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| Reading the news on a tablet. Image source. |
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I scroll through WeChat (a Chinese social media app), and everyone is talking about the coronavirus. Then I scroll through Twitter, and everyone's just going about their normal life, talking about whatever they usually talk about. Maybe there's an occasional tweet from CNN about the coronavirus. (Both WeChat and Twitter have a lot of posts about the death of Kobe Bryant though. He had a lot of fans in China.)
I feel ... I feel like my people don't care. I'm living through a national health crisis which is affecting 1 billion people, and barely anyone on American-centered social media is talking about it. (By "affecting 1 billion people", I mean it's disrupting our lives. We have to stay at home, and a lot of people are worried. I don't mean 1 billion people are actually at high risk of being infected- that's just not true.)
I have heard this same sort of sentiment from other immigrants- "we are basically all on lockdown, and none of my friends back home have reached out to ask how I'm doing." Yes, I'm safe, I'm okay, but this is psychologically very hard. Just waiting at home, restless, checking the stats about how many confirmed cases and how many deaths, checking WeChat messages from people right on the edge of panicking... And it must be even harder for people who live alone.
So... all of this has me thinking about compassion and what our reaction should be when we read news stories about problems on the other side of the world. I feel bad that I've seen so few people on Twitter talking about the situation in China, but, well, why would they? If they don't know anyone who lives in China, then why would they talk about it?
I can't bring myself to believe the lack of Twitter posts from people who have no connection to China is a bad thing. If that were true- if it were true that Americans all "should" talk about this, just because it's affecting everyone in China- well then that would mean we'd have to get all emotionally invested in every tragedy we hear about in the news. And we just can't do that. We don't have the emotional bandwidth for that.
This all goes back to what I wrote about last November: Culture, Objectivity, God, and the Real Reason I Moved to China. In that post, I said I used to believe I had an obligation to "love everyone equally", like God does. I no longer believe that. Instead, I accept that as human beings, we are limited in our emotional capacity, and it's unhealthy to try for that "ideal" of "loving everyone equally."
It means that when something bad happens to people you know, or people from your own culture, you care a lot. You feel sad for a while. But when the same bad thing happens to people from a different culture, you don't really care. And that sounds awful- but I don't think it would be healthy to try to "make" yourself care. Or, let me rephrase that: It would be unhealthy to try to make yourself have an equal emotional response to every faraway foreign tragedy and relatable "close to home" tragedy. We just can't. There's always something bad happening somewhere. We can't live that way, constantly mourning all the things that deserve to be mourned.
God is like that. God has an "equal emotional response" to people of all cultures. The bible says "rejoice with those who rejoice; mourn with those who mourn," and I truly believe God does that. God has the emotional capacity to empathize with 7 billion people at the same time. But humans can't. Let's do our best to "rejoice with those who rejoice; mourn with those who mourn" on a small scale, just with the people we interact with in our daily lives. But we can't take it farther than that. We can't. We're only human.
I often see people on Twitter talking about "all of you are tweeting about this tragedy that happened in Europe or the US, but nobody said anything about this other equally-bad tragedy that happened last week in this other country" ... and the purpose of their tweet is to tell us we are doing something wrong. They're saying it's wrong that we care so much more about members of our own culture than members of a different culture. And we should feel guilty.
I can't agree with that anymore. Yes, I 100% believe that people who are affected by a tragedy in a faraway culture on the other side of the world deserve to have people care about them and treat them with empathy and compassion. Yes, 100%. But that doesn't mean it has to be me. I'm not an objective outside observer of the world; I'm localized to this one specific place, a member of a few specific demographic groups. God cares about everyone equally, but I can't.
Intellectually, I care. I certainly believe that everyone in the world has equal worth. We are made in the image of God. We are valuable. We have plans, dreams, desires, interests, and all of that matters. And everyone matters equally. And so many things happen every day which shouldn't happen. All these tragedies you hear about in the news- the world shouldn't be that way. As a society, we should work to prevent those things, as much as we can.
But emotionally, of course it would have a much bigger effect on me if something bad happened to a family member than if the same bad thing happened to somebody I don't even know. Of course it would. And I would be much more saddened by something happening in a place I've been, than in a place I've never even heard of. And even though maybe this sounds terrible, I don't think that's something I should necessarily want to change.
Well, let me rephrase that: I very much believe it's important to get to know people from other cultures. It's important to learn about what life is like for people from different backgrounds. I really appreciate how online (with blogs, social media, etc) we're able to learn from a huge, diverse group of people. Coming to China and experiencing life here has made me a better person. And yes, it does mean that I'm emotionally affected by news (specifically, news related to immigrants and Chinese people) in a way I wasn't, before.
Just today I was asking my husband (who is Chinese) about what life was like during the SARS outbreak in 2003. I remember hearing about it in the news back then, but I didn't really care. Well, of course I cared in an intellectual sense, but it didn't affect me emotionally. But my husband lived through that.
