RE: Sadly, A Central Tenet Of Our Public Morality Is The Ethic Of Revenge

RE: Sadly, A Central Tenet Of Our Public Morality Is The Ethic Of Revenge (Full Version)

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vincentML -> RE: Sadly, A Central Tenet Of Our Public Morality Is The Ethic Of Revenge (1/4/2013 1:47:55 PM)
~FR~ An alternate way to look at the movie issue is that the movies are cathartic and relieve us of the desire for revenge. I am not so convinced that revenge is a big factor in the fabric of western civilization. We have stopped fighting duals over lost honor quite some time ago. The sense of honor is at the root of the desire for revenge. It is more clearly seen in Eastern cultures where daughters are murdered for bringing shame on the family and people riot for the honor of Allah. On occasion politicians demogaogue and stir up a latent national honor among Westerners, but really do we not more often shrug at the concept of honor? In the Newtown instance revenge is for selling newspapers and advertising on television, imho.

Aylee -> RE: Sadly, A Central Tenet Of Our Public Morality Is The Ethic Of Revenge (1/4/2013 1:55:57 PM)
quote: ORIGINAL: vincentML ~FR~ An alternate way to look at the movie issue is that the movies are cathartic and relieve us of the desire for revenge. I am not so convinced that revenge is a big factor in the fabric of western civilization. We have stopped fighting duals over lost honor quite some time ago. The sense of honor is at the root of the desire for revenge. It is more clearly seen in Eastern cultures where daughters are murdered for bringing shame on the family and people riot for the honor of Allah. On occasion politicians demogaogue and stir up a latent national honor among Westerners, but really do we not more often shrug at the concept of honor? In the Newtown instance revenge is for selling newspapers and advertising on television, imho. I find it interesting that sometime in the last 20 years we have went from believing that art imitates life to life imitates art.

vincentML -> RE: Sadly, A Central Tenet Of Our Public Morality Is The Ethic Of Revenge (1/4/2013 2:10:16 PM)
quote: ORIGINAL: Aylee quote: ORIGINAL: vincentML ~FR~ An alternate way to look at the movie issue is that the movies are cathartic and relieve us of the desire for revenge. I am not so convinced that revenge is a big factor in the fabric of western civilization. We have stopped fighting duals over lost honor quite some time ago. The sense of honor is at the root of the desire for revenge. It is more clearly seen in Eastern cultures where daughters are murdered for bringing shame on the family and people riot for the honor of Allah. On occasion politicians demogaogue and stir up a latent national honor among Westerners, but really do we not more often shrug at the concept of honor? In the Newtown instance revenge is for selling newspapers and advertising on television, imho. I find it interesting that sometime in the last 20 years we have went from believing that art imitates life to life imitates art. A good point. I would stretch the window and attribute it to the abundant availability and ease with which we access dramatic images that come with the new technology and density of our cities. Have a look at the popularity of gangster movies during the Depression of the 1930s as an example. We all don't live down on the farm anymore, Dorothy.

mons -> RE: Sadly, A Central Tenet Of Our Public Morality Is The Ethic Of Revenge (1/5/2013 4:10:08 AM)
op You did not answer the question in a manner that did not seem right! Are you saying the movie "Birth of a Nation" was a movie about honor? If this is what you saying it is wrong, this movie had no revenge needed it was the cause of lynchings across the USA during the showing of the movie there was no reason for this to happen! No one was hurting anyone, it was base on a silly notion that black men would become "uppity" and make their way to attack the white females in the cities where they had homes, businesses! No this had nothing to do with "honor" mons

GotSteel -> RE: Sadly, A Central Tenet Of Our Public Morality Is The Ethic Of Revenge (1/5/2013 4:23:00 AM)
quote: The ethic of revenge is contrary to the teachings of every major religion Yeah I'm skeptical of that as well.

GotSteel -> RE: Sadly, A Central Tenet Of Our Public Morality Is The Ethic Of Revenge (1/5/2013 4:42:23 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: meatcleaver Revenge is a base instinct, it's primitive and doesn't require thought. I don't think that's correct, revenge seems to be all about thought, specificly anticipation. quote: ORIGINAL: http://articles.latimes.com/2010/oct/18/health/la-he-revenge-20101018 Most of us have revenge fantasies, human behavior researchers say, and nearly everyone believes that punishing someone who did him wrong would feel tremendously satisfying. But new studies suggest the reality of revenge is far different. Acting on vengeful thoughts often isn't nearly as gratifying as expected and — surprisingly — can even make people feel worse. Still, the delicious pleasure anticipated from taking revenge is such a powerful drive that it appears to be hard-wired in the brain. University of Zurich scientists found that merely contemplating revenge stimulates a region of the brain called the dorsal striatum, which is known to become active in anticipation of a reward or pleasure, such as making money or eating good food.

