Sort of feel bad. :-(

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I hate the empathy issues I HAVE! The Boston teorrist attack happened and I laughed. Same as 9/11 surely if you've been here on WP long enough you know that. I just made an empathy topic last week but it came up again!! !! My sisters friend just had a baby and had a seizure (but is fine) but when I heard my heart sank I felt bad and worried "I hope she's ok!! !!" Yet for major teorrism I laugh! I jump to lets catch the guy who did this while everyone else is OMG! shocked/upset! UH! I'm more upset over this friend having complications from pregnancy!! !! The baby is healthy and happy but with the moms past issues logically will she make it to see the babies 18th birthday or even grow up! I THINK of these things!! !! ! While everyone else is OMG! bombs OMG! terrorist! I say lets catch them and BE DONE TALKING ABOUT IT!! !! !

YET! this friend everyone is just hope she's ok and blip on the radar. I am worrying and naturally upset!! ! and all people are gushing is the baby! Yes cute big sweet 7lb. baby! But I'm hoping the mom is ok! (Heard she was fine and recovering but still!! !! !)

I hate I feel so much for this friend yet could care less during Katrina or 9/11 I feel "wrong" somehow!

I can understand that. You know your friend. You don't know anyone who's being attacked and killed in far away places. I mean why limit yourself to Boston, 9/11 & Katrina? There's some sort of disaster that takes place all the time. I could probably list over a hundred that have taken place so far this year. Am I supposed to be heartsick over each and every one of them? I figure if you're supposed to be a good person for feeling heartsick over the Boston bombing, you should feel just as heartsick over every single tragic disaster happening everywhere. But who does?

To be purely cynical, I think a lot of it is just social hype. And all this stuff gets joked about to no end underground so to speak. And things like Boston is a huge cash cow for the media. The only reason why you even know what happened in Boston and the only reason you know how people are reacting to it is, because the media is making a huge spectacle out of it because it makes big bucks for them. I think in many ways people's empathy over this is just being exploited. And I think a lot of it is just people giving the expected reaction. I think people get excited over these events, the media knows this, and stokes that excitement as much as they can.

I don't think you should feel that you should be expected to join in everyone's hype over Boston, just because you have the capacity to feel bad over someone you personally know. I'm sure that if someone was making a big show of sobbing over what happened in Boston and then got a call telling them they just got fired, they'd shift their focus to that and anguish over that a lot more deeply and genuinely than over the latest media bombshell. I'm sure the people making up jokes about what happened in Boston, and there's plenty of them I'm sure, would not be joking about a personal tragedy i.e. loss of job or sick/injured friend or a friend's sick/injured child etc.
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Let me give you another example, just so you don't feel like you're the only one. Where I live, there was a horrific accident. A speeding car, with an I think intoxicated driver, lost control and smashed into a bus stop killing and maiming a lot of people.

Now I've gone past this bus stop a million times. It's within walking distance of where I live. I eat at a food join right next to it all the time and have parked my car within 20 feet of that bus stop dozens of times. I know this bus stop really well.

However, when this happened, all I really wanted to do was survey the remaining evidence of the wreckage and carnage ala CSI. And I was actually somewhat annoyed that there were so many people gathered around the site doing candle vigils, I'd feel too conspicuous investigating the area. I was wishing they would go away long enough for me to go over the area with a fine tooth comb. I didn't once think to join in the vigil or to leave some flowers or anything like that. I was really more focused on the forensics of what happened. And only interested at all because it was so close to home.

Now if someone I knew and cared about had been one of the victims, then I would've taken it personally and been haunted by it... to some (slight) degree.
That's just the way I'm wired.

I'll be honest when I hear about the bombings, hurricanes etc my reaction is often "I'm sure glad I was not there". Honestly isn't empathy mostly a fake emotion for everybody, I agree most of the hype is just that. I do feel sympathy and compassion however that usually does not happen until I learn about the people affected, how they were injored or died and what they were living for in some great detail. When I hear about people who comitted suicide or died after being bullyed really hard for example that depresses me becouse I can relate really well. In the end I have to feel a real genuine connection to feel anything and I will never feel that with everybody. When I do feel than connection I wonder if its a little stronger then most as the things that get to me appear to be brushed of by others or even become comical in a short while. I would not feel bad becouse we are using a different measureing stick and a different emotional responce system, just pretend to care and all will be good with the general public, thats what there doing mostly. Those are my thoughts.

To the OP:

A situation with someone you know might feel more 'real' to you.

I am curious what you found funny in the Boston situation? I am not angry and I am not judging you. I'm literally curious.

I do the unthinkable! I follow the victim information afterwards. I followed Gabriel Giffords recovery online and was interested in that. Also to me the Dark Knight Rises shooting beats 9/11 or Boston in my book. I'm a HUGE Batman fan and woke up to find out the midnight earnings to find out some sicko shot up a showing of it sickens me!! I read a victim got shot in the throat and was asking for her dead daughter! Might be paralyzed! I read the actor who played Batman Christian Bale visited that hospital meeting victims.

Oh wait I'm sorry NT society! All you care about is Mr. Psycho and OMG! He killed people!! !! ! You don't know what kind of pain the victims are going through!! ! and stuff!! !! !!

I'm glad I'm not the only one that laughs at these events. I also believe with rapidroy the news blows things out of proportion. We didn't have news all the time in the early 60's just newspapers but Eddie Gein is one of the worst Serial Killers. Yet people are scared OMG! Crime is up! When statistically it's NOT!! !

Why did I laugh? Well 9/11 looks like an action movie and it was like an automatic response. Boston is "here we go again" American news is going to talk about it for weeks. It's like a death of someone super famous "Quick lets make history documentaries and show there best films!!" The only issue with Boston to me is it was a Marathon. It just goes to show nothing is safe anymore. Otherwise it's "Here we go again" with the news talking about it for weeks.

Honestly, I never care when tragedies happen and it makes me feel like a horrible person but I guess it's emotionally draining to care about everybody and it's very hard to care when I can't relate to the situation or know the people. It's easier when it's somebody you know.

I think I over simplfied empathy a being a fake emotion, empathy maybe real to those who feel it however the feeling are not often orginal to the person feeling it, rather a reaction created in yourself based on seeing someone suffering without actually genuinely caring about it, perhaps a forced overaction(an exmaple is when a coworker goes on about a break up you have no intrest in or care about yet NTs often show empathy for them). I'm a good, careing, helpful person with a big heart so i'm told however at best I can only think and fake the above and normally fail to a degree, sympathy, compassion and the like isn't really the same thing as empathy, I don't think anyway.