Comment by ImPostingOnHN
5 months ago
> It’s not either-or. You can tell people No and be empathetic to their reasons at the same time. Understanding doesn’t mean agreement or acceptance. It also doesn’t mean you excuse their behavior, or allow it to continue. Empathy doesn’t mean you like what they’re doing. That would be sympathy.
We're talking about a discussion in which the author continues their violations after being told "no", and excuses it with their "reasons".
Their reasons can come after they stop the actual wrongdoing, and maybe after they understand what they did wrong and apologize for it.
We all agree that that would be tactful. But, human empathy is neither an act of excusing the subject of the empathy, nor limited to tactful subjects.
Asking someone to empathize with their persecutor while they are actively harming that someone is generally viewed as abusive gaslighting in most other contexts.
Would you ask physical abuse victims to be empathetic towards their abusers in the middle of a beating, too? What if they were told it hurt, and asked to stop, and they instead continued anyways while repeatedly and politely saying they had good intentions in beating the victim?
If someone was being physically abused, I'd like to think that I'd try to step in. What value do you see in this comparison?
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Gaslighting in its original sense is a continued process of abuse that leads to a person doubting their own perception, typically with a long term PTSD as consequence. What we are discussing here are possible strategies to get somebody to change their behavior. If you consider people stating a different opinion than you to be gaslighting you, you might want to dig deeper.
I think what is happening here is a difference in understanding of what we mean by empathy, and what it entails in terms of visible action or response. I tried to make it clear that to me, you can both be understanding of the feelings and the (ir)rationality of an abuser and be clear in your boundary-setting (and possible application of protective force) at the same time. The understanding of your “opponent” can help guide your interaction, whether it is verbal communication or other. It doesn’t mean “to be nice” in your response, or accepting their actions.
The reason why I advocate for “more empathy” is because I firmly believe it can make you more successful in clear boundary setting and in communicating and achieving your goals, not weaker, especially in situations where you strongly disagree with somebody else’s actions.
To come back to the case at hand: We seem to agree that the goal is to get him to stop and take the project down. The strategies employed so far to tell him No didn’t make him stop. Now what? I suggested to try a little empathy in the response, something along the lines of “Thank you for offering your help in making NP++ even more successful! We appreciate your effort. For now, can you please take it down, and then we can discuss how you can bring your strengths and abilities to the project in a way that causes less controversy in our happy little community? Looking forward to hearing about your ideas!”. (Only works if sufficiently true; adjust where necessary.)
The goal remains the same. Only the strategy is different. It doesn’t matter if I “like” the person or not, or if I “care” about them. I am interested in achieving my goals, and it requires their cooperation for that —- unless I want to sue. Which I don’t.
With your hypothetical domestic violence abuser, you can shout No all you want at some people and they just won’t stop. If your goal is to get them to stop, you CAN try different strategies. Empathy expands your range of possible actions; it doesn’t limit them.
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