I have spent the last four years walking a tightrope between empathy and apathy.
I find myself crying over images of hollowed-out hospitals thousands of miles away. Other days, I see a death count in the thousands and feel nothing. Sometimes, when I’m at dinner with people I love, and I’m laughing—those laughs that hurt and leave you sore—I think that the world might not be so bad. Then, I’m quickly reminded of the fact that food and even laughter are privileges.
There are generally two camps of thought on the state of the world: everything is bad, and I must care and do something about all of it—or, everything is bad, and I can’t do anything, so I will do nothing. Sometimes, we walk the line in between these, and the day’s wind blows us from one side to the other.
Contrary to popular belief, the world is not getting inherently worse. We just have easier access to all the bad parts of it, and we are finally beginning to listen to the voices of those who are harmed the most by it. Global media coverage makes it so that we find the bad everywhere. As we celebrate a victory in one place, we mourn a tragedy in the other. This has placed an ethical imperative that we care deeply about everything going wrong all over the world, whether the tragedy is in our backyard or across the Atlantic. On the surface, this statement is easy to agree with. When we dig into what this kind of care entails, it becomes complicated.
There is plenty of social science debate on whether or not it is even possible for individuals to care about everything shown to them by globalized news coverage. The American Psychological Association shows time and time again that 24-hour news coverage is detrimental to mental health. In each study, we see the theme of helplessness: there is so much wrong, and we can’t possibly fix all of it.
Because of the ethical imperative, we have seen the landscape of social action turn into one of vague virtue signaling through social media instead of legitimate action and improvement.
This feeling of walking the tightrope between the need to care and the inability to take action leaves no one winners. Increased awareness does not necessarily increase action. In fact, news overwhelm might be the death of meaningful social action because of its paralyzing effect on consumers. We need some kind of reframing.
I don’t remember when I first heard the serenity prayer. I know it was not a catholic liturgical space, as I have never been to a catholic mass. When I came across it again, it felt like an answer to a question I didn’t know I had.
“God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can and the wisdom to know the difference.”
Notice there is nothing in these sentences about what we can or cannot care about. Instead, the focus is on what we can do—what we can change. It is an oddly pragmatic approach to social action.
I am not sure it is possible to simply turn off our care for tragedy. However, you do not have to allow the constant free flow of images and information about these atrocities to take over your life in order to care about them.
The American Psychological Association published an article listing some practices to help combat media overload. These practices include limiting when and how much we consume and commonplacing practices such as writing out the headlines that concern you longhand and reflecting on them. More than anything, they highlighted the benefits of getting involved in causes that you care about. Doing something helps the individual and the collective.
It is essential to point out that with increased global coverage, our local news sources have severely suffered. This is particularly tragic considering that the issues in our own area are often the issues that we are best equipped to handle. It may be that you care greatly about humanitarian efforts in Yemen, but you may be more equipped to take action against poverty in your own county. In an article titled “Local Journalism in Crisis: why America must revive its local newsrooms,” Claire Hendrickson included statistics that showed the decrease in local journalism has led to a significant drop in local involvement. The reality is that there is something we can do most often, though it involves the things happening around us more than those thousands of miles away.
This does not mean that we do not care about non-local issues, and there are some ways that we can be active in these situations. One of the best ways we can get involved in larger national and international issues is by calling local and state representatives. Yet the lack of democratic involvement on a local and state level has made this a rarity. While some Americans may hop on planes and do international social justice, the everyday American has to find ways to take action where they are—that means local people helping with local issues.
I don’t think it is possible to simply turn off our care for human atrocities, no matter how many miles exist between us and the ground where the blood is shed. But no matter how hard we try, we cannot fix every issue everywhere. We can do our best to be informed, but being informed does nothing if we create a society of educated people who are miserable, helpless and paralyzed.
It’s April 11 when I write this, and the New York Times tells me that yesterday, a hydroelectric plant in Italy killed three people. Jessamine Journal tells me that “Lexington planners ask for input on the future of Jessamine County transportation.” Lex18 tells me that nearly 150 pedestrians were killed in the greater Lexington area last year. I care about all these things.
“God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.”
Featured image by Lena Overman.
