Tell me if this gets too personal, but do defectors evoke positive emotions? (Because they lower societal expectations?) Or negative emotions? (i.e. you have a sweet spot of cooperation and dislike deviations from it?)
If they have similar attitudes to mine, then the feelings are slightly positive, possibly because of receiving validation for my own behaviour. On the other hand, if the defectors are doing worse things, the feelings are fully negative, I don’t think there is any effect as you suggest.
To put things more concretely, I try not to do anything harmful but also don’t do anything that helps society (charity, activism, environmental stuff, etc.) unless I get some concrete benefit. When someone does defect in the way of being actively harmful or breaking laws, then my emotions are negative as I said, but interestingly not as strong as in the case of activists. Perhaps because such behaviour feels normal and expected from other people, or just because it doesn’t feel as much like a threat to me personally.
So I would say that your second suggestion is correct in my case, I do have a sweet spot of cooperation (basically what I do and feel is justified) and dislike deviations from that, with heavier weight on the “more cooperation” direction.
Tell me if this gets too personal, but do defectors evoke positive emotions? (Because they lower societal expectations?) Or negative emotions? (i.e. you have a sweet spot of cooperation and dislike deviations from it?)
If they have similar attitudes to mine, then the feelings are slightly positive, possibly because of receiving validation for my own behaviour. On the other hand, if the defectors are doing worse things, the feelings are fully negative, I don’t think there is any effect as you suggest.
To put things more concretely, I try not to do anything harmful but also don’t do anything that helps society (charity, activism, environmental stuff, etc.) unless I get some concrete benefit. When someone does defect in the way of being actively harmful or breaking laws, then my emotions are negative as I said, but interestingly not as strong as in the case of activists. Perhaps because such behaviour feels normal and expected from other people, or just because it doesn’t feel as much like a threat to me personally.
So I would say that your second suggestion is correct in my case, I do have a sweet spot of cooperation (basically what I do and feel is justified) and dislike deviations from that, with heavier weight on the “more cooperation” direction.
Well that’s a mindset I don’t encounter often irl. Do you estimate you’re a central example in your country / culture ?