Redemption

[The Good Reverend Roger]

In fact, I'm going to go ahead and just give the thread to Navkat.  She got what she came for, and the fact that I had spent an hour or so writing on a topic that was new and (I had hoped) interesting is a small price to pay for "LOOK AT ME!  HEY, LOOK AT ME!  WHY ARE YOU ALL LOOKING AT ME?  I'M OUTRAGED!"

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

In fact, I'm going to go ahead and just give the thread to Navkat.  She got what she came for, and the fact that I had spent an hour or so writing on a topic that was new and (I had hoped) interesting is a small price to pay for "LOOK AT ME!  HEY, LOOK AT ME!  WHY ARE YOU ALL LOOKING AT ME?  I'M OUTRAGED!"

Maybe have it split? It's a really good topic, waste to let it go.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

In fact, I'm going to go ahead and just give the thread to Navkat.  She got what she came for, and the fact that I had spent an hour or so writing on a topic that was new and (I had hoped) interesting is a small price to pay for "LOOK AT ME!  HEY, LOOK AT ME!  WHY ARE YOU ALL LOOKING AT ME?  I'M OUTRAGED!"

Maybe have it split? It's a really good topic, waste to let it go.

Later, maybe.  Right now it's a dead issue.  I figure I'll ask Cain to split it later, then write an add on to it to try to relaunch it.

[Cardinal Pizza Deliverance.]

In fact, I'm going to go ahead and just give the thread to Navkat.  She got what she came for, and the fact that I had spent an hour or so writing on a topic that was new and (I had hoped) interesting is a small price to pay for "LOOK AT ME!  HEY, LOOK AT ME!  WHY ARE YOU ALL LOOKING AT ME?  I'M OUTRAGED!"

I'm still thinking about the OP. I get as far as "Well yeah, some people should just burn for the shit they do, no matter what they do or say." Which leads to "Well how is that justice if they genuinely change and can help fix the damage they've caused?"

"The potential for recidivism is too great a risk, in the worst case scenarios."

"What constitutes worst case scenario?"

"Who are you to judge?"

And on and on.



As a rape survivor and an abuse survivor, I spend large amounts of time thinking about this shit.

Forgiveness, more than redemption because I wouldn't want to be exposed to the people involved in the rape and abuse again, even if they're trying to make amends somehow. If they showed up at my work, or a fiber festival, or the county fair, handing out pamphlets for RAINN and the Suicide Hotline, I would probably lose my shit.

So I think my knee-jerk 'burn them all' comes from not wanting to be anywhere near the abusers, I don't want to see their faces, I don't want to hear their voices.

Even if they are 'doing good', just their image is a negative impact on those they hurt. Which maybe would make their acts of redemption less helpful in the whole redeeming thing.

So I think the redemption would need to come from someone else's hands than mine because I'm not biped enough to allow for it yet.



In the case of shit that hasn't actually happened to me . . . the example provided, for instance, I think George Wallace went from having an ideal of what he thought the world should be and seeing the reality of what his ideal wrought. That's a humbling and transformative experience right there. Especially when you realize how much you were involved in ruining what you sought to create.

I think redemption is possible.

Julian Assange . . . if he is a sexual predator then he needs to serve time for that. But it doesn't negate what he did and I don't think it should tarnish the information he released. But I'm basing this on the belief that the sexual predator thing was a smear campaign to invalidate what he'd done in the first place so maybe I'd feel differently if I thought he was actually a predator.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

One thing about redemption is that it doesn't necessitate interacting with people who are like your former victims -- or even getting out of prison.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

And, I am thinking about a greater social and perhaps historical redemption, not individual forgiveness and redemption.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

One thing about redemption is that it doesn't necessitate interacting with people who are like your former victims -- or even getting out of prison.

Yep.  Or even getting out of the harsh glare of negative publicity during your own lifetime.

This guy comes to mind:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilhelm_Canaris

[Cardinal Pizza Deliverance.]

One thing about redemption is that it doesn't necessitate interacting with people who are like your former victims -- or even getting out of prison.

That makes it easier to contemplate. Thanks.

[navkat]

I was just asking for you to consider having some empathy, but hey.

I do have empathy. That's why I don't take my wording lightly and it's primarily why I hoped it would illustrate my point. It was intended to strike a chord in a spot that causes all of us to wince. It flopped. I don't know how to resolve that in my mind because the last thing I want to do is cause "gratuitous" pain that nets nothing of value but I honestly don't know how to better transmit the message.

[Faust]

I'm not one to take my ball and go home (in the 6 or so years I've been here, I've only been tempted once and Faust crushed that)

I'm not sure what you are referring to.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

It was intended to strike a chord in a spot that causes all of us to wince. It flopped

No, that part of it succeeded brilliantly.  It succeeded so much everything else flopped.

[Cardinal Pizza Deliverance.]

I was just asking for you to consider having some empathy, but hey.

I do have empathy. That's why I don't take my wording lightly and it's primarily why I hoped it would illustrate my point. It was intended to strike a chord in a spot that causes all of us to wince. It flopped. I don't know how to resolve that in my mind because the last thing I want to do is cause "gratuitous" pain that nets nothing of value but I honestly don't know how to better transmit the message.

As someone who has filter issues, may I suggest looking at what your head says . . . and then backing it down a few notches, from seizure to wince. My idea of what will make people wince usually makes them scream and flail, instead.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

I was just asking for you to consider having some empathy, but hey.

I do have empathy. That's why I don't take my wording lightly and it's primarily why I hoped it would illustrate my point. It was intended to strike a chord in a spot that causes all of us to wince. It flopped. I don't know how to resolve that in my mind because the last thing I want to do is cause "gratuitous" pain that nets nothing of value but I honestly don't know how to better transmit the message.

As someone who has filter issues, may I suggest looking at what your head says . . . and then backing it down a few notches, from seizure to wince. My idea of what will make people wince usually makes them scream and flail, instead.

Same here.  You may have noticed that my head is a filthy & awful place.  I tend to tone it down, outside of fiction pieces I write, and even then I usually go back and reword things a bit. 

[Pope Pixie Pickle]

ok, so, people have triggers. people deal with trauma in different ways.

I got told 3 months after my boyfriend (i was 21) died by a colleague to "just fucking get over it"

Too Soon? You betcha.

thing is, it doesn't matter if it was 3 months or 3 years...

You don't get to decide how other people deal with their shit, and I was trying to say that going *that far* in a graphic description or telling people how to cope is something I personally won't do, because I are not the arbiter of all the things and how things should be done. So my giving you figures and facts and asking you to do some reading was about considering the emotional health of others.

I think a spot of moderating my language or whatever is of more worth than "IMA SAY WHAT THE FUCK I WANT" and you know, fucking with someones head.

[navkat]

Okay, so  sign a pention. If you get enough sigs, I give Faust the thumbs up to rip it down. Hell, get five. Mod the shit out of it. I don't give a rat's ass anymore.

I need to go yell fire in a theater or some shit. Rip wings of of flies. Catch ya ltr.