This post candidly discusses the moral quandary of abuse victims lashing out at their abusers. 

Recently I watched a crime show with someone which concluded in the bleakest way possible. Despite the police arriving in time to intervene, a traumatized woman shot her abusive husband dead and was arrested. I voiced my sympathy for the woman, who presumably would face a lengthy prison sentence for killing someone in front of police officers who commanded her to drop her weapon. My companion told me he felt badly for the man for losing his life. I voiced empathy for the woman who was pushed to the brink of sanity by long-term abuse and seemed to snap. However, my companion told me the man had claimed the same reasoning when explaining why he abused his wife. This led to a complicated moral dilemma. Are people who strike back at and even kill their abusers just as bad as the people who abuse them?

Ultimately people are responsible for their own actions. Therefore it is easy to look at two acts of violence and fault both parties. However, life doesn’t exist in a hermetic seal. An abuser who lashes out at their victim is considered wrong. A victim who responds to periodic abuse is often considered less at fault and can even be deemed heroic and sympathetic for defending themselves. However, as was depicted in the fictional TV show, victims can also strike back when not in immediate danger. The long-term consequences of being abused can push someone over the edge and cause them to have violent thoughts that are chillingly similar to that of their abuser albeit for different reasons. But does this justify or excuse retaliatory violence?

Abusers thrive off of the power imbalance that abuse provides. Lashing back at an abuser is a turn of the tables that provides a victim with a rare and fleeting sense of power and grounding in an otherwise often helpless and bottomless state of feeling unmoored. It can also be done as a defense mechanism or a life-saving reflex. I am sympathetic to people who are so robbed of their sense of self and control that they fleetingly lash out at the person who robbed them of these things. However, that doesn’t excuse retaliatory violence that is not a form of self-defense. This broaches another moral question. Is it wrong to selectively give sympathy? Should we only feel for victims of violence even if abusers are also victims?

What happens when abusers are only abusive because they were abused? Though this longstanding myth certainly does not bear true for all abuse victims, it does have credibility in some cases. If someone only acts abusively because that is all they know, are they less culpable for their crimes? Though this conversation calls for empathy for victims of abuse regardless of whether or not they become abusive, it also runs perilously close to excusing behavior due to prior circumstances. Abuse, especially when experienced in childhood, can have a massive impact on cognitive formation. However, blame cannot keep being handed back for generations when abuse stems from a long line of transgressions. People should be responsible for how they behave.

So where does that leave us? In my opinion, lashing back at your abuser isn’t the same thing as abusing someone. However, victims of abuse have to be extremely careful. Not only is it immediately dangerous to strike your abuser, which can prompt even more abuse, but it can become a learned habit. Although violence can be innate to some people, it is also something that is taught. When violence becomes a learned response to stressful or unpleasant situations, victims of abuse can become abusers in their current or future relationships. Violence is a dangerous and cyclical virus that will infect you if you allow it. That is why it is necessary for the sake of yourself and others to step away from violence before it becomes a part of your system.

With that being said, I don’t believe it is morally wrong to kill your abuser if it is done so to save your life or the life of anyone else. I can also sympathize strongly with people who kill their abusers to avoid a life of agony if they somehow feel as though the situation is inescapable. When it comes to simply snapping and killing your abuser, as done on the show I watched, I consider this a morally gray area. Murder was committed, which should warrant punishment and rehabilitation. However, it would be negligent to not consider the circumstances and mindset leading up to the act when determining an appropriate sentence.

In parting words, people should be held accountable for their actions. At the same time, it is never wrong to express empathy since there are a lot of sticky and complicated factors that contribute to who a person becomes or fails to become. However, it is an individual responsibility to oneself and society to unlearn violence and abuse before they become ingrained responses. At the end of the day, people are ultimately responsible for their actions even if there are many heartbreaking reasons leading up to decision-making or tragic reflexes.