The Age of Absurdity: Why Modern Life Makes it Hard to Be Happy (2010)
Page 6
So the human capacity for self-deception is extraordinary – but there is another capacity that is even more impressive. The talent for self-justification is surely the finest flower of human evolution, the greatest achievement of the human brain. When it comes to justifying actions, every human being acquires the intelligence of an Einstein, the imagination of a Shakespeare and the subtlety of a Jesuit. One example that especially impressed me was the argument of a wife-beating husband who explained patiently that the punches and kicks requiring hospital treatment were a proof not of his own, but of his wife’s, atrocious behaviour – if a gentle soul such as he was driven to violence then the provocation must have been intolerable. And this was an intelligent, sensitive man, a well-known poet famed for his honesty, tolerance and love of women.
The classic experiment on self-justification was carried out over fifty years ago when a psychologist called Leon Festinger infiltrated a cult that was based on the belief that a flying saucer would arrive at midnight on 20 December 1954 to save true believers from the end of the world on 21 December. Many cult members left their jobs and gave away their savings and, on the evening of 20 December, gathered with their leader to await deliverance. When midnight came and went without a spaceship there was naturally a certain amount of apprehension. But at 4.45 a.m. the leader finally realized what had happened – the unshakeable faith of the true believers had caused the world to be spared: ‘Not since the beginning of time upon this Earth has there been such a force of Good and Light as now floods this room.’81 Hallelujah! The ecstatic group contacted the press to report a miracle and then rushed out into the streets to convert the unbelieving world.
So not only does irrefutable evidence fail to destroy a delusion; it can actually reinforce and intensify the false belief. For this astounding feat of mental trick cycling Festinger coined the drab term ‘cognitive dissonance’. Unable to tolerate two dissonant beliefs, the mind simply eliminates the more inconvenient of the two. And, whereas contradictory evidence is uncritically rejected, confirming evidence is uncritically accepted. If there happens to be no evidence either way, this too is taken as confirmation. I discovered this myself during the Troubles in Northern Ireland when an exultant group of nationalists informed me that, as result of a successful IRA action, the local hospital morgue was overflowing with the bullet-riddled bodies of British soldiers. ‘But there’s been nothing in the papers or on TV,’ I objected. They laughed in contempt at this naive response: ‘Exactly.’
No mental feat is too difficult for self-justification – and memory distortion is one of the easier tricks. As all dictators understand, those who wish to alter the future must first alter the past. So, ability to cope with the future is encouraged by exaggerating problems overcome in the past – hence the popularity of accusing parents of bullying or neglect; not only does this make the child seem more resourceful, it is a convenient way of attributing blame for any lingering imperfections. Our own past bad behaviour is, of course, conveniently suppressed. Nietzsche understood this: ‘‘I have done that,’ says my memory. ‘I cannot have done that,’ says my pride, and remains inexorable. Eventually memory yields.’82
And creating memories, even the most bizarrely implausible, is only a little more difficult than distortion. There are several million Americans who sincerely believe that they have been abducted by aliens.83 The clinical psychologist Susan Clancy interviewed several hundred of these ‘experiencers’, as they describe themselves, and found the same pattern. All of them had suffered from mental distress and dysfunction and then had had an alarming sleep experience – actually a phenomenon known as ‘sleep paralysis’ – which they subsequently explained by an abduction story. The aliens were then blamed for the original problems. As a woman suffering from sexual dysfunction explained, ‘I understand that it’s related to what the beings did to me. I was a sexual experiment to them from an early age.’84 This is an extreme way of evading responsibility – but it might cause less damage than blaming parents…unless the aliens get hold of Clancy’s interviews, realize that they have been made scapegoats and decide that, as innocent victims, they are entirely justified in mounting an alien invasion of the USA.
