Free to be you and me, but what if you suck?

Someone brought something to my attention this weekend. A fellow AMC hiker who had hitched a ride with me up to New Hampshire for a Mt. Morgan ascent said glibbly during our two-hour car ride: "We're all so different, you know." And while, theorhetically, I knew that, somehow it still really caught me off guard.

The context was important. I had been explaining that I can't really imagine that some people just don't care about being good. I wish I had a less active moral compass, but I can't believe that some people just might not care at all. I've heard that theory, but I can't believe it. It's so foreign given my day to day experience.

When I started my grad program, the first question they asked us was "Do you think people are inherently good and evil, or do you think they become good and evil as a result of things that happen to them?" It was important because it would presumably influence our counseling style. But I'm not talking about people who are diagnosable - people with antisocial personality disorder or a very real emotional disconnect. I'm talking about normal people who just don't give a shit. Is that genetic, chemical, or is that a conscious choice to ignore the little nagging voice in your head?

And if it is just a conscious choice, why are some people free to make it and I have to spend my afternoons in therapy because "I should have been nicer to the homeless guy on the corner"? God, it's exhausting to be me.