Americans are just extremely paranoid. This is even more true when it comes to children. At least once a month a new study comes out showing that something might be bad for us. Butter and fat are bad. Margarine is bad. Saccharine is bad. Aspartame is probably bad. Caffeine is bad. Alcohol is bad. Cough medicine is bad. Anti-depressants are bad. Cub scout badges are bad. Meat containing E. coli is bad.
To make this problem go from bad to worse, we then look to the government to make it better by telling us what we can and can't eat, which medicine we're allowed or not allowed to use, what safety features our cars, car seats, strollers, and everything else must have, etc. As if it weren't enough to be paranoid for ourselves we have to be paranoid on behalf of everyone else.
I believe there are a multitude of reasons for this, but let me outline a few key reasons Americans are so paranoid:
- We're afraid to die. In a society that no longer accepts cultural norms that were held by Western civilization for centuries, we've lost our faith in God. That doesn't mean we don't believe in God or a god or gods or whatever. It means that we aren't really sure that he, she, or it is really going to let us move on to a happy afterlife. Many Americans cling to life and look at someone like a soldier fighting in Iraq with at least puzzlement and probably much more with scorn that they would take a chance at throwing away their chance at a long life. I'm sure there are some who would prefer a long life of fun to a short life of freedom.
- We have a lot of free time. Americans and Europeans have more free time than any other culture in the history of earth. We've reached a level of technology whereby we can easily produce a surplus of food without even using all of the arable land. The ancients had no weekends. They worked all the day long every day to survive. The Jews added a single day of rest, but that was not necessarily because they could spare the time. Nowadays most folks have two days off every week and only work an average of 8 hours a day, we build marvelous things that rarely need repair, many people have as much as 4 weeks off from work per year. All this free time gives us time to worry about things and it grants us an especially large amount of time to worry ourselves about others, to become busybodies meddling in the affairs of others.
- We live a long time. The life span of an American is as long as human life spans have been since before the Flood. Babies and mothers, by and large, survive birth, infancy, and childhood, which wasn't always the case. As such, many people don't even know what death is except possibly in a goldfish or a dog or other pet. Many of us do not know someone who's died for a long time and we usually don't know people who die often until we get much closer to our own. Even 200 years ago, death would have been an ever present reminder of how fragile life really is. Without this reminder, we may know we're going to die, but we can easily ignore it on the emotional level.
As I said, there are a lot of other factors, but I don't really want to drone on. Death is a reality every person faces. Even if science finds a way to eliminate disease, make the body robust to serious accidents, and stop aging, something will get us sooner or later. As the tag line for the Matrix Revolutions stated, "Everything that has a beginning, has an end." You absolutely cannot live forever in this universe.
At the very least, every person should at least be aware they may die and accept it. Not to do so is to live an unhealthy life. If you can't accept the nature of what you are, how can you possibly expect to live your life to your full potential? I hope every American would come to a point like this (though, I'm not nearly naive enough to believe it would actually happen).
This paranoia about death is getting out of hand. It's starting to lead to a restriction of freedom. It's starting even to lead to bad decisions that may even lead to shorter life spans if it is not careful. For example, eliminating products that could save lives because they might also take lives (air bags, medicines, medical treatments, etc.) is not a good idea. A one-size fits all approach to such things can lead to a decrease in the average life span we all hope to see get longer and longer.
Cheers.
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