The psychology of doommongering

[BlueBlancmange]

Following on from the thread about the motives of people who doom monger about the future, I have been thinking about why those who engage feel confident it will work.

To be clear, just as on the other thread, I am not talking about people who, for example, realistically state that we likely won't just be totally back to normal by next autumn. While not ideal, this is a perfectly reasonable outlook. I am talking about people who post things like 'People need to accept that this is the way we live now. Anyone who thinks the vaccines won't be rendered totally redundant within 6 months due to the new variants is quite frankly delusional. I'm afraid we need to get used to the idea that we will need to socially distance forever and that life as we knew it is gone'.

This is not the general scientific consensus, yet they post these alarming prognoses in tones of authority and utter certainty.

I assume their underlying thinking is that no normal person would possibly want the future to be like that. Therefore, when people read it, they will assume that someone would only post something that dire if they have carefully weighed up the evidence and been forced to conclude it's the case (sadly). Also, anyone who would not doom monger with the motive to simply upset others (as in most people) is likely to find it hard to imagine that could possible be the motive of anyone else.

Just wondering what others think.

I live in Australia where things are actually pretty good. But still my mother is predicting that life will never be the same again.

She’s a lifelong pessimist, she always likes to expect the worst in the hope that she will be pleasantly surprised. So really it’s just a continuation of her existing personality.

Why does anyone care whether other people have a gloomy outlook or not?

It would be very naïve to think that seeing prognostications of doom everywhere would not affect some people quite a lot. You might argue that people shouldn't take any notice of anything that isn't hard fact, or anything that is claimed by someone who isn't an expert, but that's not really how most human beings work. Besides, when even the government and experts disagree with each other and change their minds regularly, it's far from easy to trust that you can tell what the real facts are.

Agree with lazylinguist.

As a concrete example, I just told an aunt that dd was looking forward to going to university this autumn. There was a hurrrumph and, “I highly doubt if anyone will be going this year.” . Yes, I know there is the strong possibility (probability, even) that things will be still be crap, but it was the kind of triumphant piercing of my little bit of optimism. I’m just thankful she didn’t say this to dd.

Actually, do doommongerers impart their depressing predictions on children and young people? Whatever I may fear, I would never tell the dcs that they will never again go on holiday/to school, let alone find a partner, and that this is it. Virtual reality till the end of time.

Why does anyone care whether other people have a gloomy outlook or not?

It is the triumphant broadcasting of it I find difficult. One pessimistic aunt you can handle but thread after thread or at the very least comment after comment agreeing at how shit everything is difficult. That’s mainly why I give the Coronavirus topic a massive swerve. I would recommend anyone struggling with low mood or anxiety at the moment to stay away from those threads... it’s just like picking scabs and then wondering why the wound won’t heal.

@Divebar

Why does anyone care whether other people have a gloomy outlook or not?

It is the triumphant broadcasting of it I find difficult. One pessimistic aunt you can handle but thread after thread or at the very least comment after comment agreeing at how shit everything is difficult. That’s mainly why I give the Coronavirus topic a massive swerve. I would recommend anyone struggling with low mood or anxiety at the moment to stay away from those threads... it’s just like picking scabs and then wondering why the wound won’t heal.

Why is it a bad thing or pessimistic to note that things 'will not go back to normal'? Why is there this obsession with returning to what once was? Half the people on the planet have been wearing face coverings for more than 40 years. It is considered the disgusting and rude for someone with a cough to cough opening and not cover the faces with facemasks in public. They think of our sharing culture where if I get a disease I share it freely with everyone I meet, and deposit it into their drinks and over their food to be a repugnant way of living. Are they wrong? Are we the better people for our loving sharing world where what is mine is yours when it comes to my infections?

