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Originally Posted by Angela  How do you feel about a child molester or terrorist? When you label them at an identity level, you get a pretty rock-solid judgement, and plenty of negative emotion about them, don't you? Now, does that make a positive difference? Maybe you think it *keeps* society safe to feel bad about them? Is it true that it's the negative emotion that keeps society safe, or is it really something else? (and is society really safe from child molesters and terrorists? they seem to proliferate despite all the judgement of them.)
Lots of people live in fear of child molesters, terrorists, bitches, and alphas, etc. How much positive influence do you think they have, in exchange for feeling their judgements and bad feelings? |
I'm not saying anything good comes from judging or labelling people. My point was just that it can be really hard not to automatically judge people.
I would love to be able not to do it and I think a lot of good could come from not judging others. For instance, if both sides in the Middle East conflict withheld judgment of the "enemy", the peace process would be a lot easier. A suicide bomber is really just someone doing his/her best with the resources at their disposal - but that's hard to realise if someone in your family was killed by one.
The Dalai Lama is good example of how something like this is really possible. His people has suffered a lot at the hand of the Chinese government, but he still doesn't judge them.