Using Violence as an Act of Revenge
Is it Okay to Key the Ex’s Car and Violently Take Back Your Money?
I took a Louisville slugger to both headlights,
Slashed a hole in all four tires…
Maybe next time he’ll think before he cheats.
Carrie Underwood sang the words that spoke to every woman — I would say people in general — who have ever went through the same experience of being cheated or any kind suffering from a significant other in her single “Before He Cheats.” It is easy to get angry and upset to the point where you feel like the person who has hurt you. In the stages of when the person is suffering the most, the person hurting feels that the person who hurt them deserves absolutely every worst-case scenario to play out. It is easy to want to get the revenge that the person who caused this pain. I say this from personal experience. I mean. After my break up, I wanted to fill the bath tub up for a nice warm bath where my ex-boyfriend’s new PlayStation and T.V. could have a little de-stress soak. From a personal perspective, I know that will be more destructive than constructive, so I could not bring myself to do it.
According to Nietzche, people see a creditor and debtor relationship, where the creditor is the person who has been punished and needs to be compensated with the debtor’s suffering. In his eyes, people tend to react to violence with violence because people will never feel satisfied with . I feel that deep down inside most people want to do something bad to the person that has caused them pain. This craving for revenge is what fuels a lot of hatred and violence in the world, and it is a weird concept to simply give a yes or no answer. Just talking to some people in my own personal, I found out that people always have the thought to break something near and dear to the person in question, even if days before the creditor was incredibly in love with their now debtor. It is hard to say when it is to act our violent responses.
Bitch better have my money!
Please don’t call me on my bluff
Pay me what you owe me
In the case with Rihanna, she made an entire music playing out her fantasy of revenge on her old accountant. At the end of the video, Rihanna reveals on what looks like a mat of torture where every weapon of choice is labeled with a certain crime. In order to Rihanna back, she is going to want more than the money amount that was taken. This also brings up Neitzche’s point about how debtors will never be able to pay off their debt because there is no monetary sum or amount of suffering that will be able to suffice the creditor. If both Underwood and Rihanna have this mentality, then do people just like dramatize their lives with violence as revenge. For Underwood, her love has been taken for granted, and she is trying to prove something to her lover (maybe ex-lover at this point) that he cannot just do whatever he feels like doing. For Rihanna, she was literally robbed, and she made a video to make her come back as a way to prove not to mess with her money. I feel that either way, both of these artists are valid for the way that they are feeling, and luckily, they have their music to be able to voice it, without actually doing the violence.
Yet, Nietzche believes that there is not really a point to holding onto those feelings, and people simply need to forget about the violence that occurred in order to end the cycle of violence. One person who tried to prove this concept is Kesha with her own comeback song “Praying.” Even though Neitzche completely hated religion because of his father, praying is maybe an exception?
You brought the flames and you put me through hell
I had to learn how to fight for myself
And we both know all the truth I could tell
I’ll just say this is “I wish you farewell”
Instead of trying to seek revenge, Kesha is using another take on trying to deal with her situation, and she is simply trying to let go of the situation. In her song she is expressing how she wants to pray for the person who has done terrible things to her in order for them to heal. Them healing, at least in this song, is the only way which she is able to cope and heal with her situation, which is more than likely her sexual assault case. Instead of completely forgetting she is keeping people accountable and putting the blame on the problems that is plaguing the person to cause the violence. I feel like this is one way people can maybe stop the violence: forgiving but not forgetting.
I do not believe that people can simply forget the situation, like how Nietzche would have wanted. But, I feel like Kesha’s take is the most realistic, when it comes to ending violence. Violence should not be the answer to seek revenge, but people should try to take the lessons to grow from them. When this happens, it takes the blame away from the creditor and re-humanizes the debtor. It also feels like this is where the ethics of person should be taken into account. The debtor may truly feel that the creditor needs to suffer, so I do not feel that they should be stripped of their choice to use violence. Carrie Underwood and Rihanna feel the need to express their violence, which they might have felt the need to act on it, so they should not be stripped of their anger. As much as there should not be any violence in this world, some people may feel the need to hurt someone or get their revenge on the person, and they should be able to do that.
