Diogenes cynicism5/15/2023 ![]() ![]() You won’t be surprised to hear, then, that cynical people also earn less than others. Writing in the Journal of Experimental Psychology: General in 2020, psychologists found that cynical attitudes lead to being treated disrespectfully-possibly because cynics tend to show disrespect to others, leading to a vicious cycle. Read: Middle-aged white Americans are dying of despairĪdding insult to injury, people tend not to respect cynics. (Although both of these studies involved only men, nothing suggests that the results are gender-specific.) In one 2017 study on middle-aged Finnish men, high cynicism also predicted premature mortality. In 1991, researchers studying middle-aged men found that a cynical outlook significantly increased the odds of death from both cancer and heart disease-possibly because the cynics consumed more alcohol and tobacco than the non-cynics. Modern cynics also suffer poorer health than others. In other words, that smirking 25-year-old is at elevated risk of turning into a depressed 44-year-old. In one 2009 study, researchers examining negative cynical attitudes found that people who scored high in this characteristic on a personality test were roughly five times more likely to suffer from depression later in life. We can most definitely conclude, however, that modern cynicism is detrimental. There were no happiness surveys in Antisthenes’s times, so we can’t compare the ancient cynics’ life satisfaction with that of those around them who did not share their philosophy. Read: American cynicism has reached a breaking point “Modern cynicism come to describe something antithetical to its previous meanings, a psychological state hardened against both moral reflection and intellectual persuasion,” the University of Houston’s David Mazella wrote in The Making of Modern Cynicism. The modern cynic rejects things out of hand (“This is stupid”), while the ancient cynic simply withholds judgment (“This may be right or wrong”). Whereas a modern cynic might say, for instance, that the president is an idiot and thus his policies aren’t worth considering, the ancient cynic would examine each policy impartially. It was based on a refusal to accept the assumptions and habits that discourage people from questioning conventional dogmas, and thus hold us back from the search for deep wisdom and happiness. T he original cynicism was a philosophical movement likely founded by Antisthenes, a student of Socrates, and popularized by Diogenes of Sinope around the fifth century B.C. Want to stay current with Arthur's writing? Sign up to get an email every time a new column comes out. Instead of assuming that everyone and everything sucks, we should all live like the ancient Greek cynics, who rebelled against convention in a search for truth and enlightenment. The problem isn’t cynicism per se it’s that modern people have lost the original meaning of cynicism. It makes you less healthy, less happy, less successful, and less respected by others. But it won’t change the fact that the modern cynical outlook on life is terrible for your well-being. Whether cynicism is more warranted now than ever is yours to decide. Sentiments about other institutions in society follow similar patterns. Since 1964, the percentage of Americans who say they trust the government to do what is right “just about always” or “most of the time” has fallen 53 points, from 77 to 24 percent. What was satire then is ideology today: Cynicism-the belief that people are generally morally bankrupt and behave treacherously in order to maximize self-interest-dominates American culture. “I don’t know what they have to say / It makes no difference anyway.” “Whatever it is, I’m against it,” Marx sang in his 1932 film, Horse Feathers. By which I mean followers of Groucho, not Karl. T here are a growing number of Marxists today. Click here to listen to his podcast series on all things happiness, How to Build a Happy Life. “ How to Build a Life ” is a weekly column by Arthur Brooks, tackling questions of meaning and happiness. ![]()
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