Civilians in war-crushed Aleppo anticipating their imminent deaths recently filmed their final goodbyes to world as government and Russian forces marched to take the rebel-held city.
In the aftermath, it was revealed that many families were killed in the fighting, some in summary executions with a handgun, according to the United Nations. The toll is at the hundreds and could rise as more news pours in.
Ten days from Christmas, a joyous and festive occasion for billions around the world, we can only watch helplessly as civilians are massacred. We can only make angry and anguished comments on Facebook. We can only “like” and “share” on social media articles about and photos of the atrocities being committed. However, that is the extent of our engagement. As many residents of Aleppo have asked over the months, where is the UN? Where is the world? Why is no one helping nor sending rescue?
Similarly, the Philippine drug wars have reached almost genocidal proportions with thousands killed without due process since the start of the Duterte administration. Despite extensive coverage of the slayings of drug users (and very few drug lords) by local and foreign media and warnings issued by international bodies, no help has been extended nor sanction given.
What can explain this seeming indifference and reluctance to act?
In the article “Psychic Numbing and Atrocity” (Slovic, et.al., 2010), researchers “suggest that a form of psychophysical numbing may result from our inability to appreciate losses of life as they become larger…” Our brains are simply not up to the task. Therefore, we feel more for the loss of one person we know, rather than for a million murders of strangers. “When it comes to eliciting compassion, the identified individual victim, with a face and a name, has no peer.”
Two descriptive models offer an answer to the question of how we actually value human lives. System 1 thinking “evolved to protect individuals and their small family and community groups from present, visible, immediate dangers” and did not evolve “to help us respond to distant, mass murder” that System 2 thinking, “if activated, finds reprehensible.” These models are said to “demonstrate responses that are insensitive to large losses of human life, consistent with apathy toward genocide.”
The same article quotes writer Annie Dillard of speaking about “compassion fatigue,” wherein the public becomes inured to the sight of suffering and resistant to helping. However, I have not observed, so far, any such fatigue extended to the victims of natural disasters.
Indeed, the study says that vivid images and stories of individual victims of natural disasters carried on media “unleashed an outpouring of compassion and humanitarian aid from all over the world.” We only have to recall how the world helped us after the ravages of Super Typhoon “Haiyan.”
“Perhaps there is hope here,” the researchers say, “that vivid, personalized media coverage featuring victims of genocide could motivate intervention to prevent mass murder and genocide.” So far, attempts by Philippine media in this direction aren’t working as hoped.
What is happening in Aleppo and the Philippines is not a natural disaster but war. Appeals to the world for rescue and help are met with the wringing of hands and ranting on social media, but not much else. This is donor fatigue, that on this immense a scale is defined by an internet source as “a slowness to act on the part of the international community or any other donor base in response to a humanitarian crisis or call-to-action.”
Combine this fatigue with global political crises, weakening democracies, the resurgence of strongmen and proto-dictators, and economic instability, and the situation looks even bleaker and more depressing.
There’s one thing, though, that humanity will never lose, and that is hope.
Those who want to do take action to help Syria, which has been suffering from five years of civil war, can consider donating to the charitable organizations that are working in the area. Among them are the British Red Cross and Doctors Without Borders/Medecins Sans Frontieres. The Red Cross delivers food and medicine, and provides shelter, water, and medical care. MSF supports eight hospitals in Aleppo, runs six medical facilities across northern Syria, and supports more than 150 health centers around the country. Before donating anything to anyone, however, vet the organization to make sure they are legitimate and above-board.
For our beloved Philippines, we can but continue the struggle for justice even as it, and mercy, are in short supply this holiday season.
Dr. Ortuoste is a California-based writer. Follow her on Facebook: Jenny Ortuoste, Twitter: @jennyortuoste, Instagram: @jensdecember