MetaFilter posts tagged with Compassion

GivesMeHope: For Those "Exhausted by the Negativity of the Mainstream Media"

WCityMike — Sat, 19 Sep 2009 18:39:03 -0800

GivesMeHope (RSS), a site for those "completely exhausted by the negativity of the mainstream media." Modeled after their polar opposite, Fuck My Life, the site serves as a source for sometimes glurgy, but much more often touching, 350-character stories that can serve to remind that "the world is a fine place and worth fighting for." The Top 10, as voted by readers, are enough to melt hearts of stone. Oh, and The Office's Dwight thinks it's "awesome". (Or, rather, Rainn Wilson thinks it's awesome. I imagine Dwight's survival-of-the-fittest mentality would lead him to quite a different opinion.)

Craniosynostosis in the Middle Pleistocene

homunculus — Fri, 03 Apr 2009 14:38:11 -0800

Deformed skull of prehistoric child suggests that early humans cared for disabled children.

Compassionate Canada.

gman — Tue, 10 Feb 2009 15:09:30 -0800

Canada is a desired location for Guantanamo Bay detainees. The Canadian Council for Refugees has profiles (pdf) up for some of the people they are helping.

Love Thy Neighbor: Why Have We Become So Suspicious Of Kindness?

jason's_planet — Sat, 03 Jan 2009 12:54:33 -0800

Love Thy Neighbor: Why Have We Become So Suspicious Of Kindness? Most people, as they grow up now, secretly believe that kindness is a virtue of losers. But agreeing to talk about winners and losers is part and parcel of the phobic avoidance, the contemporary terror, of kindness. Because one of the things the enemies of kindness never ask themselves - and this is now an enemy within all of us - is why we feel it at all. Why are we ever, in any way, moved to be kind to other people, not to mention to ourselves? Why does kindness matter to us?

Novels 'better at explaining world's problems than reports'

stbalbach — Thu, 13 Nov 2008 15:21:59 -0800

Novels are 'better at explaining world's problems than reports'. According to the study "The Fiction of Development: Literary Representation as a Source of Authoritative Knowledge" (HTML or PDF), people should read best-selling novels like The Kite Runner and The White Tiger rather than academic reports if they really want to understand global issues, such as poverty, migration and other issues.

Khaled Hosseini's The Kite Runner "has arguably done more to educate Western readers about the realities of daily life in Afghanistan under the Taliban and thereafter than any government media campaign, advocacy organisation report, or social science research", said the report. It also praised the winner of this year's Man Booker Prize, The White Tiger by Aravind Adiga, for its "passionate depiction of the perils and pitfalls of rampant capitalism in contemporary India". The novel "deftly highlights the social injustice and moral corruption that underpin the country's apparently miraculous economic development during the past decade," it said.

The Feminine side of Buddhism

desjardins — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 15:54:48 -0800

As in most religions, Buddhism's pantheon of deities and saints has been male dominated. The preeminent exception to this is Kuan Yin, the goddess of compassion, also called Guan Yin or Kannon. She is the female form of the bodhisattva Avalokiteśvara, who underwent a gender shift after being popularized in China. She has inspired amazing forms of worship. Female Buddhas and Bodhisattvas Female deities in Buddhism

MettaFilter

homunculus — Sun, 27 Apr 2008 10:12:50 -0800

"Attention regulation and monitoring in meditation" (PDF). A recent article in Trends in Cognitive Sciences on the neuroscience of meditation, focusing on how meditation alters and sharpens the brain's attention systems. The research is being done at the Waisman Laboratory for Brain Imaging and Behavior (previously), who have also recently published research on the "Regulation of the neural circuitry of emotion by compassion meditation" (PDF), which describes how meditation can cultivate compassion by physically affecting brain regions that play a role in empathy. They shared this research with the Dalai Lama at the recent Seeds of Compassion forum.

how to talk to a friend with cancer

nickyskye — Sun, 16 Dec 2007 09:45:11 -0800

How to talk to a friend with cancer, Time interview. Author of the excellent, Help Me Live: 20 Things People With Cancer Want You to Know [now a free, readable online Google book], Lori Hope, also lectures on compassionate communication and blogs for the practical and supportive CarePages.com, "free, personal websites that connect family and friends during illness and injury. Top 10 Dos and Don'ts.

Cats and War

homunculus — Sun, 14 Oct 2007 21:35:22 -0800

What Cats Know About War. A reporter adopts cats to reconnect with life amid unremitting death. [Via linkfilter.] Another War's Stray: An interview with John Laurence (.mp3), the author of “The Cat From Hue: A Vietnam War Story”.

