There are always two sides to a coin, at least that’s what I was told. But from what I observe, there are as many sides to a coin as many there are observers of the coin. It is this simple idea that can make anyones confidence to separate the right from the wrong rather foggy. Makes me wonder, what is truly morally correct.
Rahul looses his mind, picks up a knife and stabs Kirat. Is Rahul wrong? Is it with him that the fault truly lies? Or is he a victim of poor upbringing? Could his actions be the symptoms of the defects in his parents skill to parent? Or is his friend circle to blame? But then if we do find out it was his friends who influenced Rahul to pick up the knife and stab Kirat, then the obvious question that would arise is in what way and in what degree was this influence? On the other hand, should parents have to clear a ‘Good Parenting’ exams before been allowed to become parents?
What was this ‘influence’? Did they directly say “Go, Rahul, and kill Kirat. What he did deserves nothing less than death”. Or did they do an inception of a simple idea. An idea that resulted him to conclude that killing Kirat is the only way out? Was this inception deliberate or simply incidental?
Let’s say it is his friends who influenced Rahul to Kill Kirat. So now, are his friends the true criminals? After all, it’s because of them that Rahul did what he did. Or were his friends the victims of yet another defect in the society they live in?
Any horrid event in history has more than just one ingredient in its recipe. It is puzzling at what level of questioning should one stop to settle with the final judgement. Is there even a thing called a ‘Final Judgement’? And if there is nothing such then why the hell are we sentencing people to jail! They are not the only people to be blamed. There are others, who had a role to play. May be not directly but they did influence the crime. That is to some extent a punishable guilt. They were unaware of the impact their actions would have? Similar lines to ‘Ignorantia juris non excusa’.
Some people would say, “Rahul is the one who killed Kirat, put him in jail”. Some would argue, “Rahul did kill Kirat, but he is not to blame. It’s his friends who influenced him with a deliberate intention to have him kill Kirat. Put his friends in jail”.
Some might further argue “We discussed Rahuls upbringing and friend circle to identify the source of his criminal act, let’s do the same for his friends. After all we do need to be fair in our judgement, right?”.
And finally, someone might come up and argue “You know what, may be Kirat just deserved to die. So why punish Rahul and his friends for something Kirat deserved?”. Someone else would question, “How do you fairly judge who deserves what?”.
There are varied perceptions to where the guilt lies. If society is interested in solving the problem at the root, there are so many ways to look at a situation that it becomes impossible to pin point just one root cause.
Differentiation between wrong and correct, bad and good is only a matter of perception. The angel of ones view to a situation.
May be the perception of good and bad is lost here, but this thought might signify the finding of a concept. A concept that can revolutionize how a person chooses to finalize his/her judgements.
Never blame the person for his/her doing, blame the society, blame the situation, blame the process.
-Anant Agnihotri
Hey Anant, I agree with your thoughts presented in the Post. I would just like to share my thoughts about the conclusion. According to me,we have to hold people accountable for their actions, at the same time we can also look into other factors but not holding the doer responsible is going to eventually create a society where everyone does whatever they want and then blame the situations for what happened.