Monday, July 13, 2020
Is Empathy or Logic more important in a Leader?
One of the articles from Room for Debate I chose to read was “Does Empathy Guide or Hinder Moral Action?”. In this article, debaters Paul Bloom and Jamil Zaki argue whether rationale/logic or empathy is the decisive attribute which makes a person “good”. One position on this article by Bloom is that empathy can cause people to pursue “short-sighted and unfair moral actions" and allow bias to influence their actions. On the other hand, Zaki claims that empathy is necessary because it can contribute to positive change, such as arising attention to movements that strive to secure moral principles. For example, it can “jumpstart human care for larger groups”. By reading this article, I can see how there are positive and negatives to each side of the issue. However, which characteristic should be held by a leader: empathy or rationality? For example, should the President rely on logic to take action or empathy to understand the people he is impacting? In the past, if former presidents or powerful leaders were more empathetic, would some of the issues that we face today not be so abundant?
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The characteristics of a leader in my opinion should have both empathy and rationality, although not as much empathy. I wasn't alive when 9/11/2001 happened but when it did, war on terror was declared because of what happened to the towers. The leaders knew empathy that the American people were mad that this happened, but then decided to fight people that weren't involved, leading to unnecessary deaths and those who became war struck. Not as much rationality was put on the subject and emotions were clouding judgement. Feel free to disagree with that, it's just what i think. Empathy is a good characteristic, but rationality and logic should be put first. Another example of too much empathy and lack of rationality proved harmful is when the US closed down flights from China early this year. Of course not all, but a lot of people didn't agree with blocking flights because it was seen as racist, this here showing empathy towards immigrants who want to go to the US. But as cases blew up, people leaned towards more rational thought that yes close all travel to minimize spread of covid-19. So, in my opinion rationality first, but empathy is good in that it allows leaders to know the struggles of regular citizens.
ReplyDeleteCertain aspects of a leader vary from situation to situation and empathy might be beneficial for one problem while logic might be better for another situation down the road but logic is a much better choice because logical conclusion are usually one that weight all the pros and cons of a situation and decide on the best course of action based on that which usually results in the best option for all parties involved.
ReplyDeleteI, as a leader, cannot let emotions rule the environment because I work in an environment where tasks must be accomplished and work must be put out at a rapid pace. If a peer comes up to me and tells me "I'm so tired, can we take a break?" I would decline because being tired is not an excuse when an important task must be finished. Furthermore, that individual person probably isn't the whole class environment so my answer would be no. However, is that not empathy? I assessed that one person wanted to take a break on a project while the rest were still working hard and came to the conclusion that they should keep working for thee betterment of the whole group rather than the individual. I just used empathy without emotions. Clashing empathy and logic is not valid because empathy is being able to see an issue through someone else's eyes while logic is a medium empathy is used through. A better argument would have been whether emotional empathy vs logical empathy being a better trait in a leader. To that, I say logical empathy is better because you can't empathize with every single one of your group members and make all of them happy unless they are literally all the same person. Trying to make everyone happy results in no one being happy and logic ensures everyone is neutral on an issue.
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