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.
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.