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Empathy and Understanding
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Ilya Shambat
Jan 29, 2023, 9:50:21 PM1/29/23
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A claim frequently made about narcissists and sociopaths is that they lack empathy.
Empathy however can go wrong as well.
The problems I’ve seen were when naturally empathic people empathized with the wrong people. If you are empathizing with the mafia, then you get used for wrongdoing. A good quality that is empathy is put in service of something that’s wrong, resulting in good serving evil.
I’ve been accused of being a narcissist, but I’ve empathized with a number of people. More importantly I went to the bother to consciously understand other people. Consciously understanding a person is different from empathizing with them. With understanding, you don’t feel what they feel; you see them for who they are. And then you are less likely to fall for their bullshit, while going to the bother of figuring out where they are coming from and avoiding the error of uninformed judgmentalism.
Anything human can be used for wrong. That is even things that are in themselves good. Empathy is a wonderful quality; but it can be used for wrongdoing. We see the same thing with beauty, money, intelligence, moral values such as patriotism and altruism, what have you. That these things can get used for wrong does not make them bad. What is wrong is their misuse, not what they are in themselves.
An empathic person needs to take care not to empathize with the wrong people. Otherwise the good that is in her gets used for wrong. She may do well to supplement her empathy with conscious understanding. That way she will be seeing the person clearly. And then she can decide whether to apply her empathy in support of that person or to correct his behavior.
Empathy however can go wrong as well.
The problems I’ve seen were when naturally empathic people empathized with the wrong people. If you are empathizing with the mafia, then you get used for wrongdoing. A good quality that is empathy is put in service of something that’s wrong, resulting in good serving evil.
I’ve been accused of being a narcissist, but I’ve empathized with a number of people. More importantly I went to the bother to consciously understand other people. Consciously understanding a person is different from empathizing with them. With understanding, you don’t feel what they feel; you see them for who they are. And then you are less likely to fall for their bullshit, while going to the bother of figuring out where they are coming from and avoiding the error of uninformed judgmentalism.
Anything human can be used for wrong. That is even things that are in themselves good. Empathy is a wonderful quality; but it can be used for wrongdoing. We see the same thing with beauty, money, intelligence, moral values such as patriotism and altruism, what have you. That these things can get used for wrong does not make them bad. What is wrong is their misuse, not what they are in themselves.
An empathic person needs to take care not to empathize with the wrong people. Otherwise the good that is in her gets used for wrong. She may do well to supplement her empathy with conscious understanding. That way she will be seeing the person clearly. And then she can decide whether to apply her empathy in support of that person or to correct his behavior.
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