Aswad -> RE: Sadly, A Central Tenet Of Our Public Morality Is The Ethic Of Revenge (1/5/2013 7:18:38 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: PeonForHer Is it? I vaguely recall a bit of the old revenge stuff going on in the Bible. Doing God's work for him, and all that. No? Actually, if you have a look at the parts about an eye for an eye, for instance, that's not in favor of vengeance, but rather against disporportionate retribution. Later teachings in both the Christian branch and the Muslim branch expounded on the underlying thought by suggesting that forgiveness is a better choice than vengeance. A radical, new idea for the region at the time, and still contrary to some of the cultures in the region (e.g. Pashtunwali rejects this entirely). People arguing that media are filled with violence might want to have a look at the purpose behind that violence, which is usually vengeance when it isn't necessity. For most of us, necessity isn't going to map onto any potential violence we might do, save for self defense and eating meat, both of which are almost universally accepted. Vengeance, however, tends to map quite well into new violence, as does "righteous" wrath, these saturating media as far as values and causes go to a greater extent than even violence. I didn't see much violence in Desperate Housewives, but I saw a lot of vengeance. That's irked me when you've commented on violence in the media. Violence is a part of us. A recent popsci mag mentioned how the shape of our hands, so ideally suited to developing technology, may have evolved to make us better able to do violence and succeed at harming or killing others without damaging ourselves in the process. Our first written works involve violence. We enjoy it, including in the various sports out there, which channel it into less damaging outlets. But most people need a reason to let it off its leash. Media seem to be bigger on glorifying half baked reasons for doing things than on glorifying the actual doing of those things. IWYW, — Aswad.

Aswad -> RE: Sadly, A Central Tenet Of Our Public Morality Is The Ethic Of Revenge (1/5/2013 7:24:23 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: jlf1961 Revenge assumes that all you want to do is get even.... I like to collect lots of interest. Yeah, that's what happened at Sandy Hook: quote: ORIGINAL: kdsub Justice. Personally, I think it's a pretty shitty solution, while others think it'll make everything better if we just kill enough folk. IWYW, — Aswad.

Aswad -> RE: Sadly, A Central Tenet Of Our Public Morality Is The Ethic Of Revenge (1/5/2013 7:27:58 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: vincentML An alternate way to look at the movie issue is that the movies are cathartic and relieve us of the desire for revenge. Maybe. If the target of vengeance in the movie is one that maps onto our personal lives. We're good at channeling. The Jews had a scapegoat, instead, once a year, which seems to have worked out, except for the goat. quote: We have stopped fighting duals over lost honor quite some time ago. We stopped giving a shit about honor shortly before that, so it works out. [:D] quote: The sense of honor is at the root of the desire for revenge. No, I think you're talking about "face", which is a different beast altogether. We started mixing the two up about when honor itself fell out of vogue. quote: On occasion politicians demogaogue and stir up a latent national honor among Westerners, but really do we not more often shrug at the concept of honor? We shrug at the very concept of values, so why not also at honor? Are we not mice? IWYW, — Aswad.

PeonForHer -> RE: Sadly, A Central Tenet Of Our Public Morality Is The Ethic Of Revenge (1/5/2013 7:48:01 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: Aswad Actually, if you have a look at the parts about an eye for an eye, for instance, that's not in favor of vengeance, but rather against disporportionate retribution. The desire for revenge is involved in both, isn't it? If it isn't, what is the motivation for 'proportionate retribution'? What is the point of it? quote: Later teachings in both the Christian branch and the Muslim branch expounded on the underlying thought by suggesting that forgiveness is a better choice than vengeance. 'Eye for an eye' was superseded by 'turn the other cheek'. But a big and powerful - perhaps the biggest and most powerful - message of the Bible, arguably, was that God is always right and God is always good. He's a vengeful god; therefore it's right for humans to be vengeful too. We want to be 'godlike' and here's the example set for us. There seems to be a pretty plausible connection between that idea and the God-like 'superheros' of today's favourite Hollywood heroes. Sergio Leone's Clint Eastwood revenge films are a fine example. quote: That's irked me when you've commented on violence in the media. Eh? Where? quote: Media seem to be bigger on glorifying half baked reasons for doing things than on glorifying the actual doing of those things. Is it? I'm not sure that's true in my own experience. The violence takes up the bulk of most of the celluloid in the revenge films I've seen, if I recall rightly. In High Plains Drifter we eventually find out why Eastwood's character is being so murderously violent - but the explanation is minimal. We only need to know enough to accept that his violence is "justified"; that his killings are 'righteous' (to use that Biblically-toned word beloved of detectives in NYPD Blue, for instance).

