[prancer_or_vix]

I think you're overlooking the role that rapport plays in this. If you don't have a rapport (it's a new relationship, for example), one doesn't have that to rely on (this describes a significant portion of online interactions, like this one!).

If one has a solid rapport with someone, and that person says something that one find upsetting, one's much less likely to attribute that behavior to malice, because rapport is just social context.

> Apparently people who are concerned with this are “not willing to accept the effort of empathy”?

I think a more accurate thing to say is that those who are harmed and cannot contextualize it to be reasonable are not willing to enable that harmful behavior by the person that has harmed them. Empathy is just the act of "putting yourself in someone else's shoes to gain respect for their perspective". I can empathize with an asshole and decide that their behavior needs to be called out _despite_ OR _because of_ the context I have for that person (e.g. I might be more likely to call out inappropriate behavior in those with power than in those without power, with whom I might work more closely to come to an understanding privately, as there's really no use kicking someone when they're down).

[Fellshard]

You can't have rapport with a Twitter mob. Individuals, yes, but I've seen time and again when individuals are pressured by the mob until they finally turn on the friend who 'made a mistake' and excoriate them even more fiercely than the mob itself has.

Keep in mind how this CoC change started: it wasn't by a one-on-one rapport with an individual.

And also keep in mind the freezing effect you're having on people new to the industry who need mentorship to help them mature. Sometimes you're screwing up because you're young and need to temper your own tongue.

And sometimes the screw-up isn't actually a screw-up, and a mountain gets made out of a molehill. This is more often the case than anything else, as this entire post demonstrates, and it would be wrong to conclude the premise as part of the argument.