How does aggressively demanding compassion work? I mean, it does, politically, lots of social change was achieved by people going on the street and yelling the equivalent of “fuck you, you are harming us, we suffer, you asshole” but I guess on me it does not really work and I wonder on how it works on others. I am compassionate with people who come accross as harmless and non-threating for me, while when people come accross as aggressive or angry I am in a defensive-hostile, fight-or-flight mood. But apparently, not everybody, for this thing clearly seem to work.
Extrapolating from just the American civil rights movement and Indian independence movements, both of them were accompanied by barely contained violent movements with the same goals. Acceding to the demands of the peaceful protests provided a way to give the status of winning the conflict to the peaceful people while meeting the demands of the violent. Conversely, the recent Occupy movement had no real violent wing to speak of and while a lot of people showed up for the protests and there was a lot of awareness raised, there was no legislative impact at all.
I am not talking about violence, I am talking about demanding compassion in a lingo that does not sound harmless and non-threatening, so it is not “pretty please with sugar on top of it”, but kind of challenging and angry. Um, Tumblr. I would expect this to create reactions of either fear or anger, fight-or-flight in other people and that is supposed to prevent the feeling of compassion. Yet, it is working, apparently some of this chain is not true, maybe it does not create fight-or-flight or it does but people can feel compassion while feeling that too.
I guess what I mean is how do you know that it was that tactic that worked? How do you know that the people who showed compassion afterwards did so because it was demanded of them and not because people making angry demands made them feel more safe openly showing pre-existing compassion? I tend to agree with your first impression. I certainly don’t respond to hostility by handing over control of my emotions to hostile people. I get defensive of my position.
Of course this is probably me committing the typical mind fallacy and trying to avoid thinking about the question by finding ways to disqualify it. So, one mechanism that comes to mind is that people who are more prone to guilt may see angry protesting as signaling an issue that their guilt can attach to and then subsequently act compassionately to alleviate their guilt. That’s not very charitable since it assumes a kind of mental defect on the part of the compassionate, so maybe people who were not really aware of another groups suffering and don’t feel too defensive about it once they’re made aware of it and don’t have any particular problem with the defining feature of the suffering group might feel that the angry demands are justified and come to feel/act compassionately for that reason.
Here’s my speculation: By getting really angry about it, you’re acting in a way that would make the desirable belief (don’t misgender trans people, for example) common sense. Most people would get angry if you openly state stuff like “Women shouldn’t be allowed to drive cars because they’re stupid.” By getting angry about less accepted stuff, you (try to?) give your belief a more mainstream status.
The complication is that you can succeed at getting specific behaviors by showing anger.
Compassion and/or full inclusion in one’s group is reflected by a much more complex and flexible set of behaviors, and I’m not sure anger is a useful tool for getting that.
One thing that is working on even me, even though I easily fall into flight-or-fight reflexes shutting down my capabilities to empathize, is “OMG I can’t believe you just said that! Must be irony right?” Such a simple “trick” and works on me every time, I instantly wonder “Wait, I just violated a rule most people agree about and I was not even aware of its existence? Better crawl back under a stone, I don’t seem to be able to keep up.” The “trick” is that censure, judgement given with such a confidence feels like actually having a strong social support behind it, even when it is not the case.
How does aggressively demanding compassion work? I mean, it does, politically, lots of social change was achieved by people going on the street and yelling the equivalent of “fuck you, you are harming us, we suffer, you asshole” but I guess on me it does not really work and I wonder on how it works on others. I am compassionate with people who come accross as harmless and non-threating for me, while when people come accross as aggressive or angry I am in a defensive-hostile, fight-or-flight mood. But apparently, not everybody, for this thing clearly seem to work.
Extrapolating from just the American civil rights movement and Indian independence movements, both of them were accompanied by barely contained violent movements with the same goals. Acceding to the demands of the peaceful protests provided a way to give the status of winning the conflict to the peaceful people while meeting the demands of the violent. Conversely, the recent Occupy movement had no real violent wing to speak of and while a lot of people showed up for the protests and there was a lot of awareness raised, there was no legislative impact at all.
The civil rights movement also had the support of powerful parts of the government.
I think the Occupy movement’s bigger problem was their insistence on not actually making any demands at all.
I am not talking about violence, I am talking about demanding compassion in a lingo that does not sound harmless and non-threatening, so it is not “pretty please with sugar on top of it”, but kind of challenging and angry. Um, Tumblr. I would expect this to create reactions of either fear or anger, fight-or-flight in other people and that is supposed to prevent the feeling of compassion. Yet, it is working, apparently some of this chain is not true, maybe it does not create fight-or-flight or it does but people can feel compassion while feeling that too.
Why do you think that angrily demanding compassion works?
I did not want to give concrete examples to avoid rustling feathers, but I saw this at pro-gay-marriage rallies or slut-walks.
I guess what I mean is how do you know that it was that tactic that worked? How do you know that the people who showed compassion afterwards did so because it was demanded of them and not because people making angry demands made them feel more safe openly showing pre-existing compassion? I tend to agree with your first impression. I certainly don’t respond to hostility by handing over control of my emotions to hostile people. I get defensive of my position.
Of course this is probably me committing the typical mind fallacy and trying to avoid thinking about the question by finding ways to disqualify it. So, one mechanism that comes to mind is that people who are more prone to guilt may see angry protesting as signaling an issue that their guilt can attach to and then subsequently act compassionately to alleviate their guilt. That’s not very charitable since it assumes a kind of mental defect on the part of the compassionate, so maybe people who were not really aware of another groups suffering and don’t feel too defensive about it once they’re made aware of it and don’t have any particular problem with the defining feature of the suffering group might feel that the angry demands are justified and come to feel/act compassionately for that reason.
Through forcing political and/or institutional and/or social changes. It’s a slightly masked demand for redistribution of power.
Here’s my speculation: By getting really angry about it, you’re acting in a way that would make the desirable belief (don’t misgender trans people, for example) common sense. Most people would get angry if you openly state stuff like “Women shouldn’t be allowed to drive cars because they’re stupid.” By getting angry about less accepted stuff, you (try to?) give your belief a more mainstream status.
The complication is that you can succeed at getting specific behaviors by showing anger.
Compassion and/or full inclusion in one’s group is reflected by a much more complex and flexible set of behaviors, and I’m not sure anger is a useful tool for getting that.
Good point! Salemicus convinced me well that anger is an emotion felt over the felt violation of social rules, thus it can also be used to generate consensus and cohesion about social rules: http://lesswrong.com/lw/lsw/rationality_quotes_thread_march_2015/c2yn?context=1#c2yn
One thing that is working on even me, even though I easily fall into flight-or-fight reflexes shutting down my capabilities to empathize, is “OMG I can’t believe you just said that! Must be irony right?” Such a simple “trick” and works on me every time, I instantly wonder “Wait, I just violated a rule most people agree about and I was not even aware of its existence? Better crawl back under a stone, I don’t seem to be able to keep up.” The “trick” is that censure, judgement given with such a confidence feels like actually having a strong social support behind it, even when it is not the case.