Empathy

As this emotion-fraught election season draws to a close, tempers are flaring and metaphorical, hate-filled punches are being thrown by both sides of the electorate. I’m really more of a story-teller, rather than a political blogger, and I don’t intend to start spouting my political views here. I know some of you are thinking back to the Kate you knew in 2000, and remembering how annoyed I was at any mention of the election, and my roommates for fixating upon it and having knock-down, drag-outs about who should have won and how the votes were counted. Kate hates politics, you are saying to yourselves.

Well, I’ve grown up a bit since then. I don’t know if that is what has made me care about the state of the union this year—I’m getting older, and I can see how it matters. Some of it is the candidates themselves—how exciting to see a black man and a woman both on tickets this year. Some of it is the need for a new direction in our country, and that feeling that ANYTHING has to be better than this. Regardless, politics seems to permeate almost every discussion I overhear in the hallways at work, as well as the conversations I participate in.

I’ve always had a fascination with how people’s brains function. I spend a lot of time pondering why the people I know think the way they do. I try to diagnose the neuroses of my friends and family and acquaintances and co-workers. I'm always convinced there must be some psychological reason that people do the things they do. I had a boss, who will remain nameless (but my friend Red and I called him The Powser--our slang for a poser on a power trip), of whom I could never make up my mind whether he was actually crazy, or if he knew what he was doing was wrong most of the time, but was sure he could convince the rest of us that he was right. Either way, he was nuts.

As I watch the political ads and the interviews with pundits and listen to editorials on both sides of this election, I am struck by the fact that both sets of people have a stock set of lines to deliver. I know these things are what unites us with those on our side, but yesterday I heard some of those stock lines delivered by a co-worker. She said it like she thought it up alone, like she was the first person to say it. That made me realize that it isn't just a line she's spewing--it is a belief.

This particular person is on the republican side of the aisle, and what she said was that she didn't want any more of her money going to taxes to pay for things like welfare, which is just a handout anyway, because people just take that money and then don't get jobs or anything, just take advantage of the rest of us hard workers.

It struck me that she was completely lacking in empathy for this imaginary group of people who are taking the tax dollars and using them as "handouts." That she couldn't put herself in the shoes of someone who needed help, and the government was the only one there with a hand to lend in tough times.

I know that there are people who take advantage of the system. That's true of any system. But for each of those people, isn't it possible that there is someone who is really helped by programs like welfare? Isn't it possible there is at least one good, well-meaning individual, who is just down on his luck? Don't you want to believe that there is good in the world, and that it manifests itself in different ways?

One of my favorite bloggers posted a theoretical question on her web site, asking whether you would give money to a family in need if you were also required to give a very bad person the same amount of money?

My answer to this question is yes. I can't imagine being turned away from help because I couldn't fill out all the forms or navigate the legal system. If you don't have empathy, I think it's hard to be a liberal, or at least someone that leans to the left. At least that is how it looks from here. I'm thankful for my empathy, even though it sometimes makes me a little nuts, myself. If people were more concerned with self-sacrifice than with self-preservation, we wouldn't be in this mess.

How do you see it? Do you think one side is more compassionate, more empathetic than the other? Does it influence how you vote? Let me know! I have a research theory idea in my head and I need some feedback.