Is revenge OK?

[J. Mason]

Originally Posted by Hunter Green

I wish I could express myself better on this, but, I wondered if there was an actual scientific, or non-emotional, reason to be against revenge and cruelty, etc.

Like, could someone convince others, using nothing but logical debating skills or science, why revenge or cruelty is "wrong". For example, to my knowledge, animals do not partake in revenge, and they do not seem to particularly be involved in intentional cruelty. Why?

I don't think you can convince others, but brainwash yes, like a cult does. But my opinion again!

But I have seen animals partake in revenge and it is not a pretty picture, my dog has the scars to prove it too.

[Nat]

Originally Posted by Hunter Green

I wish I could express myself better on this, but, I wondered if there was an actual scientific, or non-emotional, reason to be against revenge and cruelty, etc.

Like, could someone convince others, using nothing but logical debating skills or science, why revenge or cruelty is "wrong". For example, to my knowledge, animals do not partake in revenge, and they do not seem to particularly be involved in intentional cruelty. Why?

I thought I'd quote a bit more from that transcript, because it may be some of the meat you are looking for:

...............

Tippett: And then I guess what is especially intriguing about your work as well, and perhaps even more surprising, even kind of takes us out of our boxes, than the fact that revenge is natural is that you are really suggesting also from a scientific perspective that we have a forgiveness instinct, an aptitude for forgiveness, and that has been crafted by natural selection just like revenge.

Mr. McCullough: I expected to find, frankly, less research as I dug through hundreds of scientific articles on the naturalness of forgiveness but, boy, was I wrong. As it turns out, a lot of biologists have been trying to figure out what allows human beings to be the cooperative creatures that we are. We're cooperative with each other in a way that really makes us pretty unique among mammals for sure. You know, we cooperate with our relatives, but lots of animals do that. But we go further and we cooperate with people we've never met. We cooperate with people that we're not related to. And by virtue of our abilities to cooperate with each other, we can build magnificent cities and radio stations and do all kinds of wonderful things. But one of the ingredients you have to have to get individuals to cooperate with each other is a tolerance for mistakes.

Tippett: Hmm. Interesting.

Mr. McCullough: You can't get organisms that are willing to hang in there with each other through thick and thin and make good things happen despite the roadblocks and the bumps along the way if they aren't willing to tolerate each other's mistakes. Sometimes if we're cooperatively hunting — let's say we're some sort of animal, that we're some sort of animal that works together to hunt — sometimes I'm going to let you down. And maybe it's not even intentional, but I'm going to get distracted and I'm going to make a mistake. And if you take each of those mistakes as the last word about my cooperative disposition, you might just give up and so no cooperation gets done. So, really, our ability, and across the animal kingdom many animals' ability to cooperate with each other and make things happen that they can't do on their own is undergirded by an ability to forgive each other for occasional defections and mistakes.

Tippett: Here's a passage from your book — which, again, a lot of this just seems so basic, doesn't it, when you articulate it, but it's things we don't see or think about. I mean, you know, you said that everyday acts of forgiveness are incredibly common among people who know each other.

Mr. McCullough: Right.

Tippett: You know, we think of forgiveness as these heroic acts and there are always these heroic examples of forgiveness. But you said we think of it as this balm for great wounds. But you said, "Yet, in daily life, forgiveness is more often like a Band-Aid on a scrape and at first glance perhaps only slightly more interesting. But, of course, uninteresting doesn't mean unimportant."

Mr. McCullough: Right. And this, again, was part of my attempt to do violence, I guess, to this metaphor of forgiveness as this difficult thing that we have to consciously practice and learn, because we don't know how to do it on their own. I forgive my seven-year-old son every day. Right?

Tippett: Right.

Mr. McCullough: Because he's an active, inquisitive seven-year-old who sometimes accidentally elbows me in the mouth when we're cuddling and sometimes puts Crayons on the walls. And yet it seems demeaning to call it forgiveness.

Tippett: To even call it forgiveness. Right.

Mr. McCullough: Right. I wouldn't dignify it with the term forgiveness. It's just what you do with your children. You know, you accept their limitations and you move on. He broke my tooth once when I was drinking out of a water glass.

Tippett: Right. Right.

Mr. McCullough: I mean, parents have a million of these stories, right?

Tippett: Right.

Mr. McCullough: But you don't put any effort into forgiving. It naturally happens and you move on. And there's a great evolutionary story about why it comes so easy in those kinds of circumstances too.

Tippett: Mm-hmm. Which is pretty obvious, I guess.

Mr. McCullough: Yeah. I mean, evolution wasn't kind to individuals who would seek revenge against their genetic relatives, bottom line, right? So we have this natural tolerance for the misbehavior of our children. So it is at that level you're talking about incredibly mundane. We put no effort into it. It happens every day a thousand times. We would never even give it a second thought. And yet we do it over and over again.

