Class Taste Reflects Our Conception of Happiness

We are now interviewing college graduates to see the connection between their tastes and their social class fraction. We started asking about why our subjects chose particular things or chose particular services. We soon realized though, that the more important question, the prior question, is to ask which choices seem like just utilitarian selection, and which choices involve a moral element.

I have over the past few years also been studying happiness, looking for what makes for a happy society.

I now see a point of convergence between these two lines of inquiry:  to ask people which of their choices seem to involve a moral element is to ask them their conception of the happy life.  In these questions, as we add them up, we are discovering (together with our subjects) their vision of eudaemonia - of a flourishing life.

Gov. Beshear Restores the Voting Rights of 180,000+ Nonviolent Felons in Kentucky

Kentucky is one of the few states that does not automatically restore voting rights to felons after they have completed their sentence.

Outgoing Governor Beshear, in a fine act of statesmanship, signed an executive order to restore voting rights to more than 180,000 nonviolent felons.

This is a good day for democracy.

Positive Civility Requires a Thick Skin

Here is a good centrist idea:

To take a positive step toward creating civility in society, be relentlessly reasonable.

Have a thick skin.

Don't get upset over potential problems.

Cut other people some slack when they are insensitive or thoughtless. (You undoubtedly need the same slack cut for you sometimes.)

Too often we think of civility as consisting of what we do not do - not being extreme, not getting worked up over minor issues, not calling names.

I offer this idea as something that centrists (or anyone interested in civility) can do to actively promote the happy society.

Millennials are the Most Willing to Use Government Censorship in a Good Cause. This is Still Wrong, But Teachable.

It is alarming that 40% of Millennials would be willing to have government prevent people from saying things that are offensive to minority groups.

Still, I see this as a vice of their virtues.  They are trying to overcome America's long history of racism.  The tool they have chosen - government censorship - is a cure worse than the disease, but they are trying to cure a disease.  Millennials are young, and famously less informed about history, including the historical use of government suppression of free speech to oppress minority groups.

I think most Millennials are not far from supporting other, less oppressive means of helping denigrated minorities. The traditional mechanism for opposing outright racists - public shaming - is effective and not as dangerous as government suppression.

For most people, though, the problem is not so much outright racism as it is insensitivity to unexamined denigration.  The cure for insensitivity is gentle consciousness raising.  And that applies to educating Millennials who are insensitive to the dangers of government censorship.

Only about Six Percent of the Electorate Supports Donald Trump

Donald Trump is the current front-runner among Republican presidential candidates.  Some take this to be a very scary sign about the tastes of the republic.

It is helpful to remember, therefore, that all that really means is that a quarter of Republicans favor him now, at this early stage.  And Republicans make up only a quarter of the electorate.  A quarter of a quarter is about six percent of the whole.

Moreover, unlike most of the other Republican (or Democratic) candidates, Trump has very high negatives.  Almost twice as many people have an unfavorable view of him as have a favorable view.

Presbyterians Have the Highest Level of Church Involvement Among Mainliners

The Pew Research Center has an interesting study of just how involved in church the members in different denominations are.

In general, evangelicals are twice as involved in their churches as mainliners - 41% "highly involved" for evangelicals on average, versus only 20% for the average mainline denomination.

Among mainline Protestant denominations, Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) members show the highest level of involvement, with 31% highly involved.

Interestingly, that is about the same proportion highly involved in the evangelical Presbyterian Church of America.

Democracy is Winning in Burma/Myanmar

One of the best stories of the last couple of weeks is that Aung San Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy won an overwhelming victory in elections to parliament, taking over 80% of the open seats.

The military junta still controls the government, will take months to actually relinquish the seats the NLD just won, and re-wrote the constitution to specifically bar "the Lady" from becoming president.

Moreover, the last time Suu Kyi's party won an election, the junta simply invalidated it and continued the dictatorship.  They put the leader of the opposition under years of house arrest.  The world noticed her continued civilized resistance, and gave her the Nobel Peace Prize.

I am very hopeful that this time we will see the junta finally start to let go.  Full democracy will come to Burma/Myanmar.

