Figure 1:

A. Power

B. Ostensible Victim

C. Scapegoat

Z. Desire for power

X. Partial acquisition of power, impetus to continue victimage mechanism.

Y. Unjust castigation, or antagonization of actual victim.

V. Reprisal by the victim, causing the ostensible victim to appear as the victim, helping them to acquire power. 

There is nothing more terrible than not seeing your hand in the creation of your own horror. In the above figure, what is visible is the mechanism by which individuals are scapegoated, disabused, ostracized, marked, and thrown into the equivocator’s cycle; the cycle of gas lighting, muddying the water, and the whims of the narcissist.

To understand how this occurs, we must start with a basic observation and assumption about reality: Mankind wants power, but one thing that ultimately corrupts is power (i.e. No Man can handle power). From the Ring of Gyges, to the desires of Sauron, to the exorcism of Man from Paradise, or to every emperor vying for world domination, what is perennially known is that no mortal, nor capricious being is capable of wielding power without — by that power — being corrupted. To deny this would be to subject one’s self to the very mechanism that would corrupt them in the first place; as such, the proof of this premise’s truth is in the pudding.

Secondly, what can be discerned from any instance where one individual is lacking and another is not is that, the one that is not lacking has more than the other. Simple enough, right? But what if the one that had gave to the one that did not, because they had empathy for the one that was lacking? As a result, the one that is lacking acquires, at least partially, what the other has in their pocket. The beggar is well aware of this, as is the welfare fraud recipient, even the alimony queen. To suggest the invalidity of the force of empathy as a mechanism to acquire power would be to deny the reality of the aforementioned particulars, and because the aforementioned particulars evidently exist, we cannot deny that this mechanism, through which those that are lacking acquire something, exists. I.e. (when one is vulnerable, if others empathize with them, they are granted powers.)

When these two arguments are combined, we derive a conclusion that does, or will follow from it: ostensible vulnerability is a mechanism to acquire power that one cannot handle.  In particular, for large groups of people to act out this mimetic process, or for a group that holds power to perpetuate their supposed vulnerability, the dynamic instantiated in figure 1 occurs. The ostensible victim desires power, they antagonize, or unjustly castigate their mark, causing them to rebuke the ostensible victim, “B,” which allows, “B,” to use their victim’s response to justify an empathic reaction from others to garner control, or power. The empathy of those that afford them power is the ignorant, or (far too often) willfully ignorant response by others who wish to be compassionate but do not understand the difference between Compassion and Empathy.

When discerning between Compassion and Empathy, the important difference to recognize is that the former compels the observer to put themselves in the shoes of both the ostensible victim and the actual victim. In doing so, the observer should, etymologically speaking, feel for both, recognizing the manipulative and malicious nature of the ostensible victim and the literal victimization of the actual victim. If the observer were to merely empathize with the ostensible victim, they would not put themselves in the shoes of either, so to speak, but simply see things as they appear to be; if the ostensible victim appears as the victim, and appearance is enough to garner them power, or support, the ostensible victim will receive what they are aiming for; i.e. acquire power through the victimization of someone by framing them as the source of their apparent impotency.

Examples of this mimetic process are myriad; it only takes a modicum of compassion to recognize the reality of its existence. 

Argument Key:

Premise 1: No Man can handle power.

Premise 2: When one is vulnerable, if others empathize with them, they are granted powers.

Conclusion: Ostensible vulnerability is a mechanism to acquire power that one cannot handle.