Estimated reading time: 1 minute, 59 seconds

I know nothing about educating people, and I don’t know if there’s such a thing as teaching people how to feel a certain way like being empathetic, especially adults. You’re making a case for the removal of context while also arguing that it’s essential, so I’m not really clear on what you’re saying here. Telling someone to remove context in world that’s all about context is like giving someone knowledge that is useless and inapplicable in real life. But as I try to imagine how this could possibly work, i think maybe context can be used consciously instead of being removed altogether. For example, if you begin by showing me an image of someone being tortured – I get an immediate reaction of empathy. Next you tell me that he’s being punished because he’s a serial rapist pedophile – My feelings are replaced with anger, disgust, feeling what is being done to him is justified. Next you tell me that he’s been abused his whole life – My feelings change again and maybe there’s an internal struggle. Maybe this is a really bad example but I’m trying to say that you can teach me to control my judgements and biases and challenge them rather than have them control me and my feelings. And maybe that way I can access my initial feelings of empathy again after losing them with every disclosure you made. Maybe we aren’t losing our humanity as much as we are losing access to it. This idea makes me hopeful.
I’ve taken children out of the equation this time because in my experience from listening to people who aren’t empathetic about what’s happening to people in Gaza generally feel this way out of judgment rather than due to distance. I heard people say things like: “The people of Gaza support Hamas, they support their governing Gaza, they support their terrorism as a form of resistance, they support killing Egyptian soldiers and civilians – why should I empathize with them?” Some people consider them enemies. And it’s really challenging to make people empathize with their enemy. And you’re right, self-interest can be so consuming that there’s no room left to feel for others.