​In a recent interview, Elon Musk claimed that empathy is “killing Western civilization.” He’s not alone. A growing number of pastors and pundits, especially in far-right Christian circles, are beginning to warn their flocks that empathy is a kind of moral corruption—a gateway to misplaced compassion and liberal decay. Empathy, they say, makes you soft.

But empathy isn’t softness, it’s strength, rooted in emotional intelligence. I teach it to my students not just because it leads to better relationships, but because it is what employers are looking for in new hires. Why? Because if you understand your employee, you build loyalty. If you understand your customer, you build trust. In sales, it closes deals. In diplomacy, it prevents war. In democracy, it allows us to coexist.

So why the backlash? To me, there is one commonality among the anti-empathy voices: they are all in positions of power. Empathy only feels dangerous if you’ve never needed it. If you’re comfortably seated atop the social or economic hierarchy, empathy is an inconvenience. It shatters the illusion that your opinion is the only one that matters.

When immigrants arrive at the border, empathy asks us to imagine the journey that brought them here—the violence they fled, the risks they took. When someone is wrongfully deported, empathy asks us to reconsider that decision (due process literally provides ‘the opportunity to be heard’). Without empathy, we stop seeing people. We start seeing problems. Albert Bandura calls this moral disengagement, a sort of psychological lubricant that makes it easier to ignore or justify harmful policies. Empathy introduces a friction that forces us to imagine how those policies affect everyone, not just ourselves or personal network.

Even something like tariffs reflects a lack of empathy. Critics point to poor economic strategy or shortsighted thinking, but they also reveal a complete disregard for the real people affected--farmers, manufacturers, small businesses, consumers—not to mention our global reputation.

When empathy is labeled a sin or weakness, what’s really at stake is our human decency. Empathy threatens systems of power and privilege because it implores us to care. If you can convince enough people that caring is wrong, that understanding is un-American and anti-Christian, then you can keep the power where it is—which is exactly the point. But, contrary to Musk’s opinion, empathy doesn’t destroy civilizations. It builds them. It has been a keystone of every civil justice movement we now celebrate—abolition, suffrage, civil rights. Contrary to some conservative Christians, empathy does not mean “never having to say no.” It is not pity or sympathy. It’s consideration in the literal sense, which I would argue, is the connective tissue of a functioning society.

As policies increasingly disregard those without influence, empathy should not just be defended, it should be championed. We should strive to practice it—and just as importantly, to notice when it’s missing, call out its absence, and choose leaders who reflect it. Because in the end, the fate of our shared future may come down to one simple question: Do we still want to understand one another—or not?

This piece was originally published on AL.com on February 13, 2025.

Last March, Alabama passed Senate Bill 129, effectively eliminating DEI programs in schools and institutions across the state. At the time, I wrote an op-ed explaining how this would negatively impact my classroom—not because I was leading formal DEI trainings, but because it would stifle important conversations. Given the similar backgrounds of my students, open dialogue was often the only way to engage with perspectives different from their own. But with the vague language of the law, I worried that these exchanges could be interpreted as “trainings.” So, I stopped them.

Fast forward to January 2025 and any ambiguity is gone. SB 129 was a warm-up act compared to the Executive Order, Ending Radical and Wasteful Government DEI Programs and Preferencing, which cast a wider net and struck a more ominous tone.

Since then, I’ve noticed a growing hesitancy in higher education circles to discuss anything that might fall under the DEI umbrella. People weigh their words carefully, not just for those in the room but for external stakeholders, policymakers, and even potential whistleblowers emboldened by the executive order. This phenomenon aligns with the Spiral of Silence Theory, the idea that when people perceive a topic as controversial or risky, they are less likely to speak about it for fear of backlash. As fewer voices engage, the silence reinforces the perception that the topic is off-limits, even if many still believe in its importance.

