Why is it so hard to care about struggles that aren’t ours?

This episode tackles one of the most frustrating questions of faced by activists: How do we get people to care—really care—about issues and lives that feel far from their own?

From Indigenous rights to climate justice to the daily realities of Palestinian civilians, why do some people tune in with empathy while others scroll on by?

Let's unpack how political leanings shape emotional responses, why conservative and progressive brains seem wired differently when it comes to compassion, and how our so-called "neutral" education systems quietly teach us not to care.

Let’s take a ride in the brain’s weird alleyways—through political bias, emotional blind spots, and the art of giving a damn.

Because caring isn't weakness. It's radical. <3

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Sources:

1. On the different moral foundations between conservatives and progressive, see:

- Graham, J., Haidt, J., & Nosek, B. A. (2009). Liberals and conservatives rely on different sets of moral foundations. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 96(5), 1029–1046. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0015141

- Day, M. V., Fiske, S. T., Downing, E. L., & Trail, T. E. (2014). Shifting liberal and conservative attitudes using moral foundations theory. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 40(12), 1559–1573. https://doi.org/10.1177/0146167214551152

- Smith, I. H., Aquino, K., Koleva, S., & Graham, J. (2014). The moral ties that bind…Even to out-groups: The interactive effect of moral identity and the binding moral foundations. Psychological Science, 25(8), 1554–1562. https://doi.org/10.1177/0956797614534450

2. On the role of the French Academy in setting back female representation in the language

- Milles, K. (2022). Feminism and Language: Handbook of Pragmatics https://doi.org/10.1075/hop.24.fem1

- Pauwels, A. (2003). Linguistic Sexism and Feminist Linguistic Activism
Book: The Handbook of Language and Gender https://doi.org/10.1002/9780470756942.ch24