Care and Respect : The Fuzzy Line

Our social existence involves us in a series of painstaking and yet joyful processes of learning how to tread on the sensitive dividing line between our care for other people and our respect for them. On the one hand, we learn to gradually develop and structure our ability to imaginatively participate in the lived experiences of others, especially by honing our sensitivities to their experiences of happiness, suffering, despair, hope, freedom, creativity, and wonder. On the other hand, however, in the midst of such empathetic encounters we should not become oblivious to the fact that other people are genuinely autonomous beings who may sometimes wish to be just 'left alone'. Consequently, our communal exchanges discipline us, sometimes painfully, to learn to discern the fine line between our care for other people around us and our respect for their individual liberty and their moral autonomy.