Month: January 2012

The problem with empathy is that it requires us to see ourselves as "those people"--as individuals equally as capable of meeting the same fate as the suffering person. We feel comfortable with sympathy because we can maintain our distance, setting...

You must not know who I am, because if you did, you'd give me access without having to pay to play. Heit & Cheri take on this axiom via discussions about the urinating Marines, radiologists cheating on med school exams,...

Do you know what a "scream room" is? A scream room is a term coined by students and parents in the at Farm Hill Elementary School in Middletown, CT. It is essentially a solitary confinement room, like in prison, except...

As the parent of any 14-year-old son, who apparently lied, stole, and sold drugs, Dynesha Lax opted to shame her child into obedience. Dissatisfied with the court's punishment of her son, Ms. Lax se

As I thought about this story, I couldn't help but wonder what would happen if people, fed up with corporate and government nonsense, took to the streets and pelted the offices of the offenders with eggs. After all, what sense...

Most people have a perception about bums and the homeless, but this week, Heit & Cheri challenge you to ask the question, "Who's the bum?" They begin with a discussion of political balderdash, including commentary on Rick Santorum's alleged racist...

One day in 1968, Jane Elliott, a teacher in a small, all-white Iowa town, divided her third-grade class into blue-eyed and brown-eyed groups and gave them a daring lesson in discrimination. This is the story of that lesson, its lasting...

The situation of the Strait of Hormuz should be looked at as is--an issue of protecting one's borders. At the same time that Americans argue to restrict mere people crossing their borders, Americans are trying to force Iran to allow...

In the early 1970s, Craig Haney, Curt Banks, Carlo Prescott, and Philip Zimbardo conducted a landmark situational study at Stanford University. The experiment tested the fundamental attribution error: our tendency to attribute causes of behavior to personal factors, underestimating the...

There are 6 billion people on the planet. Every single one of them are unique individual. We each have thoughts and ideas and memories and feelings. What is happening in your brain when talking and listening?