HL CHAPTER 4 Intimacy - CH 5 Empathy as the Foundation of Morality

CHAPTER 4 Intimacy
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What are you looking for in a romantic partner?
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(men cared more about youth; women about status),
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the number one factor
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It was kindness. For a lot of people, this means empathy.
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empathy might have evolved in our species to facilitate one-on-one relationships,
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I made a case for this: “Where empathy really does matter is in our personal relationships.
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Here as always it’s important to distinguish empathy from understanding.
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Simon Baron-Cohen.

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he mentions that there are studies on the risks of high empathy
Note:RISCHI

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Vicki Helgeson and Heidi Fritz explore sex differences in the propensity for what they call “unmitigated communion
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“an excessive concern with others and placing others’ needs before one’s own.”
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“I can’t say no when someone asks me for help.”
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overly nurturant, intrusive, and self-sacrificing.”
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women’s greater propensity to anxiety and depression,
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empathy, because of its spotlight nature, is a poor moral guide.
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empathy can also have negative consequences for those who experience it.
Note:TI FA MALE

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Buddhist texts distinguish between “sentimental compassion,” which corresponds to what we would call empathy, and “great compassion,” which is what we would simply call “compassion.”
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The first is to be avoided, as it “exhausts the bodhisattva.
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Great compassion is more distanced and reserved,
Note:RISERVATEZZA

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Tania Singer and Olga Klimecki

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compassion does not mean sharing the suffering of the other: rather, it is characterized by feelings of warmth, concern and care for the other,
Note:LA VERA COMPASSIONE

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The neurological difference between the two was explored in a series of fMRI studies
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Empathy training led to increased activation in the insula and anterior cingulate cortex
Note:AREA DELL EMPATIA

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the medial orbitofrontal cortex and ventral striatum.
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When people were asked to empathize with those who were suffering, they found it unpleasant.
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Compassion training, in contrast, led to better feelings
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When experienced chronically, empathic distress most likely gives rise to negative health outcomes.
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David DeSteno

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meditation “reduces activation of the brain networks associated with simulating the feelings of people in distress,
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Marco Iacoboni claimed that “affective empathy is a precursor to compassion,”
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We can’t feel compassion without first feeling emotional empathy.

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Not only can compassion and kindness exist independently of empathy, they are sometimes opposed.
Note:NO LEGAME

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There is a lot of concern about studies that find a decline in empathy in medical students.
Note:IL DOTTORE EMPATICO

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If, while listening to the grieving mother’s raw and unbearable description of her son’s body in the morgue, I were to imagine my own son in his place, I would be incapacitated.
Note:EMPATIA CHE PARALIZZA I CHIRURGHI

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I have always felt that I am very empathetic, and that that has been both a blessing and a curse in my work. I have struggled with burn-out for years
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two medical students who had to shift to other specialties because of the stress of working with parents
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nursing students who were especially prone to empathy spent less time providing care to patients and more time seeking out help
Note:OSYETRICHE EMPATICHE MARTIN HOFFMAN

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The risks of empathy are perhaps most obvious with therapists, who have to continually deal with people who are depressed, anxious, deluded, and often in severe emotional pain.
Note:PSICOLOGI SFINITI

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Freud himself made a similar analogy: “I cannot advise my colleagues too urgently to model themselves
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My friend does get into her clients’ heads, of course—she would be useless if she couldn’t—but she doesn’t feel
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But what about those who are empathized with?
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get the most from doctors who didn’t feel as he did, who were calm when he was anxious, confident when he was uncertain.
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Leslie Jamison

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she also describes, with gratitude, another doctor who kept a reassuring distance and objectivity:
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Frank Jackson

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Mary, a brilliant scientist, who has spent her life stuck in a black-and-white room,
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Mary studies human perception and comes to know everything about the neuroscience of seeing color.
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Mary leaves the room for the first time and looks up to see a bright blue sky.
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some novel qualitative experience—qualia—
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strong metaphysical implications about the nature of the mind,
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you can learn some things through experience that cannot be appreciated in any other way.
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it can be comforting to talk to someone who knows just how you are feeling.
Note:FARE ESPERIENZA FA BENE

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There is a world of difference, after all, between understanding the misery of the person who is talking to you because you have felt misery in the past, even though now you are calm, and understanding the misery of the person who is talking to you because you are mirroring them and feeling their misery right now.
Note:MA QUI L EMPATIA NN CONTA

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What about our relationships with those we love?
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Most people, I assume, want to be loved and understood and cared about.
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more than they care about other people.
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But that isn’t because I want empathic mirroring.

