> Because when you think about it coldly, it's not obvious why you should care that other people are embarrassing themselves.
It has to do with enforcing and confining oneself to acceptable social behavior, and reinforcing those boundaries for oneself.
As you say, it's involuntary, or instinctive, like many social behaviors.
> On the contrary, people who talk about "cringe" are often fiercely angry at the people making them feel this way.
Aside from blaming them for the discomfort, this is also part of the enforcement aspect.
I find it interesting to consider that empathetic experience can make us hostile and less altruistic, and that this is a common yet little acknowledged phenomenon. To dehumanise, denigrate or expel someone is a way to reconcile empathy felt for them, and sometimes more obvious, accessible, or apparently righteous than altruism.
I think it's a kind of involuntary empathy in a strictly mechanical sense - feeling as if you were that person when you look at them. Because when you think about it coldly, it's not obvious why you should care that other people are embarrassing themselves.
So it's not empathy in the ethical sense. On the contrary, people who talk about "cringe" are often fiercely angry at the people making them feel this way.