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Is it O.K. to create a positive out of pity?
The other day I was at my buddy’s apartment lounging around with nothing to watch on TV. I then came upon National Geographic channel’s special of China’s Elephant Man. The link is here:
http://channel.nationalgeographic.com/episode/china-s-elephant-man-4210/Overview
As I was watching in completely profoundness and sincere empathy it got me thinking to the larger picture than what I was watching. The larger picture which all those that person’s such as myself in relatively fortunate circumstances witnessing those who are not. I would think that most people would think with the same sort of empathy towards these persons, but as I continued to watch the program I began to wonder what the ethical ramifications were having this view. I began to ask myself “Why is it that people with normal lives can’t help but take into account those that have an extremely more difficult life?”, whether it be the man in the special, a starving child in Africa, or a homeless person. I understand that we are not looking down on these people, but it seems to me one of the possible reasons why we can’t help but watch is perhaps that maybe we tend to think that while our lives are difficult we can always feel better about ourselves that we are much more fortunate. But should we be feeling better about ourselves at the expense of others? Should we (people with with relatively “normal” lives) be assuming that those with unfortunate cases automatically have a lives worse than ours. Who’s to say that those we deem “unfortunate” such as the Elephant Man to have a terrible life just because of their conditions. Yes it’s realistically that their lives they have to overcome so much more than “norms” but that doesn’t make it true their lives are worse.
I’m not believing in one side or another, just simply a rant of my thoughts.
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