empathy
[ˈempəTHē]
NOUN
- the ability to understand and share the feelings of another.
ORIGIN
early 20th century: from Greek empatheia (from em- ‘in’ + pathos ‘feeling’) translating German Einfühlung.
“Empathy is the capacity to understand or feel what another person is experiencing from within their frame of reference, that is, the capacity to place oneself in another’s position.”
When we view a person as anything else, we allow for biases to takeover. We allow ourselves to dehumanize each other and allow for fear. When we spend the time and empathize with another being by feeling their pain and their sufferings we can get beyond our biases and come to understand them. We would understand that we are not so different. Our stories are not that different and scientifically speaking we are the same. We are 99.9% similar. When we look for differences, we will find it, it is confirmation bias and it perpetuates an endless cycle of biases and fear.
Fear is an animal like instinct. It was meant to protect us in the wild when we were the weakest of the species roaming Earth. This was well before our technology overcame any physical shortcomings we have as a species. The fear we now face is produced by fellow humans. Sometimes produced intentionally to assert power over another. Fear is the easiest idea to instill into another. The fear of the unknown, the fear of something different, the fear of loss, etc. The Nazi’s used this fear quite well as did many dictators. Making each of us different when we are not that different.
These tactics were used throughout history and continues to be used today. It is effective because it plays into our innate biases. These biases had its purpose for the survival of our ancestors, but it is no longer needed. We must start thinking about how to change this within our societies.
I believe that teaching empathy at all levels of schooling is the best way to change this dynamic. It is also quite easy to do. Even simply adding in-class social experiments while teaching history would be significant. If we were all more emphatic would we be willing to hurt another person for gain? Would we be willing to hurt another person because they look different?