Am I a horrible person for not feeling anything?

[dextersmith]

You're not horrible, some people are desensitized or less connected if things are impersonal.

[Aeula]

Meh, never seen the point in getting worked up about the death of someone you never knew personally.

I guess most people just love to dramatise things.

[TheMediator]

less than a cup of coffee, its like throwing pocket change at a homeless person to shut them up and so you can feel mildly better about yourself. You're not doing it to help them. simple concept for feeble brain

What's wrong with someone feeling good for doing good? What, should people feel bad about doing good? Only then is it "truly good"?

As far as I'm concerned if the biological machine that is our brain has a circuit says "good deed = feel good", then that's just fine and dandy. Maybe society might be better off if people had a bit more of that programming, rather than focusing so much on "eat donut = feel good" or "get dick wet = feel good".

[Dreknar20]

you don't really care for people you never knew or met....................sounds pretty standard to me

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if things are impersonal.

likewise, I would care much about harm coming to my dog than some random nobody in Spain

[Mormolyce]

A psychopath is someone who doesn't care about the suffering of others in his/her immediate vicinity. Usually, the suffering being caused by them.

Actually they kind of feed on it, so it's not entirely accurate to say they don't care about it, they need it.

Wanna know about a little secret?

The Majority of us don't care about tragedies as long as they don't happen to us or our loved ones.

Pretty much.

We're just afraid people will think we're horrible people if we admit it, so we make a big show of caring.

[Deleted]

A psychopath is someone who doesn't care about the suffering of others in his/her immediate vicinity. Usually, the suffering being caused by them.

Actually they kind of feed on it, so it's not entirely accurate to say they don't care about it, they need it.



Pretty much.

We're just afraid people will think we're horrible people if we admit it, so we make a big show of caring.

That's not entirely true, they do have a sense of Empathy, it's just extremely dulled down. There have been studies that have shown that certain psychopaths actually can have a grasp of empathy, to some extent, if very deliberately reinforced.

Also, what you are describing is Sadists, not Psychopaths, lol

There is a wide spectrum of what constitues a psychopath, but there is not an inherit nessecary part of needing suffering in others, in being a Psychopath.

[Deathquoi]

I don't know why people insist on assuming they're sociopaths.

Because when you're a person that is completely devoid of interesting thoughts or qualities, its easy to pretend to be a sociopath to have something to talk about.

[Deleted]

Because when you're a person that is completely devoid of interesting thoughts or qualities, its easy to pretend to be a sociopath to have something to talk about.

Do you have any idea what a sociopath is, if you are saying it's easy to pretend to be one?

A Sociopath has an extremely high degree of analytical capacity in terms of Social behaviour, to an extreme of such that you can do insane feats.

That's very far from "I'm bored, let's pretend i can Emulate social behaviours perfectly"

[analmoose]

Anyone who isn't affected by it but acts like they really care are just using it for attention

[Deleted]

Wanna know about a little secret?

The majority of us don't care about tragedies as long as they don't happen to us or our loved ones.

Answered by post 4.

Only the media cares, and they only really care about how it fits into the various narratives they're attempting to craft or perpetuate. Oh, and I guess some charities care too when it means their CEO gets to keep making hundreds of thousands of dollars a year.

Most normal people don't even pause, much less break down in tears, when they hear that bumfuck-nowhere that they'll never visit got bombed.

So no, not a sociopath.

[Independent voter]

I just do what's manageable.



I pick up a piece of litter. Say I'm going to the courthouse to pay a bill, I pick up 1 piece of little and put it in the trash. If I picked up two pieces, that's too much.

If there's a famine in Africa I give a NGO some money for food cause with the mountains of food we have nobody should go to bed hungry.

I try to understand the minds of these shooters who are in the news, but I do this to see if there's anything that can prevent shootings in the future. Yes, I can understand what the families of the victims are going through at least a little because I've lost family members too over the years, though not to gunfire.

[May90]

It is usual desensitization we are all subjected to, as we are bombarded by news about tragedies and learn to not immerse ourselves in these stories to avoid feeling pain. Still though... Some events get to me.

I remember 9/11. I didn't live in the US then, and I saw footage on the screen of a burning building and another plane hitting another building. I thought it was a fiction movie or something. Then my parents told me that it was for real. And then there was footage of people jumping out of the buildings to their death. Damn...

[PC2]

Being emotional about it is bad. Focusing on the big picture statistical trends is good.

[Kraenen]

You can't see them so it's harder for empathy related neurons to activate.

[potis]

Accepting the problem exists is a step.

Caring about it is irrelevant, ignore all these attention seekers pretending they care.

100% of the time i shrug off any news about someone dying or whatever, mainly because it doesnt affect me directly, things would change then.

I also accept the fact i am useless and irrelevant to do something about it.

Unless your name has 2 trillion dollars behind it, your opinion is irrelevant in the capitalistic Earth, which is logical.

[Nynax]

If something happens to an acquaintance, friend, or family member, then it might get me riled (never had anything happen to those I know), but I don't feel much empathy for those I've had no contact with. Even when there were stabbings recently-ish at my high school and college, I only really felt surprised. One shrug later, and I was over it.

I'm right there with you OP, after a "that really sucks, must be horrible to go through" I'm moving on. It's definitely more intellectual than emotional though.

But I'm not a sociopath, I think we just get desensitized really. There is so much bad stuff reported ALL THE TIME, bad bad everywhere, and I'm rarely even on social media. I get my news from a NYT app, NPR app, and (oddly) MMOChamp and it still feels like the world is about to fall apart. I just don't have the energy to focus on my own life and get emotional about all the negative shit.

[Thunderball]

You're not. It's really hard to emphasize with someone who you dont know and cant relate to. You also should try to feel anything as if "it makes you a better person". It doesnt.

[Fencers]

When I hear about these shootings in the US, innocents being bombed overseas, children in Africa starving, yada yada... I don't feel any emotion. I get that these things shouldn't happen. I'd be cool with people getting along and living good lives, but I'm not sad or angry that this stuff happens.... etc

Simply self describing yourself as sheltered for the most part.

Empathy is a means humans have created in order to better communicate, anticipate and cooperate with one another. That is the basic function of empathy. Which increases the more exposed and reliant one is to others- whom are unknowable in mind.

Being a good or bad ("horrible") person is relative. Its not really related to your dilemma and somewhat contradictory. So I suspect you just don't know how to phrase your thoughts properly or accurately on this issue.

[Thunderball]

But I'm not a sociopath, I think we just get desensitized really. There is so much bad stuff reported ALL THE TIME, bad bad everywhere, and I'm rarely even on social media. I get my news from a NYT app, NPR app, and (oddly) MMOChamp and it still feels like the world is about to fall apart. I just don't have the energy to focus on my own life and get emotional about all the negative shit.

Ultimately bad shit has been happening for the longest time. We just couldnt know about it. But now we do because of social media, and I'm not sure it's a good thing.

[Tailswipe]

Completely normal.

The discussions we have at work about the latest ISIS attacks or American shooting are more because they are news worthy events not because we really care about the dead. I mean these sort of events generally struggle to compete with sports and politics for discussion time now that they are becoming common place.