Progressive Values Stories: Joe Brewer on Empathy

Written by: Edwin Rutsch on Mar 28, 2008 1:05 AM EDT

(This is part of an ongoing series of interviews of progressives telling personal stories about their values for the "What are Progressive Values?" documentary project - ProgressiveSpirit.com ).

I ran into Joe Brewer cleaning the streets of Oakland on Earth Day. Joe works as a fellow at the Rockridge Institute in Berkeley, California.  He says empathy is the basic progressive value and tells a personal story about his experiences growing up in a small town and his visit to India.

Joe Brewer:  When we talk about progressive values, what we are really talking about is how we care and why we care.  So I think the most important progressive value is empathy. By empathy I mean that we feel a strong connection with other people, and we put themselves in our shoes.  And when we do that, we feel responsibility to help end their suffering. 

So when people are treated unfairly, like with inequality, we have a responsibility to do what we can collectively in our community to care for those people and provide for them, to be sure that they are given the opportunities that everyone deserves.  So I think when we’re talking about progressive values, we’re really talking about empathy and responsibility. 

Now we extend that and say “What happens when I care about someone else, and I want them to have some kind of well-being”.  What is going to be entailed in that?  Those values include fulfillment, and if you care about someone else and put yourself in their shoes, then you’re going to want them to have the same opportunities and pursue their dreams as you have.  So, you’re going to think about their fulfillment.

And your also going to think about basic levels of material wealth, which means moving into prosperity.  Because people who don’t have the basic things they need to take care of themselves are going to suffer, and they are not going to seek their dreams.

And all that is really about freedom, which is another important value.  Each person needs to have freedom guaranteed to them, with opportunities to be able to pursue their dreams and goals.  As long as those freedoms they express don’t impinging on the freedoms of others. 

And a corollary of that is that you need to have another kind of freedom, freedom from harm.  Freedom from people restricting upon or infringing upon your freedoms.  So we have to work together as a community to guarantee those things.

Now if we start extending those things out on a community level, then we’re going to get to other kind of values. They don’t sound like normal values – values like the common good, the common wealth.  We invest in collectively what we each individually can’t afford, so have to provide together.

Things like education, public infrastructure, highways, funding of scientific research and medicine.  The things that no one can provide for themselves, that are extensions of basic levels of progressive values.  So, when we start talking about progressive values, there’s a lot we can say.

Edwin:  The first thing you mentioned was empathy.  Can you talk about your own personal experience, how you developed that value?

Answer:  Well, I look at it from a perspective of what psychology teaches us.  My experience – I grew up in a small town in Missouri, in a place where there was a lot of poverty, and most people fell pretty much trapped where they were.  So I was immersed in a living condition of feeling trapped.

What I felt when I was around other people in that condition was I felt the same lack of opportunity they felt, and I resonated – their suffering became my suffering, because I saw in them the hardships that I experienced. 

So when I talk about empathy, I talk about it at a really concrete level with the people around you.  It’s the people I interact with directly on a daily basis.  When I’m around other people, as I get to know them, I care about them.  I want them to do well.  They’re my friends.  They’re my family. 

And so, when I look at their condition, I see that it’s just an extension of my condition.  So, to put that in concrete terms, it’s that when someone can’t find work, they work really hard and can’t find work that pays their living, and unable to get health care, I look at my own situation and see similarities. 

The trick is to look into the other to see yourself in them and them in you.  So when I’m talking about empathy, I’m really talking about the connection with other people.

Edwin:  I’m also looking for actual stories, some memory or story …

Answer:  Yeah, there are other kinds of empathy besides empathy for other people.  I’m a strong environmentalist, and I know that the experience that I’ve had, like today picking up trash, is like the experience I’ve had living in squalor.  And one example of living in squalor that resonates in me – like a few years ago I visited India and visited old Delphi, a place which has concrete streets and mud-filled streets.  And as walked down those streets, I would smell the refuse and garbage.  People would use the streets as a bathroom – there were no public bathrooms and public trashcans.

So, as I would walk along the street, I would be surrounded by garbage and human refuse.  And so the experience I had was of people not caring for their surroundings.  And that was a place where I felt empathy for the broader world in two ways.  One, I felt the sickness we are putting on the world by having garbage lying all around.  Then I felt the sickness of our communities that depend on a healthy environment in order to survive and be healthy ourselves.  So I felt a deep sense of connection with the broader world when I was surrounded by that squalor.

Some Questions To Ponder:
    How would you define the word "Values" and "Principles"?
    How are "Values" and "Principles" different?
    What is personally the most important progressive value to you?
    Do you have a personal story or anecdote of how you learned some insight into this value?
    How does this progressive value differ from conservative values?
    How have conservative values failed?
 

Tags: