Quote:
Originally posted by Rudey
Your listing the definitions of empathy and sympathy had what to do with a point exactly?
1 a : an affinity, association, or relationship between persons or things wherein whatever affects one similarly affects the other.
These two statements qualify as sympathy. One can possibly say empathy if you could see yourself killing or having killed a white person:
"I understand his desperation and where he's coming from"
"Many of these things have happened to me, and lots of other minorities in this country...I do understand his sense of frustration in a world that treats many people as second class citizens."
-Rudey
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Actually the definition of empathy is understanding someone's experience, so empathy is appropriate in this context, because it seems to me that people
empathize with the things that happened to this man before he killed someone.
Did you miss my stealing analogy earlier? Well, here it is again: I can understand why a starving mother would steal food for her child. Do I think stealing is ok? NO.
The same idea applies. I think the bigger issue here is that you were expecting a different reaction than the one you got.
Do I get angry when rich blonde girls tell me I'm in grad school because of affirmative action? Yes. Do I get angry when I'm followed in a store for no reason? Yes. Do I get angry when people speak to me and assume I grew up in the projects instead of 2-parent middle class home? Yes. Do all these experiences mean that I think its ok to kill people? NO.
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