Forgiving someone who isn’t sorry isn’t necessarily strength. You allowing them to do that shit by forgiving them ain’t strong imo. Moving on from that person is a much stronger thing to do
Forgiving isn’t necessarily allowance, it’s unburdening yourself of the emotional weight the wrong has done to you. It’s possible to forgive someone for doing you wrong while still seeking justice, in fact doing that is the purest form of seeking justice, removal of the emotional investment of vengeance from the equation.
The wrongs you’ve done to others are the chains that bind you, but the wrongs you refuse to forgive are the chains that hold you to the person who wronged you, even after justice and atonement and even reconciliation, you won’t be free until you’ve let go of it yourself.
it’s also possible to let go without the forgiveness step.
Letting go is literally the act of forgiveness. This is like saying it’s possible to inhale without breathing.
Looks like we have a semantic disagreement.
letting go is the act of not caring, the act of me moving on.
forgiveness implies I don’t hold the person accountable anymore for whatever they did. In my mind, the first does not require the second.
You don’t allow others to do anything.
Chances are they aren’t going to change because you get pissed about. You’re just going to waste you energy on it. Like arguing on here or Reddit.
It’s much less effort to just let things go.
Letting go and forgiving are 2 different things. Letting go is allowing yourself to move on from what happened, which is good. Forgiving is saying that they are no longer accountable for what happened, which is good if they’ve realized that they did you wrong and have made steps to prevent it from happening in the future, but otherwise is just letting them off the hook for something they’ll likely continue to do.
Forgiveness is a gift you give to someone to show they’ve grown as a person, and shouldn’t be given to someone who hasn’t grown enough to realize what they did was wrong. In that event, absolutely allow yourself to let go and move on, but to not give the other person the gift of forgiveness if they haven’t earned it.
Yeah. If they’re not sorry, then they don’t think what they did was bad, and have no reason to stop doing it in the future, so forgiving them for it makes no sense - it’s just giving them the power to continue mistreating you without consequence. Get away from them, prevent them from continuing to hurt you, then accept that it happened and move on, but don’t give them forgiveness they don’t yet deserve.
Nah. Real strength is holding them accountable even when someone else demands you forgive them no matter how horrible their actions.
Accountability and justice require more real strength than easy, selfish, lazy, cowardly forgiveness.
Worth noting that holding a grudge and holding someone accountable are not the same thing, you can do one without the other.
Tell that to the people who demand others forgive.
Of course, that’s assuming there’s something wrong with holding a grudge, which of course there isn’t.
There is definitely something wrong when people who demand forgiveness purposefully equivocate the two so they can accuse victims, when they’re at their most vulnerable, of holding a grudge when they call out everyone else for refusing to hold bullies or abusers or whatever accountable for their actions.
That’s all their silly rhetoric is about. If you were abused and you are angry or sad about it and want whoever hurt you punished, you’re the one doing something wrong, because it is not actions that they care about – actions are, of course, expected to be forgiven – but reactions are, because people who reject the paradigm are a threat to their little rape culture.
Meditate on that before you speak next time.
I don’t know what to say, you seem to have made up an intricate story in your head about me, From what I can interpret in your text I’m in the side of demanding forgiveness?
You’re fighting a strawman.
Everything depends on the situation. There is no one right answer.
To give an example, lets say a person who has about a week left due to some incurable disease does something offensive to you. Will you go about asking for accountability or forgive them?
It depends on how offensive the action was VS what the state of the person who did the action is. Regardless, you’ll need strength, either to hold accountable or to forgive the person.
Either could be the right choice, but I’m saying life is not black and white, it’s mostly gray situations and people trying to call it black or white.
Actually, that example is a perfect example of why forgiveness is a terrible thing most of the time.
It is a clearly fictional scenario built on imaginary foundations with the explicit purpose of emotionally manipulating other people into accepting unacceptable, egregious abuse,
Someone who is a week away from dying being purposefully abusive to those around them is someone who has always been abusive to the subject in question and is someone who the victim should not only have put in their place earlier in life but probably couldn’t, is also someone the victim should have simply abandoned to nursing home care in the first place. But again, the victim likely could not have as they were being abused their whole lives.
I know this because I work with the elderly. I see the sad stories play out every day. A lot of people in nursing homes are there because they deserve to be.
And you know they were able to get away with abusing their victims all their lives?
Because of dumb fucks like you trying to emotionally bludgeon everyone else into accepting forgiveness.
There are very few times in life when it’s worth it to forgive someone and that “very few” is only there so I can show everyone else I am right when you exploit it to try to shove the issue down my throat like you do to myself and other abuse survivors. Or my clients and their kids. Or everyone else.
It literally doesn’t matter what color life is. Forgiveness is a vice and a moral failing, especially for those who advocate it.