Tippett: One of the most high-profile figures of public forgiveness in the U.S. in recent years was Bud Welch. His 23-year-old daughter Julie died in the bombing of the Murrah Federal building in Oklahoma City in April 1995. Here's a statement Bud Welch made prior to the 2001 execution of Timothy McVeigh, the terrorist responsible for the bombing.


Bud Welch: The first month after the bombing, I didn't even want Tim McVeigh and Terry McNichols to even have trials. I simply wanted them fried. And then I finally come to realize that the reason that Julie and 167 others were dead is because of vengeance and rage. And when we take him out of his cage to kill him, it's going to be the same thing. We will keep the circle of violence going. Number 169 dead is not going to help the family members of the first 168.

Tippett: You do talk about some amazing examples of forgiveness, of public forgiveness, one of them being Bud Welch. But I sometimes think that those kinds of examples that do make the news, like the bombing, also exalt forgiveness as something that's really beyond the reach of most of us most of the time. You know, we kind of wish — we hope that we would be that gracious, perhaps, but it almost feels superhuman.

Mr. McCullough: Right. And if you look at Bud Welch and you look at that story from the outside and you ask yourself how can this man whose daughter was killed in this terrible explosion ever get over his rage, from the outside we have a really hard time imagining that. But if you look at the story of Bud Welch, actually what you find is he had a lot of help along the way. And if you look at the story very carefully, you can actually learn a lot about how the human mind evolved to forgive and what kind of conditions activate that instinct in human minds, because a lot of those conditions ended up falling into place for Bud. In fact, he doesn't talk about forgiveness even for himself in that case as having been some massive struggle.

Tippett: Well, it was incremental, also, wasn't it? I mean, it gets reported as an act, but in fact it was a process.

Mr. McCullough: Yeah, that's right. And along the way, there were events that he actually made happen for himself that turned forgiveness into one of these things that can be easier. For example, he actually sought out Timothy McVeigh's father and visited him one day at the McVeigh home and had this moment he describes when he saw Timothy's picture on the mantle. It was a high school graduation picture. And they were just making small talk and Bud said to McVeigh's father, he said, "God, that's a good-looking kid." And the tears just began pouring out of the elder McVeigh. And what he realized then was that here was another father on the verge of losing a son, of losing a child. And that immediate experience of sympathy and compassion went a tremendous way in facilitating the forgiveness process for Bud.

So right off the bat, this real human interaction starts to turn forgiveness from something difficult to do to something that's easier to do, because this compassion has happened naturally in the course of real human interaction and then suddenly forgiveness is a little easier.

Tippett: So this is getting to one of the really important points I think you make with your work, that if we can understand this forgiveness instinct and how, that even understanding in terms of evolution, that we can start to create conditions where it can be empowered.

Mr. McCullough: Right. The first is safety. Human beings are naturally prone to forgive individuals that they feel safe around. So if we have an offender that is apologizing in a way that seems heartfelt and convincing and has really convinced us that they can't and won't harm us in the same way again, OK, that's a point for forgiveness. A point on the forgiveness side. Again, the human mind evolved for forgiveness to be something worth its while, and any successful organism is unlikely to have a mechanism in it that says, you know, 'Just keep stepping on my neck. It's OK.'

Tippett: Right. Right. Right.

Mr. McCullough: Right. 'But if you can convince me that you're safe, that I don't have to worry about being harmed in the same way a second time, maybe I'm willing to move a little bit forward.'

Tippett: But it seems like that would be the hardest condition or assumption to put in place in the context of many of the worst cycles of revenge in our world.

Mr. McCullough: Sometimes safety comes through things like the rule of law, right?

Tippett: Mm-hmm.

Mr. McCullough: Sometimes safety comes through you as a small-business owner dusting off that employee manual that you don't think about anymore and asking yourself what is in here that would instruct an employee on what to do if they were being systematically harassed by a co-worker and that if there was a real serious infraction it would be dealt with in a way that restored that employee's sense of safety, right?

Tippett: Mm-hmm.

Mr. McCullough: What can you do in your associations? Your condo association, you know, when somebody has a grievance, when the neighbor has a band that he's hired for a party playing at 12:30 on a Friday night, that you know how to make sure that doesn't happen a second time, right? So that you don't then have to say, 'Well, I'm going to get back at that guy myself.'

Tippett: Right.

Mr. McCullough: 'I'm going to leave my garbage cans out all weekend long, which I know he hates,' right?

Tippett: You're talking about revenge in ordinary life, which is where I think we're more comfortable talking about it in terms of warring tribes across the globe.

