competitive ranking with other people and find that makes them unhappy to be on the bottom of rankings.

I guess it depends on where you stand philosophically, as to whether or not this would help?
 

Snoopy22

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It’s an attempt to control someone with an irrelevant fact. Used against young people more then the old.
 

sprinkles

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The observation that somebody is always worse off can be a positive tool for encouragement, but when it is framed with 'what gives you the right to blah blah blah' it becomes a negative tool of fault-finding and tearing down others.

What gives anyone the right to comment about something like this in the first place?

My answer to that particular question is "I feel what I feel and I do what I do and I gives a jolly rancher fuck."


Watermelon, bish.
 

Isis

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I believe happiness is a choice. Attitude is a choice. I do think people have a tendency towards negatives behaviors like selfishishness and having a "me me me" mentality. Placing blame outside oneself. There is jealousy and worrying about what others have or are doing when they really should be minding their own business.

Yes- there are people pretty damn well bad off. And people that remain in a "whoa is me" mindset are a drag.
 

Magic Poriferan

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My response to that usually goes something like this: "Great, on top of everything I was upset about, you've just reminded me there are children starving in Africa".

It's hard for me to understand this point. I can't even connect A to B. Why does the other person being miserable mean I shouldn't be? I don't really think happiness is that much of a deliberate choice, anyhow.

But how about this? Those starving kids in Africa should really cheer up, because there are people being subjected to entire lives of torture in North Korea. What brats!
 

tkae.

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Nothing gives you the right to judge a person based on the situation of another person.

It's an extremely short-sighted and fallacious attitude to directly compare a person's inner, emotional health to their material possessions. Beyond that, our experiences are unique, and it does nothing to ease our pain that another person has been in more pain before us. Unless we have a hive mind (which we don't), two peoples' experiences have nothing to do with each other.

If a person can have all the money in the world and still be miserable. To dehumanize them in that way boils down to sheer jealousy of what they have. You resent them for having a higher "standard of living" than you and you take it out on them by depriving them of their humanness in your eyes.

You're the lesser person for it.
 

tkae.

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I believe happiness is a choice. Attitude is a choice. I do think people have a tendency towards negatives behaviors like selfishishness and having a "me me me" mentality. Placing blame outside oneself. There is jealousy and worrying about what others have or are doing when they really should be minding their own business.

Yes- there are people pretty damn well bad off. And people that remain in a "whoa is me" mindset are a drag.

I know, right?

Those relatives of 9-11 victims need to just suck it up already.

:dry:
 

PrincessButtercup

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I've always held the belief that to manage to be happy when others around you are not (and I mean this in a global sense) is an indication of something lacking in one's character.
Why? Will my unhappiness improve their lot in life?

I believe that to have an attitude of happiness no matter what is a sign of great character.

When my son died last year I had to choose to overcome the grief. I know parents who lost children several years ago and they never got over it. My son died. I didn't. I choose life. And life means joy and happiness in spite of sorrow.

My goodness, if I wait until sorrow and anguish and suffering are gone from this earth before I am happy, I will never be happy.
 

PrincessButtercup

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Now, to answer the question of what gives anyone the right to be unhappy when there is always someone worse off?

We all have the right to be unhappy.

Period.

We do not have to earn it through sorrow or anything else.

We also all have the right to not associate with chronically unhappy people.

I will never tell somebody they do not have the right to be unhappy. I respect people far too much.
 
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