Can science explain Gina Rinehart’s poetry?
Sure, a lot of good people have spent a lot of time deriding it and belittling it. Time no doubt well spent. But every word of humorous commentary, satisfying as it is, leaves one question unanswered. Why? What critical failure of self-awareness allowed this woman to pen such odious verse?
Moreover, why did she publish it and how on earth did it come to be engraved on a plaque and pinned to a gigantic rock in the middle of Perth?
A group of psychologists based at the University of California might have an answer. In a series of studies, they’ve compared the behaviour of rich people with that of the rest of us. Their scientific opinion? Rich people are different, very different.
To start with – and this is relevant to Rinehart’s iron ore ode – rich folk don’t perceive signals of others’ distress very well. It seems they just can’t pick up on the signs.
By contrast, “lower class” individuals are more accurate in judging the emotions of others and “are more reactive to negative social situations that impact others”. The psychologists call this “empathic accuracy”, and it starts with the most basic things.
For instance, they found that rich people are less likely to pay attention in a conversation with another person. They’re measurably more likely to doodle, avoid eye contact and check their phone than others are. Compared to those with less material wealth, they also have greater difficulty deciphering the emotions of people in photographs.
The results carried through to more meaningful interactions too. They found that rich people were less likely to notice a competitor’s anxiety in a group job interview. They registered less concern when watching a video depicting a family in crisis. It’s not just empathy where wealth appears to hinder the human response. These scientists have tested social behaviour in almost every imaginable way across multiple studies. The results have been strikingly consistent. As Dacher Keltner, one of the studies’ authors, puts it, “no matter how you look at it”, rich subjects showed less propensity towards “ethical behaviour”.
Honesty? Rich people cheated more often in a game of dice. They lied more often in a mock negotiation. Generosity? Rich people took more lollies from a lolly jar intended for children. Public safety? Rich people were more likely to drive through a pedestrian crossing with pedestrians on it.
Of course, none of this (except that god awful poem) is set in stone. These scientists don’t draw the conclusion that the “lower classes” are inherently superior human beings. Rather, the hypothesis is that because workers’ lives are basically networks of cooperative relationships, their social experience necessitates “greater attentiveness, awareness and concern for others”. In other words, not being a “self-focused” twit is a question of survival for everyone other than the rich.
The good news is that these behavioural deficiencies are entirely treatable. The fix? A good dose of expropriation and redistribution. And perhaps a quiet word about poems best left unspoken. It’s for their own good.