But the silence does not reflect reality. Sure, the DEI acronym has become politically toxic, but its components are not. Research has consistently shown the benefits of diverse groups of people, from Francis Galton’s famous wisdom of the crowds experiment in 1906, to more contemporary research on firm and team performance. More importantly, diversity isn’t just a corporate initiative or an academic talking point, it’s an undeniable reality of the world my students will navigate. Equity, too, is not a radical idea. At its core, it means ensuring that people can secure the resources they need. It does not advocate for equal outcomes, just a fair shot. Proponents of recent anti-DEI measures argue that merit alone should determine opportunity, but this position assumes a level playing field that plainly does not exist.

And inclusion? It is the belief that people should have the chance to participate. What we are really talking about is accessibility. Consider how many policies and technologies have been implemented—without controversy—to remove barriers for those who might otherwise be excluded. Everything from wheelchair ramps to eyeglasses, from medications to closed captioning. These initiatives reflect the very essence of DEI: recognizing the diversity of human experiences, addressing structural barriers to equity, and fostering inclusion by expanding access. As someone who now reads movies, I am personally grateful that Netflix provides a DEI-driven service for me.

Yet, when these principles are applied to race and gender, they are viewed as ideological wedges rather than foundational values. This is critical because, as the Spiral of Silence suggests, as fewer people engage in these exchanges, the more socially and professionally risky they seem. This is the paradox we now face, and it is especially urgent in academia. The very institutions tasked with preparing students for the interconnected global workforce must tiptoe around the concepts that will shape their success within it.
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So where do we go from here? I don’t have an answer. But I know two things: 1) learning does not thrive in silence, and 2) the purpose of higher education is not simply to transmit information. A college classroom is at its best when it challenges assumptions, broadens perspectives, and equips students for the real world. These outcomes require diversity—of backgrounds, thought, and lived experiences. This is not a personal philosophy; it’s how students become the thoughtful, well-rounded professionals that organizations want to hire. If we begin muting conversations around DEI, we don’t just lose words, we lose what makes education transformative in the first place.

But as I reflect on the election results, I don’t think empathy is what’s missing. The answer, I believe, lies in understanding the hot-cold empathy gap. Think about the last time you went grocery shopping on an empty stomach. That junk food that leapt into your cart was induced by impulsive cravings—a “hot state.” Later, when you were satiated and relaxed—a “cold state”—you wondered what came over you. This same dynamic plays out in politics. Human emotions are not fixed; we shift between calm, collected states and intense, reactive states. The challenge is that empathy, inherently state-dependent, often fails to account for these shifts. In a cold state, we imagine responding to stress with logic and composure, but in a hot state, we behave differently. (When you are starving, your usual diet goes out the window). Campaigns that evoke visceral emotions push voters into hot states where rational appeals and promises of gradual progress lose their resonance. This disconnect explains why emotionally charged messages often overpower logical, measured arguments in shaping voter behavior.
 
About ninety-percent of US counties shifted red from the last election, so it is clear that the country’s resting pulse is high. Donald Trump capitalized on this hot-state politics. By amplifying grievances and stoking fear about immigration, economic decline, and cultural change, he moved voters into a heightened emotional state. This strategy tapped into deep-seated resentment and a desire for security, to preserve identity, and assert control in an uncertain world. This seemed to appeal to young men in particular. Meanwhile, the Democratic campaign leaned on cold-state reasoning, promising stability and incremental change, a calm, ordered “we are not going back” rhetoric. While logical, this approach failed to address the simmering frustrations that had been building for years, leaving Democrats disconnected from voters seeking immediate emotional validation.
 
Ironically, Trump also performed well with voters who Democrats assumed would be in a hot state but were, in fact, cold. For instance, he secured record-high support among Latino voters, despite running a campaign centered on mass deportation. Even among Puerto Ricans, who might have been expected to recoil after the “floating island of garbage” remarks, he performed surprisingly well. Why? Many of these voters, now removed from the immediate struggles of recent immigrants, were in a cold state. For them, Trump’s economic message was more relevant than his inflammatory speech; those “poisoning the blood of our country” now referred to somebody else, and therefore lost its sting.
 
