Niceness is Cruel, Evil, and Dangerous

From a young age children are taught to be nice, often as a corrective for not-nice behavior, which typically runs the gamut from schoolyard bullying to refusing to say “thank you” when offered a gift or treat.

These two actions are vastly different. In most cases, bullying is a positive action intending to define and solidify social relationships according to the established social order of the schoolyard. This social order is inherently one in which might makes right, resulting in negative externalities.

To combat this, parents and teachers in societies that reject social Darwinism correct bullying so that, outside of the space of the schoolyard, social order is maintained. Encouraging children to be nice is one such tool — it is thus a way to modify a natural competitive social order found in nature, in which outcomes are determined mostly by strength (but also by other virtues secondarily such as guile).

One tool to correct this bullying is “niceness”, although its effectiveness in correcting child behavior is questionable.

Niceness extends from this basic function — to correct the animalistic drive to let those with the most power win — and its connection to both Judeochristian ethics and what Nietzsche calls a slave morality should be self-evident.

Niceness works both on the schoolyard and off because it discourages disruption to the larger social order by an agent working to establish positionality within a smaller social order.

The function of niceness, inherently, works towards maintaining the vector of the status quo.

Put more plainly, niceness reaffirms the status quo.

If we encourage niceness, we encourage obedience.

Is not niceness, well, nice? Consider the story of a woman who enters a taxi and, when the taxi driver goes in the wrong direction, she feels it would be too rude to point this out.

The taxi driver’s goal is not to get the woman to her destination, and the woman’s niceness is a vector of risk for her.

The taxi driver, as a bad actor, knows that society encourages niceness, and leverages this to his own end.

Niceness with bad actors is dangerous and unwise.

What about good actors? Another taxi driver is friendly, cheerful, and provides a good service to the woman. As thanks, she gives the taxi driver a 25% tip, and she does this because she thinks it is “nice”.

It is not nice. It is responding in kind, and responding in kind has been shown to be the most successful strategy in game theory.

The idea is simple: one’s first action should be to cooperate, and one responds in kind at the second and each subsequent action but modified with a margin of forgiveness (Veritasium has a very good video on this idea).

This results in the best outcome for both players in the game over the long term, and suggests a simple strategy for life: be nice until others are not nice, give a little bit of leeway, and then respond with not-niceness.

Niceness, then, is not inherently good for individual actors or for society but is a wise strategy to get the outcome you want.

Notice how we are now talking about individual instances of nice actions as strategies in a game, which is very different from niceness as a moral prescription. It is not moral or immoral to kill a character in a video game — they are actions chosen towards the goal of progressing in the game.

Niceness is provisionally effective strategy but not a moral good of its own.

Niceness as a moral idea does away with strategizing completely and asserts that being nice is itself a virtue not towards an end but as an end itself. Therefore, the claim goes, it is a worthy action for all people at all times, although it may be a lesser virtue to other virtues (e.g. survival), which is why it may not be nice to kill a person, but it is still virtuous to do the not-nice act of murder if it results in self preservation, the preservation of the lives of others, etc.

However, there are many confounding variables here in which some societies will argue that, in fact, one should still be nice. Grin and bear it. Close your eyes and think of England. For God and Country.

Some might object here that I am talking about an inauthentic niceness — this is what ChatGPT complained when I presented this idea to it, saying:

“1. **Authentic Niceness**: Authentic niceness is characterized by actions and expressions of kindness that are genuinely reflective of an individual’s personal values, beliefs, and dispositions. This form of niceness is not motivated by external rewards or social approval but is an inherent aspect of the person’s character. For instance, a person who helps others out of a deep sense of empathy and compassion, regardless of whether the action is noticed or rewarded, is exhibiting authentic niceness. Philosophers might link this to the concept of virtue ethics, where such behavior is a manifestation of a virtuous character.

2. **Inauthentic Niceness**: In contrast, inauthentic niceness involves kind actions that are performed for reasons other than genuine care or empathy. This could include actions motivated by a desire for personal gain, social recognition, or to manipulate others. For example, being nice to someone in order to gain favor, to create an image of oneself as a kind person, or to avoid conflict would be considered inauthentic. This form of niceness is essentially a kind of performance or facade that does not truly reflect the individual’s internal moral state or beliefs.”

There are many problems with this, especially the axiomatic belief that authenticity both exists and can be known by a first-party and observed by a third-party. In particular, authentic niceness is defined as a manifestation of “genuine values and beliefs”.

I do not have sufficient faith in my fellow man to believe that he knows his genuine values and beliefs, nor do I think that genuineness — if it is even knowable — also equates to better. A genuine belief that Nazism is good is very likely less beneficial to the individual and society in the present than a disgenuine belief that Nazism is bad.

At the very least, a disgenuine belief that Nazism is bad will result in more nice treatment of Jews such as myself than a genuine belief that Nazism is good. This inauthentic niceness is more preferable than the authentic niceness if our goal is more utility.

Keeping this criticism to the side, let us also remember that nice actions can be committed by philosophy zombies. In fact, the education of nice behavior in children precedes the education of empathy because empathy is very difficult and takes a long time to learn.

Furthermore, if we define empathy as the capacity to feel the emotions of others, it does not necessarily follow that empathy results in nicer behavior.

I can feel your pain and still want you to feel pain.

If niceness is not grounded in empathy and not in authentic beliefs or values, what then is it?

As a rubric of asserting specific forms of behavior over other forms of behavior without specifying content, it is much like the rules of John Searle’s Chinese room applied to ethics.

It is the education of executing the forms of good behavior without defining its content or meaning.

Niceness is formulaic and programmatic.

Niceness is a zombie behavior.

Empathy is not necessary to execute niceness.

Niceness is not empathetic.

Taken to its extreme (“be nice to everyone at all times”), niceness is the most zombie of behaviors.

At a social level, niceness is a useful tool to maintain social order.

At the individual level, niceness is a useful default in most games with good faith actors, especially games that are zero-sum at one point but non-zero sum across a time series.

Most people think the opposite of niceness is cruelty; actually, its opposite is justice.

Niceness is a particularly useful tool for the powerful and a particularly dangerous risk vector for the less powerful.

It is no surprise that nice guys finish last.

Nice guys are cruel.

Women should both fear and loathe nice guys.

Both men and women should have contempt for nice guys and their willingness to act like philosophical zombies.

Nice people are not introspective.

Niceness is a symptom of a lack of empathy and thought.

Niceness encourages good actors to be enslaved to the expectations of strangers and the obligations of a society whose ultimate goals are not ipso facto those of any one individual.

Niceness enables bad actors and perpetuates fraud, violence, and genocide.

Neville Chamberlain is a famous nice man. Winston Churchill was an asshole.

If you want to help others, make society a better place, and boost overall happiness/utility in society, you should not be nice.

Instead, act based on your will to power.

Use your will to power to find and create non-zero-sum games that enable others to realize their own will to power.

The most pious sentence in the English language is “fuck you”.