Ending Cruelty

It’s a tall order, and that’s an understatement. It seems that there is some inherent cruelty in people, no matter who they are. Though I believe humans are fundamentally good, that isn’t to say we can’t be cruel. Humans are quite adept at being cruel, and often they don’t even realize it.
It’s easy to say you’re just offering “tough love,” or that you believe in “firm justice,” but it becomes far easier to be cruel when it’s considered acceptable by social and legal authorities.
I can’t tell you how often I’ve heard comments that sadden me regarding the way we treat and speak of others. A poor man isn’t poor because of social factors that disrupt his goals for a better life (factors such as economic downturn, lack of available jobs, no access to higher education), he’s poor because he’s lazy. He deserves scorn for his laziness. He deserves the pain he’s in, and some people feel if they help him they’re being soft on him, and for some reason compassion towards those we feel don’t deserve it is seen as a weakness in our society.
Take, as another example, a prisoner. Watch the news tell of prisoner abuse, and you will inevitably hear the comment “they’re criminals, so it’s not like they’re innocent.” Being beaten, being abused by those in authority or other inmates, is what you deserve for your crime? You’re in prison, and are receiving punishment for that crime. The reason we stopped cruel and unusual punishment is because it was state sanctioned revenge. Yet here we see it continue to thrive unofficially, in the hearts and minds of people who probably believe they’re only being cruel to be kind.
There is no such thing as cruel to be kind. If you’re being cruel to be kind, you’re just being cruel. Any kindness that might exist there is residual, and will go unnoticed by the recipient of your cruelty. You may think you’re doing right, you may feel that someone deserves a particular brand of justice, but all you’re really doing is letting anger, pettiness, and revenge creep into your heart. There is no love in cruelty. None.
We must live compassion. It is vital that we recognize the humanity in every person. Don’t let what you see around you convince you that your life is “normal,” because it isn’t. We all live on a foundation of personal precepts and social contracts. Every single human being you’ve encountered thinks differently than you do, their brains are wired differently than yours. It doesn’t seem that way because you’ve all agreed to those unseen social contracts, and your personal experiences reinforce the permanent nature of those contracts, but I assure you that not everything is ever as it seems.
I’m not saying you can’t hold to your own moral convictions, that’s fine if you do. What I’m saying is that you can’t use those moral convictions to justify cruelty towards others. 100 years ago, smoking marijuana didn’t make you the scum of the earth. Nowadays? Politicians talk of the dangerous nature of people who smoke marijuana, because those people are clearly criminals, and cannot be trusted. They get thrown in jail for smoking a weed that grows in the dirt, and it is fully enforced by the social contract that has been established as “acceptable.”
It’s so easy to be lulled into the notion that you’re on the side of good, and anyone who disagrees with you is on the side of evil. It makes it easier to oppress, condemn, to discriminate and abolish. It makes it legal, and healthy, to destroy the lives of others because you find in them a moral failing that you cannot abide. That is why I so often speak against moral legalism. When you equate morality with what is and is not legal, you open yourself to the idea that being cruel is just one more tool in the arsenal to eradicate the enemies of the state.
We can be better than that. We must be better than that. We need to start seeing human beings as human beings, people who make flawed, imperfect decisions. I’m not excusing horrible deeds committed by people, I just want to take away the system that dehumanizes them and makes it easier to commit atrocities against them in the name of a “justice” system that lacks mercy, and compassion.
I believe our first goal in building empathy is to recognize that we all do stupid things, we all make terrible mistakes. To accept the idea that we can improve, that we can be better people if only given the opportunity to change. A person who has stolen, who has murdered, who has committed terrible acts against others, is still a person. They’ve done wrong, they’ve done a horrible thing to another person, that is true, but that doesn’t mean they’re now useless, or someone to be locked away and destroyed. They are still human beings, and deserve to be treated as such.
Speaking of the United States, our system is far too interested in unrelenting punishment. Unlike many other countries, we don’t rehabilitate, we punish, and then when someone has done their time, we punish them upon release by making sure that record follows them around the rest of their lives, regardless of their behavior, or even their innocence. It’s shameful, and it is the system of a cruel society, one that needs to be tossed aside.
Systemic cruelty is a danger to us all, because it makes it okay for us to be cruel in return. So when you see a news story about a murderer getting raped in prison, you’ll find comments of “good,” and “I hope he gets raped by the biggest man in that prison,” we perpetuate that cruelty. That even applies all the way down the ladder to someone who stole $1,000 from a cash register in a grocery store. Our thirst for vengeance, our desire to hurt those we believe hurt us, is a strong one.
Also, I’m sorry if you didn’t know this, but yes, it is a serious problem in the United States, one that seems unlikely to go anywhere. Efforts to put an end to that practice are small, and unpopular. That is why I am concerned. It is why I fear we have adopted a culture of cruelty, one which we have no intention of discarding any time soon. In light of recent events in the news, it may even be growing in influence. I’ll have more on that tomorrow, though.
If you take nothing else away from this post today, then take this: We must be kind, always kind. Let your compassion and mercy lead your heart, not the desire for cruelty masked as “tough love,” or being “cruel to be kind.” Those concepts are not real, and only allow greater cruelties to be acted upon under the guise of justice.
Until next time, I love you, and may the Goddess bless you.