There’s an element of torture and dehumanization in it for all of us. All of us who are not sociopaths, that is. Because it can break your spirit and damage you psychologically forever, to witness so much suffering without being able to do anything about it.
This is part of the reason systemic oppression creates so much societal damage.
Naturally, people (who are not sociopaths) are wired to help a fellow human in pain. For us, empathy is an organ of our body the same as it is an organ of our mind. We hear a child cry and we look to see what happened. We see someone collapse in pain and we feel an immediate pang of pain and fear ourselves. We rush to help and comfort.
When we are forbidden from doing this for extended periods of time we start turning against ourselves, because our empathy starts to be perceived as our source of misery. But it is not.
Focus on your wanting to help, not on your inability. It will help you to retain your mental integrity. It will deny them this triumph over you and over humanity.
You are not the one doing this. It is not your fault. It is the complete fault of those in power. There’s nothing wrong with anyone that wants to help. It is everything that is right and beautiful in this stupid world