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not because I’m vicariously experiencing her pleasure. Instead it’s because I love her and want her to do well.
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More generally, we just don’t like empathizing with the sad.
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Indeed, many scholars have argued that empathy itself has evolved for the purpose of parenting—
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An obvious starting point here is that good parents understand and love their children.
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parenting also requires an appreciation that the long-term goals of a child do not always correspond
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understanding and compassion, even love, are not all children want.
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Stephen Darwall

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we put ourselves in their hands,
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When people who are wronged describe their feelings toward those who harmed them,
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they want the wrongdoer to feel the same pain as the victim.
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Heidi Howkins Lockwood,

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ideally, the sexual harasser should feel what it’s like to be the victim of sexual harassment.
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The victim might believe both that a sincere apology requires the perpetrator understanding what he or she did wrong … and that truly understanding what one did wrong requires having the experience yourself.
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Then there is the wish to restore balance.
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Pamela Hieronymi

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Empathy allows for a perfect eye-for-an-eye correspondence,
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you can’t have both. Chomsky can’t both be intellectually robust and at the same time defend friends at all costs.
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Stephen Asma argues for the moral importance of kinship and loyalty,
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this clashes with justice and fairness:
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Against Fairness.

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repelled by Gandhi’s rejection of special relationships—of friends and family, of sexual and romantic love. Orwell describes this as “inhuman,”
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Dickens had an immense social conscience—but he would ridicule those who lacked special feelings for those close to them. His examples include Thomas Gradgrind, the extreme utilitarian,
Note:UTILITARISMO.... TUTTI UGUALI

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It is wrong, many people believe, to treat people differently
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Peter Singer, take this further and argue that it is wrong to favor members of our own species
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As Larissa MacFarquhar points out, Abraham was ready to sacrifice his beloved son;
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Buddha abandoned his family; Jesus was adamant that in order to become his disciple, one must “hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life.”
Note:BUDDAH E GESÙ CONTRO LA FAMIGLIA

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It has effects that almost everyone will agree are wrong.
Note:EMPATIA... LE REGOLE NN SONO UGUALI PER TUTTI

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Self + Close People + Strangers = 100% Now fill in the numbers.
Note:QUANTO TEMPO DEDICHIAMO AGLI ALTRI

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Even if we decide that certain individuals are worthy of special treatment, even here empathy lets us down, because empathy is driven by immediate considerations, making us too-permissive parents and too-clingy friends.
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Empathy as the Foundation of Morality
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Perhaps empathy is like milk. Adults don’t need milk; we do fine without it. But babies need milk to grow.
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empathy as the developmental core of morality.
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Adam Smith and David Hume.
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Martin Hoffman,

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As Michael Ghiselin put it: “Scratch an altruist, and watch a hypocrite bleed.”
Note:I CINICI

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Thomas Hobbes

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Natural selection might be selfish (in a metaphorical sense), but if so, it’s selfish about genes, not individuals.
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confuses the goals of natural selection (again, metaphorically speaking) with the goals of the creatures
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Similarly, there is an obvious evolutionary motivation for sexual intercourse (it leads to children), but this is very different from the psychological motivations
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We are naturally kind because our ancestors who were kind to others outlived and outreproduced those who didn’t.
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many animals—and all mammals—care for their offspring,
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He finds that chimpanzees will rescue one another when they get in trouble, and sometimes act to increase others’ pleasure and decrease others’ pain.
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toddlers do seem to care about others.
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some theorists have argued that brain areas involved in empathy are the product of experience with the world, not what we start off with.
Note:EMPATIA... INNATA O ACQUISITA. CONTROVERSO

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if you stick out your tongue at a baby, the baby is likely to stick out his or her tongue back at you. This can plausibly be seen as reflecting an empathic connection
Note:LINGUA

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This is controversial

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Even days after birth, babies get upset by hearing other babies cry
Note:EMPATIA E DEPRESSIONE

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All these anecdotes and experimental findings can be readily accounted for in terms of caring for others without any sort of empathic feeling.
Note:COMPATIBILE CON AIUTO SENZA EMPATIA

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In one study, rats were trained to press a bar to stop other rats from receiving painful electric shocks.

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BAMBINI SCIMMIE E ANCHE RATTI

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But do these empathic reactions generate moral behavior?
Note:EMPATIA E MORALE?

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If I feel your pain but don’t know that it’s your pain—if I think that it’s my pain—then I’m not going to help you.
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when children help others, is it because they are feeling their pain?
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Paul Harris

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the evidence for this connection isn’t there.
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young children are capable of helping without showing any distress.
Note:AIUTO

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you see the victim’s face contorted in anguish, but you don’t see anguish in the consolers,
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right now, as best we know, empathy is not like milk.
CONC E. NN È NÉ COND NECESSARIA NÉ SUFF X AIUTARE

Contro l'empatia SAGGIO

Il populismo è un male della politica difficile da combattere perché – almeno in parte - è anche l’essenza stessa della politica.