Mr. McCullough: Well, the thing I like about these principles is they're scalable, right? So we can talk — actually, usually people when they ask me about the book, they're actually less interested in the geopolitical stuff.

Tippett: OK.

Mr. McCullough: But I can, you know …

Tippett: Well, yeah, we'll get there. So what's the second after safety?

Mr. McCullough: Value. We are inclined to forgive individuals who are likely to have benefit for us in the future. So we find it really easy, as I was saying, to forgive our loved ones or forgive our friends or forgive our neighbors or our business partners because there's something in it for us in the future. And the costs sometimes of destroying a relationship that's been damaged are just too high, because establishing a new one is so difficult to do. So relationships that have value in them are ones in which we're naturally prone to forgive.

[Sparx1_1]

Plotting revenge as a nice de-stressing exercise for the imagination can feel wonderful, but actually carrying it out usually causes way more problems than it solves.

That said - forgiveness is not necessary either. Too many people mess themselves up with the idea that choosing not to express anger somehow means they have to forgive and forget.

[Reader]

Originally Posted by Yellow band

Hi Hunter!

I don't want to derail, but Dogs, they have a little chip in their brain that is self activating, and the sweetest most loving dogs, some times attack another dog. It's called they prey mechanism. However, I don't think they know it is intentional cruelty. Humans perceive it as such.

Good thread. Makes me check myself.

Hi Yellow. :) Thanks for the post. I thought this part of your post was really interesting in particular: "However, I don't think they know it is intentional cruelty. Humans perceive it as such."

It never would have occurred to me to that perhaps revenge or cruelty was perceived. But, I guess when you see documentaries where a lion hunts a zebra and wins, it is cruel in a manner, though clearly revenge is not involved in that case. Perhaps perception is a part of the equation. I never thought of that.

That makes me also think of that phrase "cruel to be kind." Is there such a thing? Thoughts?

[uniquetobeme]

An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind.
~Mahatma Gandhi

I don't believe in Karma. I spent some time thinking about karma. In my mind, if karma were a real thing, bad things wouldn't happen to good people. I see a lot of good people who have tremendous struggles in their lives.
What I do believe is the universe, or God, or whatever force there is out there gives us lessons to learn.

I try not to wish bad things on anyone, but I often hope that life gives the them the lessons they need to learn in life.

I believe the world is a place full of wounded souls, and why would I want to add to that pain?

I can't say that it is easy and that I'm always successful. I can't say I don't have a little pleasure in seeing someone who has wronged me have something happen to them-but not anything terribly bad.

Yet, deep down I have to admit, if someone injured my children, I would hope the police were able to find the person before I do. It wouldn't even seem like revenge, it would seem like instinct to me, like a mama bear...don't mess with her kids, she'll come after you!

[princessbelle]

I haven't seen this thread before. I admit i've not read all the posts here, but wanted to share my thoughts on this.

I've thought about this concept before. There are so many, many ways to wrong someone that has wronged "you". Revenge is easy. I can think of a million ways. I knew a girl once that had 1000 tons of rocks delivered to her ex's yard after she caught him cheating. She of course had his credit card.

I've worked along side some winners who i could have easily got into trouble with their jobs. Or friends or exes, loads of people can try and be jerks, and it is relatively easy to get revenge on people. All you have to do is put your mind to it. But, seeking revenge and waiting for it are two very different ways of living. I USUALLY choose the latter, living with peace in my heart, knowing that i didn't deserve the type of treatment i was given and knowing i took the high road and didn't cause anyone any pain even if they deserved it. But, pain came anyway.

I've learned over the years, if someone is an ass they usually get what's coming to them in the long run. I've seen it soooooooo many times, over and over. I honestly cannot think of one person who has wronged me that hasn't ended up getting "wronged" by at least one other person, or a situation, or gotten fired, or lost friends and became somewhat isolated.

Call it karma or whatever you want. But, i've learned to just wait. Watch. Then, when karma or life or their bad choices happen, smile to myself silently and walk away, and secretly give myself a high five.

Revenge would be easy. Really easy. A piece of cake really. But, waiting, watching....that is what makes me strong and then...very happy at the end result. Every. Single. Time.

[Gemme]

I believe in revenge. There's a time and a reason for all things, even the dark and ugly that we try to sweep under the rug when no one's looking.

[softheart]

I will probably burn in the eternal fires but, I don't care. Sometimes it feels so good. (giggling)

[Dominique]

An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind ~ Ghandi

[JustJo]

I don't believe in a God....or eternal punishment....or divine rewards....or karma.....or revenge.

It can be tempting, but I believe the saying that the best revenge is massive success.

