Tiny Atrocities
→ May 19, 2021 | Reading time: ~1 minute
Elisa Gabbert is immensely quotable (not the best thing to have read in the times of COVID though).
As the injustices pile up, and reserves run low, the question of where we should focus our moral attention becomes critical—when exposed to more evils than we can possibly attend to, most of us feel helpless. And what, more than helplessness, excuses apathy and inaction? Rather than confront global suffering, we may cull our feeds, or stop watching the news. Or, worse, we may make of the suffering other an enemy, turning apathy to antipathy. These unspoken algorithms by which we manage our empathy—they are almost innocent, almost “self-care.” (We’re not committing atrocities, just refusing to witness them.) But layered together, they have the shade of evil.
— Elisa Gabbert, The Unreality of Memory