Party Political Broadcast by The Hedonist Party

"You can take the day off
when you vote for total bliss"

Party Manifesto

"Everyone's already suffered enough to last a lifetime, so there's no need for any more. But people who prefer to be miserable needn't worry - pleasure is always optional. Nobody wants to 'get tough' on workaholics or 'clamp down' on puritans - having a good time can't be imposed."
Most adults listening to this broadcast will have suffered the oddly stiff and starchy attitudes towards pleasure and happiness which have persisted for ages in our society. For example, we still believe that happiness must always be earned (we use words like 'disgusting' and 'shameful' when people experience it after doing nothing to earn it). We think we have to purchase units of enjoyment with recognised currencies like work, suffering, effort and self-sacrifice, and if you don't pay in advance, the happiness is 'tainted'... and you end up paying your debt in guilt.

It's as if we've been encouraged to program our brains with the instruction:

"To get happiness you have to suffer"

But this translates into "to be happy you must be unhappy", which sounds like insanity (no other political party is brave enough, or stupid enough, to tell you you're insane.)

Is this merely playing with words or do we really have a tendency to restrict our happiness to only the self-negating kind? And if we operate this way, does it follow that we're afraid of great happiness because it demands equally great suffering in return? This could put constricting limits on the types of enjoyment we allow ourselves (e.g. nothing beyond socially sanctioned rewards for work, or pleasure with built in self-destruction as 'payment'). It could even be significant in global terms - the prospect of happiness for everyone would be too frightening to even contemplate, as the only way to 'earn' it would be to endure a calamity of planetary proportions (in fact, many religions insist on a terrible doomsday-type 'cleansing' before we can live in paradise). Perhaps it would be saner (and less like hard work) to 'cleanse' ourselves of the idiotic notion that happiness has to be earned.

Do you ever get the impression that government, generally, is alarmed that some people might be having a good time without paying for it? Why else do they immediately put a stop to the fun by introducing new laws, license fees, experts-for-hire warning how dangerous it is, etc. It's not enough for them to have to suffer for each small trickle of pleasure. And, let's face it, if people enjoyed themselves too much at the weekend, they would never go back to work on Monday.

People seem fed up with the kind of happiness that always has strings attached - brief, carefully rationed holidays, officially sanctioned means of enjoyment. They want unconditional happiness, the kind that everyone deserves in infinite quantities, without having to beg for it, and without having to pay for it with work, guilt, struggle, punishment, subservience or any other loss of basic human dignity. Happiness free from any notions of worthiness.

That was a Party Political Broadcast by the Hedonist Party.

"A lot of research into the factors affecting happiness has taken place over the past 30 years. Much of this has focused on economic influences (e.g. work done by the Centre for Economic Performance at the London School of Economics). One of the conclusions to come out is that we don't seem to be getting happier (or at least we won't admit to it). In the last 20 years there has been no reported increase in happiness in Europe or the USA."

Independent 15/l2/94
Anxiety Culture/Issue 2 - page 12

POLITICIANS ENDORSE MASOCHISM AGAIN
(Article sponsored by the Hedonist Party, 1997)

"YES, IT HURT. YES, IT WORKED" (recent political campaign slogan)

"Formation of the masochistic response: a child helplessly anticipates some unavoidable pain (e.g. from an angry adult). Since the expected pain is unavoidable, the only way to respond to the feeling of helplessness (i.e. the only way to exercise any control) is to hasten the arrival of the pain - to get it over with. Thus, control is equated with bringing pain to oneself. Contrary to popular belief, this self-infliction of pain isn't experienced as pleasure - in fact, pleasure is rejected as it negates the control mechanism."

From Mass Masochism by Rev. E. C. Leigh-Hurt

Mass masochism is promoted in two ways:

i) Encouragement of the belief in unavoidably painful realities of life, and the consequent inevitability of suffering.

ii) Emphasis on social responsibilities such as discipline, obedience, hard work and taxes, which are "necessary" for the state's management (i.e. control) of public suffering (pleasure becomes a brief, guilty respite from our main functions which is endless toil and payment of tax).

Opposing all this, the Hedonists believe that happiness is our central function. Hedonists regard attempts to control suffering as futile and costly. Suffering shouldn't he controlled or managed, it should be replaced - with pleasure. Use your vote for Uncontrolled Happiness, not Controlled Unhappiness.

(© Hedonist Party)

Anxiety Culture/Issue 3 - page 6

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