Man, "empathy is important" is such a weird thing to not have consensus on, I had to Google it. Two of the top autocompletes for "empathy is" for me were "overrated" and "bad."

So, you aren't the only ones thinking it. But it's highly unconvincing to me. Isn't it reasonable to suspect that this pushback against empathy is coming from defensiveness? (I mean in general, not accusing anyone of anything.)

Accepting everyone as part of the human family (or in this setting, the sophont family) and treating them as such is the source of moral and ethical codes to begin with. Putting your code before your fellowship is getting things backwards and is prone to justifying the unjustifiable.