We can imagine what it means to lose everything – and that provokes either our empathy (sensitivity to another's feelings as if they were one's own) or our fearI recently read that criminality is on the rise in German towns that contain accepted refugees. But it’s not the refugees who are responsible for this crime wave: Germans in these towns contain been committing arson,damaging property and attacking refugees. In other words, Germans contain been making their own worst fears advance exact. Often the fear of loss leads to the very loss we fear – a principle that holds exact not only for jealous lovers but also, and it seems,for those who turn to violence out of fear that the refugees will cost them their safety and peace.
The refugees haven’t even all been registered yet, but already they raise questions about who we are. Some Germans can imagine what it means to lose everything – hence their empathy (sensitivity to another's feelings as if they were one's own); some can imagine what it means to lose everything – hence their fear.
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Source: theguardian.com