First of all, I forgive you for not reading and trying to understand my point and abuse me by calling names. (There you go, you have an example when to forgive)
I never mentioned forgiveness is the ultimate choice. Neither did I mention being assertive is. My point, to repeat, is this - the decision to take your action DEPENDS ON THE SITUATION. We should not blindly advocate “always forgive” or “always be assertive”. It ALWAYS and ALWAYS depends on the situation.
What we should do is to have the mindset to take a step back and analyse the situation and choose the correct action.
The example I gave is purely fictional and I don’t know how you are blindly taking a stance against such abusive elderly ? Maybe you have worked with elderly and maybe in those situations they deserve it, but how do you know the situation of everyone in the world ? How can you take that stance without having enough information about them.
Again, please take a step back and try to understand my point.
Well, would you look at that. It’s exactly what I’m talking about.
If you want to manipulate other people into accepting beliefs that directly conflict with their interests and harm them, you could try not blatantly proving them right, to start.
First of all, I forgive you for not reading and trying to understand my point and abuse me by calling names. (There you go, you have an example when to forgive)
Like here.
When I said explicitly that forgiveness is used as an emotional cudgel by worthless, petty slimeballs like you to get your way.
And you’re using it as an emotional cudgel to get your way.
And you’re a particularly petty scumbag at that, while we’re talking about name calling.
You’re the kind of scumbag who’d get defensive and tell some poor girl you forgive them for calling out your shitty brother, or cousin, or friend for raping them, so you can feel like you got one over on them.
Hell, you’d beat your own spouse and tell them you forgive them for the inconvenience when they call you out on it in court.
Because just as I said, forgiveness is nothing more than a flex and a power-trip for vile fuck-ups like you.
You deserve the name-calling you get. Let them hurt you deep within, for all the lies and suffering your ilk imposes on everyone else without a second’s thought.
🙄
Oh, calling it now: you are going to respond: “Well, I hope YOU feel better, find healing and find peace in your life”, because of course the morality behind forgiveness isn’t about what’s good for other people, it’s about asserting superiority over others so you can make yourself feel better. Because of course having a grievance against you is always bad, and negative feelings bad, positive feelings good, and anyone who feels bad is always inferior to you. That is how abusers think. We’ve all seen that lame-ass song and dance before.
It’s okay though. I actually do have a happy peaceful life, because I reject people like you. I don’t keep trash in my life.
morality behind forgiveness isn’t about what’s good for other people
I’m sorry you see it this way. All I did was try to point some random stranger on the internet to what I felt is right. If you don’t accept it that is ok. Hope your belief system works for you and as you said you have a peaceful life, so good for you.
I understand that I can’t get my point through to you, so I’m not going to. I don’t know you enough to make this point so I could be completely wrong, but if I may make one remark, you tend to over assume things. Again I could be wrong, but that’s what I felt from the brief conversation.
Also on the same lines, you don’t know me, and whatever crappy person you made up in your mind is, I’m not that. So I don’t care about those remarks you made. Those are just in your mind.
Yes I accept it is a universal truth that positive feelings and peacefulness is good. And where I can help I will. Not because I think of myself as privileged or superior, because I have received help and forgiveness from others and I consider I owe it to others too.
I’m not going to respond any more because I see no point. One last thing I would say is one day you and I will die (my friend, if I may). And it wouldn’t matter what was right or what was wrong, because in death, nothing matters. So all these thoughts that we have are just for the few years in between. Hope we sail those years without harming oneself and others.
Wish you good life 👍
You literally could have just said “Wish you a good life” without the wall of text that says literally nothing.
The rest of us certainly will have good lives, by the way, as we reject abusive scumfucks like yourself.
Oh, but I’m sorry you feel the need to be a hypocritical, toxic, destructive, fake prat who thinks it’s okay for you to get defensive, angry and to lash out when you’re called out on doing something really horrendously egregious, but anyone else who tells you what you’re doing is wrong is beneath you. No disrespect. Blessings be upon you for your forgiveness.
Am I doing the bougie sarcasm thing right? Do I need to get plastered on cheap wine before trying it or did you drink it all already?
Agreed.
Sometimes, not forgiving is like drinking poison and expecting the other to die. This is bs. This is passively holding a grude and forgiveness only helps you pass away the feeling. Leaving you open to 1) not learn how to deal with the situation and 2) setting yourself up for it happening again.
Strength is needed to be assertive and hold others accountable. Even more so, when doing it in a respectful manner.
Forgive? Nah. Let go of the anger because they’re not in the room right now? Sure.
That’s the kind of bs I don’t want to hear until I’ve moved on. Remind me in 10 years.
It’s like when I see someone who only knows “literally” as an adverb. I downvote, and then move on. Nothing to forgive.
Wait, someone using “literally” as an adverb means they don’t know how else to use the word?
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It’s like when I downvote a prescriptivist
