Revenge Is Sweet

The most common question of revenge in relation to science is, “Why revenge is sweet?” Scientists say they know why. I've read this article entitled, "Brain Study Shows Why Revenge Is Sweet written by John Roach for National Geographic News. A new brain-imaging study says we feel satisfaction, pleasure and happiness when we punish others for their bad behavior and see them suffer. We rebuke people who committed wrong against us, abused our trust, lied and cheated on us. It’s actually bad to feel happy when we see someone’s suffering and that’s because we punish him/her. Yes, we’ll feel happy and guilty at the same time because we know to ourselves that being vengeful is a bad thing. It would make us look more of a bad person compare to the person who hurt or abused us.

"A person who has been cheated is [left] in a bad situation—with bad feelings," said study co-author Ernst Fehr, director of the Institute for Empirical Research in Economics at the University of Zurich in Switzerland. "The person would feel even worse if the cheater does not get her or his just punishment."

Fehr along with his colleagues say that the feeling of satisfaction people get from allotting punishment or justice may be what makes the societies keep going together. Cooperation among strangers is greatly enhanced by altruistic punishment if it is ruled out, theory and experimental evidence shows.

I searched for another article and found this one entitled, "Is Revenge Really Sweet?" by Susan Cosier in Science Friday. She says that some scientists have used EEG as their way to measure electrical activity of neurons in the brain. They've found out that a part of the brain called the prefrontal cortex lights up when a person is insulted or humiliated which happens to be the same area that brightens when someone sees delicious food and tempted to eat it, Eddie Harmon-Jone says, a University of New South Wales neuroscientist. The greater the activity in the prefrontal cortex, the stronger the one's compulsion to respond.

"A car cuts you off. Somebody takes your wallet. A person bumps into you on the street. A feeling wells up inside: You want revenge. Research shows that the impulse to lash out is similar to that of a food craving—and by satisfying it, you demonstrate that you’re not someone to be messed with. Yet while it’s possible that acting on such urges may feel good at first, negative long-term consequences can make revenge bittersweet."

Human beings have learned to control their behaviors in so many ways. For instance, some people can stop the vengeful instinct and for those people who can't might fight back with physical or verbal assault.

When someone we love and trust hurt us, we get really angry and disappointed. We also get confused because we’re bothered why they were able to do that to us if in the first place they’re someone that we trust. Or maybe they aren’t aware that it would hurt us. Sometimes, it will come to a point that we think; we just don’t matter to them. People also tend to believe that once the trust has been broken, sorry means nothing and will never be enough most especially if we got really hurt.

We all dwell on hurtful situations that we tend to hold grudges over someone, so vengeance and hatred can take root. If we allow negative feelings to eat out positive feelings, we find ourselves swallowed by bitterness and injustice. It’s never worth it to seek for revenge. It will just hurt us as much as we hurt them and we might regret it in the end. We shouldn’t let our lives to wrap up in the wrong things that we can’t enjoy the present because we’re still attached to what happened in the past. Still, the best thing that we can do is to move on, forgive and forget about it but not the lesson that it taught us. Forgiving people doesn’t mean that we deny the person’s responsibility for hurting us and doesn’t minimize or justify the wrong. As we let go of grudges, we’ll no longer define our lives by how much we’ve been hurt but how much we’ve learned and understand everything. Practice forgiveness, embrace peace and let go of resentment and just live a happy life.