It’s Not Moral Outrage. What You’re Feeling Is Empathetic Anger.
And there’s nothing wrong with it.
My aunt loves outrage porn.
She gets outraged when there’s no Santa on the Starbucks cups, or there’s too many satanic images in a Disney reboot, or when they replace James Bond with a black woman. She complains about socialism and free handouts, even though her daughter collects disability checks. Like most of us, she expresses her outrage on the internet.
In real life, she’s downright cheerful.
Here’s the thing:
Nothing she gets outraged over has the slightest impact on her well-being. In person, she’s always smiling. She has a good life.
(She’s also vaccinated.)
So what gives?
Let’s talk about moral outrage.
There’s an objective way to define moral outrage. Psychologists Stefanie Hechler and Thomas Kessler describe it as the anger we feel when someone violates our moral code, our sense of right and wrong.
Outrage focuses on intention and wrongfulness. It’s not really about the actual harm someone does to anyone.
You don’t have to hurt anyone to provoke outrage.
