I think kindness is a good rule for rationalists, because unkindness is rhetorically OP yet so easily rationalized (“i’m just telling it like it is, y’all” while benefitting – again, rhetorically – from playing the offensive).
Accusations of unkindness are also, as you say, “rhetorically OP”… best not to get into litigating how “kind” anyone is being.
Your implication that Aella is not speaking, writing or behaving sanely is, frankly, hard to fathom. You may disagree with her; you may consider her ideas and perspectives incomplete; but to say she has not met the standards of sanity?
Not difficult at all, I think. “That person is controlling my mind with their words!” is, actually, typical of things that a delusional person would say (and if you add “… and they don’t even know it!”, that only adds to the effect).
This in addition, of course, to all the “kill it with fire” stuff, which is … either ill-considered, or deliberately hostile. (One may justifiably use stronger language here, but I prefer to avoid such, if possible.)
She speaks about an incredibly painful and personal issue with remarkable sanity and analytical distance. Does that mean she’s objective? No. But she’s a solid rationalist, and this post is appropriately representative.
I’m afraid I cannot agree with your assessment.
But see, here we are trading subjective takes. You imply this post is insane. I say that it is impressively sane. Are we shouldering the burden of standards for speaking, writing and behaving sanely?
We are doing better at it than the OP, at least for now. (And the “takes” are not so subjective as all that…)
Perhaps you could re-read that part of her post with principle o’ charity / steel manning glasses on.
Perhaps I could, but that would be unwise. These concepts, as commonly deployed these days (if not, perhaps, as originally intended), tend to be more detrimental than beneficial to effective reasoning and communication.
If your “principle o’ charity / steel manning glasses” lead you to read this paragraph:
In this, I am a conflict theorist; this is not a mistake, this is war. And a part of me knows this isn’t “true”—as in, I could have been born into a brain that ended up doing strong frame control. I know they are real people with feelings and needs. But that “true” perspective will let them destroy you; when I run into strong frame control, I snap to an extremely antagonistic frame. No, you are not allowed into my life, my home, my friends, and I will try to remove you from the power you might use to hurt anybody else.
… as anything other than an expression of actual hostility, then I submit to you that said “glasses” are, in fact, blinders.
There is no way to read “I will try to remove you from the power you might use to hurt anybody else”, “extremely antagonistic frame”, “war”, as merely “I choose not to interact with such people, for my own personal idiosyncratic mental health needs”, or what have you—unless you’ve got blinders on.
As for “red flags” not necessarily meaning “bad behaviors”—for one thing, that is merely the motte in a very obvious motte-and-bailey scenario. In these sorts of discussions/scenarios, people never consistently refrain from treating “red flags” as definitely bad; people never consistently stick to the “it’s just a neutral-in-itself possible-warning-sign”. They simply do not.
But we don’t even need to go that far, because the specific alleged “red flags” to which I objected are not even warning signs, but are instead (a) directly and straightforwardly good, and—as I pointed out elsethread—also (b) some of the best ways to resist the actually bad things that Aella describes!
Accusations of unkindness are also, as you say, “rhetorically OP”… best not to get into litigating how “kind” anyone is being.
Not difficult at all, I think. “That person is controlling my mind with their words!” is, actually, typical of things that a delusional person would say (and if you add “… and they don’t even know it!”, that only adds to the effect).
This in addition, of course, to all the “kill it with fire” stuff, which is … either ill-considered, or deliberately hostile. (One may justifiably use stronger language here, but I prefer to avoid such, if possible.)
I’m afraid I cannot agree with your assessment.
We are doing better at it than the OP, at least for now. (And the “takes” are not so subjective as all that…)
Perhaps I could, but that would be unwise. These concepts, as commonly deployed these days (if not, perhaps, as originally intended), tend to be more detrimental than beneficial to effective reasoning and communication.
If your “principle o’ charity / steel manning glasses” lead you to read this paragraph:
… as anything other than an expression of actual hostility, then I submit to you that said “glasses” are, in fact, blinders.
There is no way to read “I will try to remove you from the power you might use to hurt anybody else”, “extremely antagonistic frame”, “war”, as merely “I choose not to interact with such people, for my own personal idiosyncratic mental health needs”, or what have you—unless you’ve got blinders on.
As for “red flags” not necessarily meaning “bad behaviors”—for one thing, that is merely the motte in a very obvious motte-and-bailey scenario. In these sorts of discussions/scenarios, people never consistently refrain from treating “red flags” as definitely bad; people never consistently stick to the “it’s just a neutral-in-itself possible-warning-sign”. They simply do not.
But we don’t even need to go that far, because the specific alleged “red flags” to which I objected are not even warning signs, but are instead (a) directly and straightforwardly good, and—as I pointed out elsethread—also (b) some of the best ways to resist the actually bad things that Aella describes!