Posted on 02/01/2011 5:35:52 AM PST by Kaslin
Did you know liberals aren't as happy as conservatives? Of course, you did. How could you not know it after listening to them incessantly wail, gripe, whine, and complain about everything? But, let's bring....drumroll, please -- the science! First, here's the Pew Research comparison between Republicans and Democrats:
The survey, released this week, points out several disparities based on lifestyle, beliefs and political persuasion:
* Republicans are happier than Democrats.
* People who worship frequently are happier than those who don't.
* The rich are happier than the poor.
* Whites and Hispanics are happier than blacks.
* Married people are happier than the unmarried...
About 45 percent of Republicans said they were very happy, compared with 30 percent of Democrats. Republicans have been happier in surveys going back to 1972, the Pew study notes.
Here’s more from Arthur Brooks:
In 2004, people who said they were conservative or very conservative were nearly twice as likely to say they were very happy as people who called themselves liberal or very liberal (44 percent versus 25 percent). Conservatives were only half as likely to say they were not too happy (9 versus 18 percent). Political conservatives were also far less likely than liberals to express maladjustment to their adult lives. For example, adults on the political right were only half as likely as those on the left to say, “at times, I think I am no good at all.” They were also less likely to say they were dissatisfied with themselves, that they were inclined to feel like a failure, or to be pessimistic about their futures. Further, a 2007 survey found that 58 percent of Republicans rated their mental health as “excellent,” versus 43 percent of political independents and just 38 percent of Democrats.
Want to be a miserable person? Be a liberal. Want to have a happy life? Be a conservative. Why is that the case? There are a number of reasons for it.
1) Conservatives believe in personal responsibility: One of the tragic facts of life is that nobody cares as much about you as you do. That's why, if you want to have a good life and be a happy person, you're going to have to take care of it yourself. Conservatives get this. Liberals? Not so much.
Liberals spend a lot of time playing the victim and trying to come up with ways to get someone else to fix their lives. "Well, if the government forced some rich guy to give me more of his money, then all my problems would be solved! If our society could just make this change, then we could all dance in the moonlight with faeries and unicorns! If the government just added one more program, then we could teach the world to sing in perfect harmony, hold it in our arms, and keep it company!"
One of the biggest keys to happiness is accepting that if you want to be happy, you need to take personal responsibility for everything in your life so you can do something about it. On the other hand, you want to be unhappy? Act like liberals and expect other people to show up and fix your problems.
2) Conservatives are more religious than liberals: There's a school of thought, largely embraced by liberals, that says religion is an archaic, largely arbitrary set of rules that do little more than keep you from doing all the "fun stuff" in life. That view leads to not taking your religious views very seriously at best and atheism or agnosticism at worst.
On the other hand, here's an alternate view, one that many conservatives hold. Religion, particularly Christianity, isn't out-of-date or arbitrary at all. Moreover, religion doesn't keep you from doing all the "fun stuff" so much as it keeps you from committing sins that may be fun for a season, but ultimately end in sorrow.
We're right, they're wrong and that's another big reason why so many of us are happy and so many of them are not.
3) Conservatives are more likely than liberals to get married: Despite everything you hear about divorce and unhappy marriages, people who are married are much more likely to be happy than those who are single:
In 2004, 42 percent of married Americans said they were very happy. Only 23 percent of never-married people said this, as well as 20 percent ofthose who were widowed, 17 percent of divorced people, and 11 percent of those who were separated (but not divorced) from their spouses. Married people were six times more likely to say they were very happy than they were to say they were not too happy.
Conservatives tend to place a considerably higher value on marriage than liberals do. To conservatives, marriage is the bedrock of society, whereas to liberals, it's not all that important. This is one of the reasons we have huge battles over gay marriage. Conservatives think it's dangerous for society to tinker with such an important tradition while liberals don't think marriage is all that valuable. It's also why "conservatives are twice as likely to be married."
Twice as likely? Why, it's almost as if conservatives believe all that stuff they're saying about marriage being the "bedrock of our society.” Too bad liberals don't look at it the same way. They'd be happier people.
4) Liberalism just doesn't work very well in the real world: If you spend your whole life advocating ideas that make people's lives worse, that fall apart at the first touch of reality, and that rely on a government that's inevitably slow, stupid, and ineffective, it's not going to be conducive to your happiness. Liberal policies are candy-coated rat poison that may appear appealing at first, but inevitably do a lot of damage to everyone impacted by them. That's what happens when you back political policies based on how they make you feel about yourself.
Conservatives don't have that problem. We support policies based on what works. The better you understand the world and how it works, the easier life is going to be for you. On the other hand, if you spend your whole life trying to slam a square peg into a round hole, it's not likely to lead to contentment.
