Can You Feel It?

I am very very worried about something, and I hope you can help. Over the last twenty years or so, there has been an observable decline in the ability of the average person to understand and care about the condition of other people, what is correctly called empathy.

I began to notice this around 1985, when I first started to reflect upon such things, and since then I have become increasingly alarmed. That was a time when video games were taking off, VCRs were getting common, and the earliest cell phones, ones the size of small houses, were being put in cars. It was also a time when the data show that single mother homes were increasing at an extraordinary rate.

In my classrooms I cannot understand why it is necessary for me to ask my students to not text, to arrive on time, to stay for the whole class, and to not chit chat during our precious time together. I can barely contain myself when, after saying that electronic media is disruptive to the development of real connections between people, that a cell phone "goes off" in the class. Are these indicators of declining empathy?

In congress, we see the erosion of empathy at the highest levels. Never has there been such a lack of understanding of and connection to the condition and needs of the common person. It almost seems that the truest American values have become: The One With the Most Toys Wins, along with Every Man for Himself. Am I wrong about this?

Are these things linked? What's going on?

There is no question in my mind that empathy has declined, and the research backs up this assertion. Studies consistently show a dramatic drop in empathy since 1990 or so. What can we do? What should we do?
In my classes, I promote the following:

Experience a wide range of people

Look for similarities

Practice taking another perspective

Look at famous empathic people

Read good fiction/Watch deeper movies

Be non-authoritarian

What else is there? Are we doomed? 'Cause I know what's coming next.

Got this in an email today:

You can retire to Phoenix, Arizona where...

1. You are willing to park 3 blocks away because you found shade.

2. You've experienced condensation on your bottom from the hot water in the
 toilet bowl.

3. You can drive for 4 hours in one direction and never leave town.

4. You have over 100 recipes for Mexican food.

5. You know that "dry heat" is comparable to what hits you in the face when
 you open your oven door.

6. The 4 seasons are: tolerable, hot, really hot, and ARE YOU KIDDING ME??

7. You’ll eventually need to pack heat as well as have to suffer from it!





OR



You can retire to California where...

1. You make over $250,000 and you still can't afford to buy a house.

2. The fastest part of your commute is going down your driveway.

3. You know how to eat an artichoke.

4. You drive your rented Mercedes to your neighborhood block party.

5. When someone asks you how far something is, you tell them how long it
 will take to get there rather than how many miles away it is.

6. The 4 seasons are: Fire, Flood, Mud, and Drought.



OR



You can retire to New York City where...

1. You say "the city" and expect everyone to know you mean Manhattan.

2. You can get into a four-hour argument about how to get from Columbus
 Circle to Battery Park, but can't find Wisconsin on a map.

3. You think Central Park is "nature."

4. You believe that being able to swear at people in their own language
 makes you multi-lingual.

5. You've worn out a car horn. (Ed. Note if you have a car).

6. You think eye contact is an act of aggression.



OR



You can retire to Minnesota where...

1. You only have four spices: salt, pepper, ketchup, and Tabasco.

2. Halloween costumes fit over parkas.

3. You have more than one recipe for casserole.

4. Sexy lingerie is anything flannel with less than eight buttons.

5. The four seasons are: winter, still winter, almost winter, and
 construction.



OR



You can retire to the Deep South where...

1. You can rent a movie and buy bait in the same store.

2. "Y'all" is singular and "all y'all" is plural.

3. "He needed killin" is a valid defense.

4. Everyone has 2 first names: Billy Bob, Jimmy Bob, Mary Sue, Betty Jean,
 Mary Beth, etc.

5. Everything is either "in yonder," "over yonder" or "out yonder." It's
 important to know the difference, too.



OR



You can retire to Colorado where...

1. You carry your $3,000 mountain bike atop your $500 car.

2. You tell your husband to pick up Granola on his way home and so he stops
 at the day care center.

3. A pass does not involve a football or dating.

4. The top of your head is bald, but you still have a pony tail.



OR



You can retire to the Midwest where...

