The Exercise Of Social Power

As recently as three and a half years ago, I expected people to eagerly detach themselves from erroneous or unverifiable beliefs as soon as they were confronted about them.  It did not take long for me to realize that very few people are like this.  For a rationalist, finding a person who loves truth instead of constructs and assumptions is like discovering a pool of water in a scorching desert.  The truth is that the vast majority of people are not intelligent (though they could improve if they chose to) and do not yield to reason when their follies are exposed.  However, even people who do not respond to refutations and proofs in a rational way will often respond to something else: power.

Although power is often associated with violence or political authority, power does not have to take the form of physical, military, or political might.  It can also be manifested in how someone affects the emotions of another person.  The few people who possess both intelligence and social skills have the ability to manipulate others with ease.  Manipulation is not inherently about using someone as if they are nothing more than a means to an end; it is not itself immoral [1].  Thus, using social power to emotionally pressure or coerce those who are not aligned with reason--through everything from mockery to emotional coldness--cannot be wrong on its own.

There is nothing wrong with even directing emotional and social brutality towards moral inferiors, something which does not itself involve the dehumanization of anyone.  Nevertheless, it can involve a great degree of sincere harshness, but harshness alone is not necessarily unjust.  Social power and manipulation can hold great pragmatic power when someone will not submit to reason and morality, since some will feel coerced by social and emotional factors into doing the right thing, even if they have no care for it otherwise.  This only makes them more deserving of the harsh treatment they receive, but it can be better for them to externally pretend to care for rationality and ethics due to emotional coercion than for them to not even pretend at all.

And why should a rationalist not treat such people harshly?  As long as no actual moral obligations are violated--as long as nothing slanderous is said and no immoral physical behaviors are engaged in--there can be nothing unethical about emotional brutality, social manipulation, and mockery.  Any objections are rooted in meaningless, subjective preferences.  It is not as if people who reject reason deserve to be treated as equals by those who embrace it.  The person who refuses to be rational and upright has no legitimate complaint when he or she is treated as inferior to those who do otherwise.


[1].  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2018/09/what-is-manipulation.html