scullyangel Posted:

Overall I agree with CreepPipe. Of course the context means everything.

Pbuming on murdering someone and regretting it vs the regret one may feel for murdering someone?

– that is quite different than –

Pbuming on getting involved with someone and regretting it vs the regret one may feel when involved with someone and it’s not working out or it ends in a mess.

In the murder scenario I’d prefer to regret not doing it. In most other scenarios I’d prefer to skip the “what if?” I do think a certain amount of perspective is always involved.

In the murder scenario, I would prefer to have done it and then regretted it later. Regretting later is indicative that the consequences that followed the action may have truly rehabilitated me… However, it doesn’t change the fact that I had, in fact, taken someone else’s life. I made a terrible mistake, had to deal with the consequences (my conscience and possibly jail), and in the end, changed. Even if I had deprived someone of their life, I learned and genuinely felt sorry. I do realize that this is not enough. I know that I would never be able to make up for it, but I would try. This may even mean that I regret the action so much that I can never forgive myself. I believe that my preference in this is illustrative of my desire to grow as a person (and in the worst of cases, even at the expense of others), which can, admittedly, be viewed to be as horrible as the other option.

Preferring the option of true regret that stemmed from a missed chance of murdering someone, in contrast, symbolizes a lot more than a vapid “oh, awesome, in this scenario I’m not in jail and at least I didn’t kill someone.” Imagine what kind of mindframe you would need to be in to truly regret not murdering another individual… Imagine a feeling of utter weakness that the only place you can derive strength is by shooting someone in the head. Regret is a strong emotion, and feeling it towards a missed chance of murder represents utter decay —the state you are in is so bad that you spend your days wishing you had taken someone’s life. This is a haunting image that resonates.

I guess it’s subjective. I think a murderer who can presently reflect on his past and legitimately be sorry is better than the guy who, in the end, is so ****ing torn apart that he, himself, wants to be the murderer.