Revenge Embedded in Culture and Media, Banned by Law

Revenge is popular at the movies. Liam Neeson has practically banked his career on revenge flicks after starting out as a “serious” actor in Schindler’s List, Michael Collins and other Oscar-worthy films. More actors have jumped on the revenge bandwagon such as Sean Penn and others:

Revenge Movies Offer Mythic Middle-Aged Protectors

Revenge is one of the oldest human emotions and drives stories even from ancient times. It is a primal urge to right a wrong and see a villain get his/her comeuppance. In olden days, taking the “law” into one’s hands was the only way to get justice as there was no law nearby or available. But with the advent of the industrial age and the rise of crowded urban areas, governments asserted their power and frowned on revenge as it was extra-legal and out of the control of elites and the powerful. The function of modern law is not necessarily to achieve justice or enforce ethics and morality, but rather to keep a lid on things on society. Keeping the peace and harmony of society is the paramount value, as how else can business and capitalism function? But by removing revenge as a tool of getting justice, many people feel powerless and project onto the film screen to live vicariously through the vengeance-taker.

Revenge can be seen as a moral imperative; that is we must get justice on a wrong-doer otherwise that person will commit wrongs upon others. The psychopath must be taken down a notch to know they cannot get away with their damaging actions with impunity. There are many things that are perfectly legal, but are not ethical, and therefore there is no legal recourse against someone who knows how to skirt those lines (and it’s not hard either). Twitter and other social media can ban revenge porn postings:

Twitter Takes Steps To Combat Stolen Nudes And Revenge Porn

But it’s not going to stop it. Wronged people will find a way to get revenge, and if it’s not through posting nudes of someone on Twitter then they will find other sites or other methods. With no legal outlet for getting justice, don’t be surprised when people become outlaws to get the satisfaction of a balanced and just order. In the meantime, they will continue to flock to revenge movies to satisfy their primal desire vicariously and then manifest motivation to get revenge in their real life.

One Gaffe on Social Media Will Cost You Your Job

Modern life is unforgiving, and social media only exacerbates this harsh reality. People have always said stupid things, but now that one stupid thing can cost you your job:

Justine Sacco’s One Stupid Tweet

What Sacco said was stupid, insenstive and offensive, but the question should be asked whether this one tweet was truly reflective of who she was as a person. Was this part of a pattern of stupid, insensitive things she said, or was it a one (or two) off, shot from the hip, while waiting in the airport. We are under constant pressure to sling snark because others find it funny and will like and follow us more. Sometimes the line of public proprietary gets crossed, and then a person is pilloried for bad taste, insensitivty, racism, etc. If you haven’t realized it by now, this site positions itself as reasoned argumentation in irony to the connotative meaning of the site’s address moniker. But at some point, no matter how careful, something will end up getting written that will offend someone in some way that not have been anticipated. And then jobs will be lost because of it. One of the most horrendous examples from the article is the guy making an off-color sexual joke about dongles at a tech conference, and then a woman takes it upon herself to take his photo without permission and outed him as a misogynist to the planet. He promptly lost his job, and then so did she. Companies are wimps that fire employees who stray even a bit off the line into the slightest whiff of controversy. These companies should be boycotted as they are chilling the speech of everyone who works in them by firing employees who make one mistake in their private life.

The problem is that all our different selves at home, work, shopping, school, have become conflated for everyone to know every single facet. The joke Sacco told was meant for her good friends, but it spread globally because it is much more difficult to keep our private self under close wraps.

Originally posted: http://www.mccarthyism.com/2015/20150215.htm