Is ‘people pleasing’ actually fuelling fascism?
While silence might sometimes be golden, speaking up can be the diamond-bladed tool needed to cut through lies and apathy, says Amy Kean. Mealy-mouthed acquiescence may seem appropriate to keep the peace, but holding your tongue is only fuelling the negative noise.
Imagine you’re sitting in a waiting room. Perhaps you’re waiting to see the doctor about a worrying case of athlete’s foot.
Maybe you’re waiting to audition for the part of Maria in a local production of West Side Story. Or perhaps you’re in a waiting room waiting to be let into another waiting room, which is the real waiting room, and inside that waiting room is a mischievous sprite creature, who is also waiting. Waiting to set you three riddles which, if you cannot solve, will spark your untimely demise. Just picture whatever feels realistic.
You’re in a waiting room, waiting with lots of other people, and all of a sudden the room fills with smoke. “Oh, shit!,” you think.
You’re in a waiting room, waiting with lots of other people, and all of a sudden the room fills with smoke. “Oh, shit!,” you think. “The room’s filling up with smoke!” Panic mode activated, your pulse races. You look to others around the room and, to your total confusion, no one else is reacting at all. Not a peep.

Above: People would rather allow a room to fill with smoke than 'make a scene'.
The alarmed thoughts continue bouncing around your head like a tween on a pogo stick but the less these people react, the less you react. “If smoke filling the room was a big deal, everyone here would say something, or do something,” you think. “I don’t want to scare anyone.” So you stay silent until, eventually, you worry less. You remain in your seat in that busy smoke-filled waiting room, each of you sitting stationary in your chairs, until you inevitably choke to death.
We’re socially programmed to behave. We don’t like to ruffle feathers, do we? No one wants to be labeled the bad apple. The sour puss.
In this situation, only 10% of people would leave the room. Don’t believe me? Well maybe you’ll believe Bibb Latane and John Darley who conducted a psychological experiment in 1968 called The Smokey Room. They put different sized groups of research participants and secret actors into a room that quickly filled with smoke. When the participants were alone, most (75%) raised an alarm, but when they were surrounded by non-responsive actors, they just… let it happen.
It’s the perfect demonstration of diffused responsibility: the more people there are in an emergency situation, the less likely any one individual is to act and the greater the likelihood they’ll remain a bystander. Why does this happen? Well, it’s complicated. We’re socially programmed to behave. We don’t like to ruffle feathers, do we? No one wants to be labeled the bad apple. The sour puss. The anomaly. Despite our best intentions, the majority of human beings just want to be accepted. Even in life or death scenarios.

Above: Despite our best intentions, no one wants to be the odd one out.
The 50s, 60s and 70s saw a bunch of dubious psychological studies that interrogated that one perplexing concept: obedience. Academics wanted to answer the question that will haunt the world forever. How the did the Nazis do it? How was it possible for an entire nation to become so complicit in the murder of so many millions? Why didn’t people speak up?
Most of us believe we’re good souls, but most people don’t actually speak up. Not at work, not on the street, not in war, or genocide, and especially not in experiments. Whether it was Milgram’s electric shocks, or the The Hofling Hospital Experiment (in which nurses were asked to - and delivered - fatal doses of an unknown drug to fake patients), when faced with a pressured situation the majority do what they are told. They will preserve themselves, prioritising their safety and social status above all else.
Most of us believe we’re good souls, but most people don’t actually speak up. Not at work, not on the street, not in war, or genocide.
Interestingly, participants who ‘did the wrong thing’ in these research studies suffered mentally for the rest of their lives at the dark realisation they’d conform in the face of moral crisis. But in the moment, they just wanted to please. In 1950 the sociologist Adorno and his pals described the “authoritarian personality” - people who love rules and instructions and social norms to such an extent they will ostracise those who are different. These people are a gift to evil politicians. But there’s another, less overt personality type that’s ultimately just as destructive.

