How can I help? I say this to my daughter all the time. I usually mean it as a redirection for some kind of tantrum, or a snafu in the routine of an average nameless morning. It’s better than saying no or telling her what to do, or worse yet, doing it for her. Each of those incurs the wrath of my spirited, mighty warrior.
It’s actually a good way to start any morning, I’ve realized. How can I help? It’s a good way to frame your life.
On a hike: pick up that foil Luna bar wrapper someone else left behind.
At the school: make two things for the bake sale. Volunteer to freeze ice pops for the family picnic using the chest freezer I bought to store breast milk, and when they don’t freeze in time, dispatch your spouse to buy more so the kids will have enough.
At the mailbox when it’s 98 degrees: bring water for the mail carrier sweating in her dark blue uniform.
At the grocery store: put the small carts in the row with the other small carts, so the young dude in the neon traffic vest doesn’t have to stand there on the hot asphalt and separate them.
These are small things. Here is where I should point out that I am no paragon of virtue. I would sleep in until 10 every day if I could, I like ice cream too much, I curse at other drivers too often, I don’t call my family enough, I am (very, very) bad at following up on emails, I need to work harder to fight racism, sometimes I lose my patience. So please don’t mistake this for some kind of lecture about morality. I aim for little virtues, even a cup of cold water, and sometimes I pull them off, is what I mean.
What I can’t understand is the people who appear constitutionally unable to do this. They do the opposite of this. They don’t ask, how can I help you? They instead ask only, how can I help myself? I’m saving the cold water for me. Never mind the organization of the grocery carts. Let’s price out the alligator-filled moat, you know, just to get a feel for the cost. Just … how?
I imagine these meanies feel bad about being meanies because surely they must. Surely they lay awake at night, unable to sleep, their hearts so full of ice and vinegar that the bile rises in their throats. Being mean and calculating, expending the effort to do so, simply has to take a toll. Right?
Because this is supposed to be a blog about science, I tried to think about meanies from an evolutionary perspective. Isn’t bad, evil behavior maladaptive? We are a social species; it would make more evolutionary sense to cooperate, be kind, lift up, help out. Right? Maybe the meanies are a quirk, a random mutation of the body politic that selection will eventually sweep aside.
It turns out there are some studies suggesting a connection between genes and antisocial behavior. People who witness violence in childhood, or are victims of violence, are more likely to exhibit antisocial behaviors as adults, the research says. According to one study, in certain cases this might be driven, at least in part, by small changes in a gene, specifically the one that codes for activation of something called a monoamine neurotransmitter. It’s the MAOA gene? OK, maybe.
I also learned that building community itself can be a corrective for meanie behaviors, as New Zealand-based researchers Russil Durrant and Tony Ward explain in a textbook called “Evolutionary Criminology.” “Desistance from offending is explained in terms of increased social bonding that arises through engagement with pro-social institutions such as marriage, parenting, and work,” they write, “that may serve as ‘turning points’ in the lives of individuals.”
Literally, engaging in relationships and institutions that require you to at least sometimes ask “how can I help?” could make you a better person.
I could have spent hours reading the evolutionary psychology literature (it really is fascinating) but you know what, I don’t know what makes meanies rev their engines. In fact I hope I never really understand it. The only thing I can do is carry some cold glasses of water, I guess. Pick up the wrappers and recycle what I can. Try to make this place a little better than I found it. Try to ask, how can I help?
Image: Spøttrup Castle, Denmark, by Wikimedia Commons user Slaunger/CC-BY-4.0
