anonymous text, un: ANON

[doreimi]

i have a question. there's no right or wrong answer, i'm just wondering what people think.

suppose somebody came here, and outwardly they seemed like an average person. kept to themselves, didn't make trouble, maybe were a little bit weird but not, like, offensively so. you've never seen them do anything wrong. they seem pretty harmless. they're just a normal, fine, generally boring person.

then imagine somebody else said that they knew that person, and that all the niceness was just an act, and really that person was dangerous. really dangerous. and that the person hurt people in really bad ways. but imagine there was no proof of it, really, just that upset person's word against the boring person's.

how would you decide who to believe? would you only go by what you saw yourself, or only by what happened here and not where they came from, or what? would you believe anyone at all?

like i said, there's no right or wrong answer, i guess. i just wonder how you would make a decision either way, in a situation like that.

Comments

[tigerpoet]

I do.

Don't get me wrong, though, it's only the opportunity to be a better person. If they start doing that sort of thing again, they've rejected that fresh start, and I won't regret introducing them to the point of my sword.

[doreimi]

oh, i see. so it's more like being on probation. the chance to prove that they've changed.

[tigerpoet]

Right. If they reject that chance to repent, then they have no one to blame but themself.

[doreimi]

so you'd call this their "one last chance", then. because that's something everybody deserves, right?

i'm not trying to sound like i'm questioning you, i'm just making sure i understand.

[tigerpoet]

That's what I mean. Everyone should get the chance to try to be better than they were, if they're willing to try.

[doreimi]

and it doesn't matter how many chances they might've had before this, because this is the one more, and the last one. right?

because this is the only one that you're around to see, so that makes it easy to define, i guess. is that it?

[tigerpoet]

It's difficult. If there's anyone who can fairly decide exactly how many chances every criminal deserves, it certainly isn't me.