Il populista si oppone al tecnocrate. Non che il tecnocrate sia il bene, ma per ora lasciamolo perdere, prendiamolo solo come bussola per orientarci.

Facciamo qualche esempio d’attualità: la gente non vuole mangiare sempre la solita minestra, dopo un po’ si stanca, quindi, dopo un grigio tecnocrate come Monti è inevitabilmente attratta dal populismo di Grillo e Salvini. Dopo un dottrinario come Ratzinger è sedotta dal populismo di Bergoglio.

Come potremmo definire il populismo nel modo più semplice possibile? Forse così: il populismo fa appello alle viscere della gente anziché al suo cervello.

Dopo che il termine “populista” è entrato in disgrazia il populista non si considererà mai tale e nemmeno riterrà di fare appello alle “viscere”. Preferirà considerarsi invece uno che “sta vicino alla gente”, che “si mette nei suoi panni”.  Preferirà considerarsi “empatico”.

E ha ragione!: la guerra al populismo è essenzialmente guerra all’empatia in politica.

***

Paul Bloom ha scritto un libro intitolato “Against Empathy”, ci sarà utile nello stanare il populista, anche quello che è in noi.

Uno pensa che l’empatia sia al cuore delle politiche di sinistra.

Esempio di politiche “empatiche”…

… these include being in favor of gay marriage, stricter gun control, increased access to abortion, more open borders, and government programs such as universal health care…

E a sinistra non smentiscono: George Lakoff (il linguista militante che piace tanto alla Lipperini)…

… Behind every progressive policy lies a single moral value: empathy…

Ma qui nasce il dilemma del doppio nesso…

… Perhaps more empathic people tend to adopt more liberal views than conservative views; or maybe being exposed to liberal ideas makes one more empathic, while exposure to conservative views makes one less…

Ad ogni modo, anche molte politiche di destra sono fondate sull’empatia. Il populismo non è monopolio della sinistra. In questo senso la guerra all’empatia (e quindi al populismo) è bipartisan.

Ma cosa significa essere progressista (o “liberal”)?…

… those who want greater legal protection for sexual and ethnic minorities, who worry about the proliferation of guns, who favor legal access to abortion, who support diversity programs in universities, who support universal health care, and so on…

E’ difficile dare una definizione scientifica, all’apparenza il controllo delle armi ha poco a che fare con il matrimonio gay.

Per fortuna il senso comune è qui una guida affidabile. Con il senso comune le nostre previsioni si dimostrano abbastanza corrette.

Ecco per esempio 5 tipici temi della politica…

… five issues: 1. Stricter gun control laws in the United States 2. Universal health care 3. Raising income taxes for persons in the highest income-tax bracket 4. Affirmative action for minorities 5. Stricter carbon emission standards to reduce global warming…

E’ incredibilmente facile capire come si posiziona il conservatore e come si posiziona il liberal su questi temi.

Qualcuno ritiene addirittura che lo spettro politico conservatore/liberal sia universale.

I due poli per John Stuart Mill…

… political systems have “a party of order or stability and a party of progress or reform.”…

I due poli per Ralph Waldo Emerson…

… “the two parties which divide the state, the party of conservatism and that of innovation, are very old, and have disputed the possession of the world ever since it was made… such irreconcilable antagonism must have a correspondent depth of seat in the human condition.”…

Su alcuni temi il divario è più nitido…

… matters of reproduction, relations with out-groups, suitable punishment for in-group miscreants, and traditional/innovative lifestyles.”…

Su altri meno, per esempio in economia: liberismo e deregolamentazione non sono monopolio della destra. Qui il senso comune vacilla se chiamato a prevedere.

C’è poi un elemento sorprendente: l’uomo psicologicamente di destra non vota necessariamente a destra (e viceversa). La psicologia non predice il voto con esattezza, specie nelle elezioni locali (dove si parla di buche più che di matrimoni gay)…

… correlation between political views and party membership is about 0.5 to 0.6…

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Considerato tutto, sembrerebbe proprio che l’empatia (e quindi il populismo) coinvolga di più i sinistrorsi.

Lo vediamo bene dagli slogan politici…

… Barack Obama, who talks more about empathy than any president in history…

Lo slogan di Bill Clinton è esemplare…

… “I feel your pain.”…

La sinistra domina al meglio il linguaggio dell’empatia.

