EL responses to the American tragedy of 11/09/01


In response to the suicide hijackings in America this month, a number of Emotional Literacy/Emotional Intelligence websites have commented about the tragedy and the subsequent proposed action by the American and Coalition governments.

Asking if there is an Emotionally Literate Response to the World Trade Centre Bombings, James Park, chairman of Antidote - Campaign for Emotional Literacy, questions what we can do to ensure that such cruel events are less likely to happen again. Wishing for international efforts to shift towards ways of ensuring that the conditions which foster extreme violence and hatred give way to the development of understanding and mutual support, Mr Park acknowledges that a reactive emotionally literate response is inevitably different from how a proactive response to conditions would have appeared:

"Ideally, of course, we would not be starting from here. We would long ago have found ways to engage with the emotional experience of people in the Middle East as they responded to the self-interested interventions of the West in their affairs. We would have known what feelings were brewing and tried to evolve appropriate responses. We would have shown at least a desire to understand even those whose behaviour we found most inexplicable and distasteful."

The Six Seconds EQ Network has dedicated an entire section of its site to an exploration of responses to the incident, and features an open letter to George W Bush by Esther M. Orioli, President and CEO of Q-Metrics. Ms Orioli asks Mr Bush to represent the best integration of cognitive rationality and emotional intelligence in his role as leader; her requests include time for proper grieving and reflection, the teaching of tolerance and human compassion, and to cease references to evil and good in his speech:

"To speak as though this is the work of the devil is to remove the real and ever present choice that people have to take responsibility and act from an internal locus of control. We are NOT powerless and need not be victimized by some force outside our control. These are acts of terrorism, not god or the devil. As Americans place our flag on their houses, their cars and their buildings, remind us that we are interconnected and interdependent with the rest of the planet. We are one people, one Earth."

Steve Hein at The EQ Institute writes about the importance of empathy as one of the best natural ways to prevent violence. Stating his belief in the need for those in power to listen to those who feel powerless, Mr Hein suggests that:

"if we were to go to the villages where they are celebrating the recent events and give people a chance to talk to us for one week, without judging them or invalidating them, they would no longer feel a desire to celebrate death. They would feel understood. [...] Threatening to punish people creates feelings of fear and defensiveness. It will not create empathy. This is such a simple principle of human nature. But it seems that it is one which was never taught to our world leaders."

Articulating concerns about how others might react to his views, Mr Hein perhaps gauges well how talk of emotional literacy might be received in the current atmosphere. Now, more than ever, however, the need for the promotional of emotional literacy could be at its greatest. As James Park concludes, amongst all the talk of American 'intelligence' and its improvement, "it would be nice if some of the attention focused away from spies and on the sort of emotional intelligence that is so clearly required in this situation."