As a determined optimist, I never thought I’d be saying this, but it’s true: the world is mean and getting meaner. Instead of bringing us together, the internet seems to have fuelled our divisions by empowering those who are best at sowing fear, mistrust and outrage. We’re angry with each other over migrants, gender identity, climate catastrophe, wokeness and so much more.
A recent survey by King’s College London found that for the first time a majority (52%) of the UK population believes that culture wars are a serious problem for society and politics. I’m sick of this. I suspect you are too. I’ve spent the last few years looking for an antidote. Just possibly, it can be found in a pair of human instincts wired deeply inside us: generosity, and our response to it. At the start of the pandemic lockdown, stories of death, chaos and grocery-hoarding filled the media. Like many of us, an Australian woman, Catherine Barrett, felt on the edge of tears much of the time. One day, one of her neighbours put a box of tissues on the communal table in her building with just a simple note: “Please take if needed.”
