I do not think they are simple of mind or heart at all. And by the way i am originally from those parts, so it would be kind of ridiculous for me to claim they are simple minded (and infact i think they are far better at dealing with things than most people in other cultures - with the exception of certain Asian cultures). They have different ways of working through stress. For example they have intense faith (and since you said you have befriended people from places like Ghana, the Philippines and so forth you know what i mean). Once something happens they grieve through it, and then they move on. This does not mean at all that they are simple-minded, just that they have a divergent archetype of working through stuff.
I do believe that our stresses are far less serious than those of people in the Third World, particularly as we have the security of knowing that we will not be allowed to die of starvation or disease, have access to recreation, have access to justice, and have only to work hard to achieve financial success. Worrying about college loans and career advancement is a pretty trivial stress compared to the question of whether one will live or die, or whether one's children will die before they're three. ----Capriole.
Totally agree with you. I even said that in my post. Most Western stress factors are absolutely trivial, especially when compared with what people in the rest of the world go through. And i also said that according to the medical field it is not the magnitude of stress but its constancy. The human body is, as i said before, able to cope with great deals of stress. What it is not made for is coping with perpetual levels of stress.
A person can be intensely stressed for a short-period of time, and even have psychosomatic symptoms as well as true-to-life physical illness. But normally the body rectifies that after a while. However have another person who is always stressed, even if it is over totally insignificant things, and the body soon gets basically overburdened.
People in the third world have big stresses (and again note that i am talkign of typical locales, not places like the Sudan that have constant and heightened levels of oppression/suppression/repression etc). In your typical developing nations there are huge life issues. For example if the rains are late then there is a chance the whole harvest is lost. Or if there is a malaria outbreak. Or some pathogen that blights that seasons crop yield. These are truly HUGE stress factors. But they are not constant. And most of the people from there are actually quite happy ....actually quite joyful (again, since you have met people from overseas you must have noticed remarkable levels of joy. It might not be termed as 'western happiness,' but is is joy beyond description).
In the west many (not all) people in urban areas have many small issues. Totally insignificant (for example many of my workmates always seem to be working under the Sword of Damocles - as if there is always a looming threat). The stresses may not be near that of an Indian facing crop shortage for his 4 kids, but the marking factor is that the stress is chronic. Always present. And that is what makes it dangerous.
But anyways, what do I know! Here is an excerpt on the medical significance of constant stress.
Time magazine's June 6, 1983 cover story called stress "The Epidemic of the Eighties" and referred to it as our leading health problem; there can be little doubt that the situation has progressively worsened since then. Numerous surveys confirm that adult Americans perceive they are under much more stress than a decade or two ago. A 1996 Prevention magazine survey found that almost 75% feel they have "great stress" one day a week with one out of three indicating they feel this way more than twice a week. In the same 1983 survey only 55% said they felt under great stress on a weekly basis. It has been estimated that 75 - 90 percent of all visits to primary care physicians are for stress related problems. Job Stress is far and away the leading source of stress for adults but stress levels have also escalated in children, teenagers, college students and the elderly for other reasons, including: increased crime, violence and other threats to personal safety; pernicious peer pressures that lead to substance abuse and other unhealthy life style habits; social isolation and loneliness; the erosion of family and religious values and ties; the loss of other strong sources of social support that are powerful stress busters.
Contemporary stress tends to be more pervasive, persistent and insidious because it stems primarily from psychological than physical threats. It is associated with ingrained and immediate reactions over which we have no control that were originally designed to be beneficial such as:
* heart rate and blood pressure soar to increase the flow of blood to the brain to improve decision making,
* blood sugar rises to furnish more fuel for energy as the result of the breakdown of glycogen, fat and protein stores,
* blood is shunted away from the gut, where it not immediately needed for purposes of digestion, to the large muscles of the arms and legs to provide more strength in combat, or greater speed in getting away from a scene of potential peril,
* clotting occurs more quickly to prevent blood loss from lacerations or internal hemorrhage.
These and myriad other immediate and automatic responses have been exquisitely honed over the lengthy course of human evolution as life saving measures to facilitate primitive man's ability to deal with physical challenges. However, the nature of stress for modern man is not an occasional confrontation with a saber-toothed tiger or a hostile warrior but rather a host of emotional threats like getting stuck in traffic and fights with customers, co-workers, or family members, that often occur several times a day.
Unfortunately, our bodies still react with these same, archaic fight or flight responses that are now not only not useful but potentially damaging and deadly. Repeatedly invoked, it is not hard to see how they can contribute to hypertension, strokes, heart attacks, diabetes, ulcers, neck or low back pain and other "Diseases of Civilization".
They agreed with you that people in their homelands, wherever in the world those homelands are, are happier than most Americans. They seemed to believe that this was in part because their countrymen were not driving themselves mad in an ambitious effort to attain material success, but were contenting themselves with what was available locally. They did not expect the government to give them things or help them. And they were always surrounded by family and friends, from whom they could expect communal support. It is a mistake, they said (and I agree strongly with this) for children to leave home to go to college, pursue careers and raise children far from their roots; there is great comfort to be found in living close to kin.
They also agreed with you that Western diseases like hypertension are less prevalent, but also as medical workers they pointed out that many people in the Third World do not live long enough to develop circulatory disease. The typical Third World diet, through all its variants, does not offer enough richness to bring about coronary disease. There is also far more opportunity for exercise, as my 90-year-old relatives in rural Slovakia would agree. So it's difficult for these medical professionals to ascribe the low incidence of circulatory disease in their cultures to low stress levels, as correlation is not causation; there could be several interconnected reasons.
As for stress, they agreed that day-to-day living in the Third World causes little stress, particularly for men. But unfortunately most Third World countries, your own blessed homeland of course excepted, are subject to famines, shortages, war, terrorism, epidemics, etc. So 15 years of a peaceful agrarian existence will be interrupted by a five-year civil war during which thousands are killed, followed by a dictatorship, followed by an insurgency and refugee status, etc. This is an ongoing stress--but again, unpleasant as it may be, people do not live long enough to develop coronary artery disease from it. And life, they point out, is very different for Third World women than for men, as the women are often subject to a harder life than we in the West can imagine, with resultant depression and stress.
The bottom line is that it is not Third World life but agrarian life, whether in the undeveloped countries or in the US, that brings the most peace and satisfaction to people. Having lived on a large farm during my formative years, I know well the quiet joys and peace that can only come from living in the country. I intend to return there soon. Best of all is life in the rural USA, where modern conveniences and health care are combined with a quiet outdoor lifestyle!