What the World Needs Now

About a week ago, Onion and I were heading East to go see his ma. Being relatively "new" here still, we didn't anticipate the entrance ramp to the highway coming up on us quite so quickly, so we were in the wrong lane. Onion slowed down, put on his blinker to indicate he was trying to get over, and began slowly to inch his way towards the right lane... one car passed, another, then another. Thinking perhaps he had an opening, Onion started to make his move when one mightily-pissed off driver honked and screamed at us -- obviously, he either hadn't seen us, or had, but had no intention of letting us in. Being on the passenger side, I glanced over to see the guy we had enraged -- shaved head, some piercings, tattoos, snarling and cursing at us, showing us his middle-finger.

"Oh, fuck you!!" I suddenly found myself screaming back him. "Would it have killed you to let us in?!" This guy looked pretty big and mean, but in that moment, I wanted nothing more than to get out of the car and kick his ass. This is laughable, of course, because although I am not exactly small, I'm a pretty peaceful Bird by nature and not particularly known for kicking ass. The guy screaming at us probably kicked ass for a living. He sped off, quickly zooming past all of the other cars on the highway until he was well out of our sight.

I can still see the guy's snarling face, full of rage, screaming at me. And I can easily recall how incredibly angry I felt -- how much I hated the stranger in the next car, and how I wanted something bad to happen to him for being such an asshole. Onion had said "He's probably a really nice guy" and I replied "I doubt it. He's probably a selfish prick. He certainly drives like one."

Having been to counseling in the past (I'm one of them ruminators, remember?), I realize that my anger wasn't just about that one guy screaming at us. In that moment, that snarling face represented everything that's been pissing me off for weeks (months?) now -- both in my personal life and in the political arena.

I've been thinking a lot about empathy lately -- obviously, I could use a little work on this myself. I found this passage, from a commencement speech made in 2006 by then Senator Barack Obama:

The world doesn't just revolve around you. There's a lot of talk in this country about the federal deficit. But I think we should talk more about our empathy deficit - the ability to put ourselves in someone else's shoes; to see the world through those who are different from us - the child who's hungry, the laid-off steelworker, the immigrant woman cleaning your dorm room.

As you go on in life, cultivating this quality of empathy will become harder, not easier. There's no community service requirement in the real world; no one forcing you to care. You'll be free to live in neighborhoods with people who are exactly like yourself, and send your kids to the same schools, and narrow your concerns to what's going in your own little circle.

Not only that - we live in a culture that discourages empathy. A culture that too often tells us our principle goal in life is to be rich, thin, young, famous, safe, and entertained. A culture where those in power too often encourage these selfish impulses.

They will tell you that the Americans who sleep in the streets and beg for food got there because they're all lazy or weak of spirit. That the inner-city children who are trapped in dilapidated schools can't learn and won't learn and so we should just give up on them entirely. That the innocent people being slaughtered and expelled from their homes half a world away are somebody else's problem to take care of.

I hope you don't listen to this. I hope you choose to broaden, and not contract, your ambit of concern. Not because you have an obligation to those who are less fortunate, although you do have that obligation. Not because you have a debt to all of those who helped you get to where you are, although you do have that debt.

It's because you have an obligation to yourself. Because our individual salvation depends on collective salvation. And because it's only when you hitch your wagon to something larger than yourself that you will realize your true potential - and become full-grown.

Yes. Yes, yes, a thousand times yes. This is why I voted for this man.

I find it relatively easy to feel empathy for others -- unless they hurt me, or piss me off. Onion was probably right -- the snarling guy in the car probably is a nice guy -- probably has tons of friends and laughs readily, maybe has kids that he gently tucks in to bed each night. Maybe when he looked at my snarling face, I reminded him of every woman who's ever screamed at him about -- oh, about whatever multitude of things women scream at men for. Maybe he just lost his job. Maybe, if we sat down and had a cup of coffee together, we'd discover we had a lot in common. Maybe not. But I'm fairly positive we wouldn't end up screaming at each other.

Years ago, there was a play (later turned into a movie) called Tea and Sympathy. I'm thinking maybe it's time now for Coffee and Empathy.