The “Monkeysphere” is a concept that humans (and primates) can only care about a limited number of people; generally 150 people based on Dunbar’s Number. A person in an urban setting is far more likely to have many acquaintances based solely on their proximity to so many people. Whereas, someone in a rural environment might not encounter so many different people regularly, so they might not hit their “Monkeysphere limit” and might be more likely to care about a stranger.
Just total speculation on my part, and I’d counter that rural areas tend to be more insular and less trusting of outsiders, and based on that might be less likely to help a stranger. A person from an urban community might be exposed to more diversity and would therefore be more likely to empathize someone different from them.
No, in fact they not only supported social services across the country through supporting more socialist aligned candidates but they also did things like open their schools to non kibbutz kids to provide education, daycare, and meals for kids who didn’t have that available to them reliably at home.
But Kibbutzniks aren’t really comparable to rural folk in remote places in America in the first place. Israel is tiny, you can’t really get very remote.
Yup, or at least this was my experience growing up in the sticks. But they do like the stereotype of being friendly, uncomplicated folks and aren’t going out of their way to disabuse people of it
I definitely agree with you there. They think some people are unworthy of help, due to geography, race or identity.
I mean, these nice neighborly folks were most likely racist as shit. In the case of my stepfather he was definitely racist as shit. Both his father and stepfather were in the Klan. He hid his racism from me for as long as I knew him. So yes these people are definitely only helping a certain kind of person.
I just remarked on it because a while back (several years) my car needed a jump and based on past experience I was surprised when I asked for help, nobody agreed to help me. But I live in a fairly populated metro area now. So it’s hard to judge whether it’s a matter of geography or a matter of time.
Half a century ago plus, before we met, my wife stepped off a curb in NYC and twisted her ankle badly. Crying. Unable to stand. No one paused a second to help her.
There are local norms. Chicago is a nicer place for example. That’s why she stayed And the false advertising that was my curly hair of the time.
Back to doom and gloom. If I did believe all was lost, no hope, I still would hope to be a person who could find reason to be more than angry all the time. Victor Frankl no I couldn’t be … but if all is meaningless because it us too late, set in stone, let’s at least have some fun while we can
Some will recognize the reference: chaos always wins after all.
For me when I think of the future it’s like… What if this is all I get?
This is the second time at least I’ve mentioned Emily St. John Mandel, but in her book Station Eleven, a post-apocalyptic tale about a traveling Shakespeare troupe, she really nailed this sense of longing for what is now our present moment. You realize how really extraordinary it all is, and maybe the future’s not guaranteed, but we have this now. We have all this now.
I wonder if the doomerism is grounded in a fear of our own mortality, because for each and every one of us, at some point things are going to get so bad that we die. This is unavoidable. We want to prevent people from suffering on Earth, which is an excellent priority, but literally every person on this planet is already going to die and there’s nothing any of us can do about it. If we accepted that basic fact we might be more clear-eyed about the current situation.
I’m not the only one who thinks so. The late peace activist Thich Naht Hanh, who founded the Plum Village Zen community, placed a major emphasis on climate action among his followers (he called this social justice work “engaged Buddhism.”) The first step, he said, was accepting that a lot of people were going to die because of climate change. This is immutable fact. It isn’t pessimism, it’s realism. So knowing that, how do we respond to this moment?
I think that’s what I’m striving for, clear-eyed acceptance of even the worst things without losing myself to this blind fatalism, and still feeling like I have the capacity to both recognize the good I have and to act to change what’s wrong.
My issue with pessimism you’re already unhappy about things that haven’t happened yet. To some degree, that is inevitable, especially for someone like me with anxiety. But when I can avoid it, I do. I don’t pre-comply, and enjoy what I can when I can.
Maybe some people can say “Everything is shit, so I don’t have to care and can enjoy what’s here” but that’s not me, and that’s not the people that others seem to have issues with. It’s the ones whose pessimism brings down the mood.
It think that a lot of people are trying to maintain some degree of optimism about the future. D_T’s posts have enough truth in them that they can make that difficult. And that makes it easy to get mad at him.
That just isn’t how my anger tends to work. I’m more like “yeah, I can see why you feel that way” as long as you yourself don’t treat people badly. It’s the ones that get angry and attack that are more likely to get under my skin. And that includes the people who attack the doomers.
The expression I try to remind myself is “Don’t borrow trouble.”
Put another way, “Don’t suffer twice.”
Or in my case like five million times.
Do you know how many times I’ve died already?
Another thing I forgot to mention about Station Eleven. When I read about the characters’ longing for the things we have, I remember thinking, “Oh. This is about death.” We have to let go of all of this someday. And every day life becomes so much more poignant in that context.
I think there’s less of it because with cell phones people don’t need it as much. I once stopped to help a driver with a broken down car. Gave him a ride home. I wouldn’t do that today, not because I’m more cautious or less generous, but because I’d expect him to be able to summon better aid (including a tow truck) on his own.
Anecdotally, I’ve never gotten more aid from strangers than when i lived in NYC. From the guy who intervened when a … begger?.. potential mugger… was hassling me at night on the subway to the woman who left her seat on another subway car to chase after me because my wallet fell out of my pocket.
I once sat down on the floor of a subway car, because i was pregnant and felt nauseated. Someone who saw me gave me their seat.
But the twisted ankle looks more like a scam. New Yorkers, like women, are accustomed to needing to be cautious about interactions with strangers on the street.
Actually I think it was more both time and place: NYC late ‘70s. It was particularly no eye contact don’t get involved time in NYC. By early ‘90’s NYC was a different place.
Your cell phone comment makes lots of sense and I see it as related to diffusion of responsibility - basically that my help probably isn’t really needed. (And I’m late for where I am going …)
