It seems like it’s nothing more than something mothers tell their kids so they stop fighting. It seems like pretty much everyone, religious people, atheists, liberals and conservatives alike take glee in the suffering of evildoers and their enemies. Majorities in every single country in the world agree with capital punishment in principle, it’s just that in Europe people are humane enough to realize the system makes mistakes.
In fact, it almost seems taboo to be forgiving, like you are accused of being a doormat or worse yet soft on crime or lacking a backbone and not “standing up for yourself”.
My roommate had some gang member throw a glass cup at his car. He actually pursued him because he wanted to make him pay (legally), but I kept telling him let’s get the hell out of here. He said something to the like of me being a coward and not sticking up for myself, but I WAS looking out for myself by trying to flee the trouble.
He provoked the thug anyway so I didn’t feel a lot of sympathy for my roommate’s plight even though he is my friend. He put me in danger because he wanted retribution.
So I would say most people do think two wrongs make a right, and that our justice system is ultimately about giving victims the satisfaction of seeing their enemies suffer, in a moderated and somewhat sane way, so that people don’t start blood feuds.
I don’t think that expression means what you think it means. Sort of like people who don’t know the complete saying “an eye for an eye” is that “it makes the whole world blind”.
Punishing someone for committing a crime, defending yourself or seeking just retribution for a wrong committed against you is not a “wrong”. Seeking vengeance or vigilantism is.
For example:
It is not wrong for your friend to seek damages against someone who vandalizes his car.
It is wrong for your friend to go and damage their car in retaliation.
Forgiveness is fine, but you still have to pay for what you did.
I don’t know. People on this message board seem to view the world through some pretty weird lenses.
Isn’t the whole purpose of punishment to avenge the victim in a reasonable way so that their families/themselves don’t take matters into their own hands though? Especially since rehabilitation is not really something people take seriously. I don’t get how there is a difference between punishment and revenge aside from the state being the mediator.
99.9999% of people, even a friend of mine who is in general a very forgiving person would agree it should be legal to kill your rapist or a family member’s killer if he wasn’t punished by the law, for example.
The problem then is in your idea of what is right and wrong. Killing the rapist is wrong specifically because we have a legal system that can do a better job of determining guilt and enforcing punishment.
In a society where rapists could go free, killing them would be a viable option. Not (just) out of vengeance, but because they will continue to rape if not stopped, and people would need an outside system to be able to lock them up.
Not that vengeance is widely regarded as wrong in and of itself, anyways. People just have an upper limit–which is based on the law being able to handle it for them.
It is killing an innocent person that everyone has a problem with. A lot of people have no problem killing someone guilty of a sufficient crime. Killing them isn’t “wrong,” so it’s not two wrongs making a right.
Most people think two wrongs don’t make a right. They just don’t agree that the second action was wrong.
I think that’s missing the point a bit and getting too hung up on semantics. What people mean when they say two wrongs don’t make a right is that it’s not OK to hurt one person just because they hurt somebody else. But like I said, it seems like nobody really believes that, not even a lot of Christians, a faith that is centered around forgiveness.
Cite? That’s never how I’ve heard it used. I’ve heard it used to mean that you cannot justify your bad behavior by s saying it was in response to someone else’s bad behavior. It was still bad behavior (or a plan to behave badly) on your part.
I think you’re trying to have a discussion about punitive justice, but I think you picked a misinterpretation of a famous phrase to kick it off with.
Yes, in the US jail time is not about rehabilitation. It’s about profit, restraint and, a distant last, comforting the victims.
I highly doubt this. Given that only about 60% of the people in the US think it is OK for the government to kill people, it is unlikely that more than that are in favor of citizens taking the law into their own hands to kill people.
Also as others have said the point of the statement seems to be against the idea of revenge for revenges sake, rather than justice or deterrence… If someone rapes and kills your daughter it is not OK to rape and kill their daughter.
That’s not “the complete saying”. I mean, it’s a complete saying (of relatively recent origin), but it’s not the completion of the phrase “an eye for an eye”, in the sense that it was there in the original text and most people leave it out. It’s a commentary on the original statement.
“An eye for an eye” is a statement about reciprocity and proportionality in punishment. It’s saying that a just punishment for a transgression is equal in magnitude to the transgression. If applied fairly, it’s not a terrible system, since it prevents the escalation of violence that occurs in feuds.
On the subject of the OP, “an eye for an eye” isn’t at odds with “two wrongs don’t make a right”. Punishment, properly meted out, isn’t a wrong. It’s justice. The first statement is about the proper punishment for a crime. The second is a caution against vigilanteism.
No. There’s a huge difference between avenging the victim and simple justice. Ideally, the criminal justice system punishes people who deserve to be punished. It has nothing to do with avenging or revenging anything. People who violate people’s rights should have their own rights curtailed, in an appropriate manner and degree.
I’ve never believed in that stupid saying. I take my cues from Jesus who was wrathful when he had to be. The old saying about an eye for an eye just leaves everyone blind doesn’t take into account that to the victim, they’re already blinded, so if we don’t do an eye for an eye, it leaves a nation of criminals that can see perfectly.
So what’s your response if I go out and kill my neighbour? My neighbour can’t be brought back to life. So do you just say “what’s done is done” and let it go?
I think there are very few people who feel I shouldn’t be facing some degree of punishment or retribution.
And if any mischief follow, then thou shalt give life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burn for burn, wound for wound, bruise for bruise.
We have a “system of justice.” Punishment for crimes is only one part of this system; punishment is meant to be a deterrent. If I have to pay $120 for getting caught driving too fast…maybe I won’t drive that fast.
The system of justice has safeguards, protections, appeals, and is highly regulated. Meanwhile, just going out and trashing that Blue Ford Focus whose driver flipped me off has no such protections.
(Are you absolutely sure that’s the same Blue Ford Focus? What if you just trashed the wrong guy’s car? Or what if the driver had just borrowed it from a pal of his: whom have you actually punished?)
I think harming someone (physically/mentally/imprisoning them/etc.) is wrong, no matter what they have done. I truly believe that two wrongs do not make a right in the sense that the OP describes.
At the same time, I also think failing to prevent someone from being harmed, where something could realistically have been done, is also wrong. This sets up a damned if you do, damned if you don’t moral calculus, and I usually try to follow my gut to the lesser of two evils. That can make me feel a little better about it, but it doesn’t mean it isn’t wrong.
No. It’s mostly about deterrence and keeping dangerous people locked away so they can’t hurt anyone, balancing out against what is a fair punishment for the crime.
Note that in more restrictive societies, the punishment often far exceeds the crime (i.e. cutting off your hands for stealing a loaf of bread). This is more about control and power than any form of rehabilitation or justice.
That’s not even an equivalent punishment. The rapist didn’t kill anyone. That’s one reason why the state serves as the mediator. Another is so that everyone operates under the same law, the same system of determining guilt or innocence and the same sentencing procedures.
Paying for doing wrong is human nature. However, most of the time that kind of thinking lead to retaliation. We mostly act at the hype of our emotion that most likely ended in wrong action. I see nothing wrong in paying because of wrong doing, but in a right way or procedure. Likewise, forgiveness is needed after that kind of event in order not to have or hold any grudge to that person.
who was wrathful when he had to be. The old saying about an eye for an eye just leaves everyone blind doesn’t take into account that to the victim, they’re already blinded, so if we don’t do an eye for an eye, it leaves a nation of criminals that can see perfectly.