Good People Doing Bad

             I recently heard something about a person that I greatly respect and have genuine affection for. What I heard is driving me crazy and I want to yell in their face, at the top of my lungs, “WTF were you thinking?” If it’s true I just don’t know how to wrap my head around it. It’s so insane and heart breaking that I don’t want to know the details. Just knowing the accusation and having an imagination is bad enough.

            I’ve always thought of myself as having a tendency towards self destructiveness and my history kind of bares that out, but this is way out of my league. Someone who has worked so hard over so many years to build a great life just hit that proverbial flashing red button and blew it up into a million pieces.

            So my question is why do good people sometimes do things that are so bad? I know that in his heart this is a good person. He has been good to me, to his community, to his friends, and to his family. So why now do something so stupid? What happened to the self control, to the conscience? Will a moment of weakness now become a lifetime of regret?

            Human history is full of good and loving people doing bad and hurtful things. Whether it’s recent, like pedophile priests and coaches. Or more historic, like everyday Germans being part of the Nazi extermination machine. Our common history and teachings like the Bible are full of such sad and terrible things.

            Even in my own personal history, I’ve done things that were emotionally hurtful to people I cared for, yet I know that I am a good person. Why did I do it? Youthfulness, lack of self control, not giving value to the other person’s feelings. In hind sight lots of reasons but at the time probably just selfishness. Do I have regrets and feel guilt, you bet. Have I learned from it, become a better person and more empathetic? Yes on that one as well.

            I believe that humans, like Pit Bulls are born good. Some may be born with more aggressive tendencies but it’s the training that makes them turn from normal dogs to fighters. The same goes for us, we are born just wanting to love and be loved. It’s the way we are raised, treated, and taught that makes us who we are as adults.

            Now of course I could be totally wrong and maybe someone could be born just plain evil. This person that I’ve been writing about, maybe the goodness was all a rouse just waiting for an opportunity to do bad. I just don’t think so. I think that we like to label people as evil, Attila the Hun, Adolph Hitler, Osama Bin Laden to name a few. But even these men were innocent children once. I think we call them evil so as a society we don’t have to take any responsibility. We are taught by religious doctrine that it’s good versus evil, God versus the Devil, but the problem is it’s not that simple. We like to think of it as black or white but the truth is much grayer, it’s just too hard to try and understand or rationalize why good people do bad things.

            OK, back to the person in question. I haven’t seen or talked to him since the accusations, gossip, and emails started flying and I’m not sure what I would say. What I want to say is that even if you did do something so stupid, I can’t just throw away my feelings for you. I still like you, respect you, and want to be your friend. It’s just going to be different because it can never again be the way it was.

That’s the problem with this thing we call life, no matter how much we wish, hope, or pray, there are no “do over’s”. We only get one shot so try and do right the first time. But if you’re like so many people before you, who are basically good but do something bad, remember humans have this great capacity to forgive, but we also never forget.

Finally, you don’t know who I’m talking about so DON’T ASK. Even if you think you know, I’ve said all I’m going to say.

To view the column in it's original form go to page 14 of the following link. Winters Express 4/26/12