Unfortunately for people in our country who are not being listened to ( quinsy) , we as a society like to still pretend "we are listening" - the disease is often denial and ours more than theirs.

Why do we so desperately want to show we care? It is a symptom of what the psychologist Oliver James has dubbed our "low serotonin" society. Despite being healthier, richer and better-off than in living memory, we in the West are more depressed than ever. Institutions such as the church, marriage and the family have withered in the postwar era. Raised in fragmented family units, more of us live by ourselves. Ostentatious caring permits the lonely nation to forge new social bonds. As James concludes: "A common impulse behind wanting to give love unconditionally to non-intimates is the desire to receive it."

dogood rather than exhaust yourself?

From a review of Patrick West's book CIS publication