When is Revenge Most Satisfying?

April 17, 2015 12:07 AM

Vengeance is a goal-driven act, sought out to restore a sense of justice to the universe. But what happens when retaliation is targeted at someone other than the original transgressor?

The Complicated Psychology of Revenge

A thirst for vengeance is nothing if not timeless. It is as classic as Homer and Hamlet, and as contemporary as Don Corleone and Quentin Tarantino; as old as the eyes and teeth traded in the Bible, and as fresh as the raid that took the life of Osama bin Laden. But while the idea of revenge is no doubt delectable — the very phrase “just desserts” promises a treat — much of its sugar is confined to the coating. The actual execution of revenge carries a bitter cost of time, emotional and physical energy, and even lives. That minute before revenge is savory, as the authors of the Science study recognized; but what about the days and weeks that follow?

posted by the man of twists and turns (15 comments total)

Pervasive as this revenge instinct may seem, modern civilization can feel fortunate that resisting the urge to retaliate is even more common... More often than not in today’s world, this scale tips in favor of forgiveness.

These are words that can only be written by someone who has never had to deal with people keying their car over parking spaces in Los Angeles.
posted by teponaztli at 2:11 AM on April 17, 2015 [2 favorites]

Revenge against someone, anyone certainly seems to describe the way the death penalty works here in the U.S.
posted by TedW at 3:05 AM on April 17, 2015 [1 favorite]

Oh thank goodness the psychological scientists discovered this in the past few years; the rest of the population have known that revenge is not worth it for millenia.

That's how science works.
The rest of the population "knowing" something is not enough for people who like to really know how X works.

As for the "...have known that revenge is not worth it for millenia.". Really? I might be mistaken but I believe revenge played a large role in conflicts "for millennia".
posted by huguini at 3:26 AM on April 17, 2015 [12 favorites]

"Restore a sense of justice to the universe"?

What does that even mean?

Seriously, as far as I can tell, most of the time when people talk about "justice", they just mean some gussied-up kind of revenge anyway. And when they don't seem to mean revenge, I can't figure out what they do mean... the best guess I can usually make is "following arbitrary rules for no particular reason", which makes even less sense.

And even if justice does mean something other than revenge, I'm 99 percent sure that people are seeking revenge for its own sake, not to fix the Universe...
posted by Hizonner at 4:14 AM on April 17, 2015 [5 favorites]

"That's how science works. "

I thought science was limited to the dispassionate.
posted by klarck at 5:24 AM on April 17, 2015

the man of twists and turns: "But what happens when retaliation is targeted at someone other than the original transgressor?"

Iraq after 9/11?
posted by notsnot at 5:40 AM on April 17, 2015 [5 favorites]

the best guess I can usually make is "following arbitrary rules for no particular reason", which makes even less sense.

Maybe it kind of goes back to really old ideas about the universe being in harmony or disharmony. To some, "justice" in a really abstract sense seems to mean that the proper balance of things required to maintain social harmony have been restored or preserved. This is just a guess, but "just" means right, or correct. So "justice" as an abstract concept might imply restoring things to their right place to preserve the balance of harmony/order in a society. And there's a lot of literature about something called "restorative justice" out there, though I haven't read it and don't know much about what it means.
posted by saulgoodman at 5:53 AM on April 17, 2015 [1 favorite]

"just desserts” promises a treat

I'm sure it has been done already countless times, but I have always thought "Just Desserts" would be a great name for a pastry shop.
posted by Dip Flash at 6:16 AM on April 17, 2015 [3 favorites]

Served Cold!
posted by the man of twists and turns at 6:20 AM on April 17, 2015 [2 favorites]

I'm sure it has been done already countless times

So often that it's even mentioned on the Wiktionary page.
posted by JaredSeth at 6:21 AM on April 17, 2015

This is sort of like when the Narco twins wanted to slay Heisenberg to avenge Tuco when it was Hank's brother-in-law who actually did the justifiable killing.
posted by Renoroc at 8:36 AM on April 17, 2015 [1 favorite]

I'm sure it has been done already countless times, but I have always thought "Just Desserts" would be a great name for a pastry shop.


There was a chain of bakery/cafes in Toronto called that for years. One was the scene of a pretty terrible robbery/murder back in the 1990s, which actually led to a number of conversations similar to this one.
posted by TheWhiteSkull at 8:49 AM on April 17, 2015 [1 favorite]

Is that how "award-winning journalism" is done today? You read a New Yorker article, scan over a scientific study on revenge, summarize some of your impressions and you're done! I wonder how long that took from start to finish.
posted by tecg at 8:51 AM on April 17, 2015 [1 favorite]

saulgoodman: "And there's a lot of literature about something called "restorative justice" out there, though I haven't read it and don't know much about what it means."

Restorative Justice focuses not just on the offender, but also on the victim and community, and doesn't view punishment for a crime as a purely transactional, automatic function of the state.

For example, let's say you broke into my house and stole all my jewelry. Traditional conceptions of justice (in the west right now) would typically put you jail for several years for burglary and attempt to recover and return my jewelry or its monetary value. That's helpful, but it doesn't deal with issues like how angry I (as the victim) am that you stole not only my jewelry but my sense of safety in my home; that you took away my last sentimental memory of my beloved great-aunt; that you frightened my children such that they missed a couple weeks of school; that I had to spend two years in therapy to get over it. It also doesn't deal with the negative effects on my community, which now feels more fearful and less-safe. And it doesn't deal with what you were going through -- did you target me because I fired you last week? Are you using substances that made you unable to control your impulses? Did you need to steal to support a habit? Do you have any sense that what you did was wrong?

Restorative justice involves trying to restore both the victim and offender to a right relationship with the community, rather than punishing one and declaring the other compensated. That typically means a lot of conversations and moderated meetings; it means allowing the victim to express their anger at the offender, to hear the offender understanding the ramifications of what he did, to get an apology from the offender. It means helping the offender to get help for whatever triggering problems made him commit a crime (in addition to traditional jail or fines), and helping the offender to get services to reintegrate into the community and to build a proper connection in the community. It means the offender does restitution in meaningful ways, directly or indirectly, and that restitution and apologies are given to all the "stakeholders."

Done properly, it's extremely effective. It has the highest satisfaction rate for victims and, crucially, is very successful at reducing recidivism, because offenders are often people on the margins of society, and restorative justice works to integrate offenders into the mainstream of society instead of further marginalizing them.

It's very popular in communities like schools; the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission was partly restorative-justice based.
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 12:00 PM on April 17, 2015 [8 favorites]

There is a name for this

Anyway, I interrupt your punditry to tell you that all your commentary about riots is bullshit and confused and tendentious and fuck off. And that economists, God bless ‘em (no, not really), have a name for this.

Politically motivated riots are a form of altruistic punishment. Look it up. Altruistic punishment is a “puzzle” to the sort of economist who thinks of homo economicus maximizing her utility, and a no-brainer to the game theorist who understands humans could never have survived if we actually were the kind of creature who succumbed to every prisoners’ dilemma. Altruistic punishment is behavior that imposes costs on third parties with no benefit to the punisher, often even at great cost to the punisher. To the idiot economist, it is a lose/lose situation, such a puzzle. For the record, I’m a fan of the phenomenon.

posted by the man of twists and turns at 12:26 PM on May 11, 2015