The Pros and Cons of Revenge

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What is revenge? Revenge is defined as the action of inflicting hurt or harm on someone for an injury or wrong suffered at their hands (Oxford definition). It can also be described as the act of a person inflicting wrong on something that previously inflicted wrong to it, with the purpose of trying to restore justice. Revenge has been a part of humans for as long as they have existed. In fact, even before the emergence of humans, primates showed to have intragroup relationship conflicts. Primatologists (from Primatology, the study of primates) Frans de Waal and Lesleigh Luttrel conducted a study in which they would test for revenge in three species of primates. One of the species (chimpanzees) demonstrated a noticeable pattern of revenge. (McCullough 2008) Also, apart from primates, many animals, like ants, also express explicit behavior of revenge. In the ants' case, the previously enslaved ants kill the captors' babies in order to make it “even”. (Pamminger et al., 2012) So, what does this say about revenge? It says that the desire of acquiring justice is not only in humans, but also in animals. If this feeling is also seen in animals, then it is most probably an evolved trait.

Revenge is viewed in a different way by almost everyone, meaning that there is no definite answer as to if it is beneficial or not. The act of revenge has seen some drastic changes in perspective throughout history. During the Middle Ages, conflicts would not be regarded as resolved until they were avenged. In fact, many long-established justice systems (similar to the one that the Samurai class held in Japan's feudal past, that consisted of “revenge for honor”) are confined to only revenge. (Ikegami 1995) Even Modern Western legal s...

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Rosenbaum, T. (2013). Payback: A Case for Revenge. Chicago: University Of Chicago Press.

McCullough, M. (2008). Beyond Revenge: The Evolution of the Forgiveness Instinct. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Tobias Pamminger, Annette Leingärtner, Alexandra Achenbach, Isabelle Kleeberg, Pleuni S. Pennings, & Susanne Foitzik (2012). Geographic distribution of the anti-parasite trait “slave rebellion” Evolutionary Ecology

Ikegami, E. (1995). The Taming of the Samurai: Honorific Individualism and the Making of Modern Japan. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.

Carlsmith, K. (May 2008) Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, (Vol. 95, No. 6).

Jaffe, E. (October 2011.) The Complicated Psychology of Revenge. Observer Vol.24, No.8

Revenge. (2013, November 17). Wikipedia. Retrieved November 21, 2013, from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Revenge

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