who is to blame

[jfoldbar]

ive been having a philosophical debate with someone about the concept of who is to blame in an example.

 

imagine a scenario where 2 neighbors have an issue. the neighbors generally get on very well until now.

 

joe is happily washing his car when greg from next door comes strait over and starts screaming at him about a noisy party he supposedly had last weekend.

greg kicks the tire of joes car a few times in anger.

in retaliation joe starts arcing up and goes over and kicks gregs tire. he misses the tyre and kicks the panel, causing damage. and of course the problem escalates from there.

 

joe could have handled the situation different, but in anger he acted the way he did which resulted in the car damage, which resulted in the problem growing.

 

an analogy i like is " greg made a fire, but instead of joe putting water on the fire, he put petrol"

 

 

in a situation, who is generally considered at fault. the person who made the fire, or the person who put the petrol.?

why/why not?

[dimreepr]

We all get angry now and then and kick a tyre or two, so no-one is at fault at the time. The real problems start when either Gregg or Joe wake up in the morning determined to carry the grudge 'in spite' of not being angry anymore (at least not the tyre kicking type).

So in answer to your question, the one at fault is the one who doesn't understand the value of forgiveness in the morning.

Edited August 9, 2019 by dimreepr

[Phi for All]

5 hours ago, jfoldbar said:

in a situation, who is generally considered at fault. the person who made the fire, or the person who put the petrol.?

If the situation doesn't involve litigation, perhaps it's best not to approach it with a perspective requiring "fault" or blame. Do we have to blame someone as close as a neighbor for their occasional misdeeds? Are we looking for justice, or will an apology do? For family and friends (or people you'd like to be friendly with), isn't it better to let them know how you feel about their actions/words so you can discuss the incident, rather than set out purposely to elicit a guilty plea?

There's a lot of context here too. If my neighbor has a party loud enough where I'm annoyed, but not loud enough to go over and say/do something about it then, it seems overblown to rage at him/her the next morning. In fact, I think I'd only get really angry if the neighbor didn't care that they'd messed up, or if they did something so monumentally stupid that it put them/us in danger (in which case I wouldn't wait till morning).

[StringJunky]

Greg needs to get a life and accept neighbours will impinge upon their peace occasionally.

"You were noisy last weekend"

Ah, sorry mate, I'll keep it down next time."

[Phi for All]

19 minutes ago, StringJunky said:

"You were noisy last weekend"

Ah, sorry mate, I'll keep it down next time."

I guess this is another tolerance threshold issue rather than a firm line in the sand. 
 

"We could hear how great your party was last night."

"Sorry, I tried to keep the music down, but folks kept turning it up when I wasn't looking."

"The music didn't keep us up as much as the fireworks. Was firing a cannon necessary? And who got choppered in at 3 am?"

[ALine]

Hmm, this one is a bit tricky. It is like when two countries begin to go against one another which eventually escalates into a war. When Greg initiated the arguement due to how joehaving a loud party Greg began the confirmation. If it is true that Joe had a loud party previously, but was unaware of Greg being able to hear the party then I would say the "blame" would lay on Greg. This is because Joe did not have the intention to hard Greg, however Greg, through hitting Joe's tire, wanted to cause harm. 

I think it would based on 2 variables, The intention of harm and understanding what that harm would do after the event of causing harm has occured. Basically hitting someone and knowing what affects of hitting that said someone.

In this case if Joe was aware of his party and understood the consiquences in respect to Greg, being that he would not be getting any sleep and be tired, maybe making him late to work or something, then Joe is at fault initially.

If the confrontation continues then over time these variables may become more and more distinct. Escalating to possible violence. 

tl;dr: Joe's at fault if aware his party is harming Greg. Greg's at fault if Joe's unaware his party is harming Greg. 

The first is an accident, the second would be considered purposeful leading to him being at fault.

 

Edited November 15, 2019 by ALine