and to be fair, not everyone has the bandwidth and energy to be thinking on that

Incredibly astute and also incredibly sad because it's a very purposeful design of our society to have everyone so broken and tired by our world that they simply don't have the energy to recognize that other people are suffering as well. I am constantly trying to remind myself that everyone around me is struggling as hard as I am, and it's not anyone's fault they don't have all the time in the world for me. How could they?? They're hanging by a thread just like I am!

Which is part of why I say "The cruelty is the point." You're very correct that I was being reductive, but there's definitely a class (mostly the capitalist class, people who actually have capital.) of people for whom it simply boils down to a desire for power for the sake of power. An enjoyment of expressing power over others, and making them squirm. Those are the people who are designing society to be this way, to break every worker so badly they cannot stand up for one another. They smirk knowing we're so broken we can't stand up to save ourselves. They simply get off on hurting others.