Of course, the experiencers are familiar with the scientific explanation and vigorously reject it (‘I swear to God, if someone brings up sleep paralysis one more time I’m going to puke’), greatly supported in this by mixing with fellow experiencers and sharing stories, for justification also operates at the group level. The ‘us-consciousness’ described by Sartre creates an overwhelming urge to justify anything done by Us and to condemn anything done by Them. Such Us⁄Them distinctions can be based on the most minor differences – and have been created artificially by researchers – but are strongest when the distinction is longstanding. Religion, of course, provides the ultimate differentiation, with a divinely anointed Us and a divinely damned Them. And anyone who has lived in a long-term conflict area will be familiar with the line, ‘Their atrocities are always so much more vile than ours’, or, from the more passionate group advocates, ‘Our atrocities were actually committed by Them to discredit W.
The perpetrators of violence often follow a cycle where the innocence of a victim requires a drastically contemptuous justification that actually intensifies the hatred and rage. So the more helpless the victim the more violent the attack, and the more desperate the need to re-establish moral superiority. Dictators invariably see themselves as self-sacrificing patriots working only for the good of their countries. The writer Louis Menand spotted a wonderful poster in the Haiti of the infamous Jean-Claude ‘Baby Doc’ Duvalier: ‘I should like to stand before the tribunal of history as the person who irreversibly founded democracy in Haiti – signed, Jean-Claude Duvalier, President-for-Life.’85
Of course novelists have always understood the subtleties of self-justification. There is a minor episode in War and Peace that is so convincingly horrifying it has stayed with me long after I have forgotten all the war scenes. After the battle of Borodino the Russian army, reneging on a solemn pledge, abandons Moscow to Napoleon – and anyone who can afford transport flees the city. A mob, angry at being duped and deserted, gathers outside the residence of the governor, Count Rostopchin. This shrewd official realizes that a scapegoat is needed and orders his soldiers to fetch a youth imprisoned for distributing leaflets criticizing the authorities. ‘This man,’ Rostopchin cries to the mob, ‘is the scoundrel who has lost us Moscow.’ But, when the youth is brought out, he is pitiful – shabby, emaciated, shuffling in leg irons. Worse still, he seems to expect justice and compassion: ‘Count,’ he pleads timidly, ‘there is one God who judges us.’ But Rostopchin, rather than being moved to mercy, is driven into a frenzy. ‘Cut him down,’ he screams at his men and, at a muttered command from an officer, a dragoon hits the youth on the head with the flat of his sword. The resulting cry of shock and pain incites the mob to finish the job. And, while they are distracted with beating and kicking the youth to death, Rostopchin makes his way through to the back of the residence and is borne away in a carriage with ‘swift horses’.
Then begins the work of self-justification. At first Rostopchin is sickened by his own cowardice and cruelty and chilled by the youth’s mention of God. But, little by little, he convinces himself that his behaviour was not only irreproachable, but necessary ‘for the public good’. As an individual he would have acted differently, but as governor it was essential to safeguard both the dignity of the office and the life of its current holder. Soon he is congratulating himself on so astutely killing two birds with one stone – appeasing the mob and punishing a criminal – and, by the time he reaches his country estates, he has ‘completely regained his composure’.86
But, if anything can be justified, what hope is there for self-knowledge and self-transformation? The psychologists point out that delusion, justification and righteousness are successful because they operate below consciousness. Once exposed to awareness they lose most of their power. This is, of cours
e, the understanding advocated by Buddha, Spinoza and Freud.
But psychology has identified another obstacle to change in the ‘set point’87, a kind of default setting or equilibrium state of the self. Schopenhauer defined this as ‘our primary and inborn character’.88 So even the effects of something as positive as winning a lottery or as negative as paralysis will eventually wear off. The time limit for extreme effects is a year or so; after lesser disturbances we revert much more quickly. This explains why we always overestimate the impact of future events – we are never as happy or as miserable as we expect to be. In other words, our natural temperament is always reasserting itself; people can get used to almost anything. In Kafka’s Metamorphosis Gregor Samsa experiences only ‘slight annoyance’ about turning into an insect and is soon scampering happily across the ceiling of his bedroom.
