Thursday, March 24, 2011

Kiss-Kiss-No-No-Bang-Bang

There’s an article in Time this week (http://healthland.time.com/2011/03/22/the-cranky-dieter-explained-self-control-makes-you-angry/) about how dieting makes people cranky. Turns out it’s not just a sugar crash that makes people pissy when they are on a diet (and if you’ve never worked in an office where half your co-workers are on the Atkins, thank your lucky stars), it’s that you’ve told yourself no more often. Seems that exercising self-control bugs people. A lot. Kind of one of those, if it was a snake it would have bit me observations.

And I can’t stop thinking about it. Do you suppose people getting angry easily because they’re practicing self-denial explains Islamic extremism? I know it’s a jump. But go with me on this. Islam is a deeply, deeply no-no religion. They have food restrictions. They have sexual restrictions (big time). They have social restrictions. Every time they turn around there’s some rule they’re butting up against. And the more fundamentalist you get, the more hemmed in you get. Women are burkahed to death. But men get it too. If you go by the statistics on how many times the average man thinks of sex a day, and some Islamic sects say a man isn’t really even supposed to have impure thoughts, that’s telling yourself no about every minute and half. Gah. I’d be pretty pissy too. That’s not including the rest of the day – gee, I’m tired, I don’t feel like praying for the 4th time today – NO – gee, I’d like to have political self-determination instead of deferring to the ruling of a mulla – NO. Damn, that ham sandwich looks good – NO.

And not just Islam. Back during the Troubles, the Irish, as a bunch, were some hardcore Catholics. Not just regular Catholicism. Like voodoo Catholics. Lots of no-nos. Then they started throttling back with the rest of the Catholic world, and suddenly, no more car bombs. Huh. Go figure. David Koresh and Waco. And I can tell you, back in the day, there were any number of extreme fundamentalist sects in the deserts of Arizona who loved them some guns and Jesus. Timothy McVeigh came out of those wilds.

As usual, I’m no social scientist. Just a blogside philosopher. But it makes a peculiar kind of sense. Kind of puts going to hell in a completely different handbasket.

2 comments:

WashingtonGardener said...

I don't think moral or religious directives are on psychological same level as purely self-discipline/denial -- in one case you are doing it for God, in the other you are doing it for yourself to repair a flaw so you only have yourself to be mad at... definitely a formula for crabbiness. I'd correlate it more with say somehow who is in the closet or who is unhappily married and "staying together for the kids."

FirePhrase said...

I can definitely see what you mean about the closet or the bad marriage. But I'm still wondering about the religion thing. I can see where devotion to a higher power would help you get over, around or through the aggravation of self-denial (probably much better than self-denial just based on a moral construct without a theological bent). But denying yourself your "I wants" is so medula oblongata-based, right down there in the animal brain. The intellectual/spiritual aspect takes that moment longer to process. I still kind of lean towards the accretion of irritation is going to be more wearing in your most restrictive religions.

Of course, people who don't have any boundaries at all, and never get any practice with self-denial just end up wildos and in trouble all the time. There has to be some balance in Thou Shalt Not and ah, go ahead and do whatever you want.

TIME: Quotes of the Day