Why I don’t feel sorry for sad people

When emotion meets ethics

A while ago, a Chinese lady Peggy accused me of not showing sympathy for my biological mother Mandy, when the latter showed sadness after the death of my 19-year-old feline brother Seth. I was disappointed at her turning off the heat on the cold winter night, which made Seth unable to stand up the next morning for the second time in a month. He passed away within a week in a heroic way. Of course, his death wasn’t out of the blue— he had been coping with chronic issues for years, and we didn’t know whether he could survive this past winter or not.

While I grieved over his death and meanwhile, acknowledged Mandy’s sadness, I didn’t feel sorry for her. As mentioned in my recently published hybrid memoir The Snowy Battlefield of Ohio (Amazon link), I have lost my filial love for my biological parents since I was an adolescent. That fragile family bond was broken after the death of Seth (dubbed Samuel in the book), since Mandy kept denying that the cat’s quickly worsened health had anything to do with her negligence. “He died because he was old and sick, not because I turned off the AC,” she said. People like her could barely think in terms of concepts of “trigger” vs “underlying cause.” Holding different opinions, we grieved separately after the funeral service, without conjugation.

I might look heartless or cruel in the eyes of some folks, especially those from collectivistic cultures, but that’s how I have evolved to be after living through my personal experiences, as shown in my book. Again, sorry to disappoint some psychotherapists who would blindly promote unification and forgiveness (this point is also heavily explained in my memoir).

Do I have to feel sympathy toward other people’s sadness?

From the perspective of cognitive therapy, as opposed to neurobiology, sadness indicates a complete or partial loss of a person’s value. “Complete” as in grief; “partial” as in when your beloved entity is attacked by an external force and you have no way to defend it.

So the question comes down to: Do I have to feel sorry for someone else when they lose their personal value(s)?

Under normal circumstances, I naturally do sympathize, out of humanitarian conscience, especially when I share a group identity with the victims, from “international graduate students” to the broadest one “human race.” Nevertheless, as I grow older, I realize I can’t afford to wholeheartedly emphasize, i.e. resonate negative feelings with victims all over the world inside my brain and body. I’ll inevitably get depressed if I do so. That’s why serious psychotherapy is a paid profession, not a freebie.

What stops me from feeling sorry for a person the minute I see their sad face or hear their sad voice?

(1) What if this person’s value is inherently harmful to others? In that case, their loss of value is beneficial for the public good. I, as an Objectivist who advocates for rational selfishness, will benefit from that. Examples are the loss of life/health of a murderer, a rapist, a hypocritical priest, a corrupt autocrat, a sinful teacher, or a violent parent. What else? The destruction of a hard drive that is full of child pornography.

(2) What if the person’s value was gained in an unethical or illegitimate way? For example, if one lost a computer that was stolen from someone else. Now replace the computer with a child. The thief may sincerely love the child and treat the child well, but it’s still unethical to steal other people’s offspring.

(3) What if the loss of value was caused by the behavior or inaction of this person, who would later feel sad? We all make mistakes out of ignorance or arrogance, and we all regret some decisions we’ve made. However, expecting sympathy, mercy, or forgiveness in this case indicates a sense of entitlement. Don’t take tolerance, kindness, or a second, or even third chance for granted.

(4) What if the value is based on vanity or other people’s suffering? (This condition is an extension of the 2nd condition, namely, exploitation of human labor.) For example, when a kid fails to score high in an exam, a Chinese tiger parent cries alone at night. The kid’s test score is, ultimately, the result of the kid’s own effort. This parent is seeing their kid as their possession, or experimental subject, or industrial product, which violates human rights in the context of Western culture. Such parents steal credit most of the time as one can imagine. When there’s no credit to steal under some circumstances, they cry out loud with a sense of entitlement, ” My investment is lost!” If someone doesn’t care about something, academic scores, for instance, you can’t make them care about it through manipulation.

(5) What if their value is beyond my comprehension? Imagine someone tells me their virtual asset worth a million GodCoins was stolen by a hacker, and I can’t find anything related to that GodCoin on Google. So how can I feel sorry for them? I’m not familiar with that virtual currency and thus cannot estimate that person’s loss.

In none of the cases above should one feel compelled to sympathize with these people, at least from a rational point of view. Understandably, I, a former scientific researcher, will not jump to the conclusion that this person is a true victim under my moral standards. Assessment and evaluation come first. I think everyone ought to do the same.

For cases that don’t fit the stringent criteria (believe me, no one in this world is completely innocent), one may offer some condolences or kindness out of formality, but even that shouldn’t be an obligation. If you stand on the side of evil, then you are at least half evil yourself. However, don’t use verbal abuse toward those who already acknowledged their wrongdoings. We should reward people for becoming better people. Unfortunately, not everyone will sincerely acknowledge their errors. Let’s be realistic. Humanistic psychologists may have some methodology that I’m not capable of, but I hope their judgment is based on evidence, not faith or assumptions.

