Sometimes, personal stories change minds

Sometimes, they don't

With the election just two days away and all of us inundated with it, I will keep my thoughts today brief.

As a direct consequence of the Dobbs decision, women are dying preventable deaths in states like Georgia and Texas. Reporting from ProPublica:

• A Woman Died After Being Told It Would Be a “Crime” to Intervene in Her Miscarriage at a Texas Hospital

• Abortion Bans Have Delayed Emergency Medical Care. In Georgia, Experts Say This Mother’s Death Was Preventable

• A Pregnant Teenager Died After Trying to Get Care in Three Visits to Texas Emergency Rooms

I have been thinking a lot about Michelle Obama’s plea to men to “take our lives seriously.” Her words are affecting to me — someone who already shares her views — but will they work on someone who doesn’t value women? I am actually asking.

Sometimes, personal stories change minds. In 1970, New York State Assemblyman George Michaels cast the deciding vote that helped to legalize abortion in New York, and it was his daughter-in-law sharing firsthand stories of women she knew that persuaded him to change his mind on the issue.

Sometimes, they don’t.

I am reading Aruna D’Souza’s Imperfect Solidarities, which is an argument against relying on empathy to catalyze political change, in part because empathy “puts the burden on those who are being dehumanized to argue for their worthiness of empathy” and also because empathy is a personal emotional experience, not a collective act. D’Souza argues instead for alliances based on an imperfect understanding of the other, for a world in which we care for others whether or not we are able to empathize with them.

“We should not have to understand others or hear their plights in terms that we can most easily absorb to be willing to fight the systems and structures and powers that bring them harm.”

I also long for this world. Whatever the outcome of Tuesday’s election, we have a lot of work to do.

That said, for my U.S. readers who are able, please VOTE and consider this idea of imperfect solidarities when you do.

Love, and see you on the other side.

— Shayne