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Shame them, shun them, ban them, beat them

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Re: Shame them, shun them, ban them, beat them

#11

Post by ajkjk »

I think the only thing that really works is to appeal from one's person. Had Mr L said: the flag is important to me, and draping it over yourself like that is something I find disrespectful, given how many peoples' lives were lost in defending it, please do not do that again---then it might have worked to change the child's opinions on the matter. Maybe not right away, cause kids are slow on picking up lessons, but I believe it would have made the opposite long-term impression.[^1]

Whereas the mis-use of shame just turns the child against the teacher and their whole system of values, even if momentarily 'corrects' the behavior. It would have worked if the child already shared Mr L's values, but they didn't, and shaming someone on the basis of a value they don't hold themselves doesn't work at all. And I think that usually the way ones learns values from others is by seeing them exemplified, since they can naturally identify the value of those values and how they benefit everyone. Being threatened does not work. Being admonished because you're hurting someone you didn't mean to hurt does.

There are some epicycles, also. The appeal to respect only works if the child is actually concerned with the teacher's feelings; it won't work if it takes place in an ambient culture of disrespect or apathy. And if the community insists that people be respectful to each other, then if the child continues to mistreat the flag, Mr L now has the legitimate grievance that the child is being disrespectful after knowing better, which is now personal, not in terms of an abstract and un-shared value, and is fair grounds for admonishment. I imagine that this always works a lot better for actually changing behavior and inducing people to treat each other well.

[^1]: I anticipate some people to react that this doesn't work at all in practice and is how we got to a culture of polarization, e.g. progressives moralized about being respected a lot and instead made enemies out of a lot of people who now don't want to respect them at all. I see this as different, because it was often actually using shame but under the trappings of asking for respect: instead of saying "please respect me because I am asking you to" it says "shame on you for not respecting me the way I demand", which is more like what Mr. L said in the story; the feeling that this is an unjust use of power triggers the recipient to turn against it. And anyway it would only work if you're in a respect-based society along with your counterpart; it's not going to work in anonymous unmoderated online discourse.

Re: Shame them, shun them, ban them, beat them

#12

Post by ajkjk »

nh23423fefe wrote: post #5

Violence is the most effective behavior modification because it leverages pain. Every moral good has to be anchored to pain and its avoidance. Tit for tat is rational violence allocation. The golden rule has some "contrapositive" version right? I'll harm you in the way I should be harmed for bad actions.

"most effective" requires a lot of justification. I think it's empirically false, personally. A system that uses violence to establish norms is fundamentally unstable because it lets whoever can muster the most violence set the rules---meaning people have an incentive to change the system for their benefit and everyone's incentivizes are pointing in different directions. Whereas a system whose behaviors are enforced by overall prosociality will find equilibria that are also generally prosocial and therefore will be defended by everyone, so their incentives point in the same direction, making it more stable.

Re: Shame them, shun them, ban them, beat them

#13

Post by nh23423fefe »

ajkjk wrote: post #12
nh23423fefe wrote: post #5

Violence is the most effective behavior modification because it leverages pain. Every moral good has to be anchored to pain and its avoidance. Tit for tat is rational violence allocation. The golden rule has some "contrapositive" version right? I'll harm you in the way I should be harmed for bad actions.

"most effective" requires a lot of justification. I think it's empirically false, personally. A system that uses violence to establish norms is fundamentally unstable because it lets whoever can muster the most violence set the rules---meaning people have an incentive to change the system for their benefit and everyone's incentivizes are pointing in different directions. Whereas a system whose behaviors are enforced…

you haven't made an argument for why stable rules are good nor have you justified the assertion that prosocial enforcement even exists

Re: Shame them, shun them, ban them, beat them

#14

Post by nh23423fefe »

np- wrote: post #9
nh23423fefe wrote: post #5

Violence is the most effective behavior modification because it leverages pain. Every moral good has to be anchored to pain and its avoidance. Tit for tat is rational violence allocation. The golden rule has some "contrapositive" version right? I'll harm you in the way I should be harmed for bad actions.

