Happiness mania, based on the idea that “Everybody oughta be happy, so let’s fix ’em” hit apogee recently, then broke open like a piñata. It was bound to happen. Reality does not welcome nonsense with open arms or even a touch of grace. It blows things up.

by David Stone

for Assorted Idea, Large & Small

What went off the track with happiness mania?

Frankly, everything did, and anyone with a clear head could see it coming. Evidence was right in front of us everyday. For example, when the most common reply to “Nice weather today” is “But it’s gonna rain later,” what makes you think people want to be happy. They don’t.

Let me emphasize: They just don’t.

The outrageousness of happiness mania hit peak when Yale cognitive scientist Laurie Santos took a leave of absence for “burnout.” But no, she pushed back against a reporter for the New York Times: “Back up, back up. I took a leave of absence because I’m trying not to burn out,” she said. “I know the signs of burnout.” Oh? And the difference is…

Her Yale class, Psychology and the Good Life, hit the spin cycle and couldn’t manage the velocity.

“Why are there so many happiness books and other happiness stuff and people are still not happy?” Santos asked the Times. “Because it takes work! Because it’s hard!”

Oh, boy. Happiness is too hard to teach? Maybe we’ve got a little too much Ivy League in the sauce.

What’s wrong?

Outside academic circles, you may have noticed something natural that happiness mania hopes to overturn. People so dislike the idea of being happy that they devote hours every week fighting it.

Have you seen the TV lineup recently? Show after show lines up to piss you off, scare you or convince you someone wants to kill you. One show on HBO Max, Euphoria, gets viewers so upset they have organized calming down parties. This is a show watched voluntarily.

Go to the internet and you find news headlines – today, that is – awash with stories about Russia invading Ukraine. It’s an important story, yes, but day after day after day at the top of Page One? Last week, it was a traffic jam in tiny Ottawa spun up to cataclysmic worldwide proportions. Next week, it’ll be another upsetting story. No good news, although plenty is available, will disrupt the despair party.

It’s like everyone tunes in for their daily dose of misery.

It’s the genetics, stupid!

You might wonder why people fear happiness, preferring fear and anxiety instead. It seems counterintuitive, but it isn’t, nor really. It’s burned into our genes. Down in the mouth types, over the millennia evolved with greater chances of survival. True, they probably had less sex, the reasons for which there is no reason to go into. But they were more likely to live into ripened old age.

Because fear is a powerful survival instinct.