[yummyfajitas]

I think cognitive empathy (knowing what others feel) is the technical term for what you call "therapist empathy", as opposed to affective empathy (feeling what others feel).

Cognitive empathy would be more about recognizing that the pain felt by racists is real pain. Of course, then an unpleasant moral dilemma arises - should we take such pain seriously? Traditional appeals to empathy say no, since we have no affective empathy for racists (they are far more out-group than blacks). But is that correct?

[technopath]

Hmmm, ok, so I think cognitive empathy probably subsumes affective empathy, with safeguards to stop you from getting overwhelmed by it. [edit: Or at least therapists do both of these things.]

Good question. I think therapists have an obligation to treat racists without prejudice. I've read a few papers written about the treatment of repulsive clients. Many times just by listening to and validating pain, the pain will shift and the defense - which may well be racism - will fall apart. So then I think the question is, is malignant racism only ever acceptable as a symptom of a deeper problem? I probably would be okay if the answer here was yes. (Unlike homosexuality, for example, because unlike racism, even if you construed homosexuality to be a defense, it's much harder to show that it's an unhealthy defense that actually hurts anyone.)