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Ok, there have been a lot of discussion everywhere about the fairness and rightfulness of revenge. Sometimes revenge is justified by saying it prevents future misery and for greater good, by either setting an example of fear to other people who think about doing bad, or by preventing the guy who did wrong to ever do that again. I am not going to argue against that, but the thing is in most cases that is not the case.
Many times revenge is justified by saying "well he did bad so he deserves bad things happen to him" or "if you was a close member of the victim, wouldn't you want bad things to happen to him too?" Usually the eye for eye punishment follows that logic. Well I disagree with that logic, because of a reason I have not seen brought up. Think about it from the perspective of the guy who wants revenge. He wants to cause misery to the guy who did wrong. No matter how bad thing did a guy do, it still only makes him a (bad) human being. Now I believe there is a word for someone who wants misery to other people, ah yes sadist. Does it make it any better if you would like that any harm wouldn't have happened in the first place? Maybe, but it still simply put means that if you are going to lay out an opinion that bad things should happen to bad people just because they have done bad, you're a sadist who wants to see other people suffer... for the sake of suffering.
There migth be so if you find flaws in my logic, point them out.
  
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The flaw in your logic is that you're using normative (morality-based) arguments to make a point about something objective (evidence-based).
Whether someone's stance on "revenge" or "retribution" is right or wrong is not universally obvious or true. Right and wrong, moral and immoral...these are things that are shaped by an individual's conception of The Good. Really the most YOU can conclude from the fact that someone wants revenge is that YOU find what they desire IMMORAL.
Mental illness is something objective. It doesn't depend on whether someone thinks a bipolar personality is Good or Bad. It doesn't matter if the psychologist things the schizophrenic person is immoral because of his schizophrenia. Immorality is not a mental illness any more than it is a physical illness like hypertension. It is simply a comparison of one person's thoughts/beliefs/actions and anothers conception of Good and Bad.
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On August 02 2011 05:06 beberly wrote:
The flaw in your logic is that you're using normative (morality-based) arguments to make a point about something objective (evidence-based).
Whether someone's stance on "revenge" or "retribution" is right or wrong is not universally obvious or true. Right and wrong, moral and immoral...these are things that are shaped by an individual's conception of The Good. Really the most YOU can conclude from the fact that someone wants revenge is that YOU find what they desire IMMORAL.
Mental illness is something objective. It doesn't depend on whether someone thinks a bipolar personality is Good or Bad. It doesn't matter if the psychologist things the schizophrenic person is immoral because of his schizophrenia. Immorality is not a mental illness any more than it is a physical illness like hypertension. It is simply a comparison of one person's thoughts/beliefs/actions and anothers conception of Good and Bad.
Well thats just the name the topic (whcih is sligthly sensationalist), but it is a fact, that if you want revenge you are a sadist. Its a matter of opinion is sadism a mental sickness.
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Not to be a Wiki warrior (translation: I'm about to cite Wikipedia), but Sadism is not a mental illness. It was dropped from the DSM for the fourth iteration. And even when it was in the DSM III, it needed a hell of a lot more than taking joy in someone else's pain/suffering.
Sadism, as it is understood now, is more of a sexual fetish than a cognizable mental illness.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sadistic_personality_disorder (I APOLOGIZE TO ACTUAL MENTAL HEALTH PROFESSIONALS FOR MY CITATION OF WIKIPEDIA TO SUPPORT MY POINT. PLEASE FORGIVE ME!!!)
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On August 02 2011 05:20 beberly wrote:Not to be a Wiki warrior, but Sadism is not a mental illness. It was dropped from the DSM for the fourth iteration. And even when it was in the DSM III, it needed a hell of a lot more than taking joy in someone else's pain/suffering. Sadism, as it is understood now, is more of a sexual fetish than a cognizable mental illness. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sadistic_personality_disorder (I APOLOGIZE TO ACTUAL MENTAL HEALTH PROFESSIONALS FOR MY CITATION OF WIKIPEDIA TO SUPPORT MY POINT. PLEASE FORGIVE ME!!!)