Aswad -> RE: Sadly, A Central Tenet Of Our Public Morality Is The Ethic Of Revenge (1/5/2013 8:00:01 AM)
Guess I should clarify before you complain, vincentML... Alice has honor. Bob doesn't. In fact, Bob doesn't get it, at all. So Bob looks at this aura Alica has, the outward appearance, the way people react to her and regard her. And Bob calls that honor. He wants it, of course, since it's just another form of status to him. So Bob goes about amassing it whenever he can. His face, what he regards as honor, is a big deal. It catches on, becomes fashionable. And the stresses which select for honor go away, so people can get away with this. Eventually, the common folk revolt. Honor gets thrown out with the bathwater of face. They mostly didn't have it, so they don't even notice. From that time onwards, honor is seen as a matter of face, while those who have it feel themselves cringe a little on the inside every time it's used in that way, and feel their hearts beat a little faster whenever they see the thing itself get dusted off, if only for a moment. Similar things go for most concepts related to quality, because quantity is more efficient than quality. We could make a data storage medium that is extremely fast, has a huge amount of storage, and will keep running right through the EMP of a nuclear blast with a shrug. But it's not efficient. The cost is high, and the economies of scale don't work out. It's cheaper to just make a few thousand inexpensive hard drives and run them in a RAID configuration (for the non-techs here: Redundant Array of Inexpensive Disks), which is the mainstay of the computing industry when you need fast, reliable storage of a lot of data. Almost nobody wants a disk that is "perfect", and nobody will deliver one. We just slap together a few mediocre parts into a whole that performs as if we had one disk that was actually excellent. Western culture works this way, a Redundant Array of Inexpensive Folk, a big machine of interchangeable, mediocre parts. Thanks to having been the opposite way for a while, we do better than the archetypical pursuers of R-type reproductive strategies, which never got far enough into the K-type strategy to build a substrate that permits them to thrive the way we do, but we should be under no delusions that we've actually embraced a strong K-type strategy ourselves; we have not. The advance of our state of the art comes from a few anomalies of quality that drag the rest, at times kicking and screaming, into a better future. Between the exceptions, we're mostly just muddling along. Hence, by consensus, "honor" just means "face" now. Actual Honor doesn't have a name anymore. IWYW, — Aswad.

Aswad -> RE: Sadly, A Central Tenet Of Our Public Morality Is The Ethic Of Revenge (1/5/2013 8:20:36 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: PeonForHer The desire for revenge is involved in both, isn't it? If it isn't, what is the motivation for 'proportionate retribution'? What is the point of it? The motivation for porportionate retribution is to impose a cost without escalating a conflict. The motivation for disporportionate retribution is vengeance. "Getting even" is a misunderstanding. quote: 'Eye for an eye' was superseded by 'turn the other cheek'. Which is another simplification, but one from which we can at least extrapolate the general idea, if it's not obvious to us to begin with. quote: But a big and powerful - perhaps the biggest and most powerful - message of the Bible, arguably, was that God is always right and God is always good. Seems more like a message of the church, doesn't it? quote: He's a vengeful god; therefore it's right for humans to be vengeful too. Trust us to bungle such things. We ascribe a quality we don't understand to a being we don't even claim to understand, and then try to emulate an example we don't know in the least, despite repeated warnings not to do so. That's about the size and shape of it. Doesn't strike me as a well carried message. quote: Eh? Where? Before the consolidation, for instance, you mentioned it in one of the Newtown threads. quote: Is it? I'm not sure that's true in my own experience. The violence takes up the bulk of most of the celluloid in the revenge films I've seen, if I recall rightly. In High Plains Drifter we eventually find out why Eastwood's character is being so murderously violent - but the explanation is minimal. We only need to know enough to accept that his violence is "justified"; that his killings are 'righteous' (to use that Biblically-toned word beloved of detectives in NYPD Blue, for instance). Precisely. Half baked reasons are passed off as being good enough. Lot better if they'd just had him killing a lot of people for fun. That, we get isn't okay, while the shoddy excuses that don't even aspire to being actual reasons, that, we seem to have trouble with. IWYW, — Aswad.

