Passion Project: First Reflections

These first 2 weeks for our passion projects have been helpful in starting our video. We have done a lot of the beginning stages. Our group has been working on our plot line roughly and been working on our characters. We have been looking for music for our video and deciding what our characters should like. I personally have took on the role of a mage in our final fantasy-like video. Although, nothing is final at the moment. We have not really encountered any obstacles really(Except for Tom learning to throw cards). However, I anticipate a lot of editing problems to overcome later once we actually start recording.

Empathy is the solution?

After listening and reading Jeremy Rifkin's thoughts, I do agree with his ideas on empathy to an extent. I do agree that empathy is the solution to unify humans as a race. Basically, Rifkin believes empathy is "the invisible hand" that can extend to everyone on Earth. Empathy is how humans can unite as a race before it's too late. I like his term as referring to nations as "fictions". Mostly because that is what a Nation is. Why identify ourselves as Americans from the U.S.? Why restrict ourselves with borders? Nationalism repeatedly causes problems, enemies, and wars. This is all true, but it's impossible to fix. Unfortunately, this idea of everyone using empathy to solve our problems, which in theory could work, is idealistic. Despite living at a time where we know more about what goes on in the world, I don't think we can empathize with the people who have completely different experiences than ourselves. I could never imagine being someone dealing with starvation every day and trying to survive. Sure, I can research the hard life some people live, but even that is doubtfully drawing a 100% accurate picture of what goes on in their lives. I may be able to empathize with people facing the pressing issue of bullying because that is right here where I can see it. But issues like world hunger and lack of any medical care is not something an average person can experience here. Not only that, but some people simply do not care, which is unfortunate, but true. Not all people can be reasoned with. Not everyone wants to empathize. Rifkin stated that if we can empathize with our own groups of religion and nations, we should be able to empathize with all humans as one race. But we can't empathize as a whole because we don't have any connections with our race as a whole except being human. Which most don't consider a connection because of how vastly different our experiences are depending on where we are.