Qual è la cosa più importante secondo il politico Hilary Clinton?…

… The most important thing each of us can do is to try even harder to see the world through our neighbors’ eyes…

E’ l’empatia che tiene insieme le politiche che piacciono alla sinistra liberal.

Il popolo della sinistra si identifica con il disagio degli altri e vorrebbe mitigarlo con la politica…

… To the extent that citizens identify with the distresses of others, they will prefer to assuage the distress that they witness…

E’ l’empatia che consente questa identificazione. L’invocazione della politica a favore dei deboli è la necessaria conseguenza.

I “teneroni” votano a sinistra, i “duri” a destra.

Dobbiamo aiutare chi ha bisogno! Ecco cosa ha sempre in testa il catto-comunista-tipo.

Allentiamo i vincoli all’immigrazione, alziamo il salario minimo… Sono misure alla cui base c’è un sentimento empatico: aiutiamo i bisognosi.

Mitt Romney fu preso in giro dalla sinistra quando disse: “sono orgoglioso di saper licenziare una persona quando non ne ho più bisogno”. Era una posizione talmente poco empatica da risultare comica per un uomo di sinistra. Eppure, un uomo di destra coglie bene il messaggio.

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Ora siamo in grado di sintetizzare il punto di vista liberal…

… Many liberals would sum this all up by saying that they are the caring ones, while conservatives are vindictive, cruel, punitive, and unfeeling. Liberals want to increase the minimum wage because they care about poor people; conservatives don’t. Liberals want stricter gun laws because they worry about the victims of gun violence; conservatives don’t. Liberals favor abortion rights because they care about women, while conservatives want to restrict women’s freedom…

Cosa pensa un progressista del tipico pro-life? Sempre Lakoff…

… Conservatives think of society as an authoritarian traditional family, and when it comes to abortion, “The very idea that a women can make such a decision—a decision over her own reproduction, over her own body, and over a man’s progeny—contradicts and represents a threat to the idea of a strict father morality.”…

Questo è proprio l’uomo di destra visto dal suo peggior nemico.

Una caricatura, non c’è dubbio. Eppure, in un certo senso mi ci ritrovo: di pancia anch’io sono pro-choice. La futura mamma è lì, la vedo, sta davanti a me. L’embrione lo devo pensare, è un’entità quasi astratta, abita una dimensione lontana. E’ solo grazie ad un freddo ragionamento a tavolino che mi converto alla posizione pro-life.

A volte i conservatori stessi sono orgogliosi della loro scarsa empatia: il progressista è una “mammoletta”, un “mollaccione”.

Winston Churchill…

… “If you’re not a liberal at twenty you have no heart; if you’re not a conservative at forty you have no brain.”…

Il non-empatico da grande peso alla tradizione, qualcosa di lontano e onusto. Pone l’enfasi su diritti individuali e libertà. In nome di questi principi è disposto a tollerare conseguenze che alla sua controparte appaiono  crudeli.

Inoltre, è scettico sulle virtù umane. Sulla bontà dell’immigrato. Sulla riconoscenza del beneficiato.

Vede il burocrate e lo presume corrotto o comunque facilmente corruttibile. Chiede istituzioni che assumano la debolezza morale degli eletti.

La pianificazione ambiziosa della società – che piace tanto alla sinistra – lo vedono scettico: poiché l’uomo è un ramo storto, qualcosa andrà storto – più il piano è ambizioso, più crescono le probabilità che qualcosa vada male. Molto meglio che gli eventi seguano il loro corso naturale.

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Jonathan Haidt è uno studioso che ha cercato di inquadrare psicologicamente i due fronti ideologici opposti.

La sua teoria è che ogni visione morale ha un suo fondamento psicologico. Le categorie chiave sono cinque…

… care, fairness, loyalty, authority, and sanctity…

La sinistra enfatizza “care” e “fairness”. La destra considera le cinque categorie come parificate.

Per questo un conservatore ossequierà la bandiera del suo Paese: la lealtà per lui conta. Per un liberal molto meno.

Per questo un conservatore apprezza l’obbedienza di un bambino: l’autorità per lui conta. Per un liberal molto meno.

Per questo un conservatore apprezza la donna casta: la santità per lui conta. Per un liberal molto meno.

Lealtà, autorità e santità sembrano valori meno empatici di “cura” e “correttezza”.

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Ci sono alcune misure dell’empatia messe a punto dagli psicologi. Per esempio, la scala delle “preoccupazione empatiche” elaborata da  Davis e l’ “empathizer” elaborato da Baron-Cohen.

Hanno molti difetti ma probabilmente qualcosa catturano.