The First Step in the Fight Against Terrorism: Don't Be Terrified

The whole point of terrorism is to terrify reactive leaders into a brutal response.  This helps terrorists recruit more fighters. Every time we invade a country, we make more enemies.

This is why a measured, coordinated response, using diplomatic, economic, cultural, and (only at the end) military tools is the most effective thing to do, as well as the most ethical.

Reactive leaders will not be held back by a thoughtful consideration of what will really work.

Reactive leaders will only be held back if their domestic supporters would reject a brutal response.

Therefore, the most effective thing that ordinary people can do in the face of terror is not be terrified. Keeping calm and carrying on is the best resistance.

Hypothesis: Liberals Move to the Suburbs for For Safe Schools

A hypothesis for my new research on taste and class.

People who move to the bohemian or bobo (bourgeois bohemian) parts of the city when they first get out of college really like those places.  They are not afraid of the city. These areas are among the most liberal places in the country.  For themselves they are happy and enjoy the life and diversity of the city.

Kids, though, tend to make them more cautious.  They will only stay is they are confident they can find a safe way to raise their kids.  The educational level of the schooling matters, too, but is secondary.  The ethnic diversity of city schools is usually a plus for these families. They are proud when they can find safe diverse schools.

Safety is what the suburbs sell - even, for these families, at the cost of a terrible blandness and unreality.

The Thriving Third vs. Everyone Else

I often distinguish between the "fortunate fifth" at the top of the social structure, and everyone else.  

My friend David Blankenhorn argues that the real divide in America is not between the 1% and the 99%, nor between the federal government and everyone else - the favorite division points of the left and the right, respectively.  Instead, he says the real divide is between the top 30% and everyone else.

The top group is likely to have a college education, stable jobs, stable marriages, and avoid self-destructive habits.

Statistically, one could argue well for either cut point.  The central issue is that a sizable minority are doing well, while those below live with increasing uncertainty.

From now on I will talk about the Thriving Third.  This is supportable empirically, and has the advantage of being more hopeful to those in the middle. 

Racial Gap in Replying to Church Visitors - PCUSA MORE Likely to Respond to Black Visitors

An interesting study by my friend Brad Wright at the University of Connecticut sent emails to various churches posing as potential visitors to the congregation, using racially distinct names.

Overall, there was a small racial gap: whites were a little more likely to get a response than blacks,  Hispanics, or Asians.

Catholic and Evangelical churches responded to all races equally.  Mainline churches, on the whole, responded more to white inquirers.  Here are just the white and black response rates for the mainline Protestant churches:

ELCA (Lutherans)        75% to 52% [White to black]
United Methodist          66    to 46
Episcopal                      82    to 71
PCUSA (Presbyterian)  48   to 58

The report said there were not enough Presbyterians to do a separate analysis with statistical confidence, so we should take this anomaly with a grain of salt.

Still, the Presbyterians seem not to show a pro-white bias, and, if anything, have a pro-black bias.

Pregnancy-Related Deaths Cut Nearly in Half Since 1990 Worldwide

The World Health Organization said there has been a 44% drop in pregnancy-related deaths in the last 15 years.

East Asia has made the biggest progress, where maternal deaths dropped from 95 per 100,000 to only 27/100K.  Even sub-Saharan Africa, which has the highest rates of maternal deaths, cut their rates in half.

Reducing maternal mortality is one of the eight Millennium Development Goals adopted by most nations in 2000.  The WHO goal is get down to a worldwide rate of less than 70/100K by 2030.

In the Yale Halloween Costume Controversy, the Sociologists Are Right

There has been a peculiar controversy at Yale about Halloween costumes. Sociologist Nicholas Christakis and his wife Erika encouraged students who were offended by one another's costumes to 

look away, or tell them you are offended. Talk to each other. Free speech and the ability to tolerate offence are the hallmarks of a free and open society. 

Some students vehemently objected, calling for Christakis to step down as master of Silliman College. In a videotaped confrontation, a student contended to Christakis that  “In your position as master it is your job to create a place of comfort and home for the students who live in Silliman. ... It is not about creating an intellectual space!” 

