[quacked]

Often times what is understood by first-worlders as "depression" is a cluster of problems that uniquely affect decently well-off people who have been spiritually and physically subjugated by an spiritually blank industrial bureaucracy.

If you measure stress, hunger, sorrow, fear, scarcity, etc. you'll find higher levels among the global poor, but if you measure "malaise, sadness, lack of purpose, emptiness, yearning for meaning, loneliness" you won't find that the global poor suffer these things as acutely.

People are often surprised when they visit the poorer Caribbean countries, or African countries (not experience immediate war), or South America, and come back gushing about how happy the people there are. Yes; many of the people you'll interact with the third world work fewer hours, with friends and companions from the same culture, with the same spiritual beliefs, doing physical labor outside that has an immediate impact on their direct survival.

By contrast, go to any part of the third world that is experiencing "industrialization" or "globalization"--Lagos, Cairo, Luanda, etc.--and you'll find that "depression" rates begin to increase as people grow up and slot themselves into the global supply chain instead of the lifestyle of their ancestors.

(For the record, I am not advocating that we should shut down the supply chain to cure depression, but I think this understanding of why "happiness" trends down in areas where life is easy and comfortable, but trends up in areas where life is difficult and uncomfortable, is an important step in figuring out a good mental model of the world.)

[mlinhares]

I don't know, there's a lot of that in the countryside in Brazil, that kinda looks like Africa in a lot of places, maybe not as much loneliness as people and families usually stick together but all the other things are there.

But i can see how a simpler and poorer life will remove the worries of emptiness/lack of purpose when all you can focus on is making ends meet and have enough to eat at the next meal.

[ripjaygn]

> with friends and companions from the same culture, with the same spiritual beliefs

What does this have to do with anything? I grew up in a multicultural, multireligious and multilingual part of the third world, and no one ever said or thought that we would be happier if the 'other people' were somehow disappeared. Is this coming from some sections of the modern western society blaming PoC immigrants for their unhappiness?

[quacked]

I'll answer your questions, but first out of curiosity, have you ever had any struggles with depression?

[vbezhenar]

That's correct. Humanity achieved astonishing results in technological and medical advances. But at the same time, humans still struggle with happiness.