But maybe that's the answer, maybe it's about getting to know other cultures, in a gradual and natural way, rather than reading a news story and trying to guilt yourself into having an emotional reaction to it. We shouldn't be like "here's a story about someone who died, how awful, I should be as sad about this as I would be if it was someone in my family who died." As I said, God loves everyone equally, but we can't. Yes, the victims you read about in the news were just as valuable as your own loved ones, and an objective person would indeed mourn them equally. But we're not objective, and it's not healthy to try to become objective.
So instead, we should interact with people from different backgrounds in our day-to-day life, and learn from them. A reasonable amount, that is. Not trying to "love everyone equally", just trying to gradually widen our awareness of what the world is like. And then we will feel a bit more compassion when we read the news- but that shouldn't be our goal. What an awful goal that would be- "I would like to be emotionally messed-up every day when I read the news." No, we can't live that way.
And it doesn't help anyone, if I feel "equally sad" about everything. What helps is me being kind to people, donating money to people in need, helping other people from my own culture get educated about issues affecting other cultures, supporting society-wide policies that take into account the unique needs of diverse demographic groups.
Also, as I write this post about "I feel bad because no one on Twitter cares about our plight being stuck in our homes in Shanghai" I realize that I'm much more focused on people in my situation (the waiting, the fear, the boredom, the uncertainty) than on the actual sick people who have been infected by the coronavirus. So... well that means I certainly can't complain about strangers not caring about me.
So... well I feel like this post is kind of a big jumble of ideas. Wish I could organize it better or have some kind of conclusion, but I just don't know, and also I'm tired of staying at home and I don't have the energy to think about this anymore. Anyway, it's fine not to "love everyone equally"; don't try to make yourself feel guilty about that. Care about the world, but also about your own mental health.
-----------------
Related:
Culture, Objectivity, God, and the Real Reason I Moved to China
Francis Chan and Objectivity
-----------------
All my posts about COVID-19:
I'm in Shanghai, and I'm concerned about the coronavirus (January 23)
An update on the situation in Shanghai (January 28)
About Compassion and Reading the News (January 29)
Welcome Baby Square Root! (February 3)
Remember the old days when we used to go outside? (February 4)
So we're (sort of) back to work here in Shanghai (February 12)
Blogaround (February 13)
Blogaround (February 20)
Shanghai is a good place for immigrants. (And I have feelings about it.) (February 24)
Blogaround (February 27)
Well *now* I'm glad I stayed in China (March 8)
The Weirdest Deja Vu (March 15)
Blogaround (March 19)
I'm an American in China. I CANNOT BELIEVE Some of You Are Still Going Out. (March 22)
Blogaround (March 25)
China Bans Foreigners (Like Me) From Entering the Country (March 29)
List of People Who Are Not Allowed to Call Themselves "Pro-Life" (April 2)
Blogaround (April 3)
... all right now I have way too many posts to keep updating this list. You can find them all on the COVID-19 tag.
I feel ... I feel like my people don't care. I'm living through a national health crisis which is affecting 1 billion people, and barely anyone on American-centered social media is talking about it. (By "affecting 1 billion people", I mean it's disrupting our lives. We have to stay at home, and a lot of people are worried. I don't mean 1 billion people are actually at high risk of being infected- that's just not true.)
I have heard this same sort of sentiment from other immigrants- "we are basically all on lockdown, and none of my friends back home have reached out to ask how I'm doing." Yes, I'm safe, I'm okay, but this is psychologically very hard. Just waiting at home, restless, checking the stats about how many confirmed cases and how many deaths, checking WeChat messages from people right on the edge of panicking... And it must be even harder for people who live alone.
So... all of this has me thinking about compassion and what our reaction should be when we read news stories about problems on the other side of the world. I feel bad that I've seen so few people on Twitter talking about the situation in China, but, well, why would they? If they don't know anyone who lives in China, then why would they talk about it?
I can't bring myself to believe the lack of Twitter posts from people who have no connection to China is a bad thing. If that were true- if it were true that Americans all "should" talk about this, just because it's affecting everyone in China- well then that would mean we'd have to get all emotionally invested in every tragedy we hear about in the news. And we just can't do that. We don't have the emotional bandwidth for that.
This all goes back to what I wrote about last November: Culture, Objectivity, God, and the Real Reason I Moved to China. In that post, I said I used to believe I had an obligation to "love everyone equally", like God does. I no longer believe that. Instead, I accept that as human beings, we are limited in our emotional capacity, and it's unhealthy to try for that "ideal" of "loving everyone equally."
It means that when something bad happens to people you know, or people from your own culture, you care a lot. You feel sad for a while. But when the same bad thing happens to people from a different culture, you don't really care. And that sounds awful- but I don't think it would be healthy to try to "make" yourself care. Or, let me rephrase that: It would be unhealthy to try to make yourself have an equal emotional response to every faraway foreign tragedy and relatable "close to home" tragedy. We just can't. There's always something bad happening somewhere. We can't live that way, constantly mourning all the things that deserve to be mourned.
God is like that. God has an "equal emotional response" to people of all cultures. The bible says "rejoice with those who rejoice; mourn with those who mourn," and I truly believe God does that. God has the emotional capacity to empathize with 7 billion people at the same time. But humans can't. Let's do our best to "rejoice with those who rejoice; mourn with those who mourn" on a small scale, just with the people we interact with in our daily lives. But we can't take it farther than that. We can't. We're only human.
