Basic HTML Version
July
1971
apparent reason, they began dying.
Soon, there were only half of them left.
Yet, food supply was abundant, and
no infection could be found.
But the deer kept dying - untit
there were only 80 remaining. Post–
mortero examinations brougbt
to
light a
strange fact: Striking changes had
occurred in vital organs which sug–
gested great emotional stress.
Whether we find it a palatable truth
or not, medica! authorities believe up to
one half of the ailments experienced by
humans are psychosomatic, induced by
psychological pressures, and not actual
physiological illness. This simply means
that many humans are experiencing the
symptoms of overcrowding, of an
annoying, enervating, confusing, chaotic
way of things which can result in a
whole host of effects, commonly diag–
nosed as various "illnesses."
Nor are cats any different. Crowding
them together, similar to the rat experi–
ment, resulted in what was half–
humorously called a "Fascist trans–
formation ... with a despot at the top,
pariahs at the bottom, and a general
malaise in the community where tbe
cats ... seldom relax, they never look at
ease, and there is continuous hissing,
growling, and even fighting"
(Sat11rday
Revietu,
Novernber 8, 1969, quoting P.
Leyhausen).
Sounds like New York, Tokyo, Loo–
don, or Rome! Humans are no
different.
Wül the earth duplicate tbe pen?
Will man go the route of the over–
crowded rats, cats, deer, and mice?
That's merely a rhetorical question.
He
aiready
has. The only question re–
mammg is: Will man go the ultimate
route, and populate himself out of
existence?
"l
think we have 15 years to decide"
answered Dr. Calhoun, lead scientist in
the rat experiments.
"If
we don't make
up our minds in this time
to
reverse our
population course, l'm pessimistic about
the future of man."
Psychological Deterioration
We have separated "psychological
deterioration" from "physiological dete–
rioration." That is an oversimplification
- the two are very much related.
Psychological stress (the main mental
Tht
PLAIN TRUTH
response of a human being to life in the
20th century) directly causes a host of
physiological problems - high blood
pressure, atheriosderosis, heart trouble,
liver disease, ulcers, digestive disorders,
exhaustion, asthma, insomnia, night
sweats, headaches, reduced resistance to
infectious diseases, endocrine (glandu–
lar) malfunctions
0f
all kinds, and
other hallmarks of urban living.
Many recognized physicians feel that
a very large percentage ( 40, 60, or,
sorne say,
90
percent!) of all physi–
ological problems can be traced back to
psychological stress, with urban areas
the main culprits, as the following
study demonstrates.
An exhaustive eight-year examination
of 1,660 rnidtown Manbattan residents
and workers, conducted by a five-man
team based at the New York Hospital
- Cornell Medica! Center, found that
less than one out of five (18Y2% )
could be classified mentally well! A full
four out of fi.ve New Yorkers had sorne
symptoms of psychological disorders,
and roughly one out of four suffered
from neuroses sufficiently severe to dis–
rupt his daily Life. For the city as a
whole, that would measure out to about
2 million seriously
ill
in their minds,
with another 4Y2 million not well men–
tally, and only
1
Yí
mili ion mental!
y
sound!
The Corne ll-New York Hospital
team could not fi.nd any evidence to
support the idea that these illnesses re–
sulted from a singular traumatic event
which "snapped the string" or acted as
the proverbial "straw which broke the
camel's back." Rather, a
Jifetime of
st,.ess
-
a continuous piling up of men–
tal constrictions, pressures, shocks, and
impairments (which is to say a life of
urban living) - is the more logical
culprit.
"Life"
in
New
York
A look at the typical New Yorker
beacs this out.
The blanched faces of subway com–
muters seem indicative of an extremely
enervating da
y
-
but it's only 8:30 in
the morning! The mail doesn't come on
time, the cabs are filled, the phone
circuits are overloaded. One hundred
decibels of noise is a common
punctuation in the day. In the words of
5
Felix Riesenberg, describing the New
York of a few years back:
"City of carpenters without wood, of
plumbers without merey. Gty of un–
comfortable comfort stations. City of
clanging radiators, of supine superin–
tendents. Gty wherein there is no room
to die....
"City wrought in fiame. City of argu–
ments unending. City of terminals,
city
of endings, city of the last attempt. City
wherein no one knows whether he is
coming or going."
T he metabolism of New York City
- the comings and goiogs, the ins and
outs of commerce, the commuting of
COMMUT ER CRUNCH
-
Tokyo's railroad commuter lines
regulorly carry two to three times
the full copocity of their design
specifications.
World lonk Photo
dull warm bodies - all represent a lo–
gística! problem which would baffle the
best of generals. But it happens twice a
day, five or six days a week, in bustling
New York City.
During an average working day, over
2.2 million employees choke the ofiices,
retail shops, factories, and government