Hugging monkeys

[shavastak]

Some years ago, a famous psychology experiment was done in which a young monkey was given two surrogate parents to choose from: one, a wire form with a bottle of milk in it, and the other, a fuzzy-covered wire form with no bottle. The young monkeys consistently chose the fuzzy-covered wire form, indicating the importance of comfort.

The same kind of phenomenon is taking place in New Orleans as the city rebuilds. Let me explain.

This morning there was a report on NPR about bars and strip clubs opening in New Orleans. Most of these places don't have running water or electricity yet, and they certainly don't have food - the people in the report were eating MREs. And drinking beer.

Don't decry this! Don't call them stupid or denigrate them. They are being human. I would argue that this behavior isn't just natural, it's right. It is not an indication of the weakness of the human spirit; it is an indication of the importance of comfort and enjoyment in the health of humans. There is something about each of us that recognizes that comfort and enjoyment are at least as important as food, water, and shelter - if not *more* important. It is not neglecting health to consider comfort and fun first - it is the right order to go about things, especially in this day and age where Americans typically have more stored food than their bodies know what to do with.

You may immediately bring up starving people in Africa. Of *course* they need food, and they need it desperately, but I would argue they'd be even *better* off if we gave them food, water, and books. Or movies. Or a hackeysack (they may not have the energy for football). What I'm trying to say is that the *traditional* basics (food, water, shelter, clothing) are missing a couple of very vital components.

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Edit: It might be worthwhile at this time to point out something I neglected to mention. According to the report on NPR, most of the people patronizing the strip clubs are rescue, police, and fire personnel. I may be optomistic, but it is my hope that most of them are just trying to wind down after long, tough days. The strip club owner spoke with great respect for his patrons, describing them as very hard workers.

FYI, my impression was that the bars are used by everybody.

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Edit #2: I did not intend this post to advocate the use of beer and titties as means of promoting human health. In the same way, I would not advocate giving monkeys cloth-covered wire as a means of promoting their health. Both are examples of a false, or at least less-than-ideal, source of comfort and/or fun. But I still think that providing for comfort and fun is at least as important as providing for food and water.

The subject of love was brought up, also. I think I would put love above all the others, not because I am a romantic, but because humans need to be loved to be healthy; lack of food will kill you faster, but lack of love is much much harder to recover from. Also, going to a titty bar does not in any way fulfill the need for love. Sex is not love; I would consider it to be in the 'fun' category. Watching sexy women bounce is even less like love, and even more like just fun.

Comments

[velvetpage.livejournal.com]

It's better now because it gives them the impetus to improve the situation to the point where the other forms of comfort, those that last longer and are not self-destructive, have the opportunity to return. It's a temporary measure to get someone over a rough spot. It doesn't become seriously destructive unless the people doing it continue after their rough spot is over.

I've had occasions where I went out drinking to forget some of the nasty stuff happening at my job. It happened perhaps three times. At this moment in time, I haven't had a drink of any kind in three months, and I don't miss it. A few nights of using liquid comfort to relieve stress did not harm me or mine in any way. Was I wrong to seek that kind of physical release? (Dancing and alcohol - I'm not into paying for sex.) I would say, no - it didn't hurt anyone, and for that moment in time, it helped relieve my stress so I could go back to my job and continue to function for a few more weeks, until a more permanent solution (i.e. the end of the school year) came about.

[nakedknight.livejournal.com]

My experience is that transient comfort brings transient relief and sucks away the motivation to make real progress.

I don't drink to get drunk, ever, and I do have an issue with it. Nothing goes away while you're drunk. The worse your problem is, the worse drinking is for you becuase it will still be there in the morning and you just lost money, time and mental health avoiding the problem and you've taken a step down the path of chemical dependence. Sure, plenty of people dance on the edge without going down the path, but in this situation, not so much.

Bad day at work? Drinking isn't that bad. Living in New Orleans? Really, really bad.

[velvetpage.livejournal.com]

I've never been drunk, either. I don't like the loss of control that comes with it, so I rarely have more than two drinks at a time. The nights in question I had four or five - enough to be quite happy, but not enough to have a hangover.

I think we're going to have to agree to disagree on the issue of the benefits of transient comfort. I simply don't agree.

[nakedknight.livejournal.com]

I don't know you from Eve, so I really can't speak for your situation. And I don't live in New Orleans right now.

But I've been down and out, living hand to mouth in a literal sense. I've seen how tempting it can be. A friend of mine in that position asked me how I got out, and the answer is I made a plan and I stuck to it. I set aside the temporary comforts to, in a very real way, save my own life. I've lived off other people's leftover canned food so I had money for gas so I could work and make money and keep my bills paid until I could complete my plan. It was a very short period in my life, but I totally understand the value of temporary comfort in my own life.

It was an illusion, a crutch I leaned on when I believed I didn't have the strength to carry on. I was wrong. When that crutch was pulled away, when I didn't have money for any extra thing anymore, I didn't lay down and die. I dug deeper and found a strength that is terrifying. The will to live, the will to improve myself - I never found it in something someone sold to me.

If you still disagree with that, I can't blame you. Maybe you haven't been there, or maybe you have and you believe that it helped. I don't know. I just haven't seen it work for myself and I've watched it drag people down - whole families of people, for generation upon generation. I wouldn't wish that on my worst enemy, much less a person I wanted to help.

[velvetpage.livejournal.com]

You're right that I haven't been there. I respect what you went through and what you did to get out of it, and I respectfully submit that the situation in New Orleans, where pretty much everyone is in that situation, is substantively different. I also suggest that the people taking advantage of it are in all likelihood those who already engaged in those pursuits quite often, meaning for them it wasn't a step down, just a step back into the familiar.

I've lived with moralistic stances my whole life, and I'm at the point where I dislike them intensely. I hope that the people using taverns and strip clubs as an escape are getting something out of it that they need. But even if they're not, and you're right, it's not up to us to condemn their behaviour. It's their lives, and their right to live them as they see fit.

[mcmiller.livejournal.com]

I'm just trying to say I'm not moralizing from on high, but saying from experience that it really doesn't help. And as a former soldier, I am speaking to the experience of soldiers and emergency personnel too - I've had missions that gave me tortured nightmares. For months afterward, and sometimes still... I watched people kill themselves and their families in empty comforts because they "deserved it" after a hard day. We deserve better than the illusion, and given the chance to provide for another, I would give them the best I could.