- Most people believe empathy to be a good thing as it is defined as the ability to understand and share feelings of another. I believe in the reading, “Is empathy overrated? by Paul Bloom he argues to the reader the negatives of empathy. Bloom’s goal is to show the reader that although empathy can be good, there are so many other factors that cause empathy to be bad. His three main points being empathy reflects our bias, how to respond to a situation, and finally knowing when you are over empathizing. “Empathy distorts our moral judgement in pretty much the same way that prejudice does” (Bloom 2). So often we choose to only empathize with the people that are close to us or that fit into our moral beliefs. More often than not you will only see someone empathize with someone who looks the same or is in the same situation as you as it is easier to empathize with people who make you feel the same way. This goes hand and hand with over empathy as you don’t feel so much pain when it’s people you can relate too, rather than a multitude of different situations.
Responding to an empathetic situation however, is much more complicated as there are many different routes you can take. “Empathy is a spotlight with a narrow focus” (Bloom 2). In Bloom’s statement, I had taken this as we only empathize with the things we choose to see. This could be a situation you walk into or even one that you overheard about. Most of the time we only empathize with either family and or friends or if we are told of influenced to show empathy. Often people show empathy towards situations only because their friends expressed their empathy and so did most people around them. Sometimes empathy can be fake. But in most cases it’s only for the very few situations that we can relate to as there are so many things we could empathize with, we just don’t have the capacity. Therefore showing that empathy can be a negative thing and we should rationalize our decisions regarding empathy before acting.
2. Bloom’s main arguments are all very strong in the sense that they are mainly negative towards empathy, and as much as I would disagree because I do believe I can be very empathetic, I do agree with what he has to say. Many of his points all relate back to each other which I thought was really nice as you are able to see the whole affect empathy has a person. First, you go through will I choose to empathize with them. Two main ways Bloom discussed this was by almost a prejudice and by if you have the mental capacity to deal with their emotions. We choose our family and friends over strangers and we only choose to empathize with a stranger when something uncommon happens. People spring into action to help and aid in any way they can and this can lead to over empathizing. “A vast warehouse was crammed with toys that the townspeople had no use for” (Bloom 2). As a result of the Newtown massacre, people donated toys to help the families have a little more joy around the holiday season. There ended up being such an abundance of them, that most of the toys were going to waste or no one knew where to put them. The community empathized so much that it became overwhelming. Just like if you are going through a tough time and your friends try to make you feel better by talking to you and trying to put themselves in your shoes, but all you really want is them to be there. The last thing that stuck was mental capacity. We are trained to deal with only one-two peoples worth of emotion at a time. If you try and empathize and feel the emotions of an abundance of people, your brain is going to overload. So we are taught to pick and choose the people we choose to empathize with. This goes back into the prejudice of empathy. Bloom’s beliefs all go back to each other and help me agree with his statements that much more, because they all relate to one another.
3. Bloom’s ideas are definitely designed to make you think about your stance on empathy. Personally for me, I had always thought of empathy to be sort of this positive thing that has many negative impacts. I wouldn’t say it was more positive than negative, but it definitely can have a substantial effect on a person. I would say I am an empathetic person as I always try to understand how my friends and family are feeling and am willing to do anything to make them feel better. Sometimes it can be a good thing as it is nice to know someone is there for you and sometimes they want someone to talk to. But, I’ve also realized from personal experience that sometimes that can be overwhelming and isn’t necessarily something that you want at that time. It can also be something influenced by others. Many times I have witnessed my friends and sometimes myself feeling empathetic for someone or something when the people I am around are also empathetic for it. I may not originally care about a subject as I don’t know to much about it, but the influence of people around me can cause me to feel empathetic towards said subject. Overall it can be positive in some light, but it is only when a person is open to empathy that it is effective.
4. Paul Bloom presented a multitude of different ideas and beliefs on empathy and how it can have strong mental and physical impacts. But one statement that really stood out to me was, “To the extent that you can appreciate that it’s better for one specific child to die than for an unknown” (Bloom 3). This statement sounds so harsh off the bat as you are saying one person dying is better than another. But what Bloom is trying to get at is that when we know more about a person whether it be one more piece of personal information, even a name, it is easier to sympathize with them over a multitude of random people you know nothing about. We tend to empathize with fewer people we know as it’s hard to show empathy towards a complete stranger. It arises questions like why should I feel bad, I don’t know them? We should be able to me empathetic towards all people, but the way our brains are wired we choose not to as it has no significance to us.
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