In today’s sermon I’m going to talk about Individual Responsibility (IR)
Firstly what do I mean by IR – that is it is the individual who is responsible for and should be held responsible for their own actions and not for the actions of others. I will talk about collective responsibility or collective punishment in a later topic.
Why is it in Kpop fanwars or fights that we never accept IR and instead sheet home blame to an entire fandom or group?
What do I mean by this - An simple example is if I commit a crime then I suffer the punishment because of it – my family, friends, relatives, coworkers who are not part of the crime do not suffer guilt by association. That would be collective punishment or collective guilt.
Just yesterday @Versatile made a thread about multi-fandoms and why they are discriminated against or whatever...no one comment talks about IR and instead focus all their energy on fandoms and definitions of stans v fans or how much you stan or fan one group…but where is the responsibility and who is responsible for one’s own actions?
If I make a choice to throw someone under the bus or attack someone or some group, is it not on me to bear the responsibility of such actions? If you see someone else doing it does one not focus on that individual and not their fandom or family or other collective?
We all come from different parts of the world but are free enough to be able to engage in open discussion here on AKP but the saying is you can have free speech and freedom of expression but one must bear the consequences of such actions.
It is on us to make sure the things we write, type, say, post are acceptable and if not then we must take responsibility of the consequences of those actions. Those consequences may include explanation of our words if people misconstrued them, an apology if we took things too far or even taking a step back and leaving the conversation all together.
No one else is responsible for own choices and actions. Just because someone provoked you or attacked your first doesn’t mean or give you the right to fight back. IRL you may be able to claim provocation as a defense to some minor crime and for murder it may be downgraded to a lesser charge but we are still responsible for those actions. An eye for an eye just leaves two people blind.
By not accepting and acknowledging responsibility for your own action regardless of what “the other did or did not do” is simply passing the buck or the blame onto others. I’ve said it here plenty of times that we cannot change the actions of others we can only effect change onto ourselves.
I’ll leave with a quote by my fellow Chinese Confucius and Ernest Hemingway
There is nothing noble about being superior to your fellow man, true nobility is being superior to your former self.
Only the wisest and stupidest of men never change
someone tell me what he has written in one sentence, sorry lazy me