But there are interesting exceptions that resist the gravitational pull of the set point. On the positive side, cosmetic surgery is reported to have a long-term beneficial effect that refuses to fade.89 So perhaps I should pay more attention to those emails promising a penis capable of extra duty as a backscratcher. And on the negative side, no one ever learns to tolerate excessive noise. This was surprising at first but soon made sense. I like to think of myself as a strong-minded individual who can withstand heavy psychological pressure – but any malign regime wishing to break me would have only to lock me in a room and play loud rap music. After a few hours I would betray my wife, daughter, friends and every ideal I have ever held dear.
This apparent fixity of the set point has led to claims that it is genetically determined. David Lykken and Auke Tellegen analysed the long-term moods and traits of several thousand sets of twins, and concluded that the subjective well-being of identical twins was similar whether they had been reared together or separated, whereas this was not true for non-identical twins.
Lykken’s conclusion was unequivocal: ‘Nearly 100 percent of the variation across people in the happiness set point seems to be due to individual differences in genetic makeup.’90 So there was a further conclusion: ‘trying to be happier is like trying to be taller’ – hence The New Yorker cartoon showing two middle-aged men in leisurewear sipping cocktails in front of a fake château, with one saying to the other, ‘I could cry when I think of the years I wasted accumulating money, only to learn that my cheerful disposition is genetic.’91
There are several possible objections to Lykken’s conclusions. Firstly, there is the difficulty of measuring accurately something as abstract as a psychological set point. Then the study does not seem to have considered, much less investigated, deliberate attempts to move the set point. Those in the study may have been as fatalistic as most people in accepting their temperament, but what would be the effect of a conscious, informed, determined and prolonged attempt to alter the default state? In fact, there is a physical equivalent to the psychological set point – the biochemical equilibrium state that our bodies maintain in a regulatory system known as homeostasis, a sort of thermostat effect. But as the neurobiologist Steven Rose has explained, these default values are not permanent: ‘The set points around which the moment-by-moment fluctuations in an individual’s biochemistry oscillate on the microscale themselves change during the trajectory of a lifetime.’92
So, if physical set points can change, why not the mental equivalents? The evidence on cosmetic surgery and noise already shows that this is possible. And a recent survey suggests that the set point follows a U curve over a lifetime, starting high, then dropping to a minimum in the middle years but climbing back, amazingly, to the high level of youth.93
And factors other than age make a difference. Those with religion are happier than unbelievers. Married people are happier than singletons.94 But is this a confusion of cause and effect? Those happy to begin with may make better spouses. And countries report different levels of happiness, with the former communist states at the bottom of the table, confirming that the project of mass happiness led to mass misery.
Also, some forms of status do confer meaningful benefits. Those in professional jobs are happier, not because they earn more or have greater prestige, but because they have more control over what they do. They have the priceless gift of autonomy and so are free to exercise personal responsibility.
But the importance of most forms of status is relative. We will be happy with very little if everyone else has a little less – and miserable if this distinction is eliminated or reduced. So workers’ unions have been justified in protesting at ‘eroded differentials’ – indeed a genuine and painful affliction. And this explains why a pay rise may make an employee howl with rage. If someone else at an equivalent level got more, then the smaller rise is not merely worthless, but an insult. The issue is not the money but the ranking it signifies. Money used to buy status; now it is status.
But little in human psychology is simple. A survey of Olympic medallists showed that bronze medal winners tended to be happier than those taking silver.95 How is this possible? Consider the differentials. Bronze is aware only of the vast gap between itself and the unmedalled many not even close to the podium – whereas silver sees only gold one hateful step up.
And, if there are no genuine distinctions, artificial differentials must be created. Every community is minutely calibrated in terms of social superiority – not just district by district or even street by street but frequently house by house. I have no doubt that, even in shanty towns, there is virulent snobbery – the early settlers regard themselves as aristocrats and the new arrivals as scum.
In the age of entitlement everyone wants to appear superior to everyone else, but traditional marks of superiority, such as birth, wealth, professional status and exclusive district, are by definition difficult or impossible to acquire. The solution is to establish new forms of superiority, for instance by becoming cool and thus infinitely superior to the multitude of the uncool. Coolness is a cheap form of exclusivity available to everyone – like culture snobbery, my own differential. Becoming superior to philistines is not only cheap but relatively unassailable. There is little chance of a stampede to read and rave about Proust (and I would be profoundly annoyed if too many followed my recommendation and made Marcel popular). But staying cool is hard work because the cool is constantly destroyed by mass adoption. It was cool to get a tattoo when tattoos were the insignia of the dangerous outlaw – but soon even suburban housewives had tattoos on their bums.
