“‘You know how people are about not taking care of an animal; they consider it immoral and anti-empathic’” (7).
When Barbour, Rick’s neighbor, says this the readers get introduced to another aspect of their society: the importance of empathy. Based on the implications of Barbour’s words, one can assume their society values empathy highly and has strict rules about it. Just the simple fact of now owning an animal, something that is normal in our world but definitely not a given, can cause other people to look down on you. Additionally, it appears that public perception and approval is very important to people (which isn’t that surprising) but this novel presents an interesting additional layer where not only does societal pressure exist, but so does the desire to prove your humanity. This line gets said quite early in the novel, but the ideas it introduces are seen for the rest of the story. The reader learns that Rick’s job is hunting down androids that are posing and living as humans. The way that Rick and other bounty hunters determine whether someone is a human or an android is by a test that measures empathy. It is believed that the one behavioral difference between humans and androids is that androids cannot show the physical signs of empathy. After learning about this, the importance of empathy in their society becomes even clearer. In order to not feel guilt over the killing of androids, humans must believe themselves to be morally superior because of their empathy, whereas androids are something subhuman, something that can be killed with no mercy. At one point of the novel, one of the androids said that androids are considered even lower than animals which is an important hierarchy to remember. Even though animals also don’t show empathy, the fact that androids resemble humans is what makes them so terrifying to people. I think the androids are a really good example of the “defamiliarization” Jameson brings up in the article we read about utopias. The androids look like humans and can even blend into society but their existence is seen as a threat to people.
Another interesting thing I noticed about this sentence is the use of the word “anti.” Anti does not mean “not” but means to be directly opposed to. That means by not owning an animal, you would not be seen as just not empathetic; you are seen as a threat to empathy. In a way, this society seems to have (ironically) weaponized empathy into a tool that can ostracize and even kill.