Aasof’s Reflections

24/2/2019 — Sunday on Facebook: I have been trying to write a post about compassion fatigue for some time now. The compassion fatigue I want to write about is not that experienced in the so-called helping professions who know as much about the limits of empathy as they do about its merits. Studies of oncology nurses, trauma workers and even marriage counsellors, among others, have documented a common “compassion fatigue” that seems directly related to the amount of emotion shared. What I wanted to write about is the compassion fatigue that we all experience when reports in the media makes us become compassionately numb.

We have never been more aware of the appalling events that occur around the world every day. But in the face of so much horror, is there a danger that we become numb to the headlines — and does it matter if we do? Is compassion fatigue inevitable in an age of 24-hour news (url*)? 

Shamima Begum’s plight, which caused me to write this week’s post, has created a numbness in most of the nation’s compassion. In doing so it drew me into altering the lyrics to a song from Porgy and Bess by George Gershwin. Shamima Begum has not only  aroused a nation’s ire in the UK, but the pressure of public opinion is now what is clearly driving a political agenda.

Listen to yo’ daddy warn you
‘Fore you start a-traveling
Life may of’n taunt you
Life may of’n haunt you
But compassion is a sometime thing
Yes compassion is a sometime thing

If ever it comes a callin’ you
An’ it ties you to its apron string
It will shame you an’ will blame you
Ofttimes even may disclaim you
‘Cause compassion is a sometime thing
Yes compassion is a sometime thing

Don’t you never let it cleave an’ grieve you
Or wear it like a weddin’ ring
It loves you an’ deceives you
Robs all thought afore it leaves you
‘Cause compassion is a sometime thing
Yes compassion is a sometime thing
Yes compassion is a sometime thing
Yes compassion is a sometime thing

Some people feel a strong sense of kinship with all members of humankind, no matter what differences or distances might exist between them; others have a tendency to keep those feelings closer to home.

Connection to Humanity Quiz — click image

Porgy (url/book):
Click on icons (page top left) for Internet Library features. Scroll down page for downloads (free).

Porgy and Bess discography (url/wiki): The opera by George Gershwin, has been recorded by a variety of artists since it was completed in 1935, including renditions by jazz instrumentalists and vocalists, in addition to operatic treatments.