Needless to say, consumer culture is aware of the universal hunger for differentials and has provided an artificial form of exclusivity in the brand. The genius of branding has been to disguise the undesirable conformity of consumption as its highly desirable opposite, distinction. So conformity is the result of everyone striving for distinction in the same way.
Occasionally brands get caught in their own contradiction of attempting to make everyone want to have what not everyone can have. Burberry, a clothing brand based on a landed-gentry image, launched a marketing campaign to increase sales but was adopted by soccer hooligans, which destroyed the image. But, in general, branding continues to flourish, with consumers paying exorbitant prices for what is supposed to distinguish them from the crowd, but only reveals them to be part of it. Much consumption is driven by a futile attempt to get ahead of the pack – or a defensive need to avoid falling too far behind.
And another discovery of psychology is that the emotions are asymmetric, with the negative more powerful and long lasting than the positive. Schopenhauer also understood this: ‘the weakness of wellbeing and happiness, in contrast to the strength of pain’.96 The positive emotions are capricious day-trippers, but the negative emotions are imperialists – determined to invade, overwhelm, occupy and subjugate. And the key to imperialism is to get the natives to do your dirty work. Think of how anger possesses the entire being, feeding itself in every possible way, forcing the intelligence to create justifications and the memory to resurrect ancient grievances. Whereas the positive emotions are butterflies that flit
through, alight briefly and fly off. And there is an equivalent imbalance in the eye of the beholder. We tend to forget favours quickly, but remember dirty tricks forever. This is one of the problems of marriage – it takes a huge amount of good behaviour to make up for one slip. It is easy to sin but a bitch to atone. Jonathan Haidt extends this principle to finance and gambling by explaining that the pleasure of gaining a sum of money is less intense than the pain of losing the same amount. Bad is always stronger than good. But Shakespeare was on to this long ago: ‘Men’s evil manners live in brass; their virtues we write in water.’97
This explains why anxiety and depression can so easily become chronic. They occupy the mind and convince it to support the feelings with negative thoughts. The psychologist Aaron Beck identified an unholy trinity of views common to many depressives: ‘I’m no good’; ‘The world is bleak’; ‘My future is hopeless’.98 And supporting this trinity of general views is a quartet of negative reactions to specific situations: personalization (blaming yourself for accidents or bad luck); overgeneralization (believing yourself to be always the victim of terrible events); magnification (exaggerating adverse effects); and arbitrary inference (drawing negative conclusions without evidence). Beck then developed Cognitive Therapy, which trains sufferers to identify such thoughts, write them down and classify them as bullying by one of the Gang of Four – psychology’s version of the Buddhist and Freudian techniques for achieving transformation by understanding.
Independently of Beck, psychologist Albert Ellis also developed a version of Cognitive Therapy known as Rational Emotive Behaviour Therapy. This was intended not so much for the multitude suffering from depression as for the even greater multitude suffering from unrealistic expectations. Ellis’s unholy trinity was the three crippling ‘musts’: ‘I must succeed’; ‘Everyone must treat me well’; ‘The world must be easy’.99 He defined belief in these three as ‘musturbation’, a form of self-abuse possibly even more widespread than masturbation. Such a familiar litany of demand! The first ‘must’ is the curse of perfectionism, the second is the curse of neediness and the third is the curse of stupidity. So much anguish and outrage could be prevented if towns and cities floated over their streets every day three giant balloons, showing the messages: ‘Failure Is More Common Than Success’; ‘Many Will Dislike You Whatever You Do’; and, on a balloon even larger than the other two, ‘The World Does Not Oblige’. The essence of the Ellis approach is that the problem is not with events themselves but with our illusions concerning them and our reactions to them – both of which can be controlled.