[Jett]

I believe revenge hurts the person seeking it much more than anyone it is directed at. Mainly because to plot and need revenge you have to mentally hang onto the negative or toxic situation (and feelings surrounding) to sustain any motivation to carry it out. Similar to the saying I think "Holding a grudge is like stinging yourself to death over and over with the same bee"

As far as cruelty goes I think it's a sickness humans carry all their own burden with, I don't think animals are cruel since cruelty takes motivation and need to specifically BE cruel and derive pleasure from that. I don't think say, a lion's motivation in killing a zebra is to satisfy their need to cause it pain and suffering but to satisfy it and it's Pride's hunger. Hmmm, though there is an animal that does seem to exhibit cruelty, downright brutality at times to members of their own group... interesting it's the animal that's DNA sequencing reveals they share 96% of human genes, the chimpanzee. Hard to say it's cruelty though, as we don't know what they are thinking... like we can with people.

Forgiveness... I do believe in forgiveness in most situations, but right, I may not forget... I forgive because, mostly, this is a f*cked up world... it and it f*cks ppl up, I have made mistakes too...

[Scuba]

Contemplating revenge on someone, although tempting sometimes, only keeps me angry and renting space in my head to someone who really doesn't deserve it. The end...

Scoobs

PS I would rather be renting space to someone I am contemplating "other" things with...it just sounds so much more fun

[BullDog]

Living well is the best revenge.

I've actually flat out said that to a few people in my life. When people try to mess with me it actually does spur me on to do even better for myself. Ultimately my happiness and well being is based on the positive but sometimes the negative does give me an extra push.

When I look later to see where I am and how I feel and then see them in their same patterns of behavior... I smile. Then I go back on living and I'm happy.

[Jett]

Originally Posted by Glenn

Folks, If anyone ever tried to harm you, your babies, or your loved ones in the past, and you think justice was'nt served, just buy a side by side twelve gauge and give them both barrels if they come around again to try to harm you and your loved ones. Especially if they're bigger then you and you have a clean record.

Hey yeah, I didn't say I wouldn't blow some idiots ass right back out my door, I happen to have a double barrel and handgun. I was talking revenge not protection... I'm like a friggen Silverback on crack when me or mines safety is in jeopardy...

[Vlasta]

I fortunately didn't found myself in a tragic situation such as loosing my child or my love one has been murdered or something similar to . So , I can't really say how I would feel in that particular situation .

I was raped by my son's biological father when my son was three weeks old and I had 26 stitches . Well back then and the country I was living at, even if I went to police they would looked me as I was crazy and throw me out from police station .

Yet , revenge it's never ok in my book . I just let go and don't give any negative energy to whatever situation . I let go and not being malicious whatsoever . Sit back and trust me as many said in this thread what goes around comes around .

I see already on some they done wrong to me are getting back in not a good way and I am not talking just about my partners . Matter of fact , one of my partner that done very wrongs to me , lost his sister to a cancer . I couldn't even bring myself to feel any satisfaction . I felt really bad for hym and his family .

I honestly think it's about your personality , but as I said revenge it's never ok in my book . I let it go , life will takes care of it .

[Passionaria]

I've heard that living well, is the best revenge. Like Bulldog, I believe it is.

[kittygrrl]

lots of good thoughts here regarding this potentially explosive issue..and while i am a firm believer in karma, when it comes to revenge, i prefer to center my focus on evaluating and controlling my responses..and viewing it as an opportunity to examine what i need to do to overcome the need to have it, justify it etc..making peace with it and not letting it do further damage is what i've learned i need to do.

[nycfem]

I generally subscribe to the idea that revenge is a waste of time and that it's 1000 x better to just move on to something positive.

Now revenge fantasies are another stories. It is fun and sometimes therapeutic to go back and forth with a trusted friend about what I'd *like* to do

[istolurboxers38]

I used to think revenge was one way to hurt a person as they hurt me. I have now realized that revenge is not the way. If someone hurts me it is just better to turn my back and walk away. It seems to hurt you more cause it comes flying back at you even harder. So my feeling on it now is to just walk away that way nothing can come back flying at you and you keep yourself safe.

[Legendryder]

When I was younger, I had anger issues. If I felt I was being wronged, in any way, real or not, I came right back at the person in a not nice way. As I got older, I learned that it didn't really make it better. Did not make me feel better. Many times, I let my mouth write checks my ass could not cash. I got my ass kicked more than once on that type of deal. I had to learn a better way to deal. So, I just started to ignore and walk away. And I will be darned, if it didn't keep me from getting my ass stomped into a mudhole. And something else.........I didn't drop to a childish level. I began to use my mind instead of my fists. Cause, honestly, I am too old to take a butt kickin' anymore.


Now, if ya throw a pea at me at the dinner table, all bets are off. I WILL throw a pea back. lol