Got GUILT?

[Jenna]

You are walking to the station with your partner after a lovely evening out.. All of a sudden you are accosted in the street.. this guy decides you both offer some easy pickings.. and at the end of a nasty looking knife requests you and your partner give him your valuables. His eyes are glazed. He is clearly NOT in absolute control of himself and intuitively you do not believe valuables are what he is looking to gain. You are thus prepared. Fortunately! Because manically he lunges with the knife at your partner. You are faster and put him down hard and swiftly before he realises what has happened. Your partner is wounded but ok. Your attacker though is out cold. It is only then you see the oozing darkness of his blood against the grey pavement and realise what has happened.

Weeks later, the police are happy and pursue no charges. Your partner got a few stitches for a flesh wound but it is apparent you have saved them from potentially much much worse. But your attacker well.. dead on the spot from cerebral haemhorraging. Though he was on heroin and weakened considerably by it.. it was haemhorraging incurred from the injury sustained from YOU while you defended yourself and your partner that was cause of his death..

Q: Is guilt over an emotion you would feel at this point?

OK all my MT lovelies.. so this is a Y/N answer.. but I would be truly appreciative if you would pander to me a little and give a reasoning to support a Y/N reply if at all possible.. thank you very much

Yr most obdt hmble srvt,
Jenna

 

[Shirt Ripper]

Q: Is guilt over an emotion you would feel at this point?

Nope. Leave me alone.

 

[tshadowchaser]

yes I might feel guilt over the taking of a life that i did not intend to take providing I had only meant to put him to the ground and hold him there till authorities arrived
On the other hand NO if the attacker was in my opinion trying to kill me or my partner then I would have to question did i truly just mean to put him to the ground and hold him or was I going to pound the hell out of him if I had not seen the blood still I might questionif I had wanted to kill him or just send him to the hospital

 

[BrandiJo]

nope, i did what i had to do it was a bad thing that happend but i did what i needed inorder to protect those i care about
​

 

[Ping898]

Yes,

I took a life, for right or for wrong, IMHO that can't occur without leaving some mark on you. And I would feel guilt about the life that had been lost and watsed in the process.

 

[Swordlady]

Yes, I would feel guilty. I may had done what was necessary to protect myself and my companion, but I also have a strong aversion to physically harming another. Taking a human life would be the ultimate last resort. No way I could come out of that experience without having it affect me emotionally and psychologically.

 

[MRE]

I would feel guilty if I killed but didn't need to. If I thought the force I used was the only way I could stop the attacker from harming my wife or children, I don't think I would feel guilty. I say I don't think because I have never been in the situation. I hope to never be able to respond to your post with a definite answer.

 

[Martial Tucker]

Sadness over what happened, yes....


Guilt, no. Guilt implies that what happened was my fault and/or I did something out-of-line to deliberately cause the undesired outcome. That's not the case in the scenario that you described.

Actually, I would focus on the fact that you probably SAVED at least one, and possibly two innocent lives, given the description of what happened.

 

[green meanie]

Q: Is guilt over an emotion you would feel at this point?

No. I wouldn't feel guilty. :asian:

 

[Shaolinwind]

You are walking to the station with your partner after a lovely evening out.. All of a sudden you are accosted in the street.. this guy decides you both offer some easy pickings.. and at the end of a nasty looking knife requests you and your partner give him your valuables. His eyes are glazed. He is clearly NOT in absolute control of himself and intuitively you do not believe valuables are what he is looking to gain. You are thus prepared. Fortunately! Because manically he lunges with the knife at your partner. You are faster and put him down hard and swiftly before he realises what has happened. Your partner is wounded but ok. Your attacker though is out cold. It is only then you see the oozing darkness of his blood against the grey pavement and realise what has happened.

Weeks later, the police are happy and pursue no charges. Your partner got a few stitches for a flesh wound but it is apparent you have saved them from potentially much much worse. But your attacker well.. dead on the spot from cerebral haemhorraging. Though he was on heroin and weakened considerably by it.. it was haemhorraging incurred from the injury sustained from YOU while you defended yourself and your partner that was cause of his death..

Q: Is guilt over an emotion you would feel at this point?

OK all my MT lovelies.. so this is a Y/N answer.. but I would be truly appreciative if you would pander to me a little and give a reasoning to support a Y/N reply if at all possible.. thank you very much

Yr most obdt hmble srvt,
Jenna

First thought, NO. Dude came at me with a knife.

