When are empathy and social sensitivities taken too far?

[Hypnalis]

I’m curious to know what exactly you mean by the term ‘empathy’ in general

It's in the post with the definitions (#18).

FWIW I agree with the intent of Neonatal NNT's OP and I think the topic could be very interesting.

But there's just one small problem ... I'm not interested in a discussion with people who don't distinguish between "empathy" and "sympathy". When I looked I found that even the Wikipedia and Wiktionary content isn't clear on the distinction, so I made two posts about that, and then I waited.

Still waiting /lol.

FWIW I'm 100% certain that "weaponized empathy" is a significant factor in the 21st century, and I think it leads to very bad outcomes. But that's politics - it's a grey area at best here (discouraged in the Rules and Guidelines) so I won't start such a discussion.

 

[vergil96]

Before I found out about autism I sometimes wondered if I was a sociopath, the way I get along so well with animals sort of cancels that idea though. I can emotionally disconnect when I get upset with people though, then I do become a sociopath, a logical machine that can think and act far faster than most people and no shred of sympathy.

Psychology isn't an exact science. The claim that psychology makes is that everyone acts exactly how they feel. This is not true. I don't see why on earth anyone should be or is empathetic 100% of the time or else it's sociopathy. Psychologists make the old mistake of projection of who they are on everyone else. It doesn't stop to astonish me how stupid statements stem from psychology. They didn't even prove that such statements about empathy are true, so what are we talking about? How is that different from Russel's space teapot?

In some senarios, I know how someone feels, but why on earth am I supposed to be nice to someone who wasn't nice or good to me or is for example trying to sell me something and manipulate? Empathy gives information about what other people (and animals) are up to - the information can be used however you want. Certainly not always is it acring on the impulse to accommodate someone. The statement that everyone acts on their impulses 100% of the time has no grounds. It's also not even common sense.

The information I have come across is that a person becomes a sociopath influenced by the environment that teaches and rewards antisocial behaviours (think a neighbourhood with a high crime rate and hooligan friends from school), but is born a psychopath - there are studies on psychopaths that reveal that they have higher levels of neurotransmitters generally associated with feeling happy and being resilient to stress such as serotonin and the levels don't drop when they face stressful sutuations or even stimuli like loud sounds, being shouted at etc. like they do for an average person. Therefore they're not motivated by punishment, exclusion or opinions. Sociopathy, according to the studies, means that someone feels like a normal person, is equally stressed by punishment, but represses it or disconnects.

 

[Vesta]

but why on earth am I supposed to be nice to someone who wasn't nice or good to me

I don’t understand this logic either. I don’t feel like greeting people who once tried to hurt or offend me, but my parents keep nagging me about it. They say that regardless of the situation, I should greet them, otherwise people will speak badly about me behind my back. To me, this seems very strange and incomprehensible

 

[Tired]

I don’t understand this logic either. I don’t feel like greeting people who once tried to hurt or offend me, but my parents keep nagging me about it. They say that regardless of the situation, I should greet them, otherwise people will speak badly about me behind my back. To me, this seems very strange and incomprehensible

I asked my autistic boyfriend about it, because he's the person who greeted recently his abuser irl, and i was furious about it. Asked him what was the point and got "like this i show that i am over them and are not scared of them and are a better person than they are."
I kind of get it but kind of don't. I guess it all depends on how we feel. I cut abusers out of my life, he keeps them in a damned friend list in social medias. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

 

[Vesta]

I remember once complaining that all my life I had been forced to interact with unpleasant and irritating people, and I wasn’t talking about relatives. People absolutely didn’t understand my situation and asked why I even allowed such people into my life.

 

[Outdated]

In some senarios, I know how someone feels, but why on earth am I supposed to be nice to someone who wasn't nice or good to me or is for example trying to sell me something and manipulate?

As I said before, empathy does not equal sympathy. In fact empathy quite often decries sympathy.

The statement that everyone acts on their impulses 100% of the time has no grounds. It's also not even common sense.

I agree. If I allowed all of my impulses to rule me I'm pretty sure I would have spent much of my life in jail.

I kind of get it but kind of don't. I guess it all depends on how we feel. I cut abusers out of my life, he keeps them in a damned friend list in social medias. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

It doesn't really make sense to me. If any of my abusers were still living in my head years later I would see that as them having a win and me being a loser.

I have actually run in to one many years later and the response was funny. I have very poor facial recognition and a bad memory for names as well so I had no idea who this person was, it wasn't until a couple of hours later that I worked out who they were. At the time I thought it was just some random idiot on drugs abusing me for no reason and all I did was laugh at them. All my friends laughed too.

 

[vergil96]

I agree. If I allowed all of my impulses to rule me I'm pretty sure I would have spent much of my life in jail.

I think I wouldn't end up in jail , but would be poor, less educated, less healthy, fat, depressed and would enagage in drama and abusive relationships. It helps to have a perspective on things.

 

[AprilR]

Too much empathy and social sensitivity can lead someone to think 'i understand this person and know what is best for them" without listening to the person in question.

Like yes, you can feel when someone around you is sad, but if you dont know the reason why they are sad, or you don' t know the person well, you might mistakenly take on a savior role and try to "help" them.

Also it might lead to emotional overwhelm and being unable to help the people in need because you "feel" too much.

 

[Aspychata]

My feeling is at the end of the day, if l felt l made the best choices in my dealing with others, then ideas of empathy and or sympathy really doesn't matter. It's a personal choice.