Ebbene, chi si definisce “liberal” è molto più empatico di chi si definisce “conservatore”.

Statisticamente le donne votano più a sinistra. E, infatti, le donne tendono anche ad essere più empatiche.

Uno studioso ha affermato che se solo gli uomini fossero empatici quanto le donne il gender gap della politica si colmerebbe.

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Detto questo, non si creda che il nesso tra empatia e ideologia sia così saldo come appare.

Michael Dukakis, Al Gore e Massimo D’Alema si presentano come uomini d’apparato (empatia zero), eppure sono uomini di sinistra.

Ronald Reagan e Silvio Berlusconi si presentano come piacioni, eppure sono uomini di destra.

Considerate poi le politiche che la sinistra appoggia insieme ai libertari. Ebbene, si sappia che i libertari sono le persone meno empatici in assoluto!

Esempio…

… gay marriage, the legalization of some drugs, and the militarization of the police. If such policies are grounded in empathy, it is mysterious why the least empathic people on earth would also endorse them…

La legalizzazione della droga ci appare come qualcosa che mette a rischio i nostri ragazzi, nel tipo empatico la cosa fa suonare parecchi allarmi. Eppure…

Inoltre, anche la destra molto spesso sceglie in base all’empatia. Prendiamo il caso dell’immigrazione…

… So liberals in favor of open borders may try to evoke empathy for the suffering of refugees, while their conservative counterparts will talk about Americans who might lose their jobs…

Oppure consideriamo gli scontri di piazza: il sinistrorso sta con i dimostranti manganellati perché vede il sangue in TV e si scandalizza. Ma anche il destrorso puo’ stare con la polizia perché empatico con il povero agente buttato nella mischia per un misero stipendio da 1.200 euro al mese. Oppure è empatico con il povero negoziante che si è visto le vetrine fracassate senza colpa alcuna.

***

Purtroppo, il dibattito politico non ha per tema lo smascheramento dell’empatia. Ci si scontra piuttosto su “verso chi” dovremmo indirizzare la nostra empatia.

Per questo il populismo è insidioso: è parte integrante della politica.

Prendete la diatriba sulle armi.

La sinistra diventa subito empatica con le vittime dei conflitti a fuoco.

La destra con i poveri proprietari che non possono difendersi.

Un politico scaltro come Obama conosce i suoi polli e dà un colpo al cerchio e uno alla botte…

… Smart politicians appreciate this symmetry. When Barack Obama was talking to the Denver Police Academy, he recounted that, while campaigning in Iowa, Michelle Obama told him this: “You know, if I was living out on a farm in Iowa, I’d probably want a gun, too…

Qui Obama cerca di entrare in empatia con un’ audience “nemica” per fraternizzare e capitalizzare la sua rendita politica.

Quando due sentimenti empatici cozzano, vince il più intenso. Quindi la ricetta del buon politico è “più empatia!”.

Prendiamo il caso della tortura.

Qui sembrerebbe che il discorso sia a senso unico: si simpatizza con la vittima torturata.

No. Dick Cheney richiesto di definire la tortura lo fa in questo strano modo…

… an American citizen on a cell phone making a last call to his four young daughters shortly before he burns to death in the upper levels of the Trade Center in New York City on 9/11.”…

Il vero torturato è l’americano vittima di attentati non prevenuti per i limiti posti a certe pratiche sui prigionieri combattenti. Intento ti piazza lì questo papà che fa l’ultima telefonata al figlio dal World Trade Center.

Ancora più significativo è il dibattito sulla libertà di espressione: i liberal condannano le espressioni razziste e sessiste. I conservatori quelle desacralizzanti. Tutti e due la pornografia.

Per chi va fuori dal seminato, tra i politici scatta la gara a chi avanza per primo richiesta di  licenziamento.

Anche il più zelante difensore della libertà d’espressione pone dei limiti. Ma qual è il problema della “politica empatica”? E’ che porta sempre acqua allo stesso mulino: quello della censura.

Gli argomenti per la libertà di espressione sono tremendamente anti-empatici. Roba cervellotica tipo…

… the world is better off in the long run if all ideas, even bad ones, get an airing…

Chi vuoi che ascolti quando l’offesa è fresca?

Passiamo all’ambito della giustizia e dei tribunali.

Obama ha invitato i giudici ad essere più empatici.

Apriti cielo, le parole sono state interpretate come qualcosa destinato a generare un liberal-bias nel mondo della giustizia.

