Thoughts on living right.

[Harmless]

Oh no, I think I was just confused on the wording on the earlier post at first. It makes more sense now.

It does make sense, respecting the wishes of the person who died.

What if that circumstance was not present though?

[nin10mode]

If you're close enough to that person, you wouldn't need to physically hear their wishes, would you?

[Harmless]

Oops, I don't think I made my question clear enough, sorry. I meant, what if they did have some vengeance in themselves, but were still a close friend?

[nin10mode]

At that point, that doesn't coincide with my morals, so I can't say.

[Harmless]

Ah.

What about when it should come with Judicial matters though? As far as I'm concerned, our Prison system is starting to become a Criminal College if anything - criminals who have already had records of criminal activity are sent there, then released to do more. Right now our most common sentence is spending years in Jail, but that doesn't stop them from keeping a criminal mind and wanting to do criminal activities.

Would it makes sense to start giving out more death penalties to help prevent them from doing any more acts, and to free up the space in our jails? Or would that just inspire vengeance?

[nin10mode]

For the sake of this thread's title, I'm going to have to stop you there.

I'll PM you my thoughts instead.
Moral of the story, try your best not to spread any negative feelings.

[Harmless]

I was legitimately curious, I swear I had no negative intentions or anything. :/

Though I guess we did kinda go off topic.

[Doram]

No, I don't think it is really off topic. It is a legitimate question. Is there ever a time or situation when this is not true? Is there a limit to this advice? I say no. There is no limit.

Part of my point is this: No. You should never, ever, ever, ever, ever, ACT on any desire to take revenge on someone, no matter what they have done. (Feeling is automatic. Action is a choice.) To do that, simply creates or reinforces a cycle of violence. Ultimately, whoever you take vengeance on (be it beating them up, killing them, or merely extra loudly campaigning to have them get the maximum sentencing through legal means), has relatives and loved ones that will be angry at you, no matter how justified you are, and then want to take vengeance on you, which will require your loved ones to defend you, and theirs, back and forth, until someone decides to say NO MORE. That person can be you.

This has spiraled out of control countless times in history, and is at the root of pretty much every war. And war is what it amounts to, no matter what scale you are talking about. They hurt you, you hurt them back, they hurt you back again, around and around and around. This whole cycle is dependent on one thing, and one thing only. Justifying violence through the concept of revenge in all it's forms, from mild retaliation to war to crusades for "justice". The only possible result of a policy of an-eye-for-an-eye is a world full of blind people. Part of my point is that there should NEVER be a justification for violence.

Aside from my main point of the circular nature of such things, there are also many other ways to look at this where it is easy to see the correct conclusion. Part of this can be looked at from a purely logical point of view: You only have 24 hours in a day, and you can only really do one major thing at a time. You can spend your time being constructive in some way (go to school, go to work, help somebody), or you can spend your time being violent in some way (be mean or grumpy in any way, try to get revenge on someone in any way, sabotage, manipulate, or otherwise oppress someone). Which would be the wiser choice? Another useful logic train goes like this. If it is death of a loved one we are talking about, will taking revenge make them feel better? No. It can't. They're dead. Will it make you feel better? Perhaps for a moment, unless you really enjoy violence, in which case you have more problems than just needing to get some vengeance. Otherwise, you will have to deal with the repercussions of your actions, from going to jail after killing them, to suffering other bounce-back vengeance from your "victim's" family. And there are other bits of wisdom that point the correct way, like "Be the better man.", "Don't stoop to their level. Otherwise you're no better than them." and similar things...

For a final point of view on this, let's look at the animal kingdom. For animals, who have neither language nor advanced logic and understanding, violence is their only tool. They kill for food, they kill for protection, they kill for survival. If one animal hurts another, there is going to be a fight. If one pushes too far, they'll wind up dead. They can't talk it out. They can't reason it out. They can only fight it out. It's just how things work there. Now, as we are descended from the animal kingdom, we have inherited a bit of this mentality, so it is very natural for the instinct to be strong to meet violence with violence. HOWEVER, we ARE possessed of more advanced tools to understand and solve our problems, like self awareness, reason and logic, and empathy, much less language. And by the gods, if we have the tools, we should use them. We created them for a reason, we should use them as often as possible. It is how we have differentiated ourselves from our ancestors, and we should continue the project if our goal is to keep evolving in a positive direction. And evolving in a positive direction should be our goal, since the alternative is self destruction.

So, no. If you REALLY think about it, there is NEVER a situation where revenge or retaliation of any kind is acceptable, much less a good idea.

---

So, let me now take a moment to jump on into the next step, since I know exactly what the next question is after that one: Well, what ARE we supposed to do in the face of someone who is violent and hurting people. How can we stop them without getting violent ourselves?

Well, here's the thing. That person has already made the mistake of continuing their own cycles of abuse and violence, otherwise they wouldn't be making the choices that resulted in them hurting or killing someone in the first place. They are trapped in that very same spiral I have been talking about, and ultimately they have merely not gotten the help they need to break that in their own lives, much less what they are inflicting on other people through their actions. They don't need to be just blindly stopped. They need help. They need compassion, and counseling. This is where prison should be a useful tool (and don't get me started on how badly we mangle that tool with our current system, to the point of actually making things worse with it...). Isolate them, teach them how to properly deal with their own life, much less everyone else, and make positive and productive people out of them, if possible. And yes, I do recognize that some people are just BROKEN, with a capital BROKEN. The best we can do in those cases is to simply keep them isolated. I suppose the case could be made for capital punishment, but only in the truly most exceptional cases - where the person is so miserable in confinement that they are a danger to themselves, much less everyone else, and I could almost be convinced that it would be merciful at that point to "Put them out of their misery."

[Harmless]

Well, here's the thing. That person has already made the mistake of continuing their own cycles of abuse and violence, otherwise they wouldn't be making the choices that resulted in them hurting or killing someone in the first place. They are trapped in that very same spiral I have been talking about, and ultimately they have merely not gotten the help they need to break that in their own lives, much less what they are inflicting on other people through their actions. They don't need to be just blindly stopped. They need help. They need compassion, and counseling. This is where prison should be a useful tool (and don't get me started on how badly we mangle that tool with our current system, to the point of actually making things worse with it...). Isolate them, teach them how to properly deal with their own life, much less everyone else, and make positive and productive people out of them, if possible. And yes, I do recognize that some people are just BROKEN, with a capital BROKEN. The best we can do in those cases is to simply keep them isolated. I suppose the case could be made for capital punishment, but only in the truly most exceptional cases - where the person is so miserable in confinement that they are a danger to themselves, much less everyone else, and I could almost be convinced that it would be merciful at that point to "Put them out of their misery."

Like you've said, though, action is a choice. A conscious choice at that. And once a person commits a crime, only to be sent to Prison, knowing that they will be released later to continue their acts, if anything they would be inclined to do it again. What if people continue to make the conscious choice to steal, go against the law, kill, illegally import weapons and drugs, etc.?

How would talking to them and/or isolating them make them any better?? It's one thing to tell a person what they're doing wrong, but another thing for them to actually listen, and to stop making their conscious choices and efforts.

Would you risk more people getting killed, more drugs being shipped, and more people stealing only to eventually decide that they are 'BROKEN' when it's too late?

[*Emelia K. Fletcher]

your moral is "pacifism and optimism will somehow stop all evils in the world"