Martinez: Protesters bring reminders of Israel-Hamas war

The recent remarks from President Joseph Biden on colleges protesters seem more than good enough. After all, he supports the rule of law and condemns the clearly commendable, like antisemitism and violence wrecking institutions.

However, President Biden failed to emphasize what some peaceful protests are achieving, which in turn means failing the victims of the Israel-Hamas war.

In this instance, peaceful college protesters are helping with a big problem: how people are apt to overlook the things that matter over time. I do not say this cynically, but rather as a point supported by insight from psychology. In his book “Strangers to Ourselves,” Timothy D. Wilson explains that people tend to miscalculate how they perceive the impact an event will have on their lives. He offers the example of people watching a football game. If asked how a win or a loss will impact their emotional state, they are apt to get it wrong.

The reason is focalism, which explains “People … think of about a future event as occurring in a vacuum, without reminding themselves that their life will be full of other activities that will compete for their attention….” While Wilson may be making this point to highlight how difficult introspection is, I think it is also about how people fail to correctly assess the scale of an incident, misdirected by their everyday lives.

If not correctly assessing the scale of an incident happening for something personal like a game, it is more likely for this error to happen for something distant, thousands of miles away like the outcome of the Israel-Hamas war.

Throughout their days, people care about other things. The consequence is that they are apt not to see the magnitude of the Israel-Hamas war. It is not indifference on their part; it is just that they have their lives to live, which comes with a variety of events and moments, always changing what matters to them, whether that be something as basic as what to eat or something as common as a daily stressor at work.

This is why the college protests are important. It reminds people that this war matters. In her work, “‘I feel your Pain’: the Neuroscience of Empathy,” Kim Armstrong writes, “Through his work at the Social Brain Lab, Keysers, together with Valeria Gazzola, has found that observing another person’s action, pain, or affect can trigger parts of the same neural networks responsible for executing those actions and experiencing those feelings firsthand.”

These protesters accomplish this by showing their strong emotions, which can guide others. Rage can induce rage. Bitterness can impel bitterness. Feelings of injustice can give rise to feelings of injustice. By creating the sense of urgency through the gravity of these emotions, peaceful protesters help people know just how tragic the Israel-Hamas war is.

Consider, too, how much the war is getting. According to Pew Research Center, “About a quarter of Americans (26%) are following the Israel-Hamas war extremely or very closely. Another 37% say they are following news about the war somewhat closely, while 36% are following not too or not at all closely.” The amount of people, then, who are thinking of the war is far too slim. Getting them to care consistently is a battle of its own, a battle that is being fought by peaceful protests.

People are dying at a tragic scale. According to the Guardian, “Israel’s retaliatory offensive against Hamas has killed at least 34,596 people in Gaza, mostly women and children, according to the Hamas-run territory’s health ministry.”

We must, then, praise peaceful protesters, who engage people who, by going about their days, are vulnerable to overlooking the seriousness of the Israel-Hamas war. To do otherwise is to discourage their engagement, and leave behind the seriousness of the Israel-Hamas war.