Can there be a justification for watching and/or recording the suffering of others that we are unable to help?

Dear Richard,

First of all, good question! Having thought about it, I believe there can be a justification for watching (or recording) the suffering of others that we are unable to help.

My basic thought is that we could learn from watching this, and I think this has two benefits:

1) knowledge.
If others are suffering, it might be good to know this, even if we cannot help them.

2) Helping others.
While we sadly cannot help the people we are watching, watching them suffer could get us to prevent such situations happening in the future. We might discover some new danger. Or maybe we just see people suffering from some old danger & decide that we need to change the world, to prevent it happening again.

I hope this helps answer your question! And I would be interested to know what you think.

All the best,
Joe Saunders