Barbara Lazear Ascher On Compassion Summary
In Barbara Lazear Ascher's essay called "On Compassion" is about how she is looking around at people at a bus stop and she starts to point out the flaws in everyone that is there. In the opening sentence she talks about how sloppy this one man is by saying he has "his buttonless shirt, with one sleeve missing, hangs outside the waist of his baggy trousers." She also says that everyone at the bus stop is just daydreaming and not paying attention on what they are doing. As it goes along the owner of the French bread shop gives a man on the streets, a cup of coffee and a small bag of something either yesterday's bread or today's croissant. It may be that these are the conditions that finally give birth to empathy, a deeper meaning than compassion.