empathy without subtext

the newsletter that opted out of the oppression olympics

when i see animals—in photos, videos, and real life—hurt, even the smallest amount, my heart tightens and my stomach drops. this is why i will be vegan as long as i have the means and opportunity. i want to make every choice i can that has the slightest chance of easing the suffering of living beings, even if the impact isn’t immediate or something i will ever see for myself.

that physiological response, the gut check that comes with having empathy, is the same one i get when i pass by a bad car accident, or read yet another story of mass shootings, or learn disturbing details of historic tragedies. it’s the same feeling i get listening to the news and scrolling by photos and videos of starving people. this is the consequence of leaning into empathy. in my 3 decades on this planet, i haven’t found that my personal supply of empathy is a limited resource. the more i experience the world, the deeper my well seems to go.

i became a vegetarian at a young age after being shown the documentary Food Inc., as a means to convince me that kosher meat is better than non-kosher meat. even in middle school, my only response to documented cruelty was not to choose the bad-but-not-quite-as-bad option when i could clearly see the definitely-less-bad-option. once i learned more about our food system, i opted for the absolutely-less-bad-option of veganism.

none of this is to say that i see all suffering of living beings as equal or veganism as a universal solution. i understand that puppies, lambs, and chicks are not the same as human babies. what i don’t understand is why or how i could be expected to care more or less about one species or one act of suffering when i can care deeply about both, and then some. in the oppression olympics, there are no winners, except for those who organized the competition.

i may not have the capacity to face every atrocity head-on or to learn the depths of all aspects of human-made misery, but that does not impact my ability to care. i can’t possibly be the only person to see that the nuance of these issues can be debated once the active cruelty is abated.

let’s go back and forth about seed oils once all people have food security and adequate nutrition. we can chat about the animals unintentionally harmed by industrial crop farming (the “crop death” argument) once we stop forcing cows to give birth just to rip away their newborns and steal all of their mother’s milk to make ice cream. why don’t we audit disability assistance programs for potential fraud once all disabled people have the rights and resources they need. let’s hold every person, government, or system accountable for manufacturing starvation once all populations are properly fed and safe. this is what i believe the world would look like if empathy was equitable, not equal.

there is no subtext here. if these words make you think i am talking about factory farming, speciesism, or animal testing, i am. if you think i am talking about Sandy Hook, the Tree of Life, the Holocaust, Pulse nightclub, the Armenian Genocide, or October 7th, i am. if you think i am talking about acts of racism, fascism, Islamophobia, antisemitism, misogyny, or queerphobia, i am. if you think i'm talking about starvation, malnutrition, and violence occurring in present-day Gaza, the West Bank, Sudan, Haiti, Burkina Faso, Chad, Somalia, or any other place on this earth, i am.

in my last newsletter, i said that, “I know caring is the least I can do.” simply talking about these issues from a place of empathy is not a solution, but it remains the least i can do. imagine what problems we can eliminate by caring more about their solutions than we do our team taking home the gold from the oppression olympics?

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i welcome you to uplift resources, nonprofits, mutual aid opportunities, or something that is giving you hope in the comments.