The Way to Hell is Paved….

So there’s two competing philosophies between “Fool me once, shame on you; Fool me twice shame on me” and “Turning the other cheek”. One says that we should learn from our mistakes and if we make the same ones again, it’s kind of our fault, the other says that we should give things a second chance.

Two examples. You meet your friend’s dog for the first time and he bites you. The first adage says that you should never trust this dog because if you do, it’s your fault if he bites you again. The second says you should give the dog a second chance.

This becomes immediately situational. Why did the dog bite you the first time? Maybe he was scared by a noise, or you came towards him in a blind spot (or maybe he’s been badly raised and never told not to bite people). Could you train the dog not to bite people?

Now, what does the owner do when their dog bit you? Is he mad at the dog, telling him “No”? This means that the dog might learn a lesson, too. The next time, he should know that it’s wrong to bite people. Maybe he just needed to understand that what he did was wrong.

Now let’s take a second situation that talks about intention. Can people change? Do they do bad, mean or immoral things that hurt you on purpose? If they tried to hurt you, and you feel you have proof of this, then you probably shouldn’t give them a second chance.

I’m thinking about a situation in my family in particular here. One person in my family feels hurt by the others because these others have acted selfishly. They don’t think about anyone but themselves. I’m wondering if these other family members know this or not (the situation of the dog who didn’t know any better)? Or are they doing it intentionally to be mean? I’m wondering whether my family member can actually help them understand that they are doing something hurtful or not?

I’m not so good with the “if you don’t know (what the problem is) I’m not going to tell you.” Most people are kind of in their own heads (at best) and don’t really understand how their acts might hurt other people. Others really don’t care. I don’t know where this situation falls, and I don’t know if there’s any benefit to telling them that their behavior was hurtful.

Do you believe that most people like to think they are good people? Does even the worst person you know have an inner dialogue in their head to justify their bad acts? I know for a fact that the worst people in my life have always thought their bad actions were justified. Their justifications were fabrications, or based on some alternate reality, but they all thought they were right. Is it worth it to find out how the person got to their weird reality? Or should we just let it go?

I don’t have any answers, as usual. Just questions. And Foro.