Eppure basterebbe ascoltare la audizioni dei giudici di destra destinati alla Suprema Corte per capire che neanche qui c’ è un monopolio…

… In his confirmation hearing, Clarence Thomas suggested that his unique contribution as a justice would be that he “can walk in the shoes of the people who are affected by what the Court does,” while Samuel Alito, in his own hearing, noted that “When I get a case about discrimination, I have to think about people in my own family who suffered discrimination because of their ethnic background or because of religion or because of gender, and I do take that into account.”…

Ai funerali dei militari USA ci furono proteste. I chiassosi protestanti vennero denunciati e il caso finì davanti alla Corte Suprema: assolti. Alito espresse parere contrario: per lui turbavano la sensibilità dei partecipanti al rito sacro e meritavano una condanna. Ecco un giudice empatico con quel “turbamento”.

***

Aggiungo poi che ci sono temi cari alla sinistra chiaramente non-empatici: il cambiamento climatico per esempio.

Bastonare chi ci vive accanto per il bene di uno sconosciuto che vivrà tra cent’anni è un modo di procedere anti-empatico. L’empatia consiglierebbe di non far nulla.

Prendiamo un altro tema: l’aiuto internazionale.

Supponiamo che si proponga una sovratassa del 5% sui redditi da destinare annualmente ai poveri della Namibia. Colpire i “nostri” per aiutare degli sconosciuti: la destra insorgerebbe! E’ molto più probabile che sia la sinistra a preoccuparsi dei poveri namibiani e a considerare forme di “beneficienza autistica”.

***

Le politiche empatiche (ovvero populiste) fanno molti danni. Non considerano cio’ che non si vede ma che esiste (embrione, generazione futura, disoccupato, povero namibiano…), sono miopi e ostacolano un’azione prudente e lungimirante.

E allora: lotta ai populismi! Anzi: lotta all’empatia! Ora e sempre.

HL INTERLUDIO POLITICA E EMPATIA - Against Empathy: The Case for Rational Compassion by Paul Bloom

Against Empathy: The Case for Rational Compassion by Paul Bloom

You have 120 highlighted passages

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Last annotated on March 3, 2017

INTERLUDE The Politics of EmpathyRead more at location 1540

Note: INTERLUDE@@@@@@@@@@@@ Edit

Many people think of empathy as associated with a cluster of views that are liberal, left-wing,Read more at location 1544

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these include being in favor of gay marriage, stricter gun control, increased access to abortion, more open borders, and government programs such as universal health care.Read more at location 1545

Note: x POLITICHE EMPATICHE Edit

George Lakoff,Read more at location 1548

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Behind every progressive policy lies a single moral value: empathy.”Read more at location 1549

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Perhaps more empathic people tend to adopt more liberal views than conservative views; or maybe being exposed to liberal ideas makes one more empathic, while exposure to conservative views makes one less.Read more at location 1550

Note: x DILEMMA DEL DOPPIO NESSO Edit

There are conservative positions that are deeply grounded in empathyRead more at location 1559

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my attack on empathy is nonpartisan.Read more at location 1561

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what it means to be liberal/progressive/left-wingRead more at location 1564

Note: t Edit

those who want greater legal protection for sexual and ethnic minorities, who worry about the proliferation of guns, who favor legal access to abortion, who support diversity programs in universities, who support universal health care, and so on.Read more at location 1574

Note: x LIBERAL Edit

commonsense categories of liberal and conservative do a surprisingly good jobRead more at location 1577

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gun control have nothing to do with views on gay marriage,Read more at location 1579

Note: ALL APPARENZA Edit

this sort of crude assessment works just fine at predicting all sorts of specific views.Read more at location 1581

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five issues: Stricter gun control laws in the United States Universal health care Raising income taxes for persons in the highest income-tax bracket Affirmative action for minorities Stricter carbon emission standards to reduce global warmingRead more at location 1582

Note: x ISSUE X CAPIRE CHI STA A DS E A SIN Edit

these views hang together;Read more at location 1586

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some believe that a political continuum from left to right might be universalRead more at location 1589

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John Stuart MillRead more at location 1590

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political systems have “a party of order or stability and a party of progress or reform.”Read more at location 1591

Note: x I DUE PARTITI DI MILL Edit

Ralph Waldo EmersonRead more at location 1591

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“the two parties which divide the state, the party of conservatism and that of innovation, are very old, and have disputed the possession of the world ever since it was made,”Read more at location 1591

Note: x EMERSON SUL BIPARTITISMO Edit

such “irreconcilable antagonism must have a correspondent depth of seat in the human condition.”Read more at location 1593

Note: c Edit

matters of reproduction, relations with out-groups, suitable punishment for in-group miscreants, and traditional/innovative lifestyles.”Read more at location 1595

Note: x DOVE È PIÙ FORTE IL DIVARIO Edit

free trade or deregulation of banks, are less predictableRead more at location 1597

