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

Elfboy

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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.

because the assumption that one needs a justification for feeling a particular emotion is absurd. everyone feels dissatisfaction and frustration at times, it's part of being human.
 
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ReflecTcelfeR

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I believe it to be an exercise of humility... Albeit a poor example to pronounce.
 

Isis

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I know, right?

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

:dry:

So people should grieve the loss of loved ones their entire lives and be miserable? That is more honorable than having a positive attitude in life and lifting people up? And moving on beyond sadness to productiveness?

I hate the "whoa is me" crap people love to wager on themselves and using 9-11 to get your point across is disrespectful to the victims of 9-11. That's my pinyin.
 

Lark

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I think the right to either happiness or unhappiness is something that no one can interfer with or sanction and isnt likely to be responsive to any interference or sanction anyway.

The fact that some people have it worse is going to off set some peoples tendency to feel unhappy but to others its not going to matter, perhaps because of self-absorption or because what is being compared is apples and oranges.

A lot of the genuine cases of depression I've known wouldnt be releaved by plunging those same depressives into material hardship for instance, a lot of the time the symptoms of depression result in that or at least squalor when they occur in contexts in which material hardship isnt an issue to begin with.
 

RaptorWizard

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In an ideal society when one man suffers the whole city suffers and when one man feels joy the whole city feels joy since happiness is not perfect until it is shared.
 

Lark

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In an ideal society when one man suffers the whole city suffers and when one man feels joy the whole city feels joy since happiness is not perfect until it is shared.

That was Marx's ideal, that the full development of each become the precondition to the full development of all.
 
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Hate

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I believe happiness is a choice. Attitude is a choice.

Lol, yeah, right, tell that to the starving kids in Africa.

And while you’re at it, you might as well give them the book The Secret and tell them that with enough positive thinking and visualization that food will magically appear.

Your perspective is one of a person that comes from privilege.
 

PrincessButtercup

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Lol, yeah, right, tell that to the starving kids in Africa.

And while you’re at it, you might as well give them the book The Secret and tell them that with enough positive thinking and visualization that food will magically appear.

Your perspective is one of a person that comes from privilege.
May I ask - Are you implying that it is impossible to have a positive attitude when one is starving?
 

UniqueMixture

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May I ask - Are you implying that it is impossible to have a positive attitude when one is starving?

No, but it makes it less likely. This is why I hate religion and people like Ghandi. ONE exception to the rule and suddenly that is the standard. Wtf? Some children who are beaten by alcoholic parents turn out ok I guess this means we get a free pass on showing them compassion as well I mean it's their responsibility to turn lemons into lemonade and of course we all endure trials in our life because as we all know getting molested as a child is the equivalent of daddy and mommy not paying enough attention to you as a child pfft
 
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May I ask - Are you implying that it is impossible to have a positive attitude when one is starving?

Of course not, that would be logically stupid.

May I ask – have you ever endured extreme starvation, pain, and poverty for an extremely long period of time before? Go experience that first and then come back and tell me if happiness is as simple as making a choice. I read your above post, losing someone to death and overcoming grief is not the same thing as this; it’s not even in the same ballpark of difficulty.

What I quoted is a perspective that comes from privilege… it’s fluff… happiness is not as simple as making a choice. That perspective is in the same ballpark of nonsense as people that spout things like, “Love is all you need.” To hell with love, I don’t need that shit. I need food, water and shelter.

The clichés being used in this thread are fluff, they have no basis in actual reality, Princess.

Btw do you live in a castle?
 

Cellmold

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I would say it is impossible to remove people's subjective self-interest.

And using the desperate, unfortunate and downright awful situations of others around the world depends on what this is being used for. Sometimes as a perspective inducer it makes sense, other times it's very arrogant and disturbing, such as when first world mothers use starving African children as a tool to get their unruly brood to eat their vegetables.

As usual this is a question of personal judgement. But, do we ever pitch it right? Certainly not all the time, you have to pick the right time, whatever that happens to be....usually when a bunch of circumstances align at the right moment I would suppose.

And many of us may stop and think for a moment; a brief pause in our lives so that we can consider something elsewhere. But that moment soon passes...after all it is 'elsewhere' as previously mentioned. Out of sight, out of mind.

Im as guilty of this as anyone, no denial here. Unfortunately we find ourselves ignoring some humanitarian causes just because it is more comfortable to do so, it allows many of us to get on with our lives in a little bubble of half-ignorance. Is this wrong or right?

Morally it is both in my view, because there is shit in the world and hard times, we try our best, but the motives of ourselves and those around us are multifaceted monstrosities. Could I devote my life to a cause that I cannot see a true solution to? Isn't this just proof of my laziness and arrogance towards such causes?

Throwing money alone does nothing, but this is not a new insight, more of us would have to get our arses into gear and physically help set up infrastructures to support such places.

But we dont...because it is easier not to. Our lives are, for the most part, comfortable and it is hard to step outside of that for something you may not feel that strongly for. Because it is 'over there' not 'over here'. A letter's difference does a problem ours make.
 

Kierva

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Those kids in Africa have nothing to do with you. It's just a cheap tactic of guilt tripping.
 
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Riva

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This raises an interesting point, though.

Emotions are subjective feelings, not objective comparisons.

That's why.

Ps - Only read the OP.
 

