Yes. I imagined Mrs Fujii taking her three young daughters,
Lucy 8, Alice 5, and Penny 3. (Penny is the name we have chosen for
our unborn child should it be a girl) for a walk by the lake.
"Ooh Mummy can we go in the boats please?" asked Lucy
Alice agreed... "Ooh yes please, please, please Mummy lets go in
the boats".
So they're in the middle of the deep lake and little Penny
starts to get frightened
"Penny wants mummy to cuddle, penny a bit frightened"
"there there my angel, theres nothing to be scared of.
Mummy and Daddy love you all very much and would never ever let any
harm come to you, you know that dont you?".
"Now girls I have a special surprise for you all. Today we
are going to a very special place where only our country's bravest
and most honourable can ever go, we are the luckiest family in the
whole world......"
I wonder If Mrs Fujii waited until each one of her
daughters had stopped screaming and pleading to be saved, before
pushing in the next one. Or did she push all three in and wait
until the screaming and pleading had stopped and their young heads
had been submerged for a couple of minutes, before jumpimg to her
own death?
If you were asking me "why do I feel empathy" I answer that
it is a hardwired disposition to care about my con-specifics that
gets tuned in by learned experience (I am pleased I have it, but I
dont know why I am pleased to have it). When I hear the story it
triggers my imagination which has connections to my limbic system
and spills over to triger emotional responses that really would
only be helpfull if I were actualy in a position to do something.
I definately agree with Martz and Mark on this one.
Tony Hindle.