Tuesday, September 22, 2009

STRRESSSS IS GONNA MAKE A MONKEY OUTTA YA!


Did any of you view the National Geographic televisual feast on Stress?




Stanford University neurobiologist and author Robert Sapolsky, did an awesome job of "dumbing down" how Baboons, like Humans, are their own worst enemy.

He stated that Baboons only need about 3 hours to meet their nutritional requirements and spend the other 9 terrorising each other!



Sapolsky said, "In the beginning the stress response saved our lives, making us run from predators and enabling us to take down prey.


Today, human beings are turning on the same life-saving physical reaction to cope with 30-year mortgages, $4 a gallon gasoline, final exams, difficult bosses and even traffic jams —
we can't seem to turn it off.


So, we're constantly marinating in corrosive hormones triggered by the stress response."



I did a post on Baboons, MAN APES MONKEY , in which I reflected upon the inescapable glaring similarities between our two societies.

I found this pathetic truth to be self evident;
The system is dominated by self-absorbed bullies who dish it out to the subordinate males who in turn take it out on juveniles, females, and infants.


What Sapolsky discovered over his 30 years of studying the hormone levels of Baboons is that the Alpha males have the least amount of stress and their arteries are free of cloggery...
bastards!

Like Baboons, he says that, "our social standing (our place in various hierarchies) can make us more or less susceptible to the damaging effects of stress."


A comparison was made using the Class-ridden British Civil Service.
The BCS is a byzantine-stratafied-kafkaesque-labyrinth wherein every single job is systematically rated on some imaginary hierarchical "food chain".

Like the alpha males in the Baboon troop, the managerial staff at the top of the BCS had much lower levels of stress..
bastards!

When I think of how unfair that is it makes me so mad.
Those snootty slackards remind me of P.J. O'Rourke's generalization of the "ANGLYSCHE".



Racial Characteristics:

"Cold-blooded queers with nasty complexions and terrible teeth who once conquered half the world but still haven't figured out central heating.

They warm their beers and chill their baths and boil all their food, including bread.

An intensely snobbish group, but who exactly they're snubbing is an international mystery.

Lately they've been getting their comeuppance world power-wise, as their shabby, antiquated, and bankrupt little back alley of a country slowly winds down like the ill-crafted clockwork playthings of which their undersized children are so fond.

They all have large collections of something useless like lamp finials or toad eggs, and they would have lost both world wars if it were not for us.

They like to be spanked with canes and that's just what they deserve".

Is your position on the societal food chain affecting your stress levels?

6 comments:

  1. Yes, it is. Or rather, it has been, raising my blood pressure and giving me some tachycardia.

    But hopefully, the managerial staff at the top of my food chain has been devastatingly dismissed 2 months ago and (oh, miracle!) blood pressure values came back to normal and fast heart beat slowed down.

    ((Btw, funny racial characteristics for the Brittons, hah. Have you found the ones for South Sandwichians yet?))

    ReplyDelete
  2. The jig is up Leni!

    Los Islas Sandwich del Sur are uninhabited by humans..
    except for King Penguin, Mr. Al Batross, and the Accounting firm of Petrel, Prion, Shag, Skua, Gull and Tern.

    ReplyDelete
  3. I was hoping to hear Vicus' take on this one.

    Did you hear about Sapolsky's Forest troop? the one where the aggressive alpha males died from raiding the TB infected garbage that was the territory of another baboon group? A "nicer" baboon society emerged, with I believe, lower stress for everyone and was maintained even when new males entered the group and gave up the macho bravado to fit in. http://www.peacefulsocieties.org/NAR06/060216gen.html

    There's hope for us! but only after a small act of violence of killing off all the alpha jerks in our world.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Well - speaking as an idler I'm completely off the scale now - so no probs.
    But in my last few years at work I was part time, lowest of the low and had about 5 bosses.
    I've never been more stressed.
    Don't forget the Brits' gas mask fetish:)

    ReplyDelete
  5. It is now... my bread just bolied over...
    Sx

    ReplyDelete

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