Gabor Mate on Compassion

I had a chance yesterday to sit in on one of the Globe and Mails Open House sessions at the Toronto Reference Library. The topic was Citizenship and Compassion and the participants were Pico Iyer, Barbara Colorosa, Mark Kingwell and Gabor Mate. It was moderated (with real grace) by Paula Todd.

I will comment on some of the other material later, but for now would like to focus on Dr. Mate's remarks. He first took Kingwell to task for an all too sunny view of the possibilities and benefits of Canadian citizenship, noting the tragedy of the lives of native Canadians. And he spoke passionately and compellingly on his early childhood experience as a holocaust survivor and the sad reality of oppressed become oppressor in Palestine.

But for me his most telling remarks concerned love. When one of the usual suspects stood up to make a case for tough love, especially in the case of addiction, the response was visceral. There is no such thing, Dr. Mate insisted, as tough love. One can be tough and one can love. But tough love is a misnomer. What he did not say, but what was clearly implied, was that tough love is all too often an excuse for emotional and spiritual thuggery, particularly when applied to our most vulnerable fellows.