Column by I. O'Brien-Scheffer
I was a high schooler in 2016, at a public school in Northeast Ohio. During that time, friends made statements about Trump and his supporters, seemingly assuming their friends all agreed—claims of racism, sexism, and other -isms'. Most reiterated those remarks, while others who supported Trump or were against the Democratic candidates kept quiet or faced nasty looks, insults, and more from their “tolerant” opponents who suddenly viewed them with disappointment or even disgust. Rather than promoting a narrative of understanding, stations like CNN covered almost only negatives about their political opposition and continue to do so.
Some Republicans also took to painting Hillary Clinton as the Devil, and harshly criticized the behavior and beliefs of their left-wing opponents. The fact that someone can disregard the shameful treatment of Trump supporters, children and adults alike, as justified without a fraction of a doubt, likewise the characterization of Hillary supporters, is evidence that these last couple decades, and especially 2016, marked a turning point in our country’s overall culture, that being the idea that, “if you disagree with me, you are a bad person.”
A moral superiority/inferiority complex.
There is a shocking lack and loss of empathy in today’s society. Note: a lack of empathy can sometimes be neutral in effect. For anyone, neurotypical or not, it is our choices and the way we treat others that defines us in accordance to the outside world.
To quote New York House representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez in an interview with Anderson Cooper on 60 Minutes, from this year, “I think that there’s a lot of people more concerned about being precisely, factually, and semantically correct than about being morally right.” Though she went on to say that facts are important, emphasizing that one’s morals are of greater importance than factual accuracy is problematic. How can one make correct moral judgements if they do not know the facts? To feel morally superior is all that really matters; to feed one’s ego. Ocasio-Cortez is wrong, but if her feelings are “right,” then she is still more correct than those with whom she disagrees.
The belief that others are morally inferior creates a scapegoat: a reason to disregard differing views; discouragement of self-reflection, and an excuse for one’s own hatred and disgust. Natural antecedents to diminished empathy.
Douglas LaBier wrote on November 17, 2011, in his article, “America’s Continuing Empathy Deficit Disorder” for HuffPost, that “empathy deficit disorder” is a result of the social focus on obtaining wealth, power, status, and sufferers end up equating mental health with “success and maturity.”
This development in mindset, of what we deem as good and desirable, LaBier says, “promotes increasing vanity and self-importance… you become increasingly alienated from your own heart… you’re now ripe with delusion that you’re completely independent and self-sufficient.”
This reminds me of what my dad, a Venezuelan immigrant, told me about the state of parenthood in the U.S. Here, there is a cultural idea that once a child turns 18, they are on their own. This promise of disconnect is alienating in practice and encourages the children that hear it to be completely independent to survive. It is also isolating when parents and educators place an exorbitant amount of importance upon a child’s individual feelings and desires, while not properly encouraging the importance of everyone else’s feelings to that same individual. Empathy—to feel another’s emotions for oneself— is just as much a part of our brains as it is a practice.
No matter the catalysts of egotism, be it upbringing or political reinforcement, the results are the same. People will be stigmatized, rejected by their peers, go untreated for genuine mental health issues that are little addressed in society, and build a deeper hatred for those that they feel did them wrong, which may in turn lead to overwhelming hatred and disdain toward those that either hurt them or did nothing to help them. To refuse to open oneself to others and seek mutual understanding is a plaque on this country, rotting out the bone to create a cavity in what was once discourse. It exposes the nerve to righteous bigotry and violence that, if left untreated, misdiagnosed by the sugars that helped form it, will one day require a root canal.
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