The world would be better if people treated more situations like the first set of problems, and less situations like the second set of problems. How to do that?
It sounds like the question is essentially “How to do hard mode?”.
On a small scale, it’s not super intimidating. Just do the right thing and take your spouse to the place you both like. Be someone who cares about finding good outcomes for both of you, and marry someone who sees it. There are real gains here, and with the annoyance you save yourself by not sacrificing for the sake of showing sacrifice, you can maintain motivation to sacrifice when the payoff is actually worth it—and to find opportunities to do so. When you can see that you don’t actually need to display that costly signal, it’s usually a pretty easy choice to make.
Forging a deeper and more efficient connection does require allowing potential for conflict so that you can distinguish yourself from the person who is only doing things for shallow/selfish reasons. Distinguish yourself by showing willingness to entertain such accusations, knowing that the truth will show through. Invite those conflicts when you have enough slack to turn it into play, and keep enough slack that you can. “Does this dress make my ass look fat?”—can you pull off “The *dress* doesn’t, no” and get a laugh, or are you stuck where there’s only one acceptable answer? If you can, demonstrate that it’s okay to suggest the “unthinkable” and keep poking until you can find the edge of the envelope. If not, or when you’ve reached the point where you can’t, then stop and ask why. Address the problem. Rinse and repeat with the next harder thing, as you become ready to.
On a larger scale, it gets a lot harder. You can no longer afford to just walk away from anyone who doesn’t already mostly get it, and you don’t have so much time and attention to work. There are things you can do, and I don’t want to suggest that it’s “not doable”. You can start to presuppose the framings that you’ve worked hard to create and justify in the past, using stories from past experience and social proof to support them in the cases where you’re challenged—which might be less than you think, since the ability to presuppose such things without preemptively flinching defensively can be powerful subcommunication. You can start to build social groups/communities/institutions to scale these principles, and spread to the extent that your extra ability to direct motivation towards good outcomes allows you to out-compete the alternatives.
I just don’t get the impression that there’s any “easy” answer. If you want people to donate to your political campaign even though you won’t play favorites like the other guy will, I think you have to genuinely have to be able to expect that your donors will be more personally rewarded by the larger total pie and recognition of doing the right thing than they will in the alternative where they donate to have someone fight to give them more of a smaller pie—and are perceived however you let that be perceived.
If you want people to donate to your political campaign even though you won’t play favorites like the other guy will
The problem here is not about whether or not you play favorites but how you can demonstrate that you are likely going to play favorites in the future. A politican who has a lunch where they chat with their largest donor and then does what the donor tells them to do is also demonstrating loyality.
You only need to signal loyality via symbolic action when you can’t provide value directly.
It sounds like the question is essentially “How to do hard mode?”.
On a small scale, it’s not super intimidating. Just do the right thing and take your spouse to the place you both like. Be someone who cares about finding good outcomes for both of you, and marry someone who sees it. There are real gains here, and with the annoyance you save yourself by not sacrificing for the sake of showing sacrifice, you can maintain motivation to sacrifice when the payoff is actually worth it—and to find opportunities to do so. When you can see that you don’t actually need to display that costly signal, it’s usually a pretty easy choice to make.
Forging a deeper and more efficient connection does require allowing potential for conflict so that you can distinguish yourself from the person who is only doing things for shallow/selfish reasons. Distinguish yourself by showing willingness to entertain such accusations, knowing that the truth will show through. Invite those conflicts when you have enough slack to turn it into play, and keep enough slack that you can. “Does this dress make my ass look fat?”—can you pull off “The *dress* doesn’t, no” and get a laugh, or are you stuck where there’s only one acceptable answer? If you can, demonstrate that it’s okay to suggest the “unthinkable” and keep poking until you can find the edge of the envelope. If not, or when you’ve reached the point where you can’t, then stop and ask why. Address the problem. Rinse and repeat with the next harder thing, as you become ready to.
On a larger scale, it gets a lot harder. You can no longer afford to just walk away from anyone who doesn’t already mostly get it, and you don’t have so much time and attention to work. There are things you can do, and I don’t want to suggest that it’s “not doable”. You can start to presuppose the framings that you’ve worked hard to create and justify in the past, using stories from past experience and social proof to support them in the cases where you’re challenged—which might be less than you think, since the ability to presuppose such things without preemptively flinching defensively can be powerful subcommunication. You can start to build social groups/communities/institutions to scale these principles, and spread to the extent that your extra ability to direct motivation towards good outcomes allows you to out-compete the alternatives.
I just don’t get the impression that there’s any “easy” answer. If you want people to donate to your political campaign even though you won’t play favorites like the other guy will, I think you have to genuinely have to be able to expect that your donors will be more personally rewarded by the larger total pie and recognition of doing the right thing than they will in the alternative where they donate to have someone fight to give them more of a smaller pie—and are perceived however you let that be perceived.
The problem here is not about whether or not you play favorites but how you can demonstrate that you are likely going to play favorites in the future. A politican who has a lunch where they chat with their largest donor and then does what the donor tells them to do is also demonstrating loyality.
You only need to signal loyality via symbolic action when you can’t provide value directly.