Culture matters 6: CONCEPT OF SUFFERING AND MISFORTUNE

Today it’s dark and unfriendly outside. The chilly, rainy weather doesn’t make one especially cheerful, so why not writing about a topic that fits the weather? Let’s talk about the different opinions of Americans and Austrians when it comes to suffering and misfortune.

In America, people feel sorry for someone who is suffering and so they’d do everything to cheer this person up. That is, they’d only help as long as the depressed person tries to do something against their mood. If they keep moaning without getting active Americans would feel it’s their own fault. They could at least take a pill or see a psychiatrist, couldn’t they?

Austrians are similar concerning the cheer-up part. The difference is, in my opinion, that Austrians have more tolerance for complaints, since they love complaining themselves. Admittedly, at some point we are close to the end of our rope as well, but still we’d never advice someone to go to see a mental doctor. Backward as that may be, most Austrians assume that only absolute nutters would go to see a psychiatrist.

Here again, we can see that Americans are more active when gets to solving problems, whereas Austrians are more the passive one’s. Yeah, that’s our dear serene Austria, where people are strong enough to shrug problems off ;)

Still, I agree with the Austrian attitude that doctors can't cure everything. Moreover, isn't it everybody' s right to moan from time to time (especially when the weather is as lousy as today)? Phony happiness doesn't solve any problems!