The serenity prayer as the world falls down
I have spent the last four years walking a tightrope between empathy and apathy.
I find myself crying over images of hollowed-out hospitals thousands of miles away. Other days, I see a death count in the thousands and feel nothing. Sometimes, when I’m at dinner with people I love, and I’m laughing—those laughs that hurt and leave you sore—I think that the world might not be so bad. Then, I’m quickly reminded of the fact that food and even laughter are privileges.
There are generally two camps of thought on the state of the world: everything is bad, and I must care and do something about all of it—or, everything is bad, and I can’t do anything, so I will do nothing. Sometimes, we walk the line in between these, and the day’s wind blows us from one side to the other.
Contrary to popular belief, the world is not getting inherently worse. We just have easier access to all the bad parts of it, and we are finally beginning to listen to the voices of those who are harmed the most by it. Global media coverage makes it so that we find the bad everywhere. As we celebrate a victory in one place, we mourn a tragedy in the other. This has placed an ethical imperative that we care deeply about everything going wrong all over the world, whether the tragedy is in our backyard or across the Atlantic. On the surface, this statement is easy to agree with. When we dig into what this kind of care entails, it becomes complicated.
There is plenty of social science debate on whether or not it is even possible for individuals to care about everything shown to them by globalized news coverage. The American Psychological Association shows time and time again that 24-hour news coverage is detrimental to mental health. In each study, we see the theme of helplessness: there is so much wrong, and we can’t possibly fix all of it.
Because of the ethical imperative, we have seen the landscape of social action turn into one of vague virtue signaling through social media instead of legitimate action and improvement.
This feeling of walking the tightrope between the need to care and the inability to take action leaves no one winners. Increased awareness does not necessarily increase action. In fact, news overwhelm might be the death of meaningful social action because of its paralyzing effect on consumers. We need some kind of reframing.
I don’t remember when I first heard the serenity prayer. I know it was not a catholic liturgical space, as I have never been to a catholic mass. When I came across it again, it felt like an answer to a question I didn’t know I had.
“God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can and the wisdom to know the difference.”
Notice there is nothing in these sentences about what we can or cannot care about. Instead, the focus is on what we can do—what we can change. It is an oddly pragmatic approach to social action.
I am not sure it is possible to simply turn off our care for tragedy. However, you do not have to allow the constant free flow of images and information about these atrocities to take over your life in order to care about them.
The American Psychological Association published an article listing some practices to help combat media overload. These practices include limiting when and how much we consume and commonplacing practices such as writing out the headlines that concern you longhand and reflecting on them. More than anything, they highlighted the benefits of getting involved in causes that you care about. Doing something helps the individual and the collective.
It is essential to point out that with increased global coverage, our local news sources have severely suffered. This is particularly tragic considering that the issues in our own area are often the issues that we are best equipped to handle. It may be that you care greatly about humanitarian efforts in Yemen, but you may be more equipped to take action against poverty in your own county. In an article titled “Local Journalism in Crisis: why America must revive its local newsrooms,” Claire Hendrickson included statistics that showed the decrease in local journalism has led to a significant drop in local involvement. The reality is that there is something we can do most often, though it involves the things happening around us more than those thousands of miles away.
This does not mean that we do not care about non-local issues, and there are some ways that we can be active in these situations. One of the best ways we can get involved in larger national and international issues is by calling local and state representatives. Yet the lack of democratic involvement on a local and state level has made this a rarity. While some Americans may hop on planes and do international social justice, the everyday American has to find ways to take action where they are—that means local people helping with local issues.
I don’t think it is possible to simply turn off our care for human atrocities, no matter how many miles exist between us and the ground where the blood is shed. But no matter how hard we try, we cannot fix every issue everywhere. We can do our best to be informed, but being informed does nothing if we create a society of educated people who are miserable, helpless and paralyzed.
It’s April 11 when I write this, and the New York Times tells me that yesterday, a hydroelectric plant in Italy killed three people. Jessamine Journal tells me that “Lexington planners ask for input on the future of Jessamine County transportation.” Lex18 tells me that nearly 150 pedestrians were killed in the greater Lexington area last year. I care about all these things.
“God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.”
Featured image by Lena Overman.