The insight, or inter-sight, of empathy is not a political act in the usual way we think of politics as competitive jockeying for power. It is something that takes place on a deeper level, within and between individual people. It requires the sharing of separate stories that take their place in the common story of what everyone wants for their children — a world without genocidal weapons, drug violence, militarism, or financial institutions that have forgotten their obligation to the common good.
Empathy as a principle can seep into politics as a refusal to take sides, a refusal to define ourselves negatively in terms of whom we fear and hate, an embrace of global citizenship that looks for what is best for the whole.
by Winslow Myers
Source: www.newclearvision.com, via Edwin Rutsch