Sympathy, empathy, or even compassion, naturally requires shared abstract value attached to a physical entity (including data stored somewhere). A simple example I can recall: people with cats automatically understand one another. Due to my upbringing, I have accumulated the skills to communicate with domestic cats, but some people may hate cats. As someone who has trained and nursed a senior cat with professional skills and love, I don’t necessarily feel very sad when my friend’s cat passes away, just pity, BUT I do offer sincere condolences. (Exception: when I have interacted with my friend’s cat in real life.) When my buddy Seth died, I received almost zero condolences from people who never lived with animals or only lived with young kittens and thus had no idea what it entails to take care of cats over 15 years old. Especially not from those in my developing country of origin — they were never taught to do that. Otherwise, why is a developed country called a developed country?

In case you’re confused, here’s an easy (coarse) way to differentiate between sympathy, empathy, and compassion:

[Sympathy] Say something like “Poor XXX” or “You’re so unlucky” to acknowledge their misery. Or only say to a third party. Do nothing. Please don’t fake it if you don’t feel pity for them. It’s okay to not sympathize. It can backfire if you force yourself.

[Empathy] Say something like “Sorry to hear your loss” or “I understand how you feel,” whether your understanding is based on prior knowledge, logical deduction, or emotional resonance. Do nothing. Please don’t fake it if you don’t understand. It’s okay to not understand. It can backfire if you pretend to.

[Compassion] Say something like “Let me know what I can do to help.” Really do something to help if they ask. Please don’t fake it if you don’t want to help. It’s okay to not help. It can be embarrassing if you can’t make it.

Although Mandy and I both mourned the death of the same cat, the cat meant different values to us. For Mandy, a second son in place of the human son who doesn’t love her. For me, a buddy I played with and had to take care of when other humans failed to do so. The same entity; different abstract values attached to him, or say, different connections, as in C1=C2=C3. C1 denotes Mandy; C2 denotes Seth; C3 denotes me. The bond between C1 and C2 is independent of the bond between C2 and C3, i.e., no conjugation, as mentioned above. We grieved separately, but I didn’t feel sorry for HER loss.

There is a special case worth discussing here. When I was around 10, my maternal grandpa passed away. I was heartbroken because he was one of my caregivers in elementary school. Whenever my Y chromosome provider Dawg tried to beat me, he would stop him. During his funeral service, I noticed my uncle, Mandy’s elder brother, didn’t cry; in contrast, his wife did. I remembered that disparity and couldn’t understand why. I thought it was just the difference between Venus and Mars— females tend to be more easily affected by the emotional ambiance —, plus his dull personality. Only after I grew older was I told that this uncle was the half-brother of Mandy; in other words, my grandpa wasn’t his dad. No wonder he didn’t cry. He attended the funeral service out of respect, not familial love. We can’t expect people to feel miserable for something or someone that’s not their personal value. A value is a concept stored in your brain, and it may refer to an entity (including an animate being) in the objective world. The value involves not only the entity per se but the role it plays in this interactive relationship.

At the start of the article, I mentioned a lady Peggy. I met her in a student club during my first year in college. She was a music major without any STEM background, unlike most students in my college. She, a sophomore back then, labeled me as her “younger brother” in front of strangers, so I naïvely accepted her as a nonbiological sibling. To be fair, she was nice, caring, and frugal, unlike many women I grew up under. Unfortunately, our interactions in recent years have clearly shown me that she isn’t qualified as an elder sibling because she doesn’t pursue rationality and she is deeply entrenched in traditional Chinese culture. She was that one and only person who historically buried the idea of “chosen sibling” in me, which wasn’t beneficial for my experience in Ohio, if you have read my book The Snowy Battlefield of Ohio. I have taken the label “sister” off Peggy and only see her as an acquaintance from 2024. (In fact, back in college, she had claimed multiple freshmen from different programs to be her younger brothers; none of them still takes that relationship seriously as of today.) She told me she was shedding tears when I withdrew from her that pseudo-sibling label. I didn’t sympathize with her because that label wasn’t based on any mutual agreement, to begin with. That relationship bond was her value, but no longer mine.

I hereby warn people against this idea of “chosen siblings.” I know it sounds fulfilling and heartwarming, but it’s not objective by definition. It could lead to serious wrong expectations down the road simply because you didn’t grow up in the same household. There is no free lunch in the world, no free parenting, no free mentoring, no free caregiving, let alone free sponsoring, as I have emphasized multiple times in my book. It’s all an exchange in disguise. I am not being cynical. People can stay as good friends with boundaries and nurture their friendships long-term instead. Don’t make the same mistake I made. It’s okay to be naïve when you initially enter college. It’s necessary to stay conscious when you graduate from school.

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