Revelations

[pecunium]

I have often said I am not nice, merely civilised.

Going to a war, if nothing else, has made me more certain of this.

I recently found out someone I know died.

I smiled.

I never liked this person. In fact there was a brief time I actively hated him (he took advantage of adminstrative privilege to hack an account of mine and be vile).


In my life I have wanted to kill a very few people. He never rose to this level, quite, but I did hope he would do something physical, so that I might beat the living crap out of him. Ten years later, I no longer feel much of anything for him.

That I feel no grief at his death doesn't bother me. That knowing he is dead, and knowing that those who loved him (he was young, in that age where the reaction is, "this person was too young" but not so young as to be an obvious tragedy) are grieving, doesn't mean much.

In my heart of hearts I think the world is better off without him.

I almost think less of myself for this.

But not quite.

I am civilised, not nice.

Comments

[ladyxoc.livejournal.com]

Kindness can be overrated. Sometimes civilised is quite enough.

[sergeant3.livejournal.com]

Still don't understand why you would smile. I understand not grieving. There's alot of people whom I wouldn't grieve over. Smiling about someone's death, on the other hand, indicates some form of joy over their passing.

[cakmpls.livejournal.com]

Some people's passing should be rejoiced over.

[sergeant3.livejournal.com]

Truly evil people yes. People who annoy you because their assholes? No. I dont even rejoice in the death I cause for the enemy here. I'd much rather they gave up their guns and went home.

[cakmpls.livejournal.com]

I doubt that I would rejoice over the death of enemies killed in battle, either. The person pecunium is talking about apparently took advantage of a position of power to harm him gratuitously; such people seldom do vile things to only one.

[matociquala.livejournal.com]

Schadenfreude. It's what's for dinner.

Better to be civilized but not nice than nice but uncivilized. THOSE people are a hazard to navigation.


And, Terry, a bit of wisdom from Stephen Sondheim:

"Never talk to strangers
Even flowers have their dangers
And though scary is exciting
Nice is different than good."

[supergee.livejournal.com]

A bit of wisdom should not contain "different than."

[ms-tek.livejournal.com]

Tha is understandable

[cakmpls.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure that I've ever smiled at hearing of someone's death (though I think I have with some for whom life had become a burden), but I've failed to grieve any number of times, and felt that the world was a better place more than once. I see no reason to be "nice" regarding people who on a regular basis make the world a worse place for those around them.

[papersky.livejournal.com]

I'm totally with you on this.

Someone I hated was killed by a bomb in Northern Ireland, years ago, and to this day I've never felt this was other than a positive thing. If it hadn't been him, it might have been a good person. You didn't do it, you would have stopped it if you could, you couldn't. Why should you be hypocritical about the guy because he's dead?