By Deborah Netburn, Los Angeles Times If you feel certain your preferred candidate will lose the presidential election, that AI is coming for your job or that climate change is going to destroy humanity, then you have fallen prey to a cynical mindset, and you’re far from alone. Over the past 50 years, cynicism has spread like a virus across American society, infecting us with the belief that other people can’t be trusted, the world is only getting worse and there’s nothing we can do about it. This potent mix of fatalism and hopelessness has led to a loss of faith in our neighbors, our institutions and our dreams for the future.
Related Articles In 1972, 46% of Americans agreed that most people can be trusted according to the General Social Survey. By 2018, that percentage had fallen to 31.9%.
This rise in collective cynicism is not just destroying our hope, it’s also affecting our health. Studies suggest that cynics suffer more depression, drink more heavily, earn less money and die younger than non-cynics. But there may be an antidote to the cynical epidemic.
In his new book “Hope for Cynics: The surprising science of human goodness,” ( Grand Central ) Stanford professor Jamil Zaki suggests that cynicism can be combated with a willingness to question our most cynical assumptions and corroborate them with facts. If we would only look at the data, he writes, most of us would discover that people are more worthy of our trust than we imagine, that we have more in com.
