Most emotional: The Philippines. Least emotional: Singapore.
Self-reporting, so I question whether they've really measured emotion. One question was: "Did you smile or laugh a lot yesterday?" Depends on the meaning of "a lot," the vividness of memories of "yesterday," whether you smile and laugh when you're feeling joyful, and so forth. But... whatever. It was nice to see a color-coded map.
It made me smile.
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25 comments:
Unemotional nations make me want to cry.
Emotions are illegal in Singapore.
Too messy!
Having been to the Philippines, I can say that this is consistent with my observations.
Yes, God bless them, Filipinos are wildly emotional!
Incredibly romantic, too!
I guess Lithuanians will have to stop saying, "colder than a Finn."
So your Sunday reading goes isteve then kaus very interesting.
Well, I dunno. I recall someone reporting of Russians who got the chance to watch Doctor Zhivago when it came out laughing during some scenes because the characters were so restrained and undemonstrative. Very English, very much not Russian. I also thought the question about smiling was off. Everyone knows Americans are just weird about smiling. Photograph a murderer before execution, he's got a big smile for the camera. I suspect the survey was not that good an instrument for the task.
What? I always regarded Japanese as stoic. They had to be, condensed like that. Honestly. If emotions were to burst there'd be a torrent. Ergo sake. A very weird alcohol most like wine and most like beer but unlike wine and unlike beer.
Wine converts sugar to alcohol and co2 and , beer converts starch to sugar to alcohol and co2, while sake converts sugar and starch simultaneously.
It's alcohol content is much higher than both wine and beer.
And it's effect is unpredictable, it seems to me, similar to tequila that way. Japanese men would be druuuuuuuuunk late at night stumbling all about the Tokyo back streets and there's no telling what they'd turn into.
But still stoic nonetheless under regular circumstances.
The father sits there and looks straight ahead while a child acts out in public, and it's up to the mum to sort that, not the dad, it's not his warrior role. That' s what I noticed. I think the dad takes over later. Maybe. I'm not sure about that.
While I expected all Central and South America to be full on purple. The telenovelas are so excesivamente emocional, no lo puedo creer. So melodramatic they're unbelievable. Incredible. That is, lack credibility.
But I do pick up some good phrases.
"Ex QUE zah may"
I didin't know it can be said like that.
And I understand in Denmark smiling is considered silly, insincere, daft.
And check out the difference in birth rates as well.
When we start looking like the Russkies, you'll know Dictator Zero has won.
What? I always regarded Japanese as stoic. They had to be, condensed like that."
"Stoic" does not mean lacking emotions...it merely means the person or persons keeps his or her (or their) emotions hidden beneath an impassive exterior.
The Japanese have careful social protocols because they're such a crowded society--as you mention--but such protocols would be unnecessary if they, as a people, were truly unemotional. The combination of emotional volatility and lots of people crowded into small spaces is a recipe for chronic conflict and violence--as we see in our prisons--and strict codes of behavior serve to mitigate such conflict, ensuring a more cohesive and functional society.
I don't know, but I'm guessing the drunkenness one sees in Japanese salary-men is aother aspect of the social code: it is a codified group experience: as everyone gets drunk and misbehaves--and is expected to--no one is embarrassed or loses face for the being the lone drunkard, and it seems to be a socially acceptable way for them to release their pent-up emotions, as they can blame their misbehavior on the alcohol, thus absolving themselves from personal responsibility and shame.
"The combination of emotional volatility and lots of people crowded into small spaces is a recipe for chronic conflict and violence--as we see in our prisons"
-- Funny, I would have jumped to "as we see in our inner cities" and used that as an explanation for why we should be building out more from cities and trying to break up our population dense, crime-rich areas. That, of course, would require us to do a lot of new construction, which would also increase the available number of homes, increasing supply to meet the demand, while also supplying these homes in less expensive areas, driving down the demand in those areas closest to the cities as we wrested power from them by spreading out the population.
Or, you know, we could point to prisons, a self-selected population of violent people, or at least, people we know are pre-disposed toward flouting society's conventions.
Actually, we would be better off if our population started moving back into the cities...they're much more energy and resource efficient ways to organize communities...and not nearly so violent as you have been led to believe from watching television.
