Sorry, I think I actually jumped to my own conclusions and misunderstood your comment. I wrote a really long comment but it looks like it got lost somehow. This is the shortened version:
You make a really good point about what empathy truly is, and something I’ve been thinking about a lot lately.
We have these people in power that want to claim empathy is a weakness because they try to misconstrue what empathy actually is.
Empathy does not mean you must take pity on someone or agree with them on every issue. It’s actually a very useful tool and strength because it allows you to gain insight into their decision making process.
A lack of empathy can definitely lead people to do some horrible shit to each other bc they view the other person as less than human, but the lack of empathy can actually be exploited as a weakness.
Encouraging people to lack empathy is actually just encouraging a weakness in order to deceive and manipulate.
Like you’re saying about this kid, looking at it from his perspective it’s not so hard to see how he could be deceived, but it still does make me wonder if:
A. He was targeted for propaganda because of who he was, and
B. If targeting people to create the general idea of a “tankie” or any other extremist identity actually kind of leaves us all vulnerable by encouraging us to lack empathy for that individual?
No problem. To add on being able to identify the way others view matters and the rational they employed to justify their actions allows us to identify logical reasons from their perspective for them to change their opinions.
On point A, I suspect he self-radicalized at first and then entered his own bubble where he further leaned more into radicalization.
On point B, I believe it does. It doesn’t matter what the negative label is; viewing individuals as the caricatures that float in our minds when we hear words like “tankie” or other words that serve only, for us, to brand individuals as part of a incorrect collective encourages us to make these same un-empathic mistakes.
We shouldn’t like many of these people we brand as things like “Tankie”; but we should understand why they feel the ways they do.
Sorry, I think I actually jumped to my own conclusions and misunderstood your comment. I wrote a really long comment but it looks like it got lost somehow. This is the shortened version:
You make a really good point about what empathy truly is, and something I’ve been thinking about a lot lately.
We have these people in power that want to claim empathy is a weakness because they try to misconstrue what empathy actually is.
Empathy does not mean you must take pity on someone or agree with them on every issue. It’s actually a very useful tool and strength because it allows you to gain insight into their decision making process.
A lack of empathy can definitely lead people to do some horrible shit to each other bc they view the other person as less than human, but the lack of empathy can actually be exploited as a weakness.
Encouraging people to lack empathy is actually just encouraging a weakness in order to deceive and manipulate.
Like you’re saying about this kid, looking at it from his perspective it’s not so hard to see how he could be deceived, but it still does make me wonder if: A. He was targeted for propaganda because of who he was, and B. If targeting people to create the general idea of a “tankie” or any other extremist identity actually kind of leaves us all vulnerable by encouraging us to lack empathy for that individual?
No problem. To add on being able to identify the way others view matters and the rational they employed to justify their actions allows us to identify logical reasons from their perspective for them to change their opinions.
On point A, I suspect he self-radicalized at first and then entered his own bubble where he further leaned more into radicalization.
On point B, I believe it does. It doesn’t matter what the negative label is; viewing individuals as the caricatures that float in our minds when we hear words like “tankie” or other words that serve only, for us, to brand individuals as part of a incorrect collective encourages us to make these same un-empathic mistakes.
We shouldn’t like many of these people we brand as things like “Tankie”; but we should understand why they feel the ways they do.