This morning you could have done something in a slightly different way which would have inconvenienced you little, if at all, but would have helped someone you've never met who is suffering. Why didn't you? You didn't because at some level you need to function. If you carried the emotional baggage that the news would like to impart to you, you wouldn't be able to do anything. You have a coping strategy. This doesn't make you a bad person - indeed there was a strong evolutionary advantage to being able to hit cro-magnon man on the head with a jaw bone - so you can probably blame your genes. The sanctimonious have claimed that this is all dealt with by their political and or moral philosophy, more on this later.
I'm also surprised to note that there doesn't appear to be a field spotter's guide to political philosophies. We've all been taught political philosophy from the other end: `Grand German chap A constructed the following value system from which came this brand name philosophy.' not `The idea B can be traced back though the thinking of the following grand German chaps, was implemented in administration C and caused riots D,E and F'. I think this might be an invaluable tool for our current "one ideology" political minds. After all ideas are dangerous things and need lining up in books.
