The Culture of Coercion

Much of the conflict between "social justice warriors" and their antagonists arises from a conflict between mutual trust as a political foundation, and coercion (arising from distrust) as a political tactic. (I previously wrote about this conflict in "The Christians and the Pagans".)

People who are used to operating on coercion assume the worst of others and both expect to be coerced into doing good, and expect that they will have to coerce others in order to get what they want or need. People who are more used to operating on trust assume that others will usually want to help and will act in good faith out of a similar desire for mutual trust.

I want to be clear that when I talk about coercion-based people, I'm not talking about sociopaths or any other category that's constructed based on innate neurological or psychological traits. In fact, people might act coercion-based in one situation, and trust-based in another. For example, a white feminist might act like they're trust-based in a situation that involves gender inequality, but coercion-based when it comes to examining racism. And I'm also not saying people never cross over from one group into another -- I think it can happen in both directions. But to stop relying on coercion requires work, and there are few incentives to do that work. There are, however, a lot of incentives to give up trust in favor of coercion (or at least pretend to) and give up your empathy.

If you assume the worst of other people, of course you won't be able to imagine any way to achieve your goals other than coercion. Assuming the worst isn't a character flaw -- it's taught, and thus, can be unlearned. At the same time, experience isn't an excuse for treating others badly (and people who assume the worst of others will treat others badly, partly because it helps make their assumptions self-fulfilling, removing the need for them to change their assumptions and behavior). We are all obligated to do the work that it takes to live with others while minimizing the harm that we do to them.

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