But there is another wikipedia page
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sadism
Which says
Sadism is the derivation of pleasure as a result of inflicting pain or watching pain inflicted on others.
I QUESS I AM SORRY, if I did not know what are the official requierements to consider sadism a mental illness.
PS. What do you mean there are official limits of these things? I would consider that thing an ultimate matter of opinion. Figth the power!
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On August 02 2011 05:16 Sea_Food wrote:Show nested quote +On August 02 2011 05:06 beberly wrote:
The flaw in your logic is that you're using normative (morality-based) arguments to make a point about something objective (evidence-based).
Whether someone's stance on "revenge" or "retribution" is right or wrong is not universally obvious or true. Right and wrong, moral and immoral...these are things that are shaped by an individual's conception of The Good. Really the most YOU can conclude from the fact that someone wants revenge is that YOU find what they desire IMMORAL.
Mental illness is something objective. It doesn't depend on whether someone thinks a bipolar personality is Good or Bad. It doesn't matter if the psychologist things the schizophrenic person is immoral because of his schizophrenia. Immorality is not a mental illness any more than it is a physical illness like hypertension. It is simply a comparison of one person's thoughts/beliefs/actions and anothers conception of Good and Bad. Well thats just the name the topic (whcih is sligthly sensationalist), but it is a fact, that if you want revenge you are a sadist. Its a matter of opinion is sadism a mental sickness.
In the same way that it is a matter of opinion that brain cancer is a physical sickness? The only thing that is NOT an opinion in this whole discussion is Sadism's classification as a mental illness. All the other things are opinions: whether revenge is good or bad, whether a desire for revenge is tantamount to sadism, whether there exist any moral justifications for revenge-seeking. THOSE questions are open to debate. Sadism is simply not a mental illness. It may be morally wrong, but it's not an illness.
EDIT in response to your last post: "Mental illness" is an objective concept. Each one has a specific definition that mental health professionals (psychologists/psychiatrists) use to determine whether an individual has that disorder, in much the same way that physicians diagnose physical illnesses. This is what I was getting at in my first post. You were trying to prove that wanting revenge was a mental illess by saying that it is morally wrong or that it was essentially sadism. But even if those things are true, it doesn't make it a mental illess. THAT is where the objective/subjective divide occurs.
EDIT TO MY EDIT: I think the moral question of whether there exist valid moral arguments to justfy retributivist punishment is VERY interesting, though. I agree with you that it is very tough to morally justify pain and suffering purely for the sake of revenge. Perhaps not impossible, but difficult. Where I disagree, though, is conflating that with mental illness.
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On August 02 2011 05:29 beberly wrote:
You were trying to prove that wanting revenge was a mental illess by saying that it is morally wrong or that it was essentially sadism.
Actually what I intedned to prove was that revenge is essentially sadism. (Sorry bad english?)
I tougth that sadism is considered an mentall sickness as default so thats why I put it in the name of topic, but it seems I am wrong about that.
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On August 02 2011 05:40 Sea_Food wrote:Show nested quote +On August 02 2011 05:29 beberly wrote:
You were trying to prove that wanting revenge was a mental illess by saying that it is morally wrong or that it was essentially sadism. Actually what I intedned to prove was that revenge is essentially sadism. (Sorry bad english?)
Haha I guess I was tripped up by the (admittedly) sensationalist title. I do agree with you that revenge might be fairly similar to sadism. I think it is a LITTLE different, though. Sadism results in pleasure for the sadist. Revenge-seekers, though, usually don't get "pleasure" from the pain that others receive. At most, it is a grim satisfaction that "justice" has been done. In addition, usually Sadists enjoy seeing the suffering of others generally, where revenge-seekers want only a specific person to suffer (the person who has committed a wrong). It's a small difference, and probably unimportant, but I think it does exist.
