The fox that killed my chickens depressed me more than 250,000 tsunami deaths

It is hard to know how a tragedy is going to move a person who is not directly affected by it. Over a death or misfortune in the family, or among one’s friends, one is sure to feel pain and grief. But what of those other ghastly events involving people, maybe hundreds or thousands of them, with whom one has no connection? They provoke shock, disgust and horror, but not necessarily great personal sadness. Could it be true that I was more depressed when a fox killed all my chickens than I was when the Indian Ocean tsunami of 2004 swept over a quarter of a million people to their deaths? I have an ugly, shameful feeling that I might have been.

Perhaps I am uniquely unimaginative and lacking in empathy, but I fear not. It is a harsh fact of life that most people do not truly feel the sufferings or losses of people in situations in which they cannot imagine themselves.