Empathy generally means....you put yourself in another person's shoes....reference their thoughts, worries, woes, and beliefs....and you find some common ground.
Generally, when intellectuals talk empathy, they suggest that both sides come to a precise middle-ground....does not get any real hype. No one says precisely how both sides could give up half of their core argument or discussion. Historically, it's hard to find any situation in the past forty-odd years where empathy was played out and two sides came to a neutral point. I know folks will argue otherwise, but I challenge them to some point in Europe, the US or any part of the world where two sides gave up half of their argument and reached some purely neutral situation in life.
Why bring up this topic today? German N-TV (commercial in nature) went out and did an interview with an American intellectual....Carolyn J. Lukensmeyer. Lukensymeyer (PhD) leads the organization National Institute for Civil Discourse in the US, which has the primary function of bringing mass empathy across the American landscape.
Lukensmeyer's big mission in life? She wants to bring the mass of Americans to publicly discuss Trump and restore balance....meaning that Trump isn't elected in 2020 for another occasion. To achieve that, she is hyped up on empathy.
N-TV's interview with Lukensmeyer discusses the whole matter, and how they are bringing thousands together and reshaping their view of Trump....so that empathy wins out in the win (meaning no Trump exists after 2020).
Germans are somewhat interested in topics like this. For German intellectuals, if empathy had existed in 2016....then Americans would not have voted for Trump and the world would be a fine place today.
The interview is well worth reading (probably sixty lines).
The general problem I see with intellectuals and this argument of empathy....it means you'd have to come half-way across (from both sides). So you'd go and ask the intellectual folks to put on common-working-man's shoes, face up to NAFTA, unemployment and feel the general suffering required in a chaotic business environment. For some reason, most journalists, intellectuals and such....don't worry much about their work, their household, or their stability....they aren't the likely ones to ever be laid off or out of work for a year or two.
Yes, this empathy thing would awful hard for some folks to wear the shoes of the other. For this reason, I tend to see the discussion and suggestion of more empathy 'balance' as being amusing.
If Hillary Clinton had judged the 'rust-belt' and the NAFTA job episode correctly, she might have come out with a similar position like Trump. But she didn't. Nor do I think anyone for serious consideration in the Democratic Primary for 2020....will ever chat about this jobs situation or negativity over NAFTA. They will hype up fake news, the evil Russians, and the desire for empathy. None of those things restores job confidence or builds up enthusiasm for business growth in America.
This empathy thing in Germany? Maybe up until the end of 2016, there was zero empathy over migration and asylum efforts in Germany.....it was a one-sided topic. Now? Over the past two years, both major political parties have been dragged into the empathy pit and forced to wear the shoes of migration oppositionists. If you had suggested that type of empathy would exist in Germany back in 2015, most journalists would have laughed. Yet here we are....the pro-asylum crowd has been forced into become highly empathic toward the anti-asylum folks.
So when you hear the topic of empathy....the first thing to ask....is there anyone really willing to bend half-way toward the other's guys position?
1 comment:
It's always annoying when a noble ideal is twisted into something corrupt.
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