So where does this leave the disillusioned citizen? Ezra Klein urged Democrats to respond with curiosity, but Democrats have been the party of curiosity. From listening to conservative radio in rural Alabama to dissecting New York Times election podcasts, much of the last eight years of my life has been spent trying to understand Trump voters. I put myself in their shoes, trying to make sense of rationale ranging from misunderstood views on tariffs to podcast bromances to “he just speaks his mind,” to “If a fellow felon can become President, that makes my prospects better.” The thing is, I can empathize with those viewpoints. I get why a convict becoming the President would give hope to someone with a criminal record. The real obstacle for Democrats wasn’t lack of empathy, it was the volatility of the emotional state of the voting public.
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Of course, we must acknowledge the broader context. Dissatisfaction with the status quo—fueled by COVID and inflation—meant that nearly every incumbent government worldwide faced similar struggles. Perhaps the 2024 election was inevitable. But that doesn’t diminish the lesson. Empathy is not just about understanding others’ feelings but recognizing the emotional states that influence their actions. To move forward, political campaigns must address voters’ fears and frustrations while offering a vision of hope and long-term progress. For citizens, fostering empathy means engaging with opposing views in good faith, striving to understand not only what people believe but why they feel the way they do. Though divisions run deep, building a resilient democracy starts with a shared commitment to listen, understand, and bridge the emotional divides that shape our decisions.

The part I couldn’t shake was “a peaceful and quiet life.” If this is truly what evangelical Christians want, then why are their views so often made public? Harvey insists that the church is not getting more political, rather “politics is getting more spiritual.” In his view, politics are now trespassing into areas traditionally discussed and decided by the church. This has led to a public discourse where gender, sexuality, and family structures have become political battlegrounds with evangelical voices leading the charge.

Anyone who has followed politics over the last 8 weeks (or 8 years) would agree that Donald Trump lives the opposite of a “quiet and peaceful life.” Harvey’s defense is that his congregation supports the platform, not the person, but this justification offers a moral loophole. As long as a candidate champions certain values you agree with, all other values—and personal transgressions—can be overlooked. We’ve seen this alignment in action for a long time. Trump was first elected as “a symbolic defense of the United States’ perceived Christian heritage,” next he followed through on a promise to overturn Roe v. Wade, then he leaned into masculinity and an anti-immigrant rhetoric, and started thumping his own Bible, and most recently he has weaponized some of their deepest fears (e.g., transgender people).
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Pastor Harvey’s quote concisely encapsulates the paradox that is the overwhelming support for Trump by white Christians. In one breath, he speaks of peace and quiet; in the next, he defends a movement that persistently targets those who would likely be met with Jesus’s compassion and empathy. Trump only amplifies the chaos that evangelical churches claim to wish to avoid. True peace and quiet would mean letting others live authentically and without judgment. It would mean not turning personal matters into political ones, platforms into pulpits, or faith into a shield for exclusion. If the church truly values peace, the quietest—and perhaps the most Christian—vote would be for a candidate who is only vocal in her advocacy for inclusion, progress, and the welfare of the entire country.

Ranking who has a greater stake in something isn’t just complicated—it threatens the very foundation of fairness. In my marketing class, we discuss stakeholder theory, which suggests that organizations should consider the interests of all parties who affect—or are affected by—an organizational decision. To illustrate the concept, I ask my students to identify the stakeholders of Auburn University. They begin with the obvious: students, faculty, staff, alumni. When I encourage them to dig deeper, they start listing parents, local and state government, media outlets, apparel manufacturers, donors, and companies that hire Auburn graduates. Eventually I push them to come up with local construction firms, the nearby Kia auto plant, Mama Goldberg’s Deli, and Chick-Fil-A. By that point, the lesson is clear: stakeholders extend far beyond the obvious players.

Next I ask them to rank these stakeholders in order of who has the greatest to least stake in Auburn. I’ve never seen two lists that match because it is impossible to say who has a bigger stake in something. This is precisely where JD Vance’s argument falls apart. Our individual contributions to society are interconnected and overlapping—you can’t tease them apart. But one thing is certain: if having children gives people a unique stake in the country, then surely raising and caring for those children does too. 