On the substance of the issue, I think the Christakises are entirely right.

I was struck by another feature.  Knowledge class homes try to be places of both comfort and intellectual engagement. Learning how to think critically is one of the aims of the homes of most professors. 

"My Vote Doesn't Make a Difference" Misunderstands What Makes Democracy Work

People who don't vote in elections because "my vote doesn't make a difference" are committing an individualistic fallacy - one of the great errors that sociology was born to correct.

The great virtue of democracy is that no important issue is decided by just one person.  The collective wisdom corrects the various individual biases - and the broader the group that votes, the more this is so.

Sociology lets us see the big picture - and in the big picture, the individual choice not to vote makes things worse, when aggregated with the millions of other individualists making the same mistake.

To Be a Sociologist, Firmly Grasp the Difference Between "Most" and "All"

For years I have told students what I call the Number One Rule of Sociology:

We make generalizations about groups which do not necessarily apply to each individual in the group.

Often people err in treating a true group generalization as if, to be true, it has to apply to each person in the group.  Since this is almost never the case, they dismiss the possibility of generalizing about groups at all.  Yet group generalizations are essential in dealing with a world of strangers.

Recently I thought up a shorter version of this rule, or perhaps it is the prerequisite to the Number One Rule.  To be a sociologist, you need a firm grasp on the difference between Most and All.

Brain Surgeons Don't Have to be Widely Informed

Ben Carson is a famous brain surgeon, but he has rather fanciful views (to put it nicely) about many other things. 

In response to the controversy over his belief that Joseph built the pyramids to store grain, a friend on Facebook asked if this meant that a once intelligent man was losing his mind.  I offered, respectfully, that surgeons are very well informed about one thing, but this is no guarantee that they are well informed, or even thoughtful, about anything else.

This prompted a respected brain scientist to offer a useful perspective:

Medical School and residencies (particularly the 6-7 years required for neurosurgery) are designed to build specific skill sets and a pretty focal knowledge base. They're generally the antithesis of the classic liberal arts arc. They don't encourage breadth. In fact, I'd say that neurosurgical training is likely to select for individuals who: 1) aren't deeply thoughtful--or even curious--about how the great, big world works, outside of neuroanatomy and its associated pathologies; and 2) are supremely confident and certain about what they do know (a necessity if one is going to cut into brain tissue). It's actually pretty easy to understand how, if anything, such training could reinforce the sort of willful ignorance expressed by Ben Carson. Contrary to the oddly popular stereotype, you don't need to be a super-genius with extraordinary powers of intellectual synthesis to be a neurosurgeon. In fact, such qualities would probably get in the way.

Happy Successful Prevention of Terrorism Day!

"Remember, remember the Fifth of November" ...

Today is the day when the British celebrate their success in preventing the religious terrorist Guy Fawkes from blowing up the government.

Whether in 1605 or today, we can all celebrate our successes in preventing anti-government terrorism.

Gleanings from the Kentucky Election

The election was mostly disappointing in our household.  There are some silver linings, and some ironies that I note by the light of the next day.

Governor-elect Bevin ran on an anti-government platform, especially against the federal government. He promised to dismantle Kentucky's health insurance exchange and Medicaid expansion.  He says he will not "throw people off their health insurance," but instead shift them to the federal health insurance program.  This, ironically, will expand the reach of the federal government.

All Republicans and Tea Partiers ran against President Obama, especially the "coal-killing" Environmental Protection Agency.  Four years from now, when Gov. Bevin''s term ends and Pres. Obama is long gone, it will be clear that the natural-gas boom, not environmental regulations, has been the real threat to the coal industry.

Attorney General Jack Conway gave a very gracious concession speech after losing the governor's race - certainly the best speech I ever heard him make.  He promised, as a good Democrat, to be at the service of the new governor.

House Speaker Greg Stumbo, the de facto leader of the Democratic Party now, gave a fine and curious speech about not letting the other party paint Democrats as any less Christian or moral.

Kentucky has elected a black person to statewide office for the first time in Lieutenant Governor-elect Jenean Hampton.