I don't see the possibility of a cleaner society with greater respect for your fellow humans' health and wellbeing to be pessimistic. I do not see the removal of the illusion of job security as a bad thing. I do not see the realisation that saving is something to be strived for as a bad thing. I do not see the realisation that buying a new TV, mobile phone or other non-essentials might not be as useful as a few quid put aside just in case things get worse, as a bad idea.

People have had their eyes opened. People have discovered that the entire world can change practically instantly with no warning and for no reason. They have lifted their heads out of their own self-involved lives and discovered that uncertainty is real and does exist and some of them have confirmed that it can be planned for.

That is in no way a pessimistic outlook on life.

If people are still on here next Christmas saying 'oh woe is me' and making out that they didn't know they could be in lockdown, and at the same time their neighbours have adapted their lives to deal with the world and are running businesses, happy and getting on with lives, you'd have to wonder really who was being optimistic and who was being pessimistic.

I think you get to choose if you want to feel like a victim, and you get to choose how long you want to wallow in victimhood for.

@IrmaFayLear

Agree with lazylinguist.

As a concrete example, I just told an aunt that dd was looking forward to going to university this autumn. There was a hurrrumph and, “I highly doubt if anyone will be going this year.” . Yes, I know there is the strong possibility (probability, even) that things will be still be crap, but it was the kind of triumphant piercing of my little bit of optimism. I’m just thankful she didn’t say this to dd.

Actually, do doommongerers impart their depressing predictions on children and young people? Whatever I may fear, I would never tell the dcs that they will never again go on holiday/to school, let alone find a partner, and that this is it. Virtual reality till the end of time.

She probably will not go to University this autumn. She may have to learn online. There may be lots of disputes about fees and education standards in the future. There may be the need in the future to write of student debts.

But how she learns through this period, the skills she develops, the discoveries she makes in how the future of business and intellectual relationships are going to be defined in her future, and the discovery that she can work without supervision and remain focussed, those things that successes come from.

Bits of paper open doors. That is all. People succeed because of who they are and what they can do. If she is happy, intelligent and enthusiastic about the world around her, I would bet neither of us will be able to stop her regardless of what University looks like going forward.

I swerve between the two, I want to believe the optimists but then I go down the 'what if' of the pessimists. I don't know why but it sort of helps to read how other people are coping, or not...

Oh, great. Sitting in her bedroom for three years seeing the world through a screen and not meeting anybody is absolutely the recipe for happiness

@IrmaFayLear

Oh, great. Sitting in her bedroom for three years seeing the world through a screen and not meeting anybody is absolutely the recipe for happiness

It amazes me how only a year ago people were bemoaning the amount of time young people spend on computers and phones, and wringing their hands about how a generation is going to grow up not understanding real human interaction.

Now we're being told that online 'learning' is just as good as the real thing. I mean, I understand the need for it in current circumstances, but I hate the pretence that it's 'just as good' and that young people aren't missing out on an awful lot. I bet the people who advocate this style of 'learning' wouldn't want it for themselves if they were 17 again.

Quite. When I think of my life at 17/18... it was ace! Some people really can’t remember having been young, or are happy to pull up the ladder behind them. Like all those smuggery smugs at the beginning of lockdown who said they were content with their “little family” (puke) pottering around, and they had been on loads of holidays, thanks, so didn’t care if travel were cancelled for ever, and no one should go out again (except for Waitrose deliverers, of course) as they didn’t see why anyone else would need to find a partner - “the world’s overpopulated as it is” tinkly smug-married laugh

Of course people will have a range of opinions ranging from optimistic to pessimistic, but I recognise this trait in a few of my contacts. I think it can stem from a place of wanting to feel a bit superior. A bit like a relative of mine, who had children before I did, and delighted in telling me horror stories throughout my first pregnancy... "Oh just you wait!" she'd say, pretending to be helpful but unable to hide a delighted smirk! And actually, her awful predictions didn't come to pass, luckily.

Funnily enough, the same relative is happily sharing doom laden Covid predictions!

Not saying it's always the case, but some people really like to feel like they know better than others and can provoke a worried reaction.