Many of World’s Poor Suffer in Pain

homunculus — Mon, 10 Sep 2007 13:15:36 -0800

Drugs Banned, Many of World’s Poor Suffer in Pain "Millions of people die in pain because they cannot get morphine, which is legal for medical use in most nations." [Via TalkLeft.]

Pain Management as a Human Right

homunculus — Sun, 08 Jul 2007 20:15:01 -0800

Recognizing Pain Management as a Fundamental Human Right. These pieces from the journal of the International Anesthesia Research Society argue that under-treated chronic pain is becoming a public health crisis which must be addressed. But a warning to pain doctors in the U.S. who prescribe opioids in doses that seem high to narcotics agents and prosecutors: “Be afraid.” [Via Hit & Run and TalkLeft.]

Darfur/Darfur Exhibit

matteo — Thu, 02 Nov 2006 11:40:51 -0800

"I couldn't face the prospect of my child growing up and asking me, years later, what I had done, and having to say: 'Nothing.'" Last spring Leslie Thomas, a Chicago-based architect, read a story detailing the fallout of hostilities between the Sudanese government and the rebels -- more than 200,000 dead, 2.5 million made homeless -- and decided to put together DARFUR/DARFUR: a traveling exhibit of digitally-projected changing images. The goal: to raise $1m with at least 24 venues in 24 months. The photographs have been taken in Darfur by photojournalists Lynsey Addario, Mark Brecke, Helene Caux, VII's Ron Haviv, Magnum Photos's Paolo Pellegrin, Ryan Spencer Reed, Michal Safdie, and former U.S. Marine Brian Steidle. On a sidenote, Pellegrin has just been awarded the W. Eugene Smith Grant.

For Boston's Catholic Archdiocese, kids in state care are better than kids "living in sin" with gay adoptive parents

andreaazure — Sat, 11 Mar 2006 04:38:35 -0800

'This is a difficult and sad day for Catholic Charities," says a representative of the church, who announced their decision to stop helping all foster children find homes rather than allow any of them be adopted by gay parents. After one hundred three years of service, Catholic Charities of Boston is exiting the adoption assistance arena because state anti-discrimination laws force them to allow same-sex couples to adopt children (despite the fact that the church considers this to be a sin).

While adoptions in progress will not be affected, on or about June 30, the group that proffers a "just and compassionate society rooted in the dignity of all people" will make chrystal clear who is included in that definition of "all." (Of the 720 children placed in homes through CCAB, 13 of them were placed with "same-sex families" [sic].)

The Mercy Seat. Mapping out a Multifaceted Iconography.

jann — Fri, 03 Mar 2006 00:32:26 -0800

The Mercy Seat. Described in the book of Exodus, the throne of mercy has quite a variety of meanings. Some contemporary Christians are interested in "reconstructing" an image based on Egyptian and Phoenician culture. In Judaism, the kisei rachamim is part of the narrative of Yom Kippur, as God moves from the seat of justice to the seat of compassion. In medieval Europe, and especially in Germany, the Gnadenstuhl was a perfect representation of the trinity, combining the cruxification, God the Father, and the Holy Spirit (usually a bird), into one image of mournful compassion. Nick Cave used the idea of the mercy seat as the frame for a song about murder, sin, capital punishment, and atonement/redemption, which was later covered by Johnny Cash (mp3 clip). The chair of mercy is even visually alluded to Jodorowsky's Montana Sacra, aka Holy Mountain. (Which have been inspired in part by the Ascended Masters of Mount Shasta, but that's technically another story - the bizarro California cultists story.)

Meditation and neuroplasticity

homunculus — Tue, 16 Nov 2004 14:04:33 -0800

Meditation and neuroplasticity. A new study (PDF) describes the changes in the brains of Buddhist monks, using fMRI to scan their brains while they practice compassion meditation. The project was a collaboration between the University of Wisconsin and the Shechen Monastery in Nepal.

Hubert Selby, Jr (1928-2004)

matteo — Wed, 28 Apr 2004 17:21:54 -0800

"Hubert Selby died often. But he always came back, smiling that beautiful smile of his, and those blue eyes of his... This time he will not be back. My saints have always come from hell, and now, with his passing, there are no more saints". Selby is the author of Last Exit to Brooklyn, (tried for obscenity in England and supported by, among many others, Samuel Beckett and Anthony Burgess), Requiem For a Dream, Song of the Silent Snow. He is being eulogized in the USA and UK, but also, massively (I've just watched a fantastic TV special) in France, where he is much more popular than in his native land (Selby's death was the cover story -- plus pages 2, 3 and 4 -- in the daily Libération today -- .pdf file): Dernière sortie vers la rédemption, L'extase de la dévastation. What makes all this kind of ironic -- in a very Selbyesque way -- is that Selby himself used to say, "I started to die 36 hours before I was born..." (more inside)