A few thoughts on empathy

I think we’re afraid of empathy. Partly that might be because we’re wrapped up in our own problems and we can’t be bothered with the problems of others, but I suspect that many of us avoid empathy because we think we’ll get so caught up in it that we’ll become consumed by it, that we won’t be able to do anything else but mourn for the gargantuan sorrows of the world. I see us inventing artificial reasons as to why we shouldn’t care about entire groups of our fellow human beings. Some don’t care about those on food stamps because it’s so easy to assume that most of them are just lazy and don’t want to work. Some want to write off those who drive luxury cars or even everybody who lives in rich countries like the United States. But tragedy could strike any of us at any time, and I think on some level, we all know this. That woman whose driving that fancy car could hit a utility poll within the next five minutes. Her brains could be splattered all over the pavement. What good will her status and her bank account do her then?

But I don’t think turning our feelings off is the answer. It’s true that we only have a limited amount of time, and there’s so little we can do about the mess the world is in. The mess is too huge and complex. So it might be tempting to become cynical and dismissive. But if we don’t acknowledge our own grief and sorrow, I think we’ll spend our lives running from those things because they’re always going to be right below the surface. And if we don’t feel for others, we become callous and mean. Is there really any happiness and satisfaction in that?

I think there’s a balance we have to achieve before we can truly be ourselves. I have thought about this for many years, and I admit that I have not worked out the exact formula, but I think we have to let measured doses of it all in. We have to feel for ourselves, and we have to feel for others. And I think we have to acknowledge the horrors without forgetting to laugh, appreciate beauty or experience joy.

I can easily recall the night that I woke up from my first head surgery. I felt horrible. I hurt all over. The first thing I did was throw up, and because I was so weak, I couldn’t even lift my head, so I vomited all over myself. And aside from the physical discomfort, I was scared and lonely, and I thought I was going to die. I am thankful that the doctors were able to successfully remove the tumor in my head, and I’m thankful that the hospital staff nursed me back to health, but that night I wasn’t sure I would make it. However, I wouldn’t have blamed anybody if I hadn’t. I didn’t expect anyone to “fix” the universe for me just so I wouldn’t have to face mortality. But it would have been really nice if someone had taken the time to stand by my bed, to touch my hand or my arm, look down at me with an open heart and feel my fear and my pain with me. If someone had done that, if someone had really opened themselves up to it, they would have felt what I was feeling because that fear and pain wasn’t just mine. Even though I was the one on my back with a big bandage on my head, anybody who took the time to feel for me would have had to acknowledge that there was a chance they could have died that night, too.

We all hurt and we’re all going to die, so maybe it’s understandable that we want to look away from the horror most of the time, but I think feeling for people actually does make the world a better place for us and everyone else. Knowing someone understood that night after my surgery would have been a comfort, and I think when we comfort others, we end up comforting ourselves. When we feel for one another, we know we’re not alone, and that’s a big help.

A few words on depression.

There might be antecedents or precipitating factors, but depression is a thing in and of itself. I have suffered from clinical depression off on and for decades. I have been hospitalized for it several times. I’ve taken a number of medications for it. I have received electroshock therapy for it. Childhood experiences probably did change my brain chemistry in a way that made it more likely that I would be susceptible to depression. My ongoing PTSD and social phobia and isolation causes stress that probably doesn’t help. But these factors don’t explain why I’m okay some days, and other days I just can’t stand it anymore. Nothing has changed all that much externally from one day to the next, but what it feels like for me inside my head does change.

People will sometimes ask, “Why are you depressed?” or “What do you have to be depressed about?” This implies that there is or should be a specific reason for the change in mood, and there often isn’t one. Sometimes someone will become depressed after being diagnosed with a disease, or after getting a divorce or after losing a child. People will then say that depression in those circumstances is understandable, and of course it is. But sometimes depression can hit you when you’re not expecting it, when it’s not so easily explained. And I think we should work at discussing this issue in a way that makes it clear to those who are depressed that they don’t need a reason or an excuse.

It’s not a personal failing on the part of the person who is depressed if they don’t have some kind of sob story to tell that will immediately play on the sympathy of those who hear it. The depressed person is in a lot of pain, and the depression alone should be cause enough for concern.