Violence is an effective temporary behavior modification tool, people will in fact change their behavior in order to not get beaten by the stick. But the flip side is as soon as they get a bigger stick, the old behavior will be back with a vengeance. So the solution here is overwhelming violence. But then there’s clearly limits to that modifying behavior too (look at the Middle East for example). Domestically, even w…

violence is a signal to offenders and non offenders. you cant only assess the effect on the direct targets of violence. if i spank my eldest, my youngest behaves better

Re: Shame them, shun them, ban them, beat them

#15

Post by ajkjk »

nh23423fefe wrote: post #13
ajkjk wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"most effective" requires a lot of justification. I think it's empirically false, personally. A system that uses violence to establish norms is fundamentally unstable because it lets whoever can muster the most violence set the rules---meaning people have an incentive to change the system for their benefit and everyone's incentivizes are pointing in different directions. Whereas a system whose behaviors are enforced…

you haven't made an argument for why stable rules are good nor have you justified the assertion that prosocial enforcement even exists

Nor do I feel the need to, since my goal was only to present the obvious refutation to the (basically fascist) argument I was replying to.

Anyway both are self-evident: prosocial enforcement exists because we see it around us every day and stable prosocial systems are good because people pick them, given the choice.

Re: Shame them, shun them, ban them, beat them

#16

Post by nh23423fefe »

ajkjk wrote: post #15
nh23423fefe wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

you haven't made an argument for why stable rules are good nor have you justified the assertion that prosocial enforcement even exists

Nor do I feel the need to, since my goal was only to present the obvious refutation to the (basically fascist) argument I was replying to. Anyway both are self-evident: prosocial enforcement exists because we see it around us every day and stable prosocial systems are good because people pick them, given the choice.

win argument button pressed lol, especially strong when mixed with shifting goal posts

Re: Shame them, shun them, ban them, beat them

#17

Post by DougN7 »

nh23423fefe wrote: post #14
np- wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Violence is an effective temporary behavior modification tool, people will in fact change their behavior in order to not get beaten by the stick. But the flip side is as soon as they get a bigger stick, the old behavior will be back with a vengeance. So the solution here is overwhelming violence. But then there’s clearly limits to that modifying behavior too (look at the Middle East for example). Domestically, even w…

violence is a signal to offenders and non offenders. you cant only assess the effect on the direct targets of violence. if i spank my eldest, my youngest behaves better

I’m curious about your age. I don’t think I’ve ever met a person that was grateful to their parents for their beatings, and that was in any way close to them. I’m not claiming in any way that you beat your kids - but violence never creates virtue. Maybe public-facing good behavior at best, but below the surface is a lot of pain looking for a way out.

Re: Shame them, shun them, ban them, beat them

#18

Post by TrnsltLife »

ViktorRay wrote: post #6

There actually is another way that the article doesn’t mention. Separation of power. https://www.c-span.org/clip/senate-committee/user-clip-scali... In the above clip, Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia mentioned the exact same example that the article mentions. That the Soviet Union’s constitution guaranteed many rights that the Soviet Union never actually gave to the people. He says this is because the Soviet Uni…

Separation of powers is what I was thinking too.

That Soviet constitution (like all communist movements that I know of) sounds utopian and unrealistic.

The American Framers, many coming from a worldview that saw humans as inherently sinful and corruptable, built as many safeguards into the system as possible to prevent that human nature from running unchecked.

Re: Shame them, shun them, ban them, beat them

#19

Post by ajkjk »

nh23423fefe wrote: post #16
ajkjk wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nor do I feel the need to, since my goal was only to present the obvious refutation to the (basically fascist) argument I was replying to. Anyway both are self-evident: prosocial enforcement exists because we see it around us every day and stable prosocial systems are good because people pick them, given the choice.

win argument button pressed lol, especially strong when mixed with shifting goal posts

You're thinking of comment threads as some kind of high school debate contest? for some reason?

Re: Shame them, shun them, ban them, beat them

#20

Post by TrnsltLife »

DougN7 wrote: post #17
nh23423fefe wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

violence is a signal to offenders and non offenders. you cant only assess the effect on the direct targets of violence. if i spank my eldest, my youngest behaves better

I’m curious about your age. I don’t think I’ve ever met a person that was grateful to their parents for their beatings, and that was in any way close to them. I’m not claiming in any way that you beat your kids - but violence never creates virtue. Maybe public-facing good behavior at best, but below the surface is a lot of pain looking for a way out.

Maybe the author of Hebrews 12:11

"No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful. Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it."

It's a long-standing trait of adulthood to be able to reflect and integrate the sometimes painful training of childhood as being necessary for producing the mindsets and behaviors of to function in society.

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