I often see people on Twitter talking about "all of you are tweeting about this tragedy that happened in Europe or the US, but nobody said anything about this other equally-bad tragedy that happened last week in this other country" ... and the purpose of their tweet is to tell us we are doing something wrong. They're saying it's wrong that we care so much more about members of our own culture than members of a different culture. And we should feel guilty.
I can't agree with that anymore. Yes, I 100% believe that people who are affected by a tragedy in a faraway culture on the other side of the world deserve to have people care about them and treat them with empathy and compassion. Yes, 100%. But that doesn't mean it has to be me. I'm not an objective outside observer of the world; I'm localized to this one specific place, a member of a few specific demographic groups. God cares about everyone equally, but I can't.
Intellectually, I care. I certainly believe that everyone in the world has equal worth. We are made in the image of God. We are valuable. We have plans, dreams, desires, interests, and all of that matters. And everyone matters equally. And so many things happen every day which shouldn't happen. All these tragedies you hear about in the news- the world shouldn't be that way. As a society, we should work to prevent those things, as much as we can.
But emotionally, of course it would have a much bigger effect on me if something bad happened to a family member than if the same bad thing happened to somebody I don't even know. Of course it would. And I would be much more saddened by something happening in a place I've been, than in a place I've never even heard of. And even though maybe this sounds terrible, I don't think that's something I should necessarily want to change.
Well, let me rephrase that: I very much believe it's important to get to know people from other cultures. It's important to learn about what life is like for people from different backgrounds. I really appreciate how online (with blogs, social media, etc) we're able to learn from a huge, diverse group of people. Coming to China and experiencing life here has made me a better person. And yes, it does mean that I'm emotionally affected by news (specifically, news related to immigrants and Chinese people) in a way I wasn't, before.
Just today I was asking my husband (who is Chinese) about what life was like during the SARS outbreak in 2003. I remember hearing about it in the news back then, but I didn't really care. Well, of course I cared in an intellectual sense, but it didn't affect me emotionally. But my husband lived through that.
But maybe that's the answer, maybe it's about getting to know other cultures, in a gradual and natural way, rather than reading a news story and trying to guilt yourself into having an emotional reaction to it. We shouldn't be like "here's a story about someone who died, how awful, I should be as sad about this as I would be if it was someone in my family who died." As I said, God loves everyone equally, but we can't. Yes, the victims you read about in the news were just as valuable as your own loved ones, and an objective person would indeed mourn them equally. But we're not objective, and it's not healthy to try to become objective.
So instead, we should interact with people from different backgrounds in our day-to-day life, and learn from them. A reasonable amount, that is. Not trying to "love everyone equally", just trying to gradually widen our awareness of what the world is like. And then we will feel a bit more compassion when we read the news- but that shouldn't be our goal. What an awful goal that would be- "I would like to be emotionally messed-up every day when I read the news." No, we can't live that way.
And it doesn't help anyone, if I feel "equally sad" about everything. What helps is me being kind to people, donating money to people in need, helping other people from my own culture get educated about issues affecting other cultures, supporting society-wide policies that take into account the unique needs of diverse demographic groups.
Also, as I write this post about "I feel bad because no one on Twitter cares about our plight being stuck in our homes in Shanghai" I realize that I'm much more focused on people in my situation (the waiting, the fear, the boredom, the uncertainty) than on the actual sick people who have been infected by the coronavirus. So... well that means I certainly can't complain about strangers not caring about me.
So... well I feel like this post is kind of a big jumble of ideas. Wish I could organize it better or have some kind of conclusion, but I just don't know, and also I'm tired of staying at home and I don't have the energy to think about this anymore. Anyway, it's fine not to "love everyone equally"; don't try to make yourself feel guilty about that. Care about the world, but also about your own mental health.
-----------------
Related:
Culture, Objectivity, God, and the Real Reason I Moved to China
Francis Chan and Objectivity
-----------------
All my posts about COVID-19:
I'm in Shanghai, and I'm concerned about the coronavirus (January 23)
An update on the situation in Shanghai (January 28)
About Compassion and Reading the News (January 29)
Welcome Baby Square Root! (February 3)
Remember the old days when we used to go outside? (February 4)
So we're (sort of) back to work here in Shanghai (February 12)
Blogaround (February 13)
Blogaround (February 20)
Shanghai is a good place for immigrants. (And I have feelings about it.) (February 24)
Blogaround (February 27)
Well *now* I'm glad I stayed in China (March 8)
The Weirdest Deja Vu (March 15)
Blogaround (March 19)
I'm an American in China. I CANNOT BELIEVE Some of You Are Still Going Out. (March 22)
Blogaround (March 25)
China Bans Foreigners (Like Me) From Entering the Country (March 29)
List of People Who Are Not Allowed to Call Themselves "Pro-Life" (April 2)
Blogaround (April 3)
... all right now I have way too many posts to keep updating this list. You can find them all on the COVID-19 tag.
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