It is also a political weapon. It may be non-violent in one domain (the tone and language presentation) but it is very violent in other domains like undermining valid criticisms, changing the conversation so it’s not about the problem but instead filibustered with metaproblems about who is / isn’t being kind in someone’s made up subjective & political definition of verbal discourse.
Just because it says “non-violent” in the name doesn’t mean it’s true. In fact it’s rather suggestive. If you have to be defensive and _define_ your communication as non-violent, that’s pretty suspect and belies dangerous motives.
It’s “politeness theater” in a way similar to how the TSA uses security theater. You can _say_ it’s effective for a stated purpose all you want, but that doesn’t make it true.