To the degree there is violence in inner cities, it is driven more by poverty than by crowding, as such.
They are only more energy- and resource-efficient because we don't actually use the rest of the space in the area well. And, yes. I lived in Oxen Hill around D.C., they're about as violent as I've been lead to believe by living in them.
The poverty is caused, in part, by the over-crowding and the incompetence in city governments.
Actually, we would be better off if our population started moving back into the cities
I would love to live in the city, but my neighbors have a pool, and I have a lovely backyard, and a two-car garage, and a basement with storage, and my kids go to great schools, and I can go on pastoral bike rides, and ...
"I would love to live in the city, but my neighbors have a pool, and I have a lovely backyard, and a two-car garage...."
You illustrate my point about the resource inefficiencies of suburban living.
Cities have a variety of inefficiencies. What do you think the cost is to ship the vast amounts of food, electricity, water and other goods from where they originate to the cities? What do you think the cost is to do recovery work after disasters in cities?
This is, again, one of my issues with cities. All the things people want to do to fix cities (create more green space, have more home-grown food, etc., etc.) all work together to, essentially, create the suburbs. Except we don't stick 400 people on top of each other in substandard apartment homes, we spread them out so they can each have a home and some space of their own.
"Cities have a variety of inefficiencies."
I don't claim cities are entirely free of inefficiencies. No human endeavor is.
"...we don't stick 400 people on top of each other in substandard apartment homes, we spread them out so they can each have a home and some space of their own."
Why do you assume apartment homes are "sub-standard?" According to what standard? I live in an apartment building in Manhattan that probably houses at least 400 people, and I prefer living here to most suburban homes I've been in.
If I need to go to the supermarket or pharmacy I don't need to get in a car (or SUV!) to drive there, I can walk a block or two in any direction and find what I need.
While I don't deny having one's own home on a private plot of land has its own appeal and pleasures, whole communities of people living this way is extremely wasteful of resources.
Robert Cook said...
Actually, we would be better off if our population started moving back into the cities...they're much more energy and resource efficient ways to organize communities...and not nearly so violent as you have been led to believe from watching television.
You'll have to go for a stroll through North Philly sometime.
But don't wear earrings. You can get killed for them.
"If I need to go to the supermarket or pharmacy I don't need to get in a car (or SUV!) to drive there, I can walk a block or two in any direction and find what I need."
-- Note: The food did not spontaneously appear in that pharmacy or supermarket. Which is, kind of my point. Yes, it is more efficient for -you- that you can walk over there and buy things. But, what strain is being put on everything else to subsidize the lifestyle of city dwellers to constantly send them piles of resources?
"Note: The food did not spontaneously appear in that pharmacy or supermarket. Which is, kind of my point. Yes, it is more efficient for -you- that you can walk over there and buy things. But, what strain is being put on everything else to subsidize the lifestyle of city dwellers to constantly send them piles of resources?"
And neither does the food in suburban supermarkets spontaneously appear there. Not every suburb is surrounded by farmland that serves that locale...in fact, most aren't.
Multiply my walking to the market by all the other city dwellers who do; it is not just more efficient for me, but for everyone who lives in cities!
Edutcher,
I've lived in NYC for over 30 years, including during the very hairy "crack epidemic" days of the 80s.
I never felt in danger in traveling about from home to work and back...or in general. Yes, there were parts of the city one would advisably avoid or be careful in, but these were the areas worst stricken with poverty.
It is not city crowding as such that leads to violence, as American city dwellers--just as the Japanese--have our own means of behaving cooperatively when living so close together.
The point is going over your head. We could make things very, very efficient for a more spread out population, reducing the overall amount of waste by reducing the amount of transportation of goods we need to do. But, the illusion of the city's efficiencies (along with some of their actual efficiencies) make it hard to figure that out.
The fact that cities and bad state and national governments have greatly gutted our manufacturing/production capabilities overall is part of why this is happening too. If we had more producers, then a more direct distribution channel would work. As we limit our producers and force mass importation, we make cities more efficient by, essentially, harming our overall economy.
There are good things about cities, but the efficiency myth is one that needs to just die.
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