Politics of Empathy

These are just some loose thoughts in reaction to something that's been rubbing me the wrong way lately.

Certainly, I am not going to say that there is anything wrong with empathy. Understanding another person's feelings and trying to get inside that mindset is obviously a valuable personal quality--one that helps to develop friends and to be a true friend. And probably there's a place for empathy in most all social roles we play. Though it should be said, empathy is hardly the only characteristic we should develop. And empathy, by itself, isn't always a very admirable value. That is, if you raise it to the highest of all values, you find that things like honor, justice, creative competition, fall by the wayside.

But empathy is a good, of course, situated within a range of values and characteristics that are also goods.

What's disturbing me is the idea that empathy is somehow a politics or a judicial outlook. Partly that irks me because it implies that one side of the political divide somehow has a monopoly on empathy. It couldn't be that while I empathize with this party, I also recognize the limitations of the law and of government's capacity to right all wrongs. No, if I feel empathy, my politics will require me to ignore the law (or interpret it to demand what it plainly does not say), because feeling trumps legal theory, interpretation, precedent, etc. And empathy means that if I feel for someone, I must, of force, believe that there must be some governmental form of redress. If a little girl drops her ice cream, empathy requires not just saying "that's very sad," but also "I've got a program to replace your ice cream."

So it's bad that the way we talk about empathy, we act as if only those on the left possess it--as if somehow a justice like Scalia or Alito is just dead to human feeling. Because of course we can ALL have empathetic feelings for people without deriving from those feelings the same high regard for government intrusion in every problem or new government programs to right every wrong. In fact, to the contrary, the most purportedly "empathetic" approaches to social problems often make the problems far worse. So, we often even encounter a divide where to be most empathetic is somehow to be most resistant to facing the kinds of social destruction one's empathetic programs have wrought. Empathy itself can become a value in itself, separate from its policy effects, which may be quite harmful to others.

It's also, to me, a cheapening and stultifying of our politics to make empathy some kind of measuring stick by which we're supposed to judge candidates for office or for the bench. First, as I said, it's stupid because it presumes to judge one's capacity for empathy from one's policy proposals or politics, which is daft. Two, it dumbs down our system to a level where feeling supersedes intellect, theory, philosophy, and really all the things that genuinely distinguish candidates.

But what's really awful about it, too, is that you COULD conceivably recognize that someone else feels as much as you do, cares about people as much as you do, really wants what's best for everyone as much as you do, is as intelligent as you are, but simply approaches problems from a different philosophy than you do. That view doesn't necessarily demean or degrade those who differ with you. They're good, smart people, just like you, who happen to be wrong. Instead, the politics of empathy mean that if people disagree with you--for example, if they think that the government funding a single-payer healthcare system is a bad idea--it's because they lack empathy. Where YOU feel for those who don't have insurance, THEY obviously lack feeling. They're really sociopaths, if you think about it. Anyone with empathy would agree that gay marriage is a good. So anyone who doesn't think it's a good must lack the requisite empathy. They're not just wrong. They're incomplete, diminished, second-class human beings.

And who needs a law book to decide a case. What you need is a box of tissue and some warm chicken soup.

I realize this post perhaps exaggerates the dialogue going on about empathy, but just barely. And it's as dumb a turn for our political discourse to take as I can imagine.

but it seems like it's par for the course to me. My sense of the political scene is that it continues ot be so polarized that it's like a western movie, with each side imagining it's wearing the white hat. So of course "empathy" is code for "those right-wing judges are cold callous bastards." The code works best in politics when it can slip under the radar; I feel my job as a citizen is to consistently try not to react the way I'm being programmed to react.

The need to demean those with whom you disagree, and which you describe so well, is pretty universal. To see other people as thoughtful, but perhaps mistaken (Didn't Kenneth Burke say something like that?) requires a true change in people and politics as we have it here isn't a good breeding ground for this kind of true tolerance.

and how he'd noticed during the 1960s on campus that rhetoric had started to move into the white hat vs black hat mentality when every issue that student groups were forwarding didn't immediately sail through to acceptance and implementation. It seems like a particularly "young" way to approach social disagreement. So maybe it's just another symptom of our obeisance to the idols of youth culture that our politics must be pouty and childish.

Hello Joe and Craddle. I don't have much time. I was having a discussion regarding empathy just this morning and wanted to add to this topic.

One of the reasons why "empathy" has become a buzz word is because of "Team of Rivals", a great book by Kearns regarding Licolns cabinet (and a whole lot more). President Obama also loved the book and has tried to emulate Lincoln.

One of Lincoln's distinguishing characteristics brought to light in this book was his ability to be empathetic. For example he had empathy for the Southern view because they were born into their perspective. HOWEVER, it didn't mean Linclon was sympathetic toward their view.

I think this is a key point. Empathy and sympathy are sometimes used interchangably and, they are two very different things. Empathy means seeing an issue from another's viewpoint. It does not mean you are going to lower the standard to accomodated another viewpoint. Being sympathetic means you are going to excuse not meeting a standard or, even lower the standard to accomodate someone.

Lincoln was empathetic toward the Southeners but, he wasn't going to cut them any slack when it came to secession.

That's quite interesting.

And I guess I meant Wayne Booth. I never can keep those rheotirc guys straight.