vincentML -> RE: Sadly, A Central Tenet Of Our Public Morality Is The Ethic Of Revenge (1/5/2013 10:24:06 AM)
quote: We shrug at the very concept of values, so why not also at honor? Are we not mice? Oh my, of mice and men, hey? Maybe in the West with the withering of the patriarchal family we find honor or face through other endeavours and associations in our professions/trades, as sports fans, through material accumulation, etc, etc, so we do not feel so much a need to kill in order to restore face. What do you think?

kdsub -> RE: Sadly, A Central Tenet Of Our Public Morality Is The Ethic Of Revenge (1/5/2013 10:58:39 AM)
quote: Personally, I think it's a pretty shitty solution, while others think it'll make everything better if we just kill enough folk Aswad I was and am simply pointing out that one mans revenge is another mans justice. It all depends on how you look at it and of course the circumstances of the situation...now don't you believe this true? Butch

hlen5 -> RE: Sadly, A Central Tenet Of Our Public Morality Is The Ethic Of Revenge (1/5/2013 11:03:27 AM)
So do you believe that most people are without honor?

DesideriScuri -> RE: Sadly, A Central Tenet Of Our Public Morality Is The Ethic Of Revenge (1/5/2013 11:16:05 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: PeonForHer 'Eye for an eye' was superseded by 'turn the other cheek'. But a big and powerful - perhaps the biggest and most powerful - message of the Bible, arguably, was that God is always right and God is always good. He's a vengeful god; therefore it's right for humans to be vengeful too. We want to be 'godlike' and here's the example set for us. That is the wrong interpretation of being made in His image. "God" is a 3-part being, spirit, flesh and soul. We were made in that image, a 3-part being. We have flesh, soul and spirit selves. With the Garden of Eden events, we lost the connection, the spiritual connection to God. When Jesus says that we must be "born again," he wasn't talking about a physical re-birth. The Pharisee's even asked him if we were to climb back into the womb (I would be very, very scared to see the woman whose womb I could crawl back into... just sayin'). His point was that we needed to be born again in God's image. We needed a rebirth of the spirit, and without that, we could not see the Kingdom of God. <ends homily>

Aswad -> RE: Sadly, A Central Tenet Of Our Public Morality Is The Ethic Of Revenge (1/5/2013 11:20:57 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: vincentML Maybe in the West with the withering of the patriarchal family we find honor or face through other endeavours and associations in our professions/trades, as sports fans, through material accumulation, etc, etc, so we do not feel so much a need to kill in order to restore face. What do you think? I don't think I should say what I think, lest this thread be yanked for using the wrong pronoun in there. Suffice to say: point, missing it and supporting it at the same time. IWYW, — Aswad.

Aswad -> RE: Sadly, A Central Tenet Of Our Public Morality Is The Ethic Of Revenge (1/5/2013 11:22:34 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: kdsub Aswad I was and am simply pointing out that one mans revenge is another mans justice. It all depends on how you look at it and of course the circumstances of the situation...now don't you believe this true? Of course. Some do see revenge as justice if it happens in the right way in the right circumstances. I see revenge as a seperate entity entirely. IWYW, — Aswad.

Aswad -> RE: Sadly, A Central Tenet Of Our Public Morality Is The Ethic Of Revenge (1/5/2013 11:26:19 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: hlen5 So do you believe that most people are without honor? Not sure if you were asking me or vincentML. If you were asking me, then: yes. IWYW, — Aswad.

hlen5 -> RE: Sadly, A Central Tenet Of Our Public Morality Is The Ethic Of Revenge (1/5/2013 11:31:00 AM)
Actually, I WAS asking both of you. I find that sad. I don't think people have changed in some inherent way since the beginning. Do you believe honor is the aberration rather than the norm?

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