If you are fortunate to have been born with a neurotypical brain, you will have developed empathy, an important component for interacting with other life forms, sensing what they might be thinking, using an amazing set of tools provided by the human brain. You are able to show genuine caring, compassion, sensitivity if required. You are able to assess threat more accurately and act accordingly. You are not inclined to inflict pain as you would ‘feel it’ too. You recognise cruelty, you will protect the vulnerable, you will speak out on behalf of those who need support.

In Kara Swisher’s book, ‘Burn Book’,  she tells the reader that she lost her father when she was five from his sudden and unexpected death. She tries to get us to understand how that must have felt,

When I was five, my beloved father died. To say my life changed in the moment he suffered a cerebral hemorrhage without warning would be an understatement. “Just imagine right now if half of your friends died,” I said to an interviewer decades later, referring to a book called The Loss That Is Forever, about children whose parents die at a young age. “Your parents, when you’re five, are really pretty much your entire world. If one-half of your friends just suddenly died, it would be shocking and devastating, and so I think it also gives you a sense of the capriciousness of life; that life can change on a dime, that bad things happen, and that you survive them just fine. You just keep going.”

Our media often show us the traumatised faces of children all over the world who have suffered such loss of not just a single parent, but a loss of siblings, cousins and generations in one bomb strike. But human survival is an amazing thing and mental scars may not mend but can inform that survivor how to “keep going”.

Human empathy may be simulated through conversations with a machine which is trained with voice and phrases conveying responses to a person saying they feel sad and lonely. Mark Zuckerberg has said that many people are lonely and believes an AI friend can help with that without seeking therapy.

Zuckerberg Says in Response to Loneliness Epidemic, He Will Create Most of Your Friends Using Artificial Intelligence

That’s pretty grim, Mark.

May 1, 12:13 PM EDTbyVictor Tangermann

https://futurism.com/zuckerberg-lonely-friends-create-ai

Kara Swisher evolved her love of journalism during the emergence of what we now often call the Silicon Valley ‘bros’.

At a young age she was a stringer for the Washington Post, and was keen on learning about the importance of ‘the medium is the message’ (Marshall McLuhan’s phrase “the medium is the message” suggests that the medium of communication itself, rather than the content it carries, significantly influences how messages are perceived and understood. This concept emphasizes that different media shape human experiences and societal interactions in unique ways. Wikipedia)

She observed:

Working for the Post was much more fun than school, except for my history courses. My focus was on propaganda and how groups like the Nazis used media and communications tools to twist facts, radicalize their populace, and demonize the targeted populations. Obviously, Hitler and his henchmen had conducted a master class in evil. But what struck me was how easily people could be manipulated by fear and rage and how facts could be destroyed without repercussions.

Obviously we are now living through an intensely profound test of our ability for ‘straight or crooked thinking’ (Straight and Crooked Thinking, first published in 1930 and revised in 1953, is a book by Robert H. Thouless which describes, assesses and critically analyses flaws in reasoning and argument . Wikipedia)

As we struggle to comprehend the Kafkaesque global implosion taking place, a recent piece by Chris Hedges reminds us of the dying of empires and their characteristics:

The last days of dying empires are dominated by idiots. The Roman, Mayan, French, Habsburg, Ottoman, Romanoff…and Soviet dynasties crumbled under the stupidity of their decadent rulers who absented themselves from reality, plundered their nations and retreated into echo chambers where fact and fiction were indistinguishable.

Frank Herbert also observed:

All governments suffer a recurring problem: Power attracts pathological personalities. It is not that power corrupts but that it is magnetic to the corruptible. Such people have a tendency to become drunk on violence, a condition to which they are quickly addicted.”

Kara Swisher wanted to join the military as her father had done, but knew the discrimination against gay people would make that impossible. Attempts in recent history have tried  to ensure the military reflected all of Americas rich and diverse society, current trends are reversing that direction.

Harvey Milk

American politician and activistActions

Also known as: Harvey Bernard Milk

Written and fact-checked by 

The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica

Last Updated: Jun 4, 2025 • Article HistoryContentsAsk the Chatbot a Question

And Brittanica updates the entry:

In November 2021 the U.S. Navy launched the USNS Harvey Milk, a John Lewis-class fleet oiler. It was the first U.S. Navy vessel to be named for an openly gay person, and at the ship’s christening Secretary of the Navy Carlos Del Toro said, “For far too long, sailors like Lieutenant Junior Grade Milk were forced into the shadows or, worse yet, forced out of our beloved Navy.” However, in June 2025, during Pride Month, U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth ordered the ship to be renamed. In a statement explaining the move, the Pentagon referenced Hegseth’s goal of restoring “the warrior culture” in the U.S. military.

The swirling war of semantics and meaning throughout social media leaves people exhausted. Fear is being spread and we have seen it all before. We are preconditioned. We know we cannot stay silent in response to cruelty. We did that to the Jews and now the Israeli government is using that fear model to defend their right to the land of the Palestinians. Global Far Right groups are using it to turn citizens against vulnerable and frightened immigrants who are fleeing their homeland for good reason.

Silence makes us complicit in crimes against our fellow beings. It cannot be the response of those of us who possess empathy as human beings, with a strong sense of responsibility toward all living things on this beautiful planet.

An assessment of the state of American politics in 1998: