Out of Fear or Compassion?

When you see a man in his late forties in rags, with a huge book bag beside him on the floor, a plastic cup on the other and a sign that says 'Homeless and hungry please help'. What do you do? Do you drive past him like the other hundred cars that did that today? Do you stop and hand him a dollar? Or do you drive to a near by restaurant, order some food, and hand it to the man? What triggers the first action? Ignorance? Belief that they can make it on their own or they're just con artists? What about the second one? Empathy. The last one? A level of compassion.

Today in class we read an essay written by Barbara Lazear Ascher 'On Compassion'. It gives us three scenarios, I believe on homelessness. We had a class discussion on whether it was fear or compassion that motivated the gift?

 In the first, there's a woman strolling her baby in a stroller. By the name of the stroller brand we learn that she's a wealthy woman. They cross paths with a man who is wearing rags with carefully braided dreadlocks. She rummages through her purse to find a dollar and holds it like a crucifix towards the man until he finally takes it.

-I believe it was fear that motivated the gift. The passage gives you details like 'her hands close tighter on the stroller's handle as she sees the man approach', 'rummages through its contents: lipstick, a lace handkerchief, an address book.', and 'bearing the dollar like a cross'. If you have to grip tighter onto something it means that you're aware you'll lose contact with whatever you're gripping onto. If Ascher has to add in the detail rummaging through its contents and list what she rummages through, you can tell the woman is nervous. Now, I'm not an expert on exorcism but bear the dollar like a cross? It's like the woman's life depends on the dollar.

The second scenario was a moody French woman who owned a cafe. A homeless man comes in and she hands him a Styrofoam cup of coffee and a bag of bread. After retrieving the bag he leaves.

-This one I could make an argument for both sides, but I'm going to meet in the middle and say that compassion drove this woman's actions but fear also played a role in it too.
This woman gave the man food, and from how the writer described it, it wasn't the first time she did that. That's compassion. But do you wonder why she didn't let him stay in the comfort of the cafe and eat his bread there? She didn't allow the man to stay because she feared that his presence would disturb the comfort of her customers.

In the last scenario, the Mayor of NYC moves the homeless into hospitals.

-I feel like neither compassion or fear drove this gesture. It was more about how things appeared on the outside versus really solving the problem. But if I had to choose between only those two, I'd be in favor of fear. The mayor would fear what tourists say about the homeless maybe?


All in all when coming to a conclusion on what motivated these three actions, I'd say it was fear and pity. The vibe I had gotten from the people from reading the passage was very negative. I feel that if Ascher wanted compassion to be the motivation for the action then she would be sure to tell us in the details.

Ascher Essay:

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/10276652/Homelessness/On%20Compassion%20&%20Homeless.PDF



Here's also a super neat thing I found: