The Need for Empathy

On December 5, 2018, our IDC class went to see “The Jungle” a play based on true events about a city built entirely by refugees. They built the Jungle to be a temporary living situation because they believed and hoped that one day, it would be a good day, and they would come to the UK so they can live happily, and safely. This play was an incredible experience, possibly the most important things I have ever watched in my life. I just wish there could have been a warning. I know about the life of emigrants too well. My parents had to survive through so much to get to this country, to make sure that when they have children they will be safe and they will have everything they need. Watching this play reminded me of all the intergeneration trauma that I have to battle through every day. I know the story of refugees too well. My job as an activist is to listen to the traumas of others and then make sure their stories are being included; I can still remember the first time someone told me that they were raped. I can still remember the first time a mother came to me and told me the story of her daughter, and how she got shot the day before Mother’s Day. and how my activism gives her hope. And now after watching this play, I hold the stories of the people of the Jungle.

I spent most of the play crying; I couldn’t stop myself from shaking because this is happening to my people as we speak. At the southern border of the United States, mothers and children are being tear-gassed. At the southern border, a boy got shot in the head because he was throwing rocks. At the southern border, people who are begging for asylum (a completely legal action) are being treated like animals. They aren’t considered humans, they are between worlds where they can see the doors of “freedom” and they have come so far and they are so close but they can’t get in.

The part that scared me the most was between two moments when they began to lift the roof and the part when one of the young boys in the Jungle shot the firearm. The part where the roof was being lifted was an experience I will never forget. The smoke and the police officers made me scared for my own life. I was completely aware that it was all a play, but my body had a physical reaction to this image of terror and destruction. I imagined how it must have felt to be there in the present; where there was no audience, only violence, and destruction. I imagined how this must have been similar to the way they destroyed civilizations in the Western hemisphere. When the colonizers came and destroyed everything they could see for their own greed—and they didn’t care who died in the process, they just wanted to show power over an innocent group of people. The gun going off in the play also made my body react in a negative way. I felt my spine shaking and I couldn’t breathe. That’s a sound I will never get used to. I am a gun violence prevention activist so sounds like that are incredibly traumatic for me. I remember that I instinctively I grabbed the nearest person and tried to protect them as I covered my own head. I didn’t think it was going to make such a realistic noise. I began to cry almost instantly and I am grateful that I was with friends who were there to comfort me.

The lack of a trigger warning was concerning but at the same time, I believe that we can’t censor images like these. Empathy is what is needed to actually create change. Being apathetic to human suffering will never solve anything and I believe that this is what people need to see, they need to see the reality of situations in their face, where they are unable to turn away because, in reality, the majority of the people in the room at that show contributed to the problem. Although they may not have directly committed a genocide, and they may not have actually taken a gun and murdered an innocent person, someone they know or maybe even themselves, contributed to the problem by electing officials that depend on a power imbalance.

I am happy that so many people went to this show, but the fact of the matter is that I cannot stand to see any more people saying that they hate the current administration while letting people die. My activism is based on love and empathy but I have no sympathy for the people who can sit and watch people die and only post something on Facebook. I am a firm believer that if we are not all free, then none of us are free and that if you stay silent the situations of injustice, you chose to defend the side of the oppressor. Silence comes in many forms, but the one that is most dangerous is when you don’t hold others accountable for their actions and their words. It is up to each of us individually to talk to our friends and family about what we need to do as a community to create equity between all people. We need to talk about the stories of the people who died at the hands of a police officer, we need to talk about the stories of the refugees, we need to talk about the young man who was lynched only 2 months ago in the United States, we need to talk about starving children in Yemen.

Empathy is so crucial at this moment, we need to see each other as our siblings and our people, and I think that was the goal of play “The Jungle”, to show how people create communities especially when there’s so much chaos around you. I am so grateful for this experience. Although I spent a lot of the play crying and not breathing, I have learned that turning pain into empowerment is the most important thing you can possibly do for you and your community.