Meow

Last night I saw a cat limping down the street, one paw held limp at its side. All I wanted to do was help it, take it home, heal it, feed it, make it better. My emotional response was so strong that I could physically feel my mood deteriorate as I watched the cat disappear into the darkness. But I wasn’t compelled enough to do anything other than stand passively and watch. I thought to myself, “There are millions of cats like this on the streets, why should I take care of this one? I can’t respond to all of the suffering I see. I’ll run out of time and money!”

3.5 billion years ago, when life first emerged out of the primordial ooze, Earth provided all the necessities to foster growth. A competition for resources began and continued existence was the grand prize. Each stage of the continuous competition required adaptation and increasing sophistication in order to capture limited resources better than all other organisms. Soon, organisms began to consume each other in order to procure the steady supply of energy necessary to sustain their living processes. A beautiful yet harsh process of adaptation, competition, and death created the incredible variety of plants, animals, insects and more that populate the earth today. Humans survived through intellect. The ability to plan, communicate, use tools, and act as a community all contributed to the endurance of our species. But as we grew in size, we began to compete amongst ourselves.

Today we distribute resources through an economy, and money serves as a certificate for the right to a percentage of resources. We are living in an age of excess. More than a third of Americans are obese¹. At the same time, 870 million people were severely undernourished in between 2010 and 2012². Some humans are clearly winning the resource battle, and others are not. But what benefit is it to gorge yourself in response to excess availability? Drastically disproportionate levels of accumulation within humanity don’t appear to be contributing to the continuation of our species. Yet our drive to gather more wins out over the opportunity to lend a hand to fellow man. This drive has a distinct evolutionary origin, but it is not impossible to rationalize away.

The same night I saw the injured cat, I saw a homeless man rifling through a trash bin in search of cans and bottles. I see this everyday actually. The first time I saw it I reacted in a fashion similar to my poignant response to the suffering cat. But overtime I have become to numb to the spectacle. How demeaning is that? I barely even notice a fellow human who has been reduced to rummaging around in waste, collecting bottles worth less than a dime. My perception of the inevitable stratification of society effectively absolves me of all responsibility to assist a man who is visibly suffering right in front of me. Still, my indifference robs him of his humanity. Am I responsible? Are we responsible? My answer is yes. I am complicit to the system which actively contributes to the degradation of portions of society. Yes, society is complex, but so are rocket ships. I believe that the human faculties of compassion and ingenuity can combine to rework society in a way which doesn’t not condemn billions to poverty and suffering. We can help each other out. Unfortunately, it is against our nature.

¹ CDC (Center for Disease Control and Prevention) 2010

² United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization 2012