How are writing and empathy similar? What is the value of empathy?
When writing in any kind of way, you are most likely giving either your opinion or facts. When writing in a blog where multiple people can read it, the writer tends to think about the topic thoroughly before posting so that they can minimize the number of negative comments or arguments. So writing is similar to empathy in this way by having the person think about the topic from viewpoints that differ from their own. Another thing is that when people are writing things such as poems or personal essays that give their raw feelings. This gives readers the ability to have empathy toward the writer when reading their work. Empathy is something that is definitely rare in the world we live in today. But with something that it is rare, it also makes it valuable. Empathy gives a person the ability to put themselves in someone else’s shoes and understand their emotions, feelings, and points of view. As a human being, many of us are subject to tunnel vision; empathy is one way that you thoroughly understand a position that another person is in. Not many people are able to understand empathy, which makes it rich in a person’s character.
2 replies on “Empathy and Writing”
Stephanie, you’ve got me reconsidering the way I write for digital platforms. The way you define empathy here is almost like a weird kind of censorship, no? If I’m thinking about how others will perceive my comments, and then change my comments because of that, am I then censoring myself? What an interesting conflict. You’re right, empathy eliminates our nasty habit of tunnel vision, I wondered if you could give me an example of something that we tend to think about in a tunnel visioned way. This would help me and your readers see the value of empathy in specific terms.
I’m looking forward to getting to know you through your writing! DW
Exactly, many people are forced to censor themselves in their writing for so that they can appeal to the mainstream world. For instance, if a student is writing an essay for a religion class, and they are in no way agreeing with the ideas of that religion, they still have to write the essay according to what the teacher has taught them. The student knows that in order to get a good grade, they must think about the topic as the teacher has taught it instead of giving a bias viewpoint of the religion that they had no true connection to.