We even have an expression for this: “It takes a village to raise a child.” It is, therefore, hypocritical to support childbearing while ignoring childcaring. But that sentiment was conspicuously absent from his narrative (though he later suggested that “maybe grandma and grandpa wants to help out a little bit more).” In truth, it doesn’t just take a village to raise a child—it takes a village (family, friends, communities, institutions) to care for a person throughout their entire life. This is where we fall short. A society signals how much it values people’s work by how it compensates them. The average hourly wage for caregivers in the United States is $16.11 with childcare workers making considerably less at $13.42. (Those numbers fall to $12.90 and $11.00 here in Alabama). Care work, social services, and education are all clearly undervalued—despite being fundamental to the future we claim to care about. If we want daycare providers to feel invested in the future, we need to show that we’re invested in theirs.

A final problematic implication of Vance’s comment is that people only care about their own progeny, as if a person’s stake in the future is limited to their biological offspring. That’s not the reality I see, and I don’t think it is the kind of world most people want to live in. When you base “stakeholding” on biology, it reinforces the generational wealth and inequality gaps that already divide us. The goal, I hope, is to improve the future for everyone.

Having a stake in that kind of future can take many forms. It might mean dedicating your life to healthcare, education, or humanitarian work. It could be acting as one of the 100 million adult caregivers in the U.S. It may involve working to address climate change or volunteering in your community. It could be any number of things we all do because we are invested in the future. And, of course, like my mom and dad, it can mean raising seven kids. This isn’t about diminishing the importance of families or having children. It’s about understanding that the stakes are collective, not individual, and that if we belittle the villagers, we risk losing the village.

If that is your birthday, you are also of the [in]famous Millennial generation, which spans from 1981 to 1996. Popular culture loves to poke fun at Millennials. They have famously ruined industries like cable and wine, products like yogurt and fabric softener, institutions like higher education, marriage and religion, long-held American dreams like homeownership, and the economy at large. All of this in the endless pursuit of best avocado toast and lattes. These rebukes are sometimes sarcastic but often genuine, and almost always from older age cohorts.
 
With a birthday in January 1981, technically I am a Millennial. However, most people think of Millennials as thirty-somethings, and there is an even smaller subset born in 1990-1991, who would be about 32-33-years-old right now. Known as Peak Millennials, these individuals have disproportionately experienced, and because of their size, contributed economic hardships. This has occurred for two reasons. First, they represent a significant spike in the population, now comprising the largest age group in the United States, and like releasing a bend in a hose, their full force is now upon us. Second, global crises (e.g., The Great Recession, COVID-19) have coincided with their major life events more than other cohorts. Taken together, Peak Millennials have fundamentally altered societal norms and expectations. Life stages that were supposed to be lock-step (e.g., go to college, get married, start a family) have shifted or changed altogether, leaving older generations scratching their heads and younger ones biting their nails.
 
The existential problem currently tracking with Peak Millennials is climate change, and to me, this is where the inequity exists. Half of all human pollution has occurred since 1989, or right before this cohort was born. That means that the generation least responsible for causing the crisis will be the one both living through the worst of it and expected to fix it. The idea is not entirely new. In fact, Richard Nixon noted a similar environmental injustice in his 1970 State of the Union address: “young Americans […], more than we, will reap the grim consequences of our failure to act on programs which are needed now if we are to prevent disaster later.”
 
The challenge is that while younger people tend to be more concerned about climate change, they are largely not in the positions of power to put that concern into action. This is true in business and policy. While the median American is 38-years-old, the average CEO is 59 while the average age in the U.S. House of Representatives is 58, the U.S. Senate is 64, and as is well-documented, both our current and next President will be 80-somethings. I am not suggesting that a Peak Millennial run for President (our Constitution does not allow it), and obviously experience is important—but so is youth. I’ve written about the Flynn Effect before, but essentially it shows that human intelligence steadily increases over time, meaning that each generation is more capable than the last. If the worst effects of climate change lie ahead, the answer is not to put an upper age limit on corporate and public offices; indeed we need wisdom at the decision-making table. In my opinion, we also need to support Millennials as they navigate an economically-skewed landscape. Things like student loan forgiveness and trade school incentives, a wealth or capital gains tax, and tax breaks for non-traditional family units are just a few ways to help level the playing field. The more young people not worried about next month’s rent, the more young people who could focus on  mitigating climate change.
 
