feelgoodery

See also: feel-goodery

English

WOTD – 3 August 2021

Alternative forms

• feel-goodery

Etymology

From feel +‎ good +‎ -ery (suffix meaning ‘the art, craft, or practice of; place of’ forming nouns).

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˌfiːlˈɡʊdəɹi/

• Audio (Southern England)

  (file)

• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˌfilˈɡʊdəɹi/
• Hyphenation: feel‧good‧ery

Noun

feelgoodery (countable and uncountable, plural feelgooderies) (derogatory)

1. (uncountable) Behaviours performed with the purported purpose of promoting emotional happiness and/or certain cultural values; these behaviours may be seen as superficial or unimportant, or as a substitute for more meaningful action.
   • 2010, Garry Mulholland, Popcorn: Fifty Years of Rock 'n' Roll Movies:

     Every mainstream pop musical money-spinner, from Jesus Christ Superstar to Mamma Mia!, finds its origins in Hair 's relentless crassness and misguided feelgoodery, which means I don't have to watch or write about any more of them.

   • 2018 December 12, Charles Bramesco, “A Spoonful of Nostalgia Helps the Calculated Mary Poppins Returns Go Down”, in The A.V. Club‎^[1], archived from the original on 24 May 2019:

     He's down in the dumps because nobody wants to buy his art and his wife died, while she's got a case of the gloomies in response to public apathy for the plight of the underclass. Their grown-up troubles form an odd angle with the purportedly innocent feel-goodery, and ultimately betray the film's cross purposes.

   • 2019, Bruce Warnock, Observations on Redemption, page 96:

     We see lots of humanistic feelgoodery on gretting cards, internet memes, wall posters, bumper stickers and the rest, aimed at justifying, in one's mind, the very things that they should feel guilty about.

   • 2020, Bruce Warnock, Road Signs to the End Times, page 46:

     Lots of smiling faces, money and feelgoodery will do that.

2. (countable) A place or work containing such behaviours.
   • 2009, John Ortved, Simpsons Confidential, page 11:

     While the school remains a progressive, liberal feel-goodery, it is also regularly ranked among the West's best liberal arts colleges.

   • 2011, Kristopher G. Phillips, J. Jeremy Wisnewski, Arrested Development and Philosophy: They've Made a Huge Mistake:

     Believing it to be an award, she has Maeby's expulsion letter from the "new age feel-goodery" Openings framed.

   • 2016 March 29, Erik Adams, “David Walton returns to display the dark side of New Girl’s big kiss”, in AV Club:

     Genevieve is exactly the type of character we usually see running one of these new-age feel-gooderies (though, based on those two references, apparently the only one who’s made an impression on me is the Arrested Development version), but Punch’s performance keeps the character from feeling like Sam’s shoes: A re-tread.

Related terms

• feel-good
• feel-good factor
• feel-goodism

Translations

behaviours performed with the purported purpose of promoting emotional happiness and/or certain cultural values

place where such behaviours are performed or taught

See also

• dogoodery