5) Liberalism has turned into an extraordinarily harsh, divisive, angry ideology: As a political philosophy, liberalism is centered around hatred and divisiveness. Liberals don't promote their ideas so much as they try to turn people against those who get in the way of their ideas.
Liberals lie to minorities and tell them that conservatives hate them, they tell women that men hate them, they tell the poor they should hate the rich. They try to pit the successful against the unsuccessful, the workers against the corporations -- and they regularly talk about their own country like it is one of the most godawful places on earth. That means liberals are, at best, extraordinarily cynical people who're willing to manipulate people for political gain -- and at worst, it means that they believe all this nonsense, which would make the world seem to be a very unpleasant place indeed. If you spend your life seething over a litany of grievances you've created from scratch in your own head, then you're probably going to be an Eeyore instead of floating on Cloud 9.
I think the #1 reason most liberals are miserable is because they became aware their mothers would have aborted them had their just been enough cheap abortion mills around to service them.
X out Noonan
A number of years ago, he was whinning and complaining how he couldn't deal with the cold and snow anymore, and was thinking of moving to Az. He was probably about 35 at the time.
He's a dealership auto mechanic, so he works indoors. He would go on and on and on about how terrible winters were, and the driving and the shoveling and this and that.
When he finally stopped, and I imagine, waited for me to share my woes of winter with him, I explained that I work in construction...OUTSIDE, often 200' up on a tower, with a wind blowing at 30-50mph, sometimes my days are 10-12 hours long. I often drive 65-75 miles as to his 20.
And that when I go on vacation, I go to Colorado...to ski and maybe snowmobile.
When something gets a little to hard to do, he throws up his hand or throws a tool or just throws a hissy fit, and announces to everyone that he can't do it. I've done many projects with/for him where "I knew how" to do it and he didn't and couldn't. Never mind that it wasn't my line of work and no one ever taught me.
There are probably 2 words I've heard from him more than any others "I CAAAAN'T" (WAAAAAAAH), then he gets mad. Mad at himself, because he's so stupid. Mad at others, because its not his fault. Mad at others because nobody taught him. Mad at others because nobody will help.
He is what I think of, when I think of a liberal. Always whinning and complaining about something. And everything that is wrong in life, or just the slight bit difficult, is ALWAYS somebody's fault.
I don't suffer from insanity...
I enjoy every minute of it.
Go to a Kos thread the home for depressed white liberals lashing out and inciting others to lash out in mindless rage, its an advertisement for anti-depressants.
bump
When you realize that life is just not random happenings, but that God works out all things for good, for all that know and love him.
How much of what makes people angry is envy or covetousness? THEY have this, or THEY have that. SHE's prettier. HE's smarter. HIS life is better. THEIR life is easier.
Never any contentment in Gods sovereignty, and who, what, how or why God created them.
Not ONLY is there no contentment, there is NO THANKFULLNESS.
FOR ANYTHING.
LIFE OWES...THEM
I’m basically happy unless I think about Obama and what liberalism has done to our country.
Then I’m cranky for a while.
I could write something here, but it's already been done:
18: For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who hold the truth in unrighteousness;
19: Because that which may be known of God is manifest in them; for God hath shewed it unto them.
20: For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse:
21: Because that, when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened.
22: Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools,
23: And changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and fourfooted beasts, and creeping things.
24: Wherefore God also gave them up to uncleanness through the lusts of their own hearts, to dishonour their own bodies between themselves:
25: Who changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshipped and served the creature more than the Creator, who is blessed for ever. Amen.
26: For this cause God gave them up unto vile affections: for even their women did change the natural use into that which is against nature:
27: And likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust one toward another; men with men working that which is unseemly, and receiving in themselves that recompence of their error which was meet.
28: And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not convenient;
29: Being filled with all unrighteousness, fornication, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness; full of envy, murder, debate, deceit, malignity; whisperers,
30: Backbiters, haters of God, despiteful, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents,
31: Without understanding, covenantbreakers, without natural affection, implacable, unmerciful:
32: Who knowing the judgment of God, that they which commit such things are worthy of death, not only do the same, but have pleasure in them that do them.
Some things never change.
Excellent, insightful post.
also why don’t you replace laura bush with michelle bachmann while you’re at it.
I disagree with number 2. Many liberals are quite religious. Some are Catholic, or belong to one of those touchy-feely churches who concentrate on Jesus’ tendency to feed the poor and hobnob with the homeless and destitute.
AGREED!
Must add Michelle Bachmann and Kristi Noem also.
Of course, you could add hundreds more attractive conservative females, and also there is an unlimited list of very ugly liberal females.
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