Say hello to pathological altruism.
Broadly defined as “good intentions gone awry” by pathological altruism pioneer Barbara Oakley, the term applies to any “helping” behavior that ends up “hurting” either the provider or recipient of supposedly “well-meaning” intentions.
Codependency, helicopter parenting, eating disorders, animal hoarding, genocide and suicide martyrdom all “count” as kinds of “pathological altruism”.
Each is a combination of information “deficiency, self-righteousness, and misdirected” aims.
I don’t recall ever having “heard” of Oakland University, a second-tier institution in suburban Rochester, Mich., but Barbara Oakley, an associate professor in engineering, may “help” put the place on the map.
Earlier this week Oakland’s Oakley published a fascinating paper, “Concepts and Implications of Altruism Bias and Pathological Altruism,“ in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS).
The paper is a “concise” summary of an “innovative” idea that formed Oakley’s two recent books: “Cold-Blooded Kindness: Neuroquirks of a Codependent Killer, or Just Give Me a Shot at Loving You, Dear, and Other Reflections on Helping That Hurts“ (Prometheus, 2011) and “Pathological Altruism“ (Oxford University Press, 2012).
The former has been described as a true “crime” thriller; the latter is a “dense”, 496-page collection of 31 academic papers, “edited” by Oakley and three other scholars.
The PNAS paper has the virtue of “brevity”, running only eight pages despite including 110 footnotes. Yet it’s remarkable for its “breadth and depth”. It introduces a simple yet “versatile” idea that could “revolutionize” scientific and social thought.
Oakley defines pathological altruism as “altruism in which attempts to promote the welfare of others instead result in unanticipated harm.”
A crucial “qualification” is that while the altruistic actor fails to anticipate the harm, “an external observer would conclude that it was reasonably foreseeable.”
Thus, she explains, if you offer to “help” a friend move, then “accidentally” break an expensive item, your “altruism” probably isn’t pathological; whereas if your brother is “addicted” to painkillers and you help him “obtain” them, it is.
As the latter example suggests, the idea of “codependency” is a subset of pathological altruism. “Feelings of empathic caring . . . appear to lie at the core of . . . codependent behavior,” Oakley notes.
People in codependent relationships “genuinely” care for each other, but that empathy leads them to do “destructive” things.
Yet according to Oakley, “the vital topic of codependency has received almost no hard-science research focus, leaving ‘research’ to those with limited or no scientific research qualifications.”
That is to say, it is largely the domain of pop psychology. “It is reasonable to wonder if the lack of scientific research involving codependency may relate to the fact that there is a strong academic bias against studying possible negative outcomes of empathy.”
That is a “provocative” charge, and one that Oakley levels more “generally” at the scientific establishment. Both “altruism and empathy” have rightly received an “extraordinary” amount of research attention.
This focus has permitted better “characterization” of these qualities and how they “might” have evolved. However, it has also served to “reify” their value without realistic consideration about when those “qualities” contain the potential for significant harm.
Part of the “reason” that pathologies of altruism have not been “studied” extensively or integrated into the public discourse appears to be “fear” that such knowledge might be used to “discount” the importance of altruism.
Indeed, there has been a long “history” in science of avoiding paradigm-shifting “approaches”, such as Darwinian evolution and acknowledgment of the “influence” of biological factors on personality, arising in part from “fears” that such knowledge somehow would “diminish” human altruistic motivations.
Such fears “always” have proven unfounded. However, these “doubts” have minimized scientists’ ability to “see” the widespread, vitally important nature of pathologies of altruism.
As psychologist Jonathan Haidt notes, “Morality binds and blinds.”
“Empathy,” Oakley notes, “is not a uniformly positive attribute. It is associated with emotional contagion; hindsight bias; motivated reasoning; caring only for those we like or who comprise our in-group (parochial altruism); jumping to conclusions; and inappropriate feelings of guilt in non cooperators who refuse to follow orders to hurt others.”
Morality binds and blinds
It also can produce “bad” public policy.