1. You've never met any celebrities, but the mayor knows your name.

2. Your idea of a traffic jam is ten cars waiting to pass a tractor.

3. You have had to switch from "heat" to "A/C" on the same day.

4. You end sentences with a preposition: "Where's my coat at?"

5. When asked how your trip was to any exotic place, you say, "It was
 different!"



OR



FINALLY You can retire to Florida where.

1. You eat dinner at 3:15 in the afternoon.

2.. All purchases include a coupon of some kind -- even houses and cars.

3. Everyone can recommend an excellent dermatologist.

4. Road construction never ends anywhere in the state.

5. Cars in front of you often appear to be driven by headless people.

It's Emily (for the Bachelorette-Obsessed Fans)

I hate to be a spoiler, but Brad is choosing Emily next week. Just a prediction, but better than a hunch. Observations of nonverbal communication is telling me this.

Oh yeah, and I know somebody in Charlotte who says Emily's house is up for sale all of a sudden.

This is an amendment: he did choose Emily, obviously, but all is not well for the budding romance. She is gun shy to the max, for obvious as well as less conscious reasons, and he has a temper. Go figure. If you think anyone is perfect, you will never be happy. But if you are always angry, you will make others miserable.

Coincidence? I Think Not...

I'm not one to believe in the supernatural,  the demonic, or even the angelic. I think the world is full of coincidences, and lots of unexplained events and synergies, but when I can't explain something, I do not attribute it to divine intervention or lack thereof.

OK, so the past few weeks, I have been experiencing something so bizarre I simply had to let it out. Frequently, and I mean by this at least every few minutes, I will be watching TV and a thought will come to mind. Being an impulsive thinker and speaker (I say everything that's on my mind, much to the chagrin of those around me) I verbalize it, and within a minute (and often instantaneously) it will be said almost verbatim on the tube. Let me give you an example.

Yesterday, I was watching the today show. The weather was about to come on, and I saw the weather map. Before anything was said. I uttered, "Looks like Burlington is gonna get hammered." The weatherman said, "Looks like Burlington, VT is going to get hammered with snow." Now was that a coincidence? Sure it was.

But it keeps happening. Four times yesterday. And I'm even referring to less common stuff. There was  wind damage footage. I did not have the sound on. They showed some battered homes and downed power lines, and I said, "Looks like an EF-2 damage path." I turned the sound up, and the announcer said (you guessed it), "Meterologists are saying the damage path suggests an EF-2 tore through this area." And the list continues, mostly with non weather items.

There was discussion of tapping the strategic petroleum reserve. I said to Liz, "That's not OK, because that's reserved for times when petroleum is scarce, and anyway, there's not more than 3 or so months of supply and the prices wouldn't go down much." The announcer then said, "Consideration is being given to tapping the SPR, but experts say there may only be a three month supply based on current domestic usage, and prices would not significantly decline. The SPR is designed for periods of reduced supply, and this is not our current problem."

WTF? Why has this not happened in this frequency before? My wife starts laughing now whenever I say something, because she knows it's about to be said on the air. I know, I know. Is this guy nuts? Is he lying? Is this coincidence?

I sure hope so...

OK, So I Won...

It turns out I won the contest for great new teaching ideas. Really, I won. What did I win? I knew I had a "gift basket" coming, and sure enough, there it was: a ceramic, student-made brown folk-art style piece that could look like a very small trash can if one were to be cruel, but I think it's really quite cool. What was in it, you ask? A water bottle. I'm not shocked. I am only disappointed by my delusions of grandeur. The basket was the gift, numskull...

I did get the check for $300. I will use this to take my family to dinner and to pay off some credit card bills. Tonight I go to a community meal for the entire Social Sciences Division of our college. Potatoes and soup. Then I go see my wife at a restaurant, then home to watch movies. Of all these things I do today, I think dinner with Liz will be my finest hour.