Humans are emotional beings, our ability to feel and respond to specific emotions defers based on our level of self-discipline. The most common type of emotion known by every human on earth is pain, it is like a living organism whose life span is eternal, for minds touched by pain it makes you do what you never thought possible. It is capable of changing the psychological orientation of any human, it is a plague with no definite cure. Humans exhibits all kind of emotional traits when we are in pain such as anger, hatred e.t.c these emotions makes a human being fixates, clingy on something for relieve. Sadly one of the many ways in which average people do this is to find something or someone to blame for the pain they are experiencing, Anything they could wage their war against, it doesn't really matter if the object of their hatred is innocent or not as long as they could feel sense of relief from vengeance.
Generally speaking, every human is prompted to vengeance. I know not everyone acts on it but the thoughts does crosses our mind. It begins from lingering thought in our subconscious as the pain we experience feast on our emotions leaving nothing but rot and emptiness. Gradually we suddenly feel the need to get closure, in fact the thought of it might not originate from us, it might be an advise from a friend and suddenly we find ourself doing all kind of ridiculous things but the most funny thing about it is that it feels so right.
But then, it is not always so simple, It is not every time we humans get to confront the source of our pain. There are times when the source of our pain is beyond reach but it doesn't stop there, the hunger for vengeance persist. The thing about pain is that it creates it's own memories, so the moment a human being is experiencing some kind of pain and we are not capable of doing anything about it, it becomes a memory stored in our subconscious till we are strong enough to avenge ourselves. This is what grudge is made of, a pilled up grievances. So what happens when we finally feel we are capable of correcting the wrong done to us and the person is suddenly beyond reach, does it make us feel avenged? no it doesn't. Humans tends to find something closer and this is where transfer of aggression comes in.
Should children be punished for the sins of their parents? Biblically it was done but I would love to approach this question with a more familiar route. Currently the laws of my country does not support it or else the children are of lawful age and are found to be an accomplice in the crimes of their parents, if not they are not bound by law to be punished for their parents crimes but that doesn't change the fact that they would be judged by the public. I mean the fact that the law isn't capable of punishing them doesn't mean it has saved them from the stigmatisation from the society.
Some time ago, a kidnapper was arrested, brought to court and found guilty. It was a huge story for the media industry, "billionaire kidnapper Evans" was the trend all over social media. He pleaded not guilty for a long period of time before he was eventually found guilty. His victims watched how he walked around the court room with pride. He was called "billionaire kidnapper" because it was said that he was the richest in the kidnapping game as at then. It was said that he relocated his family to another country before his arrest. The news media tried to keep his family member out of the mainstream as much as possible but this kind of information tends to find their way out one way or the other.
At the end of the long trials Evans was sentenced to life imprisonment, the most tragic aspect of it was that throughout his trial he showed no remorse or felt guilty for the crimes he committed. At some point his wife even took upon herself to plead on behalf of her husband, begging the public to forgive him, does it not sound ridiculous? It was said that his family and relatives enjoyed a luxurious lifestyle from the wealth Evans accumulated from committing all sort of atrocities. Do you think after his arrest and sentencing his victims will feel avenged? Not all his victims made it back alive but yet his family galavant in the society with the wealth gotten from kidnapping.
It begs the question, since the children enjoyed the wealth gotten from the crimes committed by their father, after the sentencing of their father shouldn't they face the same wrath? In the case of Evans, well his children lived happily ever after away from Nigeria. Like I said earlier the law of my country can't outrightly punish the children for the sins of their father without probable cause and in this case there wasn't any, in fact his children were not anywhere close to the age of maturity, which means it can't be said that they were aware of their fathers crimes, so why should they be punished for it? It might be unlawful and wrong but I don't think I'm capable of blaming the victims for transferring their aggressions on the children of the accused because nothing on earth can compensate their pain.
This write-up was inspired by weekly featured content titled "Since of the father" in hive learners community.
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