Standardized Compassion

Suffering takes place everywhere, with everyone, but it’s hard to define. Like a lot of things in life, suffering is relative. Some whine over the tenderness of their steak, while others struggle to find their next meal. Obviously, the ethics and fairness behind that are questionable, but so is the solution. With so much disparity, how do you standardize suffering? And if you can’t standardize suffering, how do you standardize help or responsibility? In my opinion, the answer lies, at least partly, in the problem: relativity.

Surely the wealthy CEO should be giving a larger percent of their income, but that doesn’t mean that the average Joe shouldn’t also be giving. The reality is that there are maybe a couple thousand truly wealthy CEOs where as there are hundreds of millions Joes. For example, take a highly successful CEO’s salary, $11.5 million, and give it all to charity. Now take $50 from 230,000 average workers, and you get a similar $11.5 million. I like this scenario because it reminds me that you do not need an absurd amount of money or power to affect positive change. Obviously giving relative to your own scenario is key (the CEO can and should give a significant amount more than most), but I think just giving in general is even more important.

I think as humans, we have an innate responsibility to help other humans. Suffering is an integral part of us, but so is helping. Should people live their lives without helping anyone, then I think they’re missing a part of themselves (the punishment fits the crime in my opinion). In this way, I think giving involves more of embracing yourself and seeing what you can realistically donate than giving all that you can in the name of a clean conscience.

Note: I understand humans are not as altruistic as I described. I figured I would save everyone from more human-bashing. We get it, we suck.