I haven’t held many beliefs as tightly as this one — yet somehow, it’s the topic my friends and I debate the most. Maybe it’s my longing to believe in a world with less pain. Maybe it’s my Northwestern instinct to challenge centuries of literature. Maybe it’s just the fruition of my first-world naivety.
But if I have one core belief, it is this: Fundamentally, everyone is a good person.
Now, I hear you. In fact, I can already hear a choir of disagreements. “Look outside!” you might be saying. “Look at Sudan, look at Palestine.” Too recent? “Look at Native American and Jewish history.” Too detached? “Look at your neighbors! Look at police brutality and detention centers. Look out your window.” I know this makes me seem detached and utterly disconnected from the atrocities we bear witness to daily. I don’t want you to forget those things, but move with me for a moment.
In Islam, there is a concept called “fitra” — the idea that every person is born with an innate desire to be good. Judaism has a similar thought called “Yetzer ha-tov,” a person’s inclination towards good. Countless religions utter the same sentiments of “God’s people” being born with the need to be good.
But I don’t want to simply quantify good in religious terms. For this column’s purpose, I will quantify goodness as “the desire to make the world a better place for the people around you.” Simple, based solely on intention.
On a scientific level, our brains reward altruism. Neuroscientific research shows that when people act generously, the brain’s reward centers (like the ventral striatum) activate — the same regions linked to pleasure and motivation. Not only that, but empathy is coded into us as well.
Mirror neurons — brain cells that fire both when we act and when we see someone else act — help us to “feel” what others feel. It is rewarding both in society and internally to be empathetic to people around you, and evolution has long favored prosocial behavior.
That being said, how do things like war and hate fester in a species that seems to be wired to seek out connection and love?
Empathy is innate — but it’s also a muscle. When children are brought up in an environment that strengthens it, they continue to empathize with the people around them. Subsequently, they transform that empathy into action that has positive impacts on the world. When people grow up in environments that emphasize hyper-individualism, division and fear, they lose the ability to constantly empathize.
It takes practice to empathize with people you don’t know, especially those with whom you share no identity. It’s difficult to see people who look different, practice a different religion, speak a different language and to see those you have been conditioned to view as enemies as someone just like you. To view people as equals is exercising that empathy muscle, something which many people have not built up.
Oppressive governments and ideologies take advantage of this fact and feed facts to populations that break down our ability to connect over our shared humanity. Even this is possible to break, though.
If there is one thing that revitalizes our goodness, it is undoubtedly our ability to make connections with each other.
My grandfather, for example, is both a victim and a contributor to the view that certain groups of people are the enemy. He watches conservative news every night detailing the evil inherent to minority groups in our country.
Despite this, he has kicked people out of his house for racism towards Latinos after meeting my Colombian father. He has befriended members of the LGBTQ+ community and taken time to learn of their struggles.
“They’re one of the good ones,” he’ll muse, but he says this about everyone he meets. His hatred only reaches those he doesn’t know — because to know someone is to empathize, and to empathize, in a way, is to love.
I make this argument not to feed into the idea that the world is fine — I know it’s not. Instead, I hope to offer hope: People are not born bad.
They’re infiltrated by a sickness that can be diagnosed and undone. Hatred can embed itself in one’s skin, take over the brain and influence actions — but it cannot change who a person truly is. Whether you look to spirit, scripture or science, God and nature agree: People want to be good. We ache for it.
Most people do not act out of a desire to be evil. They see their hate as a kind of protection against the things they’ve been told will destroy them. That’s why meeting someone from the supposed “other side” can have such an impact on ignorance. I’m not saying world peace can be achieved through Valentines. But I will say this: When people want to be good and are given the opportunity, they often take it.
All it takes is connection.
Gabriela Hamburger Medailleu is a Medill junior and author of “Off the Record.” She can be contacted at [email protected]. If you would like to respond publicly to this op-ed, send a Letter to the Editor to [email protected]. The views expressed in this piece do not necessarily reflect the views of all staff members of The Daily Northwestern.