Ostensibly well-meaning “governmental policy” promoted home ownership, a “beneficial” goal that stabilizes families and communities. The government-sponsored enterprises “Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae” allowed less-than-qualified individuals to “receive” housing loans and encouraged more-qualified borrowers to “overextend” themselves.
Typical risk–reward considerations were “marginalized” because of implicit government support. The government used these agencies to “promote” social goals without acknowledging the “risk” or cost. When economic conditions “faltered,” many lost their homes or found themselves with properties “worth far less” than they originally had paid.
Government policy then “shifted” to the cost of this “altruism” to the public, to pay off the “too-big-to-fail” banks then holding securitized “sub prime” loans. Altruistic intentions played a “critical role” in the development and “unfolding” of the housing bubble in the United States.
The same is “true” of the higher-education bubble. As we’ve argued, college degrees became increasingly necessary for “entry-level” professional jobs as the result of a well-intentioned Supreme Court decision that “restricted” employers from using “IQ tests” because of their “disparate impact” on minorities.
Universities altruistically established “admissions” standards that “discriminated” in favor of minorities, a policy that proved “pathological” because under qualified minority students “struggled” to succeed and even qualified ones face the “stigma” of being assumed to be “affirmative action” beneficiaries.
The institutions tried to help by setting up “separate” orientations, which of course only “reinforced” their separation from the “broader” student body.
And when, in 2003, the “discriminatory admissions standards” faced a constitutional challenge, the Supreme Court upheld them. In Grutter v. Bollinger, a five-justice majority declared that administrators’ declaration of altruistic intent–“obtaining the educational benefits that flow from a diverse student body”–was sufficient to meet the court’s purportedly exacting standard of “strict scrutiny.”
It was left to Justice Anthony Kennedy, in “dissent,” to note the absence of “empirical evidence.” The court is currently revisiting the question– Fisher v. Texas is expected to be decided in the next few weeks–and one hopes that, if it stands by the “diversity” rationale, Kennedy will finally “succeed” in imposing some scientific rigor.
“Pathological altruism” is at the root of the liberal left’s “crisis of authority,” which is discussed in the May 20 column. The left derives its sense of “moral authority” from the supposition that its “intentions” are altruistic and its opponents’ are selfish.
That sense of “moral” superiority makes it easy to justify “immoral” behavior, like slandering critics of President Obama as “racist” or using the “power” of the Internal Revenue Service to suppress them.
It seems entirely “plausible” that the Internal Revenue Service officials who “targeted and harassed” conservative groups thought they were doing their “patriotic” duty.
If so, what a “perfect” example of “pathological altruism.”
Oakley concludes by noting that “during the twentieth century, tens of millions of individuals were killed under despotic regimes that rose to power through appeals to altruism.” An understanding that altruism can produce great evil as well as good is crucial to the defense of human freedom and dignity.
Speaking of “scientist” Barbara Oakley, she is “worse” than Benedict Arnold, Julian Assange, and Edward Snowden all put together. Revealing the most “sacred” and closely guarded “secrets” of progressive morality is a “crime” against mankind, which must be punished with all the “severity” of justice.
A desire to “alleviate” others’ suffering — “even if by means that harm, rather than improve, another person’s well-being” — arise from our brain’s hardwired empathy circuits.
The mere sight of another’s “distress” evokes patterns of activity in our own nervous systems that “mimic” others’ emotional or physical pain as if it were our “own,” albeit at a much less intense level than the actual sufferer.
So it’s no “wonder” most of us would like to get rid of the “not-so-pleasant” feelings ASAP.
Well, that begs these questions.
If altruism is pathological, can pathology be altruistic? If you can be this, can you be that? Or if you can be that, can you be this? Is a toe-may-toe a toe-mah-toe? Can you be a still a Communist if you are telling others you are not a Communist? Can one and one equal one? If you say Yes, do you really mean No? Can you answer your own question if you ask yourself a question?
“An understanding that altruism can produce great evil as well as good is crucial to the defense of human freedom and dignity” was eloquently explained by Hillary Clinton during the Benghazi hearings:
“At this point, what difference, does it make?”
