What I learnt about empathy from a scary- looking man
Coming home from Morocco
My travels for work are usually far from just business trips. They are a way for me to immerse myself in a reality I am coming to know in an “emergent” and ever incomplete way, the informal economy in the global south. They are, first and foremost, an infinite exercise of empathy. Empathy is, indeed, an abused word: online everyone is “an empath”, everyone goes around with predicaments of kindness, enlightment and connection. But empathy is also an exercise, like a muscle. Or a well: a finite resource.
I work with people who have wild stories to tell, from incredible to horrific: people who are living under oppressive regimes, people who have barely escaped those regimes, victims of organised crime, single mothers who have rebelled against the social norms, queer folks who experience violent discrimination, survivors of domestic violence, climate change disasters, political persecution. This is the reality of a global labour movement. My role as a media person is mainly to listen: to remove myself and tell those stories in the most effective way possible. It’s a hard practice, but also, I think, a liberating one. As the western left leaning activist space becomes increasingly commodified, individualist and competitive, I love working in an environment that allows me to take a step back and serve a cause that is not my own and does not directly benefit me (I do think informal workers’ rights are a collective issue though, but that’s probably for another article). I think it’s a privilege. And still: listening is not a passive act. It takes a gigantic toll.
Scary looking men
This is a weird convoluted story. I will start from another point — I hope everything will make sense in the end. One time I remember reading some big italian intellectual telling in an interview that the profession of journalism is about ego. I was surprised by this statement because it could not be farther from my own experiece. I don’t think ego is a bad thing, many things in my life are about ego: exercise to see myself stronger and more muscular, dressing, even some relationships. Sometimes even activism has been about ego. Writing can be about a fragile ego (I spoke about this after publishing my first book). But journalism, inherently? No. It’s really the opposite. It’s talking to people forgetting about yourself. It’s almost an out-of-body experience for me. Who is this person? What do they have to tell? My whole attention goes to them, in a way that is almost dangerously non — egocentric. I do forget myself and my own needs. That’s what happened to me while talking to B.
I have been to Morocco for a work trip for a little over a week. B. was our driver around Casablanca and Marrakesh: we have travelled around with him for three days, me and my two friends, after the end of our training course. We made an odd group: a petit woman from Hong Kong, an indian girl always wearing amazing dresses and a white twink (me). B. was a scary looking man: the one you expect to meet outside a club at 4 a.m. trying to pick up a fight with some dealer. Tall, muscular, angular face and always wearing sunglasses and smoking.
While we were driving back from Marrakesh and my two friends were asleep in the backseat, B. and I started a conversation about his life, and partially mine. My “journalistic mind” was on: listen, listen listen, and absorb as much information as you can- I was a in a foreign country after all, this is my default mode while travelling. We started from small talk, while the dry moroccan landscape was flowing from the windows. Do you have a family? do you live close to them? what are you kids doing, how old are they? He tells me his children live in the United States, and he starts narrating the story of how he got there and how he was forced to come back to Morocco. It’s a story you can expect: of state violence and instiutional racism. I continue to listen and to absorb. Then he starts talking about his wife and his new girlfriend and how he is juggling the multiple relationships in his life, one of them intercontinental. I nod and I continue to take all of this in, while wondering if this specific point is something that we might have in common. The semi-desert keeps accompanying us. He looks at an olive tree field with a somewhat luxurious house in the middle and tells me he wants to live there. We jump from topic to topic, with his occasional sexist comment — no surprises there. I’m used to sexist men, I’m only not used to talk to them in depth about personal experiences. I can tell he is not being condescending to me. I can tell he is being vulnerable. We move to talk about addiction, and he refers to his own story of sobriety, recounting the details (which I’m not gonna share). I share a bit about the story of my family, also involving addiction and suicide. It’s an intense moment, and still I’m trying to register everything with my work mind. He asks me not to tell this story to anyone, and I cross my heart. Then he apologises for being too talkative. A scary looking and sexist man apologising for oversharing.
Flexible boundaries
At this point, all my mind “muscles” are active, like I’m doing a very intense exercise straining various parts of my body. I’m trying to understand his story, to remember it, meanwhile I’m trying to be empathetic, as well as to not appear to be too curious. I step into my people-pleasing space: I forget about myself and devote my whole attention to the person in front of me. Later that night, I cry for several hours. It’s maybe my mind telling me it’s enought. It’s my body telling me too many boundaries have been crossed. Crying feels freeing, like I’m letting go of a burden.
I’m struggling a lot to reconcile this two aspects of myself: the one who wants to disappear in things and observe with my whole body and mind, and the one who needs calm, space, silence. Unpopular opinion: I think people pleasing can be, at times, an incredibile resource. Sometimes, in order to learn, you need to make yourself ameanable to other people. But at some point, you will feel those boundaries being crossed. That’s the beauty of empathy. And that is also, I think, the beauty of journalism and storytelling. An eternal swing. An eternal push and pull: in and out of ourselves.