And Danville will finally get a new Representative in the Kentucky House after 13 years of inaction by Mike Harmon, the Auditor-elect.

Black Women Want the Top Corporate Jobs More Than Other Women Do

Black women seek the top jobs more than women of other races.

This is such an interesting finding.

I think it reflects the fact that black women have been primary breadwinners in most black families for a generation. This is especially true among poor and working-class families.  Now, though, we have a whole generation of black women mostly raised by single mothers.  Many of those young women have educated and worked themselves into the management class.  They are a big part of the pool of black women in the higher levels of business.

So, while there are very few black women in C-level corporate jobs now, I expect that rate will rise faster than will the rate of women of other races in the top-money jobs.

The "Baby Penalty" is Shrinking for Educated White Women

This is a good tool to figure out the baby penalty in long-term wages for women with various characteristics.

The big news of this research is that the gap between mothers and childless women has been shrinking, especially for educated white women.

The reasons are mysterious.  I think, as educated women's marriage rates go up, younger married couples are investing more in her career than was true in previous generations.

China Drops The One-Child Policy

The draconian one-child policy did reduce the population growth rate in China dramatically.  They went from having a population bomb to a birth dearth.

The expectable consequence of the old policy is that they will not have enough workers to maintain their cheap-labor economic growth.  They will also not have enough young workers to support their rapidly aging population.

The unexpected effect of the policy was that by limiting the number of children per couple to one, without changing the cultural preference for boys, they produced a massive sex imbalance - now about 119 boys born for every 100 girls.

For these reasons, China has officially dropped the policy.  However, many middle-class Chinese have already culturally adjusted to sub-replacement family size, just like families in developed nations. Culture, and the cost of middle-class life, may keep the one-child effect going.

Treating "Everyone as an Individual" is Impossible in a World Full of Strangers.

Students sometimes think that they should avoid using stereotypes in sizing up strangers.  This comes from an admirable desire not to misjudge people. They believe that if they just treat everyone as an individual, they can avoid ever making group generalizations.

Yet we cannot meet all strangers as individuals.  We encounter them as members of groups. It would be impossible to treat each person we meet with full individuality.

I offer, instead, that we should seek to meet groups with the most accurate group generalizations.  AND that we should remember Rule #1 of Sociology (according to me): We make generalizations about groups which do not necessarily apply to each member of the group.

Good News: The Deforestation Rate Has Been Cut in Half

The rate of deforestation has been cut in half since the 1990s.  The forests are still shrinking, but at a slower rate.

In the temperate zone, forests seem to be actually rebounding.

One unexpected fruit of the collapse of the Soviet Union is that the clear-cut forests on collective farms are now growing back since the farms were privatized again.

A Fascinating Moment from "The Jinx"

This is not the usual topic of The Gruntled Center, but I did want to commend the documentary "The Jinx: The Life and Deaths of Robert Durst."  The series, which ran earlier this year, shows interviews with rich oddball Durst after he was suspected in several murders, and tried for one.

The series famously ended with a scene of Durst, confronted with very damning evidence, denying culpability on camera.  He then went into the adjacent bathroom, with his microphone still live. He has a conversation with himself in which he seem to be admitting that the jig is up.

What struck me most about that conversation was that he sounded like Gollum.  Late in "The Lord of the Rings," the tormented Smeagol/Gollum has a conversation with himself between what increasingly seem like two distinct personalities.  Durst did not sound like that, but he did seem to have some part of his "presentation of self" that was being conducted by a personality that stood at a cold remove from the face he normally presented to the world.

Really fascinating.

Barbie Has a Great New Commercial - But She Could Still Have a Sensible Body

This Barbie commercial is wonderful about how playing with dolls can develop girls' imagination.

But she still could have a sensibly proportioned body.

Chickpeas are a Powerful Uniting Force Against Religious Nationalism

This is my favorite story today:  a restaurant in Israel offering 50% off to Jewish and Arab patrons who eat together.

The Hummus Bar offers "And real excellent Arab hummus! And great Jewish falafel!" to bring people together.

It is working.