The optimist in me thinks the fact that Greta Thunberg (age 21) and Joe Biden (age 81) are two of the biggest climate activists is a good thing. There is a clear benefit to diversity of thought, background, age, and expertise. Imagine a world of intergenerational cooperation where the experience and wisdom of older generations are complemented by the innovation and urgency of younger ones. This collaboration would prioritize sustainable policies to develop climate resilience, as well as invest in education to prepare subsequent generations to take up the mantle.
 
There is an old proverb that says, “A society becomes great when old people plant trees in whose shade they shall never sit.” If you subscribe to that logic, our society is already great in many respects. However, it is also good to plant trees in whose shade you may someday sit. Peak Millennials face unprecedented challenges, but they also have the potential to plant a lot of hypothetical trees—if we give them a chance. By working together across generations and prioritizing long-term sustainability, we can create a future where both proverbs hold true. 

The evidence is clear: students benefit from a diverse classroom. And it’s not just the underrepresented groups, the benefits accrue to the entire student body. Diversity builds confidence and creativity, enhances critical thinking and problem-solving abilities, strengthens leadership skills, and makes for happier, more motivated students. In addition, students in diverse classrooms are better prepared for the workforce because their college experience ‘better reflects the real world’. As an instructor of college seniors, my priority is to help students find that first full-time job post-graduation. Logically, it would follow that I want a diverse environment for my students. This includes age, gender, sexual orientation, culture, ability, religion, race, ethnicity, socioeconomic status, thought, perspectives, etc. However, given the Supreme Court rulings on affirmative action last year, much of the current debate is focused on race.

Faculty are not heavily involved in the admissions or recruitment process, and therefore, the composition of our student body is largely out of our control. And while we can encourage students to enroll in our courses, there are obvious limitations on our ability to diversify our classrooms. Teaching in the business school at both Alabama and Auburn, that means I have spent my career with mostly white students.

Over the years, universities have addressed this through DEI trainings. Like many educators, I have implemented techniques to try and build awareness and create space for dialogue. In one training, the presenter simply recommended expanding the images we used in our visual presentations. This was years ago when, if you conducted a Google image search for “business meeting,” the top page of results was all white men shaking hands. The message was that by including people of color in the slideshow, the people of color in the classroom would feel included (Read more about the mere exposure effect). In a positive development, a similar search in 2024 returns a much different collage of images.
 
Another activity I built into my curriculum is an open discussion on the first day of class about implicit biases. I ask if they unknowingly make judgments about me based on inherent characteristics (e.g., I have six siblings and was born way back in the 1900s) as well as characteristics I chose (e.g., I worked at the University of Alabama and am a rabid Star Wars fan…these get boos and laughs from my Auburn Tigers, respectively). Some students open up, others do not. But it always evolves into a meaningful discussion for at least some students.

Under this new bill, that DEI training which equipped me with these techniques to engage students will no longer be allowed in the state. The bill will not prevent faculty from hosting DEI discussions—as long as they do not use state money. As a university employee, my classroom discussions are technically funded by the state. Is this a professional risk worth taking? 
 
Are DEI trainings perfect? No. Are DEI trainings uncomfortable? Yes—and that’s the point. I do not “teach” DEI. Rather, I invite students to get uncomfortable with me. As teachers, we constantly push our students out of their comfort zones to spark positive change. We urge them to engage in intentional learning opportunities because the classroom is the ideal environment for stretch mistakes. In my class, we role play job interviews because it is better to mess up with a fellow student than a potential employer. I would argue it is also beneficial to discuss diversity, equity, and inclusion in the classroom where the stakes are relatively low compared to the “real world.” That is one of the great advantages to higher education: experiential learning with real-time feedback from someone who genuinely wants you to succeed. This is how progress is made.
 