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Mental disorders are far from objective. Some like schizophrenia are hereditery and could be considered a bit more concrete, but there aren't any mental diagnosesis where you can take a blood sample or confirm or anything.
Instead it's just clusters of behaviors that are often seen together and are considered harmful to the individual or others. So it's all about what is normal, right or wrong, and the most obvious example of that is how homosexuality was considered a mental disorder not long ago.
I don't think revenge serves any real purpose except create more suffering, but I wouldn't call revenge a mental disorder. Seems far fetched and a pretty normal response to a tragic incident even if it can be destructive.
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On August 02 2011 05:44 beberly wrote:Show nested quote +On August 02 2011 05:40 Sea_Food wrote:On August 02 2011 05:29 beberly wrote:
You were trying to prove that wanting revenge was a mental illess by saying that it is morally wrong or that it was essentially sadism. Actually what I intedned to prove was that revenge is essentially sadism. (Sorry bad english?) Haha I guess I was tripped up by the (admittedly) sensationalist title. I do agree with you that revenge might be fairly similar to sadism. I think it is a LITTLE different, though. Sadism results in pleasure for the sadist. Revenge-seekers, though, usually don't get "pleasure" from the pain that others receive. At most, it is a grim satisfaction that "justice" has been done. In addition, usually Sadists enjoy seeing the suffering of others generally, where revenge-seekers want only a specific person to suffer (the person who has committed a wrong). It's a small difference, and probably unimportant, but I think it does exist.
Well there is this theory that everything you do or try to do is a seek of pleasure, no matter how hard you could try to not live by the theory. So seeking misery of others = having pleasure of others misery.
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On August 02 2011 05:45 Sablar wrote:
Mental disorders are far from objective. Some like schizophrenia are hereditery and could be considered a bit more concrete, but there aren't any mental diagnosesis where you can take a blood sample or confirm or anything.
Lack of a blood sample or other biological test doesn't mean a classification isn't objective. To be a mental illness, that cluster of behaviors must exist. If the patient doesn't exhibit the relevant behaviors, he does not have that mental illness. He may not be displaying completely normal behavior, but that doesn't make it a mental illness. "Objectivity" removes the individual's preferences from the equation. If a person displays the characteristics of a mental disorder, a competent psychologist would diagnose that disorder based on the definition of the disorder, not his feelings about it. Sure, he could misdiagnose it because he doesn't think the patient exhibits a symptom, but in the same way a physician can misdiagnose a bone fracture or a tumor. Because they did poorly doesn't change the ultimate classification.
Subjective pursuits, like morality, are subject to the feelings of the individual. If I think sport hunting is immoral, you can't provide evidence that makes my moral feeling about sport hunting any less true. Just like I cannot say something to another person who holds a different belief that makes his moral view any less right.
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On August 02 2011 05:57 beberly wrote:Show nested quote +On August 02 2011 05:45 Sablar wrote:
Mental disorders are far from objective. Some like schizophrenia are hereditery and could be considered a bit more concrete, but there aren't any mental diagnosesis where you can take a blood sample or confirm or anything. Lack of a blood sample or other biological test doesn't mean a classification isn't objective. To be a mental illness, that cluster of behaviors must exist. If the patient doesn't exhibit the relevant behaviors, he does not have that mental illness. He may not be displaying completely normal behavior, but that doesn't make it a mental illness. "Objectivity" removes the individual's preferences from the equation. If a person displays the characteristics of a mental disorder, a competent psychologist would diagnose that disorder based on the definition of the disorder, not his feelings about it. Sure, he could misdiagnose it because he doesn't think the patient exhibits a symptom, but in the same way a physician can misdiagnose a bone fracture or a tumor. Because they did poorly doesn't change the ultimate classification. Subjective pursuits, like morality, are subject to the feelings of the individual. If I think sport hunting is immoral, you can't provide evidence that makes my moral feeling about sport hunting any less true. Just like I cannot say something to another person who holds a different belief that makes his moral view any less right.
