L
Lebensmüder
Soon to be deleted account
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- Joined
- Aug 21, 2018
- Posts
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One response always gets me when people talk about Nice Guys is the following:
"They were never nice in the first place, because they wanted something back!"
Even if that was true, why should this be morally reprehensible? Everyone acts like that. Ultimately, all actions can be traced back to selfish desires - even something as seemingly selfless as donating money to homeless people.
If you take a closer look at the necessary weighing of benefits/disadvantages you will see that the man donating the money pays a very small material price for enormous emotional gratification (e.g. thinking that he is a good person who did his part in improving the life quality of that homeless person by a small margin although this is definetely not the case), ultimately all actions are only performed because the acting person thinks that these actions will maximize their own emotional wellbeing. In the cost-benefit-analysis between different people the factors taken into account vary and also the weighings of the same factors vary - but in the end everyone acts in that way whether he consciously knows it or not.
Furthermore, reciprocity is the absolute basis of normal social interactions. You do something and you want something back - quid pro quo basically. If you gain nothing by being nice, why should you be nice? Basically Tit For Tat from the Prisoner's Dilemma/Game Theory: At first you are nice and give your partner a chance and then you emulate his behavior. If he is nice, you are nice, if he is not you are not. By acting that way you act in the most efficient possible manner for maximizing your own wellbeing. Simply speaking: Why should you want to be nice to someone who only takes and takes and never gives something back? Behaving in such a manner would be highly naive and illogical.
Furthermore: Even if you say that everything above is false/wrong, why can't you admit that sometimes a genuinely nice person can become frustrated and say something "bad" (from your perspective) because he was pushed over the edge, why are fundamental axioms of the human psyche simply ignored when an ugly male behaves in a certain manner? Turning the other cheek after years and years of bullshit without becoming frustrated and keeping a happy face is simply impossible, patience always has limits. You demand superhuman efforts from others which you would be unable to perform. It's not like in the movies where someone who constantly gets dealt a shit hand in life reamins an innocent, little angel with a heart of gold, years and years of shit can take their toll on you and can/will lead to feelings of resentment/anger/contempt even if you start out as genuinely nice.
"They were never nice in the first place, because they wanted something back!"
Even if that was true, why should this be morally reprehensible? Everyone acts like that. Ultimately, all actions can be traced back to selfish desires - even something as seemingly selfless as donating money to homeless people.
If you take a closer look at the necessary weighing of benefits/disadvantages you will see that the man donating the money pays a very small material price for enormous emotional gratification (e.g. thinking that he is a good person who did his part in improving the life quality of that homeless person by a small margin although this is definetely not the case), ultimately all actions are only performed because the acting person thinks that these actions will maximize their own emotional wellbeing. In the cost-benefit-analysis between different people the factors taken into account vary and also the weighings of the same factors vary - but in the end everyone acts in that way whether he consciously knows it or not.
Furthermore, reciprocity is the absolute basis of normal social interactions. You do something and you want something back - quid pro quo basically. If you gain nothing by being nice, why should you be nice? Basically Tit For Tat from the Prisoner's Dilemma/Game Theory: At first you are nice and give your partner a chance and then you emulate his behavior. If he is nice, you are nice, if he is not you are not. By acting that way you act in the most efficient possible manner for maximizing your own wellbeing. Simply speaking: Why should you want to be nice to someone who only takes and takes and never gives something back? Behaving in such a manner would be highly naive and illogical.
Furthermore: Even if you say that everything above is false/wrong, why can't you admit that sometimes a genuinely nice person can become frustrated and say something "bad" (from your perspective) because he was pushed over the edge, why are fundamental axioms of the human psyche simply ignored when an ugly male behaves in a certain manner? Turning the other cheek after years and years of bullshit without becoming frustrated and keeping a happy face is simply impossible, patience always has limits. You demand superhuman efforts from others which you would be unable to perform. It's not like in the movies where someone who constantly gets dealt a shit hand in life reamins an innocent, little angel with a heart of gold, years and years of shit can take their toll on you and can/will lead to feelings of resentment/anger/contempt even if you start out as genuinely nice.