Compassion fails when suffering lacks a visible individual face
Evidence
The psychological re-creation of suffering—the essential vehicle of compassion and tenderness—fails easily if the sufferer is not a namable or visible individual but only a totality, which has no subjective states of mind, so to speak. It has been noted that English communal life has been characterized, throughout its history, by extraordinary justice toward persons and by equally great injustice toward groups. In view of the strong feeling for individual rights, it is only this second psychological peculiarity which accounts for the manner in which Dissenters, Jews, Irishmen, Hindus, and, in earlier periods, Scotchmen, have been treated. — Georg Simmel, on individuality and social forms_…, 344
Categorization
- XREF: Connects directly to the reader’s thesis on civil inattention: the same failure to re-create another’s suffering isolates the flâneur-observer in Lofland/Simmel. — connects to: Adding scale statistics to a single identifiable case reduces compassion and giving — , The Rod and the Child: A Global History…, 8725; Dehumanizing portrayals can lead victims to be seen as less capable of suffering and less deserving of humane treatment. — 5 Reasons Why People Blame Victims; Ideological commitment requires willed moral blindness to human suffering (+2 more)
Related
- Compassion fails when sufferers are collectivities rather than visible individuals (similarity 0.91)
- Compassion fails when sufferers are nameless collectives rather than visible individuals. (similarity 0.88)
Broader Connections
- Adding scale statistics to a single identifiable case reduces compassion and giving
#expands(0.85) — , The Rod and the Child, 8725 - Elevating the individual reduces societal suffering.
#corroborates(0.60) — Jordan B. Peterson, 12 Rules for Life An Antidote to Chaos, 88 - Ideological commitment requires willed moral blindness to human suffering
#corroborates(0.55)