We have now
done 12 separate studies measuring empathy in every way imaginable, social
behavior in every way, and some work on compassion and it’s the same
story. Lower class people just show more
empathy, more pro-social behavior, more compassion, no matter how you look at
it.
--Dacher
Keltner PhD, University of California-Berkeley
It’s no shame
to be poor, but it’s no great honor either.
--Zero Mostel
in “Fiddler On The Roof”
This is not an
attempt to glamorize poverty and the “noble poor.” Yet how can a class of people be so powerless
and yet responsible for much of our economic collapse as many politicians would
have us believe? The carousel of life
is picking up speed and more of us are being tossed roughly to the side every
day. That is why I found Dacher
Keltner’s research so interesting. It
goes against the alarming undercurrent of blaming the victim and demonizing the
most vulnerable members of our society.
To be poor is
to be reminded every day of the need to lean on others. Their survival is based on reading other
people’s emotions. People in poverty
lack social buffers and the luxury of independence. Perhaps realizing the fickleness of the
future, they are more willing to share today’s small good fortune. According to Keltner, individuals from a
lower-class background ask for help and provide help to others more frequently. “When
poor people see someone else suffering, they have a physiological response that
is missing in people with more resources.” Keltner sees a strength in lower class
identity: greater empathy, community, more altruism, and finer attunement to
other people.
As we get
wealthier, Keltner suggests, we are able to insulate ourselves from
others. A country squire with a fleet of
cars will be unlikely to join a carpool or need to call a neighbor for a
last-minute ride to work. Finding a
babysitter is not left to the whims of neighborhood teenagers (no, I am not
still bitter). Wealth grants us independence, and according to Keltner,
diminishes our empathy for others. The
wealthy have the freedom to focus on the self, and consider their opportunities
to be earned. In psychology experiments,
wealthier people often miss the nuance, and don’t read other people’s emotions
as successfully. As we rise in the
classes we become less empathic and more likely to hoard resources.
Keltner’s work
legitimizes what I have felt to be true, anecdotally, for many years. If I needed a favor, or a rule bent in the
name of common sense it was often someone laboring for minimum wage who would
go out of his way to help me. Our family
has felt deep connections with compassionate home healthcare workers during
vulnerable times. When I have needed a
break, like a difficult home repair or roadside assistance, individuals without
very much have helped me and on occasion refused payment. Invariably I have been impressed by folks
with a good heart and a feeling that we are all in this together.
A number of
years ago my daughter Rachael, inheritor of the Cook gene for sense of
direction, was driving late at night and found herself lost in south central
Los Angeles. Panicked, tearful and in
need of a bathroom, she walked into an all night diner and began to cry. The counter man wanted to shoo her along, but
the cook came running from the kitchen.
This saintly woman calmed her, gave her directions, and made her promise
to call when she arrived home safely.
Rachael called. Fortunately it
was years before I heard the story, but it has always stuck with me.
There are
benevolent empathic people of means, as there are cold, selfish poor
people. The wonder is that there are not
more of each.
Tom H.
Cook is a formerly local writer. He is
performing, if you can call it that, at The Black Forest (26th and Nicollet)
with four really talented spoken word artists September 17th, at 7:30 PM.
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