You're missing the point. From a single psychologists point of view there are criteria that need to be fulfilled in order for something to be considered a mental disorder, yes (or kind of, in practise it doesn't work like that due to people not fitting into any diagnosis but are given one anyway). But these criteria and the definitions of the disorders are what is subjective. They are constantly changing and evolving, and new ones are added and old one's are removed.
So is it possible to have an objective mental disoder one day yet the next day you no longer have it because it is no longer considered a mental disoder? That doesn't make sense. If it is considered wrong you can bet there is a diagnosis for it but not if it's considered normal or right. A diagnosis needs to create suffering in order for it to be applied but you can't objectively define something like that.
Also we have these diagnosesis with 7 criteria and you need to fulfill 4 of them. Patient A has criteria 1,2,3,4 and patient B has 4,5,6,7. Yet they have the same objective disorder..? It's not like even the people creating the DSM think that they are describing something concrete, because all they are doing is looking at what behavioral signs often occur together and cluster them together. It's not a bad system because classification is needed in order to determine what treatments may work, and behind the clusters and factor analysis there may be something objectively measureable (ie centimeters instead of some likert-scale) but that's not possible today.
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"A mental disorder or mental illness is a psychological or behavioral pattern generally associated with subjective distress or disability that occurs in an individual, and which is not a part of normal development or culture"
"The recognition and understanding of mental health conditions have changed over time and across cultures, and there are still variations in the definition, assessment, and classification of mental disorders, although standard guideline criteria are widely accepted."
Hardly objective.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mental_disorder
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People can't shouldn't try to take revenge on another, because no one is perfect, and only a perfect soul should be able to take judgement on another. I do think that it's perfectly fine to want revenge, as it's part of human nature. All just imo though.
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On August 02 2011 05:45 Sablar wrote:
So it's all about what is normal, right or wrong, and the most obvious example of that is how homosexuality was considered a mental disorder not long ago.
I tought it was considered mental disorder because it was wrong? Statisticly being homosexual is only a bit rarer than being left handed, but because it was considered discusting, people sayd it was mental disorder.
That is how I remember it atleast.
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Very wrong.
Revenge for most people is a mean to achieve equity. They don't derive pleasure directly from hurting people; they derive pleasure from achieving fairness.
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On August 03 2011 02:02 almond wrote:
Very wrong.
Revenge for most people is a mean to achieve equity. They don't derive pleasure directly from hurting people; they derive pleasure from achieving fairness.
They derive pleasure from hurting people, because they try to achieve fairness with it.
No matter what would I have wrote after the word "because", the people would still be sadist.
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On August 03 2011 01:51 Sea_Food wrote:Show nested quote +On August 02 2011 05:45 Sablar wrote:
So it's all about what is normal, right or wrong, and the most obvious example of that is how homosexuality was considered a mental disorder not long ago.
I tought it was considered mental disorder because it was wrong? Statisticly being homosexual is only a bit rarer than being left handed, but because it was considered discusting, people sayd it was mental disorder. That is how I remember it atleast.
Right and normal often go hand in hand, except when it comes to the left hand I guess -.- If enough people were homosexual or bi I doubt there would have ever been a diagnosis for it.
And I guess there are more things than ethics and normality like level of function and suffering, that comes into play when diagnosis are created. But I think I touched on that already.
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On August 03 2011 03:45 Sea_Food wrote:Show nested quote +On August 03 2011 02:02 almond wrote:
Very wrong.
Revenge for most people is a mean to achieve equity. They don't derive pleasure directly from hurting people; they derive pleasure from achieving fairness. They derive pleasure from hurting people, because they try to achieve fairness with it. No matter what would I have wrote after the word "because", the people would still be sadist.
Do I really have to tell you why that's wrong? lol
Ex. You are happy your friend's name isn't on the promotion list, because it means you were promoted.
Wowow you must be a bad person.
The point is, they don't derive pleasure from hurting people. If they did, they wouldn't need to use revenge as a reason for doing it.
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EPT
