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Jack comments on A Suite of Pragmatic Considerations in Favor of Niceness - Less Wrong
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You can often give criticism and be nice. We should do that whenever possible. If it isn't possible to share the criticism without being mean then, by all means, be mean. Being nice is a good thing. But it isn't as important as sharing criticism. So don't sacrifice the latter for the former.
Okay, I get it. Thanks for your patience.
I think some people aren't capable of this, actually. I think some people find it extremely difficult to formulate forthright criticism after the "be nice" ethos has been driven into them and the community they're part of.
This hypothesis ("some people find it extremely difficult, etc.") seems awfully vague to me, i.e. hard to disprove.
Can you give an example of a community which comprises such people, who find it difficult to criticize others because "the 'be nice' ethos has been driven into them" ? I find that people in general will criticize others all too easily.
What I suspect - and this may be a legitimate argument against "niceness" - is that it could be slightly too convenient an excuse that someone is being "nice" to avoid criticizing themselves very harshly. As such, I can see how "being nice" could turn out to be a source of bias.
However, it would be easily countered in an individual by adopting an attitude of "be nice to others, unforgiving to myself". This would even be compatible with Crocker's Rules.
The one thing that might worry me (and I worry that I've seen it firsthand) is "niceness" as a favorable breeding ground for group self-validation.
I think we would be better advised to address this directly than to give up on niceness.