'Everybody has been helter-skelter heading for the bottom line'
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Q&A / PETER C. WHYBROW, Author
'Everybody has been helter-skelter heading for the bottom line'
>
> By RICHARD HALICKS
>The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
> Published on: 01/30/05
Remember the old George Carlin joke about the dimwitted seventh-grader asking questions of the parish priest in religion class? "Father, is it true that God's so powerful that he could make a rock so big that he himself could not pick it up?"
We've done some big rock-building of our own. An insightful new book tells us that we Americans are so smart, so industrious — and so profit-driven — that we've built a world so fast-paced and fabulous that we can no longer control it, or ourselves.
In "American Mania: When More Is not Enough," UCLA psychiatrist Dr. Peter Whybrow asserts that the mighty engine of our prosperity has overshot the rails and is descending into a train wreck of greed and unhappiness — a state known as dysphoria.
Dysphoria begins with happiness but quickly goes beyond it, veering into a sense of unease, anxiety and depression. That's what happens, Whybrow says, to people who are rewarded too much. Interestingly, he suggests that our immigrant heritage accounts for our compulsion to push for more. Migrants are by nature risk takers and reward seekers, and we've concentrated tens of millions of them in America.
"The migrant is extemely clever at sorting out complicated situations, especially when there's not much to work with," said Whybrow, British by birth but an American for the past quarter-century. "But we have no experience at working with affluence. We've created this extraordinary environment for ourselves, but it's totally different from anything we've ever experienced."
Q&A / PETER C. WHYBROW, Author
'Everybody has been helter-skelter heading for the bottom line'
>
> By RICHARD HALICKS
>The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
> Published on: 01/30/05
Remember the old George Carlin joke about the dimwitted seventh-grader asking questions of the parish priest in religion class? "Father, is it true that God's so powerful that he could make a rock so big that he himself could not pick it up?"
We've done some big rock-building of our own. An insightful new book tells us that we Americans are so smart, so industrious — and so profit-driven — that we've built a world so fast-paced and fabulous that we can no longer control it, or ourselves.
In "American Mania: When More Is not Enough," UCLA psychiatrist Dr. Peter Whybrow asserts that the mighty engine of our prosperity has overshot the rails and is descending into a train wreck of greed and unhappiness — a state known as dysphoria.
Dysphoria begins with happiness but quickly goes beyond it, veering into a sense of unease, anxiety and depression. That's what happens, Whybrow says, to people who are rewarded too much. Interestingly, he suggests that our immigrant heritage accounts for our compulsion to push for more. Migrants are by nature risk takers and reward seekers, and we've concentrated tens of millions of them in America.
"The migrant is extemely clever at sorting out complicated situations, especially when there's not much to work with," said Whybrow, British by birth but an American for the past quarter-century. "But we have no experience at working with affluence. We've created this extraordinary environment for ourselves, but it's totally different from anything we've ever experienced."
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