PrincessButtercup

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No, but it makes it less likely. This is why I hate religion and people like Ghandi. ONE exception to the rule and suddenly that is the standard. Wtf? Some children who are beaten by alcoholic parents turn out ok I guess this means we get a free pass on showing them compassion as well I mean it's their responsibility to turn lemons into lemonade and of course we all endure trials in our life because as we all know getting molested as a child is the equivalent of daddy and mommy not paying enough attention to you as a child pfft
As someone who has lived through most of what you mention, I was a pretty miserable person for a lot of years because I was looking for compassion or someone outside of me to fix me or heal me or love me to wholeness. It wasn't until I realized that nobody else COULD do that for me, that I had to do that for myself that I began to heal and become whole. It was my pain and my scars, after all. Duh. If I wanted to be happy, I had to do the work. (by the way, that is why a lot of victims stay stuck in victim thinking. Angry that they have to do the work to heal when they were the ones wounded in the first place. Fair? Nope. Suck it up Buttercup. Sometimes it really does suck to be you.)

So, yeah, happiness and attitude are completely a choice.
 

PrincessButtercup

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Of course not, that would be logically stupid.

May I ask – have you ever endured extreme starvation, pain, and poverty for an extremely long period of time before? Go experience that first and then come back and tell me if happiness is as simple as making a choice. I read your above post, losing someone to death and overcoming grief is not the same thing as this; it’s not even in the same ballpark of difficulty.

What I quoted is a perspective that comes from privilege… it’s fluff… happiness is not as simple as making a choice. That perspective is in the same ballpark of nonsense as people that spout things like, “Love is all you need.” To hell with love, I don’t need that shit. I need food, water and shelter.

The clichés being used in this thread are fluff, they have no basis in actual reality, Princess.

Btw do you live in a castle?
I was going to leave it at my question above but I have changed my mind.

It seems to me that you are assuming that people going through hardship would not be positive, are you not?

Apparently you are not aware of the work of Viktor Frankl. He was a psychologist who survived the Holocaust. I believe that qualifies as hard times, don't you? He found that those who maintained a positive attitude and had hope for the future - a reason to live - fared much better than those who didn't.

Numerous studies have reinforced his work - that a positive attitude increases a person's chances of surviving and overcoming adversity.

At least those are the studies I wallpaper my castle with.
 

Isis

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Lol, yeah, right, tell that to the starving kids in Africa.

And while you’re at it, you might as well give them the book The Secret and tell them that with enough positive thinking and visualization that food will magically appear.

Your perspective is one of a person that comes from privilege.

lol Privilege I did not come from, I can assure you.
My perspective comes from FAITH in a higher being. In the belief that this earth is an illusion and the real life is in the hereafter. People that have turned against their creator get sad and feel sorry for themselves. I have seen people with nothing SMILE. THAT IS FAITH.

Happiness is a choice. Attitude is a choice.
 

UniqueMixture

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As someone who has lived through most of what you mention, I was a pretty miserable person for a lot of years because I was looking for compassion or someone outside of me to fix me or heal me or love me to wholeness. It wasn't until I realized that nobody else COULD do that for me, that I had to do that for myself that I began to heal and become whole. It was my pain and my scars, after all. Duh. If I wanted to be happy, I had to do the work. (by the way, that is why a lot of victims stay stuck in victim thinking. Angry that they have to do the work to heal when they were the ones wounded in the first place. Fair? Nope. Suck it up Buttercup. Sometimes it really does suck to be you.)

So, yeah, happiness and attitude are completely a choice.

Perhaps you should have more compassion on yourself. I know what it is to choose to go on after hard shit too and in my opinion that does not condone a cavalier attitude toward people who are still mired in that. Let's be honest, there are many turns on the road of life where we have to make that decision to get up and fucking fight again and again. People who do so in spite of their trials and when they cannot see any hope deserve more than "suck it up." When the going gets tough the tough get compassionate.

Also, regarding choice/faith blah blah. Let's be honest, the way a person's pfc developed impacts all of this and there is no one size fits all solution. The "free will"/"it's a choice" argument is completely naive drivel born out of mysticism due to gaps in understanding.
 

PrincessButtercup

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Perhaps you should have more compassion on yourself. I know what it is to choose to go on after hard shit too and in my opinion that does not condone a cavalier attitude toward people who are still mired in that. Let's be honest, there are many turns on the road of life where we have to make that decision to get up and fucking fight again and again. People who do so in spite of their trials and when they cannot see any hope deserve more than "suck it up." When the going gets tough the tough get compassionate.

Also, regarding choice/faith blah blah. Let's be honest, the way a person's pfc developed impacts all of this and there is no one size fits all solution. The "free will"/"it's a choice" argument is completely naive drivel born out of mysticism due to gaps in understanding.
I do not mean to sound cavalier. I have a sign over my sink which says, "Put your big girl panties on and deal with it." Self-pity is my worst enemy. This is how I fight it.

What do you mean by pfc? Actually can you expand a little more on what you mean by your entire second paragraph?
 

UniqueMixture

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I do not mean to sound cavalier. I have a sign over my sink which says, "Put your big girl panties on and deal with it." Self-pity is my worst enemy. This is how I fight it.

What do you mean by pfc? Actually can you expand a little more on what you mean by your entire second paragraph?

Well, I can definitely understand that and it's good not to wallow in self-pity, so I apologize if I was a bit harsh on you. By the pfc I mean the prefrontal cortex. While I am not a proponent of determinism and there environmental factors can impact its development as well and even that is just a small part of an even larger whole, the pfc is very important in many tasks involving self -restraint/self-regulation as well as making ethical connections and realizations such as thinking about the consequences of one's actions and feeling a sense of remorse for hurting another person.

I would recommend this: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1693445/
 
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