the situation can be unbalanced
There are a few phrases that grind my nerves immediately once I hear them uttered. One of these phrases is 'there are two sides to every story.' Not because it isn't true, and that there isn't wisdom to be found in the phrase, but because when I hear it, it's often used to excuse terrible behavior or assign blame to a victim.
For instance: At the daycare, a little girl who is often angry, violent, and self-centered shoved another little girl off a pile of blocks, and she ended up with a fractured wrist. We'll call the shover 'Anna' and the victim 'Jessie'. Now, Jessie is a rambunctious kid who often gets into trouble because she likes to engage in rough play or climb up the playground apparatus. She wasn't supposed to be sitting on the heap of blocks. However, Anna is the one who threw a temper tantrum and shoved her off of the heap of blocks, fracturing her wrist. My employer's view is that both girls were equally to blame for the injury because Josie wasn't supposed to be sitting on the blocks, whereas I think that Anna, as the instigator of the violence, is entirely responsible for the fractured wrist. Blaming Josie for the broken wrist she got after being pushed off the blocks strikes me as, well, victim-blaming.
And people seem to love victim-blaming. For some reason, it makes them feel better to assign blame to both the victim and the aggressor, and they like to focus mostly on the victim's blame. saying that the aggressor must have had some reason behind their attacks is pointless. Of course they had some reason. Very few people act without any reason at all. Does that mean their reasoning is sound or at all morally justified? No. I don't actually care why the hell someone decides to attack me, mug me, or bully me. They might very well have a reason behind their actions that they think will vindicate them. But, the fact that an aggressor has a reasoning of their own does not rid them of blame, nor should it attribute blame to the victim.
That sort of reasoning is used to validate bullying by saying that the victims were 'annoying' or 'different', and that, had they been normal, they wouldn't be bullied. It's used to justify everything from rape and spousal abuse to people conquering and oppressing races. Sure, they might feel justified, and they might have reasons behind their actions that make sense in the context of their culture, but that doesn't make their actions any less reprehensible and it doesn't make the victims of their actions at fault.
For instance: At the daycare, a little girl who is often angry, violent, and self-centered shoved another little girl off a pile of blocks, and she ended up with a fractured wrist. We'll call the shover 'Anna' and the victim 'Jessie'. Now, Jessie is a rambunctious kid who often gets into trouble because she likes to engage in rough play or climb up the playground apparatus. She wasn't supposed to be sitting on the heap of blocks. However, Anna is the one who threw a temper tantrum and shoved her off of the heap of blocks, fracturing her wrist. My employer's view is that both girls were equally to blame for the injury because Josie wasn't supposed to be sitting on the blocks, whereas I think that Anna, as the instigator of the violence, is entirely responsible for the fractured wrist. Blaming Josie for the broken wrist she got after being pushed off the blocks strikes me as, well, victim-blaming.
And people seem to love victim-blaming. For some reason, it makes them feel better to assign blame to both the victim and the aggressor, and they like to focus mostly on the victim's blame. saying that the aggressor must have had some reason behind their attacks is pointless. Of course they had some reason. Very few people act without any reason at all. Does that mean their reasoning is sound or at all morally justified? No. I don't actually care why the hell someone decides to attack me, mug me, or bully me. They might very well have a reason behind their actions that they think will vindicate them. But, the fact that an aggressor has a reasoning of their own does not rid them of blame, nor should it attribute blame to the victim.
That sort of reasoning is used to validate bullying by saying that the victims were 'annoying' or 'different', and that, had they been normal, they wouldn't be bullied. It's used to justify everything from rape and spousal abuse to people conquering and oppressing races. Sure, they might feel justified, and they might have reasons behind their actions that make sense in the context of their culture, but that doesn't make their actions any less reprehensible and it doesn't make the victims of their actions at fault.