So where does this leave university faculty and staff in the Yellowhammer state? Personally, I am reluctant to revisit my implicit biases discussion next semester, which is a shame. We know diversity is both beneficial to and desired by the companies where my students want to get jobs. So, in a classroom lacking racial diversity, my alterative was to talk about it—perhaps to even challenge my students to think about why it does not exist in our classroom. Now that is a conversation that is as uncomfortable as it is necessary.

Make no mistake, I love my state. On two separate occasions, I have made the choice to move here and start a life with my family. I feel attached to—and proud of—both universities, and I even say y’all without trying. When you love something, you want to make it better, and if there is one state that should welcome classroom discussions of racial diversity and DEI initiatives, it is my Sweet Home Alabama.

While it seems like a foregone conclusion, the Democratic ticket is not set in stone. Even though some primaries have occurred, if Biden steps down, the party would make their nomination at National Convention. (Convincing Biden to step down is step one, but let’s allow the thought experiment). Given a recent poll revealing that an unnamed candidate would do better than Joe Biden against Donald Trump, it seems simple: nominate someone else. That is where the omission bias applies its cognitive pressure. In this case, inaction is nominating Biden. It’s the default. If he were to lose, there would be disappointment and head-shaking, but it will have been the logical, justifiable choice. Nominating someone else would constitute an action. It is pulling the lever, which means if that person loses, it will be seen as a completely preventable misstep.
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When the dust settles on the 2024 Presidential election, everyone will look in the rearview mirror at the road that brought us there. If the Democrats lose with Biden, the rhetoric will be woulda, coulda, shoulda. “We woulda won if voting block XX turned out,” “We coulda done better if we campaigned more in XX counties,” “We shoulda directed more messaging toward XX issues.” If the Democrats lose with another candidate, the rhetoric will be about second-guessing. “Why did we rock the boat?” “If it wasn’t broke, why did we try to fix it?” These questions of why the party did something will be more salient than questions of why they did not. Essentially the party will be judged more harshly for making a wrong move than for making no move at all, and if the omission bias is working proactively in the minds of the Democratic strategists, nobody is going near that lever.

This is the advantage of pooling resources, or the benefit of the commons. Most people are familiar with the tragedy of the commons--when individuals expend a shared resource until it is depleted. ​The benefit of the commons is when individuals expand a shared resource until it is even more productive. Imagine you go out with 5 friends, and everyone agrees to split the bill. If someone order nachos ‘for the table’, and you eat half of the plate, you overutilized a common resource. If, on the other hand, you don’t like nachos, but agree to split the bill anyway, you increased the utility of that resource for the rest of the table.
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This is common practice with pooled resources. For instance, we all pay federal taxes for social security even though not everyone may receive this benefit. We all pay for public education even though not everyone has children. We all pay for FEMA even though not everyone lives in disaster prone areas. The rationale is simple: we are all better off if the elderly are cared for, if children are educated, and if disasters are mitigated. We are a stronger society when we choose to invest in the collective good.
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So why does this argument lose steam when it comes to healthcare? Health insurance (including Medicare, Medicaid, CHIP, and the ACA) now comprises the biggest government spending sector, and in a recent “The Weeds” episode, Dylan Scott expertly lays out how we got here. However, 40% of Americans struggle to afford healthcare, and this number is disproportionately higher for Black and Hispanic adults. So, why do some welfare programs face an uphill battle while others do not?

It could be semantics. Many dislike the term entitlement or welfare programs, but I would argue that all government spending from tax revenue is for the welfare of our country. Social security, public education, and disaster relief are obvious, but infrastructure, public transportation, medical research—even paying down the interest on our national debt—increases our collective welfare.

