Why Politics Feels So Cruel Right Now

In this episode of “The Opinions,” the Times Opinion politics correspondent Michelle Cottle speaks to the columnists Jamelle Bouie and David French about the rise of “toxic empathy” and how the right has turned compassion into weakness.

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The transcript has been edited for length and clarity.

Michelle Cottle: Today I want us to talk about something of a vibe shift that’s happening right now in politics. I feel like we’re seeing a prime example in what might darkly be characterized as the death of empathy.

So hear me out on this. When people are feeling sour or anxious, I think they don’t want to be lectured that other people have it worse than they do. Instead, they want to be told they are justified in being upset and aggrieved and that their leaders, as Bill Clinton liked to tell us, “feel their pain.” And it’s even better if they are given a convenient group to blame for their troubles.

For years now, progressives have been engaged in a competition of sorts, which is like, “In the hierarchy of intersectionality, who has the most right to be upset?” And that has put conservative white men, in particular, on the defensive at a time when they’re already freaked out about shifting social and economic hierarchies. So a lot of people are tired of feeling guilty, and they have been very open to the idea that empathy or compassion is a weakness.