I am inclined to say "it was him or me" and that's sound logical. But I don't think that a person who hasn't been in the situation can truly answer that. What about when you start wondering if you could have just broken his knee, or when you start seeing the bloodied victim in your dreams? Even Police, who are trained for such situations still often end up needing counseling after plugging some punk waving a gun around.

 

[Fluffy]

Yes, I feel guilty. I'm human, I don't know what happened to this person before I was forced to do what I had to do - what kind of demons have control of this person?

Now would I do it again? Yup, I'll do what I have to do to survive and protect my own. I'll deal with the emotions later.

 

[Adept]

Q: Is guilt over an emotion you would feel at this point?

Only guilty that I didn't act sooner, and prevent my partner from being harmed.

I couldn't give a rats pyjamas about killing some would-be murdering junkie. I take what some people consider to be a terrible view on life, but others simply think it's honest.

I know I could be spending my holidays building schools in rural India. I know I could sell one of my cars and buy polio vaccines for children in Africa. I know I could spend my wages on food and medical aid for people displaced by natural disasters. But I'd prefer to spend my money on DVDs, junk food, mobile phones, music, and even food for my dog. As terrible as it was to have so many people die in the Boxing Day Tsunami, I was more upset when my Kribensis died last week.

I'm outrageously selfish, in the scheme of things. People are starving to death, and living in shacks made from tin and cardboard, while I spend my money on CD's and softdrink. And I'm happy with that.

If I'm happy to let people die when I could simply go without cigarettes for a week and save them, why should I feel guilty over killing someone who actively tried to murder someone close to me?

 

[Brandon Fisher]

Yes I would feel some sorrow but not guilt. The fact it was not intentional and I had no choice I would not feel guilty I would feel regret and sorrow that someone lost their life.

 

[Explorer]

It would seem natural to feel some guilt or sorrow over unintentinally taking a life. But in the long run no as my intent was only to stop harm from coming to another innocent life. In this scenario the perpetrator is not innocent while my friend is.

 

[Shaolinwind]

Yes I would feel some sorrow but not guilt. The fact it was not intentional and I had no choice I would not feel guilty I would feel regret and sorrow that someone lost their life.

I'm hip to that.

 

[evenflow1121]

Absolutely, I killed someone, I now have to live with that for the rest of my life. Though I may gain comfort in knowing that had I not reacted my friend may have been seriously hurt or God forbid dead, my intentions were to stop the assailant from hurting my friend or myself, but I some how went further and now the assailant is dead, it has to be very hard to deal with that.

 

[Hand Sword]

Honestly.....No I wouldn't. I would be more afraid (at the time) of the legal charges.

 

[Shaolinwind]

I couldn't give a rats pyjamas about killing some would-be murdering junkie.

I believe you. And you are saying, particularly in the rest of your post, something a lot of people only think. I believe you are honest and your way of thinking is certainly not inherantly evil. I don't think you're an evil person, just very realistic.

In which case, beaing a realist, I believe there might be some small thing that tugs at your heart strings over taking a human life, albeit the life of a piece of human trash. Would you say "too f'ing bad" to his crying mother? Doubtful.

 

[Ceicei]

Considering he came at us with a knife, hopped up on drugs, with intent to kill, then I will not regret my defense in stopping him, even if it ended up with his death.

(Having experienced two attacks in the past, I get flashbacks from these--though thankfully, not as often any more). I know with the scenario you present, I will have to deal with flashbacks for a long time. It is a reflection of the intense emotions present through and after the encounter. I will feel sorry that he died (not necessarily from guilt, because guilt implies that I did something wrong). I did what I could to prevent further harm toward my friend and myself, and for that I will not be sorry. Neverthless, I will be re-playing the memory over and over in my mind, second-guessing myself if I could have handled the situation differently--it is human nature to want to seek reconcilation with the mind, values, and experience. With time, that too, will decrease in frequency.

- Ceicei

 

[Adept]

Would you say "too f'ing bad" to his crying mother? Doubtful.

You're right, I wouldn't. And I'd certainly feel bad about that, but I consider them seperate, if linked, issues. On the one hand, no remorse for taking that persons life. On the other hand, remorse for causing an innocent person grief.