Now we're being told that online 'learning' is just as good as the real thing.

Are we? I don't think I've heard anyone say that.

@lazylinguist

Now we're being told that online 'learning' is just as good as the real thing.

Are we? I don't think I've heard anyone say that.

Read the post above.

And I work with a university on a part-time basis. They were definitely pushing the merits of online 'learning' while charging for a full university experience.

@IrmaFayLear

Oh, great. Sitting in her bedroom for three years seeing the world through a screen and not meeting anybody is absolutely the recipe for happiness

... based on your value system.

Maybe spending three years discovering what you and I do not know about the world and how it works, and working out what the future is going to be like despite what the television tells her, and discovering how she can still be valuable to positive to the people who's lives she touches, are things she may find worthwhile.

Maybe those are the sorts of people and the values other people will want to find in the companies they deal with in the future.

The point is no one knows, and it would be very naïve to believe that we know best, especially when we cannot control what happens, and we don't have the right to choose their future for them. All we can do is give then confidence and nurture intelligence and love and hope they find the building blocks and the temerity to stand against the storm.

Maybe spending three years discovering what you and I do not know about the world and how it works, and working out what the future is going to be like despite what the television tells her, and discovering how she can still be valuable to positive to the people who's lives she touches, are things she may find worthwhile.

Discovering about the world and how it works? From a screen?

discovering how she can still be valuable to positive to the people who's lives she touches

The sentence is hard to understand, but what lives can she 'touch' if she's stuck in her bedroom?

@lazylinguist

Now we're being told that online 'learning' is just as good as the real thing.

Are we? I don't think I've heard anyone say that.

What is 'the real thing'? Watching a university lecturer telling to 40 students telling you his opinion about what you are learning and regurgitating what has been written in books we can all buy that were published decades ago?

In engineering there isn't much you can't learn without the presence of a lecturer. I cannot talk towards Hotel & Catering Management of Psychology. I studied engineering. But believe me, there was nothing taught in my degree that required attendance at university.

Yes, it was useful to access the library, and yes it was good to have access to the computer suite. We didn't all have laptops back then. And yes it was good to be able to bounce ideas off of professors, but none of that cannot be done over the phone or via e-mail.

So why is sitting in a lecture hall 'real learning' and sitting in the real world facing a real computer with the real resources that everyone in the working world has access to not 'real learning'?

So why is sitting in a lecture hall 'real learning' and sitting in the real world facing a real computer with the real resources that everyone in the working world has access to not 'real learning'?

In many universities and for many disciplines, much learning is done by tutorials. Yes, these can be done to some extent online, but from my own experience I would say they are nowhere near as good as the real thing. Not to mention all the social and extra curricular activities that are such a part of university life.

Virtual university courses have been available for some time. If they were so great, why haven't more students chosen to do them?

I'm a languages teacher. I have taught online. It's not as good.

In engineering there isn't much you can't learn without the presence of a lecturer. I cannot talk towards Hotel & Catering Management of Psychology. I studied engineering. But believe me, there was nothing taught in my degree that required attendance at university.

Did you not have to do any practical modules for engineering?

@IrmaFayLear

Oh, great. Sitting in her bedroom for three years seeing the world through a screen and not meeting anybody is absolutely the recipe for happiness

It won't be 3 years. If they'd vaccinate students they wouldn't need to sit in their bedrooms and learn at all.

I agree with ElliF to some extent - I don't see any need to rush back to some old ways. For example, I would cheerfully strangle all vacuous "influencers" at birth but they seem to be continuing as normal

@IcedPurple

Maybe spending three years discovering what you and I do not know about the world and how it works, and working out what the future is going to be like despite what the television tells her, and discovering how she can still be valuable to positive to the people who's lives she touches, are things she may find worthwhile.

Discovering about the world and how it works? From a screen?

discovering how she can still be valuable to positive to the people who's lives she touches

The sentence is hard to understand, but what lives can she 'touch' if she's stuck in her bedroom?

