Bhutan, After Prioritizing Happiness, Now Faces an Existential Crisis (cbsnews.com)
- Reference: 0175501809
- News link: https://news.slashdot.org/story/24/11/19/156212/bhutan-after-prioritizing-happiness-now-faces-an-existential-crisis
- Source link: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/bhutan-emigration-crisis-60-minutes/
> The country boasts free health care, free education, a rising life expectancy and an economy that's grown over the last 30 years -- still, people are leaving. Prime Minister Tshering Tobgay believes it is ironically the success of Gross National Happiness that has made young Bhutanese so sought after abroad. "It is an existential crisis," he said.
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> Bhutan, which is about the size of Maryland, was largely isolated from the rest of the world for centuries. The kingdom was so protective of its unique Buddhist culture that it only started allowing foreign tourists to visit in the 1970s and didn't introduce television until 1999. Buddhism is the country's national religion. Bhutanese, especially older men and women, spend hours spinning prayer wheels full of Buddhist scriptures. Prayer flags flutter on hillsides and in forests, turning nature itself into a shrine. Bhutan's capital city of Thimpu still has no traffic lights. The nation's roads are shared by cars and cows.
[1] https://www.cbsnews.com/news/bhutan-emigration-crisis-60-minutes/
So asian amish ... (Score:2)
People aren't leaving because they are happy they are leaving because they are beginning to understand that there is a big wide world out there with wonders that they cannot even imagine exist yet ..... they're leaving for the same reason young people are leaving the amish world.
Not so sunny (Score:2)
Bhutan has a pretty abysmal human rights record, including [1]having done ethnic cleansing [wikipedia.org].
Also, young people want economic opportunity and freedom, which may not be so readily available in Bhutan.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethnic_cleansing_in_Bhutan
misleading intro (Score:2)
The fact that schools were taught in english provided a skilled workforce, and COVID-19 suppression of tourism caused massive job loss resulting in the outmigration to countries with jobs and good wages.
It is the tourism job dependence that caused the loss of population, not the 'happiness index' focus.
Wrong kind of happiness (Score:2)
Mindless happiness spinning prayer wheels doesn't compare to actually experiencing life and sharing those experiences with friends.
Once you see there is more to do, discontent is going to set in and a percentage of people are going to do something about it.