Robin Whetstone

Some kids are born with empathy. They automatically put themselves in others’ shoes. They watch Charlotte's Web and wonder, “How would I feel if I were Wilbur?” Then they sob inconsolably for two whole days. Other kids, if you don’t talk to them explicitly about empathy? Watch out. They’ll grow up to be sociopaths. I’ve had many interactions with kids that go something like this: ME: “Why did you poke him in the eye/unfold all the laundry/ decapitate these zinnias? KID: “Because I wanted to.” My 4-year-old is somewhere in the middle of the cry-for-days-because-the-pig-is-sad/murder-your-sibling-just-because spectrum (Figure 1). Her empathetic abilities are still emerging, and being shaped by the feedback she gets. Figure 1. She vigorously comforts and protects her little brother, for example, but then she also doesn’t understand exactly why we should not let our dog eat the neighbor’s cat. “Oh no, we shouldn’t go over there,” I said to her one afternoon....

Six months ago I was sitting on my back porch watching the toddler smear cream cheese on the dog when I received a Facebook message from a person I had never met. She did not really explain who she was or why she was contacting me specifically, but I guessed it was because she'd read the recent Flagpole article about  my first attempt at local politicking  since the run-up to the Gulf War years before. Her message only said that Jody Hice, the “Freedom Caucus” Congressperson for the 10 th district of Georgia, was attending a donor breakfast at a doctor’s office early the next morning, and did I want to go jump him? Jumping people is a hobby of mine, and there was actually something I wanted to ask Congressman Hice. So, even though I had never ambushed a federal representative before, and especially not at a gastroenterologist's office, I agreed. The next morning I showed up in the parking lot of the doctor’s office at 7am. Waiting for me there were the stranger wh...

“Hello,” I said to the staffer who answered the phone at Johnny Isakson’s Atlanta office. “I am a constituent of Senator Isakson’s, and I had a problem this week that I need some assistance with.” “Absolutely!” she said, “How can we help you?” She sounded relieved. Maybe I wasn’t calling to yell at her about Trump. Maybe I needed help with something simple, like a neighborhood meth lab. “Great. Well, two things happened, actually. The first is that my 5-year-old saw pictures of the march in Charlottesville. She saw the picture of people marching with swastika flags and confederate flags, and then she also saw the picture of the guy carrying the torch and chanting and wearing the Make America Great Again hat. And she asked me, mom, why do Nazis like Trump? “And so then, later, we were driving behind a pickup truck over in Monroe and the guy had a bumper sticker on one side that said ‘Trump’ and one on the other side that said ‘Trump That Bitch’. And my eleven-year...