Compassion as Commodity
There is a “truth” they are trying to sell us:
Guard your limited supply of compassion.
This is the lie that conmen sell, and politicians campaign on. (But, I repeat myself.) The algorithm shows you stories to touch you to your human core, and then it pulls the rug. There is nothing you can do about the suffering you just saw. You wasted your compassion and now you feel bad. Or worse, the twist. The person you had compassion for turned out to be the villain. Your compassion was wrong. You have to be more careful next time. Bury your compassion deep.
They have a different emotion they want you to buy. It is the opposite of compassion.
Schadenfreude.
Watching the right people suffer is fun. And there is a limitless supply of the right people. The Schadenfreude Machine is humming now. They need you to buy in. Because they know that what comes out the other end won’t feel human anymore.
Compassion makes us human. Living things should suffer as little as possible. Even the wrong ones.
A rabid dog deserves compassion. This does not mean that there is no such thing as right and wrong. Evil must be stopped. And your attention, time, and energy are limited. But don’t let them convince us that our compassion is.
Humans are the animal that cares, even about other animals a world away. Compassion is our superpower. Don’t let them tell us that we can’t risk sharing it.
Compassion is not a commodity, it is our humanity writ large.