The End of Empathy and Venezuelan Immigrants: Takeaways from a Survey of Venezuelans in Florida Eduardo A Gamarra Hannah Arendt's reflections on empathy caution against a society's decline into barbarism when compassion yields to division and intolerance. This erosion of empathy is vividly illustrated by a recent survey of Venezuelans in Florida, which reveals significant internal divisions within the Venezuelan-American community itself. Historically, immigrant communities in the United States have often demonstrated solidarity, empathy, and mutual support. However, this survey reveals a troubling trend where empathy diminishes as immigrant communities become more established. Venezuelans who arrived earlier and secured citizenship or permanent residency show starkly different attitudes compared to recent arrivals, particularly those depending on temporary protections such as TPS or humanitarian parole. The survey conducted by the Latino Public Opinion Forum at Florida Inter...
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The End of Empathy in American Political Culture? Eduardo A Gamarra Hannah Arendt's critical reflections on compassion and empathy highlight a profound transformation in American political culture. In The Origins of Totalitarianism, Arendt characterizes compassion as a complex phenomenon that paradoxically "opens the heart of the sufferer to the suffering of others," but also risks depoliticizing and homogenizing experiences by "closing the sense of uniqueness in the sufferer." This nuanced understanding of empathy offers a powerful framework for examining the contemporary decline of empathy in American civic life. Historically, American political culture has embraced civic participation, collective welfare, and an empathetic approach toward social and economic inequalities, as articulated by Sidney Verba in his notion of Civic Culture. The New Deal consensus and the civil rights ideals of the Great Society era embodied structured and institutionalized empat...