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Comment by harimau777 | Hacker News Reader

I suspect there's a number of factors:

If you are comparing to the population of the world as a whole, then I suspect that's because many people in poorer regions simply don't have access to therapy.

If you are comparing to wealthy industrialized nations (e.g. Western Europe and Scandinavia) then I suspect that America's lack of work life balance, lack of social safety net, repressive moral culture, high gun violence, etc. play a role.

I suspect that in some cultures people like pastors and family members play some of the role of therapists to a greater degree than in America.

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> I suspect that America's lack of work life balance, lack of social safety net, repressive moral culture, high gun violence

Are Americans in therapy directly affected by those issues, or - how can I put this - merely worried about those issues in general terms?

The Economist wrote recently about how political views appear to affect mental health in the USA. The title feels unnecessarily inflammatory, for which I apologise, the article's content feels much more balanced.

https://www.economist.com/united-states/2024/04/04/are-ameri... ( https://archive.is/iWAaP )

What do you mean by "directly affected?" The lack of a social safety net makes me worry about myself (and loved ones) and what might happen in the event of severe job loss or health misfortune. In my city I see people living on the streets almost every day - it is a recurring reminder of the thin line.

Almost by definition, anyone who is directly suffering from the lack of a safety net -- because they are falling through where it would be, and living on the street -- is unable to gain access to therapy, because they wouldn't have money to pay for it.

From OP's linked article:

>It is possible that liberalism does not just correlate with sadness but may exacerbate it. Musa al-Gharbi, a sociologist at Stony Brook University, has noted that educated, affluent white liberals have come to endorse the idea that America is systemically racist, leading them to view other racial and ethnic groups more warmly than their own. “This tension—being part of a group that one hates—creates strong dissociative pressures on many white liberals,” he wrote in the journal American Affairs. Another hypothesis, advanced by Jonathan Haidt, a social psychologist, and Greg Lukianoff, a lawyer, is that liberals are performing a reverse cognitive behavioural therapy on themselves: promoting not resilience and optimism about incrementally improving the world but catastrophic rumination about problems such as climate change and fearfulness of disagreement even on university campuses. Such habits of mind can deepen depression.

> leading them to view other racial and ethnic groups more warmly than their own

I smell Great Replacement Theory bullshit. Even liberal white people still like white people. Even "diverse" shows have white people. Even comparatively less-racist places STILL have an advantage for white people.

This just isn't real. Sorry, it's made up.

Personally, one of the biggest factors that impacts my quality of life is not my own financial problems but my friends' problems. E.g. having enough money to eat out isn't much good if no one else can go with you. It's hard to have fun when your friends are worried about making ends meet. Etc.

So even if it doesn't happen to them, it may directly effect them.

This comment strikes me as unintentionally helpful in understanding the problem.

"Gun violence" is of course factually a non-issue in America. Being scared of guns is like being scared of shark attacks or being struck by lightning- technically possible, but realistically such a small risk for the average person that it rounds to 0. But, if you follow certain news or get your social media algorithms tuned to show you certain content, it can seem like this big scary thing.

I also can't really fathom what "repressive moral culture" someone is imagining in America today. There has never been a time of greater tolerance for diverse sexual expression, recreational drug use, religious freedoms or alternative lifestyles. In 2024 you can be a tattooed queer polyamorist pagan who goes to Burning Man for a week and then returns to your corporate finance job on Monday.

But, all the "content for you" algorithms everywhere on the internet will have huge swaths of people afraid of their neighbor and society at large and believing they're under attack and marginalized.

I think this may depend on where in the US you live. In the South, a real consideration in interactions is "what if this person decides to shoot me" likewise behaving in a way that is perceived as immoral (read: queer) is a great way to lose your job or (if you are a minor) be thrown out of your home.

Since guns are the leading causes of death for children in the US, I don't think gun violence is correctly considered a non-issue. Comparing it to lightning is laughable.

Around 80 deaths per year, including adults and children, by lightning strikes. Versus 120 deaths by guns PER DAY, including adults and children.

https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/72/wr/pdfs/mm7250-H.pdf https://wonder.cdc.gov/mcd.html

Additionally, when most of ones accessible news sources are full to the brim with polarizing topics, this leaves with limited options. I'd venture a guess that most people would like to hear what is going on in the world around them, even if the news is as negative as it is.

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