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correlation between political views and party membership is about 0.5 to 0.6.Read more at location 1600

Note: SORPRESA Edit

particularly at the more local level,Read more at location 1602

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So are liberals more empathic? It seems so.Read more at location 1607

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Barack Obama, who talks more about empathy than any president in history,Read more at location 1607

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Bill Clinton,Read more at location 1608

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“I feel your pain.”Read more at location 1608

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Democrats use the language of empathy with some fluidity.Read more at location 1609

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Hilary ClintonRead more at location 1610

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The most important thing each of us can do is to try even harder to see the world through our neighbors’ eyes ….Read more at location 1610

Note: x HILARY Edit

empathy is what ties together the policies that liberals endorse.Read more at location 1613

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relationship between politics and empathy,Read more at location 1614

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To the extent that citizens identify with the distresses of others, they will prefer to assuage the distress that they witness.Read more at location 1614

Note: x LA RELAZIO TRA E. E POLITICA Edit

invocation of government power on behalf of the perceived victims.Read more at location 1616

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‘bleeding hearts,’ we hypothesize, would prefer liberal policyRead more at location 1616

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you should help people in needRead more at location 1618

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loosening immigration restrictions or raising the minimum wage,Read more at location 1618

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that group are motivated by empathy—Read more at location 1619

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Mitt Romney, was ridiculed for saying, “I like being able to fire peopleRead more at location 1620

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it is an almost comically unempathic positionRead more at location 1623

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Many liberals would sum this all up by saying that they are the caring ones, while conservatives are vindictive, cruel, punitive, and unfeeling. Liberals want to increase the minimum wage because they care about poor people; conservatives don’t. Liberals want stricter gun laws because they worry about the victims of gun violence; conservatives don’t. Liberals favor abortion rights because they care about women, while conservatives want to restrict women’s freedom.Read more at location 1623

Note: X PUNTO DI VISTA LIBERAL Edit

Lakoff’s analysis of the antiabortion position:Read more at location 1627

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Conservatives think of society as an authoritarian traditional family, and when it comes to abortion, “The very idea that a women can make such a decision—a decision over her own reproduction, over her own body, and over a man’s progeny—contradicts and represents a threat to the idea of a strict father morality.”Read more at location 1627

Note: x LAKOF SUI PRO LIFE Edit

This is conservatism as seen by its worst enemies.Read more at location 1630

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conservatives themselves may resonate to being less empathic.Read more at location 1630

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they accuse liberals of being softheadedRead more at location 1631

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Winston Churchill:Read more at location 1632

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“If you’re not a liberal at twenty you have no heart; if you’re not a conservative at forty you have no brain.”Read more at location 1632

Note: x CHURCHILL Edit

the importance of nonempathic moral values, such as greater emphasis on tradition,Read more at location 1633

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emphasis on individual rights and freedoms.Read more at location 1634

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skepticism about the extent of human kindness,Read more at location 1635

Note: CONSERVATOR Edit

unreliability and corruptibility of state institutions.Read more at location 1636

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conservatives worry that these never work out as planned.Read more at location 1638

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Jonathan Haidt,Read more at location 1639

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theory that humans possess a set of distinct moral foundations—Read more at location 1640

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care, fairness, loyalty, authority, and sanctity.Read more at location 1640

Note: X FONDAMENTI DELLA MORALE Edit

liberals emphasize care and fairnessRead more at location 1641

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conservatives care about all these foundations more or less equally.Read more at location 1642

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This is why, according to Haidt, conservatives care more than liberals do about respect for the national flag (as this is associated with loyalty),Read more at location 1642

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children’s obedience toward parents (authority),Read more at location 1643

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chastity (sanctity).Read more at location 1644

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nonempathic valuesRead more at location 1644

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Finally, there is research on the actual mind-sets of liberals and conservatives.Read more at location 1645

Note: t Edit

Davis’s “empathic concern” scale and Baron-Cohen’s “empathizer” scale.Read more at location 1647

Note: SCALE Edit

I complained about both of these scales in an earlier chapter,Read more at location 1647

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they probably do capture somethingRead more at location 1650

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self-defined liberals are significantly more empathic than self-defined conservatives on both scales.Read more at location 1650

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being liberal is more attractive to empathic people,Read more at location 1652

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women are statistically more likely to be liberalRead more at location 1652

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women tend to be somewhat more empathic than men.Read more at location 1653

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if males were as empathic as females, the gender gap in politics would almost entirely disappear.Read more at location 1654

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But this connection between political ideology and empathy is not as strong as it might first appear.Read more at location 1656

