Could you deal with your conscience?

Hypothetical situation here...

We'll all go along with the idea of resonable force, so a punch met by a punch, up to if you are in mortal danger going all the way and ending a life to save your own.

But if you had to do that (in a wartime situation or in a peacetime situation) could you live with yourself knowing you had killed someone?

Even if it was to save my life, and the other person was completely out of line (what a weird way to justify killing! 'I'm sorry your honour, but he was simply out of line!') I don't know if I could live with what I did.

Unless I was Chuck Norris. :woo:

 

Could I deal with my conscience knowing that I'd killed someone? I do...I mean I'm sure I could were that totally hypothetical situation to come to pass.

 

I wouldn't kill someone and then kill myself because of it,I dont think so anyway but I know it would change my outlook and the way I felt about life forever.

 

If it came down to "me or them" or "an innocent person or them", I could very easily justify it. I can't imagine I'd feel the slightest bit of guilt at swapping a scumbag's ongoing existance for mine.

It's always be a last resort though - I'm too wussy to go round offing bad guys Punisher-style!

 

no I would not feel guilty. But I might feel bad just a little.

 

Having been in these "hypothetical" situations for real, the answer is "Yes". As long I followed the continum of force, can justify my using deadly force, and I can prove that the victim of said force caused a risk for severe bodily harm or death to you. Yes. Not a problem. Would I wake up with nightmares? Maybe. Would I be alright with taking a life under these circumstances? Yes. :Angel:

 

what they said!

 

Yep. I'm not the type to be wracked with guilt, especially if I felt I was in the right and had used an appropriate level of force. Would I feel bad about it? Sure. But I could live with it.

 

Can't say it'd be easy; but I think I'd deal with it.

People saying "it was them or me"; I don't believe you'd find it that easy. No matter what the cause; doing the concious act of killing another human being is not an easy task. That person might have had a family, friends, loved ones that will miss them terribly. What of that people chances to redeem himself? Poof; gone! Why do you think many soldiers come back scarred from warzones? Even if they were in a kill-or-be-killed situation, killing is never an easy thing to live with. Or at least, I have never heard of or met any sane person that considered it easy.

 

If it was a scumbag, I would be proud and satisfied with killing that scumbag.
If it was a person I could tolerate, I would have psychological problems, I am pretty sure.

 

If it was them or me or someone trying to rape or kill my wife and kids, there would not be a moments hesitation.

It would be unfortunate that the the person would be dead (preferrably I would want the person alive and wishing they were dead).

My only justification for this rational is that it would be the attackers own fault for commiting the act of aggression in the first place and therefore died because of his own actions.

Even so, whenever you commit an act of violence justified or not you kill a part of yourself and become closer to being what you despise most.....

 

I don't really see why this question is always such a big deal.

If you've been around in this world then no doubt you've come up against some total pieces of trash. Many times I've thought the world would quite easily be a better place without these people.

If you've ever been in a situation that's turned into more than just a punch up and you had to really get with the program to save your ass... then you'd have found that crossing that line between them going out and you is not really all that hard.

If you've ever had to pull a knife to save your ass then you'd also know that when you do that - there are not a whole lot of logical conclusions to that scenario that don't include someone getting very very hurt. You don't want to be on the wrong side of the logical conclusion.

It sure as hell is better to sit back and worry about the issues of whether or not you can survive the guilt or whatever from the relative comfort of being the living victor than to be bleeding out in some crap place where you will never get a chance to see your family again.

In this life... often times... you get what you settle for.

It's really got SFA to do with Chuck Norris.

 

Sure; doing it when the time comes is pretty much natural for human beings: instincts and all.

I simply don't buy it that all these people could simply shrug it off that easily after.

 

As for the shrugging it off... that will always be situational. Depending on so many factors as to be impossible to really take a guess at.

I know people who've got very little conscience about hurting people. Come on... correctional facilites are chock full of them.

As for people who spend their time on the internet pondering the possibilities and ramifications of severely hurting someone or killing someone... well - that lot could be a whole different story.

 

I have no idea. It's a good question. I view it the same way I view hypotheticals about any other major life event. I think you muddle through it the best you can afterward. Hard to predict what that'll look like until you're there.


Stuart

 

I find worrying about anything, whether its killing someone, or how well you did on your final is never worth the time it takes to think it.

 

I think that it would be extremely hard to process. I am a very laid back person who generally takes everything in stride and doesn't react over the top to too many things. However, I am sure that taking someone's life, whether they are trash or not, would surely haunt me for a long time.

 

Well. People are murdered and massacred and all sorts of bad things happen to them, when they've done absolutely nothing wrong. So to kill someone whos trying to kill me, by that logic I spose I wouldn't feel bad about it. But then again, its completely theoretical. So i'd be betting that faced with the actual situation, provided I could defend myself, it'd still be a totally different situation.

 

To be honest we could never really know unless we had been in the situation. There have been many situations that I'd have expected myself to act completly differently than did in.

 

My point exactly.