Why do a large portion of Americans scream ‘communism’ at the slightest mention of government involvement in the healthcare system?

Why do Albertans elect the same government, decade after decade, no matter what?

Why do I hate the idea of controller-less gaming, lead by Microsoft’s new Project Natal?

The answer is simple. Change is scary.

Now, you could argue that people aren’t scared of change. After all, Barack Obama was elected on a platform that centred around change. However, one has to realize that the United States was in a dire situation at the time. Change was really the only option. We are now seeing significant opposition to change.

When situations are dire, change is much less scary than maintaining the status-quo. But what about when situations are not so dire? That is when change gets really scary.

There are 309 million Americans. About 47 million are uninsured. That means that for some 85% of Americans, they are doing alright. There are long-term sustainability issues and rising costs, but humans are notoriously short-sighted. If it works now, why change it?Change is disruptive. We like stability and continuity. The same argument can be applied to Albertans’ voting habits.

How can I prove this? Facebook.

Recently, Facebook introduced some alterations to its layout. As with any other change Facebook had ever made, there was an immediate uproar. Threats of boycotting, leaving the site, and widespread status updates filled with complaints.

The changes Facebook made were relatively minor, and simply included shifting a few things around on the honepage. But such a minor change invoked such negativity. Why?

As I said before, when things are okay, we want to keep it that way. We like continuity and stability. It’s why we’ve allowed so much environmental damage; if it works now, why change it, no matter what the future consequences are? When those consequences do come to be, however, change is embraced with open arms.

Not all change is good (Project Natal), but it’s not always bad either. Perhaps people need to see a little beyond the stable world of the status quo, and see that change can sometimes bring about great things, despite the disruption it might cause for a short time.