Consider defense spending. These funds go toward protecting our country, supporting our service members, and providing international aid, among other things. But at the end of the day, it is about keeping 332,000,000 Americans safe. We do not balk at the national defense budget because it literally saves lives, and as Thomas More said: “For nothing in the world can be of equal value with a man’s life.” Shouldn’t we apply the same logic to healthcare? The discrepancy may be explained in part by Hofstede’s cultural dimensions. For instance, the US is highly individualistic compared to other countries, focusing on ourselves and immediate families rather than larger social networks. Or it could involve our bias toward masculine values (heroism, achievement) over feminine ones (caring, quality of life). Perhaps as we move into the feeling economy, an attitudinal shift toward empathy will bring about a cultural shift in perspective.

To be clear: 1) much of our tax revenue already goes to healthcare, 2) a growing national debt is bad, and 3) fiscal responsibility is good. At the same time, the U.S. ranks 32nd out of 38 OECD countries on tax-to-GDP ratio, and we have the means to change this statistic. Still, my argument is philosophical not fiscal. If we agree on what we want our country to look like, we can work backwards to achieve those goals. Perhaps we believe that every American should be able to walk into a doctor’s office, clinic, or hospital and receive quality care. Perhaps we believe that this care should not depend on a person’s demographic profile, employment, socioeconomic or marriage status, accessibility to services, or ability to complete paperwork. If we prioritize those things, we can make it happen. We wanted the best military in the world, and we made it happen. We leveraged the benefit of the commons to ensure the well-being of our society because we made it non-negotiable. Our health deserves the same consideration. 

Duncan Watts and Steve Strogatz modeled this phenomenon in their 1998 Nature article “Collective dynamics of ‘small-world’ networks.” As one of the 100 most cited papers of all time, it has been used to explain a range of phenomena, from the spread of infectious diseases to how we are all within Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon.
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Essentially, the argument is that the world is connected. We are fewer handshakes from every person in the world than we think. Why does this matter from a climate justice standpoint? Because we tend to care more about people the closer they are to us. We are more likely to, for instance, support the GoFundMe of a friend than of a stranger. But closeness also works geographically. Peter Singer’s classic scenario posits you are wearing a brand-new pair of shoes and you see a child drowning in a lake. Most people do not hesitate to jump in and ruin the shoes to save the child, but almost nobody is willing to donate the same amount of money to save a child from malaria in some far-flung country. It even has a name: the identifiable victim effect. It is not a perfect metaphor, but it highlights the value we assign people based on their proximity to us.

Our response to climate change is largely about people outside of our immediate network. Rising sea levels will not, for example, impact someone in Ohio as much as someone in Bangladesh, but are these two individuals really that far apart? Climate change is a small-world problem—you cannot put a dome around a country—and as a result, the Ohioan and Bangladeshi are connected through a shared experience; namely, a warmer, more hostile planet with extreme weather events. (Based on a recent study, the Washington Post claimed that “at least 85% of the global population has experienced weather events made worst by climate change”). This matters because shared experiences bring people together—you can relate much more to someone going in for a colonoscopy if you have also had one yourself. Shared experiences create interpersonal bonds, they make us feel more connected, they foster empathy. If we feel closer to one another, theoretically, we may care more about each other—even if they are on the other side of the planet.

Nothing about climate change is fair, but we will never develop a cohesive global response if it is framed by guilt or nationalism, finger-pointing or tribalism, in-groups and out-groups, or a me-first mentality. We are citizens of one—albeit large—shared space, one global community. It recalls the bank run scene from It’s a Wonderful Life. At first, the whole town is out for themselves, jostling to get their money out of the bank before somebody beats them to it. Then George Bailey reminds them that their individual investments are interconnected, tied up in a neighbor’s property or a friend’s loan. Only then do they come together for the greater good. They remember that Bedford Falls is not a town of strangers, it is a community of people who care about each other.

The climate crisis will not be solved by individuals switching to electric vehicles or recycling more plastic—in Ohio or Bangladesh. It is a socio-economic, geo-political problem that requires a transformation across public policy and business systems. But influential policymakers and businesspeople could take a page from George Bailey and connect the dots between seemingly disconnected people and places. We are more likely to help someone we know, and while the Ohioan may never actually meet the Bangladeshi in this example, they are closer than they think.