When I was at school I never imagined I would spend my life sitting in front of a screen. I never had a computer, and we didn't have computers at school. At college they didn't have computers, and I go a home computer to play games on with cassettes or cartridges. I learnt to draw with a pencil and ruler, an ink pen and a razor blade for scratching out mistakes on tracing paper.

I spend the working part of my life in front of a screen. The documents I read come in emails or via transfer links to my screen. the research I do is done with e-mails to other consultants and their reports come to my screen. My progress is monitored via online project management applications. The co-ordination with people in other countries is done online.

When I need art supplies I buy them from Amazon, if I need to know something I ask people who know about those things in forums on the internet. If I want to find out about how to grow tomatoes or how to deal with mould I can look it up on YouTube.

What part of studying can I not do by reaching out to experts who already know about things online? And what part of having someone reach out to me and ask me a question that I can help them with do I not find fulfilling and worthwhile.

I grew up at the start of this information age. I am old and ignorant of most of the IT world when compared to millennials. I have been asked to restructure my dept's cloud platform and I haven't got a clue.

And we are talking about people who are IT native and whether or not they can learn about the world they are going to occupy, spend their entire lives working in and shaping, and the world they are eventually going to govern in 40 years. You are asking how they can learn about the world from their computers? I don't see the problem. You'll need to elaborate.

@psychomath

In engineering there isn't much you can't learn without the presence of a lecturer. I cannot talk towards Hotel & Catering Management of Psychology. I studied engineering. But believe me, there was nothing taught in my degree that required attendance at university.

Did you not have to do any practical modules for engineering?

As in push a wall over and explain why it fell? No. We did go to building sites and factories to watch steel being fabricated, hung on cranes and bolted together. But nowadays they have YouTube. Yes, being on a site opens your eyes to the actual real difficulties of moving ten tonnes of steel beam and positioning it where it is meant to be, it gives you an appreciation of what the guys and girls who do the work on the ground really have to put up with when you design something wrong, too big, or too complicated. But you cant learn that at Uni' anyways. Those are things you learn when you get a sh!tty phone call and have people standing around at £20 an hour while you figure out what you're going to do about it.

I spend the working part of my life in front of a screen. The documents I read come in emails or via transfer links to my screen. the research I do is done with e-mails to other consultants and their reports come to my screen. My progress is monitored via online project management applications. The co-ordination with people in other countries is done online.

That sounds like a dismal working life to me. If you enjoy it, great, but you surely must know that many jobs involve actual human interaction?

*When I need art supplies I buy them from Amazon, if I need to know something I ask people who know about those things in forums on the internet. If I want to find out about how to grow tomatoes or how to deal with mould I can look it up on YouTube.

What part of studying can I not do by reaching out to experts who already know about things online? And what part of having someone reach out to me and ask me a question that I can help them with do I not find fulfilling and worthwhile.*

Because learning isn't simply being the recipient of information from YouTube. It's about discussion, exchanging ideas, discourse. This can be replicated to some degree online, but it's no long-term substitute for actual interaction. I've seen it myself. And as I said above, if online education were so great, why haven't online universities become more popular, especially given how much money could be saved on accommodation and other expenses?

You are asking how they can learn about the world from their computers? I don't see the problem. You'll need to elaborate.

If you don't see a problem with learning about the world while not experiencing that world, I can't help.

@lazylinguist

I'm a languages teacher. I have taught online. It's not as good.

Not good because of the spoken aspect of the language study? Tone and inflection and the difficulty copying and correcting spoken French/German for example?

I wouldn't have though learning written language was difficult online. But I can see that conversational French only happens when people have conversations, and the computer screen detracts from that.

As in push a wall over and explain why it fell? No.

I was thinking more along the lines of use a flight simulator or test a PCB, but depends what type of engineering we're talking about I guess.