If we live in a milieu where a great many signals discourage empathy and self-scrutiny, and thus emotional awareness, we shall develop habits of self-absorption, the urge for dominance, and short-term perspective. Our motivation to change anything other than what we feel to be our immediate circumstances will be weak, because our sense of ourselves as continuous, reflective agents will be weak. And the clear implication of all this is that without an education of the emotions ”“ which means among other things the nurture of empathy ”“ public or political life becomes simply a matter of managing the competition of egos with limited capacity to question themselves.
Are KJS’ and Executive Council’s ears burning yet? Just the quoted paragraph describes them to a fare-thee-well.