The Art Of Blame Analysis

Blame: Forever Present The art of blame has plagued all societies since humans have had the ability to process the rightness and wrongness of a situation. Even the most notable and praised philosophers of all time have taken notice to the illness known as blame and blame's companion, guilt. These two feelings occur in people and can be affected by any difficult circumstance a person may come across. As Plato gracefully informed society, “[i]n their misfortunes, people tend to blame fate, gods and everything else, but not themselves” (qtd. in “Status Minds” n.pag.). The acknowledgment Plato makes to blame and how people accuse others is important to the understanding of guilt; similarly, the understanding of how acting this way is a problem

Most often a person will impose their opinion or feelings when in a group setting rather than speaking out alone, Leon F. Litwack, a history Professor at University of Berkeley, claims that the participants in the 1920 Duluth lynchings, “inflicted their terror as crowds and mobs, rarely as individuals” (5). Guilt can be found in every person, but the way individuals come together in a mob setting and project their guilt onto the victims of the situation points to a darker problem. If such people had been alone, mob mentality research points to the fact that they would not have acted in such an extreme way and caused so much harm. In the specific setting of the lynchings, the mob's superior power leads ordinary people to blame their own prejudice upon three innocent men who died for nothing but others inner problems. Although this outcome was severe, prejudiced thoughts and opinions impact those who are supposedly innocent all too often: the youth. In parts of Mississippi, the teenage population feels that they can be racist and judgemental because of the way they were raised (Prom Night n.pag.). They claim that their parents raised them to be as they are with similar ideas and that is why the teens behave like they do. The awareness seen in the teens is uplifting, and a source of light in the darkness of this world. However, with every positive, the infliction of

The overall population can recognize that they are blaming others and not acknowledging their own emotions yet, society cannot accept the concept that most people want to blame others, even though their reasoning is poor. Omar H. Ali, a Professor at North Carolina Greensboro, stated that it “seems we want to blame or accuse others for whatever is happening” (n.pag.). This general statement encompasses everything humanity must seek to understand. All people can find something in themselves or around them that they find corrupt or shameful. As Ali has said people will want to find any reason to blame others if it means they are kept untainted to the eye by vile conduct. It is simply easier to blame others. Professors such as Ali have performed extensive research, but no chemical formula or chart can ever delve into human thought wholly. As humans think and process emotion, the expectation is that some form of average thinking will arise amongst people.The issue does not necessarily lie with the norm but in the people. Those who find their behavior shameful can accept that their thoughts are wrong and hurtful, however, they want to blame others and the person receiving blame is almost always someone weaker. It is the classic scenario of predator and prey. With this system, eventually, everyone will have to project to stay ‘superior’. As Martin Luther King Jr. once