Empathy

Carlene and I both watched all sixteen episodes of the series, Rectify,  and talked about it for over an hour this morning as I was driving around looking at my neighbors' yards.

Rectify (two seasons available on Netflix) is a compelling, brilliantly-acted drama from the first episode to the last.  The plot centers around a young man, Daniel,  who has just returned to his Georgia town and family after 20 years on death row.  Each character is complex,  nuanced and believable.

We have our rednecks, our self-serving senator, our family with all its love and doubt and hostility.   We have the ever-loyal sister, faith and doubt, and betrayals.  In the "good" people, there are flaws that make them human and authentic.  In the course of the weeks in which the story takes place,  we have an almost Shakespearean tragedy of truths, half-truths, and lies.  It's a riveting character study that plays with the lines between reality and illusions and different versions of truth.

It's also a story of change.  Coldness can thaw.  Silence can be broken.  The character in the adjoining death row cell to Daniel's can be the most compassionate voice of all.

As I drove around looking at houses and yards, I thought of all the potential human drama going on inside those houses--which, I believe, breaks into the fabric of all families and tribes, no matter how manicured the lawns or perfect the decor.

Unlike the superficial solved-in-an-hour dramas of most television drama, this series is written and acted with such depth that you can find yourself and people you know.  Problems are not tied up in neat bows.

After watching this series, I watched a series of Ted Talks on Netflix called "Love No Matter What." Collectively, these speakers talk about bullying, shame, judgment, stereotypes, and what it means to step inside the shoes of people of another culture--specifically the Muslim people of Iraq.

Empathy is the wheel that drives all good literature and film.  In the space of reading a book or watching a well-crafted drama, we step into the shoes of people who are mirrors for ourselves.  Empathy is the way to escape the traps of judgment and self-righteousness.  Empathy--as all these Ted Talks speakers say--is the only way we can ever hope to find peace in our tribes and among ourselves.