Note: t Edit

Michael DukakisRead more at location 1658

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Al GoreRead more at location 1658

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present themselves as, rational technocrats,Read more at location 1658

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Ronald Reagan—are remarkably good at presenting themselves as empathically connected to others.Read more at location 1659

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Consider that many policies associated with liberalism are also endorsed by libertarians,Read more at location 1660

Note: POLITICHE POCO EMPATICHE A SINISTRA Edit

the least empathic individuals of allRead more at location 1662

Note: LIBERTARI Edit

gay marriage, the legalization of some drugs, and the militarization of the police. If such policies are grounded in empathy, it is mysterious why the least empathic people on earth would also endorse them.Read more at location 1662

Note: X POLITICHE COMUNI Edit

certain conservative policies also draw upon empathic concernsRead more at location 1664

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So liberals in favor of open borders may try to evoke empathy for the suffering of refugees, while their conservative counterparts will talk about Americans who might lose their jobs.Read more at location 1665

Note: x IMMIGRAZ E L EMPATIA CONTRAPPOSTA Edit

conservatives empathize with police officersRead more at location 1667

Note: SCONTRO DI PIAZZA Edit

owners of small businesses who have lost their livelihoods in riotsRead more at location 1668

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Political debates typically involve a disagreement not over whether we should empathize, but over who we should empathize with.Read more at location 1670

Note: X IL DIFETTO DELLA POLITICA. ESSENZA POLITICA Edit

Take gun control.Read more at location 1671

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focusing on the victimsRead more at location 1671

Note: LIBERAL Edit

those who have their guns taken away from them, now defenselessRead more at location 1672

Note: CONS Edit

Smart politicians appreciate this symmetry. When Barack Obama was talking to the Denver Police Academy, he recounted that, while campaigning in Iowa, Michelle Obama told him this: “You know, if I was living out on a farm in Iowa, I’d probably want a gun, tooRead more at location 1672

Note: x E IL POLITICO CI MARCIA Edit

clash of empathic concerns is yet more empathy.Read more at location 1677

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Or take concerns about the use of tortureRead more at location 1679

Note: ALTRO ESEMPIO Edit

It might seem that empathy can favor only one sideRead more at location 1680

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concerns about the suffering of those who are tortured.Read more at location 1680

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when asked to define torture, Cheney gave this example:Read more at location 1682

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an American citizen on a cell phone making a last call to his four young daughters shortly before he burns to death in the upper levels of the Trade Center in New York City on 9/11.”Read more at location 1683

Note: x CHANEY DEFINISCE LA TORTURA Edit

consider concerns about certain sorts of expression.Read more at location 1685

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Liberals worry about the offense caused by racist and sexistRead more at location 1686

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conservatives worry about the offense caused by speech that belittles traditional values.Read more at location 1686

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common cause in battling pornography.Read more at location 1688

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Both protest the ridicule of certain esteemed figuresRead more at location 1688

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quick to demand that people be fired,Read more at location 1689

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Even the most zealous defender of free speech believes in some restrictions:Read more at location 1691

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empathy is always on the side of the censor.Read more at location 1693

Note: IL PROBLEMA Edit

It seems mighty cold-blooded to tell someone who has been really hurt that they should just suck it up.Read more at location 1695

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The case for free speech, in contrast, is pretty unempathic.Read more at location 1696

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(the world is better off in the long run if all ideas, even bad ones, get an airing),Read more at location 1697

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legal context.Read more at location 1702

Note: t Edit

Obama, have argued for the need for empathic judges,Read more at location 1702

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bias the legal system in favor of liberal causes.Read more at location 1703

Note: PAURA Edit

In his confirmation hearing, Clarence Thomas suggested that his unique contribution as a justice would be that he “can walk in the shoes of the people who are affected by what the Court does,” while Samuel Alito, in his own hearing, noted that “When I get a case about discrimination, I have to think about people in my own family who suffered discrimination because of their ethnic background or because of religion or because of gender, and I do take that into account.”Read more at location 1707

Note: x L EMPATA DEI GIUD DI DESTRA Edit

Alito’s dissent in a free speech case involving protesting at military funeralsRead more at location 1711

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Alito let his empathy motivate a decisionRead more at location 1714

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certain perspectives associated with liberal philosophies aren’t that empathic at all.Read more at location 1716

Note: t Edit

best example of this is climate change,Read more at location 1716

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empathy favors doing nothing.Read more at location 1717

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empathy drives concerns about people in the here and now.Read more at location 1722

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the cost of a politics of empathy is massive.Read more at location 1726

Note: t Edit

failures to enact prudent long-term policiesRead more at location 1726

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