The Vicious Lie

I think the idea that gay = sin is destructive...as well as the idea that gay sex = sin or gay relationships = sin, but in saying that, I am not telling anyone how they should live their lives. I'm often not sure how I should live my own life much less how others should live theirs. If you abstain from sex or if you're celibate or if you embrace monogamy, that's your business. But I can't stand even the suggestion that gay = sin.

I haven't had sex in many years, and I don't see that changing in the near future. In fact, I may never have sex again. But the reasons are deeply personal. It has absolutely nothing to do with a belief that gay sex is sinful or inherently dangerous or wrong. I have trouble relaxing around other human beings, and a huge part of the reason I'm like that is because while I was a kid I was beaten over the head with the idea that my kind of attraction is sick, diseased, nasty, funny, strange, weird, wrong and sinful. Growing up in a society that strongly advocated those beliefs made the world seem like a dangerous place for me, and even now, I can't shake the feeling that I'm about to be attacked. I think the idea that a god doesn't like people like me is disturbing and hurtful, and I just don't want to hear that crap anymore.

 

I'm perfectly fine with being gay. I have always loved my feelings for my own sex right from the start. They made me feel alive, and I appreciated how the most boring day could become exciting the moment I spotted a cute boy. It was fun! But I couldn't be honest with those around me because the culture I grew up in was steeped in homophobic bullshit. As a result, I ended up with PTSD. You can't just turn that off. You have to learn to live with it and accommodate it. I have done that, and I have survived. But it pisses me off that some still spread the bullshit. And it really pisses me off when I hear LGBT people spreading it.

Late to the Revolution

Last week, The National Center for Lesbian Rights (NCLR) posted an open letter from 9 former “ex-gay” leaders in which they called for a ban on conversion therapy. On hearing about this letter, some have made it clear that they don’t trust these former leaders or that they find it hard to forgive them.

Maybe this is understandable. Alan Chambers offered a so-called apology for his leadership of Exodus International, the world’s largest “ex-gay” ministry, and shut the place down, but one could hardly claim that Chambers is now a supporter of LGBT rights.

However, I know some of these people who cosigned the letter. Four of them are on my Facebook friends list. And I believe they are the real deal. They no longer believe that being LGBT is a sin or that LGBTs can or should change, and I think they sincerely want to help us gain equality and acceptance.

I think we sometimes tend to forget how new the concept of LGBT equality is. Just a few years ago, states were still allowed to criminalize homosexual sex. When I was born in 1965, being attracted to your own sex was still considered a sickness, and those who experienced such attractions were considered a threat to society. We were thought of as degenerates, criminals and scum.

In this day and age, when Mat Staver claims that acceptance of homosexuality will lead to the destruction of civilization or when Linda Harvey claims that those nasty homos want to infiltrate schools so they can persuade kids to join the “homosexual lifestyle,” many of us laugh at their obvious absurdity, but not that long ago, their attitude was common and widespread.

While growing up, I heard the most vicious homophobic comments imaginable almost daily. The comments sometimes came from otherwise nice and friendly people. It wasn’t just the thugs who were against us. And there was nothing to counterbalance that hostile attitude. I knew no one who was out. Not one person. I rarely saw LGBT characters on TV shows or in movies or read about them in books.

And let’s keep in mind that there was a time when many of us wanted to be good little boys and girls. Many of us wanted to make our parents proud. Nearly everyone, at one time or another, has had disagreements with their parents, but only some of us have feared that we could risk losing our parents’ love, affection and support forever if we revealed who we really are. What a scary thing that is.

Many of us were taught that being LGBT was a horrible sin, an offense against God, and that those who were guilty of this sin are worthy of eternal damnation. Some of us found it hard to shake this belief. Some believed that if they accepted their sexuality, they would not only risk losing their families, but they could end up suffering in hell for eternity.

I believe that to risk offending your family in such a way that they might permanently reject you and to go against what you have been taught as a basic tenant of the faith you were raised in is a revolutionary act. I think it takes great courage to do this. I believe this so strongly that I wrote a novel about it, The Raven’s Sepulcher. (You can download it from Amazon or Smashwords if you care to read it. …I know that’s a shameless plug, but I’m like that. LOL)

I was never involved in any “ex-gay” or anti-gay organizations, but I was terribly afraid for anyone to find out about me for the longest time. I lived in fear. I’ve grown a lot over the years, but I think I still have a ways to go. I think I’m still recovering from the homophobia that was dumped on me when I was young. So I can understand why it took some of us a while to come around. I commiserate with those who had to struggle, and I’m happy to call some of them my friends.