I don’t know exactly when empathy became controversial—but I know I felt it. First as a writer. Then as a teacher. And now as a father watching entire shelves of books disappear from schools.
It’s strange to have grown up with stories that taught me to love the outsider—mutants, rebels, misfits, prophets—and now see those same stories labeled as dangerous. X-Men used to be about identity, struggle, and survival. Now, apparently, that’s “too political.”
The truth is, empathy is political now. And that terrifies me. Because literature—real literature—only works if you let yourself become someone else for a while. That’s the deal you make when you crack open a book: you trade comfort for connection. You walk through someone else’s pain, someone else’s joy, someone else’s truth.
And for all our talk about freedom, America seems more afraid of that kind of freedom than ever before.
Who Owns the Myth?
Every generation reinterprets its myths. That’s how culture survives—by remixing old truths into new forms. But right now, we’re watching something different happen: not evolution, but a hostile takeover.
Star Wars was once a simple story about good versus evil, light versus dark. But even in the original trilogy, it was more than space wizards and laser swords. It was rebellion against empire. It was the Force belonging to everyone—not just a bloodline or a bureaucracy. Luke was a farm boy, not a prince. Leia led. Han changed. The myth was simple, but the message was revolutionary.
But the moment newer Star Wars stories started diversifying their cast—Rey, Finn, Rose—the backlash came hard. “Wokeness ruined Star Wars,” people said. “It’s just politics now.”
But when was it not political?
The same is happening with Marvel. The X-Men have always been metaphors for race, gender, and difference. That’s the point. And now, studio execs reportedly want to strip that away to make it more “action-forward.” But that doesn’t just dilute the story—it betrays it.
And it’s not just pop culture.
Take Christianity. The version I grew up with was about compassion, mercy, feeding the hungry, visiting the prisoner, turning the other cheek. You know—radical empathy. But somewhere along the way, the myth got privatized. Now, it’s used to ban books and punish the very people Jesus championed. They took the myth of empathy and turned it into a purity test. A power tool. A brand.
And then there’s Trump.
To some, he’s the ultimate villain—crude, cruel, self-serving. To others, he’s a messianic figure, a warrior against corruption, a truth-teller in a world of liars. But what he really is, maybe more than anything else, is a mirror.
He reflects what people want to see. That’s his greatest trick.
I don’t know if he hates minorities. I just know he’s willing to hurt them. I don’t know if he despises the poor, but his policies certainly don’t help them. I doubt he has deep convictions about anything but himself. But he knows how to perform conviction—and that’s what we’re drawn to now. Not truth. Not empathy. Performance.
Trump is America’s great Rorschach test. He doesn’t believe in the myth—he is the myth, refracted and weaponized. Empire, ego, grievance, nostalgia. His brand is built on mythic simplicity: good guys and bad guys, winners and losers. No nuance. No empathy. Just narrative dominance.
And people are starving for that clarity. In a world that keeps changing, Trump offers a story that never does. It’s not a true story. But it’s an easy one.
And easy stories are dangerous.
And so here we are: a society battling over its stories. Who gets to be the hero. Who gets to be forgiven. Who gets to be human.
The Cancel Culture Paradox
We used to love redemption arcs. That was the whole point of stories. That people could screw up and grow. That transformation was possible.
Now, we’re not so sure.
Russell Brand is trying to reframe himself through Christianity after serious allegations—but the whole thing feels less like penance and more like PR. On the other hand, people like Meyers Leonard and Will Smith offered real apologies. They acknowledged harm, learned, and tried to rebuild.
Then there are people who got canceled not for what they did, but for what they symbolized to someone else. Sinéad O’Connor got blacklisted in 1992 for tearing up a photo of the Pope on live TV. She was protesting child abuse in the Catholic Church. Everyone hated her for it—until we realized she was right.
Brendan Fraser spoke out about being sexually assaulted by a Hollywood executive. Afterward, he all but vanished from film. Only years later did we welcome him back.
These aren’t just celebrity PR crises. They’re cultural litmus tests. They show what we’re really afraid of: the idea that people are complicated, that change is messy, that growth hurts. It’s easier to just exile someone and move on. But that’s not how stories work. And it’s not how people heal.
Why We’re So Afraid Right Now
I get it. I’ve lived through 9/11, Desert Storm, COVID, January 6th. Every few years, the world seemed to crack beneath our feet. People are tired. The ground never stops moving. And when things are uncertain, we cling to what we know.
Sometimes we cling to old myths.
Sometimes we cling to outrage.
Sometimes we cling to purity.
Because purity gives us the illusion of safety.
Because complexity asks us to sit with the fact that people can be good and bad, wrong and right, broken and trying.
And that is exhausting. But it’s also the only way through.
Reclaiming Empathy
I’m not saying we shouldn’t hold people accountable. I’m saying we can hold them accountable without giving up on them. We can disagree with someone’s past and still root for their future.
Stories taught us how to do that. They still do.
So let’s keep reading. Let’s keep writing. Let’s keep telling stories that challenge us to care about people we don’t understand. That ask us to feel for someone who once terrified us. That remind us we’re not done becoming yet.
Empathy isn’t weakness.
It’s what makes us human.
And right now, it’s the most radical thing we can offer.
Frank M. Anderson's Writing 
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