[alstonite]

It’s interesting to see a country’s internal rank of its own happiness against how I would rank them using my worldview.

Israel for example seems like a place that would be fairly unhappy right now given world events, but they rank quite highly.

Saudi Arabia also sticks out as unexpected. It seems in the media I hear about their government being quite oppressive (especially against women), so seeing them just above the US is surprising.

[dannyphantom]

IMO, everyone on Earth has to reconcile with their current circumstances and make the choice to go about life with a positive or negative disposition in spite of those circumstances.

[scythe]

Another big surprise is Mexico. It seems like every day there's another gory story about a bunch of people disappearing or getting shot in a gang war. But they're the second-highest ranked in North America at #12, behind only Costa Rica.

Israel I think is similar to Costa Rica in that whatever problems Israelis have, they look around at their neighbors and realize how much worse it could be.

[bombcar]

Maybe they're ranking themselves so high because they're not in the "bunch of people gorily disappeared."

[myth_drannon]

It had a huge drop in positive emotions due to the war with Gaza in 2023. Actually, negative emotions were higher than positive which is sad and expected. But the index includes many metrics that don't change rapidly like GDP, life expactancy.. so any short conflict will not have outsized effect.

[mvdtnz]

> But the index includes many metrics that don't change rapidly like GDP, life expactancy..

No it does not. It's one question without regard to GDP, life expectancy or anything else.

[magic_hamster]

There might have been a huge drop due to the atrocities on October 7th which caused the Gaza war.

[card_zero]

Perhaps all the Saudi men are very happy.

[nradov]

Do the Saudi Arabia numbers count all of the foreign workers who are brought in to do the dirty jobs for low wages and treated like dogs? Or are only citizens counted?

[deadbabe]

In Israel they use happiness as a rebellion. You try to kill them, you say what you want, but they don’t care, they stay happy. It fuels their enemy’s rage.

[10xDev]

No they just call you an antisemite and ask America to bomb you.

[magic_hamster]

Not really? The current conflict with Iran is entirely a joint venture where Israel is taking on a significant portion. In previous conflicts the US was marginally involved and even pushed Israel to stop fighting entirely. I don't think you have a good grasp on these events.

[myth_drannon]

Yes, maybe. It's the old jewish way of dealing with being powerless in exile. You try to hit us, we smile and joke. It's not healthy.

I think it's now more about gaining power as a nation and not being at the mercy of those who seek to destroy us.