Above: Sometimes it's the seemingly nice people, the people-pleasers, who do the most harm.
The nice. “Nice people made the best Nazis,” said the writer Naomi Shulman. “My mom grew up next to them. They got along, refused to make waves, looked the other way when things got ugly and focused on happier things than ‘politics’. They were lovely people who turned their heads as their neighbors were dragged away. You know who weren’t nice people? Resisters.”
The people pleaser wears their goodness like an antique brooch, dressing their self-diagnosed pathological condition up as niceness.
I’ve always been suspicious of exceptionally nice people; those who go to great lengths to tell you how nice they are. Ever since the #BeKind movement puked its way into the mainstream, this idea of being nice has mutated into a social monster. The label ‘people pleaser’ entered popular culture and spread like smoke in a tiny room. Otherwise known as Sociotropy (an excessive investment in interpersonal relationships and strong need for social acceptance) it’s common, with 54% of women exhibiting these behaviours, and 40% of men.
The people pleaser wears their goodness like an antique brooch, dressing their self-diagnosed pathological condition up as niceness. It’s the art of not saying what you think, never rocking the boat, wearing a smile, handing out biscuits, and ensuring everybody around you feels comfortable, sometimes to the detriment of your own psychological safety.
But underneath the surface it’s not pure altruism, it's anxiety and self preservation disguised as selflessness. The primal fear of being disliked, disapproved of, or (even worse) being called difficult. It’s the invisible masking tape on the mouth that stops people from saying “Hang on, this feels a bit suss,” whether we’re in a smoky office or an ethically dank political regime. The people pleaser is a martyr. Yet, who are they pleasing?

Above: The 'the spiral of silence' sees people stay silent on important issues because they believe their peers don't care about these issues either.
In times of peace, people pleasers are fine, of course. They can crack on taking notes in meetings and giving half-truths as feedback in appraisals. But during a terrifying period in which rights are being taken away from the most vulnerable in society, from illegal abortions to the trans right to exist, and when fascism is a genuine rising global threat, the people pleasers are bystanders we need more from. In the UK just last week, Reform saw a painful amount of success, winning 677 seats out of a possible 1600 in the local elections. Two thirds of voters didn’t vote.
Our voices have never mattered more, yet we’ve never used them less. 76% of British people haven’t taken part in a protest, and 73% don’t think they even work.
I’ve never seen regular people speak less. Speak less about Palestine, speak less about the climate, speak less about the wrongdoings of ridiculous institutions like the Royal Family or speak less about the wave of violence against women. Dr Sandra Geiger at Princeton University calls this 'the spiral of silence', in which 89% of people care about issues facing the planet and society, but believe their peers do not, and so stay silent. Because no one else is speaking out, the 89% believe that they are in the minority.
“It’s not my place,” they say.
“I don’t want the confrontation.”
“I don’t want to stick my neck out.”
Our voices have never mattered more, yet we’ve never used them less. 76% of British people haven’t taken part in a protest, and 73% don’t think they even work. The trouble with people pleasing is that it teaches us to self-censor; muting ourselves even when something feels wrong, because we don't want to be that person. The one who makes things awkward. The one who sends the “just flagging this” email.
So we edit, rephrase, and we let it go. Multiply this across a workplace, a society, a nation, and suddenly you’ve got mass agreement with things nobody actually agrees with. Fascism doesn't always need force, sometimes all it needs is a nation of people who’d rather be liked than loud.

Above: Sometimes you need to be loud, even if you don't think people want to hear what you have to say.
Dr Martin Luther King said as much, and often. In particular, he took legitimate issue with “the white moderate who is more devoted to ‘order’ than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says ‘I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I can't agree with your methods of direct action’.” This is an issue as old as time, yet it persists. I AM NOT CALLING PEOPLE PLEASERS NAZIS. But when you keep the peace, whose peace are you keeping? What if the ‘peace’ is actually killing people?
They told us the best way to be in life is obedient. It’s not. It’s not to passively please thy neighbour, it’s calling the police when your neighbour’s being burgled.
If you’re a people pleaser, I see you. I love you. But now is the time for you to resist! Screw being nice. The world needs you to get some gall. All of us are sitting in that weird waiting room between birth and death trying to do the best we can, but now the smoke is pouring in and it’s time to scream.
I know you want to be good, but they tricked us! They told us the best way to be in life is obedient. It’s not. It’s not to passively please thy neighbour, it’s calling the police when your neighbour’s being burgled. It’s sticking your leg out so the burglar trips. Because the thing is: being honest with people, speaking up and refusing to be a bystander are actually pretty likeable behaviours, in the right context.
You want people to like you? Fight Nazis, before everything goes up in flames. It’s the ultimate act of self-preservation.